#also i assume a lobotomy
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How dare you 😡
Exer is pointy
Not NO.
It's yes, stars.
Get it right
;)
british scum
#/hj#exer being pointy is my only weakness#also i assume a lobotomy#oh yeah i forgot to tell people so ill js say in the comments#so like#at school last week#my class was taking a walk#and i was w my friend#and we were farrrrr behind so we ran#and then we stopped bc we had cramps#and she was like “my side aches so much” and i pretended to punch it#and she was like “actually punch it”#and i did#HOLY ME#IT HURT SO SO SO BAD#i actually broke one of my fingers bc of it#turns out#she has scoliosis#and she was wearing this brace#to help fix her back???#idk#anyways i am a damaged person#send help before i punch someone elses back brace or fake leg or glass eye or whatever#once i got hit by a car#AND#ON A DIFFERENT OCCASION#A SQUIRREL CHASED ME FOR LIKE 10 MINUTES AFTER I CALLED IT BABYGIRL#THAT WASNT EVEN THE FIRST TIME#once i called one “radical jim” and he chased me for a few minutes#jackson's diary
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imagine if I made all of the sephirah play monopoly... (excluding the As)
I think you should invite Ayin at least for the sheer hilarity of Angela potentially bankrupting him.
#I'm assuming this is about char ai dbfjfjg#lobotomy corporation#character ai#spark talks about nothing of relevance#now that's what i call shitposting#questions#nage1undhammer#(also side note - the ruina sephirah ais are more developed i think so I'd use them! at least the ones I've found by Pochita)
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good to see you're ready to get railed
Sol badguy hmu anytime ykyk
#lobotomy corporation#netzach.irl#netzach#anon ask#||#i uh. i only have jack o in revelator. not strive lmao#im also bad at playing her so railed in more ways than 1 <3#also what the fuck /lh#im assuming this is abt guilty gear anyways#or atleast netzach o valentine
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I promise I’m going somewhere with this but I am currently fixating on how seeing Naberius’s trident knife in the beginning of HtN gives Harrow the Gideon Memory Migraine™, despite no clear connection to Gideon:
Ianthe considered this. She nudged the confection basket hilt of the rapier at her hip aside, and took out a long knife that, again, ran a hot rill of pain down your temporal bone. It was—though you had never bothered to learn—Tern’s main-gauche, his trident knife, a long blade from which two other blades would spring at the press of some hidden mechanism; she flicked that mechanism now, and with a snickt they burst out like a firework, two hard points of gleaming steel. She flicked it again, and the blades went snickt back into their housing.
Is it simply that it’s something from the Canaan House era in general? Or is there more going on? Stick with me here.
One of my pet theories I’ve been harboring since Kiriona’s wounds were revealed is that Harrow herself wounded Gideon after she threw herself on the fence, paralleling Jesus’s side wound from being speared after his crucifixion. They needed to ensure Jesus was truly dead, and presumably Harrow also needed to be well and truly sure that Gideon was dead before proceeding. Ianthe says she put a sword through Naberius’s heart to pin his soul in place for her ascension, and we see his body run through with the sword. Harrow needing to do the same to Gideon would certainly be some very juicy angst fuel.
The other crucial component here is one of my other favorite pet theories: that Harrow knew Gideon’s sword was haunted, likely before even coming to Canaan House. I’ve seen a few people do some more detailed explanations about that, but I’ll do a brief rundown here.
Harrow says as far back as GtN about the sword “I never liked that cursed thing anyway; I always felt like it was judging me.” After the events of HtN with the River and Canaan House 2.0, we know she has an innate and potentially subconscious talent with spirit magic; it seems likely she was able to sense what was in the sword whether she knew exactly what was going on or not.
In HtN, Guideline #3 in her her pre-lobotomy letters to her post-lobotomy self has several stipulations (wipe it down with arterial blood nightly, coat it in regenerating ash, don’t cut flesh or bone with it) that sound a lot like precautions one would take to keep a soul from hopping out of it.
When discussing the sword with Abigail in Canaan House 2.0, we get some very specific qualifiers around how much information Harrow is able to provide about the sword. Directly before remembering that the sword was Gideon’s we have: “Harrow’s brain, though still a jumble, was no longer a mess in a darkened room. Memory had gifted her a small torch she could light the disarray with.”
After that, she struggles to recall further details, her own brain providing obstacles: “The light was not proving helpful enough: she was, in desperation, kicking over piles of the rubble in her own brain.” In the end, she’s able to tell Abigail: “I hated that damned sword for years. I don’t know why; it just felt strange - rancorous. I cannot deny that I often assumed its edge would be the last thing I saw. I don’t know.”
Circling back to the final battle of GtN, we get my favorite little nugget of support for this: Harrow is described as looking “affrighted” when Gideon tells her to go get her two-hander. I’d initially taken that to mean she was startled (and maybe a bit annoyed) to find out that Gideon had brought it at all, or freaked out at the situation in general. But I’ve begun to wonder if she specifically didn’t want Gideon to bring that sword with her to Canaan House because she knew, or at least suspected, what it contained.
Which brings us to the trident knife. If Harrow needed to fix Gideon’s soul in place by impaling her herself, and she knew there was a malevolent soul in the two-hander that could conceivably hitch a ride in another body that it came into contact with, she would have needed a different tool for the job… Which may very well have been the trident knife. Seeing the weapon she used to mutilate her cavalier’s body with seems like exactly the sort of thing that would bring on one of Harrow’s Gideon-induced headaches, no? It’s also notable that when Harrow sees this knife, it’s directly before Ianthe stabs her through the hand, again analogous to crucifixion wounds. I gotta say, if this holds water, there’s a certain poetry to both Harrow and Gideon receiving versions of the Holy Wounds on the blade of the same knife.
(Edit to add: further theorizing prompted by @camilla-rekt‘s fab addition can be found on this reblog)
#this is really just a jenga tower of theories but i'm still sitting here rubbing my hands together like a cartoon villain#i am just ripping biting tearing to know what happened between those two chapters#(and incidentally there may have been actual ripping biting tearing involved but i digress)#i wonder if this could have anything to do with the favor harrow owes ianthe… hmm#Nona the Ninth spoilers#harrowhark nonagesimus#Gideon nav#kiriona gaia#ianthe tridentarius#Nona the Ninth#ntn#the locked tomb#tlt#tlt meta#tlt theories
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I keep thinking about The Body telling Harrow 'she told me not to tell you'. On my first listen through I assumed this was referring to Gideon, because I was looking for any proof of her.
On my second, I didn't even question it. But does that even make sense?
As I have stated before I don't believe Gideon can see/interact with Harrow's hallucinations the way Harrow can (and if she can see them, she can definitely distinguish between hallucinations and reality). It's also very OOC for her. Gideon was angry, Gideon would want Harrow to know she was there.
So the only she this 'she' could possibly refer to is pre-lobotomy Harrow. And that makes so much more sense! Of course pre-lobotomy Harrow would warn her own hallucinations not to tell post-lobotomy Harrow. Of course she would be referred to as a 'she' and not 'you' because she is 'dead.'
And now I'm crying about all the fail-safes Harrow put in place to preserve what she thought was Gideon's revenant. I love that mean little goth so much 🥹🥹
#harrow the ninth#harrow the ninth spoilers#htn#htn spoilers#tlt#tlt meta#htn meta#harrow the ninth meta#the locked tomb meta#harrowhark nonagesimus#gideon nav#the body#griddlehark#ship: one flesh one end bitch
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UNRELIABLE NARRATORS; SIDE C
*NOTE; propaganda is out of order due to poll length!
Eugenides Propaganda:
the entire plot hinges on a detail he lets the reader (and every other character) assume is true. I don't want to spoil it because it's a really fun reveal but he is lying from the first second he appears on the page and you can't trust him to tell the full truth about ANYTHING related to himself and his goals. he mostly does it to keep his advantage and not have other characters be suspicious of him but it's just so fun when you realise he's been lying the whole time
Harrowhark Propaganda:
She gave herself a lobotomy and gives completely incorrect flashbacks to the previous book. Things that straight up did not happen. Gaslight gatekeep girlboss.
She’s schizophrenic (confirmed by the author) and also lives in a world with necromancy and ghostly revenants. She’s not just an unreliable narrator for readers, she’s an unreliable narrator of her own internal experience. She knows this and has to work with people around her to compensate for it. Descent into spoilerville below. Seriously Do Not Read if you want to read these books. There’s also the little matter about how she is *not actually the narrator* of a huge chunk of the story that we are initially led to believe is being told from her perspective.
(Spoilers) Holy shit she is THE most unreliable narrator. This gremlin gave herself a lobotomy so that she could forget about Gideon Nav, the most important person in her life (for magic soul-preserving reasons) so half of the second book in the series is spent gaslighting the reader about a book they just read. She comes up with an entire alternate version of the events of the first book in the series to carefully exclude any mentions of Gideon, and any time someone says ‘Gideon’ in front of her she LITERALLY has a stroke and/or an intercranial hemorrhage as her brain overwrites the word with someone else’s name. God occasionally intentionally triggers her memory revision to get out of difficult conversations. She also hallucinates ALL the time (unrelated to the lobotomy). She shows up at her frenemy’s room in the middle of the night (think little kid stumbling to their parents’ room and saying “I frew up”) to ask her to come check underneath her bed for the corpse that’s been wandering the space station. When frenemy checks underneath the bed, frenemy claims not to see anything, and Harrow is such an unbelievably unreliable narrator that it’s an open question in the fandom as to whether frenemy genuinely didn’t see the corpse or if frenemy was just yanking Harrow’s chain. Harrow is also haunted by a literal ghost that fucks up her already fucked up alternate history. Girlie will pick up a piece of paper and read from it the most violent and haunting piece of prose ever composed, when in reality all that’s written on the paper is the elementary school Superman S*. I am NOT joking that is a real goddamn scene. Harrow was created to win this poll. TLDR; she has brain damage and memory loss, she hallucinates, and is also haunted. * https://twitter.com/vestenet/status/1301012651145859072
Girl is so unreliable, she unreliably tells me events I was there for!!! She's retelling the previous book and I'm like "girlie, this is absolutely not how it happened". Also, she gave herself a DIY lobotomy, it has to impact your memory center I guess
She literally had a lobotomy, how can she be reliable
More Propaganda under cut!
Harrowhark is simply the unreliable narrator of all time. Can’t remember shit because of a lifetime of trauma? Check. Maybe lying to yourself and those around you a bit? Most definitely. Being gaslit by the survivors you depend on to orient you to reality? For sure. How about a little bit of canon schizophrenia? She’s got it all. Ghosts? Or something? Spirits that are attached in some way to your body and are not perceivable by others? Sure, sure! But how about spirits that are attached in some way to your body and are gonna use you to hijack others’ bodies and maybe kill God, too? Absolutely. Wee bit of DIY brain surgery? If it would make you an unreliable narrator, friends, then Harrowhark Nonagesimus has been there, been subjected to that!
Okay I don't know that much about this series since I haven't convinced myself to read all of the first book, but this is my blorbo in law so I'd feel bad not spreading propaganda (all of what I'm saying is something I've read, as to prevent myself from straight up submitting misinformation). So all of Harrow's unreliable narration takes place in the second book, Harrow the Ninth. Basically, without her even seemingto acknowledge it, Harrow's brain is very fucked up during this book, to the point where even she's not sure how reliable her narrative is. There's many questions left unclear as a result of her fucked up little brain, like what's real, what's fake, whether we can trust her judgement, whether even she can trust her own judgement, whether her original cavalier is dead or not (Harrow is convinced she is), etc. Let me tell you, I adore unreliable narrators who aren't even that sure if they're reliable. I have yet to eat that trope up here in this circumstance, but this poll might not run again by the time I do, so for now, here's my messed up blorbo in law.
OKAY SO REMEMBER MY GIDEON SUBMISSION? HARROW DOESN’T! SPOILERS AHEAD BECAUSE SHE LOBOTOMIZED HERSELF TO FORGET GIDEON BECAUSE THAT’S A HEALTHY WAY TO GRIEVE AND THEN IN THE ONLY PARTS OF HER BOOK THAT SHE NARRATES (THE REVISED CANAAN HOUSE PARTS) IT’S LITERALLY A ROOM FULL OF GHOSTS HER BRAIN SUMMONED TO DEAL WITH THE FACT THAT SHE CUT HER BRAIN IN HALF TO FORGET GIDEON. she also is a) haunted and b) psychotic, experiencing hallucinations her entire life of both the ghosts haunting her and less supernatural hallucinations- bells tolling, bones rattling, her parents (some of the only dead people NOT haunting her), etc! in the revised history of canaan house that her brainghosts invent, she brings along someone who knows about her psychosis to help reality check her when she tells him go! her caregiver as a child and support when she got older, crux, is a horrible man- but at one point, when someone other than harrow is in harrow’s body and tells him “i am not harrowhark, i am sorry,” his response is simply “aye, you’ve said that before too. who are you then, if not my lady harrowhark?” showing his familiarity with her psychosis and his love for the child he wouldn’t dare see as a daughter. but enough about that lets talk about her unreliable narration! she lies about her feelings of course but she also simply hides the truth from everyone, all the time, compulsively. also literally the entire section of her book that she narrates is a lie she’s telling US about a lie she’s telling HERSELF and no one understands even a little bit of the truth until like the last act of the book. queen.
#eugenides#the queens thief#queens thief#harrowhark#harrowhark nonagesimus#harrow the ninth#unreliable narrator battle#unreliable narrators#polls#side c
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I'm going to expand on one more deranged (very unlikely) theory before I go to bed.
So, many people have pointed out that Fyodor's last words were Jesus' as well, shortly before he died and was resurrected three days later. @originalaccountname makes an excellent point that the other side of the Page was set to be activated on the next full moon... which is in three days.
But I also suggested that Fyodor did something to Sigma - and here's how we can merge these theories, through the power of flex tape and my egregious lack of sleep.
Here's the thing about Fyodor's ability. We still don't know how it works but many people have commented on how he only seems to use it on non-ability users - and it kills them instantly. Blood spurts from their heads. We've never seen him use it on an ability user... so many people assumed it couldn't kill them. When Fyodor lets Sigma take the information from him, Sigma sees everything and passes out, comatose from sheer information overload. But it's entirely possible this is not the only thing Sigma "received". Fyodor simply allowed him to read whatever he wanted, and his ability also works through touch. Is it possible Fyodor's ability activated too?
If that's the case, what did it do?
Well, this was where I kept saying - guys, I think the split personality has an element of truth to it. While that performance was all an act - perhaps it draws from the truth of Fyodor's ability. Maybe the killing people part... is actually the ability not working the way it is supposed to. Then what else could that action of allowing Sigma to read him (and thereby making contact) be, but some kind of precaution in case he were to die?
I'm suggesting that Fyodor's ability may involve some kind of possession. A possession through corruption over time.
If that's the case, it would make Fyodor something that perhaps was once human but is no longer - if he's been surviving by transferring himself to others through his ability, then might it be said that he has ceased to be truly human? We know abilities require human souls... but what if both a person and their ability were to transfer to another body - would the body not have to be suitable to harbour an ability? It implies ability users are the only ones who are suitable "hosts"; for people without abilities, they cannot take the strain of the invasion of Fyodor's being and die instantly.
Fyodor is likened to a demon or conjuror. If he is able to hijack others' bodies, then that's rather like a demonic possession. What does this have to do with Crime and Punishment? Well, I won't speak on the book itself, but I will say that in Dead Apple, Fyodor says "I am crime" and his ability responds with "I am punishment".
He sees the two concepts as "close friends". Crime as the body, punishment as the ability. Two possible interpretations - one, Fyodor learned how to cheat death using his ability, which is a "crime" that he commits to carry out his "punishment" on those who are sinful (this "crime" could've been learned by poking around human brains, which may explain why he knew how to give Ivan and Nathaniel a lobotomy lmao). The other is that the "crime" is whoever he happens to be inhabiting (as an ability user, he sees them as sinful innately), and the "punishment" is inflicting his ability on them to corrupt them and take control. In other words, his true punishment can only be inflicted on ability users - death is not punishment and is seen by him as release.
There's also the final words he says, which are Jesus'. I want to go back to Sigma for a second. A man written into existence from nothing for some as yet unknown purpose... Is it possible he will awaken three days from now?
If so, it's possible he could use the Page on the full moon, goaded into it by the piece of Fyodor that was transferred to him, in order to actually, properly resurrect Fyodor, and/or slowly take over Sigma's body and mind as he gains more control from the inside. That is all.
Hope this was at least coherent. I can barely keep my eyes open I'm so tired
#storyrambles#i know i sound insane. i don't really put a lot of stock into this 'theory' if you can call it that#just having fun with the weird concept that popped into my head and wouldn't release me until I wrote it#help#bsd#bsd season 5#bsd spoilers#bsd fyodor#bsd sigma
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Golden Apotheosis
My turn to finally introduce a Sentience Custode of my own! However, with a twist! Ya'll remember that Shard I made with @sculptorofcrimson and @bispecsual? Well I'm introducing a stand in for her in husbandry... and don't worry the boy in this fic is a stand in for Valdor (or maybe you should worry).
Please big thanks to @bispecsual for also beta reading
Enjoy
WORDCOUNT: 6524
@egrets-not-regrets @liar-anubiass-blog @barn-anon @bleedingichorhearts @gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan
@ms--lobotomy
Thank @squishyowl for the dividers
tw: Nudity, blood, death (very much on brand with 40k so far) POV shifting
The blood that ran down her naked body was still warm. Aurora trembled with fear as she knew she was destined to die today... there was a horrifyingly calm acceptance of that fact that ran through her. She opened her mouth to breathe and spit out blood that leaked into her mouth. She was blind as she refused to open her blood covered eyes as her arms were held out by large hands... her long brown hair now stuck to her back as it was heavy with blood and all she could hear was the loud booming voice of the "preacher" Astartis... Aurora felt something placed on her head as it dug into the skin of her scalp and chants and jeers flooded her ears.
Large thumbs swiped over her eyelids allowing her to finally open. Her eyes only briefly scanned the gathered crowd of Astartes as she was dragged to a raised platform and her eyes looked to her cell companion. Aurora didn't blame her even if she apologized again and again for what was going to happen... it wasn't her fault that she was being held hostage to get her Astartis to behave, she learned his name was Ari... Aurora didn't blame Ari either. Her hands were held over her head as she was strapped to a metal pointed wheel, a star of Chaos, she somehow knew... she looked over to her fast friend who was silently crying as she was held by an Astartis in black and gold. The unwilling sorcerer approached, glancing at his human.... glancing to the marine holding his bonded... who gave her a squeeze causing her to scream.
The "preacher" kept speaking as Aurora looked at who she assumed was Ari. His body unarmored as she looked over his face and for a moment when their eyes met she could see the regret in them for a fleeting moment before they hardened as he painted her flesh with symbols that made her mind hurt. His hands soon moved and glowed as his voice took on a double voice melding with his own. She felt her body pulse as warp stuff bled from her brown-gold eyes.
They thought it was fitting given the close resemblance she held to many of the depictions of the Carrion Emperor to give her a golden laurel. Several of them could see it... how swollen her soul was... and with Ari pushing more warp into it... it only made it a better sacrifice.
Ari wanted no part of this... he hated this... he was no human killer! But... but... his human was in danger.
Aurora looked up at the sky and there was silent pain that rushed through her body. Something inside of her was pulsing as, unknown to her, more and more of her soul was forced to take in raw warpstuff. Empowering her and making her ripe for an offering to the gods. She felt like the seams of her entire being were being ripped apart to the point she could no longer take it and she screamed, "SOMEONE HELP ME!" Desperately she screamed as she forced her throat raw.
But within the warp that those fallen Astartes were feeding her soul too... all that was there was the laughter of thirsting gods...
Apollo was falling. He blinked as he was indeed falling as his armor was adjusting and informing him of the calculated time till impact. His bright blue eye behind those ruby red eye lenses twitched around in their socket as he was fed information from several sources. He was about to land in a gathering of Chaos Space Marines... during the middle of a ritual... Perfect timing he thought to himself . Apollo twisted his body like a cat, unhindered by his armor, as he was made to move unnaturally. He arched and his armor braced and readied himself as his hands gripped his Guardian Spear. Where he was... will come later he had to eliminate a cancerous growth first. But, as he fell his eyes glanced towards the altar and a breath before impact his eyes caught gold.
It was a baseline human female covered in blood. On her head rested a mockery of a golden laurel that his Master was fond of. His eyes met hers for a split second and pools of gold-brown looked at him... afraid. Vines of warp like energy akin to some violent xenos flora wrapped and latched onto his soul... he was going to save her... he was going to save her regardless... but he was going to save her... for she looked far too much like Him.
Limbs and viscera exploded outwards as Apollo made impact with a traitor marine. As the smoke cleared it was already far too late for them. Before even the words "Custodes!" could leave the mouth of the traitor that spotted him... a dozen of them were already dead.
Ari's eyes widened as he knew he had only precious seconds... his eyes flicked over to the marine holding his human and all Ari had to do was twitch and their head exploded. She was opening her mouth to scream as Ari flooded his body with the lashing warp to fuel his speed. He needed to out maneuver the Custodes. He was kind enough to cut Aurora free as within breaths he was suddenly by his human as the warp wrapped around the both of them and before Aurora realized it... they were gone. They fell to the forest floor as Ari held his bonded tightly... safe.
However, Aurora was far from safe. She was still in so much danger as she scrambled to her feet after being freed. Her heart was beating wildly as she still felt like she was coming undone and her hands covered her ears as she trembled in pain, a scream ripped from her throat. The warp that had bled into reality whipped around her... it hurt! She was scared! And she poured all of her emotions into the currents around her.
Help me please... a voice in his mind pleaded as the Dread Host, Apollo, cleaved a limb free from the traitor in front of him. He danced between the ruptured metal and dying marines. He violently shoved the bubbling anxiety down, a feeling he had thought he had forgotten how to feel, as his eyes drifted towards the screaming and pained human his mind raced something screamed at him... SAVE HER... SAVERHERSAVEHERSAVEHERSAVEHERSAVEHERSAVEHER he gritted his teeth as something in his mind screamed at him in his own voice... he felt compelled to listen but he twirled watching his Guardian Spear slice through metal like it was butter. "Working on it." He snarled out to himself.
Aurora swayed on her feet as she regained some semblance of steadying herself and made to get away! The Golden Astartes could do that right? What help would she be... though she barely turned to run before a hand wrapped around her throat. Her hands looked so tiny as she tried to pry off metallic fingers from around her throat. The Feral Astartis snarled at her in that dark tongue, it wasn't Gothic, and it made something inside of her hurt. The dark apostle looked toward the custodes being swarmed before rushing off with the half ready sacrifice. It was just a minor setback... he would try again.
Aurora reached out to the golden warrior looking at the red eye lenses on that white faceplate... before she moved out of the camp at a sickeningly fast speed. Apollo's head snapped to the direction of his charge. His mind rapidly did the math at how fast he could get to her. He was finally done playing as his spear ripped open bellies before he turned on his heel like a flamenco dancer as he ran after them. Apollo needed to know why she looked so much like Him. He had joked or, now that Apollo reflects, perhaps in His own way admitted that He had many paramours over the years; both before and after the creation of the Primarchs. Apollo remembers him being young and bold enough to ask, "Should we be expecting any secret children my lord?"
He remembers the faint smile that was only in His eyes and not upon his lips as he ordained to answer Apollo, "No Apollo. I haven't had any in thousands of years."
Aurora was sobbing again, her tears cleaning the sticky blood on her skin, leaving their trails against her lightly tanned skin as she felt the hand around her throat squeeze. She was going to die... she had allowed herself to feel a fleeting sense of hope when he fell from the sky like a golden star... no... there was no golden hero here to save her. She opened her eyes as her brain had trouble registering the golden mass rapidly approaching her as... her brain told her.... it shouldn't move that fast... that smoothly... she felt sick as it moved so smoothly and so quickly that she couldn't register properly the fact he had already grabbed the dark apostle's arm and had already ripped it clean from its socket.
She only registered the sudden fact that she was falling now after a horrifyingly instantaneous sound of screaming metal. All Aurora knew was that at this momentum she was probably going to die if she hit the ground. However she blinked as the sound of leaf litter scattering met her ears as she was pressed up against a golden chest plate as she came to a stop. Her heart was beating like the wings of a hummingbird as her brown-gold eyes darted around. She looked up seeing the white facemask of the golden marine... she looked over her shoulder and could see the other dead on the forest floor.
Apollo watched as those gold-brown eyes looked around and back at his faceplate once more before she started to wildly weep against him. He normally wasn't good at handling their outbursts but he focused on the golden "laurel" on her head tangling with her hair was a bunch of scrap metal twisted and painted. His deft fingers moved it free of her scalp and wickedly tossed it at the dead marine watching the "leaves" sink into his skin. He felt her fingers grip his armor as he moves her, slightly wrapping her naked form in the black cloth he has wrapped around his waist. Apollo had many questions but as she started babbling up at him between her tears he realized he did not understand what she was saying... Apollo like all custodes was well versed in many imperial languages but this... this he did not know. He looked over her body as she was dehydrated and slightly underfed but otherwise she was healthy which soothed something inside of him. Apollo knew he wasn't good with baselines but he did his best to soothe her as now... he had to find his way to civilization.
The local Astartes were scrambling as there was a Custodes, an unknown Custodes, heading their way. Traitor and Renegade Astartes retreated from the immediate vicinity and entered hiding. A Custodes was a force of nature and would rip through a community like a tornado. Those at the wall gained confirmation as this was not one of the few that they knew of which meant this was a recent arrival... an unbonded Custodes. They would make things difficult as only bonded Custodes would allow the tentative truce between the Loyalists and Traitors continue... all by their mercy. So they were dealing with potentially two unbonded Custodes... they prayed to the Emperor and to the Dark Gods that no more were sent.
Apollo looked at the fortifications as he approached them picking up on Imperial Fist architecture mixed with Iron Warrior. His eyes narrowed at the joint project as he knew about the Ultramarine approaching him as his hand held the passed out bundle closely to him. He held his Guardian Spear at his side as the Ultramarine finally spoke, "Noble Custodes." Apollo could hear the accent as an old Mcraggian dialect and given the crusade pattern armor he was wearing... Time Displacement. Apollo theorized.
"Ultramarine." Apollo replied emotionlessly. The human in his arm whimpered softly, twitching slightly.
The Ultramarine looked at the Custodian's legs that were covered in dried blood. However his eyes kept glancing at the passed out human wrapped in the black cape of the custodian, covered in blood. He prepared to speak again but Apollo cut him off.
"When am I." He demanded.
"024.M2." He says automatically. The Ultramarine was surprised at the way the Custodian seemed to move in a way as he took a deep inhale.
"Where are we." Apollo turned to face the Ultramarine now, his grip on the spear becoming a little tighter.
"We are on Terra, my Lord."
Apollo stood there processing the conversation; he's never heard of a large time displacement going backwards. Ancient marines being shot forward in time was more common than not but... it could happen just he has no recollection of anything this severe, "When are you from."
"986.M30, my Lord." Internally the Ultramarine knew he was breaking protocols with these lines of question... they were supposed to ease in new arrivals... but then again this was a Custodes... and they had nothing ready for Custodes.
"I see." Apollo said as the silence before coming at him with, "I also see traitor marines in your midst."
"When are you from, my Lord?" The Ultramarine attempted deflection... Apollo could have killed him for such insolence.
"001.M42." Apollo said with a clipped breath.
"I... I see." The Ultramarine replied.
Apollo could see the micro movements of the armor... could see the way he was inhaling... he was clearly on the vox talking to others. He could order his machine spirit to override their encryptions to have full access to their conversation... but he refrained... for now. He glanced back down to his charge? He hardly was an Aquilian Shield to think of her as a charge but it felt right... a warmth that cradled itself between his hearts. His eyes pulled away and returned to their icy gaze as he looked around his mind playing stratagems of how he would dance between target to target he was confident even with her in his arm that he could kill them all. He had sparred with several Captain-Generals even the greatest of them all, Valdor. He was part of the host that was the Emperor's wrath... he was one of his Master's scalpels... and he saw much cancer to be removed.
"My Lord," Apollo looked to the Ultramarine, "if you will follow me... there is a lot we must inform you about." He started walking and Apollo adjusted his charge in his arms. Her golden eyes opened for a brief moment as the bags under her eyes were heavy... the way her hand shook weakly as she slurred out something in the language he did not know... how she curled against him once more before passing out again.
Apollo's eyes flicked about as they walked through the city seeing the baseline's glance about, none of them wearing any signifying colors that they were serfs or a part of some faction that Apollo knew of. The sky was a crisp blue that he knew few worlds had such a blue sky naturally and he is certain that if the Ultramarine was correct... the night sky might have a number of stars he knew by heart. But his eyes flicked to various windows as Apollo made mental notes of the traitor marines and any "loyalists" that would give him trouble should what they so desperately wanted to tell him... was unsatisfactory.
They approached the base as his eyes flicked to the defenses, far more lacking than what would normally be called for, his eyes flicked to the humans there. Negligible variables in his mind as they would die to simple flicks of his spear and they would be gone. He looked at the approaching Salamander Apothecary sizing them up, "Lord Custodes. I can take the human-" He starts slowly moving his arms to offer to take them.
"Dehydration and the beginning stages of starvation." Apollo says quickly, passing the bundle to the Salamander. He ignored the desire to pull her closer... he ignored the desire to rip her back into his arms... he ignored the desire to keep her close and have her stay with him. His icy blue eyes flicked to the Salamander... he would be a simple bump to cut through should he need to collect her; it would be easy to find her.
He followed the Ultramarine still into a meeting room as Apollo looked at the dozen of marines in the room. He stood like a statue in the doorway looking between each one of them planning out how he would kill each one and how he would move onto the next. When Apollo was satisfied with his stratagem he finally spoke, projecting his voice, "I have been here a total of three hours. And for that entire first hour I spent killing Traitor Astartes." He pauses for a moment, "In the past twenty minutes I have seen Thirty-two more. So gentlemen," He said with almost a snarl in his voice, "Tell me what is so important that should convince me to not start slaughtering you all."
It took them an hour to explain the bare bone basics. Apollo then made them stay an additional four to go into detail on every piece of information. He met with Loyalist "traitor" legion marines... A renegade marine... and one very brave Chaos Space Marine. Apollo processed the information in that painful silence, well painful for the Astartes as he was fine. He finally made a calculated move as he took off his helmet and pinched his brow. Utilizing a disarming technique to lure them into a calm but to express a desire to truly emote.
Apollo calculated the time span was roughly one of a ten thousand years with the earliest they were dealing with was one of the Uncrowned Princes fresh from the Unification Wars to the most recent which was a Primaris marine and himself being the latest to arrive from the Indomitus Era. "I'm satisfied with the explanation." Apollo said as there was a silent collective exhale of relief. "Have one of your Librarians determine if the human I brought in is... bonded to me."
"Yes my Lord." Someone said as Apollo stood up to leave the room.
Aurora feels that she's somewhere else... she's in a bed. She opens her eyes looking at the medical bed she is in as she sits in shock just remembering how she had fallen against her 'hero' as she had been calling him. Her hands began to tremble as... it... it was over? A click and a trill bring her eyes over to molten colored eyes of a large Salamander who is holding his hands open trying to look submissive, "Hello there little one." He says gently.
Aurora wanted to be brave... that she had handled being captured for the past few weeks with some dignity... Aurora wanted to be so very brave but she had accepted that she was going to die in some horrifying way... and tears fell from her brown-gold eyes. She wept as it was finally over... oh god it was finally over! "Shh Shh you're okay." She felt a hand on her shoulder and leaned into the gentle touch as she cried into his offered shoulder.
A nurse would come in eventually as she calmed down and slowly explained her ordeal and Aurora asked with a weak voice, "Can we call my mom? I've... I've been missing for awhile. My college probably called her."
"Of course Aurora. Do you want anything?"
Aurora swallowed softly, "A shower."
Aurora sighed happily as she felt fingers against her scalp. The last time she had been cleaned was in the camp by an Astartis that kept leering and getting too handsy.
"Diana." Another Nurse spoke through the door, "Big guy that brought her in wants to see her with the Librarian."
"Tell them I'm in the middle of bathing her." Her nurse said as she gently rinsed her hair.
The next voice through the door was in Gothic and sounded like an Astartes. Diana spoke it back... sounding more and more annoyed before sighing. "I swear for giants from space or whatever they really don't understand the concept of shame or that people don't like to be naked around them." She looks down at her, "They need to check something and don't want to wait I can-"
"It's fine. Just please... can... can you keep washing my hair." Aurora said with a whimper.
"Of course."
Apollo heard the whimper in her voice through the door as it soon opened as he saw those gold-brown eyes looking at him... there was shame in those eyes. He silently took in a sharp breath as he felt something painful rest between his hearts. His master needed to be taken care of. Each one of the Ten Thousand had done their part in lovingly taking care of Him before and after his placement on the throne. Apollo was no different as his eyes scoured her body... spying spots of blood still in her skin... her hair having knots in it... blood caked under her nails... all accompanying that look of shame in that golden gaze. He felt the deep aching need to be the one washing her hair... "Check." He said softly and quickly breaking himself from more thoughts.
As the librarian gazed into the warp... he did not know what he was looking at. There was a mess of "chains" and "vines" all around the Custodian. Writhing, locking, withering, pulling, coiling, unlocking... in a mess that he couldn't find what he sought. He looked to her and found the "tether" for a bond and followed it back... "Yes. She is your bonded."
Apollo turned away without another word and he threw his weight around to get what he needed as he took a "crash course" in the current local language called English. Once he grasped the basics, the noosphere was opened to him, simply called 'The Internet'. Apollo's mind rapidly took in what he learned as with what he saw made ten thousand year old memories danced across his mind. Cultures of ancient Terra became new again back home... ideas and images that are young or even old here and now cling to life and importance twenty-eight thousand years into the future and even older. Ideas were reused, rediscovered, once more lost, and once again found time and time again.
Apollo keeps watch over his new charge, he was made to kill not to coo at mortals like the Aquilian Shields or the Emissaries Imperatus often did, but he was digesting all that he had learned so far as his eyes looked to his charge and that gnawing in the back of his mind... she looked so familiar. Early the next morning an exhausted looking woman is escorted by the nurse to her room and through the window Apollo watches the two embrace and weep. Aurora, he reminds himself of her name as he replays the conversations she had with him after he saved her before she passed out.
"Captain," He voxes the appropriate leader, "Inform the bases near where she lives that I will be following."
"Right Away."
Aurora felt disappointed that she never got to properly thank 'hero' for saving her. Sure she saw him around but she also saw how everyone walked on eggshells, which would be impressive given how most of them were in that armor of theirs, around him. But she was going to be heading back home as she had found out she was a couple hundred miles away from home and where she was going to college... oh college... she started to think about college again.
"Ow." She is pulled from her thoughts as her mom gives the middle of her forehead a flick as she looks at her confused.
"None of that. I will be taking care of everything until you're ready to go back to college." Her mother said.
"But-"
"Aurora." She felt her mother hold her shoulders, "I have been living in limbo waiting to be told you were found dead. Please let me be the mom?"
Aurora could tell her mom had gotten a bit thinner... she always kept herself together even through the roughest parts of her childhood and she could tell she had taken the news about her being taken... badly. "Okay." She relented and hugged her mom smiling as she felt her kiss the top of her head. Aurora knows she wasn't planned for but her mother never made her feel like, as she put it, an oopsie.
"I'm going to finish up your discharge papers. And then I'm sure the nurse will come get you."
"Can you bring me something to eat?"
"I'll ask the nurses, kiddo." Her mom said before leaving the room and Aurora was left with her thoughts.
However, her eyes caught gold moving outside and she quickly rose out of bed and opened the door seeing 'hero' walking down the hall. "Hey big guy, wait." She called out as she moved towards him, oh sure she shouldn't be out of bed but she didn't want to miss this opportunity. She felt so small standing next to him and looking up at him as he now had a black shoulder cape that she vaguely remembers being wrapped up in... but he was looking down at her. She swallowed and smiled, "I'm probably going to be leaving soon but I've been wanting to thank you so much for saving me." She can't help but rise to the tips of her toes as she says 'thank you' just smiling up at the silent guardian.
Apollo, hidden behind the white faceplate and red eye lenses, felt something wash over him... praise. It was the same sort of warmth that he would get when He praised him. She looked ready to leave at his silence but Apollo placed his hand on her head giving her a gentle pat on the head. He removed his hand to not let strands of her hair get tangled in his servos. She smiled up at him, the smile reaching her golden-brown eyes, and once again that ten thousand year old part of him melted in the same way... that he was eager to get again. She quickly rushed back to her room and Apollo watched that waist length silken brown hair, a shade he knew by heart, sway with each quick bouncy step.
Eventually her life had to keep moving back forward and Apollo watched it all. He watched her blossom back to life, like the spring flowers she often loved to wear in the flower crowns. Her golden-brown eyes glittering with joy and laughter; sparkling in a way that stirred something within him. It made Apollo want to get closer... it made him want to touch her in ways that made him hesitate to get closer for he was disturbed by feeling such desires so intensely.
There were a handful of Custodes here and when they were from were also as varied as the Astartes. But they had a smattering of personalities and how they were handling these bonds... Odysseus; he could tell; was still in mourning and handling the bond with suspicion. Kaeso on the other hand urged him to enjoy it and Apollo bit his tongue when he wanted to remind Kaeso how to behave. However, Kaeso was behaving... behaving how he had been during the Unification wars and the Great Crusade... not to how he was used to him acting since those 'happier' times.
"It's you!" Aurora said excitedly as she looked up at Apollo whose armor was now clean and glittering in the light that fluttered between the leaves. Apollo looked at the crown of cherry blossoms on her head and could not help but think of how similar it felt to a laurel...
"Hello Aurora." Apollo finally spoke to her.
Aurora's eyes widened for a moment as she finally heard the soft masculine voice that came from the helmet, she was used to them having deep voices; and his was still deep compared to a normal human; but it was softer than what she expected. He watched her smile soon after taking steps to close the distance between them. And as she smiled at him Apollo watched the gold in her eyes glitter and glow in seeming approval of him. He took a knee and her smile grew once again, rounding her cheeks, as she bore her teeth in that very human gesture of a grin, even showing her gums slightly. "I am a Custodes. I go by many names each given to me for a deed I have completed. My deeds are numerous and my name long but you may call me Apollo."
Apollo smiled under his helmet as she grinned approvingly at his introduction and it made him feel good, but he didn't know why and part of him no longer cared. "I am your bonded." He stated and he listened to the way her heartbeat lept up as she giggled happily even bouncing slightly to show her uncontained joy at his statement. Even going up to him and giving him a hug. Apollo normally did not like mortals touching him or being close to him, but this felt nice.
Words flowed easy between them and when Apollo removed his helmet he heard her gasp. He felt something inside of him savor the way she held his face watching her eyes dart around his features. Cooing about the freckles that danced from one ear, down to the cheek below his eyes, over the bridge of his nose, and ending at the other ear. She looked over his strawberry blonde hair but it was clear she was enamored with his freckles... but she looked at him in a way he didn't know why but it made him crave for her to look at him more... to hold his face still... to look at him... to be so alive... he couldn't stop seeing his dear beloved Emperor in her.
"What's on your mind, Apollo?" She cooed at him.
"You look," He paused for a moment debating on telling her but decided it wouldn't hurt, "like someone I knew."
"Well, I'm certain you saw what my mom looked like. I do share at least half of my DNA with her." Aurora teased as she cupped his face still, running her thumbs over his cheeks.
"What of your father?" He said tilting his head, as he had quickly determined that she enjoyed him being emotive; a thing he noticed Astartes who wear their armor often with their human do... pantomime their expressions. He watched her exhale and roll her eyes as she pulled her hands away. Apollo held back a frown at the lack of contact between them.
"Never met him. Mom literally only met him once. Though it's a really funny story on how he got my mom, for context she never really randomly slept with people, to sleep with him." With her gestures and movements it was an often told story. "She was at some bar and tells me that she looked at the other end of the bar and sees the most handsome man she's ever seen. Tall, strong jawed, silky brown hair going to his... as she puts it 'nice ass', swore that his eyes had to be gold, and just had some European air about him; though... tangent we learned that he might have actually been Anatolian when I took a DNA test. But... " She waves her hand resuming the main point, "She waited a bit as she was certain that no one that good looking was at this bar alone. But he was so she decides to shoot her shot and they get talking." Aurora makes a grand gesture for the next words, "Massive nerd with many fields of interest, so my mom, also being one, saw that as a point in his favor. But that's not the thing that riles my mom up and gets her to sleep with him, oh no... so she asks him his name," She builds the suspense for a moment, "he called himself 'Revelation'." She waves her hands at the reveal. But she soon shakes her head and laughs, "My mom and I have had a laugh at that given how it sounds like she had already made up her mind to have sex with this stranger but it's funny that him being a 'mysterious' handsome stranger named Revelation. Is what cemented it for her. But yeah they had sex and nine months later I came into the world."
Apollo's pupils became pinpricks as he was, as was most of the ten thousand were, privy to many of His names and he distinctly remembers Revelation being one of them. His breathing remained steady, no outward sign betraying his emotions, but his heart was racing as time crawled for him as he finally really looked at Aurora drinking in every detail... he wasn't losing his mind as he could see it. She was his Master's child.
"I might know your father." Apollo said.
"Do you now?"
Aurora blinked as she had been doing so for the past 5 minutes digesting what was told to her after Apollo had info dumped a lot on her. She had to sit on a stump half way through his explanation of her father... "Okay so... let me go through the highlights. My dad is an immortal space warlord, who is also worshiped as a god, but heavily insisted that he wasn't a god... when apparently he liked to play god genetically. He was also a really shitty dad because how else do you get nine people who call you dad to want you dead?"
"That is a gross simplification of everything." Apollo stated bluntly.
"THAT ISN'T SAYING NO APOLLO!" She shouts. Apollo just huffs as he decides to not give her a vocal answer but he is pleased when she presses him for more, "And you want to find him because he made you when he was playing God but its not out of a familial obligation it's because you wholeheartedly serve him?"
"Correct."
She is quiet for several moments before letting out a sigh as she looks to him, "Okay Apollo I won't stop you from finding him. I'll even do my best to help you but I need you to answer something for me."
Apollo preened under her acceptance of his desire to find her father, "Gladly."
Aurora felt mean for what she was about to say but if what he had told her was true... he was like ten thousand years old... he could handle this easily. "What will you do when you find him? The man you know does not even exist yet and he might never exist. Given how he's the one who makes both you and apparently the Astartes and since you," she points to him, "are here and now and you're from the really far future and none of it includes mentions of this happening? Means that this is probably now an alternate timeline, if you believe in that of course. SO Apollo... please tell me... what are you going to do?" Her words struck at something deep inside of his psyche. His mind came to a screeching stop. "Oh God... Oh God... Apollo? I didn't mean to break you." Her voice cut through to his mind as he finally heard her again after being frozen still as a statue looking through her.
Apollo knew that this endeavor was utterly selfish... it was flawed and flimsy enough for a baseline mortal to see the holes in it... but he just wanted to serve a living Emperor again... he just wanted to see the life in his eyes once more... she was right... he wasn't the same man who had handcrafted him into what he was... Apollo felt himself mourning again as his hearts ached in pain as he looked at his bonded... his dearest Aurora... she was alive... oh she was oh so very much alive.
The golden chains that bind him and tether him to his beloved master are violently twisted apart with only few of them loosely hanging onto him as the vines dug and pushed under the claps and cuffs that the chains were wrapped around. Apollo was in that dark grief again as his mind rushed and tried to pull him out and there calling his name looking up at him concerned was Aurora. His thoughts coalesced crashed on that singular thought of how she was his beloved Master's child... and the poison blossom bloomed over his hearts as vines wrapped around his neck... around his being... holding him tightly as even the vines wrapped around the broken chain links leading back to his Master and held them in place.
"Apollo?" Aurora looked up at him concerned as he had stood there looking through her and being completely emotionless.
If he could not love and serve his beloved Master here... then the princess... this tiny Empress in front of him would have to suffice. Something deep inside of him was utterly thrilled at the thought of holding her again... her being so easy to pick up and hold... so small and fragile... her hands against his face again whispering praise to him... so small... and all his.
"Apollo? Are you okay?" She whined softly feeling guilty for causing him to shut down basically but Apollo smiled at her and nodded.
"Thank you Aurora. I needed to hear the truth." He gently took one of her hands and dropped to a knee as a practiced warm smile graced his face, "And with that... I am ready to diligently serve you. I vow to keep you safe. And to be as a bonded should be, my Lady." Apollo said his icy blue eyes watching her face as he then kissed the back of her hand before turning it slightly and kissing her pulse point on her wrist. He contained his smile as he felt it against his lips and heard her pulse quicken. His eyes drank up the blush on her tanned skin.
She squeaked as he picked her up, princess style, easily and once more Apollo regarded her blush akin to being praised! Words once more again flowed easy between them as he carried her back to where she was staying as he could tell she was excited to have him as her bonded... perhaps not as excited as he was but he was certain in time she would be.
Perhaps Apollo could see why Valdor was so enamored by the Shards he often collected... so deliciously small... and all very much his.
#warhammer 40k#space marine husbandry sentience#tales from the barn#intense bond#yandere bond#carnal bond#oc: Aurora#oc: Apollo#adeptus custodes#yandere custodes#Sensei oc#yeah I've pulled out old ass lore for what is going on#there is a lot of husbandry lore#Apollo the custodes#Apollo the dread host#Aurora the Sensei#Custodes bond concept is barn anon's idea
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Hi, I am trying to write a homosexual book that takes place in the 20s. I am unsure where to start and how bad the 20s was for homosexuality so if you have any tips it would be appreciated. Thank you for reading.
Homosexuality in Historical Fiction
I'm going to answer this in two parts: (1) Tips for writing queer historical fiction, and (2) the 1920 gay culture.
Get Your Language Right
Vocabulary is key to capturing how homsexual people identified themselves and interacted with one another at the time. Consider:
The kind of language/code used at the time. For example, gay men in the 1950-60s would have spoken Polari to skirt UK’s strict anti-homosexuality laws. This might mean your characters say seemingly ridiculous things like, “Bona to vada your dolly old eek!” (good to see your nice face)
Authenticity vs. Sensitivity. We don’t need to perpetuate old slurs just because they were used “at the time”. Would the readers of today (your target audience) be accepting towards use of such language?
Is it really necessary? Just like in the case of foreign languages and dialects, it may be better to just refer to the code/secret language being spoken rather than overdoing it in dialogue. Also, does your character identify themselves as a part of this community at all?
Balance Between Struggle and Hope
Often in historical LQBTQ+ fiction, if the conflict is badly written, the readers are just going to feel angry and frustrated. Because:
Even the likable, otherwise reasonable characters won't be able to accept homosexuality easily, often opposing it downright.
Homosexual characters may be confused, struggle with self-doubt and self-hatred (which can't be fun to read, obviously)
The norms of the time make any “resolution” rather disappointing (compared to modern times).
Your goal is to juggle between these strong negative emotions to convey the central message and let hope shine through. Linger too much on negativity and your novel will be dark, but treating these themes 'lightly' will make you sound shallow.
So, treat oppression just as you would write a physical antagonist. It's powerful and a possible life-threatening opposition to the Lead, but it has flaws, loopholes and needs time to regroup before it hits our Lead again with increased force.
+ General Tips
Beware of giving your characters hindsight. As a writer, we know what happened both before and after the time period the characters live through, but they don't! The characters not being able to predict what comes can be a good tragic element.
The word “homosexual” wasn’t coined until 1869, and didn’t become common parlance until the early 20th century. From at least the very early 17th till the mid-19th century, the most common term for women was “tribade,” referring to the act of tribadism (scissoring). Some people used the term “fricatrice.” In the 18th century, “lesbian” and “Sapphist” started to become more common terminology. Men were called sodomites and pederasts (a word which didn’t have the paedophilic connotation it does today). The word “homophile” was coined in 1924 and was most commonly used by gay men and lesbians in the 1950s and 1960s.
“Gay” didn’t take on the almost exclusive meaning of homosexual until the 1960s, and even then, it was still used in the old sense of “merry” more than a few times. Only in the 1970s did it finally emerge as the most popular, mainstream word.
Less suspicions were aroused by a lesbian couple living together for decades than a gay male couple. Many people assumed they were just two very close spinster friends, not that it was a Boston marriage. There were many more questions about why two men would want to live together.
To avoid the very real risk of jail, lobotomy, conversion “therapy,” or the loonybin, sometimes a gay and lesbian couple would enter a ménage à quatre. Though it appeared on the surface as though two straight couples lived in the same duplex or right next door, they were actually just lavender cover marriages. Some had children (through various means) and co-parented.
Photo booths were seen as a safe space where a same-sex couple could kiss, cuddle, and embrace without fear of arrest or public suspicion.
Some lesbian couples were able to adopt children as single women, in jurisdictions which permitted that. More daring couples underwent artificial insemination and then went abroad to give birth, coming home with “adopted babies.”
Similar to the handkerchief code in the BDSM community, some gay men signalled to one another with red neckties and green carnations. Parisienne lesbians signalled to one another with violets in their hair.
There’s a long history of gay bathhouses, dating back centuries. Since male homosexuality was illegal and severely punished, a bathhouse was among the few places it was safe to meet potential partners and engage in sexual activity. Even the very real fear of police raids didn’t deter patrons. Manhattan, Paris, and London were home to many famous (and luxurious) gay baths, but there were plenty of lesser-known ones in other cities.
While not everyone was lucky enough to have a lavender ménage à quatre, many people had individual lavender marriages. Sometimes the spouse knew s/he was serving as a cover, sometimes not.
There were also more “traditional” ménage à trois marriages, composed of the lavender couple plus the true same-sex partner all living together. Sometimes these arrangements were composed of a bisexual plus a partner of each sex.
People did NOT casually out themselves! They could only confide their secret to other confirmed friends of Dorothy and extremely radical allies who had proven they could be trusted and wouldn’t turn on them.
You don’t have to make your straight characters raging, violent homophobes, but it’s completely unrealistic and historically inaccurate to show them all immediately, unquestioningly, lovingly accepting their friends’ homosexuality if the secret comes out. They might agree to not let anyone else know, but the friendship would probably be over. Other people, a bit more open-minded, might eventually reconcile but never be able to completely shake the belief that their sexual orientation is unnatural, strange, or wrong. Some people might only come around after decades of estrangement and realising gays and lesbians are just like everyone else.
To avoid discovery, some lesbians called one another by male names in their letters. Some liked those nicknames so much they continued using them in real life.
1920 Gay Culture
The United States - The Roaring Twenties
As the United States entered an era of unprecedented economic growth and prosperity in the years after World War I, cultural mores loosened and a new spirit of sexual freedom reigned.
Harlem’s famous drag balls were part of a flourishing, highly visible LGBTQ nightlife
"Pansy Craze”: gay, lesbian and transgender performers graced the stages of nightspots in cities
lesbian and gay characters were being featured in a slew of popular “pulp” novels, in songs and on Broadway stages (including the controversial 1926 play The Captive) and in Hollywood—at least prior to 1934, when the motion picture industry began enforcing censorship guidelines, known as the Hays Code. Heap cites Clara Bow’s 1932 film Call Her Savage, in which a short scene features a pair of “campy male entertainers” in a Greenwich Village-like nightspot. On the radio, songs including "Masculine Women, Feminine Men" and "Let’s All Be Fairies" were popular.
On a Friday night in February 1926, a crowd of some 1,500 packed the Renaissance Casino in New York City’s Harlem neighborhood for the 58th masquerade and civil ball of Hamilton Lodge.
Nearly half of those attending the event, reported the New York Age, appeared to be “men of the class generally known as ‘fairies,’ and many Bohemians from the Greenwich Village section who...in their gorgeous evening gowns, wigs and powdered faces were hard to distinguish from many of the women.”
The tradition of masquerade and civil balls, more commonly known as drag balls, had begun back in 1869 within Hamilton Lodge, a black fraternal organization in Harlem. By the mid-1920s, at the height of the Prohibition era, they were attracting as many as 7,000 people of various races and social classes—gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and straight alike.
London - Balls and Adverts
Like other large cities at the time, London was home to many drag balls and nightclubs where the gay community could express themselves.
"Lady Austin's Camp Boys" (1933): At a private ballroom in Holland Park Avenue, west London, 60 men were arrested in a police raid after undercover officers had watched them dancing, kissing and having sex in make-up and women's clothes. But despite facing a lengthy prison term and disgrace, the organiser, "Lady Austin", told officers: "There is nothing wrong [in who we are]. You call us nancies and bum boys but before long our cult will be allowed in the country."
Other gay men found partners through personal advertisements, which could be an equally risky strategy.
In 1920 the publisher of a magazine called the Link and three gay subscribers were each sentenced to two years of hard labor on charges of indecency and conspiring to corrupt public morals.
Some adverts even appeared in the national press, such as the Daily Express, although they were not quite so blatant. People would ask for 'chums' of their own sex and offer to take people on holiday.
One man responding to an advert in the Link wrote that he was "very fond of artistic surroundings, beautiful colours in furniture and curtains, and softly shaded lamps and all those beautiful things which appeal to the refined tastes of an artistic mind". He added: "All my love is for my own sex", and wrote that he longed to give his love "in the most intimate way".
Gay adverts often had references to Edward Carpenter, Oscar Wilde and Walt Whitman, or would say 'I have an unusual temperament'.
Berlin - The Weimar Republic
The Weimar Republic, Germany’s first parliamentary democracy lasted from 1918 until 1933 and was a time of progressive cultural renaissance from cinema, theater and music, to sexual liberation and a flourishing LGBTQ scene.
Berlin was home to around 40 known queer bars, a number which had doubled by 1925. The cabaret bars and clubs like Eldorado were packed to the brim with lust, tassels, glitter and flamboyance.
Drag shows were the norm and stars like Marlene Dietrich (a Berlin-native) and Josephine Baker who were icons for the queer community, performed regularly in Berlin’s lavish halls.
Kiosks sold an array of well known queer publications like Die Hoffnung (The Hope), Blätter für Menschenrecht (Leaflets for Human Rights), Frauenliebe (Woman Love), and Das dritte Geschlecht (The Third Sex).
As homosexuality was still illegal, Berlin’s Tiergarten and other parks, Nollendorferplatz as well as train stations and the infamous octagonal public bathrooms
Underground spaces flourished.
Here's a list of books with an LGBTQ+ POV character, set at least partly in the 1920s:
Self-Made Boys: A Great Gatsby Remix
Dead Dead Girls (Harlem Renaissance Mystery, #1)
In the Field
The Lady Adventurers Club
Last Call at the Nightingale (Nightingale Mysteries, #1)
A Good Year
The Last Nude
The Sleeping Car Porter
Once a Rogue (Roaring Twenties Magic, #2)
Slippery Creatures (The Will Darling Adventures, #1)
Crazy Pavements
References
https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20180212-polari-the-code-language-gay-men-used-to-survive
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2004/jul/03/gayrights.world
https://www.history.com/news/gay-culture-roaring-twenties-prohibition
#writers block#writers and poets#writing#creative writing#writers on tumblr#creative writers#helping writers#poets and writers#writeblr#resources for writers#let's write#writerscommunity#writers#writer#write#female writers#writer things#how to write#author#write every day#write it#write anything#write up#write that down#writing advice#writing community#writing tips#writing inspiration#writing prompt#on writing
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the thing I find the most interesting about Walpurgis Night is how in Dante's Notes, it says that Faust explained that the IDs and E.G.Os extracted are of those that are important to not only the sinners but also to Limbus Company as a whole. Which is interesting for 2 our of 3.
Faust makes sense, she made Mephi, she is sorta the leader of the sinners, she works with Vergil and was there for his "recruitment" and has high level access than Dante. She is very important to both the sinners and the comoany.
Hong Lu at first might not make sense but could. Obviously he is a sinner, but I think it's his connection to the company that makes him "relevant" as the notes say. His family. I dont remember where its said but I believe Faust mentions that the company has multiple sponsors. It could be possible that Hong Lu's family is one of these sponsors, and that's how he became a sinner, similar to how K Corp Hong Lu ended up there because of his grandmother.
But the weirdest for me is Meursault. How is he relevant to the company? We know he worked at N Corp. But we also know he wasnt an inquisitor and I doubt he was a member of the new League of Nine. So for him to be important, I think he was probably a high ranking member of N Corp, not only considering that he is "relevant" to the company but also because he has dealt with distortions in the past. Maybe he is where Limbus got some of their own information on distortions....but other than that, I cant really think of any other ways for Meursault to be "relevant" or important to the company.
Iiii think it's less literal/direct like that, personally.
The exact wording of the relevant point is as such:
"Though the timelines and the worlds we can access are expanded during this period, it's not like we'll be extracting random Identities and E.G.O from all over the place. Faust explained that whoever we end up extracting will be relevant to all of us. Relevant... to Limbus Company's current state in some way."
The most obvious interpretation of this (and one most will immediately get) is that while the Walpurgis Night expands the range of the Extraction, it's not a completely random expansion. We won't be getting some random Backstreets Rat Identity, but ones that would be of interest to Limbus Company.
I assume it's sort of an in-universe explanation of why the things that can be extracted here come from the other games specifically. Limbus Company clearly has an interest in what happened at Lobotomy Corp, Vergilius has made it clear in 4.5 that he's interested in the Library, and it's not out of the question for Limbus Company to also have an interest in Moses' Office from Distortion Detective due to their own dealings with Distortions and E.G.O (though that one might be more relevant later on in the story, seeing as it's something that isn't available now but might be later).
That being said, it obviously can't be that simple. This is Project Moon we're talking about, and Faust is outright pointed out to be hiding info on Walpurgis Night in the cutscene.
Now, I don't think it's the Sinners themselves that are the relevant part here. After all, the specific quote is explaining the event as a whole, not just the current iteration of it. If it was about the Sinners and not the specific Identities and E.G.O we'll be getting, then Walpurgis Night would be a kind of shitty Extraction event, cause it would mean those three would be the only Sinners that would get stuff in it, and I highly doubt that will be the case.
Rather, I think the actual thing we should be looking at is the Context and Themes of the E.G.O and Identities in each event.
Look at what we got this Walpurgis Night:
An E.G.O of the Forsaken Murderer with focus put on being restrained, yet that restraint not being enough. It seems to parallel what we know of the Sinners' situations, how becoming one restrains them yet is not enough to completely stop them from acting out.
A LobCorp ID coming from the HQ branch, with focus put on Faust knowing way more than she lets on. This, of course, parallels Faust in the main world, how she clearly knows more about how Limbus Company operates than she lets on.
A Hook Office ID with focus put on the possbility of the Office failing and it not giving enough work to the ID. It might parallel Limbus Company's current state, how it's not yet influential enough to be a for sure success, while at the same time only giving a seemingly small amount of jobs towards one of its most important departments - the Sinners.
If my interpretation is right, then it's likely we're going to see different focuses in the next Walpurgis Night events depending on what information we learn about Limbus Company or how its status changes over the course of the main plot. Though, it is just speculation on my part.
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Not going to annoy the original post with this, because it was clearly meant to be allegorical - but it is very distracting to see appendectomies used as a default obviously-beneficial intervention when their application is so questionable. Like, 'routine' appendectomies are insane I mean neurodibergent - generally you don't have to routinely *amputate an organ* from a species for it to manage a basic digestive infection. The appendix is often literally taught as being a useless organ, too, when both: it should be obvious that no body part is an island, completely disconnected from the function of the rest of the body it's a part of; and, also, that modern research has discovered the appendix to be an important part of the gut microbiology. For the same level of jarringness as to the I assume just casually-chosen procedure, just imagine the post had said, like, 'lobotomies' instead :v
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Adding onto the "John’s emotional outpourings" thought train:
I think it’s so interesting that in his final speech to Dean, not only does he applaud Dean for assuming the parentified and spousified role that he himself forced on him ("You took care of Sammy and you took care of me"), he also specifically praises Dean’s obedience and lack of self-advocacy in the matter ("You did that, and you didn't complain. Not once.")
Hearing John acknowledge everything Dean’s sacrificed for their family no doubt meant a lot to him, but I actually think it was very detrimental to his self-worth in the long run. It further cements the idea that Dean’s value is intrinsically tied to how useful he is to others, to how much shit he’s willing to take from loved ones without a word of protest, and to how much of himself he can give away. By the end of the season se see this idea culminate in him selling his soul ("At least this way, it’s like my life could mean something."), which is really just the natural extension of how his life and his body have always been treated as bargaining chips.
This is an interesting interpretation, Anon—not one I aim to take issue with, but since it's in my inbox, I'll share where my interpretation differs. It might be more in the sense of John's intentions.
I think there's a reason John opens with and mainly gives an apology—for being an empty shell—for Dean having to fill his shoes—and the majority of his speech being an apology and given within the context that John himself failed and that Dean had to fill his shoes biases me against interpreting the closing lines where he praises Dean's actions as him meaning to say that's where Dean's inherent worth lies.
JOHN
You know, when you were a kid, I'd come home from a hunt, and after what I'd seen, I'd be, I'd be wrecked. And you, you'd come up to me and you, you'd put your hand on my shoulder and you'd look me in the eye and you'd... You'd say "It's okay, Dad"
Dean, I'm sorry.
DEAN
What?
JOHN
You shouldn't have had to say that to me, I should have been saying that to you. You know, I put, I put too much on your shoulders, I made you grow up too fast.
To me, John is saying the opposite of that Dean's worth lies in being the eternal care taker. It's him saying that Dean deserved to be protected and cherished and comforted, and John utterly failed, and instead Dean had to pick up his slack—carry his dead weight—and that wasn't fair. He finishes with,
You took care of Sammy, you took care of me. You did that, and you didn't complain, not once. I just want you to know that I am so proud of you.
I take this not as John necessarily praising that Dean didn't complain? I take it as an acknowledgment that Dean is an actual person. The same way John knew Dean wanted a home despite Dean insisting differently to us and Sam in various season 1 episodes, John understands that what Dean does and what Dean feels are different things. Dean is not the mindless John robot Sam framed Dean as in 1.10. There's a reason Dr. Ellicot wanted to make Dean better in 1.10 and tried to ghost-lobotomize him (because Dean was angry—because he resented his family [1.06]) but there's also a reason Dean was able to resist his ghost-lobotomy long enough to burn Ellicot's bones.
In regards to being proud of Dean—I mentioned that I think John focuses on this because he saw what tipped Dean off that he was possessed by Azazel in 1.22. But supplying further context here—1.21-1.22 are about Sam and John both fighting to be the first one to die for revenge... and being willing to sacrifice each other. In 1.22, as they are about to enter the building where John is located, Sam insists that Dean not bring The Colt with them. He doesn't want to waste a bullet for John. Sam insists this is what John would want, and Dean says he doesn't give a damn what John wants. Dean sneaks the gun in anyway, and kills a demon who's beating Sam to death with it. That's what leads to the conversation about the the wasted bullet with Azazel!John.
Dean: You’re not mad?
John: For what?
Dean: Using a bullet.
John: Mad? I’m proud of you. You know, Sam and I, we can get pretty obsessed. But you – you watch out for this family. You always have.
It's chilling that Azazel is the one to praise Dean, isn't it? And it's further chilling that that's what tips Dean off that this is not his dad.
Dean knows this isn't John specifically because John would not appreciate what Dean did for their family this whole episode—what Dean has always done in fact: keep their family afloat and keep them all alive while John was busy being stuck in his own head, burning with rage and vengeance... and even throwing blame at Dean. Dean got yelled at by Sam before he brought the gun in for wanting to prioritize John's safety over revenge, and Dean was ready to get yelled at by John too for prioritizing Sam over revenge. John would be too blinded by vengeance to notice or even give a damn that Dean saved Sam's life. John would tear Dean a new one for being the only rational person in the room—the only person who hasn't been swallowed whole by bloodlust to the point of not giving a damn about the rest of the family... and in a less extreme sense, this is how it has always been. Dean has always been unappreciated. So John shows a little goddamn appreciation for the fact that Dean kept them afloat— for the first time ever. Then pointedly—John's last act is to finally prioritize Dean's safety specifically over his revenge. He abandons the revenge quest that just one episode meant more than Dean or Sam's lives, and hands The Colt over to his mortal enemy to save his son. He chooses love for Dean over vengeance.
What sullies John's speech—what poisons it for Dean—is what John does right after. And this is what I meant about John "poisoning the well". John apologizes for putting everything on Dean's shoulders right before... leaving Dean with the bag for the rest of eternity. It isn't like John's going on vacation—he's going to Hell. But he still permanently makes Sam Dean's responsibility. He doesn't even tell Sam what's going on—he treats Sam like a child and makes Dean his permanent guardian, permanently foisting his parental obligations on his parentified son right after apologizing for allowing him to become parentified, and that ruins John's speech.
I think Dean selling his soul has several interconnected motivations, and absolutely—a gigantic one is Dean's parentification and the belief that he is disposable. Dean feeling disposable and like sacrificing for his family is all he's good for was never going to be solved by one conversation, but John's one conversation is also ruined, and arguably just makes Dean more resentful because John pushes at this scabbed over wound for Dean, making it raw, and instead of wrapping a bandage around it, he ultimately pushes his thumb in. However, also leading into Dean's demon deal is 1) Dean loves his brother. 2) Dean being made to feel responsible for Sam specifically for his entire life 3) Dean's believes he came back wrong and him being alive is unnatural (it's left a hole in his chest—he feels unbalanced—angry—off—almost monstrous) and sacrificing himself will restore the natural order and help him escape this looming monstrosity. 4) Dean is trying to escape John and Sam's expectations and demands—that he fulfill John's dying wish and make himself responsible for Sam by saving or killing him. In a disturbing way, it's how Dean is liberated.
By making the demon deal, Dean has fulfilled "saving Sam" through an very unintended loophole, and avoided "kill Sam"—a mandate Dean was perpetually haunted by all of season 2—that Sam was determined to enforce at every opportunity while knowing it was what made Dean want to die! Being responsible for the whole rest of Sam's life makes Dean tired—it's why he says he can't handle the weight on his shoulders—he can't handle the pressure and the expectations that he chain himself to Sam's destiny for eternity. He's tired. He just wants to escape... and he initially sees his demon deal as a light at the end of the tunnel—as a way to get away. It makes him feel good for the first time in a long time (3.01)... because he is freed of the burden of his family's expectations and demands. When Dean starts to explore why he doesn't care that he's dying... that's where he confronts his parentification and objectification.
#mail#season 2#2.01#1.22#3.01#john#i dont deserve what he put on me#parentification#dont objectify me!
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hm, i guess its time for headcanons!! (Since its been a while since ive been here or on tiktok, i thought maybe it would be fun!
Hajime is allergic to peanuts, he never tell anyone because he just assume that it was unnecessary info, till when he ate something kazuichi made to him and he fell on the ground, almost dying
Fuyuhiko HATES yakult, as lactose intorelant, he had to drink it very often, mostly as a child and he absolute hates it
Hajime hates physical touch, but he pretend to like it, Fuyuhiko loves physical touch, but he pretend to hate it
Fuyuhiko can tell if izuru is the one talking easily, sometimes people go and say things like "hajime is acting so different today", he stares and just say "probably because it isnt fucking hajime"
hajime smells just like those baby soaps, he rarely uses perfurme, fuyuhiko like those expensive perfumes, he really likes those, specially the strong ones, but he rarely uses them either, because he is embarassed to
Both have shitty families on different ways (btw, this isnt fully headcanon, most of this topic is in fact canon) fuyuhiko's family is violent, they often fight, to the point of death threats between his parents, he had to grow up in an extremely hostile enviroment. Hajime on the other hand had parents who were neglectful, they probably just didnt care about him, his urge for feeling special probably came from this, hajime's parents wanted a trophy, not a child, and they probably let hajime do a LOBOTOMY because, 1 - he would finally be useful, and 2 - his presence wont be missed
Hajime and fuyuhiko both have a hard time sleeping, they spend the night awake talking to each other, sometimes they fall asleep in the middle of the chat, other times they just spend the whole night awake
hajime loves talking about his interests, but never got the chance to do that, once fuyuhiko found out about this he made hajime talk to him about it for hours, fuyuhiko actually make good commentary about it and seem to actually care and get his excitement, which makes hajime happy
Hajime and fuyuhiko are both overworkers, and always call out for each other, even thought they do the same mistake
Fuyuhiko is totally Japanese, hajime isnt, as thought as he is Japanese descendant, he is also latin American, specifically brazillian, he was on brazil between the age of 0 to 10, he then moved to japan, even if it was pretty early on his life, hajime likes the dishes from his homeland and make fuyuhiko try them, fuyuhiko fell in love with the brigadeiro, which was sweet just like he likes, hajime makes them often for him, sometimes when fuyuhiko is alone at his Office he eats them
Just like fuyuhiko like sweet things, hajime doesnt mind food, but he like bitter and spicy food, like REALLY MUCH, fuyuhiko thinks he is insane to drink Juice without sugar or to eat so many spicy things without a cup of water, i guess hajime's favorite bitter thing is...fuyuhiko! I love this analogy, like hajime is a sweetheart and fuyuhiko like sweets, its only far for the opposite to happen!
hajime when he gets mad he often stop talking and just ignore the person he is mad about, fuyuhiko not only mock him and his angry mood, but he often treat the person equally bad, he didnt even care about the motive, he just did, fuyuhiko didnt ask why he was mad thought, he knew it was frustrating hearing this type of question, but still he says things like "just say how much of a bastard this piece of shit fucking is! I have no idea what this mother fucker done but if youre mad it must been pretty mess up"
They like to watch EVERYTHING togueter, hajime is the type to say "no...please dont do it *character* dont do it youre gonna to die dont do it" for the TV, fuyuhiko is the type to "STOP GOING THERE ASSHOLE YOURE GOING TO DIE, COME BACK. COME BACK." In the end the character die and they both stop talking, but probably thinking the Same thing, that it was the most obvious thing ever
Fuyuhiko relationship with izuru is...weird, they often dont talk, they spend their time in silence, which is often more comforting then scary, fuyuhiko sometimes Braid izuru hair, fuyuhiko is aware izuru is just a repressed version of hajime, even if people try to make them different persons
And for the final headcanon, izuru wakes up early at 9:00 to watch mikudayo show, for some reason he likes it, he watched it in the past, and had a few memories that he didnt remember, so he started to watch those episodes everyday, the first time fuyuhiko saw him doing it was like "huh, hajime what are you doing awake right now" to realize it was izuru, he then see the mikudayo program and gets confused, how could izuru like it, he just silent watched too, fuyuhiko now likes the mikudayo program, he just dont admit to anyone
I HOPE YOU ALL LIKED!
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When you think about it, the current situation between the state of Jujutsu Kaisen and MHA are really similar. Both Shonen are reaching their end points, with MHA having one more arc to go and JJK having maybe two more. They’ll both end by end of year. Both fandoms are actively imploding: MHA fans are either writing fanfic to deal with Horikoshi’s questionable writing decisions (to be fair, he has to deal with Jump editors) or just coping. (Ask 1/2, I’m running out of space)
Jujutsu Kaisen fans are either coping extremely hard (search up lobotomy Kaisen for context) or just practically praying that Gege fixes the story. Both authors are trying to finish the story up fast. Gege is trying to finish so that they can write their idol manga (yes, really) and earlier, Horokoshi is done with the jump editors. The problems plaguing both manga are even similar, with Horokoshi’s villains being boring and him killing off to many people, and Gege’s villains… (ask 2/3)
…Are also boring AF, with the equivalent of the HPSC or even Overhaul, (Kenjaku, who’s as immortal as AFO but actually smart), being replaced as BBEG by Sukuna, who STILL has not had his backstory explained. (And is as dull as AFO.) The only difference is that Gege has killed too many characters for us to care, while the stakes that Horokoshi has put up aren’t all that engaging. (And again, so many pacing issues.) Thankfully Gege seems to be back to writing well, but only after a THREE WEEK …Break. ( sorry, my last ask got sent in early.) With all that said, what do you think about both series? And what do you think either author could do to fix it? (So sorry that my asks are this long, this got longer than I expected, and I didn’t know Tumblr had a character cap) (Ask 3/4)
I never got into Jujutsu Kaisen. I have no idea what it's fandom is doing and I'm not really invested in finding out since I'm not reading that manga. However, I do know enough to weigh in on Sukuna. The reason I hate AFO being an idiotic cardboard cutout is because of how he was built up, and how MHA has other characters represent societal failings, but AFO doesn't. How AFO steals the screentime from the far more compelling Shigaraki.
However.
Sukuna, from my understanding, was always the main antagonist. After all, the series starts with him possessing the protagonist. Additionally, JJK takes many cues from Naruto--which makes sense, as they're both highly influenced by Hunter x Hunter. And Sukuna serves a very similar role to the Nine Tailed Fox in Naruto, but where Kurama eventually came around, Sukuna doesn't. All media is a conversation.
Like, Sukuna is the Evil Curse. Isn't he called The King of Evil Curses or something? Why wouldn't I assume he's the main antagonist, when he's introduced the way he is and given such weighty titles like that and remains a constant threat through the entire story?
I'm sure an actual JJK fan could give a more nuanced take on it though.
As for fixing MHA? You can't. And I'm fine with that. The problems I have with MHA are things that either have to have never happened (the OFA Kills Quirked Wielders bullshit) or needs a total rewrite (the HPSC not being a major antagonist before their destruction). However, Horikoshi already laid the groundwork for all of the things I want rewritten. I don't necessarily need to see Midoriya fight the HPSC to know that they're bad and that he's making a point about government seizing control of bodily autonomy being bad, or that celebrity culture leads to unsustainable pressure and putting people on unrealistic pedestals. Horikoshi has already made those points.
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"im gonna go get that lobotomy" - gray probably after carmen rejected him
this is the stupidest thing i ever made
Can we refer to graham's mind wipe for what it is which is literally a lobotomy. Bro literally had his memories and personality changed like thats wild
and also yeah just gave him his teen bangs for the sake of the joke, assume a car splashed water on him or something
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more cally o'pia stuff because it's my blog and i can do whatever i want forever. below the cut is a very rough broad written timeline of How Things Shake Out In Da AU. i hope you enjoy, very dry timeline notes
>20 years ago…
The Psychic 7 (namely Ford, Bob and Cassie) raid a hospital that is performing lobotomies on psychics. In the resulting scuffle, Cassie impulsively rescues-slash-kidnaps one of the patients, a 10-12 year old boy, Caligosto Loboto.
Ford and Otto eventually reach an arrangement with Cal’s birth parents, convincing them not to press charges and to release Cal into their custody. They’re secretly quite happy to be rid of their troublemaking psychic child and to not have to face the consequences of the botched lobotomy attempt.
Cal is raised collectively by the Psychic 7 (minus Lucrecia, who’s already left for Grulovia by the time he arrives), becoming a powerful psychic, voracious reader and writer, an amateur tinkerer, and very much a next-gen hippie weirdo. He’s particularly bonded with Cassie, who stepped into a maternal and teacher role for him early on, so she takes the role of his legal guardian on paper and he assumes her surname, becoming Caligosto “Cally” O’Pia.
20 years ago…
The Psychic 6 have their fateful battle with Maligula. Cal, by this point a teenager, remains behind to watch the Gulch and keep an eye on the then-ongoing construction of the modern Motherlobe. He ends up finding Ford, mind shattered, wandering through the woods one night. Cal is unaware of what happened to him but keeps watch over him until the rest of the Psychic 6 - minus Helmut, of course - return from Grulovia.
Helmut’s funeral is held. Cal is particularly affected, especially seeing Bob’s subsequent mourning and breakdown - Cal looked up to the two as a model relationship and they helped him realize his bisexuality, so the incident gives Cal significant hang-ups around emotional intimacy and relationships.
Cal becomes part of the first class of Psychonauts agent trainees after the Motherlobe’s opening, alongside Truman (who he sees as a sort of cousin-slash-honorary family member).
Between then and Psychonauts 1…
Cal graduates and becomes an official agent, though by this point he’s already started becoming disillusioned with the Psychonauts mission, due to the continued breakdown of his family in the Psychic 6. He deliberately puts on an ineffective, slacker persona to avoid being put on missions, despite being a powerful and capable psychic. By the time Cassie leaves the Motherlobe, his role is primarily head janitor and semi-official steward of the Gulch. He also writes for True Psychic Tales under a pseudonym.
As his disillusionment grows and he becomes less trusting of the other Psychonauts for help and answers, he adopts the Loboto persona to go undercover unofficially. He’s especially looking for more information on Grulovia and Maligula, since he suspects he hasn’t gotten the full story from his family or the official press.
Cal befriends Oleander after the latter becomes an agent, eventually progressing to a tumultuous on-off relationship, which becomes something of an open secret around the Motherlobe. Each of their unaddressed issues, combined with assuming the worst based on the other’s unaddressed issues, makes each successive breakup worse and sabotages their secretly-mutual hopes for a serious lasting relationship. The big breaking point occurs when Oleander is badly injured on a mission (losing his eye and gaining his facial scar), making Cal panic over the idea of losing him like Bob lost Helmut; he encourages Truman to reassign him to Whispering Rock, which Oleander finds out about and takes as a tacit rejection-slash-lack of belief in him due to his own issues.
Shortly before meeting Oleander, Cal also has an extended affair with a married woman that he breaks off when she objects to him also seeing other people on the side. He remains unaware that he fathered a child through this affair.
Just before Psychonauts 1…
Oleander’s father dies, which causes him to finally snap and start up the Brain Tanks Plot. Having learned about Cal’s moonlighting while they were dating, he blackmails “Loboto” into helping. Cal agrees so he can secretly sabotage the project from the inside and attempt to keep Oleander safe.
Around the same time, Cal also gets a lead about the Delugianaries and infiltrates them as "Loboto". He begins to learn more about Maligula’s history with the royal family and the movement to reinstate the lost prince.
Psychonauts 1…
"Loboto" interferes as best he can with the Brain Tanks Plot without revealing his true identity to the other inmates, nor making it obvious to Oleander what he’s doing. He leaves massive openings on the psychic radio communications in hopes someone at Whispering Rock will catch them, stations Sheegor and Crispin to intentionally create weak points for an intruder, leaves the kidnapped brains out in the open to be recovered, and intentionally stalls debraining Lilli (to whom he’s an honorary uncle as Cal).
When Raz finally gets to the tower, Cal secretly trails him to make sure Raz can get to the top safely and unopposed. Once he does, Cal bails to return to the Rhombus of Ruin and continue his undercover work. Unfortunately, his boss there has figured out his true identity as Cally O’Pia, and blackmails him into kidnapping Truman by threatening his family (namely Cassie, Oleander and Lilli).
Rhombus of Ruin…
“Loboto” kidnaps Truman, and much like with the brain tanks, does everything he can to sabotage the plot without getting caught. This mostly entails poorly packaging Gristol’s brainless body, failing to dispose of the brain case, and capturing the Psychonauts after they crash rather than leave them to drown. Recognizing Raz and realizing he can excuse not “knowing” to put him under high-security restrictions the same as the other agents, he deliberately leaves Raz the means to navigate the facility via clairvoyance.
Raz learns of “Loboto’s” true identity from Oleander after rescuing him, and ends up using Oleander’s PSI-Portal to enter Cal’s mind. There, he sees the projected "Loboto" persona and meets Cal himself, who plots with him how to fake capturing “Loboto” and escaping in order to rescue Truman without giving away his betrayal. He will not give Raz information on his employers, however, still fearing for the others’ safety.
The Rhombus’ self-destruct auto-engages when “Truman” is released, to Cal’s horror. However, Raz and the agents are able to escape with their “captive”, though he still refuses to talk about his employers.
Psychonauts 2…
Sasha attempts to use a psychic construct to get the information out of Cal. It goes very, very poorly. However, Raz does manage to learn more about Cal’s backstory and get a glimpse of his boss and Maligula.
Sasha continues to attempt to interrogate Cal through the first part of the story, to no avail. After the Lady Lucktopus heist, Sasha’s forced to release him, and he returns to monitoring the Forgetful Forest. He drives away the psychic bees when Raz disturbs them, and Raz can talk to him about the undercover work as “Loboto”, his upbringing with the Psychic 6, and his apparent complicated relationship with Oleander. (There’s an optional sidequest where Raz can go back and forth between Cal and Oleander uncovering and pointing out their misinterpretations of each other, eventually convincing them to talk things out post-game.)
Post-reconstructing Ford, Cal discovers the three in the Gulch and is looped in by Raz. Cal still can’t help directly out of fear of his family being targeted, but gives Raz some tips for trying to talk to Cassie and Bob, and moves to the entrance of the Gulch to keep watch and feign ignorance of Raz, Ford, and Lucy’s presence. Raz can go back to him after helping either Cassie and/or Bob, and Cal is grateful for their apparent steps towards recovery, and baffled yet amazed by Compton and “Nick’s” arrival (with a hint that he already knows what’s up with the brainless Nick).
While Raz and company are doing final preparations for the Astralathe, Cal is distracted by Augustus trying to make it through the Gulch (and experiencing distress due to his repressed familiarity with it), allowing Norma to sneak by and witness the Astralathe activating. She comes back with Truman, and Cal is forced to let them by, knowing Truman is actually Gristol. He also witnesses Lilli tailing them and, realizing everyone is at risk no matter what and he has nothing left to lose, Cal instructs Lilli to distract “Truman” as long as she can and get out of dodge with Raz if the worst happens.
Cal runs back to the Motherlobe to search for the brain case just as Sasha, Milla, Hollis and Oleander are about to leave in pursuit of the mole. Cal begs Oleander to help him and he reluctantly agrees. The two find the case hidden in the mailroom and rush out to deliver it just as Maligula’s storm is released; they end up finding and protecting Lilli during the storm, and turn up just after she reunites with Raz to help with re-braining Truman.
In the post-game, if Raz either already completed or completes the sidequest with Cal and Oleander, they will be found together in the Gulch cleaning up around the Heptadome, and will confirm they’re talking things out. Cal will thank Raz with a signed copy of True Psychic Tales, though Raz doesn’t quite make the connection between Cal and the author. Cal also reveals Truman’s punished him for the kidnapping and undercover work by putting Cal back on the active agent duty he’s worked to avoid, intending for “Loboto” to start doing officially-sanctioned undercover work to clean up the remaining Deluginaries.
#anonymous puzzler writes#technically. look for categorization on this blog purposes we count it#long post /#psychonauts spoilers#rhombus of ruin spoilers#psychonauts 2 spoilers#tw death mention#tw implied eye trauma#psychonauts#ok i think that's post. enjoy#tw lobotomy mention#tw medical abuse mention#forgot those two !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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