When Everything Changed

Pairing: Spencer Reid x m!reader (ftm)

A/N: Well this is the Spencer fic, this is quite short as I wrote this on my way to the doctors office (scary trip) and I hope you all enjoy it :)

mentions: strong language(?), gay pining (?), slight hinting at soulmate au. DO NOT READ IF UNCOMFORTABLE. FEM ALIGNED AND AGELESS BLOGS DONT INTERACT. If theres any warning i left out please let me know

-> do not repost, copy or translate my works nor post them anywhere else. Reblogs, likes and comments are appreciated.

You woke up today feeling weird but you pushed those feelings away wanting to enjoy your last couple of days before going back to work, you had taken a break from working for the BAU and had spent time working in your books, you had taken a break because of some unfortunate events in your life but you push those thoughts away and get out of bed to get ready for your day.

You get in your car and head to your local coffee shop to have some breakfast as you looked at your phone for the books you wanted to get at the library, after having breakfast you head to the library with a soft smile on your face, it had been a while since you were there. Saying hi to the librarian before heading to the section of books you wanted, you grabbed the two books you needed but the third one wasto high fo you to reach making you sigh and curse your genes. You put the books in your hand down before moving the stool that was at the end of the section and pulls it to where you wanted it and move to grab the book only for someone else's hand to touch yours.

You looks at the person and you feel a little sting on your forearm but you don't put much mind to it, you smile as both of you pull your hands away "The Persian Boy, do you have interest in such books" you ask trying to diffuse the tension as the both of you stared at each other. "I usually don't go for books like these but a colleague of mine recommended it, what about you?" you look at him "I'm quite a fan of such books, I recently finished a similar book to it" he hands you the book "here you can read it first" you bite your lip "um I was thinking of buying it" he realizes what you meant but you continue "I don't usually lend people books but, I can buy it and then I can lend it to you to read" he smiles and nods "that would be nice um-if you want y-you can give me your phone number and I can message you when I get done with it" he says as he hands his phone to you, dialing in your number you hand him the phone "y/n, that's a nice name" he says before letting you know his name "Spencer"...

[timeskip]

The day was finally here, the day you go back to work, were you nervous? Definitely. You had called hotch to let him know that you were ready to be back, it was a surprise to him. He agreed to let you come back and here you were parking your car, you get out of the car and head in going directly to hotch's office as you feel eyes on you. You knock on his door and here the come in "y/n how are you?" he gets up and shakes your hand "I'm good, um how have you been?" you ask to which is reply was the usual 'I'm good'.

Leading you to the round table room where everyone was, at once you caught the eye of someone-Spencer, you both hold eye contact for what felt like a hot minute "you both know each other" you hear derek say as he let's a small smirk slip "w-we met at the library" Spencer says to which Derek and Emily (who had previously introduced herself) let out a sound of acknowledgement "oh he is the library boy huh" Spencer's turns red before hotch stops the other two.

After the introduction as you set up your desk that was infront of derek, Spencer walks up to you with a book in his hand "um y-y/n I just wanted to apologize for earlier and also wanted to give you this" he hands you the book "it's okay and, thank you. ah I hope you liked the book" "I did it was quite interesting not the genre I usually go for but now I will" you flip through the book to see he had written on some pages which brings a small smile on your face "I'm sorry-" you cut him off "it's okay I think I would quite enjoy reading your views on somethings" he smiles at you before nodding "um i-i don't know if you would be willing to or not but I was thinking we could go for some coffee later on the weekend if you would like to that is" "we definitely can"

{your pov}

I was in my room reading the book he had given back to me, smiling like a teenager every time i saw his messy but heart-warming handwritten notes. The day was spent with Spencer showing me around the new places that were installed after I had left, I felt at peace with him being near me, I didn't know why I smiled every time he would be close to me, or why my eyes searched for his every time I entered a room. Could it be...no no I can't go through such pain not again, I shake my head as I put the book aside and lay down trying to keep my mind off a certain someone...

°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°

Tagging:

@it-is-your-boi-void

I hope you all enjoy it and I hope you all are having a great day/night ❤️

the biggest problem with skyrim i see people critiquing it not point out isn't just "the writing is shallow"

i mean it is. but a lot of games have overall shallow writing without that being an issue. sometimes you dont need 90 pages of lore for smth. sometimes simple events can spiral out of control into massive problems. the elder scrolls series definitely has a world so complex though that it should have more interesting and detailed writing, but the biggest problem with skyrim isn't that

the problem is video games are not just writing and a setting. there is game play, themes, characters, and often multiple overlapping stories/plot lines in that setting. And all need to work together as cogs in a machine or the whole thing doesn't fucking work right. it's like making a play, and while i almost fucking failed script analysis in college (dont ask), i do understand that, and how different parts of the experience are weighted as a decisions

skyrim is a game that is heavily weighted towards gameplay and exploration of a setting. its primarily a sandbox game. thats all well and good, a lot of my favorite games are. it is a power fantasy that is (supposed to be) about play choice and agency. and almost nothing in the fucking game actually reinforces and works toward it. in fact it often directly contradicts it.

skyrim tries to bring up a number of themes, especially in the main story quest. stuff like morals, power, how to wield power, what actual justice means, and the nature of violence. and it does absolutely fuck all with it. if i as a dragonborn misuse my power at best i will piss off the guards which literally can happen to anyone. most of the time no matter what i do no npc gives a fuck who i am. i can be the thane of every hold in skyrim, most of the population will still be rude assholes to me.

take paarthurnax. we all hate and bemoan the dilemma we are given. either kill dragon grandpa or be locked out of the blades stuff from now on. it seems like such a stupid choice to the point one of the most popular mods is telling delphine "shut up im in charge". but i think, even if its subconscious for most people so they don't even realize it, the reason this choice is so stupid has nothing to do with the fact we like dragon grandpa (or at least not the whole thing), but because the entire empire is built upon horrific war crime after horrific war crime of emperors with dragon souls. tiber septim did absolutely heinous shit on and off the battlefield. he killed innocents. raped. abused. lied. manipulated. and he never really repented, unlike paarthurnax. what does he get? well after a convoluted scheme we learned about back in daggerfall, he gets to be a whole ass fucking god and gets worshipped. there are potentially elves who remember his reign of terror and being ruthlessly slaughtered and removed from their homes, their cities burned and families killed, all out of greed from this motherfucker. and they are the bad guys for opposing his worship. they are portrayed as cartoonishly evil mass murderers, torturers, schemers, etc etc and at no point do we get a genuinely sympathetic take from a thalmor agent where they list out all of his war crimes and horrible shit he did that still effects them to this day, and to top it all off the empire left them to fend for themselves during the fucking oblivion crisis.

so as delphine bemoans all of paarthurnax's war crimes and horrible things he has done, how no amount of repenting can make up for it and he's too dangerous to leave alive and we should kill him Right Now because what if he, even by accident, succumbs to his nature as an Evil Dragon and does horrible things again, she is also actively defending the horrific, much more recent war crimes of other Evil Dragons just in mortal form. if delphine has a point, then so do the thalmor, but they are just cardboard bad guy elf nazis and the empire can do no wrong.

violence is rewarded time and time again, but THESE characters being violent is bad. because. all dragons are evil and able to be corrupted by power, but the player if they decide to be a massive asshole don't really face that much scrutiny besides ultimate gameplay inconvenience. because this is a sandbox power fantasy! you should make your own choices without being punished! but that means the story about power, the cost of violence, justice, and morals, as well as your greater place in the world can have no gameplay weight. and if it has no weight in the most important part of the experience, then it has no fucking weight at all

i could go on and on. like how the dragons are supposedly intelligent creatures with their own language, culture, customs, and morality system but are basically for most of the game about as smart and engaging as the average bear or wolf you encounter on the road outside of 2-3 dragons in heavily scripted, linear conversations during the story, but we'd be here all day.

Hi! I really admire your artworks and remember you talking about writing huge amounts of Lore for them and vice versa. Do you plan on publishing it as illustrated books or something one day, or is it one of those eternal passion projects some artists like to do (I do it too lol but haven’t posted artworks of it yet) for themselves that will probably never see the light of the day if not for some bits and pieces? Just asking out of curiosity and respect for the craft that goes into things like this plus from what I recall it sounded very interesting and like something I’d like to read. dont mind me if you talked about it before I wasn’t following you yet. anyway Have a good new year!

Sup, and good new year to you too! Last year I massively revamped my entire world building, which made a lot of the 400+ pages of outlines and world building I had obsolete. That isn't bad at all - I'm incredibly happy with everything I have now it feels much more true to who I am as a person and what I want to stand for. It was also taken with a ton of enthusiasm by my friends which just makes it more exciting lol. However, I feel like I'm sitting in front of a big pile of shards (affectionate) now. There's a ton of things to be sorted and worked on new, and I traded a more linear kind of story for a more ethereal and "wooshy" setting. I'm p much laser-focused on my Istrati vampire clan right now, even worse than before, and am developing the world around them. I still don't have a set protagonist, I prefer to see that world as many lives intertwined.

In short, I would absolutely love to release something physical one day. I have so much art. The BotS pages alone went over number 40 last year, and while most of them went equally as obsolete as the five year old world building, it's still a pretty dear project to me even when I stopped plastering it all over the web. I'm just really bad at wanting to sell people things, which is inevitably what comes when you release stuff. That also makes me a pretty lousy freelancer actually rofl.

Also, I'm eternally grateful that so many people love and support what I do, no matter how little or much I talk about it. It's genuinely healing and whenever I see someone getting excited about something I did, be it friend, or acquaintance or just some stranger on socmedia, it makes me just so fucking happy. If you have any questions feel free to throw yourself at me anyway, I always love answering questions and talking about stuff lol.

I don't usually reblog art on tumblr (to this page I mean, usually it goes on my main blog cause there's more followers there) but I fucking love art. I fucking love fucking comic artists with their awesome fucking comics with fucking scribbly faces that somehow perfectly encapsulate human emotion. I love traditional artists with their watercolor and crayons and oil pastels and fucking idk acrilic paint and charcoal and pencils and shit. I love seeing timelapses and expressive gestures below finished products. I love seeing it. I fucking love art thats non traditional like throwing rice or assembling Rubik's cubes. I LOVE IT ITS FUCKING GREAT. The skill and creativity. I fucking love it. I love seeing fairies and other magical creatures and scifi settings. I love seeing them so much and i would say fantasy and magic in any setting is beautiful and bassass dddd cause I love faries and shit but honestly all settings great. I fucking love it all. I WANNA SEE FUCKING INKY PAINTED CHARCOLS. fucking helle. i love the goddamn fanart of television shows and other media wirh worse art. i swear to fucking god. some of you artists dont get enough love. even """ammatures""" fuck that. youre all fcuking great. i am more of a writer than a visual artists (((not proof here but trust me when im actually writing i am fucking good at it. fuck you dad. i am good at fucking writing. See, the fucking idiot said. If I just put in active effort to write, and use the baskspace button, the writing becomes better. It is one of my few skills, therefore I feel like I can acknowledge I am good at it. Personally, like I alluded to earlier, I enjoy fantasy. I have spent years escaping into fantasy stories. Sometimes I fail to finish them, due to adhd and depression, but what I do create actually is fucking good. When I was younger, I wrote on Wattpad, and like the pretentious little shit I was, I would leave comments on all the stories I read correcting grammar. I have spent so long studying story structure (admittedly informally) and used to read a lot which, I'm trying to do more again soon. however for the purposes of this textpost, its too much effort especially in this context))) anyways fucking hell one time this person (who sounded kinda young tbh in text) messaged me on wattpad and asked for permission to make FAN ART OF THE MAIN CHARACTER OF MY STORY I WAS WORKING AT THE TIME and i was like HOLY SHIT THEY WANNA MAKE FANART OF MY CHARACTER and they did and were embarassed about it SOMEHOW and it was so good this drawing (looked great)

found it you can read the story here anyways yeah fucking artist. fucking love yoou guys hell yeah. did i mention watercolors? landscape artists? comics? comic writers who use their art as a way to communicate serious things? with non bland fucking corporate art bullshit. thank you for explaining complex issues to me in an easier way. thank you for helping translate news stories and recent issues with colorful doodles and comics to help me understand. thank you for making me more interested in graphs and statistics. thank you for making one facet of numbers that are more acceptable to me. thank you for the above average more competent graphic design. thank you so much. i love you fucking porn artists. i fucking love you furties and trans people drawing ideal selves to show EVERYONE IS AN IDEAL BODY YO SOMEONE BECAYSE EVERYONE SEES DIFFERENT AND YOURELLL FUCKING GREAT and all the beads and candy art and custom sculptures that are useeful or mayve not and doodle sn scrivles and crazy experiments. and fucking dumbass youtubers who spent $$$$ making the most creative but also stupid and useless shit you have ever seen in your goddamn life because who even thinks of theses things ans went through and did it because why the fuck not. you are infuriating but entertain my world compared to the commentators who will make their own little sketches and lectures in their own videos. fucking fucking shit. all og it. whenever i see someone go "idk if i can make animation itll look silly* WHO FUCKING CARES BRING ON THE SILLY AND LET IT SLOWLY AND SATISFYINGLY EVOLVE INTO MORE COMPLEX AND DETAILED ANIMATION FOR THR WORLD HELL YEAH I LOVE THE EVOLUTION FROM SILLY BOUNCE TO MUSIC TO COMPLEX SHORT STORIES AND SHIT YOUR GODDAMN CHARACTER ARC IS NECESSARY FOR ENTERAINMENT JUST FUCKING DO IT BECAYSE ALL PARTS ARE EQUALLY ENTERTAINING IN DIFFERENT WAYS come on just fucking draw. fellow yarn people. i know you. look at me i am you. i am an amature but fuck it ill try to keep up. fucking love you crochet and knitters and sewers making plushies and custom clothing and shit yes fuck yeah. KEEP THAT SHIT UP i just make giant enormous pride flag knitted blankets (cant make money doing that cause no one is dropping $200 for that - which would be underpaying me probably) i have seen the most intricate and detailed fucking crochet lingerie and other outfits and they are so fucking cool all of it i love it fuck yeah. i probably forgot something but for some reason i cannot feel my fingers because there is no bloodflow and they are frozen because i have undiagnosed and untreated circulatory problems

Hi hello good afternoon I am supplying you with wlw book recs because we all deserve them. Please reblog with your own recs because I’ve only been reading sapphic books for a few months so haven’t covered loads of amazing ones, and hopefully this can become a massive rec list of wlw books :)

Also please please please check the TWs for all of these so that you can stay happy, healthy and safe 💗.

Fantasy:

- The Priory of the Orange Tree: [“We may be small, and we may be young, but we will shake the world for our beliefs”] Look I know you’ve all heard of it. Now read it. Swords. Queer women. Queer women with swords. Dragons. Castles. Battles. Many many many pages of beautiful words. There is nothing missing from this book.

- Cinderella is Dead: [“I don't want to be saved by some knight in shining armour. I'd like to be the one in the armour, and I'd like to be the one doing the saving.”] Fuck the patriarchy. Dystpian. Gay. Fantasy. Cinderella is dead (wow). Badass main character. Fighting for rights and fighting for eachother. 👩‍❤️‍💋‍👩

- Girls of Paper and Fire: [“Instead of disappearing, she makes me feel reappeared. Reimagined. Her touch shapes me, draws out the boldness that had been hiding in my core.”] We said learning to heal! We said finding safety in eachothers arms! We said fighting the oppressive government! We said fuck the patriarchy! We said fantasy women with swords! We said (kinda) enemies to lovers! We said please check the trigger warnings for this book!

- A Dark and Hollow Star: [“The number one law of the universe is choice, after all — bad things happen to the people who take that option away from you.”] Fantasy that actually uses the words bisexual and lesbian and gay and genderfluid!!! Urban fantasy. Four main characters: two mlm, two wlw. Swords and monsters and fae and powers and tension and fate. Read for the pretty cover, stay for the characters.

- Gideon the Ninth: [“I cannot conceive of a universe without you in it”] This book is dark and horror-y and gory and weird as fuck. This book has skeletons and necromancy and a huge weird haunted house and everyone dying under mysterious circumstances. This book has enemies to i-dont-even-know-what. You will not know what is happening in this book but you will love it. Trust me.

Dystopian:

- We Set the Dark on Fire: [“Maybe this was trust ... Giving someone the power to ruin you, betting your life on the belief that they wouldn't.”] once again, repeat after me: fuck the patriarchy. Rebellion. Enemies to lovers. Dystopian world where every man gets two wives. Guess what happens 👀

Contemporary:

- The Henna Wars: [“I've never really thought about having a type. I guess my type is....beautiful girl. Which is a lot of them. Most of them? Pretty much all girls”]. Girl dealing with the aftermath of coming out to her parents has a crush on a girl who is competing against her in a school competition. Main character is muslim, bangladeshi and lesbian and love interest is black, brazilian and bisexual. Just read it. Don’t do it for me. Do it for yourself. You deserve to smile.

- Her Royal Highness: [“PERRY I’VE FOUND AN AMERICAN!”] Look this book may be cliche and predictable and a little ridiculous at times but it made me unfathomably happy so I don’t care. Scottish boarding school+royalty+an american. Enemies to lovers but not im-gonna-stab-you enemies to lovers (which ive read my fair share of truet me), more like why-are-you-so-unbearably-irritating enemies to lovers you know?

- Written in the Stars: [“I’ll break into your apartment and move everything three inches to the left and fuck with your flow, okay?”] Good, solid contemporary new adult romance. Enemies to lovers. Grump x sunshine. Actually has a sex scene (this might not be everyones thing i just noticed wlw books often skirt around them so thought id point it out). Ugh its just so cute.

- You Should See Me In a Crown: [“When I open my mouth, everything happens so fast—the way I can feel her everywhere, the way my hands steady instead of shake where they tangle in her hair because I’ve maybe never felt so grounded before, so rooted in a moment”] What happens when a Black queer girl tries for prom queen in a weird, cliquey prom-obsessed school? What happens when one of the other competitors is the unabashedly gay cute new girl? This is what happens. Guys. Guys. Guys. Read this one oh my god. I say this about every book but seriously READ THIS ONE. So so so so so good. Everything you could ever want in a queer coming of age book.

- The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo: [“You do not know how fast you have been running, how hard you have been working, how truly exhausted you are, until someone stands behind you and says, “It’s OK, you can fall down now. I’ll catch you.”] I know you’ve all heard this but you’re about to hear it again. Queer women in the 50s? Sign me up! Sign yourself up! Buy this book and then read this book! Freak out about this book! Cry about this book! Tell everyone you’ve ever met to read this book! Cry some more about this book! Make this book your whole personality!

Thriller(?):

- The Girls I’ve Been: [“There is no normal. There is just a bunch of people pretending there is. There's just different levels of pain. Different stages of safe. The biggest con of all is that there's a normal.”] Thriller. Guns. Menstrual cups. Con artists. That awkward moment when you’re stuck in a bank robbery with two murderous men, a child, your ex boyfriend and your current girlfriend. Not romance but has romantic themes (established relationship). Coming to terms with childhood trauma and abuse. This book is short but deceptively heavy with the themes it deals with so, again, please check the TWs.

Ones on my TBR:

- Last Night at the Telegraph Club

- The Miseducation of Cameron Post

- A Memory Called Empire

- This Is How You Lose the Time War

- Girl, Serpent, Thorn

- This Poison Heart

- One Last Stop

- She Who Became The Sun (omg i want to read this so so so badly)

- The Weight of the Stars

- These Feathered Flames

- Honey Girl

- The Chosen and the Beautiful

- She Drives Me Crazy

It’s all for his sake - Endeavor and the Sunk Cost Fallacy

My hero academia 301 is a pretty interesting chapter, but for me, the most notable piece of it was how Endeavour reacted to the realization that Touya couldnt surpass All Might.

upon realizing that his son might not be able to do it because of inborn physical limitations, he immediatly stopped his training, which frankly was the responsible and adult thing to do. 

This stint of real parenthood did not last long however.

After taking the matter to a doctor, he is flat out told that not only cant Touya achive what endeavor wants, but it is a direct result of his incredibly selfish and irresponsible attempt to play god, by trying to breed the “perfect” hero into being.

It is how you react when you lose however, that shows who you really are, and endeavor illustrates that very, very well.

Upon being told in no uncertain terms that his attempts at Breeding an heir failed magnificently, producing a child that was not capable of resisting his own immense power, but also admonished by his doctor for even attempting it, and adviced not to try again, Endeavor instead doubled down, while focusing on the child he screwed over from the start with his attempt at genetic manipulation.

It was all for him you see. Endeavor doesnt use those words, but that is how he spins it here. it was all for Touya, all for his sake. if i stop now, then Touya was all for nothing, a mistake, im doing this for my son.

if im doing this for my son, then im not responsible for any of this.

his wife however, calls him out on it, as she understands Touya much, much more than endeavor does. or rather, she sees him fully as a human being, instead of as a thing, a weapon, a failed attempt at an heir.

Unlike Endeavor, Rei is able to see the way this all is affecting her son. She is able to see, and understand that Touya has fully accepted what Endeavor wanted him to be. a stronger, and better version of himself. however, unlike Endeavor, she only cares about him as a person.

Endeavour by comparison isnt completely uncaring about Touya. like most abusive parents, he does possess love for his offspring, but it is forever tainted by the fact that however much he might care, or not care about Touya, any familial love he has for his son is tainted by the fact that to Endeavor, he is a failed experiment, a failed heir, not his child. 

He is the golden child that Endeavor was building up as his true and only heir, who he breed, trained, and molded to for that single purpose, and now that he’s reached a point where he cant continue that legacy.

so, its time to abandon him, and start over new, despite literarily having just learned how stupid this plan was, and that it can, in fact, go completely wrong, with a quirk that will fuck over the person he brings into the world.

Of course, Endeavor doesnt use those words to frame it. there is no way to pretend to be a hero, if you phrase it like that after all. Intead, this is the words he uses.

this is a very important series of panels for a great number of reasons, some that can be debated, argued, and we will probably never know the full truth to the questions because this is a series published in 2020′s shonen jump, and there are things that probably wasnt gonna fly with Hori’s editors, if it was the case.

but lets start with what can not be debated. Endeavor’s words here.

“If we want him to give it up, then we have no choice... Touya... Cant surpass him.”

These are very telling words, and however you believe The third and fourth children of the Todoroki family was concieved, there is not denying the meaning of what he’s saying here.

The only way that my son will stop being an idiot and fall into line, is if we have another baby. that is the only Right way to move forward. it is morally right, because if we dont do this, then he’s going to destroy himself.

there are two ways to interpret this scene.

The charitable way is to read it as the fact that he used Rei’s oldest son’s mental state as a justification of guilting his wife to have a third child, to give this attempt at a superpowered breeding project another shot, despite the fact that they now know that this can lead to a child who is essentially born crippled from his own powers, and despite the fact that Rei obviously understands the effect of them continuing this insanity will have on their oldest son.

the uncharitable way to look at it, is that he used this as justification for flat out raping her, and forcing a third, and then later a fourth child on her.

I personally believe the last one, given a number of factors shown in this chapter(the way this page is framed, the fact Rei obviously didnt want a third child, given she predicted exactly how touya would react, the way her eyes would latet turn when she looks at who is presumably touya which really brings to mind how she would later react to her youngest son’s face after her mental breakdown, etc.), but i’ll frankly admitt that withouth a direct quote from Hori, its impossible to know for sure one way or another. 

either way however, this is a very good example of Endeavor both being influenced by, and using Sunk Cost Fallacy to justify bringing another potentially crippled child into the world for his own, selfish goals.

sunk cost Fallacy, is a mental reaction to when you invest more time and resources into a project, that you becomes so emotionally invested into said project that you will continue to invest into it, even if it reaches a point that it becomes clear that the resources you put into it, far, far outweighs the potential gains you can achieve.

because if you give up after having invested years, and years of effort to breed, raise, and train a kid, and then all that effort was absolutely wasted. hence he choose to keep going, despite having learned what a terrible idea this is.

He doesnt care about the fact that his next child might be even more crippled than his firstborn, he doesnt care about his son’s actual wellbeing. he cares about the fact that if he doesnt continue this insanity, then not only will he not achieve his dreams, but everything he did to get to this point was for absolutely nothing.

and endeavor cannot accept that. and so long as he can justify breeding more children into the world, and there being any chance they might inherit both quirks perfectly, he doesnt care about anything else.

and the moment he realised that this kid wasnt gonna cut it either, he did it again. it is not a coincidence, that the age gap between Endeavor’s second, third, and fourth children were all 3-4 years apart. because thats the age where you can usually tell when a quirk will manifest or not, as established earlier in the series.

While she isnt brought up directly by Endeavor as a justification, it is very telling that Endeavor decided on having a third child, only after his second child was old enough that he could tell that that there was no chance she could take the place as his heir instead.

So, he had his third child, and as time passed and it became obvious that he wasn’t gonna be able to fulfill Endeavor’s goals either, he dumped him, and instead breed a fourth child into existence.

and finally, he struck gold. he did it. he produced Shoto.

everything was finally worth it, and now, everything would be absolutely fine. the cost fallacy had reached its end, and it was now all full sails ahead.

except of course it wasnt.

His oldest son, now in middle school, had been raised from birth to believe he would surpass his father, only to be thrown away, and getting to see his father try to replace him, not once, but twice.

frankly, this scene is probably my favorite in the chapter, because it goes to show Endeavor’s mindset. Natsuo made a point that their father completely ignored his older children. and he did... from Natsuo’s perspective. however, having a more thourough picture of things, we can clearly see that this wasnt the case with Touya.

Endeavor genuinly cared for Touya, enough that once he got that child he tried to breed into existence 4 times, he genuinly wanted him to just abandon trying to be a hero. he genuinly thinks of himself as a good dad here, wanting his son to abandon the mission he set out for him before he was born. of course, with context, this heartwarming scene is incredibly sad and insidious, because we understand why Endeavor got so attached to his oldest child. because he WAS the golden child. he was the child Endeavor genuinly cared about, and invested in, and trained personally with great warmth and enthusiasm.

And not only did he abandon him as a failed project the moment he realized he wasnt gonna live up to his ridiculous standards, but he literarily created 2 more kids to try and replace him, just as his oldest son was old enough to understand what exactly his dad was doing. over the course of this chapter, we get to see Touya’s start as a 5-8 year old, his deteriorating mental state over the years, until he finally seemed to reach the breaking point with Shoto’s birth sometime in his middle school years 12-15. 

Endeavor is in this scene, just not capable of understanding why Touya so desperately wants to become a hero, when obviously he isnt physically able to do so. he isnt able to understand that he is 100% to blame for the fact that his son is having a full emotional breakdown after literaly being replaced by his siblings. 

In other words, Endeavor genuinly think’s he’s a good person. a person who has made a few mistakes along the way sure, but a person who was always justified in the end, and now that he’s having to face the fact that as dabi would later say “The past never dies” and has to face the aftermath of his inane attempt to play god for the pettiest of reasons, things simply arent going to work out.

He isnt going to have a happy family, who can now put the awful early years behind them, he put way too much effort, caused too much suffering and sacrificed too many years of his life for this not to work out as he wants.

after all, if he walks away from this project now, and lets Shoto have a normal childhood, and decide for himself, with no pressure from him, wheter or not to become a hero, then the sunk cost fallacy will have reached a negative end. it will all have been for nothing.

and we know he did eventually double down on this mentality, literarily beating into Shoto that he WAS going to become a hero, and there was not but’s or no’s about it.

there was no way that Endeavor was EVER going to let things be for nothing. His treatment of his older children could not be for nothing. His treatment of his wife could not be for nothing. His treatment of Shoto, and the way he beat him black and blue to train him, could not be for nothing.

Because if it all was for nothing, if everything he feels guilty about was for absolutely nothing, then he was in fact, a bad, bad person, who had no justification for anything he ever did.

ok officially asking you what's up with the published drarry fanfic with the numbers filed off

Okay sorry it took me a while to get to this I had to. sleep etc. I'm making this post non-rebloggable bc im 99% sure the author has a tumblr and I don't necessarily want them to see me slagging their book off LMAO. under the cut bc its pretty long

Ok so my partner tumblr user tackythor went to the bookstore. To get some books. As one does. And someone working there was giving her recs including this book. She gave kind of an inaccurate description of it too by the sounds of things? So anyway she brings some books home including this one and I'm reading the blurb which is like "two boys who hate each other fall in love at a magic school in new zealand!!" im like ok. sounds bad but i wont say anything bc i dont want to be a dick. I read the first page and am like ok yeah this is NOT for me.

So tumblr user tackythor reads some of this book and im like ok how's it going?? She's trying to figure out how to explain it and goes ok so it's like the characters are basically Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy. That's when the PENNY DROPS and she's like oh my god that's. that's LITERALLY what it is. So me being nosy I rifle through the book and find thank you's/acknowledgements to people on tumblr and ao3. It's all starting to make SENSE. Anyway a real quick google of the books title will rapidly find you the title of the og fanfiction AND a pdf of the (now deleted) fanfiction which I obviously immediately downloaded and read so I could compare the two.

ANYWAY, the book isn't great, because none of the characters really have a personality. This is because you are expected to already know who they are. Because they are harry potter characters with established personalities and backstories. None of these made it in to the book however. Ron and Hermione have been genderswapped to make it less obvious that they're Ron and Hermione. The Harry character is a real cranky dick a lot of the time, which makes sense if you realise he's Harry and has gone through a lot of trauma, but makes less sense for someone who's Literally Just Some Guy at a School. There are also no descriptions of the school beyond "there are no windows and it's grey and depressing". There are also no visual descriptions of any of the characters save Harry and Draco. There's also a lot of weird... sexism? and other isms? in the og fanfiction, most of which has been thankfully edited out, but occasionally some weird stuff filters it's way through (can't think of any examples off the top of my head rn, a lot of kinda strangely rigid gender stuff for the most part.) the general premise is they have to raise fake egg babies for a class assignment which is how Harry and Draco get together because they partner up to get back at their exes and I guess.. pretend flirt in the process? In the book it's not really clear why they don't like each other. They just sort of.... don't. Draco isn't a wizard racist but just a rich guy from a big city who pulled a couple of pranks on Harry or something. Again, not quite on the same level of trying to murder the headmaster etc etc but WHATEVS.

This book won an award which is how it got published. I think the fact that it's a queer novel set in nz with a POC as the main character and an indigenous magic system means that people sort of focused in on that, and thought it was a unique premise for a book and glossed over the fact that it is not super well written and the plot is very, very thin, because it is of course mostly a vehicle for drarry sex. (which has been edited out but the book is still fairly adult for a YA novel). Clearly the people running the award had no clue??? There are some nuggets of interesting stuff in there such as the system of magic but again, these are a bit of loose world building that aren't fully fleshed out. I could GO ON but I'd need to do another rifle through the book/have another discussion with tumblr user tackythor to refresh my memory about some of the finer details of the book lmfao. Anyway everyone's giving it really good ratings and reviews and it JUST DOESN'T MAKE ANY SENSE TO ME but I don't really read YA so who the fuck knows. Maybe it's good in the YA world. I find that difficult to believe though. The editing really improved the book though. Like by a LOT. But where it struggles is in the lack of fleshed out ANYTHING.

I've avoided mentioning the title so far bc i dont want this coming up in the search results for the book LOL so I’ll mention it in another post. yes im paranoid what about it

To me, it doesn’t make sense to make Magneto the main villain because it has been done so much before and it would connect it so much to the Fox Films. Also I think there is a GREAT laziness in writing Magneto especially in films. He generally didn’t want to kill all humans, subjugate them yes because he doesn’t trust them. Which isn’t a ‘good guy’ move in itself and he slips in and out of.

He legit murdered genocide I think when he was going to kill all humans. Like no.

I also think that the average cinema goer likes Magneto too much… or maybe that is me. It would also require them to recast the most famous faces of the franchises?

Like is anyone going to care if they recast Jean, Scott, Iceman, Rogue, Kitty, Beast even Mystique but Magneto? I don’t know. I have long been a fan of an actual Jewish actor playing Magneto but following Ian McKellan would be difficult for the casual fans to accept. I don’t think Fassbender left such an amazing impression.

Even my most average MCU fans friends (and god they love the MCU 😤 but I see past it) still talk about how much they want to see a Magneto solo film.

To me I would put the focus on their reveal and sentinels. Then again I thought they’ll go through Krakoa stuff. Like it turns out the mutants have been living on this Island etc

With the ‘simpler times’ comment I have to for the sake of my sanity have to think that it was because Pietro knew where he was. Things were clear to him, as much as it hurt he had his sister. The following trauma had not occurred. Again I don’t think this is true but I am trying to reason bad writing. He didn’t doubt his morality but was indebted and controlled. Shitty actions were out of his control.

I don’t read Avengers so I didn’t know he was shelved for so long.

I think the Trial of Magneto is trying to ride on the coattails of Wandavision because even though she’s not a mutant a lot of the internet was wanting Magneto to show up. So what is the best way to get those fans who wanted to see that? Set up a family comic book where they establish the family again because I guess the MCU fans heard they’ve changed their background and themselves didn’t like it.

I see the Trial of Magneto as something poorly thought out as they saw what the audience was interested in. The timeline kind of clashes uncomfortably with Inferno. Which makes me think it was wedged in there to ride the Wandavision train and undo the retcon on the side of the main storyline.

Thank you for reading my essay/rant

Ok so I'm going to first say you have a lot of great thoughts and great on picking up the whole forced feeling. You are right, it does feel wedged in there and it does feel forced because that's exactly what Marvel did.

The Trial of Magneto was supposed to be an X-Factor plot, it was Leah Williams next arc, here's an article link talking about her podcast: link (yes I know it's bleeding cool but I don't have time to listen to the podcast)

Leah Williams tells us that X-Factor was canceled because Leah's pitch for the Magneto/Wanda story for X-Factor, now called Trial Of Magneto, became such a popular pitch at Marvel but they thought the reader numbers for X-Factor wasn't big enough for this story, so they wanted it as a separate comic. And canceled X-Factor #10 rather than seeing it run as originally planned, with the Trial beginning in X-Factor #15. Williams says she only learned about the cancellation of X-Factor when she was writing #9, so as she had to finish the series quickly, squeezing six issues worth of story into those last two issues, calling it "cramped and rushed".

So I'm not a fan of Leah but the way Marvel treats it's writers has always been terrible so this cancellation doesn't surprise me. Could this be about W*ndaVision? It's likely, but it's more likely this has to do with Hickman bowing out. It's no secret literally everyone hated the retcon and I always knew it would be undone but I didn't think it would take 6 years but here we are.

Hickman leaving is a bigger thing, he stated in an interview ( link ) that he had planned Krakoa and X-Men to be a 3 arc story, and he wasn't allowed to move onto the 2nd arc because the clowns at Marvel liked the idea of Krakoa too much and I'm so mad because that's exactly the kinda behavior that annoys me with the fans, them thinking Krakoa is just a fun playground for the mutants to mess around with.

"Oh, plans have changed entirely," Hickman says. "When I pitched the X-Men story I wanted to do, I pitched a very big, very broad, three-act, three-event narrative, the first of which was House of X. And while this loosely worked as a three-year plan, I told Marvel upfront that I honestly had no idea how long the first part would last because there were a lot of interesting ideas that I had seeded that other creators would want to play with, and so, we left this rather open-ended. I was also pretty clear with all the writers that came into the office what the initial, three-act plan was so no one would be surprised when it was time for the line to pivot." Hickman continues, "However, I also knew that I was cooking with dynamite, and it was very possible that what I had written in House of X, and the ideas contained within, was not actually the first act of a three-act story, but something that resonated more deeply and worked more like Giant-Size X-Men, where it would represent a paradigm shift in the entire X-Men line for a prolonged period of time. So, during the pandemic, when the time came for me to start pointing things toward writing the second-act event, I asked everyone if they were ready for me to do that, and to a man, everyone wanted to stay in the first act. It was really interesting, because I appreciated that House of X resonated with them to the extent that they didn't want it to end, but the reality was that I knew I would be leaving the line early."

I'm so MAD because the thing I was predicting, that Hickman would have it come crashing down and everything would be revealed to be terrible and Mutant Death Sex Cult Island wasn't a paradise is never going to happen because the fucking CLOWNS at Marvel don't want him to move past it. I may have my personal gripes about some of Hickman's writing but we can't deny the man wrote one of the best if only the best Marvel Event with Fantastic Four/Avengers/Secret War.

As for the simpler times comment, like I have my theories that I wrote out here, and that's what I think is most likely but I do think Pietro's life has never been easy or simple once his adoptive parents died. Pietro could be drinking to a time before the Brotherhood.

I would love for a Jewish actor to play Magneto and any other characters who are Jewish. I would love for a Jewish writer to be able to write them too. However Ian's performance literally set him in the minds of the people as Magneto, not even Fassbender's bleh one note Magneto could compare. Imo the only reason people liked the younger Magneto was because he was young, handsome (? ig idk i dont simp for him) and they could ship him with young professor X (cowards. where is the old man ship???) But I feel like a new actor could definitely fill the role if they are Jewish and the writing was good.

Magneto's writing in comics... well I just wish we could have a Jewish writer for him. There's some great stuff for him but I feel like characters like him and Doom could be written better by non white/american writers.

Although by today's standards the og X-Men trilogy doesn't hold up I will defend the first two movies with my life simply because after Blade these movies opened up the idea that a good serious, non campy version where characters called Magneto and Cyclops were taken seriously. X2 in my mind was the definitive X-Men movie. Was it totally comic accurate? No, but it doesn't do what the MCU does, it doesn't treat the watcher like they need to have their hand held through all the military propaganda and "hints to the comics". Also side note; the reason no one cared about any of the other X-Men being recast is because all through most of the X-Men movies the focal story point has been Professor X vs Magneto. If they really want people to care about those characters/actors then we would need stories that focused on them. Not like how Storm barely had any character growth or plot in the og X-Men and even young Ororo got mishandled by the script. This is why I feel we should have "origin movies" for the X-Men that don't do what Wolverine Origins did and try to make a whole new cast but instead should use the stories as they are. If it was Kurt's story then we would see him join the X-Men, and have the other actors revolve around that. Same with each of the others, the X-Men work best when they are working off each other and each given enough screen/page time to shine. Unfortunately we all have our favorites, even movies and writers, so those are who are going to be pushed for fans to love.

Thank you for your long rant and sorry for my own long rant/reply.

my thoughts on the crank palace

i touched about this a bit on twitter (@newtedison_) but i figured i would Try and touch on my points more here (spoilers obv) again, its sort of lengthy

1. im gonna start with talking about the ending because i need to get it out of the way. either i havent read the books in a while and i forgot some canon (which could very well be true, i literally forgot that Bliss was a thing) or this ending makes no sense and is (somehow) setting up for a tdc sequel? so first off, newt was shot in the Head with a Bullet and somehow didnt immediately die? i know that that can happen in real life but it just seems so unlikely that not only would he not die, but he would survive long enough for someone from WCKD to transport him back to their labs and try to revive him. and who the fuck was he talking to? did thomas get newt’s journal at some point and i just dont remember? like i said, either im forgetting stuff or this ending doesnt make sense and is setting up a sequel which...i’ll get to later

2. why was this written? like, what was the point? i understand that this wasnt going to be all sunshine and rainbows but i feel like i was reading torture porn. like, literally all that happens is newt gets tortured (which is described in detail) by WCKD soldiers, has bouts of insane-fueled rage where he KILLS MULTIPLE PEOPLE, and then he dies. ??? what did this contribute to the canon? what was this trying to accomplish? truthfully, i never really wanted a newt-POV...well, anything except for maybe those little nuggets he wrote some time ago. but even if i HAD wanted a newt-POV novella, this is not what i would have wanted. he KNOWS that newt is almost universally the most loved character in this franchise. you can tell because he constantly uses him as a way to get fans in his good graces again. so why on earth would he take that character that so many people love and write a novella where its torture porn and a descent into madness before death? i am not interested in that At All. i’ve read fics (and even written a drabble) where newt is a Crank, and those were more respectful and easier to read than tcp. the parts where newt is having bouts of the Flare were literally exhausting to read; it was described in such vivid and torturous detail that it made me sick reading it. and it didnt help that newt is a character i care a lot about. i didn’t need to know what becoming a Crank felt like. the way it was described in the other books (and even the movies) told me everything i needed to know. the way thomas and everyone found newt at the crank palace in tdc and hes described as obviously not well, but not knowing what exactly happened to him...thats good enough on its own. the mystery of what exactly newt had to endure is part of what gives his journey more emotional depth. not everything needs to be written out and explained. not every gap needs to be filled in. 

3. me saying “the characterization felt off” is going to make some people roll their eyes because ‘duh, sami, the characterization will be off because he’s going insane’ to which i say...exactly. we weren’t really reading a newt-POV novella, were we? even if he isn’t past the Gone in the beginning, hes clearly not the same person we knew him as. the whole novella felt like an uncanny valley situation; i knew i was supposed to be reading about newt, but it felt like i was reading about someone else who looked like him. and that is part of what made this such a disconnect and made me lose interest at parts. not only that, but the world building and lore is inconsistent. newt makes a comment about how it used to rain in the glade, and apparently (as ive been told) that is simply not true. keisha having somehow working cell phone that magically connects her to her family also doesnt make sense. how would they have each others’ numbers? what are the odds that they BOTH found working cell phones in an apocalypse? i get that its a novella but you cant just throw something that crazy in there as a plot convenience. actually work on your plot and world building in a cohesive way, please. and another thing that doesnt make sense...

4. ...is newt finding out that sonya is his sister. if there was anything i would have wanted from a newt-pov novella, it would have been this. him finding out that not only is sonya his sister, but he already knows her post-WCKD. something that would have made this novella actually captivating, contributing something worthwhile to the canon that i would actually want to read, is if newt found out while in the crank palace that sonya was his sister; the Flare would remove that part of the Slice in his brain, and he would realize it was her. then, knowing that he couldnt go past the Gone before seeing her, he would try to find a way to get back to her. he could learn this after thomas and everyone originally see him, so it could match up with the canon. and then, by the time 250 comes along, hes lost all hope of that actually happening, and lashes out to thomas in a fit of rage. the journey of him trying to find his ACTUAL sister would have meant more to me than the story of keisha and dante. trust me, i love a found family trope as much as the next girl. but this series is FULL of the found family trope. it pretty much is the backbone of the franchise. so to see a blood family dynamic would have been a refreshing change of pace that i actually would have been interested in reading. also, the way that newt DOES find out about sonya is...underwhelming. he just randomly says “you remind me of my sister, sonya” to keisha in the WCKD truck. first of all, sonya is not the name you would actually know her by. you would know her by her birth name (which is lizzy? elizabeth?). second, why does he act like he didnt already meet her in the series? when the WCKD doctor tells him sonya is his sister and is alive, hes so surprised. wouldn’t he have known that already? why is there not more emphasis on the fact he already met her? that would have been a really interesting dynamic to explore, and im sad they didnt

5. the pacing and dialogue of tcp is so dragged out. i remember specifically there was a section where newt goes to talk to keisha after she starts abandoning dante, and i swear to god there was a page and a half of text before anything ACTUALLY happened or anyone ACTUALLY said anything. dashner described a launcher at one point as “the energy dependent electric firing projectile device.” that’s SIX words to describe a stun gun. a fucking stun gun! we know what it is! why did you have to use six words??? it just felt like everything was dragged and stretched to the longest it could possibly be and it added to the exhaustion i felt while reading it

6. okay i cant end it without talking about newtmas. its very obvious by now that newtmas is a VERY large part of this fanbase. its clearly the most popular ship and what keeps a lot of people interested in this series. even the marketing team for the MOVIES used newtmas as a advertising tactic (i.e.; using thomas and newt standing face to face as a thumbnail for the trailer, emphasizing newtmas based questions in interviews, even making a fucking facebook memories video for them. yes that last one is real). not only does dashner use newt as a way to lure fans in; he also uses newtmas. the parts that were sprinkled into this were so obvious that it didnt feel authentic. i cant speak for the original trilogy; i dont know the culture around ships back then, and i dont know how much it influenced his writing at the time. but the scenes in those books felt more genuine than tcp. by genuine i mean; he wrote scenes without a relationship in mind, but the chemistry had noticeable subtext that, while unintentional, was largely agreed upon by the larger audience. the parts of newtmas he added into tcp felt artificial and forced, likely as a way for people to take snippets of and use as a free marketing tool for him. one example you might have already seen; “he had already gotten used to his post-thomas, post-WCKD life.” the fact that dashner SPECIFICALLY used the phrase “post-thomas” rather than “post-his friends” or something similar shows that he is using newtmas as a hook on purpose. not only that, but to make newt’s last thoughts as he died “tommy. tommy will understand...” is...wow. first of all, i never wanted to know what newt’s dying thoughts were, but thanks, i guess? and second, when we all initially thought newt died underneath thomas with a gun to his head, i was pretty much inferred that newts last thoughts would probably be about thomas; they would sort of have to be, given the circumstances. so adding that in gives me the same feeling that “i’m coming for you, newt” at the end of the fever code gave me. not as offensive, but written very much on purpose. and the ending is implying that there will somehow be a sequel where thomas gets newt’s journal from...someone. at this point, i can only think that this sequel will retroactively make newtmas canon somehow. now that newt has been confirmed as gay, it could happen. which brings me to my last point...

7. hearing dashner confirm newt is gay was already mind-boggling before. now that i’ve read the crank palace...im angry. im very angry. i think its safe to say that newt is the character that suffers the most in this series. you can argue with me but hes definitely high on the list, if not #1. so; you take this character. you give him a horribly sad arc in the original trilogy, then decide to expand upon it and tell us, your largely QUEER fanbase, exactly how painful and torturous his last days were, in detail. and then you tell us he’s gay. something that is never mentioned in the canon, only in an offhanded reply to a tweet of someone calling you out. on a base level, i can understand why people would be happy. representation (i guess), seeing themselves in the character, having their headcanons be confirmed. great. but what i see is you telling your largely queer fanbase “hey, you see the only confirmed gay character? im going to literally write torture porn about him before killing him off and offer it to you like im providing a service to your community.” how fucked up is that? “hey, kids, if youre gay, you WILL be violently tortured and become violent and a danger to the ones you love. then you will die and your love will never be reciprocated.” what a message! and if he DOES end up retroactively making newtmas “canon” in some weird sequel...i will start foaming at the mouth. THIS is an example of how not all queer representation is good or genuine.

i’ve definitely forgotten some points but this is long enough already. let me know if you agree or if theres anything else you want to add! im interested in what you guys think

(8. I JUST REMEMBERED!!! if WCKD needed to study newt so bad bc sonya is his sister and is immune while he isnt, why did they let him run around the crank palace in the first place??? you cant test his vitals or anything you’re literally just watching him. what is the point????)

cupid!changkyunau - gift for someone who really helped me out in a tough spot! | other cupid!aus here

changkyun really doesn’t think this is the job for him 

when he thought he was getting promoted in the ranks, he was thinking like,,,,,,, messenger angel

lighting bolt staffs and prophetic wisdom delivered in tongues

he did not expect that he’d be standing in a line with a pink toga on and rose scented petals floating lazily around his halo

“this really isn’t my scene.”

he whispers to fellow angel minhyuk, who sputters and shakes his head, “too bad dude, i was MADE for this!!!”

changkyun rolls his eyes but agrees, angels like minhyuk who thrive off romanticism are most definitely fit to be cupids

if he could, minhyuk would go around the gardens quoting shakespeare and handing out bouquets

he’d probably be the most popular matchmaker in heaven - that is, if heaven didn’t have the whole ‘you meet your soulmate as soon as you get here’ kind of deal going on 

changkyun sighs, plucking the string on the golden bow he’s been given

well, it might not be my thing - but at least it seems like a pretty easy job

his initial thoughts are proven wrong

because out of every human on earth, he gets assigned to

you

and you are not interested in “love”

well at least not with anyone around you, and believe me - changkyun has gone through the options

the classic best-friend since childhood is actually your eternal love option flopped hard

because your best-friend is a boy named jooheon - a workaholic who never leaves his studio let alone to hangout, but dates?!?!? who needs those!

then there's the tall, mysterious, handsome and unattainable casanova co-worker at your workplace, which also fell through

because the casanova isn’t a casanova at all! he’s handsome alright, but you could dangle a confession in front of hyungwon and he’d just blink twice at it and ask if you were joking

changkyun even tries to set you up with the sweet boy next door, that everyone - even the neighborhood grandmas - have a crush on 

but his names kihyun, and he’s got a personality that somehow clashes way too much with yours

by the end of his first week - changkyun has gotten nowhere with you, while minhyuk is on his THIRD couple

its less so the want to help you find ~true love~ then it is the embarrassment of losing to minhyuk that changkyun takes the risk and disguises himself as a human 

he enters the shop you work at in hopes of just seeing what it is that charms you so that he can fish the right person for you out of well - 8 billion other people

you dont take too much notice of the guy that comes in, just a side glance as you continue to restock the shelves and the usual “hi! welcome, if you have any questions just ask!”

he replies with a curt, thank you - his voice much deeper than you’d expect - and it makes you do a double take

only to realize that this guy isn’t just another person or a local you’re familiar with

he’s

he’s totally your type

with black hair that gets a little longer in the front, pierced ears, and an almost disinterested and somehow at the same time storied look in the dark browns of his eyes

he’s slender, obvious even under the baggy shirt he’s chosen - and something about the almost languid way his fingers trail over some of the books on display makes you startle

because this is the first time in a long time you’ve actually stared at someone

you go back to your work, and changkyun sort of tries to hide his buffer because

did my human just ,,,,,,,,, check me out?!?! 

he shakes the thought off immediately, chalking it up to the fact that you were probably just surprised to see someone unfamiliar

he continues through the mazes of displays and shelves, but always stays in earshot of your conversations

the first person you interact with is someone your age and rather good-looking, changkyun reads his body language around you and picks up on the fact that he’s interested

but when the persons hand comes up to touch your elbow while he laughs at the joke he made - you pull it back and into yourself

ok, so they’re not into this dude. next.

another customer, a bit older tries to hit you with a one liner at the register - which you brush off coolly with a “here’s your receipt”

changkyun learns quickly that you’re rather popular with the shoppers - and he can’t blame them

you are good at your job, and on top of that quite nice to look at it. 

so its no surprise that you get the flirted with often

but what he does not get is why no one - not even the array of characters coming in and out - why does NO ONE spark your interest

and then changkyun decides to test out the only theory he’s got left

he approaches you with a book in his hand and tries not to react when he sees your smile perk up a little

“do you have anything else by this author?”

he asks and you nod, an enthusiastic note in your voice as you tell him to follow you down this aisle

he does, curiously watching you from the back before you stop in front of a shelf

on purpose, he sort of runs softly into you - chest against your shoulder before he steps back with a polite apology

something tugs inside of him when he sees a redness spread to your ears

as you say it’s fine

something about the corridors in the shop being small

the third and final straw to prove his theory, is the fact that you are the one to ask him a follow up

“are you fan of this series? i like it too!”

as he’s been watching you, he hasn’t seen you do this with anyone and a part of him cant believe it but the other part is happy to answer

“yes, ive been reading it since it came out.”

he points to one of the books and says that its his favorite and the little excited nod you give him makes changkyun grin internally

you get more animated as you talk about it and he nearly loses track of time

and you nearly lose track of the other customers

you two are so absorbed in the conversation 

and he finally buys one of the books and follows you to the register to pay, he sees your hand sort of hover a little over his when you pass him the bag

oh, looks like i finally figured out their type.

changkyun knows better - and this is already a troublesome situation - but he takes one look up at you 

and what you had felt when you first noticed him come through the door - changkyun is feeling now, looking at you so closely

and goddamm- i mean darn, they’re kind of my type too.......

“do you by chance have time for coffee this week?”

its a line minhyuk had taught him, explaining that coffee is a way people bound and get closer to the interest the cupid has chosen for them

so changkyun is blown away himself when you agree and scramble to get your number down on the shops business card

you wave at him as he leaves and he stops to look at your number, name, and the smiley face youve left on it

but then - when he gets back up to heaven - the reality daunts on him

is he,,,,,,,,,,,,,,is he about to match you - his human up with - himself!?!?!

he tries to churn through the thought when a hand wraps around his shoulders

“so hows your first case going!”

minhyuk sings - jittery with adrenline, “i just matched my fourth pair!”

changkyun bites back his lip, tilting his head to the side

“i think - i think this case might take a bit longer than usual.”

“what, like a month?! changkyun, just shoot them with the arrow-”

changkyun shoots a look at the book and the card that sticks out from between its pages

“actually, i was thinking more like a lifetime.” 

A character analysation of IdV’s Bloody Queen

Bloody Queen AKA Mary is a hunter in the mobile/PC game Identity V. She is personally my favorite hunter because she is easy to learn but hard to master. Her backstory is something that has always interested me though, so i decided to compile my thoughts onto this one post.

Something i appreciate about IdV’s character roster is that some of them are based off of historical characters, and interesting ones at that. So expect a lot of history lessons and references that should be explained in order to understand a character fully (especially with Mary considering how there isn’t a lot shown about her backstory through promotional content, and im talking about stuff like the official website here).

With that in mind, let’s just get into it.

There is not a lot we know about Mary other than the fact that she is inspired from a mix of stories, those being about a French queen named Marie Antoinette and Bloody Mary. These two are used in seperate ways, Marie Antoinette’s story being used as heavy inspiration for Mary’s backstory and lore, while Bloody Mary is a visual/gameplay inspiration.

Mary’s description on her info page and on the official idv website is 

This is strange because it really tells little to nothing about Mary besides her being aware that the position of a queen means a lot of vulnerability. It also strikes me as weird because every other hunter has a fleshed out backstory being written under this tab. (With the exception of Guard 26)

So overall, the ground to work on is pretty small, we dont have a lot of info revealed to us, and therefore leaves her to be a character who loses a lot of potential on a writing stance.

Intro Video

Mary does have an introduction video, though, which explains the base of what happened to her Pre-manor. 

The video explains how Mary was the queen of a country that had a bad financial crisis which was so bad people couldn’t afford food (if we are sticking fully to the Marie Antoinette inspo, this was in the 1790′s) and the public felt as if Mary didn’t care enough to help her people, the citizens voted her to be beheaded under a guillotine. Truth be told, Mary was actually trying to help her citizens by giving them cake.

We have probably the most lore information about Mary from her deduction descriptions, which explain her career as a queen more in detail, about struggles she had and her situation in general.

Deductions

(Credits to u/mawile94 on Reddit for the images)

The first conclusion is clearly telling us that the king Mary married had a problematic family, and the king’s family probably only looked at Mary as someone who will keep the family’s name up, someone who will have a child with the king. (Also, dont get confused: Maria Theresia is Mary’s mother’s name, not her actual name.)

Mary used to spend a lot of time away from the palace in Petit Trianon, which is a manor located in Versailles. The secret letter tells us that Mary was egoistic, naive, and was kind of a glutton. The letter mentions how rumors are powerful, and are going to spread really fast once word comes out about the “incompetence” and lacking abilities witihin the royal family, which will eventually be Mary’s demise.

Princess Lamballe is once again a historical recreation of actual Priness Lamballe, a part of the Savoy House (Western EU country). In real life, Lamballe was actually the confidante (someone who you would discuss private matters with as a royal) of Marie Antoinette after her 1 year old marriage came to an end. IRL, Princess Lambelle dies along Marie Antoinette’s side as she gets killed in the French Revolution. 

The shameful secret can really only be assumed to mean that Lamballe was actually Mary’s secret affair, especially looking at how all evidence suggests that the actual royal family Mary is connected to seems to be a mess. Mary is kind of confirmed to be wlw from this deduction which is fucking cool, but this rumor mightve been what also caused Mary to be beheaded. (But, IRL, the king Artois considered Marie to be physicially unattractive or even smart enough for him, in contrary to him, where he apparently was attractive. He did end up making up with quite a number of mistresses. But let’s not get into a conversation about how unhealthy or toxic royal relationships were in the 1700′s)

this is obviously saying Lamballe is being replaced by the Yolande (Countess of Polignac) as her confidante. IRL, this happens because the Countess of Pilognac and Lamballe start having quarrels against each other, in which they try to win over the queen’s heart, and over time Marie ends up preferring Yolande’s company. But Lamballe feels as if Yolande was a bad influence on the queen, yet she could do nothing about it. The friendship between Lamballe and Marie remained regardless, and she constantly admired Lamballe’s loyalty toward her.  "She is the only woman I know who never bears a grudge; neither hatred nor jealousy is to be found in her." 

Mary finally has a child, and it is a girl. Here we see the reinforcement of Lamballe’s loyalty, but with this conclusion also being titled as a rumor, it is also telling that this is one of many reasons people will start getting suspicious of Mary’s possible affairs.  

This conclusion only leads me to believe that one of the several reasons why Mary was treated the way she was by the public was because of jealousy towards her life and the things she achieved at a young age. The description of the people who are spreading the rumors are bitter, sour people who take joy out of seeing the bad in successful people. Here is where it all goes downhill (as evident by the subtitle under the deduction title.)

We will once again need a little bit of a history lesson for this one:

Koblenz, first of all is a city in Germany. The reason why the French would ever think of even setting up anything in Germany was because of the French Immigrants, and the reason why the Germans were cool about this was because the archbishop-elector (one of the chiep bishop electors) was the uncle of Louis XVI-a persecuted king of France. Along with the refugees that entered the city, two of them was Louis XVI’s brothers: The Count of Provence and the Count of Artois. them, along with Louis XVI’s cousin, Prince Louis Joseph formed an army of aristocrats who would seek to fight for the Ancien Regimé (The name of the political and social system that was popular in France at the time.) In the meantime back in France, the Royal Family gave in and decided to adopt the  Constitutional Monarchy, which was very modern at the time. This deduction description just basically explains that this is where Mary and the royal family fucks up, i just thought it would be interesting to know what they actually meant by what they wrote.

Yolande has left behind the Royal Family and made a run to escape the country. If you’re wondering, at the start of the revolution Princess Lamballe was actually in Switzerland, but as soon as she got notified of the situation she revisited the royal family to aid them, and reassumed her position.

This letter in particular is pretty cut-and-clear: the intention of the revolutionists was to smudge the royal family’s name in the dirt once and for all. What real-life anti-monarchist propaganda would consist of at the time was promiscuous imagery of Lamballe and the queen as lovers to further “besmirch” the queen’s reputation.

This is just obviously hinting at the aftermath of the French Revolutions and also telling us the present (at the time the letter was written). Mary gets executed by the Guillotine, and-well we all know how the rest of the story goes.

Overall, Mary’s deduction story is just a short summarization of what actually happened before and during the French Revolution: it even added the details of how actually sketchy and corrupt the royal family within was, not just the dissatisfaction of the public. As a summary of what this meant for Mary, as the Hunter, she feels pure bitterness, and anger towards the citizens for the way they treated her and the people around her. And as we can see, there was no reference towards Bloody Mary what-so-ever, and the reason why that is is because according to the Chinese version of IdV (which is what the original game’s region/language is) Her name actually would translate to “Madame Red”, not Bloody Queen. I think it was just the translators having fun with words, and since her design is very similar to that of what a person would think Bloody Mary looks like, i guess it made sense to them lol

But regardless, we’ll still take a look at Mary’s design.

Mary’s design is simple compared to other hunter designs in IdV. A simple, ball gown which was originally white, but turned red due to Mary’s beheading, pools of blood dropped all over her body. Mary also used to have long hair, but assumed by the very broken looking locks of hair, her hair probably was cut down by the guillotine. Eagle-eyed people will also take notice to her neck, which is stitched back onto the rest of her body, which the designers wanted to include really bad since its prevalent even in concept sketches as well:

Mary’s gameplay design is based solely on mythologies about Bloody Mary, however, which makes things kind of confusing, but i guess thats what idv excels at the most lol

anyway, you’ve reached the end! if you have read this far, thank you so much, i put so much effort and research into this and i hope people will make good use of it. I also hope i made you more interested in playing mary and/or the French Revolution, lol  but thank you for reading this!!

references:

The Count of Artois and the Coming of the French Revolution by Vincent W. Beach 

The Princesse de Lamballe; a biography by Hardy, B. C. (Blanche Christabel)

My history textbooks

And wikipedia lol

Some other interesting things to note in the old rogue trader 1st edition 40k book

The book itself has a fascinating structure to it because its actually frontloaded with the game rules, equipment and the like first [including a mutants table] and backloaded with the 40k setting details. Partly because unlike the modern 40k which is about playing games within the setting, the old rules seem more so geared towards creating rules to play a game of your choice. That is, well im not sure how well it would actually work the book does seem to encourage you to make shit up or even use a completely different setting like star wars instead.

some space marine chapter symbols on one of the opening pages. you can see chapter symbols for 7 of the modern big 9 of the loyalist chapters [blood angels, imperial fists, iron hands, space wolves, ultramarines, white scars] but they seem to be placed alongside the blood drinkers, flesh eaters, flesh tearers, and the... i think the rainbow warriors and silver skulls chapter symbols as well. Best guess is that they were originally suppose to be a lot more important then they ended up being. Also interesting to note but of the 7 of the big 9 here, only the iron hands symbol seems to get any major modification later on [if it is the iron hands anyways]. the early dark angels symbol has a thin in the middle fat on the end shaped sword in early versions and the space wolves symbol gets more bestial in modern versions, but the iron hands logo in modern 40k is flipped with pointier finger tips compared to here.

an interesting note here, since the modern 40k setting has a tendency to make the imperium seem and feel so monolithic and all encompassing on the galactic stage. Here its more so emphasized that even with the imperium being fairly large its only a blip in terms of the actual galactic scale of things. Something i wish was more carried through into modern 40k.

a little blurb on how warp space/travel worked in 1st edition. You could arguably still apply this to modern 40k too, that in terms of practical application its like using river systems to travel rather then going by sea

the section on warp drives and how they work, im not sure how accurate or effecctive 1-4 light years per jump is but it is the most detailed explanation ive seen as to how it actually works [as opposed to warp travel being random as fuck]. i also rather like the explanation as to why you can’t exit out of warp space right next to suns [and likely planets as well though thats conjuncture on my part] as youll just fuck up your ship if you do. On a side note, it says navigational drive instead of machine spirit/servitor or the like here cause 1st edition 40k imperium utilized robots instead [im guessing the men of iron and their rebellion wasn’t a thing yet].

Warp gates were also a thing and seemed to be implied as a common method of warp travel, and likely the main method of going long distance in a practical length of time.

they were aliens alll alonnnng! kidding aside, i like the idea that the dangers of the warp was more so psychic predatory alien species just chillin there rather then it just being a one to one copy of fantasy battles chaos gods. gives the setting a more unique flavour ya know.

some early info on warp storms with a 10% stastic of all solar systems cut off by warp storms to highlight the frequency of them.

early navigator info, seems their appearance was a lot less strictly defined and the third eye doesnt seem to be a thing yet. some info that explains why their so useful as well to keeping the imperium together despite it being “so thinly spread” compared to other space empires.

early figures on the astronomicans range. it not covering the eastern fringe at all i find fairly interesting cause ultramar in modern 40k is positioned firmly in the eastern fringe of the galaxy. 

for reference, heres what i assume is a map showing the effective range of the astronomican

nothing particularly notable outside of the weird implication that the emperor was far less of a vegtable here then he is now.

seems the imperium was far less monotheistic then as it is in modern 40k. Makes me wonder what other gods an imperial pantheon might have.

1st edition emperor was far less of a punk then modern emperor it seems, since it doesnt look like he needed 1000 psykers a day just to keep him goin. 1st edition emperor kept himself alive through sheer force of will. Also the ecchlisiarch didn’t exist back then and instead seemed to function in place of what the high lords do now. Though arguably a lot more effectively since they also seem to cover the ecchlisiarchs duties as well.

the direct subdivisions of the adeptus terra, which in this context gives a much more religious connotations to their jobs. Early custodes were just warrior priests i guess? and the arbites were priest judges? maintaining the astronomica also seems to have originally been a more voluntary effort then the other 1000 psykers sacrificed a day to keep the thing running it is in modern 40k.

the administratum also falls under the direct control of the adeptus terra.

the inquisition is basically the same then as it is now though it seems master of the inquisiton used to be a much more desirable job then it is now.

imperial governers were also basically the same despite in 1st edition being appointed by a religious priesthood administratum.

the adeptus astartes originally called legiones astartes cause space rome. Note the effective origin of the continuing space marine problem of scale of numbers cause this effectively means that in 1st edition 40k there are only one million marines in total spread out across the entire imperium. Though the imperium is also implied to be smaller then it is in modern 40k that still seems... insufficient for fighting across an entire galaxy. Also chapter masters were commanders back in the day and like governors not strictly speaking religious just taking orders from the priesthood.

even back then these guys got no respect. Though from the sounds of it the imperial army was closer to the pdf back then well the imperial fleet and space marines were more so responsible for the conquering.

we need more rogue traders with space marine squads under their command in modern 40k, cause that sounds a lot more interesting then deathwatch.

the officio assassinorum was a lot smaller back in the day that they didnt even deserve a proper mention it seems.

some classic imperial infighting here, with people willing to kill each other over grain quotas. Which sounds like a hell of a basis to make a scenario around let me tell you

civilized worlds, aka hive worlds light/modern earth transplantations are the most common planet type here. I do like the note however of imperial citizens being the usual imperial citizens.

feral worlds are basically the same though i find the early setting pieces on the legion astartes and the imperial commanders fascinating for all the implications it provides.

some hive world stuff, most notable is the implication of routine purges to maintain manageable population levels. Which is something you dont surprisingly see very often in modern 40k [usually its just rebellions that have to be put down that call for ��purges’] and also implies that despite the misery of living in overcrowded hive cities people are still banging like crazy.

as i said, robots were much more of a thing for the imperium then as opposed to now.

apparently grabbing medieval peasants, stuffing them in space suits and telling them to go murder jibbering orks with hand cannons was considered a worse idea then grabbing a caveman to do the same thing? Guess you could consider a medieval world a developmental stage before reaching civilized status.

paradise worlds were space marines do tai chi and yoga i guess and research stations, aka what can we exploit out of this planet.

cappin it there for now, let me know if ya wanna see some more stuff from this fascinating book.

30 questions about me

@landturtlealyce thx 4 the tag boo ilysm

name: officially on tumblr jay but the real ones call me janai

gender: u can call me whatever and i will probably responds

star sign: virgo

height: taller than alyce

time: currently 11:44am not sure what time it’ll be once i finish tho

birthday: september 17th

fav band/group: uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh probably big time rush and one direction. tbh i dont listen to a lot of new music so i’m very much stuck in the 2000-2010s music range

fav solo artists: ed sheeran, lewis capaldi, sam smith, basically anyone who can make me cry through song

song stuck in my head: currently nothign because its still early and i have yet to listen to music today

last movie: ummm all the way through was probably rise of the guardians (which is so good omg im in love with jack). i did wach most of barbie the island princess at a sleepover but fell asleep before the end (don’t judge me it was four in the morning)

last show: i wanna say a series of unfortunate events was watchin with a fren on discord and we just finished the other day 

when i created this blog: i think i made this thing late 2016 but i didnt really start using it until 2018/19

what do i post: mostly reblogs, every now and again i might post a fic or maybe my attempt at making art

last thing i googled: new york song (it got brought up with friends and i was like jay z is also in that song right? i was right lol)

other blogs: this is my main @luxyweek is where i hosted luxy (luka x xy) week @mlficadoption is the dead page where people can send in fic ideas for others to write if they want @jmajkawrites wow can’t even tag it cause i haven’t posted there, but that is gonna be my writing blog once i finally get it properly set up

do i get asks: sometimes mostly when i’m being a fool on main or i reblog one of those fun ask games. i have a bunch of those pass the love ones that i keep meaning to answer 

why this url: this is just the username i’ve been using all my life so when i first got to tumblr i was like yeah this works

following: 318

followers: 242 (love all y’all)

average amount of sleep: 7-8 hours sometimes more sometimes less

lucky number: 8 no reasoning just 8

instruments: i used to play the piano before i stopped about 2 years ago

what im wearing: ‘pjs’ its really a fancy hoodie dress i got online for very cheap

dream job: man i wanna know this too i really don’t know what i wanna do because i find so many different things interesting. all i know is that whatever i do i wanna be able to work from home for part of it 

dream trip: probably just a trip around east Asia. I’ve already been to Japan and I really loved it and I wanna just explore those areas more because it’s so different from where I’ve traveled before

fav food: oxtail most likely

nationality: american

fav songs: just the way you are - bruno mars, hold me while you wait - lewis capaldi, introducing me - nick jonas

last book: Tale as old as Time by elizabeth braswell. its apart of those twisted fairytale series and it was so good highly recommend reading it

top 3 fictional universes i’d love to live in: 1. the universe of black bird of the gallows by meg kassel(one of my favorite books ever) i know its not THAT different from this world but the myth that is created in the story is so good that i wanna just go there and research and explore it myself 2. the keepers of the essence worlds (another book series ik. it’s by rebekah aman) wonderful world building and there are so many worlds hidden inside i just wanna explore them all 3. uhh stealing from maddy and alyce the world inside of my brain

tagging: @emsylcatac @pawsomelybuggy @iveofficiallygonemad and anyone else (also feel free to ignore the tag)

5, 21, 49?

I dont want to hunt for the questionsssssssss.......... 

But I like you. so you get answers anyway. >:[  /j

5. Top five formative books? 

Okay listen. I don’t know if the Sandman or Watchmen comics count, but I read both when I was like seven and MAN let me tell you. I was Not A Happy Kiddo. (As I got older though, I went back to them, and really loved all the twisty bits in Sandman. Still not super fond of Watchmen, but meh.)  Also read the Hobbit (that one that has the illustrations that make Elrond look old and he has a beard and for some reason there’s actual stars just floating around his head like the cartoon spinny dizzy things) and that was. Something of an awakening?? Not sure to what exactly.  By the same token, I read the LotR series pretty early on. That definitely kicked off my interest in mythology and fantasy and even history, I think.  More recently, I read a book called (I think- I went to check but couldn’t find it on my shelves. :(  |) The Thief Lord, which was both very fun and just the right amount of intriguing to keep me engaged. (It was also set in Venice, which helped keep me interested.) 

Also, yes, I think things can keep being ‘formative’ to someone well into their adult years. You don’t just stop growing because of a number. 

21. What aspect of your writing are you most proud of? 

Well, I’ve been told that I’m good at capturing an atmosphere or a specific feeling. Personally I agree, and I’m really proud of that! Especially because I have such a hard time with it. Words don’t come naturally to me, even when it seems like I just spit them out onto the page. 

49. Favorite fictional world? 

.......... there’s so many...... 

Pirates of the Caribbean was the first one I can remember absolutely falling in love with. That was shortly followed by Assassin’s Creed, and then Tolkien’s works, which quickly tumbled into Skyrim.... and I’ve loved Star Trek and Doctor Who both since I was about five. (I blame Dad for those ones.) 

“Hi...Hey hello I am not Atti or Jasmine... I’m the editor for the show and being on the radio is uh... not my normal. But something very weird happened and I hate .... to be the one to tell you but.... both Wolfgang Jamison and Jasmine Kos have gone missing.  They had taken over the station last night and used our recording booth to record a new segment meant to air today... But uh... Well, I’ll let the recording speak for itself. This was the last known audio of the duo.”

“Hello and welcome to a special episode of Atti In The Morning. As most of you should know -- I'm not Atticus. Atticus was one of those taken earlier this year. My name is Jasmine Kos and I've been hosting the show in Atti's absence. We've been talking on and off since the first person went missing five years ago about these missing cases.Over the past five yers we've come up with some really interesting and insane theories of what has happened to our friends and family and today we decided its time to talk about all these ideas. So I've invited on an actual journalist to help us break down all these ideas and talk about all these theories.Hello Wolfgang, how are you this morning?" "Well, I'm here so that's already a decent start. Ready to discuss with you and hopefully debunk some of the more off the wall theories that I've heard floating around while writing the stories on those missing on the island." "What has been the most off the wall theory you've heard as of late? I'm sure you've heard some crazy ones, I know we've gotten some insane calls with theories. One of the most recent was that they were being replaced by the creatures that have come through the door." “See that’s not as crazy as it sounds. The doors did show up right before people began to turn up missing. I believe one of the most off the wall ones I’ve been told when interviewing residents on the island was that they weren’t missing at all but rather they all took off to start a cult ran by Chloe Vara. Which is probably the least likely to start a cult out of those missing.” “Well, that’s only partially true isn’t it?  Demigods have been going missing for five years now, but the uptick does coincide with those weird doors. Any idea what might be behind them? Beyond the one that opened at the family day party. But on the idea of Chloe, i think i rather like the idea of it being a cult run by her. At least you know they’re being well taken care of instead of this dread we all have of how they are and what’s happened to them. “ "Yes but there has never been any evidence to link the crimes now to those in the past other than no one found them. In any other part of the world that happens every single day. Growing up in New York you learned quickly that crime can happen at any point to anyone. The fact that the disappearances ramped up when the doors appear may be a coincidence but we might not find out unless those involved are found or come forward with any information. One of the things I always wondered is how Luke Decker completely vanished without a trace. Did they not have tabs on their officers at all times?" "I remember back when the first person seemingly vanished off the isle, Noreen, we all assumed she just ran away or went on some sort of extended vacation. I imagine that's sort of how it was for a lot of the people who went missing in the first couple years, back when it wasn't suggested we all live on this isle. People probably thought, 'they just went away for a bit' or because of where they lived people just chose to ignore it because of how common disappearances were in their area.  I think its massively overwhelming for isle residents because this is supposed to be a safe zone. " A beat and a breath, then,  "Which yeah -- that plays into how does a detective just vanish into thin air. You'd think after the first like 10 demi-gods went missing and the numbers ramped up they would have been tracking people's phones or something. Which -- do we know if they've been keeping a record of GPS movements of people since this has gotten so much worse?" "I would assume you are referring to Noreen Gomez? The demi-god who seemingly vanished after a fight with her girlfriend? Yeah, it might have been that way or not connected at all. These are just theories but you have to consider we're paying more attention because it's our kind that are disappearing. I just want to know why the police have only just now really started investigating the disappearances. The Gomez case has been closed for five years, they just assumed she took off. Which, alright, a demi-god goes missing and they don't bat an eyelash but how do they have no idea as to where Decker went? It makes me think that the police know more than they're letting on, which happens to avoid panic, but six months have passed since they began ramping up and we have no answers. You'd think they would be surveying everyone on the island at this point. No one else in and no one else out."

"One and the same; But yes, it appears we're all paying way more attention now than we used to. My guess as to why now compared to before would just be that one or two wasn't worth, as horrible as that sounds, all the time and energy the police department wanted to spend but now theres... 15 missing just from the isle, thats not counting those who were kidnapped off isle...It's dumb. All of it. They should have never closed the Gomez case they shouldn't even let up on the ones they're working on now. They need to search every inch of the isle, the shadows, the dark corners... all of it. I don't -- totally disagree, maybe locking down the isle could stop, or at least lead to some clues about what happened to our loved ones."

"No, I believe we are on the same page which is where my own conspiracy comes into play. I'm not sure I trust the police completely, which makes me sound as if I were a huge conspiracy theorist. Maybe I am now. Perhaps this entire situation has made me jaded and I want someone to blame, much like others do as well. I just don't understand how none of the crime scenes seemed to leave behind any trace of evidence. The entire apartment was ransacked when Atticus and Briar went missing and the same for Wesley Sullivan. Yet, they found nothing? I wonder if there's not more going on in that station." "I think the whole isle has become a giant conspiracy. We're all a bit obsessed with them now. It wouldn't surprise me either if there was a cover up, if someone in the police force is a bit to close to the kidnappers and is protecting them -- if not one of them. Its either that, or whoever is kidnapping the demi-gods is one themselves and knows what we'll look for. I just -- dont understand how no one sees them leaving the house with the person, how has no one, anywhere in the world seen anything to give us a hint at how our friends and family are going missing? Its like they’re shadows or ghosts. Which, after the door opening, I 100% believe theres ghosts running around now."

"That's my thought exactly. Something strange is going on and I want to get to the bottom of it. I know that the listeners might not know how often we get together and talk about conspiracies like this. Jasmine has become my partner in crime when it comes to this story and I do appreciate your help in what we're trying to discover. Right now, only those missing and the ones that are taking them know what is happening. What kind of creature lurks in the shadows and snatches people at night? Maybe it's Fae folk. They've been said to be tricky little things. All I know is I don't trust many people at this point."

“Yes! Wolf and i have become a bit of a duo looking into all this. It’s been sad and fun in its own way, and I’m more than happy to try and help save our friends. I also made a friend at the station, not PD but she seems pretty -- honest. We may, with her help, actually get to the bottom of this. But the idea of fae folk sounds pretty realistic to me; we have gods, creatures — who’s to say that the myths outside of Greek mythos isn’t real? I wouldn’t be surprised if all of mythology is actually real at this point. Maybe some other god from another religion is pissed off and taking children to make a point”

"Good, we need all the help we can get in getting to the bottom of this. I want to make things right for those of our peers that have been taken away from us for so long. I want to make sure they get the justice and truth that they deserve. That's a great point, it could very well be someone trying to make a point. If that were the case, the question remains what kind of point are they attempting to make right now? And how many more people have to suffer?" "I think we have lots of people on the isle that will happily help us in whatever way they can. We just have to ask and I'm sure they will. But yes i agree. We need to make sure our friends and loved ones get the justice they deserve because I can't -- seem to make any logical explanation for the reasons they're gone or why someone would be trying to make a point by kidnapping people. I just really hope they're ---" Rustling "What  -- How did you get in here?" Muffled voice "Go where? I --"  Silence

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

As you can hear... someone else came into the recording booth, we’ve done everything we could to try to enhance the voice, hear what the other person said but .... nothing can be made out. Nothing makes sense.... We don’t know who or what or why this happened. All we know is when we came in this morning it was set up and recording as if they had just stepped out to go to the bathroom.... I --- I honestly don’t know what else to do or say or how the show will continue on after today... We’ll figure it out. And I’m sorry.”

Ok I'm gonna be a little petty on main about CR discourse stuff so if you dont wanna see that, understandable.

Honestly this is expect as I engaged in the discourse by posting something critical, but I just wanted to make my retorts the pushback I saw on Twitter. I'm posting it on tumblr and cropping out names, I really just want to air things out.

I want to state, I do not think Beaujester is dead, I think it will come back, I have hope in Marisha and Laura to address in whatever way they choose to. Marisha does not seem like one to change their mind on things based on fandom push back. But I still think there is room to be disappointed in this moment in time based on ones views on the matter.

Anyway these tweets are about my post about liking friends to lovers in wlw shipping, how the ships I like aren't usually canon, and how one inching into canon and then somewhat seemingly inching away was disappointing to me.

I want to say off the bat, that my statements were personal opinions and not meant to be a judgment on how anyone else ships or consumes media.

Did I say too much? Did I go too far? Maybe. Maybe I just want to see different love stories, love stories I connect with me in popular media.

I did not say anyone had to feel the same way as me. I never said "this is why I'm leaving critical role" I did not say it was queer baiting. Just that I was excited about a thing then disappointed, and I am comfortable with this disappointment rather than trying to shrug it off.

Here's the first tweet I wanted to retort

1) I never said I wanted to see a gay realization story over an out and proud one. Thats why I dont feel any shame about that, because I didnt say that. I said I want relationships with depth and growth, and that sometimes wlw fall into the pitfalls of leaning on mutual sexuality without as deep of a connection as could be. This also happens aaaallll the time with straight pairing, the girl and the guy get together purely because they are the girl and the boy. Sometimes love stories aren't engaging

2) my post wasn't tagged with anything so you had to go out of your way to find this looking through posts mentioning beaujester. If you dislike the ship or how ppl interact with it in their own space then dont go looking for it.

The second

1) again not looking for a gay awakening story, I never said that, i said i like an intense emotional relationship, which I generally find more so in gal pals than wlw ships. Again a personal preference.

2) those movies are usually exclusively about being a wlw, which have their place but wlw romances in shows and settings that aren't just about that are what I'm most interested in. As a personal preference. Consume media how you want to

3) B/Y is not an established relationship, but they are both lesbians yes.

4) the type of relationship I am talking about is rarely shown in media though? I can see how this might have been misinterpreted, but I think we are one the same page. I want to see a variety of wlw stories that we are not getting. I want to see how I feel love and relate to love stories as much as you want to, those just might be two different types of love stories. If we had more rep as a whole we wouldn't have to pit it together in the same show.

The 3rd photo

Ok this one I probs shouldn't have to add, but same as above, I'm not talking about a gay awakening story. I'm talking about a deep full well rounded friendship to lovers relationship.

Photo number 4

I dont know what to say here. That's not how sexuality works?? You are not attracted to everyone that has the same sexuality as you. That's the exact issue I was taking..."if they're both gay they're going to be attracted to each other" is the exact pitfall i was talking about, you can lean on the implication that ofcourse the two gay characters are getting together, because they're gay.

Also yes, if jester and beau had the same dynamic as beau and yasha I would also not be as interested in it as other ships. I like beau and jester's in canon dynamic." If you change the thing you're interested in to something you're not as interested in you wouldn't be interested in it." Is a true statement but I dont think it's the point you are trying to make.

Sorry for my rambling and venting you may now go back to your regularly programmed blogging