#I’m hoping his popularity has dropped off a bit and that the youngest generations have learned that they need to vote
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Chapter 9: The Truth
Fake Memories
Series Summary: After Y/n is caught cheating on Wanda with Carol, Y/n would do just about anything to get Wanda back into her life. But was it even Y/n’s fault that she cheated? Or was it the new enemy set on revenge?
Chapter Summary: The after effects of the attack on New York have changed everything for the Avengers, Wanda, and Y/n.
A/n: I have managed to write this all within one day. I’m sorry if there are any mistakes but please let me know your thoughts love :) (Not my GIF)
Warnings: Fighting, Hydra, Blood, Mentions of Death, Anxiety, Curse Words
Word Count: 4.9k
Masterlist
Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 | Chapter 7 | Chapter 8 | Chapter 9 | Chapter 10 | Chapter 11 | Chapter 12 |
Covered in ash, dirt, and dried-up blood, Steve was a walking disaster as he paced through the hospital waiting room. Well, if you would call it a hospital that is. It’s been less than an hour since the Avengers have controlled the fires in New York but the troubling news of Y/n and Wanda brought them to a halt.
They quickly rushed to the “hospital”, which was just an empty leased building before being revamped into a hospital for this emergency. The walls were made up of light green curtains. You couldn’t even separate the blood-curling screams from down the hall to the one next to you.
“Stop pacing Rogers. You’re making my head hurt,” Tony said as he sat next to his suit. He had managed to borrow one of the hospital’s tablets to see if there were any updates that could remotely be done to the tower. So far, no luck had been made to reboot F.R.I.D.A.Y or power up the building in general. “Don’t tell me what to do,” he bit back.
Before Tony could say anything, Natasha lightly elbowed him in the stomach to keep him hushed. Now was not the time to start fighting especially at a time like this. “Are you any closer to powering up the tower?” She asked. If Natasha was nervous, she sure as hell didn’t show it. While the assassin did have a similar beat-up look like Steve, her composure was almost too relaxed. However, if Steve cared to notice, he could quickly see how big of a lie that was but his mind was only focused on the two youngest Avengers.
On the other side of the building lied Wanda and Y/n. The only thing separating those two was the thin green curtain and the team of tired nurses and doctors that surrounded them. And while the two have been closer before, this was the first time in a while that they both slept peacefully by each other. It didn’t matter the circumstances of how they slept, but rather what they dreamt...and it was of each other.
“What do you think we would have been like if we lived normal lives?” It was a late afternoon on a sunny day in spring. Wanda and Y/n laid down in the grass under a tree that shadowed them from the sun. Today was one of their off days and seeing as the weather was nice, the two felt like it was a perfect time to go to the park.
“Well, we would obviously attend school.” Wanda was lying down on her back with a dandelion in her hand as Y/n laid on her side, using her left hand to support her head. “I can honestly see you as being the popular person or maybe even the President of some type of political club.”
“What makes you say that?” The soft breeze that covered them came once again, which blew the pappis away. The small frown on Wanda’s faced made it hard for Y/n to focus but she still responded, “You just have this powerful aura to you, Wanda. When you talk, people listen. But what you do better is how easy it is for us to believe you. That’s something not a lot of leaders can do.”
“You make it sound like I’ll be the next President of the United States,” Wanda replied jokingly. “I wish.” Wanda pushed Y/n back slightly as she laughed but all Y/n did was smile at the action. “But what about me? What do you think I would be like?”
Putting her finger to her chin, Wanda thought for a moment before saying, “Honestly, without your powers, you are probably a film nerd at heart. Maybe just a nerd in general.”
“Hey! Now you’re just being mean.” Wanda rolled her eyes as she threw away the dandelion stem. She turned her head to face Y/n. There was this adoration in her eyes that quickly made Y/n blush. “Who cares. All I know is if anyone decides to mess with you, they’ll obviously have to go through me.”
“Oh, so you’re telling me the President of the political science club is going to come to my rescue?”
“Duh! I’ll probably yell at them or something. If not, I’m not afraid to get nasty.”
“You’re unbelievable.”
“How’d you let them get away?” Fury said as he walked into the hospital that Y/n was at. The man was not in his finest hour. First, the mass destruction of New York city was blasting on the news. Reporters and anchors are not looking in favor for the heroes regardless of the actions they’ve taken to try and minimize the damage. Many were angry at the mere fact that this happened at all.
“Someone on their team had quickly teleported them to safety,” Carol stated. The girl has been feeling nothing but guilt for the past hour. Although she did save Wanda and Y/n, the state she had found them in only did worse for her thoughts. “Even if I did try to catch up to them, the lack of response from Wanda and Y/n meant something. I probably couldn’t have faced them alone if I tried.”
Before Fury could have walked any further into the building, Carol grabbed him by the arm, forcing him to look at her. “Her ears were bleeding Nick...I think they did something to her head again.”
Wanda woke up with a slight headache, the dream vaguely on her mind. As she started to grasp her surroundings, she only grew more confused. “Where am I?” She thought. The loud beeping beside her combined with screams and loud thoughts overwhelmed Wanda. Feeling the need to get out, she quickly started to remove the various wires on her as the recent events caught up to her. “Ma’am, I’m going to have to ask you to lay back down,” the nurse asked kindly.
“Where’s Y/n?” Wanda almost lost her balance as she stepped off her bed. She used the nurse in front of her to regain her balance, before walking out of her “room”. “Ma’am, I’m not going to ask again, please lay back down or I will have to get security.”
The threat was the last thing on Wanda’s mind. All she could focus on was finding Y/n. Using her powers, she closed her eyes and tried to sense where Y/n was. Considering the girl was right beside her, it didn’t take long for Wanda to find out.
Quickly walking over to the side of her room, Wanda pushed the curtain to the side but the sight in front of her made everything stop. There was Y/n, battered and bruised. There was drywall dust on her face along with dried-up blood. “Y/n,” Wanda whispered in disbelief. Much to Wanda’s dismay, Y/n didn’t respond. She remained unresponsive on the bed.
Reaching out to try and hold her hand, Wanda was pulled back by the same nurse. “Ma’am, please let the doctors and nurses do their jobs while you go back to your bed.” Wanda shrugged off her hand, her eyes glowing red as she said, “Don’t.”
Wanting to be by Y/n’s side, Wanda tried to walk towards her again but Steve’s voice made her stop. “Wanda.” Turning back around, Wanda first noticed just how beat up Steve was. His helmet was off which made Steve oddly look like a raccoon. If times were different, maybe Wanda would have laughed. Instead, she stormed out of the room, feeling more overwhelmed.
“I’m sorry about her ma’am,” Steve said with a courteous nod.
Wanda sat on the ledge of the roof. The slight breeze of the night was coursing past her as she mindlessly fiddled with her fingers, a nervous habit she developed after her parents’ death. It was during a harsher breeze that Wanda touched her forehead where the slight open injury was at. She had left the floor just moments ago and somehow her feet led her here. Although she knew that she needed someone to look at the injuries she sustained, her mind was focused elsewhere. It was plagued with thoughts about the girl that was still entrapped in a room full of doctors that had no clue how to treat her. Wanda knew it was wrong of her to read their minds, but she hoped that at least one of them at least knew where to start. Panic and anxiety filled the redhead’s body the more she realized that no one knew how to help Y/n. Soon, the room felt as if it was enclosing on her. Before Steve realized she was about to break down, she left to sort out her thoughts and emotions.
Wanda had been so deep in thought that she hadn’t noticed Carol leaning against the entrance of the roof. The blonde was only a couple of feet away from Wanda wearing black sweatpants and a shirt. The girl was wrapping up a mission when she saw the text from Y/n. Carol didn’t know whether the drop in her heart was from the fake feelings Memory Man had created or whether she genuinely cared about the girl’s wellbeing. It didn’t matter though. What mattered was Y/n’s safety.
Carol leaned up against the ledge while surveying the view. They were a foot away from each other but it didn’t take a mind reader to know that both girls were thinking about Y/n. Ironically enough, they each had their separate thoughts about how they failed to protect Y/n. For Wanda, she felt as if she was the sole reason that Y/n got hurt. If she had only conquered her abilities more, Y/n wouldn’t have had to sacrifice herself again just to protect her. Not only that, but Wanda felt beyond frustrated with herself for being so frozen and paralyzed as the enemy hurt Y/n right in front of her eyes. There was nothing holding her back besides herself and that was something that will haunt her for a while. For Carol, she felt that if she were just a bit faster and maybe not a galaxy away, she would have reached them in time to help.
After a couple of minutes of silence, Wanda sidely glanced at Carol. The first thing she noticed was her attire. It didn’t take long for the dots to connect before she realized that it was Y/n’s clothes Carol was wearing. Wanda bit her tongue at the ounce of jealousy and resentment that decided to rise within her. This was no time to start arguments especially with the person that helped Y/n just in the nick of time. So Wanda had opted for a different but just as difficult route. “Thank you.”
Carol heard but decided to remain silent. Clearing her throat, Wanda continued, “I’m not sure what would have happened if you hadn’t found us.” Finally, the two made eye contact as Carol glanced at Wanda. “I’m only here for Y/n,” Carol deadpanned. Wanda choked at her words but still had a serious composure. They both looked back at the city but there was a more tense feeling in the air. Carol hadn’t cared if the words had hurt Wanda. What she cared for was Y/n. But the looming question in the back of her head was always if this was a genuine feeling or if it was forced. However, the way her heart overwhelmingly felt angered at the person beside her, she knew that at this time, the feeling was genuine.
Subconsciously, Wanda felt the emotions that leaked out of the blonde. She didn't need to go in her mind to realize that. It felt like Carol’s guard was down leading her aura to be seen. It had covered the area surrounding the two in such a suffocating manner that Wanda felt like she couldn’t breathe. The two most compelling emotions were the anger she held for her and the love she had for Y/n. As she cracked her knuckles, Carol muttered, “It is quite ridiculous the things Y/n continuously goes through for a team that can barely return the favor.”
“You don’t get to-”
“Now listen here. I don’t quite care much for your team. Frankly, y’all don’t deserve Y/n.” The two faced each other with such intensity that one wrong move could cause a fight with two of the galaxy’s most powerful superheroes. “But if I’m being honest, you don’t deserve Y/n.” Wanda’s fists clenched at Carol’s words. It took everything out of the redhead to not fling Carol out of New York, because how dare she accuse her of such atrocities.
“If I were you, I would stop where you’re at,” Wanda said threateningly. The spiral scarlet glow in her eyes only made Carol chuckle. “You know you’re not the only one with powers.” Carol’s fist glowed with the same intensity as Wanda’s eyes. But the threats were pointless as the two had stopped at the same time.
“You don’t see it but you should feel lucky Wanda.” Cocking her eyebrow, Wanda responded with, “And why is that?” The redhead remained in a defensive stance as she crossed her arms. Carol walked closer to her and placed her hand on Wanda’s shoulder. Wanda was still tense but it slightly faltered when she saw how serious Carol was. “There’s a girl out there that loves you even when her mind and heart tell her otherwise.” And with that, Carol left Wanda to herself.
The burning feeling in his legs shouldn’t have felt familiar but it did. It reminded him of the body that he held through New York’s streets. It reminded him of the blood all over his hands and clothes. It reminded him of that fateful night that he failed.
And as he stormed into the hospital with nobody in his hands, something in the way that the team looked made his blood drain. Before Bucky could ask about Y/n’s whereabouts, Beth had walked in. Seeing her familiar face caused Bucky to be slightly relaxed but still anxious about what she could possibly say.
“I have an update on Y/n’s health.” Carol had walked into the room and her attention immediately landed on Beth. “Tell us, Beth,” Fury said.
“As of right now, she will be fine. The doctors have her hooked up to a solution that is allowing her regeneration abilities to work. But-,” before Beth could finish her update, Tony had stood up and loudly commented, “- Great, now that we know Ms. Hydra is okay, can we get back to the real issue at hand?”
As Carol was about to advance to Tony, it was Beth’s words that made the room quiet. “Of course it would be the self-righteous billionaire that would talk shit.” Tony’s head snapped towards Beth. “Excuse me?!”
Beth glared back at Tony, not daring to back down. Her arms were crossed as she continued, “Don’t act like you can’t hear me, or is your ego too far high for you to actually listen?”
Walking towards Beth, Tony said, “Listen here you son of a-” Before Tony could get any closer to Beth, Bucky had used his arm to stop him. “I wouldn’t if I were you.” Tony forcefully removed Bucky’s hand from his chest. He stepped away from Beth, not wanting to deal with what he thinks of as just some pathetic nurse.
“You know what the real issue is Tony - actually - all of you. It’s the fact that you seriously think of Y/n to be this villain.” Beth had let out a dark chuckle at the irony of the situation. “Or have you forgotten the shit you’ve ALL done? Let’s name them, shall we?”
“Beth-” Beth glared at Bucky. She didn’t care if this wasn’t the time nor the place for this conversation, because God was she so tired of them. “Tony, remember all the weapons that you’ve created for mass destruction and have yet to actually own up to the consequences of them?”
“I would stop there if I were you before-”
“Before what?!” Beth said as she threw her hands up. “Before you sue me?! Before you attack me?! Oh - that’s it, isn’t it? What are you gonna do? Kill me? Like how you did with Y/n?!” The room grew more silent as everyone besides Bucky and Beth digested her words. “It’s honestly sad how a bunch of adults has managed to push a KID to take their life away. All for what?! Because you thought she cheated on Wanda! News fucking flash - she didn’t even fucking cheat.”
“What?” Steve said. The shock of Beth’s words was still affecting him. “It was Memory Man. He had put fake memories in Y/n’s and mine’s heads. That was the whole reason we kissed - wait - did you not know about this?” The team was frozen while Carol and Fury impatiently waited for answers.
Not caring to wait for their pathetic excuses, Beth said, “It’s not like it matters what they have to say. They don’t even care for Y/n but for those that actually do. Right now we have no clue what her mind is going to be like. Memory Man has already given her enough damages before and considering we don’t know the full extent of his powers, we can only wait till she wakes up to see if she will actually be okay. Now if you don’t mind, I have a patient to take care of.”
Before Beth could leave, Bucky grabbed onto her arm. He gave her a look but Beth wasn’t having any of it. Ripping her arm from his grip, she stated, “Don’t Bucky. You know how much your family has hurt her. So don’t just stand there and act like they’re saints especially since you know how much Y/n needed you.”
It’s been a couple of days since the attack in New York and Y/n has since woken up. She has barely spoken to Beth, Bucky, Carol, or Fury. Although Estell’s presence would have been welcomed, Beth has yet to tell the girl the news of Estell’s death. Unfortunately, during the attack, she was shot and killed on sight by Hydra. The only reason Beth knew was from the long list of deaths she read on TV.
“We need to transport Y/n to a different location,” Fury said in a small meeting that consisted of only Bucky and Carol. “I agree. Since Hydra has managed to infiltrate the tower once, who knows when they’ll do it again.”
“That’s why a different country will do her better than here.” Fury sighed at the decision that was laid upon them. New locations will always be hard to adjust to but that wasn’t all of it. “Wanda will remain as Y/n’s guard.”
Abruptly standing from her chair, the loud screeched filled the room. “Are you serious?!” Fury’s expression didn’t change as Carol only grew with rage. “She could hardly take care of herself during the attack. What makes you think she could possibly take care of Y/n?”
“The girl was simply outnumbered. We all were.” Moving to get the file that was beside him, he slid it on the table. Bucky grabbed it and had started to silently read it. “But I need the both of you on the front lines. After what Beth has said, I need you two to make sure that the team is actually doing their job. They were supposed to have found out about Hydra’s plans before the attack, now I’m starting to think they didn’t even try.”
Carol was still angry at Fury’s decision to which he sighed. “You will know of Y/n’s location at all times. I will let her have a remote that when activated should send you a signal. Since you’re back on Earth, you’ll get to her in seconds.” Carol sat back down in her seat. Although she was still mad at Fury’s decision, she felt better knowing that Y/n could signal her for help.
“Now, I need you to say your goodbyes for now. Y/n leaves in an hour.”
Wanda stood in the foyer of the hanger as various agents loaded up the quinjet with materials that she and Y/n would need for the time they were gone. She was informed of the last-minute decision just moments ago by Fury himself.
“Please take care of her.”
The words echoed in her head as it had been the only time she’s seen Fury actually care deeply for somebody else. Before she could ponder more about it, Beth had interrupted Wanda’s thoughts. “Wanda?”
Turning around to the source of the sound, Wanda stood in front of a young blonde woman with intense eyes. “I’m Beth,” she said as she held out her hand. Wanda reluctantly shook it, not quite sure as to who this lady actually was. “I’m Y/n’s friend.”
“Great, another pretty girl I have to worry about,” Wanda thought. “Well, I’m also her nurse but I think she would consider me her friend as well.” Wanda stood awkwardly not really knowing how to respond.
Using this opportunity, Beth handed Wanda a bag full of medicine and vitamins. “I know this will be a lot to ask of you but could you please take care of Y/n?” There was no doubt in Wanda’s mind that this girl in front of her meant well. The nurturing feeling in her aura surrounded Wanda.
“That girl has been through a lot and I would know.” Confused by the intensity of her words, Wanda couldn’t help but ask, “How do you know this?”
“I’ve been her nurse for a while now.” This news only confused Wanda even more. “Was she injured before the attack?”
“What is it with you guys and not knowing a single thing about Y/n?” Beth thought. She started to get irritated at the thought of another Avenger hurting Y/n. She could only hope Wanda was different from the rest. However, Wanda heard Beth’s thoughts and said, “What do you know that I don’t?”
Beth scoffed at the question and replied, “The truth.” The simplicity of her answer made Wanda internally roll her eyes. Whether she admitted it or not, she had started to feel territorial over the fact somebody else knew Y/n better than her.
“Wanda let’s go!” Fury yelled from afar. The two looked over and saw Y/n hug Carol, Fury, and Bucky goodbye. Oddly enough, she looked emotionless when she did it. “Just please don’t fuck up again.” Wanda didn’t answer respond back to Beth because if she did, something bitchy would have probably left her mouth. Instead, she walked over and into the quinjet. She buckled into the seat closest to Y/n but the girl didn’t give any attention to Wanda. She remained silent and focused on her hands for the whole ride while Wanda thought more and more about what Beth meant.
“Now that we’re all here let’s get started.” Fury turned on the projector and the first image the was on the screen was New York on fire during the attack. “So far, we’ve received word that there have been 125 casualties and approximately around 500 critical injuries suffered from the attack.” Click.
“However, we face a bigger number when it comes to those that are currently missing. Estimating from 600 - 1000 people are found to be missing. And since we have efficiently cleared the rumble from the damages, our sources have found out how they’ve gone missing.” Click.
Footage of the event was playing but in the location of the subways. One by one, explosions could be seen in various parts of different train passages. It didn’t take long for Hydra soldiers to infiltrate the train systems but all camera footage cut to black. “Hydra has effectively taken hostages of those that were on the train during that night. They have used bombs to blast any chance of us going after them in these tunnels.”
“Is there a way to locate the subways?” Steve asked. “Since New York hardly invests in their transportation department, they are unable to track any of their subways. More than likely, Hydra has already disposed of them in case they were to be tracked.” Click.
“What we need is to figure out where these people have gone. This many hostages taken is something we cannot allow. And considering we have hardly been able to figure out their plans before the attack, I can only assume the worse when it comes to this.” Fury turned the projector off and continued his speech.
“Bucky and Carol will be removed from their current missions to assist the team with this situation. There will be absolutely no complaints about this. Any signs of lack of cooperation, I will gladly remove you and ban you from missions indefinitely.” Fury looked around the team once more and felt disgusted at the people he has to work with. Giving them no time to reply, he left the room not being able to stand the sight of them anymore.
Since they were dismissed, part of the team left in a hurry until it was down to three people. Tony was about to leave when Steve said, “Are you going to apologize to Y/n?” The question was genuine and serious because ever since that night, Steve had been unable to sleep. All he wished he could do was apologize to Y/n but the girl refused to see him. Unfortunately, he understood why.
“Why should I? It doesn’t change anything.” Steve stood up and slammed the table with his hand. “We killed her Tony.” Tony walked in front of Steve. “I didn’t do anything,” he sneered.
“Steve. Tony. We need to calm down,” Natasha said as she watched the two go at it. “Don’t act so mighty Natasha. I heard you bullied the girl too.” This comment caused Natasha’s jaw to harden. “Aww, did I hit a nerve?” Tony childishly asked. “Oh fuck off Tony. There you go again bringing other people down when you can hardly accept what you’ve done. YOU took away Y/n’s funds. She couldn’t even afford anything.”
“But you watched me do it, Rogers. You could have done something too yet you let it happen. So don’t patronize me. Nothing of what she said changes anything.” Tony quickly left the room as he felt himself explode in anger. This didn’t even surprise Steve anymore. He was tired of keeping the family together when it was clear now that it was meant to be apart.
“Here we are,” Wanda said as she dropped her bags in the living room. Looking at her surroundings, the flat was a decent size. Two bedrooms, one bathroom, a kitchen, living room, and accommodations on the floor below them.
“So what do you-,” Y/n hadn’t responded to Wanda’s question as she zoomed past her and walked into her room. Softly closing the door shut, Wanda sighed at her reaction. It wasn’t a surprise but Wanda still couldn’t help but feel hurt by it all. “I guess I should start unpacking.”
It’s been a couple of weeks since Y/n and Wanda started to live together in the flat located in the small town of Edinburgh. While Wanda mainly kept the place tidy, Y/n remained in her room all the time unless it was to use the bathroom or to eat. The only time she would even dare to be close to Wanda was during dinner. If it was breakfast or lunch, Y/n would take what Wanda cooked for the day into her room.
But Wanda was stubborn. She always left Y/n little notes of her whereabouts anytime she left for an errand but a small compliment would always be at the end of it. Sometimes she would knock on Y/n’s door and ask if she would want to watch a movie with her. Obviously, Y/n never answered but Wanda continued to ask. Other times, Wanda would think of Y/n’s favorite foods and would cook them for dinner that night. And while Y/n had never said it out loud, the empty plate she left in front of her always made Wanda swell with joy.
However, tonight was going to be different. Usually, the two would sit in silence as Wanda would have the tv playing in the background but Wanda needed to hear Y/n’s voice. Not only that, but she was hoping that the truth would come out as well.
Trying to figure out a way to break the silence, it was oddly Y/n that had done it first. “Why don’t you hate me?” At first, Wanda was shocked that Y/n had actually spoken, but the girl regain her composure and said, “Why would I hate you? You’ve done nothing wrong.”
Y/n was silent for a moment until she said, “But I killed your brother.”
Chapter 10
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On Family
An excerpt from Memoirs of a Flesh Eater, never published
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One question that I see asked in the news a lot is why there are still any ghouls left. We have a distinctive, high-impact feeding habit that requires us to stay within human society, where we are both outnumbered and outgunned. This has essentially been the case since the development of automatic firearms, and you’ve continued to develop more and more effective methods of killing us since then. How are we not extinct?
The talking heads always have lurid theories to propose. My personal favorite one, which comes up every couple of years or so, is that the government is secretly breeding us so that they have an excuse to send secret police out into the general populace for nefarious purposes pretending to be exterminators. As if they’d need the excuse {Editing Note: I’ve gotta keep my political views out of this except where they directly pertain to ghouls. No unnecessarily alienating people}. The most commonly accepted one seems to be that we just have a lot of children to compensate for our high mortality rate. Spatha calls that an R strategy, I think. Scarlet calls it the Rabbit Theory. Whatever you call it, it’s wrong. Our species has survived off the strength and compassion of our families.
Contrary to popular impressions, our “nuclear” families are pretty small. My understanding is that 1-4 children is the typical range. I’m the only confirmed only child in my friend group. Scarlet’s the youngest of three, Scorpio’s a middle child, Spatha avoids talking about her home life, and Kestrel doesn’t know her biological parents. There’s a couple of pressures that keep our family sizes small. First, it’s challenging to feed too many ghouls at once, especially ghoul children, who we don’t want worrying about where they’re going to get their meals. Second, the majority of ghoul parents are going to end up as single parents before their kids are fully grown. Either one of them is going to get killed, or they’re going to have to separate to go on the run from the exterminators; and, of course, we do still break up and get divorced sometimes.
These pressures are exaggerated by our general lack of an extended family. It’s not that all of our aunts and uncles get hunted down - even if they did, we’d still have cousins - but it’s not safe for us to have traceable extended families. When exterminators identify a ghoul, the first thing they do is put out a bulletin for all known blood relatives. The most common tactic to avoid this is, when multiple siblings make it to adulthood, at least one of them changes their identity and moves away. This isn’t always done, but it’s done often enough that document forging is a widespread and well-respected profession in the Society. It’s useful for dodging exterminators in other circumstances too. My mom and I changed our names and moved cities after exterminators killed my dad when I was 4.
Between that and the sheer number of out-and-out orphans in our Society, it should come as no surprise that we’ve developed a new family structure to fill in the gaps. The terminology we use for this structure is variable, but the term I’ve always used is “household”. A household is a sort of adopted extended family, typically formed by and centered around one particularly resourceful ghoul called a patron. The patron takes whichever ghouls they choose under their wing, introduces them to each other, and helps them coordinate their talents and resources so that they all have everything they need. Most obviously, this means making sure they all have a supply of flesh, but there are numerous other kinds of support a household can provide. I doubt I need to emphasize again how valuable a reliable source of companionship and safety is, but patrons typically have access to connections and contacts that can help the other members of the household accomplish their goals.
My household, for example, was founded by our patron Yaga. It consists of her, her adopted daughter Kestrel, my mom and I, my friends Scarlet and Scorpio and their immediate families, and four other older ghouls. There’s also Spatha, who has been reluctant to fully join the household but acts like a member in most contexts. Three of our members have reliable flesh sources, and Yaga coordinates with other ghouls to find supplementary sources to ensure that she always has a surplus on hand. This keeps all of us well-fed and lets her distribute the rest to those in need in exchange for favors and cachet that the rest of us can use for our own advancement. In turn, the rest of us pitch in for odd jobs here and there, mostly on flesh-gathering jobs of one kind or another, and we look out for each other. I’ve done a bit of babysitting with Kestrel, for example, and Yaga was able to get me and Scarlet summer jobs to save up for college.
Babysitting, by the way, is one of the most valuable services a household can provide to a ghoul parent. Given our mortality rate, it probably isn’t a surprise that there’s a good bit of cultural pressure to have children, and have them quick. Ghoul children are… a lot. When we’re newborn, we’re pretty much like human babies. Ghoul babies can nurse from ghoul mothers for awhile, which is a relief. They need to switch to flesh before their teeth come in, though, so that means flesh slurry, which is more complicated to make than you might think. For best results, you want a mix of blood, muscle tissue, organ tissue, and bone, especially marrow. We get better at pulling all our nutrients from just flesh as we mature, but babies aren’t as developed. Getting those varied tissues is a little more complicated than just getting flesh. Bone especially is challenging - more mature ghouls have no need for it, and it’s honestly kinda gross. You just have to hope that whoever you’re getting flesh from can start holding some bones for you. Not every source has easy access to bones.
{Editing Note: I think I wrote bone too many times - it looks fake now. Bone. Bone.}
We get our ghoul teeth at the same time as our baby teeth. Our ghoul teeth fall out and are replaced too, but we keep growing new ones our whole lives, kinda like sharks. Funnily enough, I don’t think we grow extra human teeth, which seems like a strange way for evolution to take us, but what do I know, I’m not a biologist. At that point we can start eating regular flesh, and parents have the unenviable task of explaining to toddlers that they can’t just slide their teeth out whenever they want. Our other features come in a bit later - claws between 4 and 6, eyes with puberty. Let me tell you, the claws hurt coming in. I couldn’t hold a pencil for a month. My mom told the elementary school that I was deathly sick so she could keep me home, but I think Scarlet just pretended he’d broken both his hands and went in splints. I don’t envy him - stretching my claws did a lot to relieve the pain.
I’ll admit freely that, by our standards, I had a pretty charmed childhood. I fit into human society pretty easily, I had a mom who loved me and could provide for me, a patron and household to help pick up the slack, and ghoul friends my own age. I had the discipline to keep my true nature hidden from my human peers, and I don’t think I was even particularly traumatized by the pressure of performing humanity that much. I can safely attribute that to the fact that I had safe spaces throughout my life to let the charade drop. Most ghouls at least have that. Most, but not all.
Our integration into human society also means that we inevitably become entangled in human society. We become invested in the lives of our human peers, we befriend them, care about them. Sometimes we fall in love with them. Eating people seems like kind of a big secret to keep from a potential romantic partner - I certainly couldn’t manage it - but some ghouls form romantic relationships with humans nonetheless. Maybe some of these human partners eventually discover the truth and are willing to overlook it for the person they love, but I doubt it happens often. I’ve certainly never heard of it. I’ve heard of it going the other way, though, a human partner discovering the truth and reacting poorly. Someone always dies when that happens. I personally know a few ghouls who’ve dated humans, or are seriously involved with them. Frankly, it scares the hell out of me. I get that the heart wants what it wants, but some wants aren’t worth the risk.
{Editing Note: That last line feels… tense. Emotionally charged. Why? And should I change it?}
In my opinion, the gravest of these risks is what happens when a human and a ghoul decide they want to build a life together, but kids are already in the equation. The human-ghoul mixed family is probably the most toxic environment that a ghoul child could be raised in and conceivably survive. All that pressure of hiding your true nature from your peers as you grow up? That feeling of isolation that follows you everywhere you go among humans? All of the most crushing emotional turmoil I’ve described in this book so far? Imagine if there was no relief for that even at home with your family. I frankly have no idea how ghoul parents manage to feed themselves and their children without being caught, or how they manage to perform humanity so flawlessly and constantly that their literal immediate family never catches on. I don’t know how those children manage to survive to adulthood, but I imagine they have some seriously fucked up mental health problems by the time they do. Factor in the suspicion that they would inevitably face from our Society when they finally are able to join it properly - after all, who more likely to become a Judas or be Lost than a ghoul raised by humans? - and I’d be willing to bet most of them don’t make it out of their twenties.
Before we move on entirely from families in general and mixed families in particular, I’d like to take a quick aside to talk about “half-ghouls”. You hear about them in horror media fairly often, the biological child of a human and a ghoul. Authors love to ascribe all sorts of traits to these hypothetical creatures - greater and more monstrous than the sum of their parts, supernaturally strong and vicious, impossible to detect within human society, sometimes with traits that are blatantly impossible, like telepathy or mind control or just plain magic. All of that is obviously untrue, but it’s something of a point of contention as to whether or not a “half-ghoul” is even possible. None of the ghouls I’ve talked to seem to agree about whether it can happen, and a search of human medical literature was similarly inconclusive. Humans, at least, seem to think that it might be theoretically possible, but have never been able to verify it by observation or by medical experiment. Of the ghouls I know that have been romantically involved with humans, none of them have ever gotten a kid out of it. It’s one of those things where we just don’t know. If it were possible, I’m not even sure what the implications would be.
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First Parent up is Horkeu Kamui! I hope these satiates those who requested for him for a bit, I’m still getting a feel for his character!
Under the cut for length!
Word Count: 2429
Horkeu Kamui
IF YOU WANTED TO HAVE/RAISE BABIES, HE’D BE SO HONORED ABOUT IT
He’d probs go off into a spiel about it and you’d have to sit through this hour long talk of him shooting off about how humbled he is that “you’ve chosen this Horkeu Kamui to sire your children, my Hero- it is the highest honor-”
He’d probs end up with with three little babies, all of them boys, the oldest is two years older than the twins and all of them are extremely overprotective of you when they get older
He’s ecstatic when you bring home your first boy. He’s always been enamored with the thought of a family and now here’s the start of one with his beloved hero. He’s honestly euphoric about it
You’d think that he'd be an amazing dad with zero problems since he’s had a history of raising heroes- but, here’s the thing, he has zero clue how babies work because when he gets the heroes, they’re usually all older then, you know, little kiddos. So when you hand him your guys’ first boy for the first time, he just, let’s him lay in his arms too afraid to move because what if he drops him????
You have to lead him by the hand for a bit, which he’s a little embarrassed about, real talk, until he gets the hang of it- which he does, he gets it real quick
He’ll try his best with diapers, but,,, my guy- the dude has a sniffer, what, 100xs better than ours??? So like, he’s coming out of that shit (haha) with tears in his eyes and a migraine. So I suggest you doing it just to spare him and then just comfort him afterward, because a Kamui who’s in pain is… well, painful to see
He does everything else tho!
He loves dressing your babies up in general! He gets these really cute baby clothes that Bathym designed just for your babies, even tho your first boy would always give him grief about wearing clothes- which killed Kamui because he hates doing stuff that makes your babies uncomfy (he’s really soft for them- like extremely soft for them)
Your twins tho, love wearing the clothes and he actively sends pictures of them to Bathym who literally flips his lid everytime
Your older one will try to pull said clothes off of them any chance he gets though, in his two year old words: “Trapped!”
Kamui is distressed and you laugh at his distress, which just distresses him even more because:
“My Hero, are you taking a video of this?”
“Yes” You say as you continue to hold up your phone, a bright smile on your face.
He’s struggling with pulling your biggest boy off of your youngest son who’s fighting to keep his shirt on.
With your guys’ babies, they slept in their crib until they started figuring out how to crawl out of it (especially when they all respectively start walking) to get to you guys; you thought that this was just going to be a trend with your first born- but no, he started breaking out the twins and you two almost shit when you both woke up when you felt shifting on the end of the bed that ended up crawling up until your guys’ chest, Kamui tensing, and then you two open your guys’ eyes and there’s three sets of sparkling eyes staring down at you. Suffice to say, Kamui almost launched your boys into the ceiling until he realised who they were. Which they were giggling all the while, your oldest holding the other two up by their waists, until your youngest yawned and flopped down in between you two. And then your middle boy went right after and then your oldest boy rolled your middle out of the way and squashed him up to your youngest, proceeding to curl up against Kamui’s side and knocked out
You and Kamui looked at each other until you shrugged and grabbed the blanket at the end of your bed and pulled it over the boys before you snuggled deeper into the blankets. Kamui promptly followed your lead
When they turn to toddlers, Kamui starts to teach them all how to fight since he wants his boys to be able to protect themselves (and you)
Your first born is, of course, two years ahead of them in his training compared to the twins so he takes it upon himself to help them when they need it so that their papa doesn’t have to worry about them too much, which Kamui is so proud of him for
When he he first took them to the Berserkers colosseum- they uprooted EVERYTHING because all of the gladiators went bat shit crazy when they met the babies; nobody went to do any of the fights, they were all derailed because everyone wanted to say hi to the boys
Kamui was a little worried about his oldest because he almost bit Claude’s hand when he tried to touch his youngest brother, but Claude just laughed it off and started into a spiel about how he would make a great gladiator for the Berserkers one day!
It all changed when he noticed Snow and he screamed and rushed to hug his leg. Snow was shocked and Kamui was trying to pry him off his leg all while saying “Apologies, I should have warned you all, he loves lions and other such big cats.”
Snow was so flattered that day
The boys are enamored with Pollux and they cheer every time he’d show off his punches, your middle thinks he’s one of the coolest things ever and wants to learn how to punch like him
Bathym already knows the boys but he’s still so excited to see them and he shows off his moves too, which the oldest tries to copy but he refuses to let go of Snow’s pant leg so he ends up slipping and almost falling but there’s, like, four different sets of hands shooting to keep him from falling; but your youngest is hoping around and toddling towards Bathym and Bathym is MELTING. He ends up holding him the entire time that Kamui is there with them
They meet Nomad and Macan and your oldest is determined to hold onto all of the cat therians; Nomad complains as he lets him hold onto his pant leg too- Macan he has to be convinced a bit more. “Hah? You wanna get eaten, kid?”
“Not if I eat you first!”
Kamui almost shit until Macan laughed and wrapped his tail around his arm (which left him sparkly eyed) and said: “you can’t even if you tried.”
Your middle boy noticed this and decided to grab onto papa’s tail and Kamui almost died
All three end up meeting Garmr and they are IN LOVE with him and Garmr gets all the pets and love he could ever want
They’re all sad to leave and the Berserkers force Kamui to make a promise to bring the three babies back
Kamui is happy too because now he has like, 20 different babysitters. Score.
When they hit the tween years, your oldest is very boisterous and energetic, he bounces off the walls and you have no idea which one of you he got that from. Your other two are very calm, though your youngest is the shyest out of your boys
Your oldest boy is very popular and definitely joins a sports club, something like football, but he definitely goes into wrestling if they have that (he practices with Uncle ‘Suke who makes him a mask for him, but instead it’s wolf themed). He’s protective of his brothers and the people he cares for, so he doesn’t put up with any bullying on his watch. He will square up if he has too, but it usually doesn’t have to come to that because he’s pretty chill by the end of it
The oldest comes to Kamui when he needs help with emotional problems, which, might not be the best, but it also is an added oof for Kamui because your oldest has zero filter so when he asks why you have to pee into a girl to have a baby, Kamui almost DIES
Your middle flits between you and Kamui, luckily he is not one to just hit you with any off the wall questions, so it’s all nice and relaxed when you answer his questions
The little one goes to you with any of his problems. Which can go either way because he’s very similar to Kamui with his social skills, so you’re sometimes sitting there blinking at him trying to figure out how to answer a question
The boys at this point are becoming more and more protective of you and they are determined to keep you safe and happy. Like, any person even thinks about flirting with you- they’re getting three tweens in their face and it’s terrible because they could all snap a man’s back over their knee and they’re only, what? 13 and 11 respectively (they are huge baby bois, adopted or not)
Your twins are both much calmer than their older brother, they’re also much closer to their dad’s disposition too, so they tend to be closer to wall flowers- or at least they try; their big brother drags them into the spotlight a lot because he talks about them ALL THE TIME- so they have to put up with their brother’s rambunctiousness a lot
All three of them have a tendency to get in trouble together, your oldest usually runs head first into things while the other two are trying their hardest to get him to not do what he wants to do
There was this one time you and Kamui had to go and get them at three in the morning because your oldest dragged the boys into, what they thought was an abandoned fake haunted house, and your youngest twin called you in near tears as he quickly screeched that: “THE HOUSE IS ACTUALLY HAUNTED- THE HOUSE IS ACTUALLY HAUNTED- MOM/DAD/NANO- COME AND GET US-” And then the message cut out at the sound of your oldest son screaming bloody murder and your oldest twin… also distantly screaming: “DAD. COME AND GET US-” You also heard some… growling??? And more screaming????? You think???? Anyway- you almost shit, and since you were in the living room at the time and Kamui was in your guys’ little home gym you both ended up almost running into each other trying to get out of the house and into the fucking car-
So, you two get there, ready to murder someone- when you see all three of your boys sitting in front of said “haunted house” just to see Benten of all people yelling at them with Ebisu holding his face in his hands; turns out Benten also thought that the house is haunted and decided to go in their for a video, she also dragged the poor man into it too, and they ended up bumping into a dresser and knocking it over, which set off the boys which caused your son to start swinging, which kicked up a whole bunch of dust, almost got Ebisu punched in the face, and caused Benten to start swinging as well-
Long story short, they were very grounded after that 😔😔😔
By the time they get into high school, your oldest is still loud and boisterous but he’s already on the verge of getting a scholarship for his football and Wrestling and the twins have really committed to their passion: which is MUSIC!
Your oldest twin is in band and plays the French Horn, but he also plays the violin and Bass (Kamui really likes the bass so he learned how to play it just for him ); while your youngest is in choir! Him and his brother get together and do a mini concert just for you two and their older brother- who cried whenever they first played, he was so proud
Their older brother still brags about his little family- it’s actually gotten worse
All of his friends know almost everything about you guys, it’s kinda freaky tbh
Also, you will never forgive Kamui for instilling the instinct to protect you with their lives because they really take their job seriously
There was this one time where your oldest brought one of his friends over and, aw, poor boy had a big ol’ crush and you and almost got chucked through a window when he tried to be smooth with you by three different giant boys
Kamui just sat with a serene smile on his face as he flipped some pancakes- he’s such a little shit, you swear-
Your boys still like to be near your guys despite being older- like they prefer sticking to you guys than going with their friends
UM, YOUR BOYS TRAIN- despite the boys not focusing on a fighting career or anything of the sort, they still like to be able to stand on par with their big brother so they can help him train- WITH THE RANKERS AND CLAUDE HAD TO REALLY SELL YOU TWO ON IT TO LET HIM TRAIN WITH MACAN BECAUSE, BRO, IF MACAN HURT YOUR BOYS HE WAS GONNA BE TURNED INTO A TIGER RUG BY THE BOTH OF YOu
But he’s actually a really good teacher??? Which shook the fuck out of both of you (and Nomad)
Speaking of that, your oldest likes training with him, Snow and Nomad the most, while your oldest twin likes training with Pollux and your youngest likes learning from Bathym the most and has some scary ass kicks now
When your boys do graduate, all of the Berserkers are there to see it and Kamui is so proud of them- he’s not one to cry but he will have this super proud smile on his face and he’ll bring his boys into his arms and squeeze them real tight- your oldest is full on sobbing because he doesn’t want to leave you guys for college; the twins are also sobbing because they don’t want to leave, but they end up going to the same college as their older brother (who is excited AS FUCK ABOUT IT)
Another really good dad, I think he’d be really fulfilled by the end of it all- he loves his boys to death and he’s so happy you chose to have a family with him- he’s just- ah- so good
#dad hcs#Horkeu Kamui#SFW#x reader#nonbianary reader#gender neutral reader#reader scenario#housamo#tokyo afterschool summoners
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The Princess and Her Knight
Audience List
Day 7: The Princess and Her Knight
Clang. Ting. Slash.
All these sounds were heard throughout the castle’s training halls. It was a sound of metal meeting metal. A sound of clashing swords. They were followed by a series of high pitched grunts and yelps from every knights in training. They were there to impress. Yes, impress. Especially their mentors who taught them how to cross blades. Now, all of the knights in training were kids. All ranging from eleven to fifteen years of age, although, there will always be the youngest of them all.
Weiss Schnee, in her tender age of six, had already aspired to become the greatest, if not greatest, the best knight Remnant has to offer. She took a hold of a sword at the age of seven, and was trained by a well renowned knight, Ozpin. To Ozpin's amusement, not only was she determined, she also learns fast and had already experienced her first duel at the age of eight and a half. And now, Weiss is here, in the very hands of the Kingdom of Vale at the age of nine, hoping that she'd at least be, of by some miracle, be picked as one of the new generations of knights.
Weiss grunted as she fought and let her sword meet the other knight's sword. It was a boy she was fighting, there were only a handful of girls who were present, mainly because the others were weak willed and let the boys bully them, and so they left. But Weiss, persistent and determined, fought and ignored whatever they were spouting on about and continue to stand tall.
The boy slashed his sword, his arms going down to land a blow on the white haired fighter, but she jumped out of the way, stepped on the sword and thrust her sword forward to meet the boy's neck in an inch. The boy gasped and looked at her eyes and saw a steely gaze, he shivered and admitted defeat. Weiss pulled her sword back and gracefully hilting her sword on the sheath on her waist. The royal knights and other knights in training who acknowledges her, clapped their hands in recognition. Weiss internally smiled, pride looming on her, then she shook her head as she remembered her mentor’s teaching of not to get full of yourself and head back towards her mentor.
Ozpin nodded and smiled at her, she in turn returned it as well. The leading knight step in front and spoke. “Knights! Attention! Form five man frontage, move!”
The knights in training ran and one by one took their positions. Their legs marching, their swords making so much clatter and the royal knight shouted and they all stood straight.
“All of you are splendid knights! Fit to be part of the round table.” The knight paced back and forth, looking at the knights in training. “But unfortunately, not all of you will be picked. We only needed a handful of brave warriors on our prime. But do not worry, dear knights. You will once again meet us, and let’s see what you have become.”
The royal knight stopped walking. He eyed every single one of the knight, observing them, reading them like an open book. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “I have decided…”
The flurry of names went static on the white haired fighter. Her nerves getting on her, yet her face showed no emotion. Her eyes continue to bore holes at the knight in front of her.
“Weiss Schnee.”
What?
She blinked as she heard the knight shout, as he dismissed the other knights who didn’t get lucky. Her feet standing firmly on her boot. She heard that right, right?
“Now all of you.. welcome to the royal court!!” He exclaimed. The knights grunted in response and he nodded. “All of you are dismissed!”
Weiss found herself staring at the garden's set of flower beds with variety of flowers blooming around. Her mind still processing what happened down at the training hall. And the cogs took it’s place.
“YES!! WOOHH!!” Weiss jumped from where she sat and tip toed around the shade of the tree as she celebrates her promotion. Then she heard a giggle. She jumped and pulled her sword, positioning herself in a fighting stance.
“Whoah! Hey, it’s okay, it’s just me!!” Yelled a panicked voice. The figure stepped from the tree trunk and showed itself.
It was a boy wearing a white blouse, red vest and a black shorts paired with brown leathered shoes. His arms up in the air. “I’m sorry to startle you, young knight.”
Weiss blinked and relaxed a bit, sheathing her sword, although her left thumb were still uprooting the base of her sword’s hilt. “Who are you?” Weiss asked. The boy perked up and dropped his arms. “Ruby! Nice to meet you, young knight.”
“What brings you here? And how come you are inside the castle’s vicinity?” She questioned. The boy grinned at her. “I’m just here to look at the flowers. As for how, you could say I’m a visitor of the castle.”
A visitor? “You’re a royal?” Weiss wondered. The boy shrugged and smiled. “Maybe?” He answered. Then he went over to Weiss. “Wanna play?”
Weiss cleared her throat and stood up straight. “I am a knight in training. I must—” The boy hold her hand and grinned at her. “Don’t worry. No one will know. Trust me.”
She didn’t know why and how, but she trusted the guy and let him lead her to Oum knows where. They played under the sun, laughing and giggling around as they play tag. Weiss, as a child, wasn’t able to experience what ‘fun’ is for children. She had only immersed herself into learning how to use a sword and to become a valiant knight. That, was fun.
“Ruby?!!”
The boy perked up and looked at the castle. He then gazed at Weiss and smiled apologetically. “I’ll meet you soon, young knight.” Then off he go. Weiss stared at the disappearing back of her playmate, feeling lonely all of a sudden. “Yeah.. see you soon.”
A week passed by with her training with all the knights in the training hall. She even made friends. The orange haired knight, Nora Valkyrie. The redhead popular knight, Pyrrha Nikos. The silent, yet deadly, Blake Belladonna. The blonde idiot(her words, what with the amount of courting she receives), Jaune Arc. And the calm knight, Lie Ren. And today, they were gathered around in the training hall. They were there to greet someone important as the knight in charge vaguely put.
“Knights! Attention!”
They all went to position. Weiss was in front. Then her gaze met a familiar figure accompanied by her mentor. It was the boy she met not long ago. Why was he here?
“This is Ruby Rose.” Ozpin started. “She is the crowned princess, and the next-in-line for the throne.” Her eyes subtly widen as the person she thought was a he, was actually a she. And to top of that, she was the crown princess… oh god, she played with the crown princess, oh god…
Ruby's eyes skimmed through the knights that stood proudly in front of her, her silver eyes met with blue ones. She smiled at her and Weiss was blinded on the spot.
“She is here to pick a knight that will serve her to the end. A knight that will stay by her side no matter what happens. A knight that will pledge their loyalty to her.” Ozpin finished, looking at the knights. He heard the princess giggle beside him and looked down. “Are you ready, princess?”
“Come on, Ozpin. I already had my eyes death set on someone.” The princess grinned. She took a step forward, skipping as she stood in front of Weiss. Weiss blinked as she saw the boy—girl wave at her. “Hello there, young knight. I believe I owe you a meeting you sooner than later.” She again, for the second time, gave her an apologetic smile.
Weiss breathed out. “I didn’t wait for that long, your highness.” Ruby frowned and poked the knight's nose. “Ruby.”
Weiss blinked. “What?” Ruby giggled and looked at her. “Call me Ruby. And no buts! Princess’ orders.” Weiss gaped at girl, but found her voice. “As you wish.”
Ruby beamed at the response and looked at Ozpin. “I pick her.” Weiss was once again dumbfounded. Ozpin smiled and nodded. “As you wish, your highness.”
Ruby looked at the knight. “What’s your name?”
“Weiss. Weiss Schnee.”
And that’s where everything had started. Her time as a valiant knight blossomed into fruition. As told by Ozpin, she pledged her loyalty to only serve the princess and to never leave her side. Ruby was delighted at the fact and would always run around with Weiss in tow. Although, there were a couple of times that Ruby would forgot that she needed a knight on her side to guard her and there was a time that Ruby had gotten herself hurt without the knight knowing. Weiss was livid. But not for the princess, but for herself. It took Ruby weeks to convince her that it wasn’t her fault, but her own. Still, Weiss was reluctant to accept the fact.
Since then, the two were inseparable and was connected by the hip. Wherever Ruby go, Weiss was there. She always stayed by her side that it was painfully obvious as to what would be the outcome of their princess and her knight relationship. And Weiss was painfully aware of that fact.
Weiss is in love with the princess.
She knew that, by heart. As much as she tried to dismiss and deny it in the past, it was evident that she fell for her, hard. Her friends can vouch for that. Even Ozpin noticed it. But would she dare to confess? No! Because, according to her, she doesn’t deserve a princess like her. So she kept her mouth shut.
“Weiss…” Ruby moaned, and Weiss flushed, cursing herself for thinking such thoughts. And her red gown gave little to none in her imagination. “Can we go to the carnival, please?”
“No, Ruby. You have to meet the other royal guests.” She replied. Ruby pouted, then a mischievous smile graze her lips. She gave Weiss her ultimate attack… puppy eyes. Weiss looked away, but the princess was stubborn. Well… so is she. “Your highness.” Her voice turned cold.
Ruby backed away as soon as she heard her tone. She doesn’t like it when she use that voice on her. It was steely, cold and void of emotion. It made her feel unwelcomed. Weiss noticed this and sighed. “I’m sorry, Ruby.” Ruby shook her head and smiled, though it didn’t reached her eyes. Weiss flinched at the look. “It's okay. You are doing your job, and you're doing great at it.”
Meaning, she’s intimidated. Weiss bit her lip and gulped. She’s sooo, going to regret this decision. She looked at the sad princess and cleared her throat to make her look at her.
“After this… event. I’ll take you out.” She promised. Ruby perked up and kissed her on the cheek. Weiss’ eyes widen. “Thank you, Weiss! You’re the best.”
Weiss dismissed the action, yet she can’t help but feel giddy and bit herself to keep her from squealing in delight. She observed Ruby interact with countless of men, trying to get on her good side, and maybe get a smooch or two. Weiss didn’t appreciate the actions, yet all she can do is stand there and make sure they didn’t get too close. But when a guy tries to hold her without the princess’s permission, she found herself growling and giving him the nastiest glare she could muster at the guy, her hand in the hilt of her sword. Not needing to be told once, the guy scrambled away.
“My hero.” Giggled Ruby, only for Weiss to flush beside her in shades of red.
True to her words, Weiss did try and take her out. Emphasis on the word try. Before Weiss even grabbed the opportunity to lead her outside, the princess was dragged to a meeting that left her all alone in the hallway muttering to herself.
“Hey, Weiss!” She heard a chirp from behind. She swivel back and saw her fellow knight, Nora Valkyrie. She nodded a hello to her. “My, you look swell today, Ice Queen.” Nora grinned. Weiss rolled her eyes. Nora then thrust her hands on Weiss, shoving her a piece of paper. “Ciao, Ice Queen!”
The white haired knight held the paper in her palm and read the text.
“Go to my room. Whatever you see there, follow it. Then meet me in the garden. Love, Ruby.”
Weiss raised an eyebrow in confusion, but proceed to follow her orders and move straight to the princess’ quarters. Her armored foot clang at the tiled floor as she stop in front of the door to knock. The door opened to reveal Blake Belladonna, another fellow knight. Then her eyes gazed at the bluish white dress laid elegantly on the bed.
Blake offered a hand. “Here you are, my lady. Your dress.” Weiss blinked at her friend's antics and tried to question her, but was cut of and politely asked her to change her clothes, Ruby’s orders.
Weiss can’t help but to scoff at the order. Ruby was having fun giving her orders, making her wear a dress of all people. Then her eyes met Pyrrha, she smiled at her and guide her to sit in front of the mirror. Weiss’ confusion grew more by the second. She also tried to ask the redhead, but the latter just smile as she fixed her hair and applied light makeup to her.
“As a knight, you look dashing. But as a lady, you are a princess.” Vouched Pyrrha as she let the white haired knight see her reflection in the mirror.
She briefly wondered who was the princess in the mirror before realizing that it was her own reflection. She, indeed, look like a princess. Her hair tied into a bun, with a little bit of hair falling on the side of her face. She wore an eyeliner and a light blue eye shadow to compliment her gown. A pearl necklace adorned the pristine skin of her neck. Her ear was adorned with an earring that fits her whole left ear in a shape of a half snowflake.
Her eyes then met Blake and the raven haired knight smiled at her. “Time to go, Weiss. Your prince is waiting.” Her eyebrows met as she looked at her. “Prince?” Blake only smiled.
Blake lead her to the garden. Under the tree where a swing is perched on the tree branch. The swing was occupied by none other than Ruby Rose. Then she noticed something different. Her dress was replaced by a suit.
“Your Majesty. The princess is here.” Blake bowed. The royal stood up from where sat and looked behind her. She smiled at Blake and gave her a nod.
Weiss began to drink in the figure in front of her. The princess—now a prince, looked absolutely dashing than any other men she met. Her hair was spiked, yet it fits her well. She was wearing a red prince’s coat, adorned with gold linings and embroidery. Her pants were sleek black, paired with black shoes. Her hands adorned with white gloves and a smile on her face as she look at the stunning woman in front of her. Ruby stepped forward and bowed, holding the latter's hand, kissing it.
“Ruby? What’s with all of this?” Weiss asked as she watch her hands intertwine with the brunette.
“Well, I figured that a woman like you, also needs to be treated like a princess.” Ruby gazed at the lustrous blue pools. “For the past twelve years, you have been appointed as my knight, by yours truly. And you’ve been doing a pretty good job guarding me and accompanying me all around.”
Ruby took a deep breath. “I also noticed that, you don’t really have a time for yourself. And I sometimes ask myself if I’m depriving you of your alone time. And so..” Ruby outstretched her unoccupied arm and gestured to the garden. “This. This is the time, you are treated as a woman… as a princess.”
Weiss didn’t know what to say. Her life as a woman are always been spent as a knight. As the arm of the princess she loyally serve. She guessed that, there’s no point as acting like a woman, she needs to act like a knight that will protect the princess from harm. She didn’t expect for Ruby to notice it though. Or that she would care about her. Because to her, she is just a knight.. nothing more nothing less.
She looked at Ruby and their entangled hands. Her face burned in different shades of red as she stared at their hands. Ruby’s grip tighten and she looked at her as they walk through the garden.
“You… my lady, are absolutely stunning.” She complimented. The white haired knight turned another shade of red. “Y-you’re just saying that..”
Ruby stopped walking and faced her. “Weiss. When I say you’re beautiful. You are beautiful. You are gorgeous. Breathtakingly lovely. And…” Weiss waited. Ruby licked her lips, before biting her lower lip. “There was never a time that my eyes ever left its gaze on you. Remember when I appointed you as my knight?”
Weiss nodded at her. Ruby gave her a smile. “I said, I had my eyes death set on someone. And that someone… is you.” Weiss’s eyes widen. Her mind's cogs started turning. She didn’t want to expect. She didn’t want to think. But she hoped that this wasn’t a dream.
Ruby clasped both of the knight's hands and squeezed it. “I love you, Weiss. Ever since I saw you in the garden—no, from my window when you first stepped at the gates. I had always loved you. Even up till now.”
Weiss fought her tears back. “But… I’m a knight… I’m your knight. A-and.. a knight shouldn’t be with a relationship with their command… much less a royal.” Ruby shook her head and stared at her with determination. “I don’t care. They can fight me for my decision, but it won’t change. My love for you won't change. I spent twelve whole years, keeping my feelings at bay. And now…” Ruby cried. “I don’t want to lose you.”
Weiss blinked away her own tears and wiped a gloved hand on the royal’s eyes. “You won’t lose me. I’m your knight. I’ll stay with you, all our days together.” Ruby sniffles and smile. Weiss smiled back and said. “I love you.”
Ruby leaned in and captured her princess’ lips. Ruby tilted her head and slipped her hands on her lover's cheeks, her right thumb rubbing the side of her cheek. Weiss’ hands made its way on the brunette’s chest, fisting her coat as they deepen the kiss. Weiss broke away and stared at the prince with her half lidded eyes. Ruby does the same, a smile dancing in her lips.
“Will you be my girlfriend, Weiss?” Weiss chuckled and snaked her arms on the latter’s neck. “You don’t know how long I’ve waited for you to say those words.” And with that, a kiss once again was made under the moonlit sky. The moon shining above them, and the stars twinkled in delight. A new flower blossomed under the moonlight’s gaze.
Notes:
I made a debate in my own mind as I think of what I would choose for this day's prompt. And in the end I picked this.
I decided to make Weiss a knight because it fits her well. And as for Ruby, I have my mind settled on her being either a femme or a futch. Plus, I want Ruby to be a princess.
They don’t have an age gap. Both are nine at the start and on the end they’re twenty-one.
Weiss is actually a princess, but the kingdom was gone. And yes, she’s an orphan. Ozpin adopted her.
Ruby likes guy clothes. She was actually called ‘Prince’ at some point. Especially when she wears the royal suit.
Weiss realized her feelings when Ruby was nearly assassinated by Adam Taurus. Blake killed him out of saving her friend when he almost struck Ruby with a sword.
#wrw2020#white rose week#rwby white rose#otp: thank me later#day 7#ive entered the knight!weiss fandom#because weiss as a knight?#oh yeees
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FEATURE: The Top 10 Fight Scenes of 2020 According to YOU!
One of the defining features of anime as a medium are the fight scenes. From their diversity of visuals and dramatic staging to their use in narrative development to the off-the-wall powers and techniques their characters employ. Watching weightless CG battles in superhero flicks, it’s hard not to feel like Hollywood is decades behind. Let’s fix that by letting YOU decide who gets some accolades.
If you’ve read this article’s companion pieces on 2020’s OPs and EDs you know the drill. What follows is a list of the Top 10 fight scenes of 2020 as determined by viewership on the Crunchyroll Collection YouTube channel, weighted at 30 days so anime from earlier in the year don’t get an advantage and to balance flash-in-the-pan popularity vs iconic moments that will continue on in the fandom’s consciousness. It’s not a perfect metric but I’ve gotta say, the results do show some great taste ...
10. Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? - Ais vs Asterius
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Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? has always been measured with its action, honing its greatest moments into dramatic peaks, so it was great we were able to finish 2020 with not only some of its biggest battles, but Ais finally stepping on the gas for the first time on television since 2017 by battling the legendary minotaur Asterius. Ais didn’t disappoint, as she shouldn’t with her place at the very top of the adventuring world and an unreachable ideal Bell aspires to. Also, opening the fight by shearing off her opponent’s arm may be the most brutal kickoff to a Danmachi fight we’ve seen yet. This battle topped 500k in its first 30 days and I’m confident will make a lasting impression.
9. Tsugumomo2 - Kazuya vs Kyouka
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Tsugumomo’s second season delivered some absolutely huge battles, but I gotta say I’m surprised the top fight wasn’t Kanaka terrorizing the entire cast of the series with their hunt for blood. That said, Kazuya’s battle against Kyouka had some spectacular effects, a few creative obi adaptations, a divine possession, and a shorted punch to secure the victory so it had all the primary features that make Tsugumomo fights great … And for fans of the series, yes it also had that … This fight drew 600k views in its first 30 days to secure its spot on the list.
8. A Certain Scientific Railgun T - Level 6 Mikasa vs Touma and Sogiita
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A Certain Magical Index and its various spinoffs have a penchant for going completely off the rails very quickly. This fight in spinoff A Certain Scientific Railgun T is every bit as absurd. Mikasa is pushed into Level 6, giving her godlike power and sending her into a berserk state that only Touma’s magic destroying hand can take down. We also get a guest appearance from one of the series' best side characters in Sogiita whose ability to literally turn guts into power is impossible not to love.
Basically, the fight was amazing, Mikasa’s Level 6 form and its absurd power were wonderfully adapted by JC Staff and Touma and Sogiita showed off some amazing combo attacks to prevents the destruction of the city. In particular, Sogiita’s “Super Amazing” punch and princess carrying Touma drew 700k viewers in its first 30 days.
7. Golden Kamuy - The Stenka
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The most common phrase I hear from Golden Kamuy fans is that the series is underappreciated and, as a Golden Kamuy fan, I’m inclined to agree. This series is so violent, I’m constantly surprised by what it gets away with. I’m hard-pressed to think of another series that has aired in the past five years with the same level of brutality. Basically, I’m saying I’m overjoyed to see Golden Kamuy made the list, even if it's from one of its most tame battles that is simply a no-holds-barred free-for-all where everyone gets their nose broken by a berserk Sugimoto.
Might have been the JoJo's reference (not really) but this battle got 700k views in 30 days and just barely beat out Railgun T by ~1k views.
6. JUJUTSU KAISEN - Gojo vs Sukuna
youtube
Another series I’m unsurprised to see on the list but with an unexpected battle. I would have imagined Gojo’s battle against Jogo might have drawn more attention, or perhaps more recently, Itadori’s battle with Mahito. This clip does make sense after a fashion. It was a breakout moment where MAPPA showed they really meant business adapting JUJUTSU KAISEN and the fight was between two characters that have become fan favorites.
Definitely, a defining moment that pulled in double the seventh placer's views at 1.4 million in its first 30 days! Since JUJUTSU KAISEN is still attracting new fans and already topping popularity lists, I imagine it would have been even higher given a bit more time in 2020. Gojo vs Sukuna has continued its upward climb to almost 3 million views, putting it only a few days away from claiming the Number 4 spot in lifetime views. Not bad for an anime in the year's final quarter!
5. Boruto - Sarada vs Sakura
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BORUTO: NARUTO NEXT GENERATIONS has delivered spectacularly animated battles for just about its entire run that prove this anime is no afterthought to the Naruto franchise. Despite a wide selection of quality battles that dropped in 2020, I must admit I knew this one would be at the top. What self-respecting Naruto fan wouldn’t be interested in seeing a less-than-friendly mother/daughter slugfest between Sarada and Sakura? Although theoretically a training match to help Sarada develop her Sharingan, the amount of destruction makes it clear that one wrong move and even Sakura’s medical Jutsu would have trouble putting either of them back together again.
The Uchiha family battle secured its place with 1.5 million views in its first 30 days. Sarada's family moments, even the ones without fighting, are always winners and Sarada vs Sakura is the third youngest clip on the list so I'm guessing this one is going to withstand the test of time.
4. One Piece - Zoro vs Hitokiri Kamazo
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One Piece has been on a tear since the beginning of its much-anticipated Wano Kuni arc. Even after delivering a huge battle between Luffy and Katakuri at the end of Whole Cake, there has been a notable bump in the frequency and quality of standout animation in the long-running series, which is great to see since the Wano arc is a series of back-to-back skirmishes that can be elevated by some explosive visuals.
No moment this year stands out more in my memory than Zoro’s battle against Hitokiri Kamazo and it seems the fans agree. Zoro borrowing his enemy’s weapon to pull off an amazingly animated Purgatory Onigiri may be one of the coolest sequences in One Piece’s almost 1,000-episode long run. This moment also got 1.5 million views in 30 days, narrowing beating Boruto by about 13k views.
3. Black Clover - Everyone vs The Devil
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Black Clover has grown as a production to develop a unique visual style for magic-heavy battles and really deliver some hugely impressive battles. It’s ramp up hit a peak in 2019 with the battle between Julius and Licht and it’s been riding high ever since. The top fight of 2020 is an obvious one, as the climactic moment of the series' insanely escalating arc kicked off by Julius and Licht’s battle. It seems like half the cast piled into Hell to take on the unnamed devil and his overpowered word soul magic. To be honest I was surprised the series kept going at all after a moment this climactic (I’m not complaining though).
The final attack of this battle drew 1.6 million views in its first 30 days and now sits proudly in the Number 2 spot for lifetime views on this list at over 5.5 million!
2. The God of High School - Jin vs Jaegal
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With its sheer number of lovingly animated battles, The God of High School was a shoo-in for this list and might represent 50 percent or more of its total entries if I hadn’t limited it to one entry per series. Jin vs Jaegal is a natural choice, as the climactic battle of the fast-paced fighting series which delivered on the much-anticipated reveal of Jin Mori’s charyeok. This one really put the god in the high school, jumping far past One Piece to pull 2.1 million views in its first month.
1. My Hero Academia - Endeavor vs Special Nomu
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My Hero Academia had a huge climactic battle to cap off the winter season, so I gotta say I’m surprised to see it’s the other one that secured the top spot as the Number 1 battle of 2020. Deku vs Overhaul was a huge moment for the series and definitely sits in the upper half of this list, if not the Number 2 spot — but something about Endeavor fighting a Nomu really pulled in a crowd, even putting the clip on YouTube’s trending list. It continues to creep upward at 7.5 million views. One of the most-watched moments of the entire year!
On reflection moments that show a theoretical power ceiling of a series are always impactful, such as Orochimaru’s battle with Sarutobi or even My Hero Academia’s own battle between All Might and All for One. Endeavor definitely pulled out the guns for this battle to leave an impression before the long wait until the next season ... Or maybe it was just because he said “plus ultra?” Regardless, Endeavor blasted past even the Number 2 spot on this list at 3.7 million views in its first 30 days.
Those were the best battles of 2020 according to you and, consequently, the last of this series of Top 10 lists. When it comes to fights there’s a lot more to look forward to in 2021. Boruto, Black Clover, and One Piece have all been building toward their current arcs' big conflicts and each seems primed to pull the trigger early next year. If that weren’t enough JUJUTSU KAISEN is about to kick off its school event and MHA is set to make its return.
That does it for 2020. Hope to see you all at the same time next year.
If you feel the fandom has missed a great moment, feel free to share it in the comments below!
Peter Fobian is an Associate Producer at Crunchyroll, writer for Anime Academy and Anime in America, and an editor at Anime Feminist. You can follow him on Twitter @PeterFobian.
Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!
By: Peter Fobian
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Danganronpa 1 & 2 characters as High School “recommended reading” books I actually read
Makoto Naegi
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
when i read it: 5th grade for fun, 10th grade for English class
did i like it? well enough yeah
content warnings: thematic & period-typical racism, ableism, and sexism
about: Recounts a summer in which Scout and her brother, Jem, watch their lawyer father defend a black man accused of raping a white woman in the south while balancing raising them alone. Other stuff happens, but that’s the most important plot thread.
Sayaka Maizono
Medea by Euripides
when i read it: i don’t remember, maybe 9th for drama, 12th for English?
did i like it? yep!
content warnings: child murder, infidelity, some pretty brutal other character deaths, sexism
about: Medea, who has sacrificed everything to be with her husband - even committed treason - has been left by the man so he can move on to woo and wed a princess. And she loses her shit.
Leon Kuwata
The Adventures of Huckelberry Finn by Mark Twain
when i read it: 11th grade
did i like it? yeah!
content warnings: thematic & period-typical racism (use of the n-word), domestic abuse, classism iirc?
about: After his abusive dad comes back and demands money under the threat of death, Huck Finn runs away with a fugitive slave down the Mississippi River. Being Mark Twain, it’s a comedy, although Huck’s father is genuinely kind of frightening and his friendship with Jim is kind of heartwarming.
Chihiro Fujisaki
Frankenstein by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
when i read it: 10th grade for fun, 12th grade & freshman year of college for class
did i like it? I’ve got mixed feelings; i love the book, hate most peoples’ interpretations of it.
content warnings: character death, incest (depending on the version of the novel you read), unethical doctors, neglectful parents
about: Thinking he knows better than literally anyone else he’s ever met, Victor Frankenstein decides it’s his birthright to play god. He robs graves to build the perfect body, and then, once he’s successful, flips his shit and refuses to acknowledge any part he played in the creation, wrecking the lives of like everyone he knows.
Mondo Oowada
The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton
when i read it: like 6th or 7th grade, for fun
did i like it? i loved it!
content warnings: abuse, thematic classism, character death
about: Honestly the most obvious choice to make for Mondo. Ponyboy Curits, a greaser, recounts the last few months of his life in which, after being repeatedly harassed and then nearly killed by gang of rich kids, his friend Johnny stabs one to death. In order to keep Johnny out of prison and Ponyboy out of a boys’ home, the two run away. Considering Ponyboy is also being raised by an older brother, this totally fits Mondo.
Kiyotaka Ishimaru
King Lear by William Shakespeare
when i read it: twice in college (discliamer: as an english major i had to taken an entire course on shakespeare, so he shows up a lot here between that and having done theatre)
did i like it? no
content warnings: a surprising amount of gore for a stage play, including a guy getting his eyes gouged out and someone getting beheaded iirc
about: The king’s getting up in years, so he’s hoping he can drop the workload off onto his three daughters while remaining the figurehead. His youngest, Cordelia, who he loves best, refuses to kiss his ass by saying that he’ll still have power over her once she’s married, and this pisses him off so he disinherits her. Then her sisters, annoyed with their father and his favoritism, decide that with Cordelia out of the way they can now do basically whatever they want and determine to make his life hell. Since he named them Goneril and Regan, I don’t blame them.
Hifumi Yamada
The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
when i read it: college, but i wanna say i read some of the stories in it for English classes in high school?
did i like it? some of the stories i did yeah
content warnings: varies from story to story, but i remember unsanitary, drunkenness, and infidelity
about: The overarching “plot” as such is that a group of people are making a pilgrimage to Canterbury, and decide that to pass the time they will tell two stories each. Each story is told in-character, and whoever tells the best story has to...buy everybody dinner, or something? I don’t really recall. It’s a comedy, but it’s also unfinished because Chaucer bit off way more than he could chew.
Celes Ludenberg
“The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allan Poe
when i read it: 11th grade
did i like it? probably, i’m a fan of Poe
content warnings: drunkenness, murder
about: This one got memetic on tumblr for a while, but essentially this guy decides to get revenge on an old friend of his for some kind of sleight by getting him drunk during Carnival, leading him into the basement, and burying him alive. Poe isn’t one to go soft.
Sakura Oogami
“A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
when i read it: 10th grade
did i like it? no
content warnings: objectification, something akin to torture
about: A family finds an old man with wings lying face-down on the ground and decide to keep him like a pet. People see him and assume he is an animal, and the family decides to start charging admission like their own private sideshow, while onlookers abuse him. One of those extra depressing stories that makes you wonder why the hell you had to read it for class.
Mukuro Ikusaba
The Crucible by Arthur Miller
when i read it: the first time, probably in 6th or 7th grade, and then several more times after that for a variety of other classes. it’s a theatre and English class staple.
did i like it? when taken in context, yes. but i’m also fucking sick of reading it.
content warnings: infidelity, paranoia bait, period-typical racism & sexism (takes place during the Salem Witch Trials)
about: The plot is a witch hunt, in which a girl who had an affair with a married man claims to have been taken over by the spirit of the devil and that all her friends and a variety of other townsfolk have too. It follows the trials as they try to determine who is and is not guilty, who will repent for their sins, and thematically is about puritanical hysteria. It’s about the Red Scare of the 50s, surveillance, the Hollywood Blacklist, propaganda, and tyrannical government. Naturally, teachers fail to provide any context for the play that actually makes it relevant or interesting. Compare to modern day callout/cancel culture.
Kyouko Kirigiri
12 Angry Men by Reginald Rose
when i read it: 10th grade (although i’d already seen the movie)
did i like it? yes
content warnings: thematic classism & xenophobia
about: The jury of a case in which a teenager is accused of murder convene to determine their verdict. All but one man believe him to be guilty. The rest of the play covers his attempts to sway his other jurors into at least casting aside their prejudices to view the case impartially.
Byakuya Togami
The Federalist Papers
when i read it: summer before 12th grade for AP Gov. yikes.
did i like it? oh god no. i had to have my lawyer dad explain it to me.
content warnings: legalese and it’s boring as fuck
about: i mean it’s just a bunch of essays to promote ratifying the the constitution. I don’t even remember if we read all of them. that’s how bad my retention of the subject is.
Toko Fukawa
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
when i read it: 10th grade
did i like it? kind of?
content warnings: bugs, emotional abuse, depression
about: A man awakens one day to find he has transformed into a giant cockroach. It’s a metaphor for his depression and what a burden he feels like to his family. If you read anything about Kafka’s life, you’ll understand why he was depressed.
Aoi Asahina
Hamlet by William Shakespeare
when i read it: i’ve forgotten when my first time was because i’ve had to read it so constantly. if i had to wager a guess, i’d say middle school, though i’ve read it for fun, for drama class, and for English class.
did i like it? yes
content warnings: character death, suicidal ideation, incest vibes (depending on your interpretation)
about: Hamlet, not over the early death of his father, is enraged that his mother has married his uncle. He’s really bringing everyone else down about it, and then he starts to see his father’s ghost on top of it all. No one’s sure if he’s just mad with grief or if the ghost is for real, but he starts making life for everyone else difficult when he decides to try and expose his uncle as his father’s murderer.
Yasuhiro Hagakure
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
when i read it: 10th grade i think?
did i like it? if i believed in book-burning, this would’ve been the first turned to ash in my trashcan
content warnings: infidelity, mediocre white men with narcissism, suicide, not sure what else
about: An aging father who thinks he was robbed of success by circumstances refuses to face facts that he is a loser by projecting his failures onto a son that now hates him and thinking real big of himself for a wash-out.
Junko Enoshima
Othello by William Shakespeare
when i read it: college
did i like it? it’s my favorite Shakepseare play, actually!
content warnings: thematic racism/xenophobia/Islamophobia, domestic abuse, character death
about: A tragedy centering around the planned downfall of Othello, Moor of Venice. He’s relatively well-respected for his heroics and generally being a pretty cool guy, but for whatever reason, Iago wants to see him suffer. And when I say “for whatever reason” - it’s because Iago never gives a consistent one, but at the end he admits the entire thing has been his orchestration and he’s had no issue exploiting peoples’ bigotry as a means to an end. One popular and pretty text-evident theory is that Iago is in love with Othello. But - causing a ruckus, bringing society to its knees, and torturing a man just for shits n giggles? Getting it all done by sheer power of charisma? That’s all Junko ever does.
Monokuma
1984 by George Orwell
when i read it: 10th grade for fun, 12th grade for class
did i like it? yes but i don’t recommend it. i like tedious shit.
content warnings: paranoia bait, sexual themes, torture, probably other stuff i’m forgetting
about: Classic dystopia lit in which the government controls the flow of information to the degree of creating its own language (”newspeak”) to explain the technology used to survey its citizens and distill history-changing propaganda. Especially relevant in an era of “fake news.” Where Big Brother Is Watching comes from. Extremely difficult to get into.
Hajime Hinata
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
when i read it: 10th grade
did i like it? yeah
content warnings: ableism, implied domestic abuse, character death, animal death, era-typical sexism (1930s)
about: Very desolate and depressing novella about the futility of the American Dream to “make something of yourself”. Two farmhands, Lennie and George, arrive at a California farm seeking employment. They just want to earn enough money to open up a farm of their own - a rabbit farm - and things are all downhill from there. Well-written and one of Steinbeck’s shorter works.
Twogami
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
when i read it: 11th grade
did i like it? yes! i loved it. but in the way that you love sleazy tabloid rag stories.
content warnings: infidelity, car accidents, character death
about: Stupidly rich people in New York in the 1920s being fake as hell. It’s about excess and decadence and the idea of having a rags-to-riches story, and it’s very homoerotic.
Teruteru Hanamura
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
when i read it: 10th grade
did i like it? one of my top faves tbh
content warnings: alcoholism & drug usage, thematic classism & racism (ie that’s the point), sexual themes, violence, non-graphic suicide (like literally the last sentence), character deaths
about: You know how 1984 is a very pessimistic dystopia about government surveillance? Brave New World is like “what if everything was a utopia because of government interference?” It’s easier to get into than 1984. It’s about a man from the upper echelon of society discovering the dirty secret of how society is able to able to function the way it does, an outsider into his world to shake things up.
Mahiru Koizumi
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
when i read it: i dunno, summer between 9th and 10th grade maybe?
did i like it? yes! i loved it.
content warnings: there are a couple of guys who are sort of gross but there’s nothing that bad in it
about: An upper-middle class family - more the mother than the father - trying to marry off the eldest of their five daughters. It’s largely character-driven and most of the plot focuses on Jane’s relationship with Bingley, Elizabeth’s relationship with Darcy, and the problems witch judging people based on first impressions.
Peko Pekoyama
Call of the Wild by Jack London
when i read it: 9th grade
did i like it? fuck no
content warnings: graphic animal violence. if there’s other stuff i forgot because i fucking hated this book.
about: I think it’s something like a dog getting lost in Alaska and has to learn to be a wolf in order to survive? It’s incredibly brutal and is one of those media where just reading it makes you feel cold.
Hiyoko Saionji
The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams
when i read it: 10th grade
did i like it? not really
content warnings: man i don’t know, but it’s by Tennessee Williams so there’s probably alcoholism, daddy issues, and homophobia
about: An overbearing mother embarrasses her son and disabled daughter when an old school friend comes to visit...I’m not sure if there’s more of a plot to it than that. Like most Williams works, it’s largely character-driven.
Ibuki Mioda
If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino
when i read it: college
did i like it? this is one of those rare exceptions in books where i read it, because i remember having a visceral reaction to it, but i can not for the life of me remember a single damn thing about it other than how stupidly difficult it was to read.
content warnings: it’s metaficiton.
about: You are the protagonist. I genuinely can’t explain anymore than that.
Mikan Tsumiki
A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams
when i read it: 9th grade
did i like it? not really, but i’d be willing to reread it
content warnings: domestic abuse, rape
about: Unstable Blanche DuBois goes to visit her sister, Stella, and meets her appalling husband Stanley. All Tennessee Williams plays seem to have a theme of family tragedy in them, with this being probably the most bleak example.
Nekomaru Nidai
The Odyssey by Homer
when i read it: 9th grade, then again in college for a classics class
did i like it? yeah
content warnings: your usual classical Greek-variety nonsense, including character death, infidelity, and partying.
about: Odysseus attempts to make his way back home after the Trojan War, and has a time of it. Having pissed off Poseidon he’s gotten off-course and gotten lost another ten years, and had a whole slew of other adventures trying to make it back home and save his wife from the harassment she’s been getting since his disappearance.
Gundham Tanaka
The Tempest by William Shakespeare
when i read it: 10th grade
did i like it? not especially
content warnings: thematic colonialism & racism...not sure what else but it’s hard as fuck to read. try reading it out loud & acting along to it.
about: I didn’t totally get it but there’s something about a wizard having been banished and now people are coming back to find him for some reason? the people who exiled him & his brother & daughter have crash-landed on his island and now he might get his revenge. Thanks, TVTropes! All I remember is discussing in one class about how The Tempest managed to predict the “finding” of America and how the English would treat the native peoples. It’s a “romance”, which in that day and age meant it was about magic. Influenced some science fiction works like Brave New World (the title of which comes from a line spoken by Miranda). I should probably reread it.
Nagito Komaeda
The Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger
when i read it: 8th grade for fun
did i like it? yeah
content warnings: implied pedophilia. i’m sure there’s other stuff but i don’t remember it well enough.
about: Perennial troublemaker Holden Caulfield is kicked out of boarding school, and takes a hell of a long time getting home from the place as he complains about his declining mental state, hypocrisy, and loss of innocence. It’s one of those books you either really love or really hate, and has been repeatedly challenged because Holden swears too much and might be bisexual.
Chiaki Nanami
Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw
when i read it: 12th grade, i think
did i like it? yes
content warnings: classism
about: A linguistics professor makes a bet with a friend that he can take any lower-class citizen and teach them to speak formal English, well enough to pass them off as aristocracy to other rich people. It’s the plot upon which the musical My Fair Lady is based, although it was intended as a deconstruction of the kind of plot whose trope it now codifies.
Sonia Nevermind
“Lamb to the Slaughter” by Roald Dahl
when i read it: 10th grade
did i like it? yeah!
content warnings: infidelity, character death
about: A guy comes home and tells his heavily pregnant wife that he’s been having an affair, and he’s leaving her. She doesn’t take it well. I won’t spoil the rest of it, as it’s a short story, but it’s fun to keep in mind that it’s be the same guy who wrote classics such as Matilda and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
Kazuichi Souda
A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare
when i read it: 8th grade for a book report and then again in....i don’t know. i’ve had to read it a lot.
did i like it? sure, it’s got some pretty great insults
content warnings: men being douchebags including stalker-y behavior, and a woman falls in love with a man who has a donkey’s head (it doesn’t last)
about: Hermia & Lysander are planning to run away to get married because Hermia’s father doesn’t approve of Lysander, and she’s trying to dodge the affections of Demetrius - the man to whom she has been betrothed, because he’s an ass who, among other things, slept with her friend Helena and then ditched her. Which Helena is still hung up on, even though he’s a gross creep. At the same time, a group of actors are trying to get together a play for an upcoming royal wedding, and the King of the Faeries is trying to win back his wife. This all connects because a faerie decides to fuck around.
Fuyuhiko Kuzuryu
The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
when i read it: college, for an independent study
did i like it? yeah
content warnings: graphic violence, i think some homophobia?
about: Kids and staff at a private school take a candy sale way too damn seriously. There’s basically a mafia at the school and some sort of weird popularity contest and hazing going on.
Akane Owari
“The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell
when i read it: 9th grade
did i like it? i guess so
content warnings: human hunting
about: A man finds himself shipwrecked on an island, and is then hunted for sport. No, really.
Monomi
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
when i read it: technically i’m in the middle of it right now, but that counts, right?
did i like it? so far, i guess i do, but it’s mainly i care character who comes up later. couldn’t give less of a shit about adam trask, full offense
content warnings: period-typical sexism & racism (set around the turn of the 20th century and published in 1952), implied pedophilia (that gets incredibly glossed over), ableism
about: A combination of heavy-handed religious allegory (Steinbeck really just can’t cool it with the Cain and Abel theme naming) and family tree history. Follows the Trask family through Adam’s childhood, tumultuous relationship with his brother, even worse relationship with his wife, and horrible parenting of his children. The end (which is what the film adaptation covers) is more centered on his son Cal Trask grappling with the idea that he might be evil because of his genetics, or something. I think that’s an argument you could make of Monomi, being related to Monokuma (or at least, how i’m sure she’d feel).
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The Watering Hole Pilot Episode: Three is Not a Crowd
(aka Cheers!... In!!… Space!!!)
Finnreylo fan fic for the @finnreylopositive double prompt: CHEERS!. An AU for the old American sitcom Cheers. Post TFA canonverse in which Ben Solo never went to the dark side but clearly other things happened as expected because both Finn and Rey are here.
Set in The Watering Hole, the most popular bar in the military complex on Coruscant, frequented by a likable gang of pilots and misfits. In our pilot episode, the bar’s three employees need to work through a misunderstanding and make some decisions about their relationship.
Note: This is written in response to the @finnreylopositive double prompt (described here); so if you want to jump off from here, make artwork or if this story or write another episode please do so. Just be sure to tag me and tag @finnreylopositive too!
Also on AO3
Rose and Poe trade a glance as Finn walks quickly out of the office, sets down the datapad in his hand, and begins vigorously wiping down the counter at the bar across the street from the Galactic Republic’s main military complex on Coruscant. They can tell something’s bothering The Watering Hole’s assistant bartender. The former stormtrooper is one of the most popular people in military circles; everyone was shocked when he decided to work at the bar instead of joining as a soldier, but no one could blame him. And the work definitely suits him. So if he’s not smiling, or chatty, or both, that’s a definite sign that something is wrong with Finn.
“What's up, man?” Poe asks before he takes another swallow of ale.
Finn ignores him and wipes the counter even more aggressively.
Rose reaches out past her own glass and catches him by the wrist. He stops moving and gives her a side eye.
“Come on, man,” she says. “You are the most transparent person and we can tell when there’s something wrong. So you can stand here and make us keep bugging you, or you can just tell us what’s up.”
He pulls his hand away, drops the rag back into the bucket under the bar, and sighs.
“Okay, fine, I’ll tell you.”
~10 minutes earlier~
“Ben, stop it, somebody could see.”
“Oh, come on sweetheart, this is the office, no one’s going to walk in on us here. And even if they did, what’s a little kissing between coworkers?” Ben Solo, the owner and main bartender of The Watering Hole, sits lightly against the desk and grins up at Rey, his business manager and sometimes-waitress, her booted feet between his, her hands resting atop of his thighs and his hands on her face. He rubs his thumbs against the apples of her cheeks. “You’re a little flushed, are you hot?”
She grins right back at him. “I don’t know, am I?”
Ben works his jaw, watching Rey’s eyes follow the movement, before he touches the end of his nose against hers and says, “I heard a rumor that the General’s son thinks you are.”
She pulls her head back and raises an eyebrow. “The General’s son? He’s a scoundrel, like his father. I wouldn’t trust his opinion.”
“Oh, okay, I see how it is. Well, I heard another rumor that someone else thinks you’re hot, too.” This earns him another raised eyebrow, and one glance at his mouth. He’ll take it. “Yeah, sweetheart, his name’s Finn, he’s the assistant bartender here. Maybe you’ve heard of him?”
Rey looks delighted. “Oh, I’ve met him and he’s lovely. And I trust his opinion, too.” They’re both happy, excited from the flirting, and she steps closer as he tips her head with his fingers and presses his lips to hers. They move together for a moment and he’s just thinking about her tongue when she pulls back again.
The expression on her face is mischievous. “I heard a rumor, too.”
“Oh yeah, what’s that?”
“I heard a rumor that Finn also thinks you’re hot.”
Ben gives her a half-smile. “Oh come on, where did you hear something like that?”
“He told me.” She looks very satisfied.
“He told you? When did he tell you that?”
“Last week, the evening Red Squadron was sent out on that mission to Dantooine. He was sad that so many of his friends were leaving at once, so we had a few drinkies at my place after closing. He got just a little chatty.”
Ben hums and moves his hands from Rey’s face down to her waist and pulls her even closer to him. Her hands grip his thighs a bit more tightly.
“I’m sorry I missed it, that could have been interesting.”
Rey sighs. “I was hoping it would get interesting. I kept thinking he would make a move but he never did.”
“Well maybe we should do something about that. Since we’ve got our thing…”
“Oh, we’ve got a thing have we?”
Ben ignores her interruption and keeps talking. “Our thing, we should bring him in. Make it a thing for three. If he’s interested.”
Rey’s cheeks are even more flushed than they were a minute ago. “Oh, Ben, that is such a good idea. We should do that. Come here and give me a real kiss, now.”
He’s more than happy to comply, and in a few minutes his hands are cupping her ass, hers are in his hair, she’s leaning over, just starting to push him back, and both tongues are fully in play when the door to the office opens and Finn walks in, his eyes on the datapad in his hands.
“Hey guys, I was looking at the inventory and I think we need more bottles…” At this point Finn looks up, and sees the other two, rumpled and flushed, looking at him guiltily. They hadn’t even pulled away from each other; Rey still leaning over Ben, her hands wrapped around his thick, dark, soft-looking hair, his large hands holding her up by her ass.
Finn stutters an apology, does his best to hide his embarrassment, and steps out, pulling the door shut behind him. He hears Rey yell “Finn!” as the door closes, but he’s too upset to go back in. He likes them both and now they’re together and life just really isn’t fair.
So he’ll just tend the bar until he has to face them again.
***
“Wait, wait, wait.” Poe looks confused. “So, you walked in on them kissing.”
“They weren’t just kissing, Poe, they were making out, right on the desk. She was basically on top of him.”
Poe takes a big gulp from his glass, finishing it up, and sets it back solidly on the bar. “I don’t understand, though. That’s what you do, right?” He looks to Rose for confirmation. “Right?”
Rose is nodding. “Yeah, Finn, I don’t see what the big deal is? Don’t, like, all three of you make out?”
“What?? No! Why would you think that?” Finn takes Poe’s empty glass and refills it at the tap.
The two on the other side of the bar exchange a glance. Rose shrugs. “Uh, because you’re together all the time?”
Poe nods. “Yeah, like you work together, but you also live together, and you hang out together…”
Finn sets down the glass in front of Poe hard enough that some of the liquid sloshes over the side and Poe tuts before taking a sip.
“We don’t live together.” Finn says.
Rose rolls her eyes. “You live on the same corridor, close enough. You’re in each other’s rooms all the time.”
“You’re always flirting,” Poe adds.
“Constant flirting. Glances. Touches.”
“Inside jokes.”
Rose laughs around the rim of her glass. “Oh gosh, the inside jokes are the worst.” She imitates a deep voice. “‘That bottle! It belongs to me!’ ‘Come get it.’ Well, I don’t get it even if you guys think that’s hilarious.”
Now Finn’s looking thoughtful. “Are you guys serious? Did you actually think we were dating - all three of us?”
Poe frowns and nods. “Yeah, definitely. It’s, like, the assumption on the base. I think we all just take it for granted.”
Finn’s still having trouble processing this information. “I’m pretty sure you guys are pulling my leg.”
At that moment, Jessika and Tallie come into the bar, with Snap Wexley following closely behind. “Hey, everybody!” Tallie says loudly.
“Hey Tallie!” Poe and Rose and everyone else in the bar shouts at the youngest pilot.
“How’s life treating you?” Asks Finn, pulling glasses of ale for all three of them as they take seats at the bar around Rose and Poe.
“It’s not, but that doesn’t mean you can’t,” Tallie answers with a smirk. Finn winks at her as he sets down her drink.
Poe turns to the man settling on the stool next to him. “Hey Snap, let me ask you something.”
“Sure thing,” Snap replies, nodding at Finn in thanks as he passes the glass across the bar.
Poe points at the bartender. “Who’s Finn dating?”
Snap smiles and nods. “Yeah, he’s dating Rey and Ben, right? The bartending threesome, that’s how I think of them.” He stops short, then nods at Finn. “Hope you don’t mind, that’s just how my brain works.”
Finn has to lean on the bar for support. “So everyone really thinks we’re all dating?”
Tallie and Jessika exchange a confused glance. “You mean you’re not?”
Before Finn can come up with a retort, the door to the office opens and Ben and Rey come out, looking rumpled, pink, and sorry.
The group at the bar calls out to them, and they wave, but stay where they are, instead gesturing to Finn to come towards them. He does so, in a manner he hopes looks casual. Super casual, yup. Very casual.
As he gets closer he can see that Rey’s eyes are a bit red, as though she’s been crying, and without thinking he puts his arms around her and pulls her into a hug. Ben just stands there, watching them.
Rey puts her arms around his waist and clears her throat. “That’s not how we wanted you to find out we were dating, I’m sorry.”
He shrugs and shakes his head. “That’s okay. I’m glad you’re happy with each other, you guys are two of my favorite people and, you know,” he lets her go and takes a step back, “that’s good.”
Ben’s running a hand through his hair and tapping a foot, and won’t look Finn in the eye. “We were actually wondering if you’d, uh, like to have dinner with us. After closing, we could go out somewhere, somewhere nice, we could, uh, talk?”
It’s a nice gesture, but unnecessary, and Finn shakes his head. “That’s kind of you, but you don’t need to explain anything to me. This is cool, it’s cool. I’m cool.” He’s not cool, not at all, but admitting that won’t help so better not to.
But Rey’s giggling, almost laughing, and she puts a hand on his shoulder before running it down his arm and taking his hand.
“We’re asking you on a date, Finn.”
He looks back and forth between them, Rey still looking slightly teary, but smiling, and Ben looking nervous and slightly uncomfortable.
“What?” He’s pretty sure he’s hallucinating.
Ben finally makes eye contact, and his eyes are beautiful, honey-brown and pleading. “We, uh, like you. Both of us, and we’re pretty sure you like us too. So, you know, a date?”
Finn’s nodding, and feels a smile coming on. “Yeah, a date would be good. A date! I would love to go on a date with both of you. Yes. A date!” Then he turns around to the group on the other side of the bar. “Hey guys, I have a date! We’re going on a date!”
The five friends lift their glasses in the air, and raise a cheer to the happy threesome.
#finnreylo#finnreylopositive#first prompt: cheers!#cheers au#cheers sitcom au#canonverse au#post-tfa
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I made a Taylor Swift Music Education Lesson that covers each album, in order, and my favorite songs from said album. I included bits of each album’s prologue and background information on each album, plus my personal opinions on each. I made this for some coworkers that want to learn more about Taylor, feel free to look it over and pass it on to anyone you’re trying to convert someone into a Swiftie :) There is a Spotify link for a playlist I made that has all these songs. You can find that at the bottom :)
Welcome to your Taylor Swift Music Education Lesson. Please read carefully.
For your education and enjoyment (hopefully), I have included a detailed track-list of all the songs on your Spotify playlist. These songs appear in order of album, beginning with Fearless and ending with reputation. I did not include Taylor’s debut album in this lesson. It’s a great album, but has a heavy country influence and was written when she was 14, so it is difficult to relate to and/or isolating to those who do not appreciate country music. Within each album, there is no specific order. As I introduce a new album, I provide you with a bit of background information to give you a more thorough understanding. This background information begins with a blurb taken directly from the prologue that Taylor wrote for said album. With each track title I have included my favorite lyric from that song. You may also see some asterisks with notes scattered throughout. I couldn’t resist. The songs I chose are either a) my favorite, b) a fan favorite, c) generally iconic in nature, or c) songs I think, or hope, you will like. My favorite song off each album is indicated with multiple exclamation points. Let’s begin.
FEARLESS: “To me, “FEARLESS” is not the absence of fear. It’s not being completely unafraid. To me, FEARLESS is having fears. FEARLESS is having doubts. Lots of them. To me, FEARLESS is living in spite of those things that scare you to death.” Fearless is Taylor’s second album and was released in the fall of 2008 when Taylor was 18. It is actually the most highly-awarded country album of all time. Fearless won Album of the Year at the 2010 Grammy’s when Taylor was 20 years old. Taylor is the youngest person to ever win that award. There are 13 tracks on this album, and 8 were written solely by Taylor. This album cemented me as a stan, and the songs saved my life in high school. I have Fearless tattooed on my back, and I truly believe that I wouldn’t be who I am today without this album. I’d probably be dead in a gutter somewhere. Joking, but seriously, high school was rough. Thank God for Tswift.
1. Forever & Always!!!!!!!!!!!: “It rains in your bedroom when everything’s wrong. It rains when you’re here and it rains when you’re gone.”
2. Fifteen: “Back then I swore I was gonna marry him someday, but I realized some bigger dreams of mine. And Abigail gave everything she had to a boy who changed his mind, and we both cried. ‘Cause when you’re fifteen and somebody tells you they love you, you’re gonna believe them.” *Abigail was Taylor’s best friend in high school, and they’re still friends today.*
3. Love Story: “This love is difficult, but it’s real. Don’t be afraid, we’ll make it out of this mess.” *This is Taylor’s first #1 song. It went #1 on both country and pop radio. She attributes her career to this song. She wrote the song in 20 minutes solo on her bedroom floor after an argument with her parents over a boy.*
4. The Best Day: “I’m thirteen now and don’t know how my friends could be so mean. I come home crying and you hold me tight and grab the keys. And we drive and drive until we find a town far enough away, and we talk and window shop ‘til I’ve forgotten all their names. I don’t know who I’m gonna talk to now at school, but I know I’m laughing on the car ride home with you. Don’t know how long it’s gonna take to feel okay, but I know I had the best day with you today. *Taylor wrote this song for her mom.*
5. Breathe: “People are people, and sometimes it doesn’t work out. Nothing we say is gonna save us from the fall-out.”
6. Fearless: “We’re drivin’ down the road, I wonder if you know I’m tryin’ so hard not to get caught up now. But you’re just so cool running your hands through your hair, absent mindedly making me want you.”
7. Tell Me Why: “Why do you have to make me feel small so you can feel whole inside? Why do you have to put down my dreams so you’re the only thing on my mind?”
SPEAK NOW: “What you say might be too much for some people. Maybe it will come out all wrong and you'll stutter and you'll walk away embarrassed, wincing as you play it all back in your head. But I think the words you stop yourself from saying are the ones that will haunt you the longest. So say it to them. Or say it to yourself in the mirror. Say it in a letter you'll never send or in a book millions might read someday. I think you deserve to look back on your life without a chorus of resounding voices saying 'I could've, but it's too late now.' There is a time for silence. There is a time for waiting your turn. But if you know how you feel, and you so clearly know what you need to say, you'll know it. I don't think you should wait. I think you should speak now.” Speak Now is Taylor’s third album and was released in the fall of 2010 when Taylor was 20. There are 14 tracks, all written solely by Taylor. There are no co-writers on this record. After Taylor won AOTY for Fearless, many of her critics said that it was impossible that she carried her weight in those writing sessions. Basically, the songs on Fearless were so good that a lot of people didn’t believe that she actually wrote them. To prove them wrong, she decided to write the album entirely by herself. This album is the fan favorite, and is my second favorite. I feel like this album was way ahead of its time. Speak Now is the kind of album I’d expect a musician to write towards the end of his/her career once they stop caring about crafting the perfect song, and start making great music for the hell of it. Most of the songs on Speak Now are over 5 minutes in length with many clocking in over 6 minutes. Definitely not suited for radio. Taylor is known for painting stories in her lyrics, and I’d say Speak Now does that the best. I met Taylor during the Speak Now Era, the most lauded of eras amongst fans. To have seen the Speak Now concert is a huge deal in the Swiftie fandom. The concert was absolutely magical. If you don’t believe me, you’re welcome to come over and watch the live DVD. Most of the general public knows next to nothing about Speak Now because none of the songs really charted on radio. However, Speak Now is the first of her albums to sell a million or more copies in the first week (a pattern not broken thus far. #blessed). Speak Now Era was sort of the golden age because she had proved herself to be incredibly talented and cemented her place in the music industry, and yet her PR stunts were at a minimum. Nobody hated her yet, and she kind of went back under the radar despite being at her prime. It was downhill from there, but we were all oblivious to that fact. We were just so blissed out, we couldn’t see the impending doom on the horizon. I could honestly write an entire thesis on Speak Now. Anyway, it was a strange time, indeed.
8. Mean: “You have pointed out my flaws again, as if I don’t already see them.” *Like I said above, the songs on Speak Now were not widely popular and didn’t chart on radio, with the exception of this one. ‘Mean’ won Country Song of the Year at the Grammy’s in 2012. Taylor wrote this song as a way to cope with relentless and over the top, mean-spirited criticism from a specific music critic named Bob Lefetsz. Suck it, Bob.
9. Mine: “But we’ve got bills to pay, we’ve got nothin’ figured out. When it was hard to take, this is what I thought about.”
10. Last Kiss: “How you’d kiss me when I was in the middle of sayin’ something, there’s not a day I don’t miss those rude interruptions.”
11. Haunted: “Come on, don’t leave me like this. I thought I had you figured out.”
12. Never Grow Up: “You’re in the car on the way to the movies, and you’re mortified your mom’s droppin’ you off. At fourteen there’s just so much you can’t do, and you can’t wait to move out someday and call your own shots. But don’t make her drop you off around the block, remember that she’s getting older too.” *Taylor wrote this the night she moved out of her parent’s house and into her first apartment in Nashville.*
13. Sparks Fly: “You’re the kind of reckless that should send me runnin’, but I kinda know that I won’t get far.” *Taylor first performed this song back in 2006 at a random live show when she first started out. Fans recorded it and it went viral. For years fans begged her to record it for an album. She did! Thank you, Taylor! We are #blessed.*
14. Enchanted!!!!!!!!!!!!: “The playful conversation starts, counter all your quick remarks like passing notes in secrecy.”
15. Back to December: “It turns out freedom ain’t nothin’ but missin’ you.”
RED: “My experiences in love have taught me difficult lessons, especially my experiences with crazy love. The red relationships. The ones that went from zero to a hundred miles per hour and then hit a wall and exploded. And it was awful. And ridiculous. And desperate. And thrilling. And when the dust settled, it was something I’d never take back. Because there is something to be said for being young and needing someone so badly, you jump in head first without looking. And there’s something to be learned from waiting all day for a train that’s never coming. And there’s something to be proud of about moving on and realizing that real love shines golden like starlight, and doesn’t fade or spontaneously combust. Maybe I’ll write a whole album about that kind of love if I ever find it. But this album is about the other kinds of love that I’ve recently fallen in and out of. Love that was treacherous, sad, beautiful, and tragic. But most of all, this record is about love that was red.” Oh, Red. I have so many thoughts about you. For starters, Red is Taylor’s fourth album and was released in the fall of 2012. Red is comprised of 16 tracks. Like I said previously, the Speak Now Era was such an incredible time, and Swifties didn’t want to let it go. We didn’t want things to change. I think the Red Era is the only era that Swifties didn’t welcome with open arms. We just didn’t know how to feel, and were afraid of things changing. But Taylor was headed in a more pop direction, and we could all sense it. Of course, Taylor had always been pop, or country pop, but that’s neither here nor there… And so, Red was Taylor’s “pop” debut, because she wrote three songs with pop hitmakers Max Martin and Yohan Shellback. But, it was also her rock debut if you ask me. Red was like a patchwork quilt of music: differently styles, production types, collaborators, producers. Taylor was trying new things and flapping her wings. And it worked. At first, I was hesitant to leave Speak Now behind, but Red quickly became my favorite album and still is. Taylor’s best songs are on Red. That is unanimously agreed upon in the fandom and throughout. Red is Taylor’s crown jewel, her zenith. Unfortunately, Taylor suffered a lot of hate and backlash for her dating life during 2012 and 2013, and that really clouded the success of Red. Like Taylor has said before, she was promoting a massively successful album and touring the world, and all people wanted to talk about was her personal life and it broke her heart. Well, Taylor, it broke mine too. Next to Fearless, Red is the album that helped me most in life. Red chronicles a disastrous heartbreak from beginning to end. The anger, the frustration, the sadness, the regret, the hopelessness, the pining away. You name it, she wrote about it. If you’re ever heartbroken, put on this album. (Except I hope that never happens to you!!) It’s interesting to me that she wrote the songs for Red while she was touring Speak Now, because we thought she was really happy at that time. But, what do we know? We never really know. Well, Red was nominated for Album of the Year at the 2014 Grammy’s and lost to Daft Punk. Whoever announced the winner that night really dragged out the R when he said “Random Access Memories Daft Punk”. So naturally, Taylor thought she had the award and her face lit up. Only to see that she did not, in fact, win. So, she stood up and clapped, although still looking a little miffed/embarrassed. Well, what do you know, the next day the internet is tearing her apart and making fun of the face she made when she thought she had it and then realized she didn’t. She became a gif, a meme, everything. I have seen the waves of irrational, baseless and crude hatred and bullying of her on the internet over the years and that, to me, was the worst. UNFORGIVABLE! So, anyway, it didn’t win the award, but fans and music critics unanimously agree that it should have. Speak Now might be the fan favorite album, due to the attachment to the Speak Now Era, but we all agree that Red is her best work. Alrighty, let’s dive in! Finally, right?!
16. I Knew You Were Trouble: “Flew me to places I’d never been, ‘til you put me down.”
17. Everything Has Changed ft. Ed Sheeran: “All I feel in my stomach is butterflies, the beautiful kind, makin’ up for lost time, taking flight making me feel like I just wanna know you better.” *Taylor and Ed are best friends in real life. They claim they wrote this song whilst having In n Out burgers on her trampoline in the backyard. I believe them.*
18. Treacherous: “Nothing safe is worth the drive and I will follow you home.” *This song is cowritten and produced by Dan Wilson from Semisonic.*
19. Sad Beautiful Tragic: “Distance, timing, breakdown, fighting, silence… the train runs off its tracks.”
20. Red!!!!!!!!!: “Moving on from him is impossible when I still see it all in my head, in burning red.”
21. Holy Ground: “We took off faster than a green light go, yeah you skip the conversation when you already know.”
22. All Too Well: “I’d like to be my old self again, but I’m still trying to find it.” *The original version of this song is over ten minutes long. This is, unanimously, Taylor’s best song of all time. Check any list by any critic and this song will be at the #1 spot. I think, for me, Red and All Too Well are tied for favorites.*
23. Begin Again: “You throw your head back laughin’ like a little kid. I think it’s strange that you think I’m funny, ‘cause he never did.”
24. The Last Time ft. Gary Lightbody of Snow Patrol: “You wear your best apology, but I was there to watch you leave.”
1989: “I wrote about moving to the loudest and brightest city in the world, the city I had always been overwhelmed by… until now. I think you have to know who you are and what you want in order to take on New York and all its blaring truth. I wrote about the thrill I got when I finally learned that love, to some extent, is just a game of cat and mouse. I wrote about looking back on a lost love and understanding that nothing good comes without loss and hardship and constant struggle. There is no ‘riding off into the sunset’, like I used to imagine. We are never out of the woods, because we are always going to be fighting for something. I wrote about love that comes back to you just when you thought it was lost forever, and some feelings never go out of style. I wrote about an important lesson I learned recently… that people can say whatever they want about me, but they can’t make me lose my mind. I’ve learned how to shake things off. I’ve told you my stories for years now. Some have been about coming of age, some have been about coming undone. This is a story about coming into your own, and as a result… coming alive.” Oh man. I have a lot of feelings about this one, too. And not the good kind. Let’s start with facts. 1989 is Taylor’s fifth album and was released in the fall of 2014. There are 13 songs. And that’s it for the facts, because now I’m going to dive into my feelings and opinions about this one. Which are basically facts, but anyway... So, like I said previously, Taylor did not win AOTY for Red and that bothered her. She went home to her hotel room, gorged herself on In n Out burgers, and cried (Dramatic much?!? It’s okay though ‘cause it was a rough night. And I’m not making this up, she really told us that’s how the night went down. POOR TAY!). Next thing you know, she wakes up in the middle of the night with an epiphany that she is going to make a sonically cohesive pop album. She said the problem with Red was that it wasn’t “sonically cohesive”. Swifties hate the word sonically cohesive. It hurts me that I am even typing it. If you are in my presence do not say the word sonically cohesive, okay? Moving on. In a way, she was right. Red WASN’T sonically cohesive, but that’s kind of what we loved about it. Every song on Red sounds exactly like the feeling the lyrics portray. We didn’t think it was an issue. But Taylor wanted to hone in on a specific sound and perfect that and keep things neat and clean. And, of course, that sound was going to be pop. EXCEPT SHE’S ALWAYS BEEN POP BUT SURE. So, Taylor decides to try 80s synth pop (I guess?) and go with that. And so 1989 is born. Look, I love the narrative and inspiration behind 1989. I am really inspired by the prologue I shared up there. It was all about independence and friendships and not needing a man because she had stopped dating. But she also said she had to stop dating because the hate got so bad. So, the whole single life thing was kind of forced on her, but whatever, she embraced it. Except we all know she wasn’t *really* single (Hello Karlie Kloss!!). When the first single from 1989, Shake It Off, came out, I cried incessantly. I was inconsolable, and my friend’s dad had to make us grilled cheeses to cope. Shake It Off never grew on me, and to this day it’s my least favorite Taylor song EVER (it’s borderline unbearable), but the rest of the album did grow on me. To a degree. The problem with 1989 is that a handful of the songs are incredible, and the rest feel incomplete/watered down/like filler. I feel like she really worked to perfect a few of the songs and geared them in a way to be popular on radio, and the rest were afterthoughts. 1989 is the only Taylor album where the best songs were chosen as singles (except for Shake It Off). With Taylor’s albums, usually the best songs feel like hidden gems because they’re never chosen for radio, and so the public doesn’t know about them. I’m happy that everyone got to enjoy her songs from 1989, but it also felt like there was nothing left over for the fans that felt special. The best songs on 1989 ended up overplayed and overdone. 1989 is the first tour I did not attend. I can be honest with you and say I regret that. 1989 isn’t a bad album, it’s a good album, but as far as Taylor’s work goes, it’s just not the best. But it did win Album of the Year in 2016, making her the first woman to win that award TWICE. To go a little deeper, it wasn’t even so much the 1989 album that I disliked, I think it was more the Era/Taylor in general during 1989 that didn’t jive with me. She got obsessed with appearance, and status, and there were some strange business dealings that left fans feeling used and abused. Before 1989, Taylor felt like the “girl next door” (I do realize she’s a celebrity and not the girl next door at all, but her perfected relatability factor became part of her marketing image), but during 1989 Taylor threw that all away to be #squadgoals with the Victoria’s secret models. Whatever, it was a strange time. Glad that is over. ALSO, listen to Ryan Adams cover of this album. It’s better than the OG at times. Aight aight, let’s dig into these sick beats (ugh).
25. Welcome to New York: “When we first dropped our bags on apartment floors, took our broken hearts, put them in a drawer. Everybody here was someone else before, and you can want who you want, boys and boys and girls and girls.” *Taylor moved to NYC the summer gay marriage was legalized in New York. Thanks for the shoutout Tay.*
26. I Know Places: “Just grab my hand and don’t ever drop it, my love. They are the hunters, we are the foxes, and we run.”
27. Clean!!!!!!: “It was months and months of back and forth, you’re still all over me like a wine-stained dress I can’t wear anymore.” *Despite 1989 being my least favorite album, this song is one of my all-time favorites. It’s brilliant how she compares a relationship to an addiction. And Imogen Heap comes through for some dope ass background vocals.*
28. Out of the Woods: “The monsters turned out to be just trees, when the sun came up you were looking at me.” *Ryan Adams cover is amazing, and so is an acoustic piano version Taylor did for the Grammy museum. Check youtube.*
29. You Are In Love: “You keep his shirt, he keeps his word.”
30. Style: “I say ‘I’ve heard that you’ve been out and about with some other girl. He said ‘What you heard is true, but I can’t stop thinkin’ ‘bout you.” I said ‘I’ve been there too, a few times.’”
31. Wildest Dreams: “You see me in hindsight, tangled up with you all night, burning it down. Someday when you leave me I hope these memories follow you around.”
32. This Love: “Tossing, turning, struggled through the night with someone knew… Lantern burning, flickered in my mind for only you, but you were still gone and gone, gone and gone.”
Reputation: “We think we know someone, but the truth is that we only know the version of them they have chosen to show us. We know our friend in a certain light, but we don't know them the way their lover does. Just the way their lover will never know them the same way that you do as their friend. Their mother knows them differently than their roommate, who knows them differently than their colleague. Their secret admirer looks at them and sees an elaborate sunset of brilliant color and dimension and spirit and pricelessness. And yet, a stranger will pass that person and see a faceless member of the crowd, nothing more. We may hear rumors about a person and believe those things to be true. We may one day meet that person and feel foolish for believing baseless gossip. This is the first generation that will be able to look back on their entire life story documented in pictures on the internet, and together we will all discover the after-effects of that. Ultimately, we post photos online to curate what strangers think of us. But then we wake up, look in the mirror at our faces and see the cracks and scars and blemishes, and cringe. We hope someday we'll meet someone who will see that same morning face and instead see their future, their partner, their forever. Someone who will still choose us even when they see all of the sides of the story, all the angles of the kaleidoscope that is you.” Last album?!? I can’t believe we’re here already! Reputation, Taylor’s 6th album, was released in the fall of 2017 and consists of 15 tracks. At the start, reputation was a wild ride. During the 1989 Era, Taylor managed to crawl out of the pit of hate and despair that the Red Era brought, and she soared to popularity. I’ve noticed this happens with Taylor, the love/hate comes in waves. One day everyone loves her again, and then the next they hate her. During 1989 Taylor was flying high. Highest grossing tour, AOTY, “dating” (I have to put that in quotes, but that’s a whole other can of worms) Calvin Harris… but, nothing good can last forever, and so literally everything fell apart. Messy break up with Calvin, even messier drama with Kimye (can’t even get into that). Things weren’t going so well. Taylor had reached overexposure and she went into hiding for almost a year. No performances, no candid shots, no interviews, no mags, nothing. She usually releases a new album like clockwork every two years, but she skipped her typical release season and tacked on another year to the wait. Well, while she was hiding, Taylor was doing what she does best.. making music. At some point during the summer Taylor put all of her music back on streaming accounts, and so I knew then that something was brewing. She finally announced the name of the album and released the first single, “Look What You Made Me Do”. The day she dropped “Look What You Made Me Do” was one of the craziest days for just about everyone, let alone Swifties. It felt like the world was literally collapsing over this song. The internet was breaking. A few people loved it right away, some people thought she had cracked and was finally losing her damn mind, and I was just confused and depressed. The day it was released I spent a large portion of the day crying. I cried and clutched onto my 1989 CD (but I never even liked 1989 that much… which shows how much I was worried….) But, before I knew it, I was bopping along to the song and loved it like the rest. And once the music video came out, I realized that everything was going to be okay. If you haven’t seen the music video, you need to. It’s iconic. It broke Youtube’s record for most views in 24 hrs. A few more songs came out before album release and I wasn’t *that* crazy about most of them. Turns out that reputation is like all of Taylor’s albums before 1989, the best songs were not released as singles. Back 2 Basics, guys. The fans get everything, and everyone else gets the scraps. When the album finally did come out I was overjoyed. Now let’s see why!
33. Delicate: “Is it cool that I said all that? Is it chill that you’re in my head? ‘Cause I know that it’s delicate.”
34. Getaway Car: “I wanted to leave him, I need a reason.” *Jack Antonoff produced this song and many others on reputation. We are #blessed. I recently read somebody say that Jack has a stranglehold on pop music. I WISH!!*
35. Dancing With Our Hands Tied: “I loved you in spite of deep fears that the world would divide us.” *Beginning at some point in 2014, Karlie Kloss and Taylor Swift entered a torrid love affair. It’s possible they are still together today. That’s a discussion for a later date. Anyway, this song is definitely about her. Funny how some people think Taylor hates gay people (why?) when really she writes songs for them. Thanks Tay.
36. Dress: “I woke up just in time, now I wake up by your side.” *Also for Karlie.*
37. Call It What You Want!!!!: “I brought a knife to a gun fight, they took the crown but it’s alright.”
38. I Did Something Bad: “They’re burning all the witches, even if you aren’t one, so light me up.”
39. Don’t Blame Me: “For you I would fall from grace just to touch your face. If you walk away, I’d beg you on my knees to stay.”
40. King of My Heart: “I’m perfectly fine, I live on my own. I made up my mind, I’m betting off being alone. We met a few weeks ago, now you try on calling me baby like trying on clothes.”
41. New Year’s Day: “You squeeze my hand three times in the back of the taxi. I can tell that it’s gonna be a long road. I’ll be there if you’re the toast of the town babe, or if you strike out and you’re crawling home.”
Spotify link: https://open.spotify.com/user/22xaifvaciqklwgcnidnxuuhq/playlist/7ssFqGusg3Sf1sPe5cS7hR
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Time of Your Life
Pairing: Harry Holland x Protagonist (brief, planned), Tom Holland x Protagonist (main, planned)
Synopsis: Jacob Batalon’s youngest cousin (Protagonist) is now – as of August – 18 years old. At the nearly-ripe age of 17, she accompanied her cousin to the Spider-Man: Homecoming premiere where she grows acquainted with the younger crowd of the star-studded cast and – most importantly – piques the interest of two Holland boys, Harry (who’s the same age) and Tom (who’s three years her senior).
Author’s Note: TOM HOLLAND AND HARRISON OSTERFIELD FINALLY MAKE THEIR WAY INTO THIS STORY WOOOOOO HOOOOOOO. In other news, this is kind of lengthy because it goes into a whole story about the protagonist’s school crush, Jake, and how much of an ass he is and how the Holy Trinity helps her forget the douche, and yeah. Such excitement!1!!!!! If you like stories about girls getting over fuckbois, read this!!!!!
Trigger Warnings: Protagonist has somewhat of a breakdown, there’s mentions of suicide but they’re brief (not even central to the plot)
Word Count: 2,992
Part I // Part II //Part III: The Holy Trinities
In which the protagonist learns of the two holiest trinities out there: Intellectualism, False Hope, and Loneliness; Tom Holland, Jacob Batalon and Harrison Osterfield.
My role in student government (ASB) was plain and simple as the Attorney General. Like the Attorney General of the United States, I basically represent the ASB in conflicts and preside over the “legal” aspects of clubs, such as the drafting of their charters and other procedural duties. Each day I’d be allowed to leave Study Period fifteen minutes early to assume my position at the front desk of the Student Government office and consume my lunch before parents, staff and students came barging in with worthless questions and futile threats.
Study Period was with Vicky, Sam, Imani and Carlos in Mr. Rosenblatt’s class that day, and we noticed that he was unusually irked with us. Normally, he’d pull up a sixth chair whenever First Period classes served as Study Period homeroom and openly prattle on with his favourite students, but that he didn’t seem quite in the mood. Neither did I, after Third Period, in between.
I’d already had a whole block period – two hours – of the four of my friends jabbering about how, technically, if the premiere was going to supplant my prom experience, Harry Holland could be my “date,” and I’d grown sick of it. On top of that, during Third Period AP Calculus, I’d dozed off after the sugar in the Slurpee wore on me. Jake was in the class with me and, just like in Mr. Rosenblatt’s class, he sat across the room from me. Instead of ignoring me, his chair was perfectly positioned to give him a spectacular view of my drool dripping onto my textbook and the scaly calculator imprint on my cheek when I finally woke up from that glorious slumber.
Jake had somewhat of a laugh and a smirk and a snigger, with dark coiffure of John F. Kennedy, Jr. volume. His lips were thin and his eyebrows the polar opposite, but somehow the lines of hair above his eyes remained symmetrical and tame. When he turned to the side, his profile was perfectly chiselled – his jaw and cheekbones formed a perfect triangle-like dip when he would suck his cheeks in, and his nose was big but not too big. And he had light brown skin, the perfect mixture of his father’s and mother’s. It was miraculous that this was what my mental capacities generated with a lack of sleep, and even more of a blessing that Jake was laughing more to himself that to his friends who were perplexed by rotations problems.
This reel of Jake’s amusement from my struggle to stay awake replayed and replayed in my head as I was fighting my anxiety to saunter towards Mr. Rosenblatt. Jake sat in the chair closest to his desk and the wall, so he had a perfect view of Mr. Rosenblatt on his desktop and anyone who came up to ask him questions.
As I approached Mr. Rosenblatt I saw Jake’s head perk up a little. His phony attentiveness became clear as his eyes skimmed lines of Shakespeare and averted to me. The brown circles rested on the left corners of his eyes as his smirk curled on the right side of his mouth. Indubitable eavesdropping done by the prettiest boy in school, and it was on my conversation.
I cleared my throat: “Mr. Rosenblatt?”
“Yes, Ms. Maja,” he scrunched up his nose like a little mole rat. Mr. Rosenblatt kind of looked like one but no one scrutinized his looks because we all knew he had breast cancer, and for our class, he’d missed the most days for chemotherapy. It fell under some cardinal sin to give him shit because he was dying.
“I just wanted to ask if I could go to the ASB right now instead of later,” I prefaced. “I finished part of the CRQ’s in class but I wasn’t feeling well in calculus –”
Jake deadass cackled.
“Uhm, Jake?” Mr. Rosenblatt inquired. “Do you have anything to contribute to this bilateral conversation?”
“I’ll make it trilateral by letting you know that Maja did indeed fall into a deep slumber in calculus and I watched it from an admirer’s distance,” Jake’s charmingly apprised our teacher and caused Mr. Rosenblatt to chuckle along with him.
“Well, if that’s the case Ms. Maja, I’ll let you go to the ASB. It must be quieter there,” Mr. Rosenblatt was right. Everyone was still in Study Period and no parents, staff nor students could pester those in the office until lunch.
I felt all heat escape from my face as I turned a pale colour and dragged myself back to my seat to get my things. I reached for my backpack as Vicky asked, “Hey, where are you going?”
“The ASB,” I said. I yanked my bag from the back of my chair and tossed it over my shoulder. My right hand shoved the door open when she exclaimed that all of them would join me; I used my foot as a door prop and said in a stern tone, “No. I’m gonna take a nap in the beanbag in the back office. I can’t talk.” I didn’t even have to fake being tired. A yawn escaped me at the perfect time.
“Oh… ok,” she said, taken aback. Somehow she and the others couldn’t put two and two together, that I was stressed above all things about this even though it was a month away, and if I really thought about it, it a few weeks away, and if I really, really, really wanted to torture myself, I’d realize that it was three school weeks away, right after exams.
Study Period was only about thirty-five minutes, so I had twenty minutes of napping time in total. Ideally I’d use the fifteen minutes to gather lunch, but seeing as I’d stopped by 7-11 earlier I bought myself some Hot Cheetos and a Caesar Salad to serve for my afternoon meal. I did, however, trot to the vending machine outside the office to get a blue Gatorade.
When I came back I popped my salad open and ripped the chip bag and dug in. The bell rang and I heard all the eager underclassmen literally racing each other to the lunch lines. I rolled my eyes and disturbed the desktop in front of me, launched Google Chrome and opened Twitter, hoping to find some interesting articles.
The door swung open after a good ten minutes, while I was enjoying a New Yorker article by Jia Tolentino, who disparaged some book by Ivanka Trump. Lo and behold, it was Jake; lo and behold, I was stupid and almost choked on my salad.
“Oooh,” he teased. “Just the Attorney General I wanted to see.”
“I’m the only Attorney General,” I sassed.
“I know, I know,” he knew then that he’d be more circumspect in his statements. “I’m in the same AP Government class with you in Preston’s room. I gotta know how this shit works, right?”
He slammed his hands on the counter in front of me, stood on the tips of his toes and peered down at my screen. “God, you’re such a nerd,” he poked. “Always reading some dumb shit that’s not so dumb.”
He let the balls of feet drop back to the ground, placed his elbows on the counter, crossed them, and then let his chin rest on the formative lump of his hands. Jake was a south paw and his left hand overlapped his right. Always.
“Is there anything you’d like me to help you with?” I questioned.
“Yeah,” he had that smirk again, which oozed of a sort of brazenness and insolence that made me cower behind my laptop. “I want to take Sami to Prom.”
Everything by my eyes were completely frozen, and they gave him an icy glare.
“Not your Sam,” this was a gratuitous reply. “Sami the soccer player.”
I
knew her – she was just as tall as I was (5’8), a bit more fit than I was (she was a tri-sport athlete, I merely did swim), was blonde (I could never compete there), and popular.
“And?” I’d no idea why he needed to tell me this.
“I just felt like I needed to tell you,” he teased.
Contrary to the strong woman I believed to myself to be in that moment, I was on the verge of tears. This was kind of brutal.
“Hey, hey, hey,” he went back on the tip of his toes again and looked at me over the screen. This time he was sterner and his rosy cheeks of douchebaggery faded into the pallor of a self-aware asshole. “I was just shitting around. Don’t cry. This is like sophomore year all over again when I sat next to you. I don’t want to get in trouble with the ASB Dean for making the Attorney General cry so just.. j-just..” he started laughing to himself again, as one would laugh in a surreal situation.
I swiveled farther away from him. Thank god for swivel chairs.
“Look, I’m trying not to be an asshole here, okay? I’ve been meaning to tell you this since last week. I figured Sam’d already told you because she was right behind me when I said it –”
My nostrils flared and my pupils shrank.
“Yeah, I know she knew and I know you know. I was only entertaining the thought of asking you, even went so far and thinking what it’d be like to have you as a date. You can fill in the rest. But I didn’t not ask you because I was judging your friends. I didn’t ask you because I don’t want to be the asshole who leads you on.”
As intense and painful as this moment was for me, I did my best to relive it just to clarify to myself that there was no yelling, no melodrama. Jake said this to me in hushed tones in a span of ten minutes and left.
The rest of the day passed by in a blur. Fifth period AP Chem was just god-awful. Carlos was there with me and I didn’t feel like filling him in on Jake or letting him copy my quiz on poly-atomic ions, so I walked up to the front of the class while our teacher, Ms. Romualdez, was lecturing and moaned to her about how I had to go to the nurse. I was a depressed, sobbing mess and needed to go home no matter what. She understood, and all twelve other kids in the class understood in respectful silence. And even though I was annoyed with him, Carlos was gracious enough to walk me to the front office, where Nurse Kelly was.
Nurse Kelly was the most neglectful nurse to ever make a cameo in my life. She dutifully attended to students who had more tangible sicknesses, but when a mentally distraught child came in, she was notorious for simply calling their parents and asking if they were stable enough to walk home. Granted, though she wasn’t a therapist or psychologist, she could have at least done more to help people who were sick of high school, as most people should for the sake of the youth. However, on this specific day, I wasn’t having it. I needed her sloppy caretaking to get me a pass off the premises of Hell and back into my bed. And she happily obliged.
When I got home, my mom was so concerned about me. She cupped my face in her hands and screamed at me, “Don’t tell me you tried to kill yourself, please, not like that one girl we read about when you were in middle school!”
“Phoebe King? What? Mom, mom no!” I ripped myself from her grip and started marching up the stairs. “Mom, just leave me alone, I started crying because I didn’t get any sleep last night and I don’t understand Chemistry and equivocation in Macbeth!” I was already in my room when I screamed this last part: “I’M SO STUPID I HAVE TO USE NO FEAR SHAKESPEARE ON SPARKNOTES BECAUSE I HATE THE FOOTNOTES!”
My face sank into my pillow and my body relaxed as I fell into an effortless nap – a nap where you can’t forge an entire plotline in your dreams and can only remember the climax of whatever your soul told you mind to project. I felt like I was enjoying it until my phone rang. It was a Facetime video call from Jacob.
“Hey, Cuz, he greeted me. His face was at the center of the screen and I could tell he was looking down at his phone. I didn’t think he was at his house because I didn’t recognize the color and texture of the ceiling. “How ya doing? Tita (Aunt) told me that you had a shitty day.”
“Oh yeah,” I rolled my eyes and sniffled a little. I saw my face in the little screen thing and saw that my eyes were ridiculously puffy and red. “I just told her I had a shit time at school.”
“Hey, man you know me, I dropped out of college and now you’re our only hope. Ya gotta become a doctor or something,” he joked, “because if anyone had a brain like yours and didn’t do anything with it, that’d be a waste.”
I smiled. Jacob always lifted me up when I felt like I wasn’t enough for the world academically, so he had a bunch of canned pep talks that would get me to cheer up no matter how incompatible they were with the situation I was in. My self-deprecation was, to Jacob, the root of all evil, so everything could be cured if he tried to talk that down. I had to stop him here, though, because this wasn’t an academic struggle or an inadequacy. I felt heartbroken because of a boy.
“It’s not because of school being hard or anything, it’s just that Jake pulled an asshole move on me today,” and so I went through the motions of everything, with Jacob barely making any interjections like “daaaaaammmmnnn” like he does in interviews. He’s an all-around attentive person.
“So it’s because you’re too smart for him,” this wasn’t a question he was asking, it was a fact.
“I guess. If you want to put it that way. He made fun of me from the get-go about me being bookish. Always thought I was an undercover college student,” I chuckled and sniffled at the same time. “But like, I feel like I’m experiencing the Holy Trinity that all the nerd girls go through in high school: intellectualism, false hope and loneliness.”
“Aw,” I heard a voice say from the background.
“Wait – am I on speaker?” I asked.
“Uhhhhh….” Jacob was collecting details to build a story as to why we weren’t talking in confidence.
“Kuya (brother, older male cousin)!” I screamed. “Who is that?”
“Listen, Maja, I’m so sorry but my Beats ran out of battery and your mom really pressed me to call you, and you know you’re like a sister to me and I thought you tried pulling some weird shit in school so I called you and –” Jacob’s phone was snatched from his hand. It flipped onto the faces of two white guys – one shirtless with a killer jaw and brown eyes and the other in a black v-neck shirt, blond hair and powdery blue eyes.
“Hey, Maja,” the one on the right with the blond hair greeted me with an awkward wave. He had a deep voice that rung out in an English accent, and he pronounced my name with the stress in the first syllable: “Maaw-huh.”
“Hey,” the other one waved shyly.
“This is Harrison, but you can call me Haz,” the blond one smiled.
“And I’m Tom, and you can call me Tom,” he laughed lightly at his joke before he realized the gravity of the situation as Jacob walked into the shot from behind them.
Jacob placed his arms around Tom and Haz and sighed. “You said you experienced the ‘Holy Trinity’ of high school, but we’re the Holy Trinity from Spider-Man and we’re here for you.”
“Yeah,” Harrison – I mean Haz – added. “We hope you don’t mind that Jacob’s been talking to us about you, and all that’s been happening regarding your attendance at the premiere.”
“But – but we didn’t know about all this stuff about this other Jake until now, darling” Tom interrupted. “That wasn’t at all expected and we’re sorry. Jake’s Beats did die and we were in the hotel room with him and we can’t go out because there’s a mob of fans trying to take a peek at the Spider-Man suit –”
“Shut up, Tom, she doesn’t want to hear this!” Haz exclaimed.
Tom. As in Tom Holland.
Harrison. As in Harrison Osterfield.
Spider-Man and his lovely assistant were joining forces with my cousin to cheer me up.
“Well, the point is, darling, is that we’re excited to finally meet you at the premiere and we’re going to do our best to make sure you have a damn good time that you can rub in that arsehole Jake’s face.”
“Yeah,” Jacob nodded along. “And Tom, you can cuss, you know.”
Tom looked quizzically at Jacob.
“It’s just weird hearing you say ‘arse.’ You’re not a euphemistic kind of guy in hotel rooms, usually,” Jacob giggled.
“Jacob, I’m talking to a lady. More importantly, your little cousin,” Tom explained.
After a few awkward exchanges of excitement and anticipation, we ended the video chat (well, I did, because Tom had the phone in his hands and didn’t know how to end the call).
“Dammit, how do I turn it off?” he yelled as Jacob, Haz and I laughed.
“Bye!” I waved at the camera and hit the red button. Back to my home screen. All I could think about was how stupid I was for not screenshotting the video call for proof that I’d spoken with Tom and Haz.
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Anon requested what romancing Yoosung in the MMO AU would be like, and so, I deliver a rough sketch of a design and the rough sketch of a route!
You are a profoundly busy college student juggling both school and work, so you haven’t had time to try Mystic Message Online - an incredibly popular virtual reality mmorpg - though you’ve heard your friend from school gushing about it basically non-stop since you met him. Said friend’s birthday is coming up though, and he’s ALWAYS wanted you to play MMO, so you decide that… hey, why not pick up a copy, level up a character a little, and then surprise him on his special day by telling him your screen-name so you can play together? It’d make him happy, and said friend is pretty cute, anyway. You can take a little bit of a break from work to have fun with him.
You go to the store and, by sheer chance, are awarded a special, milestone promotional code that will give you a number of rare items, along with a fully leveled character to try the game out with. Sounds great, right? You get home, launch the game, put on the special VR headset that makes everything feel so real, and put in you code.
after a flash of light, something weird happens.
You find that you’re logged into a max-level character with an inventory full of strange items, including a peculiar letter that you open up and read. All it says, in a loopy, elegant script, is you are the key that will unlock this world, and it promptly vanishes after you’ve read it, dissolving into particles that are carried off by the wind.
You don’t have much time to think about that, though, because you are IMMEDIATELY besieged by messages in the guild chat, one of them being from Shooting Star.
[the rest is under the read more!]
At first, Yoosung is so hopeful. He really thought, from the bottom of his heart, that RIka couldn’t be dead. There’s no way! So this has to be her, right? Returning after two years, coming back after having accomplished some mysterious work? She was always getting obsessive over things, always dropping her entire being into her job. She was always fascinated with innovation, so she just - she just -- she just did something drastic as a way to take a sabbatical, right?
Because she knew it was the only way she wouldn’t be disturbed...?
But it becomes immediately clear that, while you may be accessing Rika’s character, you definitely aren’t Rika... and Yoosung - or, as you know him, Shooting Star - becomes your staunchest proponent. He can tell you’re a sweet, gentle, generous person right off the bat! There’s no way you could be some kind of conniving hacker. While the others bicker about what to do, he offers to help you get acclimated to the game, and - as he’s done for so many newbies in the past - Yoosung gives you a tutorial.
He’s helpful, encouraging, sweet, informative, and during a stressful situation, he makes you feel miles better....
....but he also almost immediately starts comparing you to Rika.
“It’s kind of funny, that’s something Rika would say!”
“Keep this up, and you’ll be as good as Rika someday!”
“Good choice - Rika always liked using items like that!”
It makes you feel weird, but you don’t say anything, figuring that this is just a temporary state of affairs....
Until you get a panicked message from guild chat asking you to try logging out. You fail, predictably enough.
No one can log out.
Yoosung, perhaps to the reader’s surprise, immediately freaks out. You’d think this would be his dream come true, wouldn’t you? He’s doing badly in school, he spends more time in MMO than real life - but he immediately begs Seven to find some way to contact the outside world. He needs to talk to his mom! His dad!
His crush!
(his crush? you repeat to yourself, shocked. well, of course it made sense. of course. of course a cute, nice, wonderful, supportive boy like this has - has feelings for someone...)
Yoosung is miserable, but he also knows he can’t show a sad face to you, so he tries to smile and do his best in the world he wishes he could share with someone else.
Rather than trying to investigate how to get out of the world, Yoosung puts on his Paladin gear and goes out trying to help people. There are plenty of lost, scared, players - some are even kids who have been separated from their families! - that he needs to go help. That was what the RFA was supposed to do initially, right? Help people?
He’s a knight that protect’s other’s smiles! The other, smarter people can figure out how to get everybody out. He’s going to make sure they’re ok now. Thinking that this is a valiant mission, you accompany him, all the while trying not to fall too hard for him. He - he likes someone else, and... he keeps... treating you like you’re his cousin.
Like you’re Rika.
You have a long road ahead of you...
Events and story arcs -
Stray Children - Almost immediately, Yoosung gets embroiled in the affairs of the Cherry Hill, which despite the rather unassuming name, is one of the major cities in Mystic Message Online - and the one housing the RFA’s guild hall. Chaos immediately overtakes the city as players panic due to being trapped in the game, which particularly affects the youngest players, who are easy to abuse and take advantage of. You and Yoosung’s first order of business is to protect these players, and through your combined efforts, end up instating the “mentorship program”. You organize a charity society that finds higher level, more experienced players that are willing to “adopt” younger players and be their ‘big siblings’, basically. This helps form partnerships and bonds in a world where so many people have been cut from their friends.
You end up interacting with many of the children, and you and Yoosung have numerous interactions where you act a lot like parents. He jokes that you’d be awesome to raise kids with.
I’m Not Rika! - Fed up with how much Yoosung compares you to Rika - and how weird you feel, having another person’s appearance - you ask the rest of the RFA for advice. Zen JUMPS ON THE CHANCE TO HELP GIVE YOU A MAKEOVER, and the two of you go out to change what you look at!
Yoosung gets mad, saying that they SHOULDN’T BE CHANGING RIKA’S CHARACTER, but Zen fires back that YOU ARE STUCK LIKE THIS, FOCUS WHAT’S IN THE PRESENT, YOOSUNG.
...He apologizes to you, and says that you look really nice.
Cherry Blossom Viewing - Cherry Hill is so known because, in the middle of the city, there’s a hill with an enormous cherry blossom tree that’s rumored to be over a thousand years old. Since Day Zero happened near the beginning of March, about a month after, the Cherry Blossoms are ready to view... And Shooting Star decides to take you!
The players of Cherry Hill have banded together to create a festival, and you and Yoosung helped with the party organizing. The two of you have put a lot of work into helping the town come together, and under the cherry blossom trees, you see it come to fruition...
Seeing the falling petals makes Yoosung worry is this is only temporary peace, but you encourage him, saying that you’re with him 100%. Even if things do get hard - and the murmurings of hardship are stirring, as Mint Eye Cultists are recruiting among the players and promising them power if they swear a pact to the organization - you can handle it together!
Yoosung thanks you. You’re the best comrade-in-arms he could ever ask for! He feels as close to you as he did to Rika!
DAMMIT YOOSUNG YOU THOUGHT CHANGING YOUR APPEARANCE WOULD HELP THINGS
Dungeon Bungle - Seven is becoming more and more certain that the secret to what’s going on is contained within the game, and that it has something to do with you. You, Seven, and Yoosung go exploring some of the new areas added by the update, hoping that something will... happen because you’re there. While you’re exploring, Seven sees something that he wants to look over, and he asks for some quiet while he does it.
You and Yoosung leave, and start talking about... various stuff as you wait. Somehow, you end up getting on the topic of Yoosung’s crush.
This boy is clearly head over heels with how he goes on and on and ON about them, and you’re, uh, despondent but encouraging. T-This is only temporary, after all! You’re sure that.... you’re sure that there’ll be someone else out there for you...
You go take a walk, wanting to pull yourself together, when you’re captured by an ambush of Mint Eye cultists. Your distress call is heard by Seven and Yoosung, who immediately rush in to help you.
With their aid, you manage to escape, and Yoosung hugs you, telling you that he’s not letting you out of his sight! He already lost RIka, he can’t lose you too!
...While this should make you happy, somehow, it doesn’t...
I AM NOT RIKA - After your encounter with the Mint Eye cultists, Yoosung is starting to stifle you. He wants to support you, he wants to protect you, and you know if you’re ever going to get over him, you need some alone time! When you say that, hey, maybe you need some space, he says that when he gave Rika some space, he missed her killing herself! He’s not going to let you suffer alone!
You emphasize that YOU. ARE. NOT. RIKA, stop comparing me to her! Much like in the canon game, he gets advice from everyone else (who basically all tell him, yeah, Yoosung, ur being dumb), and he apologizes again, saying that he will stop. Things get a lot better between you two - which, namely, means more domestic - and you fall harder for him instead of getting over him.
Shit! He likes someone else!
Festival of Starlight - Autumn approaches, and with the coming solstice, the players start preparing for an ingame holiday called the Festival of Starlight. It’s a week-long celebration of the harvest and a feast before the coming winter, and everybody hangs star-shaped lights up in the cherry trees around town. You and Yoosung go together, and during the night, when you’re looking up at the sky, Yoosung laughs and says that it’s getting harder and harder to keep track of time now. It’s just passing so fast! he wonders... he wonders if he’ll spend his next birthday in the game, too.
You’re like - next birthday???? Wait, has he already had one ingame? And he’s like, oh yeah, it was a few days after Day Zero! He was so caught up with other things that he forgot about it.
wait.
a birthday
a few days after Day Zero? when is his birthday.
March 12, he says, the same birthday as your cute friend who got you to play Mystic Message Online in the first place.
where does he live, you ask. where does he go to school?
He’s confused about your sudden interest in his real life, since the neither of you have really talked about it (since sort of painful to talk about a life you were ripped from...) But he answers your questions, and it’s your town. And your university.
Shooting Star, you ask. What is your real name.
“??? I haven’t mentioned? It’s Yoosung Kim!”
you realize you haven’t mentioned your real name either, and under the night sky, surrounded by a million lights, you tell him, and Yoosung Kim realizes that, this entire time, he has been standing right beside his crush.
#mysme#mysme headcanons#mystic messenger#mystic messenger headcanons#mysme reactions#mystic messenger reactions#mysme imagines#mystic messenger imagines#long post#mystic messenger spoilers#mysme spoilers#mmo au#my art#yoosung kim
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Osomatsu-San Extra Stories Translation ‘Karamatsu of Dreams” Part Two
Ichimatsu, who had been in a bad mood the whole time, lazily muttered, “But anyway… there’s no way you’re going to sell. Tickets…”
“If you use common sense, you’ll see that’s it’s exactly as Ichimatsu-niisan says. Really, you’re the one with common sense here, Ichimatsu-niisan, or should I say… the normal one?”
“….hah? What are you saying, Totty?”
“Nothing in particular.”
“… Are you looking for a fight… are you?”
“I’m not looking for a fight, Ichimatsu-niisan. More importantly, there’s nothing that can really be done about the tickets not selling, is there?”
Shockwaves ran through Karamatsu. My first concert. Surely the Karamatsu Girls would rush to buy them. They’d end up becoming premium items, and be sold for high prices at auction sites.
He could think of a number of reasons why they’d sell, but it didn’t have any idea at all why they wouldn’t.
“Will they really not sell, Totty?”
“Erm… that’s just a generalization, and it’s not that I’m saying that they won’t sell because of Karamatsu-niisan, but it’s just that I wonder if people will go see a concert by an unknown newcomer.”
“So that’s it… That’s not what you said, Osomatsu.”
Karamatsu stared at Osomatsu.
“Eh? What did I say?”
Perhaps he since had already gotten board of the topic, Osomatsu was now lying down and reading the rest of his manga.
That’s right. This eldest son was that kind of man.
There was no guarantee he’d listen to your problems all the way through to the end.
If he was entertained, he’d be fine with it, but when he grew board, he’d do as he was doing now. Even though Karamatsu knew this to be the case, this time he’d allowed himself to get caught up in Osomatsu’s randomness. Admonishing himself for being so careless, Karamatsu turned his gaze towards Choromatsu.
Choromatsu was the one he could rely on most this time. In actual fact, there was only Choromatsu left now. Hoping that Choromatsu would receive the SOS of his heart, he subjected him to his intense gaze.
“Hey now, even if you ask me to rescue you…”
Choromatsu had a tendency not to come through for people at the critical moment. It seemed that his desires had not reached him.
It’s important to know when to give up too, he thought, and this time looked to Jyushimatsu.
“????”
He looked puzzled.
No, that’s understandable. Jyushimatsu is a pure boy.
In fact, it was up to him to protect Jyushimatsu, he corrected himself, and made Todomatsu his final target.
The other four brothers also looked at Todomatsu.
They put pressure on him to do something about it.
Being the youngest was a disadvantage after all. Even Todomatsu’s skilful techniques for charming people were well known to his brothers, and wouldn’t work on them.
Ok, ok, I’ll do it. If I do it, that’s it, right? His expression seemed to convey this, and Todomatsu opened his mouth.
“Erm… oh yeah! How about starting with a street performance? It won’t cost any money.”
He had been saved by the younger brother who he was supposed to save, Karamatsu thought happily. He honestly felt that his brother had grown up more than he’d thought.
“Of course… Come up from the streets and aim for the summit. Why, that’s the embodiment Japanese Dream itself, Totty.”
“Ah, yeah… erm, something like that,” replied Todomatsu, softly.
Honestly, he hadn’t thought it out anywhere close to that much, but the way Karamatsu had taken the bait left him somewhat taken aback.
“So, where do you think I should do it? If it’s on the street, then there’s no need to prepare the venue, right? I’ll send out my voice directly to everyone!”
A thought popped into Todomatsu’s mind, and he said it out loud.
“If increasing you popularity is the goal, then it should be somewhere with a lot of people, don’t you think? Like in front of a station?”
“Of course. Nice advice, Totty!”
Todomatsu thought to himself while looking at the worked-up Karamatsu with a dry expression.
(Come to think of it, fanning the flames like that and then dropping it was really awful of Osomatsu-niisan. I’m the one who had to go through all this trouble. And Jyushimatsu-niisan just ignores it with an I-don’t-understand-face, while Ichimatsu-niisan is so afraid of Karamatsu-niisan himself he tries not to get involved. But oh well, if Karamatsu-niisan goes off to do his one man show after this, that’s one less thing to worry about.)
Upon seeing Todomatsu sigh in relief, Choromatsu shook his head from one side to another, and said, “Dear me, what amateurs.”
“Now, wait a minute. First, about the street performance. These days, if you perform somewhere with a lot of people like a station without permission, the police will get mad.”
(Choromatsu-niisan, are you an idiot? This discussion was finally about to end!)
After hearing Choromatsu’s warning, Karamatsu began thinking again.
“Oh my God… write the Chinese characters for people and dream together, and you get the character for fleeting. My song can even mobilise the power of the state… I’m afraid of my own talent.”
With each overreaction, Ichimatsu glared at Karamatsu listlessly.
“Dammit…”
With one tut, the room fell silent. Even Karamatsu acknowledged Ichimatsu’s command over the room.
With an expression that suggested he was thinking, “Again? I guess there’s no helping it,” Osomatsu addressed Karamatsu, keeping his manga open.
“If that’s the case, then why not do it in a park or by the river? Or for that matter, on top of our house would do as well. It’s high up, so you’ll stand out.”
“On top of the roof… That’s no different than usual. Nothing will change if no one notices him.”
Choromatsu was cool-headed as usual.
Osomatsu answered the third son in a bored tone of voice.
“You’re the one who said in front of the station was no good, Choromatsu.”
It wasn’t that the conversation was boring, but that Choromatsu was bloody boring.
“I meant that it would be fine if he got permission. And I didn’t say ‘don’t do it.’”
“Well, where should he get permission from?”
“That, that would be… from the police or something.”
“Will it be easy to get permission?”
“I, I-I-I, I don’t know that.”
Choromatsu was completely lost in thought. When it got like this, he would be unable to get a word in edgeways for a while. It was a clever move, characteristic of Osomatsu, who knew all of his brothers weak points well.
However, the conversation had been interrupted, and it didn’t seem like anyone was going to be able to give him anymore ideas.
“Heh… in the end, we humans are all alone.”
Thrummm Karamatsu played his guitar.
The atmosphere in the room was dropping even further.
Then suddenly, Jyushimatsu raised up both of his hands and said with a smile on his face, “I know, Karamatsu-niisan. Play us a song!”
Jyushimatsu’s pure round eyes staring at him made Karamatsu back down.
“Ri, right… now?”
“Yep, that’s right.”
“Play one here?”
“Yep, that’s right, Karamatsu-niisan!”
“I can’t do that, brother.”
“Eh?” Jyushimatsu looked surprised.
“The Goddess of Music has not descended to me here, today.”
“Then how about the God of Baseball?”
“Er… I don’t think he’s descended either.”
“Is that right? That’s too bad then,” Jyushimatsu agreed with the faltering Karamatsu.
It was hard to understand what had caused Jyushimatsu to become interested all of a sudden, and the timing of his losing interest again was also unique.
Thrummmm
“Come now, what is it, brothers? Is this the end? You don’t have to hold back, help me to shine more.”
Ichimatsu slowly got up off his backside.
“Oh…Oooh! Do you have a good idea, Ichimatsu? Don’t hold back, say whatever you want!”
Ichimatsu stood right in front of Karamatsu.
Karamatsu waited patiently for whatever opinion Ichimatsu was going to give.
All of a sudden, Ichimatsu gripped Karamatsu’s neck tightly.
“Dieidiotheyyoustupidworthlesstrashinsectscumsmallfryshittymatsu!”
(((Ichimatsu finally broke?)))
It wouldn’t have been surprising if Ichimatsu had broken at any point, but he had waited until the time was ripe, and massively exploded.
“Wha, what are you doing, brother?”
“I’ve been putting up with listening to your longwinded and meaningless excuses for a while now! Make up your mind whether you’re going to do it or not, alriiiiight! This is a waste of time!”
Ichimatsu shook Karamatsu back and forth.
“NEETs talking about a waste of time is a bit ironic, though.”
Choromatsu’s put down was ignored by all.
While having his head shaken back and forth violently, Karamatsu went into Ichimatsu appeasement mode.
“Wa, wait, Ichimatsu. Calm down… no, thank you.”
“Hah? What are you talking about, all of a sudden? Have you finally broken, Shittymatsu?”
Karamatsu winked at Ichimatsu, who had let him go and was now panting heavily.
“By deliberately picking on me so harshly, you’re actually encouraging me, aren’t you?”
“Are, are you stupid? Of course I’m not, Pieceoftrashsmallfryscumshittymatsu! I’m simply pissed off because you’re annoying…”
“No need to make excuses. Humans are lonely creatures. But that is why we are able to help out each other. That’s what you were trying to say, right?”
Todomatsu whispered to Osomatsu.
“After hearing that, do you think he’s coming back down to earth at all, Osomatsu-niisan?”
“Not at all. And besides that, Karamatsu really is just too painful.”
While the oldest and the youngest recoiled in horror, Ichimatsu’s bad mood was getting even worse.
“Die, die, die… die three times, Shittymatsu.”
Thruuum
Karmatsu cancelled out Ichimatsu curses with the sound from his guitar and smiled.
“Heh… you’re not honest with yourself, are you? But thanks to you, I’ve made up my mind. I’m going to do it, Ichimatsu. For you, as well as me!”
Thrum! Thrum! Thrum! Thrum!
Keeping up a rhythm with his guitar, Karamatsu stared at Ichimatsu fixedly.
“Wait, as it’s come to this… how about forming a unit with me? We’ll go from the street to conquering the heavens together, maxing out arenas and the Budokan. You’ll be the main vocal… Ichimatsu!”
Ichimatsu pictured this.
On a stage flooded in the spotlight, he stood side by side with Karamatsu and looked down.
It was a sell-out audience. Even the standing room area was packed.
Shrieeeeek!
Waaaaaaah!
Clap-clap-clap-clap-clap-clap-clap-clap-clap
The applause wouldn’t stop.
The accompaniment started up and Karamatsu began to play the guitar beside him.
Thrum! Thrum! Thrum! Thru-um!
Thrum! Thrum! Thrum! Thru-um!
In front of him was the microphone which had been prepared especially for him.
The audience fell silent.
If he failed here, the concert would all be for nothing. The heavy pressure was all on the vocalist.
Ichimatsu felt a piercing pain in his stomach and –
“…I, I can’t do this… aargh!”
Fwump!
He collapsed right there.
“Oh my god! Are you alright, Ichimatsu?”
“Ichimatsu-niisan collapsed from just imagining it. That’s disturbing. That’s really disturbing.”
Karamatsu looked out of the window at the sky with sad eyes.
“The shock was too great for Ichimatsu.”
And after saying that, he turned back around and continued.
“Hey, brothers… won’t you… join up with me?”
“Ah, that’s fine. Because I’m not interested.”
“It’s a pass for me too. I prefer watching what’s on the stage.”
Jyushimatsu, Todomatsu, and Choromatsu turned away at the same time.
Karamatsu stared with tears in his eyes at the only one left, Osomatsu.
“Then, Osomatsu! I guess there’s no choice but for us to do it. Let grasp our dreams together!”
Osomatsu looked serious for once.
“You shouldn’t rely on me. Aren’t dreams generally something that you make come true yourself? Is success that you gained because of someone else’s help really something you would be satisfied with, Karamatsu?”
Karamatsu was taken aback.
Sometimes the eldest son said things that were really moving. At such times, and such times only, you had no choice but to feel respect for him.
“And also, singing is something that’s free to begin with. It doesn’t belong to anyone, or rather, you want to sing when you want to sing, so you sing… that’s what’s natural, right? I kinda feel like it’s better that way.”
Karamatsu gently put his hand over his heart.
“Your words just now made my heart thump. That’s it, Osomatsu! It’s just like you say. I shouldn’t sing for anyone else. I should sing for myself.”
Osomatsu replied flippantly, “That’s right. That’s right. So there’s no need to push yourself to change the way you do things. You’re fine just as you are.”
Today too, Karamatsu stood on the stage (roof).
“I am always waiting.”
For the moment the Goddess of Music would descend, and his heart would start singing.
At that moment, Jyushimatsu and Todomatsu popped their heads up.
“Isn’t this no different from at the start?” murmured Jyushimatsu.
Todomatsu replied quietly, “Shhh! This way is the most peaceful.”
In the end, Karamatsu was always Karamatsu.
#osomatsu san#mr osomatsu#translation#light novel#karamatsu of dreams#Extra Stories#bangaihen#Karamatsu#shittymatsu#painfull
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Hello! How many different types of werewolves are there, and what do they look like? Please and thank you!
Are the roles werewolves play in different myths, or any were-like creature, the same was what we think in modern times? I’m curious about how they were perceived in different cultures.
This is a second as we got that we feel is also answered by the Chorus here so we are adding it in and answering both at once. Now for the glorious Chorus’ answer!!
Ok, so, the thing is, most werewolves you see in media these days bear little resemblance to werewolves in folklore, aside from the becoming a wolf bit. Being bitten did not spread the curse/virus/whatever, wolf’s bane wasn’t considered a deterrent/poison, silver as a surefire kill was a very late addition in the early 1800’s in Germany, and they weren’t usually bound by the cycle of the moon. Werewolves as we know them now were mainly inspired by movies like An American Werewolf in London and The Wolf Man, so much so that the movie lore has been taken as folklore and it can be difficult to find accurate information. Lucky you, you’ve got us!
~ Readmore here if you think it’s necessary ~
The belief in humans who can become wolves or take on wolf-like traits has persisted in Europe for AGES, possibly originating in early Etruscan rituals in the 5th century BCE, possibly even before then. The ancient Romans and Greeks have stories about werewolves but it’s notable that the transformation from man to wolf was usually a mental/spiritual one. Many later accounts share features with these stories while other parts have changed over time. There weren’t really different kinds of werewolves in Europe so much as there were local variations on the same monster. The word werewolf itself is Old English and literally translates to man-wolf and any other name you might see is just a translation with the same meaning. Yes, this means if you’re shortening “werewolf” to “were” you’re just calling them “men.”
In most folklore there was no in-between form for a werewolf. The shift was either mental so that a person might act like a wolf, or physical so that a person might become a wolf. Either way, they were characterized by their insatiable hunger for human flesh, whether because they lost control of their inhibitions during the transformation or they never had them in the first place and were generally an evil person. Men were more likely to prey on women while women preferred children and babies. As wolves, they were said to be much larger and fiercer than normal and might lack a tail, sticking a back leg up behind them to make up for it. In human form, a wound sustained in wolf form earlier on and then found on a person would be enough to condemn them. A werewolf could also be identified by cutting open the skin and finding fur underneath. In a particularly paranoid village, being unusually hairy or having brows that meet could be seen as a sign the person was a werewolf.
The main differences between types of lycanthropes were the method of obtaining the transformation and the method of ending it. Generally though, werewolves in Europe fit into two categories: Western European (France, German-speaking countries, the Baltic states) and Eastern European (Hungary, Romania, the Balkans, Western Russia), and both shared traits with other local monsters, particularly witches in the west and revenants in the east. Sometimes the only distinguishing feature was the ability to become a wolf and a spiritual transformation might be sufficient. For example, in Serbia, vampires and werewolves were collectively known as vuldkodlak and could be identified and killed in the same ways.
Becoming a werewolf could either be voluntary, a matter of being born with the skill, or the result of a curse. Voluntary methods are seen more often in the eastern variations and they include drinking rainwater from the footprint of a wolf, wearing a wolf-skin cloak, wearing a wolf-skin belt, wearing a belt made from skin flayed from a hanged man’s back, covering oneself with a special ointment containing wolf fat and made with a specific ritual, removing one’s clothing and pissing around it, sleeping outside during a full moon in summer, passing three times beneath an arch of birch and wild rose, carrying out more complex rituals at certain locations at certain times of the year, or drinking a special concoction of beer.
Lycanthropy by birth is typically a feature of eastern European werewolves. Some children might be cursed to turn into wolves either if they suffered abuse by their parents or were looked upon by the Evil Eye (remember how I said everyone was worried about the Evil Eye in Europe?). Others might be lucky enough to be born with a caul (an extremely rare occurrence in which a piece of amniotic membrane covers the head at birth), a birthmark on their head, with an unusual amount of hair, or simply born on December 24th and this would be enough to grant them the ability. In these stories, werewolves might not transform during their lifetime but they would rise from the dead to feast on corpses and living family members as wolves.
Transformations by curse are usually the result of divine judgement. The most famous example is Lycaeon, who was cursed to become a wolf by Zeus for killing one of his own sons and serving his flesh to the gods as food. St. Patrick is said to have transformed multiple pagan Irish people into wolves for seven years, including the Welsh King Vereticus (there’s also a story where he cursed three pagan men to become wolves for seven years under the full moon and it’s considered the earliest example of that feature in werewolf folklore). Similar stories are known about Natalis of Ulster and the devil was said to curse men to become wolves in Russia.
As far as ending the transformation, there were fatal and non-fatal methods, although they could end up being equally as unpleasant. Silver bullets and weapons did feature in some later and sensationalized re-tellings of werewolf accounts in Germany but were, again, popularized by early Hollywood films. The same goes for wolfsbane; the name comes from the plant’s poison being used on arrows made specifically to kill wolves in ancient Greece, not from any aversion wolves (supernatural or otherwise) were said to display.
Traditionally, werewolves could be executed by anything that would kill a normal human, although hanging or beheading were popular during trials, which often coincided with witchcraft trials, and followed similar procedures. If the werewolf died of natural causes, the corpse must either be destroyed or beheaded and exorcised, and then the head thrown into a moving body of water to prevent it from coming back as a revenant. Other less fatal methods of reversing the transformation included drawing blood three times, striking the werewolf on the forehead with a knife three times, piercing the hands/paws with iron nails, throwing an iron object over or at the werewolf, calling its name three times, or even reprimanding it three times. In Serbia, werewolves would congregate on certain nights of the year and remove their magical wolf pelts so that they may trade them and burn them, thus releasing each other from the curse.
The one notable exception to the negative portrayal of werewolves at the time is the account of Thiess of Kaltenbrunn. Thiess was accused of werewolfery in Livonia in 1692 but instead of pleading not guilty, he claimed that he was a member of a group of werewolves who called themselves the Hounds of God. On three nights every year, usually St. Lucia’s Day, Pentecost, and St. John’s day, they would become wolves and travel to Hell where they would, armed with iron rods, battle witches and devils to bring back the harvest and livestock the witches had stolen. By doing so, the hounds ensured there would be a good harvest that year. He asserted that there were other werewolves like him and his companions in Russia and Germany and that they would go to Heaven when they died because they were agents of God, not the Devil. He managed to get off with ten lashes and excommunication for heresy.
American variants of werewolves were inspired by European stories and were likely spread by European settlers. Every culture has its bogeymen so the werewolf was often combined with other monsters endemic to the area to create the local variation. The Brazilian lobisomem shares many features with its European cousin, with a noteworthy difference: in the Brazilian myth, the seventh son of a seventh son was said to be at the greatest risk of becoming one. The rougarou of French Louisiana definitely descended from the French loup-garou and is a man who, after breaking Lent seven years in a row, gains a dog or wolflike head and is forced to roam the swamps, seeking out Catholics who have also broken Lent and eating them. In Haiti, the jé-rouge is the spirit of an evil man who may possess another, allowing him to become a blood-sucking wolf monster. They go around at night waking up new mothers, trying to convince them to unwittingly give up their babies.
All in all, this is an incredible amount of information you didn’t ask for but I hope it will help you with your writing. And before I stop, I’m going to drop one last bit of unsolicited info on you: If you’re going to write groups/communities/families/packs of werewolves, do not reference alpha/beta/omega theory, unless it is to say it is completely incorrect. Wolf packs are hierarchical in the same way a human family unit is: father and mother are at the top because they are the eldest and the parents of the rest of the group, elder siblings come next, youngest siblings are at the bottom, all in all constituting a family unit of parents and children born over the past 1-3 years. The idea that packs are volatile social units with individuals occupying a strict social hierarchy based on personality that can only be changed through conflict came out of a study done in 1947 on a captive group of totally unrelated grey wolves. Their normal social structure had disintegrated under the unusual circumstances they were kept in, but the research was erroneously applied to wolves in the wild as well, twisting our perception of them for the better part of a century.
Now happy werewolf writing.
-the Chorus
Side Note: If you do use a/b/o this is a full case of You Break It You Buy It, because it is seen nowhere in real wolves or werewolves myths. That would make it your own addition and falls under whatever rules you decide to make up for it in your fictional world.
We’re also not saying don’t write it full stop, but be aware of a few things if you do. First, many, a/b/o stories are not romantic or loving. There is an inherent power imbalance that can never be overcome by any of the characters no matter how much they want to. In most stories, they cannot fight their biology, they are not in control of themselves, they are victims, and are unable to give consent. Treat that with the horror and pain it deserves.
Second, this does not stop at romantic/sexual relationships. Be careful of how you write their casual relationships with other characters. One person attacking another is not normal behavior. Violence and abuse happens outside of romantic/sexual relationships so be wary of that and how it is portrayed in your writing as well. Write this also with the pain and suffering and horror it truly is.
If you’re writing an a/b/o story where you are able to show that the consent given falls under the definition of consent we use today and that the characters are not slaves to their biology, they are in control of themselves while engaging in sexual relations or other interactions then this isn’t necessarily the horror it would otherwise be. But you must always look at your writing and ask what makes the character act that way. If it is purely biology, it isn’t something that is consensual. If it is something all the characters decide to do, and do willingly, and not purely driven by biology then it is consensual.
#werewolves#myths#Theiss of Kaltenbrunn#lycanthrope#rougarou#lobisomem#Hounds of God#Lycaeon#Natalis of Ulster
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Stories
Finally got around to updating my stories page here so it has everything that I have over at Ao3. Stories below the cut, and yes, it’s all FitzSimmons related.
“Five Times” Series:
Five Times Fitz Would Have, and One Time He Did - Teen
Five times Fitz would have acted on his feelings, or wishes he’d acted differently, and one where he finally takes the plunge.
Five Times Simmons Wished He’d Make a Move, and One Time She Did - Teen
Simmons’ POV from “Five Times Fitz Would Have, and One Time He Did”
Five Times Interlude: Christmas Eve - Mature
Picks up right after the first two parts of the “Five Times” series. Fitz follows Jemma into her bunk. Sex ensues.
Five Times FitzSimmons Were Nearly Caught, and One Time They Were - Explicit
Final installment of the “Five Times” Series. Five times FitzSimmons were nearly caught in their new romantic relationship, and one time they definitely were. NSFW.
Five Times Interlude: Aggression - Explicit
Fitz and Simmons fight about his being stubborn. Smut ensues.
"Hour by Hour" Series:
High School (Non-Academy) FitzSimmons AU
3 a.m. - Teen
When opportunity knocks - or climbs a trellis - you answer. Or, at least you do if you're Jemma Simmons.
4 p.m. - Teen
In which Fitz' time in detention takes a far more interesting turn.
10 a.m. - Teen
Hunter and Bobbi call Fitz on what he's been up to after hours.
7 a.m. - Teen
Fitz and Jemma's morning after.
9 a.m. - Teen
Daisy outs Jemma's secret to their classmates - and her boyfriend.
8 p.m. - General
Fitz and Jemma's first official date.
5 a.m. - General
Jemma gets ready to face the day.
Academy FitzSimmons Song Fic Series:
Alone With You - Mature
No matter how often he tells himself he needs to stop, Leo Fitz just can’t bring himself to say no to Jemma Simmons.
Give Me Love - Mature
Follow up to “Alone With You.” Jemma realizes she’s made a mistake. Hopefully she can fix it, before it’s too late.
“Two Blue Lines” Series
Dublin - Mature
I wrote this forever ago, but never posted it here. Set after The Well. After several close calls, FitzSimmons try to work out some of their frustrations in the hotel bar… that is, until a preferable option presents itself.
Leopold - Teen
She doesn’t do it often, but sometimes, Jemma Simmons has to use her boyfriend’s full name. This is one of those times.
Two Blue Lines - General
FitzSimmons deal with Jemma’s declaration in “Leopold.”
Longer Stories:
180 Days (WIP) - Teen
Leo Fitz had never planned on being a high school teacher, but here he is. Now his only goal is to survive the next 10 months, but with his flat mate's girlfriend working in the same building, and an incredibly cute colleague across the hall, that may prove to be more difficult than he'd ever imagined.
Meme Responses:
Tropes
One Shots:
A Chat - General
A chat between friends. Standalone drabble, with implied UST FitzSimmons.
Comfort - Teen
In the near future, Fitz returns from mission banged up. Jemma takes care of him.
Coping - General
My take on what was going on with Fitz and Simmons early in Season 2, right after Jemma returned to the team.
Duplicity - Teen
As long as she isn’t asked to speak too often, Jemma can manage being at least a bit duplicitous.
Gravity - General
Sometimes gravity does more than hold one in place.
Girl Talk - General
A semi-trashy movie, some beer, and some female bonding all adds up for a rather unusual safe word.
Hands - Teen
Jemma finds herself distracted and lost in thought.
His - General
After a one-night stand, Jemma finds out she’s pregnant. Plot twist: Leo Fitz isn’t the father.
I’m Already There - General
Fitz struggles with the ramifications of Jemma leaving. Early season 2. One-shot.
Orbit - General
Some things are meant to maintain their orbit.
Prettiest - General
Fitz’ internal monologue after he hears the Asgardian call Jemma pretty.
Ritual - General
While Fitz lies in a coma, Jemma ponders their relationship and what exactly he means to her.
Strictly Business - Mature
Leo Fitz' company is in trouble, thanks to a friend-turned-foe. The last thing he needs is a doe-eyed Englishwoman trying to buy the lot, or so he believes... until he meets Jemma Simmons.
Tango - Mature
It was meant to be a black and white only affair.
Of course, she’d worn red.
Witness - General
Fitz has been trained to observe and learn. Unfortunately, some truths he’s learned too late.
Originally written before the season one finale, so it’s not quite canon-compliant, but I wanted to post it here, as well as to tumblr.
Written with engineerleopoldfitz
dom!Fitz Series
For Science – Explicit
After overhearing something she shouldn’t have, Jemma begs Fitz for a favor. He agrees, but only on his terms.
Safe Word – Explicit
Jemma Simmons has always been an overachiever. But what happens when she fails to follow Fitz’ rules?
(AKA: By popular demand, we wrote a story about Fitz’ toy collection as mentioned in For Science.)
Off Limits – Mature
Sometimes Jemma needs something other than playtime. Maybe they both do.
Indecent Exposure – Explicit
SHIELD really needs to stop making their awards banquets mandatory. Genius level scientists like FitzSimmons can surely find something to keep them from getting too bored?
Stand Alone Stories
An Altruistic Endeavor - Mature
“You know, Fitz, I’d be happy to help with that. I mean if you wanted. A favor between friends, that’s all.”
What do you do when your best friend offers to help you lose your virginity?
Another Door Opens – Mature
Leo Fitz is used to being on his own. After cutting his ties in Scotland during Uni and now tied up with his Master’s research, he doesn’t have time for friends or relationships outside the fleeting ones he finds for himself in London’s clubs.
Jemma Simmons is the daughter of society darlings. And yet, she’s chosen medicine as her profession, possibly the youngest resident ever at London Bridge Hospital.
A chance encounter brings them into each other’s lives, and while they both desperately needed a true friend… Everything is bound to change.
Cost of Repairs – Teen
Fix-it fic, because I think we’re all a bit tired of the Science Babies not communicating.
Fitz gets himself sliced up on a mission, but doesn’t wait for Jemma to patch him up. She tracks him down in his bunk - the long awaited talk ensues.
The First of Many – Teen
We were challenged to write something with no angst. None. At all. (It’s like y'all know how much we like to torment the Science Babies in our AU’s!)
So here we go… a SciOps era AU of FitzSimmons’ first date.
Letters – Teen
After a date goes terribly wrong, Jemma turns to Fitz to try and find solid ground again.
~*~
This is an old thread that somehow never made it onto AO3. For those of you who were following stories on my Threads page on Tumblr, you know this story as ‘Letters (AU)’. I’ve dropped the AU from the title since this has become our official head canon for this particular verse. The ‘original’ Letters will be edited and posted under a different title later on with a disclaimer, so people don’t think it’s an entirely new story.
On Thin Ice – General
Up late one night, two best friends find each other once more.
Vicissitude – Teen
Six months ago, Leo Fitz and Jemma Simmons fled the life they’d always dreamed of in order to save their lives. Living hand-to-mouth on the streets of New York, their past comes back to haunt them, sending them on a collision course with Castle, Beckett, and the rest of the team at the 12th Precinct.
You’ve Got Science – Teen
Fitz never found that clever thing to say to Simmons, and a decade later, they’re both still struggling with their regrets and an imploded partnership. A story of anonymous messages, miscommunicating science babies, meddling best friends, and perhaps a much-needed reconciliation.
With BraveJem
Repurpose Verse
Repurpose – Teen
When men invade the Bus and demand Simmons work for them, she must make an unspeakable decision, one that will change both her and Fitz forever.
Stasis – Mature
Set after the events of “Repurpose.”
Fitz has to go on living without Simmons. For the first time in his life, he fails.
Stand Alone Stories
Anomalous - General
After running an experiment at an inopportune time, Leo Fitz knocks himself out… and wakes up in an entirely different timeline. One where he and Jemma are partners in more ways than one.
Kiss – General
Set during season 1. Fitz walks into the lab and sees something he certainly never hoped - or wanted - to see.
La liaison parisienne - Explicit
After ages of dancing around each other, both Fitz and Jemma are on the verge of giving up. In a bid to help their friends, Ward and Skye take them out separately in the hopes of taking their minds off the state of things. However, when they end up in the same Parisian bar - and a little liquid courage is thrown into the mix - their evening takes an entirely unexpected turn.
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Pavlova Peril
Ao3 // Fanfic.net
I’ve finally, finally finished my Secret Santa contribution for @argentis, who asked for: “Incarnation: TAG. Virgil Tracy + Pavlova. Medium: Anything.”
Argentis, I’m so incredibly sorry it’s taken me this long to get your gift completed. My life in RL has been unbelievably hectic and stressful to the extreme this holiday season, but I needed something to keep my brain moving, and this was it. It was a wonderful prompt to work with, and sent me off on several different tangents and research paths to work out how I wanted to approach it, so I really hope you enjoy reading it. Happy Christmas, Friend. I hope you’re having a wonderful start to the new year. <3
He’d heard a rescuee talking about them on a mission, five days into December, on a course to prevent a large yacht from sinking in a storm at the outer edges of Port Phillip Bay, and he thought it was pretty cool-sounding. A dessert made of meringue, chocolate, mint and kiwifruit sounded pretty colourful to say the least, not to mention delicious. The name, he mused, sounded familiar, at any rate, even if he’d prefer much more berries and tropical fruit with it, thanks very much.
There was a supply run for the Christmas season not long after that; Grandma liked having all her ducks in a row long before December 25th, so Virgil offered to go with her in the intention of finding the ingredients in his internet-pilfered recipe to try it out, with the ability to start again if the damned automated module ate it like he had a sneaking suspicion it would, before he managed to get the dessert right. Contrary to popular belief (or just in their subsequent comparison of his skills to that of Grandma Tracy), Virgil wasn’t that great at cooking and baking, even if Alan (with his preternatural senses for knowing when it wasn’t Grandma in the kitchen) certainly thought so.
He’d never actually made meringue before, despite Gordon’s eager support of his supposed prowess, let alone meringue with cream that needed to be spread across the top of it… That was the easy part.
The reason why he was wary was because any contact he’d had with the electric mixer or other cooking utensils of the kind before now had involved him pulling it apart to see how it worked, rather than actually getting any experience in using the thing, so he was a little wary as to how it was going to turn out, especially as he was going to be using the Automated Kitchen Module, rather than the 392℉ oven that the recipe specified. The machine, new to the appliance market as it was, combined with the first-time experiment this adventure was, Virgil had to concede that it was going to be interesting.
Said recipe itself, Virgil found, in his off-tangent research into why the dessert sounded so familiar -- when he saw pictures of the finished product before he even dared start making it -- brought back memories of a Christmas when he was small, before Mom had passed away and they’d gone on one of their few family holidays overseas to visit Jeff’s youngest brother and his wife in Melbourne. Virgil now recalled thoroughly enjoying licking the whipped cream off his own fingers, and watching an even younger Gordon -- somewhere in the years between the kid’s third birthday and Alan’s birth a couple years later -- attempt to fling a spoonful of his across the table at Scott, much to their father’s and aunt’s displeasure.
The pavlova dessert, Virgil discovered, had no actually trackable regional or geographic origin. Some sources had it coming to the US as a german torte, the other, more widely accepted conclusion was that of the legendary squabble between Australia and New Zealand over the ‘invention’ of the specific dessert, one with official numbers over recipe variations sitting somewhere around the 650-70 mark. His eyebrows had risen exponentially at that revelation, courtesy of a researcher from sometime in the early 2000s at the University of Otago in Aotearoa, but on the other hand, he wasn’t surprised. One of his areas of independent interest at MIT had been a series of essays, specifically related to engineering, but with references to a myriad of other obscure topics on the proliferation of how different regional disparities had a habit of having multiple places of divergence, so he had just shaken his head and moved on.
##
Once he’d chivvied both Grandma and Scott out of the kitchen; his grandmother and eldest brother wanting to ‘help’, and prevent Grandma from helping, respectively -- plus threatening to kick Gordon’s ass if he tried to do a switcheroo with his ingredients again thank you, crutches or not you moron -- Virgil finally had the Module set with the appropriate cooking temperature, and had (pretty intuitively, he was pleased to announce, even to himself) gotten the mixer working with as much ease as he’d done with the test runs of his ion screwdriver.
Meringues were tricky. He came to that conclusion pretty quickly. The main technique involved gestures that had a lot of ‘folding in’ of the beaten cornflour, cream of tartar and egg-whites with the vanilla and sugar to make sure that he didn’t accidentally beat all of the air out of the stuff before he spooned it onto his grease-papered baking tray. Unfortunately, his first attempt, despite being as careful as he possibly could’ve been to not have gone and dropped the entire mixture onto the tray into a blob, after an hour and a half of cooking (and shooing frustrating siblings, Kayo included from the kitchen) proved to be nothing more than a mushy, burned mess, running across the edges of the tray and fouling the Module so the whole kitchen somehow stank like burned sugar. Wonderful.
Take two turned out somewhat better, the mess somewhat more confined to the edges of the tray, and the top just a little less burned since he’d dialed down the Module settings a bit, figuring that the heating element was a little too intense for the delicate structure of the meringue. Virgil examined it critically as he cleaned the bowl this time around and did a general tidy-up, and got the mixer set up again in order to whip the cream and gauge how many berries he wanted to stick on top of this thing -- and whether he’d gotten too many mangoes, seeing as no one else in the family actually liked the things aside from him. He then decided that the second time was better than the mess that the first had turned out to be, so be it if it tasted funky. He left the door open as he let it cool down entirely, and decided that if his family didn’t like it, despite their continued interest in his project -- go away John, I mean it, unless it’s an emergency, no! -- he’d just eat it himself. More blueberries for him. He grinned.
##
Virgil’s plan and what seemed to be his enjoyment of the entire experience went kind of kaput when it came to take it out of the module. His thickened cream was in a bowl on the counter, ready to dollop and his fresh fruit and passionfruit pulp all ready to set out in a pattern he’d drawn up, but to his absolute frustration (and no lack of a vehement kind of under-the-breath swearing) it wasn’t until it had slid off his tray and onto his once-black boots and the shiny wooden flooring that he realised that he’d forgotten to wipe the excess grease off the tray before he’d added the new lot of paper to it, and the whole pavlova base, from the bottom up and all the way through the middle had no friction to stick to the metal, resulting in the associated death plunge to the floor.
Damn.
Sighing, he bent on his knees with the spatula, the trashcan and his paper towelling, and set to cleaning up mess No. 2… Third time lucky? He wondered. Perhaps...
##
Take three, post-mixing found Virgil standing with his arms crossed at the kitchen bench -- streaks of powder and egg in his hair and across his face from his angry frustration at how nothing was going right; I’m following the recipe, how hard is this supposed to be?
Lip pulled between his teeth in concentration as his eyes flickered from the mixture in the bowl to the recipe print-out, to the cleaned and prepared and ready baking tray once more, he glared pointedly at the stupid thing, just daring something to go wrong this time. Normally known as patient and mild-mannered, for some reason, probably to do with his annoyance at this mess just not working for him, even when he actually expected it, it was making him even more irritated in the process. This time, the engineer thought grimly, he was going to throw it at the wall, see if creating a baking-mix mural was going to be a better use of his time than this.
He was just about to take the plunge and dab the concoction on the tray once more, when Brains arrived, data pad in hand, nearly walking straight through Virgil’s un-mopped floor, near the nook without even an upwards glance until his feet suddenly slid a little.
Virgil looked up as the older man blinked twice as he registered the white mess that now, despite Virgil’s cleaning, seemed to take over every other available surface, from Virgil’s hair and face as aforementioned, the counter top, the front of the module, the floor, the sink and everything in between, and Brains’ brown eyes narrowed behind his spectacles.
“V-Virgil,” He queried, frowning. “W-what are you doing?”
Virgil looked around and seemed to register just what a state he was in before looking back at Brains. “I was attempting to bake,” he replied quietly. “And I guess I use bake in the loosest sense of the word.”
Brains looked around, looking for a clean surface to place his data pad down. “Uh, one moment,” he said, retreating to the other side of the room. He deposited the pad before returning. “Alright, Virgil, what were you attempting to, uh, bake?”
“A pavlova,” Virgil responded. “I just can’t understand where I keep going wrong. This is my third attempt.”
“Hmm,” Brains murmured thoughtfully and looked over at the implements on the counter. He pointed at the lined tray. “Is that what you’ve been putting the m-mixture in to bake?”
“Yeah, I lined the tin and everything but I can’t understand why it’s coming out so greasy.”
“Uh, perhaps because you’ve, uh, lined the tray with the wrong p-paper,” he said, taking the bowl of mixture out of his hands and putting it down.
Virgil let him and huffed in frustration. “I didn’t realise there was a wrong sort,” he mumbled. “What’s the right sort?”
“Baking paper,” Brains replied, heading over to the cupboard to get it for him.
“Oh,” Virgil said, taking it from him. “Thanks.” He looked at the box. “I didn’t even see this in there.”
Brains smiled kindly at him. “It’s an easy mistake,” he pointed out. “D-do you want some help?”
“To be honest, I won’t say no.” He took the paper from the tray and replaced it with the baking paper Brains had given him, then refilled the tray again.
Brains took it from him and put it into the module, adjusting the temperature. “Alright, there you go, we’ll, uh, check on it again later.”
“Why did you turn the thermostat down?” Virgil asked, pointing at the controls.
“You’re supposed to preheat the m-module then turn it down for baking.”
“Oh, so that’s why it looked better the second time round.”
“Yes,” Brains smiled. “I-indeed.”
##
“Virgil, this tastes… awesome!” Alan cried enthusiastically, as he shoved his dessert spoon in his mouth at lunch on Christmas Day. Thankfully there had been no early-morning call-outs, and while Dad was still regrettably absent, and they couldn’t count on the record lasting for the remainder of the day as well, they had all just been glad they’d at least been able to sit down for lunch together. It’d been a great morning of present exchanges and good wishes shared between them, Virgil thought. He personally had some new oil paints that his grandmother had bought him that he was eager to try out at some point... “I told you you could do it bro!”
“Too right, Virg!” Gordon nodded, licking his lips and his fingers of cream and smirking. “It’s really tasty.” John, with his Christmas hat perched on his head, and breaking up his mint crisp chocolate on top of his slice, and Scott, with his mouth full of blueberries -- the ass had swiped almost all of the ones in the vicinity of his slice -- nodded as well.
“It has certainly turned out very well, Virgil.” Grandma Tracy said. “I’d have thought I’d be helping you to fix up any boo-boos.” She smiled. “I’m glad to see that I’ve been very much mistaken.”
“I remember this from when we were kids,” John said wistfully. Scott looked thoughtful.
“I thought I recognised the taste,” The oldest brother picked up a berry, examining it with bright blue eyes, before he popped it into his mouth and closing them as he munched. “Mmmmm.”
Virgil grinned wryly, rolling his eyes at Scott’s overdramatics. “Well, I had Brains to help with that.” He said, gesturing to the engineer, suspiciously quiet in all the excitement since he’d set the pavlova in the middle of the dining table. “This is actually my third attempt.” He tipped his head at Kayo, who had been eyeing him suspiciously up until this point, a smile of her own playing across her lips. “He was most helpful with telling me the things that I’d done wrong…” If he were any less, ahem... mature, he’d have stuck his tongue out at her by now. He knew that look!
“Thank you, V-Virgil,” Brains said softly, smiling in slight embarrassment. “Y-you did all the hard work!” He insisted. “I just gave you some p-pointers!”
“In any case, it tastes great.” Scott said decisively, raising his glass for another toast (the first having been for Mom and Dad and Grandpa). Virgil looked at him, startled, as clearly a little confused, the others followed suit. “To Brains and Virgil,” Scott said proudly. “For a wonderful dessert, and for three attempts for making it a Christmas worth remembering!”
“Merry Christmas!”
They all cheered, and Virgil smiled. Mission accomplished.
(Also, a huge thanks to my friend @kellyfhaycock for giving me some much-needed help with a sticky bit in the middle!! Love you hun. <3)
#pyre talks#pyre writing tag#secret santa#secret santa 2016#thunderbirds#thunderbirds are go#thunderbirdsarego#fic prompts#virgil tracy#ss 16
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Samantha Allan Park Ch. #39
Any references to TMNT or anything from popular media and culture is NOT MINE. I only own my OC's. Any references to “TMNT Out of the Shadows” DO NOT BELONG TO ME. Only my additions that I came up with myself belong to me. Anything from the films or other series ARE NOT MINE, only my OC’s and my ideas that I have added onto the story FOR FUN. Thank you.
Chapter #39
Sunday June 7th, about 3:00p.m. Still in Venezuela, about to depart back to New York
It took Donnie about 20 minutes to track a route that lead to an airport where the group could secretly board another cargo plane. It was the sketchiest thing the group had ever done since they were basically traveling and boarding the plane in broad daylight. They found some tarp and covered themselves as Donnie, being the quickest, ran over to an abandoned cart the workers drove to transport extra luggage to the plane. The group boarded the cart under the tarp as Donnie quickly drove towards a plane he knew was leaving for New York (he knew this by hacking into the airports computer system and tracked which planes were leaving for where and when). Mikey continued to carry a paralyzed Sam, though she was slowly gaining back her ability to move, but it was extremely slow. It wasn’t until 2 hours after the plane took off, about 5p.m. when Sam could officially move again. She thought this would be a reason for the boys to be happy, but this actually ended up causing more tension. Once she was able to move again the four brothers began arguing with one another, each brother blaming the other for something they did wrong during the mission whether it be something general or something in regards to Sam’s safety. The arguing went on for what seemed like forever. It was now 7:30p.m. and the brothers were still arguing with each other. They were all so focused on their harsh words towards one another that no one had picked up on how weak Sam had become despite gaining back her ability to move.
“You think standing on the sidelines makes you some kind of hero?” Raph bellowed towards his youngest brother as they stood towards the further back section of the crowded plane. Sam had walked over and was about to lean on Raph’s arm because of how weak she felt, only for him to walk away right before she did so. He was so furious with his youngest brother that he didn’t even notice how weak his female friend looked as she stumbled and managed to catch her balance as she awkwardly leaned on the wall. “You can’t just push past me like that bro!” “You were being a nitwit! You were gonna lose that thing!” “I wasn’t!” “Yes you were!” “No I WASN’T!” The two continued to yell back and forth at each other, getting closer and closer as they both moved their arms and hands to convey just how upset they were with the others words. The only thing that got the two to stop was when they heard Donnie shouting even louder than they were. “I had it in my hand! I had it right in my hand and you acted as if I wasn’t even there!” he shouted at his oldest brother who was sitting ahead of him. Just like his other brothers, Donnie was very physical as he verbally announced his frustration. And then just like him, Leo communicated the same way. Leo shook his head as he spoke. “It’s not my job to make your presence known, alright? Get out of your head and communicate” Leo announced roughly to his brother, punching his fist in his hand as a sign of how frustrating it was for him that Donnie acted the way his brain told him to but without letting the others know what exactly he was doing (in this case, specifically telling Leo what it was he was doing before the two collided in the water). Donnie rolled his eyes and walked away and sat down as he crossed his arms across his chest. He was so annoyed with his older brother’s words that he didn’t notice that Sam had slowly made her way over towards where he was standing and went to lean on his shoulder before he moved away. Sam stumbled down onto the box below her, but landed so that it looked like she had meant for the landing to be so clumsy. Leo was so annoyed that he didn’t notice how weak Sam looked and also overlooked her clumsy seating. Raph huffed from the back. “Well what do you expect? He’s all logic and no skills.” Mikey scowled at his red bearing brother. “Coming from the guys who’s all instinct and no restraint” he said, swinging his arms in front of him to diss his brother. Leo waved his arm as he stood up and stormed past Mikey. “What do you know about anything? You’re all heart and no brains!” Sam had been walking over towards Leo, but he had already stood up and stormed off towards the other side of the plane (attempting to sit away from his brothers but failing because of how tightly packed this plane was compared to the other). Sam just stood there. Her back was to the guys so none of them noticed, but her eyes began to close. She wasn’t blacking out because of her powers, but because her body had just pushed itself to great limits that day in general. She was about to fall backwards when Mikey caught her. He was the only one who had noticed her stumbles and as he held Sam now he carefully pulled her with him so that she was sitting next to him. He put his arm around her and nestled her in so that her head was resting on his shoulder.
Meanwhile, the rest of the brothers were still arguing. “How could you?” Donnie asked in a gasp. “You may know a lot about strategy but you know nothing about feelings.” Raph scoffed as he turned around. Leo bit his lip before turning to face the rest of his brothers. “Fair enough. You wanna know what I’m feeling?” he asked as he turned so that each brother met his gaze at least once, “we may be brothers, but we are NOT a team.” Mikey rolled his eyes and then looked back down at Sam. “Whatever man. If you’re gonna insult us some more then at least keep your voice down. Sam’s trying to sleep” Mikey bit back in a low voice. This caught Donnie’s attention and he darted his gaze towards the girl leaning on his brother. “She’s not sleeping Mikey she passed out. Sam!” Donnie said as he quickly walked over and kneeled down in front of the duo, snapping his fingers in hopes that Sam really was just sleeping and that he was being paranoid. Leo’s glare had softened into a concerned gaze as he watched Donnie start checking for Sam’s pulse and pull out his flashlight to check her eyes. Raph, who had been angrily pacing in the back, now stood completely still as he also watched his brother look after Sam. Donnie moved back and sighed as he clicked the mini flashlight off. “I don’t think she has a concussion or head trauma or anything serious like that. Her body’s probably just so exhausted it clocked out on her.” “She shouldn’t have been part of this” Leo and Raph oddly said at the exact same time. Donnie was extremely upset at hearing this, and he could tell that Mikey felt the same way based on the glare he had aimed at the floor in front of him. “We’re dropping this now” Donnie said in a cold tone. His voice wasn’t high, but it wasn’t a whisper. The neutral tone told the oldest two that now was not the time to share their complaints, and the fact that Donatello had switched from pouting to this bitter tone signaled how upset he truly was.
After this, the rest of the plane ride had been quiet. This was mainly because the boys were all furious with each other and were trying to remain calm after literally arguing for over a couple hours, but it was also because they were waiting for Sam to show signs that she was okay and wake up. It was mere minutes to 9:00 when the plane would be landing when Sam finally woke back up. She stirred slowly and was shocked to see the boys sitting silently and still like statues. This, plus Michelangelo’s soft and kind expression when she woke up, made her think that the storm of hateful words had passed. Little did she know, what happened earlier was just a short preview of what was to come later on.
After the plane landed, the group caught a break to dash to their truck’s hiding spot. They finally arrived back at the lair at about 9:40p.m. This was where the real “fun” began. Sam was feeling rejuvenated as she traveled back to the lair with the guys, but the voice she heard made her sick to her stomach from nerves. As the group made their way into the central part of the lair, sitting on the couch drinking tea with Splinter was Jay. As soon as the two sets of human eyes connected, the tea cup was set down and Jay was fuming as he rushed over to his sister. “Where THE HELL have you been!? Oh sorry Sensei” Jay said as he quickly bowed to the wise rat. “At ease my child” Splinter said with a kind smile. “I’ll let you handle this amongst my sons. I’m going to go to meditate” he stated as he walked towards his room. He wanted to allow this time for Jay to complete his “parenting” on his own. “What’s going on?” Leo asked in confusion since Sam had stated she called Jay and let him know what she was doing. “Sam where’s your phone?” Jay asked sternly. “Uhhhh-it’s in this backpack” she said, pointing to the bag on her back, “it’s dead though-” “WHY?!” “Because I used the chargers for Donnie’s machines.” She turned to see Donatello staring wide-eyed at her, not happy with this answer. Jay covered his mouth with both of his hands and closed his eyes as he sighed. “Do you have any idea how many times I called you?” “Well I just said-” “11 TIMES. 11 times Sam. I’ve been calling you for hours. What the hell is this about breaking into police headquarters? A-and-and flying to Brazil?! What the hell have you been up to?! Where have you been?!” “Oh you gotta be kidding me” Raph scoffed out loud as he turned wide-eyed towards Sam (all his brothers looked at Sam this way now). Sam gulped. “Oh now you’re worried huh?!” Jay shouted in frustrated excitement. “Tell them Sam. I want you to tell them right now.” Sam looked down at her feet as she talked. “So, I did call Jay and I told him about what I was doing…over voicemail” she said, muttering the last part. “OH MY GOD” “WOOOOOOOW” The four turtles were saying one or the other of these two phrases as they all threw their hands up in the air. “Sam” Jay said softly. “Yes?” Sam muttered. “You’re grounded.” Sam groaned. “For two weeks.” “What?!” “Absolutely no friend contact. That means no sports, no dance, and definitely no lair” Jay said as he violently shook his head. “Well that’s unfair because that’s just punishing these guys” Sam said in a cocky tone. She assumed at least Mikey would back her up, but this did not happen. “We’re cool with it” he said calmly as he shrugged his shoulders. “Dude?!” Sam said as she glared at her best friend. This set the turtle off. “You LIED to us Sam! You lied to me! Straight to my face!” Mikey began shouting as he jabbed his finger between himself and the girl in front of him. “I called Jay-” “And it went to voicemail! Which he didn’t get until after we left! You never told us that and you know the deal!” “Oh you mean the baby deal that I don’t get a say in?” “Are you serious right now? Do you hear yourself?” Raph roughly cut in. “Are you seriously getting upset because people care about you?” “Let her act that way” Leo cut in, “She’s staying back next time, regardless of what anyone else says.” This last comment was aimed towards Donnie who had gone against Leo’s orders in having Sam stay back in the first place, and like the genius he was, Donnie picked up on this instantly. He slammed his hand down on the table. “You wanna play this game? Alright, tell us how you really feel Leo. Since you’re so perfect and can’t mess anything up. LET’S GO!” “You said she could help and then you totally took advantage of her” Leo bit back. “HOW?!” “You kept making her do things that pushed her over her limits. Like why the hell was she under the plane?” “To help push it up!” Donatello acted out his actions as he spoke. “To keep it in the air! To prevent us from dying! And she did a freaking awesome job hence us still being alive!”
At this point Jay was sitting back and watching the brothers argue. He wanted Sam to see how much turmoil the brothers were in because of her decisions, but he was also curious as to where this argument was heading and what would be revealed. “So what, you couldn’t solve the problem on your own?” Leo barked at his brother. “Are you seriously blaming me for not finding a way to stop gravity? Then again, I’m nothing but brains and no skill” Donnie said as he glared at Raph before glaring back at Leo, “so I guess I’m supposed to just alter how all physics works. Because that’s all I’m good for, right?” “Dudes cut it out!” Mikey shouted. “Sam was fine when she helped with the plane. The real problem was her 3 blackouts.” “Dude you don’t have the right to say anything since you didn’t help anyone ever” Raph said as he pushed Mikey to the side. “And those blackouts never would have occurred if we hadn’t jumped out of a plane” he said, again, using his words to jab at Donatello. “Well if you would have jumped when I said to then Sam wouldn’t have had to save your wimpy ass!” Donnie barked back. “And if you hate my plan so much then complain to Leo! He’s our perfect leader so next time let him make every decision! I mean his is the only one that counts, right?” “I’m the leader! I figure out strategies and decide who’s intel works best and when-” “TOTAL BULL!” Mikey shouted. “You do what you want, whenever it pops into your head! You can’t call Donnie out on not communicating when you’re the exact same way! You think of one strategy and then boom-bye Leo! See you later!” “At least I move and do something! Every time I looked back you were goofing around! You couldn’t even hold onto the device for 2 seconds before it popped out of your hands” Leo scolded. “That’s no fair! We were all being thrown around!” “Well you need to learn to defend yourself you dork!” Raph shouted. “You’re such a dimwit you couldn’t even warn me that a box was heading my way before I almost fell out of the plane.” “I was looking for Sam!” “Great, so now we have to worry about you being distracted worrying about her” Raph said with an annoyed laugh. “Well you should be able to worry about yourself” Donnie snapped at Raph. “You should be on alert mode regardless of who’s around you.” “Not the point! Mikey shouldn’t have needed to worry about Sam being in danger in the first place! That’s why next time she’s staying home!” Leo bellowed. “Cut the bull!” Mikey “we need her-” “What we need is to keep her safe, which you failed at doing when you let her head smash against the wall-” “Oh and you did such a great job keeping her safe when you and Raph landed on her and crashed into the floor! Yeah I saw that!” “Well then that’s even more reason that she shouldn’t have been there. If we can’t even take care of ourselves and we’re the ones hurting Sam-” “Ummmm no!” Donnie cut in, “Mikey and I brought Sam to safety at the rapids, you’re the one who went off on your own without a word!” “Because it’s not my job to babysit Sam when we push her so far that she passes out!” “We’re a team!” Mikey bellowed, “we all help each other out!” “Oh yeah because you totally helped Mikey! What exactly did you do again? Besides sit back and goof off I mean” Raph snarled. “Sam was weak as hell and she did more than you! She was on the sidelines and still helped me reach Donnie in time to protect him. You were next to him and didn’t do shit!” “What I’m hearing is that for a 5th time Sam saved one or all of us” Donnie said in a matter-of-fact tone. “And that she was safe on the sidelines!” Mikey chipped in. “Yeah, until she made the decision to throw herself into danger!” Raph barked back. “So what I’m hearing is that we can’t trust Sam” Leo said, mimicking Donnie’s tone as he stared at him. “WHAT?!” Donnie and Mikey hollered. “She was in a safe spot and then purposefully went over her already shortened limit and put herself in danger by attacking and gaining the attention of Bebop and Rocksteady! If she can’t fight then she should be in hiding, and if she can’t voluntarily hide and protect herself then we leave her home!” Leo argued. “How can you not see that Sam easily could have died?!” Raph added in furry. “How do you not see that without her we all could have died?!” Mikey fought back. “It has nothing to do with her, it’s about us!” Donnie added to the argument. “We don’t communicate and then it leads to chaos. You know, Sam and I talked before she saved Mikey, we talked before she kept the plane in the air, and she talked to Raph before he saved me!” “Great” Leo said as sarcastically as possible, “so that means we’re a team that can’t communicate with each other which results in us taking advantage of our most vulnerable member, and we make her do everything else for us because we can’t work together and take care of ourselves.” “How are we supposed to protect her when we can’t even take care of ourselves?” Raph asked in disappointment. Leo waved his arm in front of him. “Add that to the list of reasons why next time she’s not-” “ENOUGH!”
Sam’s eyes lit up and huge wind gusts flew from her body. Jay was grateful that Raph was so close to him as he lunged and held onto Jay before the winds flew him back against the wall. The other brothers stood their ground as best as they could until the winds died down. None of them, not even Jay (being so caught up in the brothers argument), had realized that Sam was losing her cool as she heard the brother’s arguing about her. She was hurt for so many reasons. She hated to see them arguing like this in general, but knowing that she was a main cause for it hurt her even more. She hated herself for not being able to help out more, she hated that she knew little to nothing about her powers, she hated that the brothers were blaming each other for not keeping her safe, and she loathed that she had no self-control in her body attacking Bebop and Rocksteady. And she knew that admitting this would just make matters worse, but for now the only thing on her mind was getting the guys to stop arguing the way they were.
“YOU!” she shouted as she stared at Leo, who in return was staring at her with a shocked expression. He definitely was not expecting this outburst, though he felt that at this point he shouldn’t be so surprised. “Stop blaming Donnie like he scripted for everything to go the way it did! You’re lucky he formed any plan where the plane didn’t fall right out of the sky. I didn’t see anyone else up there trying to fix it. And last time I checked you didn’t communicate and say what you were doing when you went for the device in the water either! And if you EVER tell Mikey he has no brains again I will literally kick your ass!” “And YOU!” she shouted as she now turned and faced towards Raph, “Stop hating on your younger brothers! At least they have faith in me that I can help, which I DID SAVE YOUR ASS! So stop acting like I’m just a nuisance! Same with you!” she said, pointing back to Leo before she continued to verbally attack Raph. “And I’ll kick your ass if you ever tell Donnie he has no skill ever again! HE’S SENSITIVE!” “And YOU!” she said as she now faced Donatello, “Leo didn’t communicate in the water but neither did you! Yeah that’s what happens when you bench me, I see everything! So no you didn’t have it right in your hand, you didn’t even touch it! Technically he did, you both were close but you idiots don’t talk! Maybe if you guys would try to understand each other rather than just yell at each other than you would know how he really feels. The reason he’s a total ass to all of you is because he cares!” “And you” Sam said in a low bitter tone towards Michelangelo, (in fact, this low tone sounded more pissed than the way she yelled at the others) “First of all, I’m flattered you worry about me, but you still have to worry about these dorks!” she said, rapidly pointing to the other three brothers. “Thank god Raph was okay, but worse things could have happened if he had fallen from the plane at a higher level, so pay better attention! And THANKS for having my back in regards to me being grounded. Like, okay yeah I know I broke the rules, but this was to retrieve ooze from the police so that it was held somewhere safe and couldn’t harm people, and then Brazil was to retrieve a device so that we could PROTECT. THE. WORLD! I mean hey” she said in a sarcastic comical tone “I thought saving the world came first over calling my brother and getting permission, but obviously my thoughts don’t matter. As long as I’m following the rules, right?” All the brothers, mutant and human, looked down or away from Sam. They agreed with her words and they all realized that had been harsh towards both her and the other brothers. Sam’s verbal rampage was not over just yet though. “And hey” she announced as she faced all four mutant brothers, “if you have a problem with me, how about telling me about it instead of arguing about it while I’m standing right here. Oh, or would you rather me just sit on the sidelines and listen to you verbally attack each other and me not help? Because god forbid I get my feelings hurt or something. Or god forbid my powers take over again and try to keep you guys safe! Because that’s freaking horrible!”
At that very moment, something clicked in Donnie’s mind. “Sam” “WHAT?!” she shouted, obviously not ready to end her rant just yet. “What’s going through your mind right now?” Donnie asked cautiously. “I just said it! Like, I literally just said a lot! Be more specific.” “What are you most angry about right now, at this very moment. Of everything you just said, what upsets you the most?” he asked calmly, even though his friend was shouting at him. “Gee I don’t know. Maybe the fact that you’re all arguing because I couldn’t control myself” she replied sourly, “I mean forgive me for thinking you guys could die and me just reacting without even realizing what I was doing” she said, waving her arms in front of her, moving with the anger inside her. Her words however now caught all the turtles attention. “Wait, what?” Leo asked. “When were we gonna die?” “When you went over the waterfall.” “But, we’re turtles” Leo stated, confused at what had concerned his friend so much that she went ballistic and threw herself in danger afterwards. “Yeah but you didn’t know how high it was, or what was at the drop, you didn’t know if you’d be safe or not.” Wheels were spinning in Donnie’s head as he walked forward and grabbed Sam’s hand. “Come with me, right now.” He needed to get her to the med wing right away and test to see if his theory was correct. “Not yet!” Sam yelled as she pulled away, “I’m not done bitching!” Donnie then grabbed her other arm and basically starting pulling Sam, like he was dragging a child who didn’t want to leave the park. “Perfect” he replied, “keep talking as we walk.” This got Sam to stop and she finally started walking with him towards the med wing outside the lair. Leo and Raph exchanged glances for a split second and then chased after their brother, with Jay and Mikey right on their tail.
They entered the med wing to see Donnie sitting and typing away on a computer while Sam had a helmet with some patches hooked up to her head. The remaining four boys just stood and listened outside the doorway, watching to see what exactly was happening and what Donnie was thinking. “When was the last time your powers took over?” Donnie asked as he paused his typing. “Ummmm, I wanna say police headquarters.” “Why?” “…I don’t wanna say” Sam mumbled, a bit embarrassed. “Tell him or its three weeks” Jay stated. Sam groaned. “I was pissed.” “Why?” Donnie asked gently. “Because they called you monsters. That upset Mikey, and then that upset me. And then I thought how the rest of you were feeling, both how you guys actually felt and then how you were probably also pissed because that guy upset Mikey. The next thing I knew, Raph was carrying me out of headquarters and you guys were checking on me.” Sam’s eyes were now glued to the floor. Because of this, she didn’t see the concern on the faces of the brothers in the doorway. Donnie would have had the exact same expression on his face, but right now he was masking these thoughts as he typed away on his computer. “Okay, when did they go off before that?” “Uhhhhh, oh, when Leo benched Raph and Mikey.” Brows rose when they heard this. “When was this?” Donnie asked. He didn’t remember hearing about this. “I felt them kicking in when Leo said his opinion was the only one that mattered. It was weird, like I could actually sense my powers kicking in and I was able to control them. But then they started getting stronger. It was the first time I actually felt them rising up before they took over.” “You said an enemy was attacking” Raph added softly. Sam looked over at the group in the door way and stared at Raphael, her eyes stating that she wanted him to keep talking. “You said an enemy was attacking, that he was hurting me and bringing chaos into the family. I said that it was just Leo being a prick” (to which Leo pursed his lips and looked away, starting to get a bit flustered at constantly being called names like this). “I told you I had no injuries and you went back to normal.” “Wait, so what was the exact reason your powers starting going off?” Donnie asked. Sam paused, remembering the situation for herself. “Raph got hurt…in a sense. That’s the last thing I remember.” “When did they go off before that? Can you remember?” Sam took a minute to generate her answer. “When I met Casey. I sensed someone had attacked Sensei and I thought he was in danger. Then Leo was holding me and Mikey’s hands were on my shoulders. Apparently I had tried to hurt Casey because he was the first unknown face I saw and I thought he was an enemy trying to hurt Splinter.” “How far does this go?” Jay asked. “These all sound recent.” “The last one I can remember is when Donnie shocked Mikey. At least that’s what Raph told me had happened and apparently I snapped.” Donnie’s eyes went wide for a second since he had no clue what she was talking about. “When was this?” he asked. “In the jumbotron. April called and Mikey was being a dork and apparently you shocked him and then that set me off.” “Do you remember why?” “Mikey got hurt” Sam said bluntly. At this point all the boys were beginning to sense a pattern.
“It’s based on emotions” Leo stated. “Right?” A small printer in the corner was now printing out colorful photos. The pictures displayed a cranial figure representing Sam’s brain and which parts were lit up during the conversation. There was only one main chunk where a huge area was lit up in the picture. “That’s the temporal lobe” Donnie stated as he looked over the scans that were taken throughout the conversation. “We finally have an idea as to how your powers work.” “Sooooooooo what’s happening?” Mikey asked, having no idea what was going on. Donnie turned around to face the rest of the group. “The temporal lobe handles multiple tasks, including those involving memory and emotions. There’s the hippocampus which deals with long term memory, there’s the limbic system which carries out the experience of emotions, there’s the amygdala which deals with memory, decision making, and emotional reactions, there’s the locus coeruleus which deals with physiological responses to stress and panic, there’s-” “Spit it out Donnie” Leo urged. “I always thought Sam was set off specifically based on what she saw and heard alone, but it’s not just her senses, it’s how she processes them.” “So, it’s every time she’s upset?” Raph asked. “Not just upset, specifically when she feels someone she cares about is being harmed. Her powers have gone off…8 times.” “What?!” Jay asked. “List them. Now!” “The first time was when she was with me in my lab. I burned myself and she literally demolished the device that caused the burn. The second time was when she caught Raph chasing Mikey. The third time was when she caught Leo and Raph arguing and butting heads. Fourth time was me shocking Mikey. Fifth time was when she thought Casey was hurting Splinter. Sixth time was when Leo yelled at Raph right before we left for the museum. Seventh time was at police headquarters. The eighth and final time was when she saw us heading for the waterfall. Each time she thought someone was in danger and she felt a need to protect them. Her powers could even be connecting to past memories of needing to protect us and it just takes over and goes Hulk until someone calms her down.” “Wait, hold up” Raph cut in, “that all makes sense BUT why would she freak out when I chased Mikey? She’s seen that AND me and Leo arguing tons of times, but she only went crazy once for each situation.” “It was out of context” Leo cut in, his eyes wide as the wheels in his head began to turn as well. “Sam was meditating with me when you were chasing Mikey. She didn’t know what caused the argument. We were literally leaving my room and you two ran by us. And then when we were arguing-” “She was with Donnie in the med wing. She’s always there when the fights start, but those times she wasn’t” Raph said, now truly understanding how all this worked. “Plus this explains why she never freaks out during trainings” Mikey said with wide eyes, officially catching on to what his brothers were getting at. “She sees us sparring and knows we’re not in any danger.” “Has this been a normal thing?!” Jay announced. “Why have I not known about this?!” All eyes were now on Sam who was twiddling her thumbs. “I was going to tell you…but it either slips my mind or its bad timing.” “How is your life bad timing?” Jay asked, fuming the entire time. “Dude, you’re getting married and have a job while also advocating for the Foot Survivors organization. You have a million things to worry about, I’m not going to make them worse!”
Hearing this, Leo and Raph had to leave the room. They both walked back to their designated rooms, knowing that if they continued to stay that they would just start arguing again like they had earlier. They wanted nothing more than to keep their sister safe, but they couldn’t fathom Sam’s thoughts of hiding information. Maybe later they could try to talk to her about it, but they both knew that now was not the best time.
Mikey sighed with a saddened expression on his face. He was also worrying about his sister and best friend’s behaviors and mindset as of late. He sensed that now was a good time to let Sam and Jay talk, so he also walked back to his room.
Donnie wore the same expression as his younger brother. He felt the same way and decided to let the human siblings share their moment. This was the perfect spot for them to talk since it was not located inside the lair but was still nearby. He pat Sam on the shoulder as he walked out of the room.
That just left the human siblings to share their moment in peace.
#tmnt#teenage mutant ninja turtles#tmnt leonardo#leonardo#tmnt raphael#raphael#tmnt donatello#donatello#tmnt michelangelo#michelangelo#tmnoc#tmnt2016#TMNT Out of the Shadows
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Harry Potter and the Cursed Child - J.K. Rowling
Synopsis: The Eighth Story. Nineteen Years Later.
Based on an original new story by J.K. Rowling, Jack Thorne and John Tiffany, a new play by Jack Thorne, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is the eighth story in the Harry Potter series and the first official Harry Potter story to be presented on stage. The play will receive its world premiere in London’s West End on July 30, 2016.
It was always difficult being Harry Potter and it isn’t much easier now that he is an overworked employee of the Ministry of Magic, a husband and father of three school-age children.
While Harry grapples with a past that refuses to stay where it belongs, his youngest son Albus must struggle with the weight of a family legacy he never wanted. As past and present fuse ominously, both father and son learn the uncomfortable truth: sometimes, darkness comes from unexpected places.
My thoughts: GINNY: “Harry, there is never a perfect answer in this messy, emotional world. Perfection is beyond the reach of humankind, beyond the reach of magic. In every shining moment of happiness is that drop of poison: the knowledge that pain will come again. Be honest to those you love, show your pain. To suffer is as human as to breathe.”
On July 21, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, a new play based on a story by Rowling, Jack Thorne and John Tiffany premiered at the Palace Theatre in London’s West End. The play, along with the book publication of its script, is the first significant addition to the Potter universe since the credits rolled on the second Deathly Hallows movie in 2011. Harry Potter stands peerless in the realm of literary hits, so Cursed Child was an assured commercial success even before it debuted. Written as a transcript, Cursed Child follows the next generation of wizards and witches.
I found the latest instalment of the Harry Potter series to be an enjoyable read in the sense that it allowed me to revisit old friends made many years ago (even if only for an afternoon). Harry Potter and the Cursed Child reignited that childlike imaginative spark in me, which is the reason I fell in love with the world of Hogwarts in the first place. Without going into too much detail, the play focussed on the difficulty Harry and Ginny’s son, Albus Severus, has with being the underperforming child of “the boy who lived”. Albus struggles with living u pro the reputation of the Potter name, and subsequently becomes a bit of a loner who does not hold the same esteem for Hogwarts as his parents would have hoped. The piece also speaks to the difficulty Harry is parenting a somewhat rebellious Albus, who is often viewed by others to be “different”. When Albus befriends the child of a certain former Slytherin house member with whom Harry shared several altercations with during his time at Hogwarts, Harry is tasked with determining whether he should intervene to keep Albus out of trouble, or rather to put his preconceived notions of Malfoy’s only son aside and allow Albus to continue to spend time with his one true friend. In addition, Harry must also make Albus understand the difference between seeking out trouble versus confronting it when it presents itself to you - a lesson Albus eventually learns through the course of the play.
SCORPIUS: No, it's time that time-turning became a thing of the past.
ALBUS: You’re quite proud of that phrase, aren’t you?
SCORPIUS: Been working on it all day.
While many readers have voiced their concerns over the writing style and how it pales in comparison to the original series, I would offer the following point. This work is written in such a style to facilitate live performances. As such, it seems unfair to compare the extent to which characters are developed and the over plot complexity to J.K. Rowling’s original series. The original seven were not bound by the added task of producing a narrative which can easily be digested in a spoken format (in addition to proving itself worthy of the original series as a standalone literary text). As I have always preferred dialogue over description, this writing form has been proven itself worthy due to its easy and fast nature to read.
I truly don’t understand what’s become of J.K. Rowling in recent years. She transformed the literal and cinematic realms with her Potter books, pioneering fantasy trends that continue to this day. I suppose she’s trying to make stage plays more popular now? Not sure if that will take off, and it’s kind of unfair for the many fans who can’t afford to go see the play themselves. Those people are stuck reading the script, which requires a lot more imagination to really enjoy. There’s very little of Rowling’s great descriptive prose on display, mostly just dialogue - and it’s unclear how much of that was actually written word for word by her personally. It sounds like her style; I’ll say that. But reading it definitely pales in comparison to reading an actual book. Frankly, I’m disappointed that Rowling hasn’t taken the time to flesh this out into a novel. The same goes for the other Potter related fiction she’s written lately - the pre-Fantastic Beasts pieces on Pottermore, to be precise. Its like reading pitches she hasn’t bothered to turn into real books. Obviously, when you’re as famous as Rowling, you can get away with posting your world building notes online or having somebody else turn a story idea into a script and still have millions reading the stuff… but it smacks of laziness on her part, in my opinion.
DUMBLEDORE: Perfection is beyond the reach of humankind, beyond the reach of magic.
If you came to this book hoping for a new era of Harry Potter, you’re going to be disappointed. This book is an epilogue to the original series, not the start of a new one. There’s nothing ground breaking. The mythology is not expanded, and the new characters spend most of their time dealing with the legacies of the original cast. I’m gratified that the wizarding world will be built up by the Fantastic Beasts film(s), but there's a lot of untapped potential in the modern Potterverse that isn’t even touched in “Cursed Child”. There wasn’t enough of Hogwarts, unfortunately, and only focused on the magic outside the castle. I would have liked to see more of the home Harry Potter grew up in.
What makes “Cursed Child” work despite all the strikes against it is what it does with the aftermath of the original stories. If “Deathly Hallows” had to have a follow up in the first place, then this is a surprisingly good one. It’s certainly an improvement on the frequently criticised, rushed epilogue to “Hallows”. This is basically an expansion on that last chapter, exploring what it’s like for Albus Potter to grow up dealing with his famous dad’s legacy, and it’s very believable in that respect. True, Albus doesn’t come across as likeable until near the end of the book, and even Harry shows some striking flaws as a father, but given where both these characters are coming from, these problems make sense. It’s not the forced “happily ever after” of the Hallows epilogue; it’s complex and realistic. Additionally, there’s a very sympathetic, funny character in play in the form of Scorpius Malfoy, Draco's son. He ends up stealing the show, and is arguably the hero of the story in his own right. His lines made me laugh out loud more than once, and convinced me that to whatever degree Rowling was involved in writing this story, she’s clearly still “got it”
.ALBUS: “So what would you like me to do? Magic myself popular? Conjure myself into a new house? Transfigure myself into a better student? Just cast a spell, Dad, and change me into what you want me to be, okay? It’ll work out better for both of us.”
Scorpius was a great addition into the story. His friendship/relationship with Albus was pure, and I appreciate the attention provided towards the importance of friendship. I definitely understand why people would like to see them together as the dialogue and quick descriptions indicate a relationship, which ultimately seems to be more than friendship. Draco and Harry talking, and viewing each other as friends made me feel emotional; it took them more than twenty years, but it was worth it. I still don’t understand the story surrounding Draco and his wife, Astoria. It doesn’t make sense, and seems like bullshit the writers created to expand the plot/story.
Parts of the story itself felt a little overdone and rushed, but you must keep in mind that this addition is originally intended to be watched, not read, with delivery fitting under a specific window of time. For this, I know I did not experience the full breath and absorption of Cursed Child during my read through, and I am sure live performance characteristics such as dialectic nuances and set transformations would definitely expand this work even more, but just reading the play itself took me back into this world of magic, mishap, and mischievousness that Potterheads are long time familiar with. I am curious how the experience of watching it live differs, and cannot wait to see it when I have the chance.
DUMBLEDORE: “Harry, there is never a perfect answer in this messy, emotional world. Perfection is beyond the reach of humankind, beyond the reach of magic. In every shining moment of happiness is that drop of poison: the knowledge that pain will come again. Be honest to those you love, show your pain. To suffer is as human as to breathe.”
The Trolley Witch part made me feel uneasy. It was irrelevant towards the plot, and made me cringe while reading it. I’ve come to a conclusion, in which I cannot consider these events as cannon. As much as I enjoy certain twists and additions into the story, much of it doesn’t fit with the original Harry Potter books or does not seem to work. It felt as if the plot read like fan fiction, with its revisiting of the original novels’ plot points, its cameos of beloved characters, and its too satisfying outcomes; Hermione, for instance, is Minister for Magic and Ginny is sports editor for the Daily Prophet. Ron seems completely out of character, and revealed he was drunk at his wedding; there was a desperate attempt of humour with his character, which didn’t seem like the original Ron.
Voldemort having a child completely turned me off. He has been hinted to have a relationship with Bellatrix throughout the books, but them having an actual affair and child doesn’t seem to fit. How could Bellatrix be pregnant during the Wizarding War? There was no explanation for this, only the child was born during this time. Of course, their child would want to avenge them, and bring Voldemort back. Another villain would have improved Harry Potter and the Cursed Child as Voldemort’s daughter didn’t do the book any justice. I will not accept that Voldemort had a child with Bellatrix. I can’t, and I won’t.
HARRY: “I shouldn’t have survived - it was my destiny to die - even Dumbledore thought so - and yet I lived. I beat Voldemort. All these people - all these people - my parents, Fred, the Fallen Fifty - and it’s me that gets to live? All this damage - and it’s my fault.”
It’s a shame because there’s a lot of possibility here. There are interesting storylines taking place here, they just aren’t executed on the level we’ve come to expect from a Rowling product. I enjoy reading time travelling stories, as well as revisiting beloved characters much later in life, but this isn’t how these characters act. Albus should never have been this whiny. I liked him in the seventh book. I liked Harry in the original 7. But, here, the characters have become annoying or flat. Additionally, I wasn’t a fan of hoe entwined in the story Harry was. I’ve already witnessed him and everything he is capable of in the original seven books. Now, he's a blubbering fool. You can’t sit there and tell me that Harry Potter, the boy who lived, is going to run to Ginny every time he has a minor problem, and he is not allowed to eat sugar.
Having said that, as a reader, you have time to appreciate on the page how nimbly Thorne’s writing navigates the adventure’s death defying twists and turns, and his stage directions have poetry of their own, a style that in its lyricism and sense of the abstract is distinct from Rowling’s more direct, story driven prose. For example, when Albus arrives at Hogwarts and is sorted into his school house, we are told: “There’s a silence. A perfect, profound silence. One that sits low, twists a bit and has damage within it.” When the children travel in time, Thorne’s stage direction notes how: “time stops. And then it turns over, thinks a bit, and begins spooling backwards…”
DRACO: “…And being alone - that’s so hard. I was alone. And it sent me to a truly dark place. For a long time. Tom Riddle was also a lonely child. You may not understand that, Harry, but I do…”
As a story containing many possible alternate realities, with a text created to varying degrees by three collaborators, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is a complement to Rowling’s original series rather than a straightforward continuation. It won’t satisfy all fans: some have already taken issue with the story’s extensive reliance on time travel, the use of which seems to disagree with the magical precedent set int he books. Others have quibbled with the portrayal of Harry’s character: he comes across as pricklier and even more troubles than he was in Rowling's books. And though the release is eagerly anticipated by adult fans who grew up with the books, it remains to be seen whether children will connect with reading a complex story in a less familiar script form.
The emotional climax is devastating even on paper. Once again, the fantasy world that Rowling created nearly 20 years ago is at its most powerful when it sets aside magic and reveals the basic, brutal and human mechanics of love and grief. The characters are, mostly, exactly as you remember them, and it’s difficult to overstate how exciting it is to read a new story set in this widely loved fantasy universe. The thrill of a new Harry Potter book, even in script form, is its own kind of magic spell.
HARRY: “You know what? I’m done being made responsible for your unhappiness. At least you’ve got a dad. Because I didn’t, okay?”
Nonetheless, there is still plenty in this new release to tempt fans, for familiarities abound and the magic is intact, if fleeting. Details are minimal for settings, as can be expected given the format, but it works, as there was an assumption that anyone reading the book knows the world inside and out and can paint the pictures in the mind. In fact, fans will find much that is recognisable in the new story, in spite of the altered vessel of delivery. It is worth nothing that there is no effort made by either Rowling or Thorne to acquaint a Harry Potter newcomer to the world, so it is advised for those not familiar with the original series to read the books in sequence. From the opening lines - once the reader adjusts to the pace and syntax of the script format - a comforting feeling descends, for the world seems just as it was left when the last pages of Book 7 were reluctantly closed.
Rowling never misses a chance to raise a moral conundrum, and characters are always deeper than two dimensional, even in script form. Albus Potter, bearing the unwelcome burden of being the son of the most famous wizard to live, is faced with having to navigate Hogwarts with the same lack of anonymity as his father did. The first person young Albus encounters on the train is Scorpuis Malfoy, the son of Harry’s nemesis, Draco Malfoy. Young Rose Weasley, daughter of Hermione and Ron, heads off to make other friends, but Albus stays, in typical Rowling fashion, he befriends the last person his father would expect him to. These sorts of moral twists are some of the reasons Rowling’s books resonate so deeply, as they appeal to our better natures.
HARRY [quoting Dumbledore]: “The truth is a beautiful and terrible thing, and should therefore be treated with great caution.”
The twists and turns continue, and preconceptions and expectations are turned on their heads, as though Rowling is reminding the reader that change is good and an open mind should always be the goal. Not only are the characters’ prejudices challenged, but so, too, are those of the reader, and once again Rowling takes a fantasy and elevates it with characters that are distinct, flawed and endearing. There will be plenty who denounce Rowling for reopening Harry Potter’s world, but for those for whom the loves run deep, treasures await.
If it all sounds confusing, it is, as there were several hands involved in the creation of the first two instalments that are set 19 years after Harry Potter left Hogwarts and defeated the Dark Lord Voldemort. Rowling hinted at this glimpse of Harry’s future in the epilogue of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows,” and some of that much analysed final chapter is overlapped nearly verbatim in the play’s script; indeed, it serves as a jumping off point for a new and wondrous adventure for Harry, his cohorts and the next generation of wizarding offspring. For true Potter fans, this might be enough to be pulled back into the story. That said, the very nature of the play format of “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child” allows for very little detail, which is where Rowling’s real storytelling gifts reside. Her ability to build fully developed characters is unsurpassed and is what comprises the centre of the allure of the Harry Potter series.
DRACO: Hermione Granger, I’m being bossed around by Hermione Granger. And I’m mildly enjoying it.
Lastly, Draco and Hermione have been shipped together since the books first came out, and there is a moment dedicated to them. I’ve never understood the obsessiveness of their relationship, and it disgusts me; it's like shipping a white man who is racist with a black woman. It doesn’t make sense. He might have changed his attitude towards muggle born people, his prejudice will never completely disappear. This tine, I must admit, made me smile a bit as I realised it will make the majority of Draco and Hermione shippers happy. Yes, I felt happy for them, as pathetic as it makes me sound.
The story, once you get past the awkward format, is gripping. I devoured it in one afternoon. There are quite a few surprises in store for hardcore fans. On the whole, the tone is very appropriate for those who have “grown up” along with Harry. Fans who are now adults can relate with the themes explored here, even when characters mess up pretty badly. Harry certainly made plenty of his own mistakes over the years, and occasionally acted like a jerk. I’d argue that it’s worth giving Harry’s progeny a chance, even if you don't take to him at first. At the very least, read it for Scorpius. I’m not saying you definitely won’t be disappointed, but there are far worse ways for a Potter fan to bide the time until Fantastic Beasts gives us a weightier addition to the potter universe.
DRACO: Keep up, old man.
HARRY: We’re the same age, Draco.
DRACO: I wear it better.
Date finished: 27th March, 2017
Pages: 309
Rating/5: ★★★
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