it's really interesting how vax is the caretaker in his relationship with the sister — he, objectively, one of the most beaten up characters both by the fault of his own recklessness and the unfortunate roll of the dice. and yet, the moment he gets up and regains senses he goes to check on vex, braids her hair and watches her, following her very step.

all the while spending nights at her door and for a long time not allowing himself a comfort of keyleth's presence after the most traumatic events. i am on the episode 61 and i genuinely want to make everybody see how much he struggles all the while understanding why he doesn't do so himself being so closed off and having "and i walk away" as his default way out of the situations when emotional vulnerability is required.

I was thinking about Oz using the Sword to win the Great War then immediately shoving the Relics into the Vaults speaks to how much he doesn't want to unite the world by the sword, when, it came to mind, GoL probably intended that by default? Like, Oz only sees the Relics as things to put together when the time is right or risk the end, but they're real convenient superweapons for turning people back to Light. It just hits me that, he REALLY could've missed the entire point. 1/2

Like, Oz thinks no one should know about the Relics but him. That fear is the greatest enemy of his cause. That a crusade isn't what God asked of him. But four tangible miracles that can avert or confirm armageddon are the perfect tool for religious oppression, and it's questionable to think GoL expected Oz to take as long as he has with that in his corner? The divine mandate fails because its broken fool of a champion is still the guy who thinks women shouldn't be locked in towers... 2/2

what i always end up looping back around to on the subject of the mandate is that. the gods did not kill everyone on the planet because humanity was divided; they did that to punish a REBELLION. a proportionally small group of humans defied the gods, so the gods destroyed humanity in retaliation.

(the action that seems to have provoked this specifically is humans turning their divine gifts against their creators—magic in this case—which i also think sheds some light on why what salem did before the rebellion infuriated the gods SO much; choice was GOL’s gift and she used it to defy him, and knowledge was GOD’s gift and she withheld information from him, ergo, she used their gifts against them so they punished her.)

i think that’s really important to bear in mind vis-a-vis ozma’s divine mandate, the exact wording of which is “if your kind has learned to live in harmony with one another and set aside your differences, then we shall once again live among you and humanity shall be made whole again; but if your kind is unchanged, if you demand our blessings while still fighting among yourselves, then mankind will be found irredeemable and your world will be wiped from existence.”

and it’s—on its face—kind of weird? because it doesn’t really seem connected to any of what happened with salem prior to the massacre. but if you think about it from GOL’s point of view, it makes perfect sense:

1. light’s intention with humankind was to devise an experiment that would end the conflict between himself and his brother.

2. it is fairly clear from his behavior towards dark that light isn’t interested in compromise; he wants to do as he pleases and he also wants to lay down rules for his brother to follow.

3. when challenged by his brother, light reacts first with a show of stern paternalism, and then when that fails, a small show of force before redirecting dark’s wrath towards salem. he reacts, in short, exactly as one would expect from an authoritarian.

4. salem led her followers to reject the authority of the gods altogether and attack them—misusing (in light’s eyes) the choice he gave and implicitly siding with his brother over him by embracing the destructive side of their natures, which in turn gave dark an excuse to gleefully atomize them all. vexing!

5. a bajillion years later, after salem has grimmified herself, light drags ozma out of the void and goes: here are four relics mankind can use to remake yourselves, we’ll come back when you put them together, if you peons haven’t changed by the time we get back we’ll blow all of you up again and your little planet too.

that he also specifies “demand our blessings” as a criteria that will doom humanity to extermination makes it pretty clear that light still very much has salem on his mind—the literal first thing he said to salem, when she had done nothing but humbly fall to her knees before him to say “please bring him back,” was “you demand of me that which i cannot make so” and there are several other instances after that of one or both gods scolding salem for “making demands”—so there is a definite subtext here of light expecting ozma to stamp out any remaining whiff of rebellion against the gods.

(and it’s also a trap: if a grieving young widow choking out “please bring him back” through her tears constitutes a DEMAND, and humanity’s reward for proving worthy involves being “made whole” i.e. divine blessings will be restored, then it seems to me very likely that humans merely pleading for their own right to exist might be interpreted by light as humanity “demanding blessings” and become grounds for wiping them out)

but—anyway—where i’m going with this is i think light very much wants ozma to somehow guide or sculpt humanity into, essentially, a model of light’s ideal of what ‘harmony’ between him and his brother ought to look like; he wants nominal equality between creation and destruction but for destruction to only happen when and how he approves of it. he wants his little experiment with free will to be exactly like him and do everything the way he would do it, never the way his brother would, because that’s what ‘harmony’ means to him and the Literal Intended Purpose of humanity is to resolve the unresolvable conflict between the gods.

(which is one of many reasons why i think “fuck you we’re not remaking ourselves we’re remaking YOU” has a high likelihood of being the solution to the god problem.)

anyway—so,

i one hundred percent believe that light’s intention was for ozma to go around rooting out dark’s influence and using the relics to, literally remake human nature into what light wants it to be, i think light was being VERY LITERAL when he said he was leaving the relics behind in the hopes that humankind would remake themselves. whether that looks like a religious crusade in his mind or not, i’m not sure—certainly we haven’t seen enough of what light’s worship looked like before salem got under his skin to say whether he’d be willing to countenance wars of subjugation in his name—but whether he realizes it or not that’s legitimately the only way to kind of, sort of get what he’s asking for, because what he really wants is Absolute Obedience.

and… i honestly don’t think that light entirely realizes that that’s what he wants? he strikes me as having drunk his own koolaid and i think he truly does conceive of himself as this irreproachably benevolent if strict paternal figure guiding humanity toward the ‘right’ path, and he absolutely does not understand humanity at all, so i don’t think he even has the capacity to understand that if he gets what he wants the end result won’t even be human anymore? and that pure lack of knowledge is the most dangerous thing about him and the primary reason i think dark is actually the lesser threat, of the two of them. (dark is capricious and fickle but sometimes it pleases him to be kind, and salem was able to make an emotional connection with him by appealing to his loneliness; that is, very slightly, better than an unyielding autocrat who can’t fathom human nature and keeps trying to correct it.)

i’m also of the opinion that on some subconscious level ozma Grasps This, that in order to save humanity he would need to become a tyrant, ruthlessly enforce light’s design, and he… doesn’t have the stomach to do that and he’s too terrified of failure to even think about rejecting the gods so we get the single-minded fixation on destroying salem (which has fuck all to do with his task except insofar as he’s convinced himself that all bad things come from her) and the wildly self-sabotaging methods he brings to that quest. if he buries it all and mires himself in this conflict with her then he can at least cling to the idea that it’s all his fault and his responsibility and the threadbare illusion of autonomy that comes along with that, you know?

tangentially i think one of if not the foremost reasons ozpin stashed the relics in vaults HE COULDN’T OPEN was because he no longer trusted himself to hold onto all four without, like, giving up and putting them together so he could Be Done. he is 1000% projecting when he insists salem’s plan is definitely for sure suicide by eschaton

Live like a Rockefeller — The Rivals by Diego Rivera

At first glance, Abby Aldrich Rockefeller and the Mexican artist Diego Rivera couldn’t have been more different. She was the daughter of a prominent Republican senator and had married into one of America’s most famous capitalist families; he was a devoted member of Mexico’s Communist party, who had visited Moscow before his first U.S. mural commission in San Francisco.

Abby, however, was a huge admirer of Rivera’s art. He’d developed a reputation as one of his generation’s leading modern artists, and she knew all about his triumphs as a muralist in his homeland (in buildings such as the Ministry of Education in Mexico City), not to mention his mural for the Pacific Stock Exchange Tower in San Francisco. She purchased a number of Rivera’s oil paintings, sketches and watercolours. Her first purchase in 1929 was May Day Parade, a Rivera sketchbook (now in the collection at MoMA), which he had completed on a trip to Moscow.

In 1931, in her capacity as co-founder and trustee of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), Abby invited Rivera for a solo exhibition at the institution, making him only the second artist, after Matisse, to receive that honour. It is likely that Mexico had been on her mind for decades, ever since her first trip to the country in 1903. Rivera embodied everything that Abby and Alfred Barr, MoMA’s first Director, were looking for in terms of the museum’s programming: he was both a modernist genius with a towering body of work and as Mexico’s leading muralist, he was the foremost proponent of a genuine art movement from the Americas to the world.

On arrival in New York, Rivera paid a visit to the Rockefellers’ Manhattan home with his wife, the artist Frida Kahlo. ‘He was a very imposing and charismatic figure: tall and weighing three hundred pounds,’ Abby’s son, David Rockefeller, recalled in later life.

Rivera brought with him a new canvas, titled The Rivals, which Abby had commissioned and which he had painted in a makeshift studio aboard the steamship, the SS Morro Castle, en route from Mexico. The painting depicts a traditional festival from the southern Mexican state of Oaxaca known as Las Velas, a colourful celebration in observance of local patron saints and of the natural bounties of spring.

‘It’s undoubtedly one of Rivera’s masterpieces,’ says Virgilio Garza, Head of Latin American Paintings at Christie’s. ‘Compared with his murals — which are epic in scale and content, with sweeping vistas and narratives that are often ideologically or historically driven — this easel painting is equally monumental in presence, yet devoid of Rivera’s politics. It’s a much more intimate scene focused on regional traditions, and the brushwork is deliberately looser.’

Others have praised the rich combination of bright colours, reminiscent of Matisse (whom Rivera knew from the decade he’d spent in Paris, between 1911 and 1921) but also, more pertinently, reflecting the vivid hues evident across Mexico: from its flora to its architecture. ‘And then there’s his modern conception of space through the use of multiple planes of colour that recall the formal effects of synthetic Cubism,’ says Garza. ‘Forms and figures are synthesised and reduced to their essential elements. The viewer’s gaze recedes in stages, from the men in the foreground, to the brightly dressed women under the hanging papel picado. Rivera’s brilliant composition of intersecting planes creates a cinematic narrative.’

The Rivals  was as popular with Abby as Rivera’s sell-out MoMA retrospective proved to be with New York’s public. In 1932, she approached the artist about another project: completing a mural for the lobby of the RCA Building, the centrepiece of the Rockefeller Center, her husband, John D. Rockefeller, Jr.’s new complex in Midtown Manhattan.

Rivera’s idea was a fresco on the twin themes of human cooperation and scientific development, and he sent Abby a planned sketch of it along with a letter saying, ‘I assure you that… I shall try to do for the Rockefeller Center — and especially for you, Madame — the best of all the work I have done up to this time.’

In the process of painting the mural Man at the Crossroads, Rivera made several changes to his original sketch that would have fateful consequences. Chief among these was the addition of Lenin’s features into the face of a labourer. When news of this change in the mural reached  Nelson Rockefeller, David’s older brother, he asked Rivera to substitute the late Soviet leader for another figure.

The painter, despite many attempts to persuade him, refused. Equally vexing to the Rockefeller family was the depiction of John D. Rockefeller, Jr. on the left side of the mural drinking among a group of men and cavorting with women of questionable repute. The latter was a striking image given the family’s devout religious views and their abstinence from drinking and smoking, as well as the Rockefellers’ firm support of U.S. Prohibition-era laws. With no compromise reached, Rivera was dismissed, and although he was paid in full the mural was destroyed. ‘The mural was quite brilliantly executed,’ wrote David Rockefeller in Memoirs in 2002, ‘but not appropriate’.

Rivera would go on to recreate Man at the Crossroads, in modified form as Man, Controller of the Universe, on the walls of the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City. Here again, Rivera depicted John D. Rockefeller, Jr. clutching a martini amid scenes of gambling and excess, while the other side featured workers and various Communist leaders.

Despite all these events, Abby and her sons Nelson and David remained admirers until the end. She would donate many of the Rivera works she owned to MoMA, although The Rivals  was one piece she held on to. As a sign of how highly she valued it, Abby gave it to David and his wife Peggy McGrath as a wedding present in 1940. They, in turn, would give the painting pride of place, for decades, in the living room of their summer residence, Ringing Point, in Maine.

David Rockefeller’s interest in Latin America and its art and culture spanned many decades. In January 1946, after completing his military service in the Second World War and before he started work at Chase Bank, he and Peggy decided to take ‘a second honeymoon’. They settled on Mexico as the destination for their six-week holiday.

‘This was our first direct exposure to Latin America, and we were very much taken with what we saw,’ David wrote years later. ‘We were especially fascinated by the remarkable pre-Columbian monuments and artefacts, as well as by the charm of much contemporary Mexican painting and folk art.’ He recounted how keen they were to see the famous Mexican frescoes of Rivera, José Clemente Orozco, and Rufino Tamayo in Mexico City and Cuernavaca. ‘We especially wanted to see Rivera’s murals, since I had met Rivera with my mother when he first came to New York in 1931,’ he recalled. ‘I had always found him to be a very sympathetic person, and I liked his painting.’

The couple had travelled to Mexico armed with letters of introduction from Nelson Rockefeller, who had been appointed Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs by President Roosevelt and had subsequently visited virtually all the Latin American nations. One letter was addressed to Roberto Montenegro, an artist friend of Nelson’s, who introduced David and Peggy to other contemporary Mexican artists.

At the beginning of his long career with Chase, one of David’s first assignments was in the bank’s Latin American division. In 1965 he assumed the chairmanship of both the Council of the Americas and its new cultural adjunct, the Center for Inter-American Relations (CIAR). The latter was responsible for introducing Americans to the cultures and artists of Latin America, including staging the first one-man show in New York for Fernando Botero.

In 1991, he endowed the David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard, which continues to explore Latin American politics, society, and culture, and after his retirement from the bank David was made chairman of The Americas Society, which afforded him, he said, ‘many new opportunities to visit the nations of Latin America and the Caribbean, and to appreciate their diverse art and culture.’

~ ROCKEFELLER COLLECTION | AUCTION PREVIEW · 9 May 2018.

Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E52 (Feb. 26, 2019)

There’s a lot to unpack here.

This week’s guests are Laura Bailey and Liam O’Brien!

Announcements:

Travis Willingham’s Yeehaw Game Ranch debuted today on CR’s Twitch channel! Travis and Brian will be livestreaming every other week at 4 PM Pacific (alternating with MAME Drop). Today’s episode will go up on YouTube on Thursday. On Monday, March 4, the Kickstarter for the VM cartoon will go live! They’ve been talking about this almost since the start. This episode of TM will be uploaded to YT on Thursday morning, and will be available on a one-week delay in podcast form!

The cowboy hat makes the rounds. Laura points out that she was actually in an episode of Walker, Texas Ranger.

Okay, on to episode 52: Feral Business. (Liam, just as the splash screen comes up: “That means masturbating.”)

Laura: “I think everybody should refer to their penis as a tiefling. Anyway, continue.”

There’s a discussion about classes for said tieflings. It gets a little out of hand.

Stats! Jester got her 5th HDYWTDT of the campaign against the shoosuva. Caleb has now dealt over 1,400 points of damage. (Liam: “Really?”) Frumpkin got his first natural 20 to perceive the rats and shoosuva. 

Laura and Liam have a heated negotiation about who gets to cuddle the Jester and Kiri plushies.

100% of the out-of-character motivation for the Disguise Self was just Liam missing being Laura’s twin. Liam: “You know, I like to have fun in my D&D games.” They enjoyed getting to sit next to each other again at the live show. 

Brian: “What were you gossiping about?” Liam: “Your tiefling.” Laura: “Specifically yours.”

Jester’s view on Caleb hasn’t changed since his backstory reveal. Laura: “I feel like it makes more sense that he’s more standoffish, and it made me feel much more guilty for the times I gave him shit for being muddy and stinky and stuff.” She points out that Jester got to see a lot of different types of people pass through, not to mention listen in on their conversations, and probably has a broader experience with a variety of people than some might expect.

Liam talks about how Xhorhas is “rough, and the customs are different, but it’s a real place” and not the bogeyman often presented to the Empire.

He objects to a question talking about how Caleb’s planning to take down people in the Empire, pointing out that he’s never confirmed that. Laura immediately concocts a theory about Caleb being a top-secret spy for the Empire.

Laura: “Jester has no idea that her charisma isn’t as high as... Beau’s or... is Beau’s very high?” She loved leading a diplomatic conversation, and didn’t know how it would turn out, but she feels like she killed it.

Snoozy Henry!

Liam: “Caleb’s not scared of being manipulated. I think that’s done.” It feels off being away from the Empire, not because he still feels loyalty, but mainly because everything that matters to him is still there.

Another round of dick jokes comes to a climax (sorry) with “Cocks Machina”.

Gif of the Week! Jester learning the ways of the goth.

If the opportunity presents itself, even in Xhorhas, Jester will 100% pull a prank and try to spread the word of the Traveler. “Nothing is sacred to Jester!”

Laura mentions that she has no backup character planned if Jester dies; she feels like having a backup will make her more likely to accept the possibility of losing Jester.

Jester doesn’t really care about the Empire vs. Krynn conflict. “Political bullshit. I don’t think the Krynn are necessarily evil, but I don’t know.” Liam points out that nobody really knows the motivations behind the conflict in the first place. Caleb mainly sees it as a big mess. “Caleb will still have emotional ties to where he was born and raised, but he knows they’re flawed and awful. They’re really terrible people.”

Laura’s theory: “The Empire stole a lot of artifacts. They stole the dodecahedron. The Krynn just want it back. And now we have it. And we’re fucking everything up.”

Big Tiefling Energy.

Jester on tattoos: “Nah, I’m not afraid of the pain! I can take it! I’m really strong!” She’d totally get a tattoo if the right idea came along.

Caleb isn’t too concerned about the group getting sidetracked, since he doesn’t really have “an agenda for where he wants to go”. He wouldn’t want to do something boring, but that’s not exactly a worry with this group. “They keep going to places with things he’s interested in.”

Laura on Jester’s changing dynamic with Nott: “It’s interesting to find out that Nott’s a mom. She knows what that relationship means, and she is just devastated for Nott that she can’t be with her son.” What seemed the worst was that she didn’t have someone who thinks of her the way Jester thinks of her mom. “I thought about so many times just her not taking a bath. It just makes me so sad.”

Fan Art of the Week! A giant city-tortoise.

Liam: “Man, get a load of Brian’s kenku.” Dani: “This has to stop.”

What the heck does “consecuted” mean? Laura: “I think it means something about being reborn.” Liam: “Yeah, reincarnation.”

Liam on potentially picking the wrong spells: “I don’t worry that I will. I just know that I will.” Marisha warned him.

Brian asks Laura about where her vote’s hovering in the vote for DnD Beyond’s president. Laura: “I feel like Liam has a stronger platform.” Liam: “Is that a dick joke?” Laura: “I’m sitting next to Liam. So Liam.”

Dani: “Contractually, as Sam’s campaign manager, I have to vote for Sam. But he’s also not paying me, so I’m just saying, Liam, if you paid me, I could maybe switch sides. Look, I’m working for exposure only, and I’m feeling very exposed.” Liam: “Listen, my shell corporation will talk to your shell corporation after the show.”

Jester’s not too worried about the group being disrespectful by hanging onto the dodecahedron. “It’s a powerful thing! Look at it! We can play with it!” Liam: “Yeah, it’s not her god.”

Liam: “I miss playing twins.” Laura: “I do too, buddy.”

Henry is moved to the couch when Liam starts literally curling up on the floor to be closer to him:

Jester would create a Magical Viagra spell. Dani: “Like the Wand of Smiles, but for dicks!” Laura: “The point of it would be to just make people feel awkward.”

On Jester checking on Fjord’s tusks: “It’s important to her that he appreciates himself as much as others appreciate him.”

Liam: “My character will probably die soon anyway.” Everyone: “LIAM O’BRIEN.”

Laura points out that Jester’s come closer to death than Caleb. “If anyone’s going to die soon, it’s me.” Brian: “Stop it! Stop!”

Search for Grog Questions (SPOILERS FOLLOW!)

The group played a private home game as Vox Machina for fun recently (”It didn’t make sense, but it was fun!”). Liam was envious of the group getting to play their characters again, so he wanted to play something at least VM-adjacent. He also loves building out the world and wanted to continue fleshing that out. “She saw VM, unbeknownst to them, a couple times.” He also wanted to be able to keep people from dying and “breaking the universe.”

Laura on playing VM again: “It was really crazy, and me and Taliesin gave each other the biggest hug after the show. I missed Percy and I missed that relationship so much!”

Having Lieve’tel around was painful, but Vex “didn’t have the same reaction to it the way Keyleth did. It was bittersweet. I think she appreciated that someone appreciated what her brother did.”

Gilmore and Allura’s voices were big moments of nostalgia. Percy-Vex banter. Scanlan wanting to kill Trinket. (Laura really thought she’d have to leave Trinket behind, and the “I can carry him” killed her.) Scanlan’s singing. Pike! Liam: “Roasting the shit out of Travis.” Laura: “Oh my god.”

Rose! How do you feel about Emma and its various adaptations?

Sorry for the delay in answering - blame the school trip!

I love Emma. I wrote my dissertation partly on it (also on Northanger Abbey, Rob Roy and St Ronan’s Well) and while I loved it before I loved it even more after studying it. All of Austen’s novels are extremely well plotted, but Emma might just be the best. It’s like a detective novel in that respect (and has been described as such on multiple occasions) because you can pick up on clues to what’s really going on all the way through but on a first read, you don’t see them. Miss Bates unintentionally reveals details that can be explained by Frank and Jane’s secret relationship but they are hidden in her verbal overloading. Emma’s own thoughts betray her unknown interest in Mr. Knightley, and his actions point to his love for Emma. And so on. 

Jane Austen is also being radical in her use of literary conventions and genre in Emma (as she is in basically all her novels). She has the tightest mystery plot ever written at this point hidden directly inside a novel that sticks strictly to the conventions of romantic comedy. She even goes overboard with it - successfully navigating three couples to appropriate happy endings. However, within that solid structure, she plays with expectations and conventions in a subtle way and this is where I get really excited.

First we have Emma herself, a heroine “nobody but myself will like”. Austen clearly loved questioning and pushing conventions of who was allowed to be a heroine. Her previous novel, Mansfield Park, gave us Fanny who most people at the time found disappointing after Elizabeth Bennet and modern readers (unjustly IMO) hate, and she followed Emma with Anne Elliot who was far too old to be a romantic heroine according to contemporary standards. In the middle we have Emma Woodhouse, a meddling snob. She’s got a lot in common with Mr. Darcy actually and her character development in terms of recognising the bad behaviour she is guilty of and the prejudice she feels towards those of a lower social status is pretty similar. But while Darcy and his character development is held up as beautiful and heroic and romantic, Emma is frequently condemned as dislikable. I do wonder why that could be… Personally, I love Emma. She’s clever and shrewd and funny and, honestly, is there anyone who doesn’t think Miss Bates is annoying and doesn’t want to throw a tantrum at the prospect of being upstaged by Mrs. Elton? Are you, dear reader, such a paragon of rational enlightenment and charitable feeling? Would you instantly see through Frank Churchill and resist his flirtations? Would you be best friends with Jane Fairfax and not be just a little bit jealous of her and how much Mr. Knightley everyone seems to admire her? Have you never said something cutting and regretted it? Are you perfect, reader, ARE YOU? Come on. Emma is one of us. She messes up, she judges badly, she says cringeworthy stuff in inappropriate situations, she gives bad advice - she’s human. And she deals with it without losing her positive outlook and she does grow, enough to “deserve” her happy ending (though that’s a loaded concept) but not so much it’s unrealistic. And what makes her likeable through it all are that her intentions are good. Emma is not a bad person who has to become good and “be redeemed”. She is a fundamentally warm and caring person who needs to have some bad habits of thought and action corrected by guidance and experience. Emma’s intentions and understanding are good from the beginning.

Emma’s also interesting because, yes, she does change, but if you put her in the context of the genre she inhabits, she also gets to keep a lot. Basically, in another novel, Emma would have to pay significant penance for her bad behaviour before she would be allowed to marry Mr. Knightley and she would have to prove that she is a changed woman and is absolutely not going to continue meddling and will be a good and submissive wife. Usually this also involves giving up the dangerous reading of novels which have led her astray. Several points. Firstly, Emma is not a novel reader, she is a novel writer. Emma is described by various critics as “an avatar of Austen the author” and if you read the novel through the prism of Emma being an author, things become really fascinating. Beautiful, illegitimate Harriet Smith is the heroine of Emma’s novel and obviously Emma-as-author wants to discover that she is really the long lost daughter of Somebody and give her a socially advantageous marriage. Emma’s matchmaking attempts are the workings of a novelist plotting with characters. Emma is creating her own world. This is radical stuff, in a society where female novelists were looked down upon. Emma has the means and independence and cleverness to write a story of her own - and she is comically bad at it. This is one way in which Austen plays with genre. Secondly, it is not at all clear that Emma does give up her matchmaking at the end of the novel. Austen is coy when she floats this suggestion about Mrs. Weston’s daughter: “[Emma] would not acknowledge that it was with any view of making a match for her, hereafter, with either of Isabella’s sons”. Does this suggest that maybe Emma isn’t as cured as she should be? Thanks to Austen’s levels of irony it’s impossible to tell, which is the point. Thirdly, Emma is the only Austen heroine to have real financial and social clout. Emma really does rule Highbury and at the end of the novel, instead of being subsumed into her husband’s world, he in fact moves in with her (however temporarily). This is practically the Regency equivalent of her keeping her name after marriage. She and Mr. Knightley are social equals and she does not leave her home or her sphere of influence when she marries. The only other heroine this would be true of is, interestingly enough, Fanny Price. But Mansfield Park is notoriously inward looking and Fanny’s ending allows her to truly become a Bertram which is what she wanted all along for better or worse. And Fanny and Edmund’s social status and influence are much less significant that Knightley and Emma’s are.

Something else to bear in mind when thinking about Emma’s character is that, despite her social power and wealth, she also lives an extremely confined and limited life. She is essentially a carer for her stultifying and claustrophobic father. She has never left the environs of Highbury. She is surrounded by people who jump to her every command and shower her in praise, both deserved and undeserved. The only person who criticises her is also in love with her. The only eligible men in her world before the arrival of Frank Churchill are her brother-in-law who is 16 years older than her, and the obsequious vicar. Yes, she can remain a spinster but even a rich spinster cannot maintain the sort of power she currently holds when faced with a married woman like Mrs. Elton (who is a real threat to her), but her alternatives are bleak. A woman of her rank and fortune should be having a London season and meeting other young people of her rank and forming external connections. Because of her father’s passive control over her, Emma has none of these opportunities. Even Fanny Price travels more and meets more people than Emma does. Yes, Emma Woodhouse is handsome, rich and clever and has had very little to vex her, but I suspect that is probably Emma’s own view of her life and it is not necessarily accurate.

Okay, this post is already far too long so I’ll end my discussion of the novel here. There’s also a lot that could be said about Jane and Frank, Emma and Mr. Knightley’s relationship and more, but Emma is clearly the most important and, honestly, the most in need of defence!

Onto the adaptations, and I’ll try to be brief:

1. The Gwyneth Paltrow film. Jeremy Northan is divine though his hair could be better and he’s not my favourite Mr. Knightley, even if I do have a massive crush on JN. Harriet Smith is a not particularly attractive redhead which is… weird. Frank Churchill is Ewan McGregor but he has appalling hair so IDK what was going on there - such a missed opportunity. Gwyneth Paltrow as Emma is a casting disgrace and I honestly can’t bear to watch this film because every time she is on screen I cringe. The producers were more interested in the aesthetic than making a good adaptation. My grandma hated it. Enough said.

2. The Kate Beckinsale film. Honestly, I don’t dislike anything about this except that I wish it were a mini-series and the proposal scene is a bit… eh. But I think it manages to stay true to the book in a feature film and I love Kate Beckinsale’s Emma. She has the right mix of liveliness and arrogance for me. Mark Strong is a stern Mr. Knightley but he’s not too handsome. Frank Churchill is perfect in this adaptation. Controversially, this is my favourite period adaptation.

3. The Romola Garai miniseries. I love lots about this mainly because the length allows everything to be expanded suitably. Johnny Lee Miller is the best Knightley by far. The Eltons are fabulous. Frank and Jane’s relationship gets more time dedicated to it. The Westons and Bateses are great. Harriet Smith is dumbed down too much - she’s naive and not too bright but this adaptation makes her practically an idiot, almost as much a disservice as the 2005 P&P film’s character assassination of Bingley, though physically the actress is perfect and she’s very likeable. And I really do appreciate what they were trying to do with Emma. It was clearly an informed choice to make her bubbly and often silly and a chosen interpretation of the text and I respect that - better that than wilful misinterpretation which some adaptations go in for. I fundamentally disagree with it - whatever her faults, I don’t think Emma is silly and giggly and I struggle to believe this Emma is a 21 year old woman secure in her position as a social leader. Her mannerisms often come across very modern - her little waves, giggles and posture and this is very irritating because Romola Garai has done some fantastic period acting (Daniel Deronda, The Hour etc.) and these mannerisms aren’t consistent across the cast. I love Romola Garai and I think it’s an interesting choice of direction, but not one that rings true to how I see the character though.

4. Clueless. Clearly the best adaptation of Emma ever made. We all know it.

5. Emma Approved. Only seen a bit of it and didn’t warm to it. Should probably give it another go. Why did they change Knightley’s name to Alex? What the hell is wrong with George!?!?

Anyway, here are my thoughts on Emma. Hope they’re at least somewhat interesting. There is nothing I like better than rambling on about Jane Austen! :-) Thank you for giving me the opportunity!

I’m just curious why you hate s11 so much I thought it was pretty good, apparently there’s a lot you hate about it so you don’t have to say everything but like, is there any general explanation you can give? I’m just curious, not trying to get you to change your opinion or anything, if you don’t like it then that doesn’t really affect me lol

It's fine, bro! I can explain if you want. I don't really care if you like it. You're free to do so. We have different preferences

So in general, it was boring as heck and there was no atmosphere in it.

When Kai lost his powers I thought he will spend some time thinking about his mistakes, have some kind of the mental break down but it wasn't it at all. He only was complaining how easier it would be if he had his powers. When he gained them again he didn't feel much about it and quickly became selfish asshole.

I can talk about how soft Cole became for hours so I won't do it. I think Cole's character was destroyed and I when I see "new" Cole there's no spark of his old self I love so much. I feel like the only things he does is picking up heavy objects and eat. Excuse me, where is that great leader, who loved fighting, always deeply cared about HIS TEAM and planned the missions. Even in comics he was leading them or helping Lloyd in some hard decisions. Now he's so... Without anything.

Fire Chapter was... Um... Was. It was. And that's all. Nothing interesting, nothing what would catch my eye. Maybe the mirror scene, it was quite interesting, at least for Lloyd and Zane. But ughh, fire animation makes me shivering. Aspheera's motives are blank and backstory is lacking, some events are erratic.

And if we're talking about Zane. Gosh, plz revenge what the hEck happened to the ice emperor. I liked the idea of Zane being a puppet of Vex but the end was so horrible. Skipping fact how I hated reunion of Akita and her brother and how Zane was returned to good, why no one cared about Zane's crimes? "Oh you murdered hundreds of people? We forgive you, it wasn't you!!". I don't think real madmen's doings are forgiven because they were controled by their illnesses. And also Zane thinks nothing big happened. This ending was so sweetly happy I felt disgusted.

I also really don't like the new animation, camera's action, shading, game of lights and whatever else from artistic point if view.

The plot was poor, led in a wrong way, also there was a lot of unnecessary scenes, even episodes... I can complain about this whole day.

I really dislike a lot of things in this season and that makes me dislike it at all. Few scenes won't repair everything. I'm sorry if I'm too harsh about it. I don't want to pick a fight so forgive me if I hurt anyone's feelings

CR Inktober, Day 15

SELF-INSERT NPC: ANTONIA MARSHSTEAD

 The town was not unimpressive—indeed, was increasing in populace and prosperity at such a rate, it could probably be deemed a city in the next year or two. Still, there wasn’t any reason for Vox Machina to be there, other than that it was a stop on the way to where they were going, and a convenient place to drink and stay the night.

Still, there were a few hours left before businesses close dup for the day, and despite protests from Grog, Vex was on the hunt for interesting finds and bargain prices.

Asking around after magical items and weapons, the group of adventurers found themselves directed to an unassuming, two-story building that didn’t really stand out too much from the local architecture, bearing a sign that declared it was ‘Marshteads’ Magicks,’ and that it was, in fact, still open for business late that afternoon.

The door opened noiselessly, no bell or chime announcing their arrival, and not a floorboard creaked as they strode in to the well-lit interior.

Sunlight streamed in from the two large, street-facing windows, revealing a neat and orderly main area which smelled faintly of lavender and cedar. The store interior, as well as the counters and display shelves were all made of a light-colored wood that gleamed dimly with their finish and the golden afternoon light. There was an open main area; two window displays flanking the door to the street, where various pieces of (presumably enchanted) jewelry were visible; left of the entrance was a glass-and-wood display case of small weapons: daggers, hand crossbows, blots, arrows, a light weight rapier, and the like, with larger weapons such as great swords and battle axes on shelves and pegs on the wall behind; on the right side of the store was another display case, this one filled with an odd assortment of household sundries, knick-knacks, and generally useful items (there were no shelves or wall displays on this side, but half-hidden in the far corner behind the case was what appeared to be a sort of work table with various sewing tools, some yarn, and a few toys on it); finally, facing the door across the floor was a plain, uncluttered counter with no displays—evidently, where sales were finalized.

Aside from the street door, the main room had two other entrances: one open archway to the right, just beside the worktable, that revealed a set of stairs ascending to the second floor, and a closed, heavy wooden door in the wall behind the sales counter.

The store seemed empty, even of people running it, save for a handsome red fox curled up on the sales counter, half-asleep and ignoring Vox Machina, for the moment. With a gasp of delight and absolutely no hesitation, Keyleth ran up to the creature, all but putting her head on the counter beside him. “Hi!” she chirped, fixated on the furry animal as one eye slitted halfway open to regard her levelly. “I’m Keyleth! What’s your name?”

The fox stretched, sat up, scanned their group, and turned with deliberate nonchalance to the stairs beyond the archway before screeching loudly.

Seconds later (while their ears were still ringing) pounding footsteps on the stairs heralded a new arrival: grumbling half-hearted, half-heard curses under her breath, a female dwarf rounded the corner. Her dark hair was pulled back in a simple braid, her grey eyes peered at them from behind a pair of glasses, though she seemed to only be in her young adulthood, and she was dressed simply: tunic, vest, skirt, leggings, boots.

As she approached the counter (stepping up on some sort of boost or stool that was hidden behind it), her scolding became audible: “—too much trouble to just walk up the stairs to let me know someone was here? Just had to screech like a tortured demon and scare customers? And you wonder why Henry doesn’t take you when he goes to negotiate with suppliers.”

The fox merely hopped off the counter on her side, vanishing from view briefly, then darting up the stairs. Tirade over with the disappearance of its target, the young dwarf woman focused on the party before her, scowl melting into an apologetic half-grin. “Sorry about that: familiars can get cranky during extended separations, and Fabian’s always been overly dramatic anyway. Anyhow, welcome to Marshteads’ Magicks—are you in the market for anything in particular, or just looking to browse?”

The final sentence was undoubtedly a rehearsed, often-delivered script, but to her credit, the young woman mustered or at least feigned a genuine enough tone that gave them the feel of natural dialogue.

Before Vex could answer, Keyleth broke in with something that’d been bothering her since first approaching the store: “Did you know that your sign is messed up? The apostrophe is wrong, and it’s misspelled?”

“The sign is correct,” came the immediate reply, in a tone that this was a correction she’d had to make a few too many times for her patience, but didn’t want to completely alienate potentially paying customers, “Marshstead is the family name, and since my brother and I run the store together, both plural and possessive are correct.” She then deflated somewhat, glancing away in a moment of embarrassment, perhaps? “…And the ‘K’ is just for flare.”

“Showmanship is an important facet of salesmanship,” Percy ranted, hoping to placate the woman before she took out any ill-will on the prices. “Though I must say the aesthetic is more reserved than I wouldn’t expected in such an establishment.”

The young woman glanced around, nodding. “Organized, you mean? Neat? That’s on me: I can’t think or work in a cluttered area. Hence avoiding the workshop as much as possible.”

“You don’t perform the enchantments yourself, then?” Vex asked, looking up form the bowstring and arrows she’d been examining out of professional interest.

“Oh, that’s Henry’s field,” came the quick answer. “He’s the craftsman, I handle the storefront for him. Is there anything in particular I can help you with or help you find? Any questions?”

Pike looked up from the display case she’d been staring into. “Uh, Miss—?”

“Sorry: Antonia. And you?”

“Pike Trickfoot. Antonia, why is there a frying pan in the case with the weapons?”

There same a genuine, if half-embarrassed chuckle in response to that question. “That started as… Well, not a joke, really. When we were younger, someone made an insulting comment about Henry’s skill with magic and enchantments, and told them he was could make even a cast-iron skillet into a powerful magical weapon. Turns out he overheard that conversation, and remembered it. So, he made this: it’s a magical bludgeoning weapon not dissimilar to a great club or the like. Additionally, it deals an extra kick of fire damage upon a successful hit. It is a two-handed weapon and requires attunement, but once it is attuned, anyone else who tried to pick it up finds it too warm to the touch to handle—so, generally thief-proof. Unless you use an oven mitt or the like, I suppose.”

“Anything else it can do?” Vax asked, half-joking. Antonia had rattled off the weapon’s attributes with the ease of someone who knew them by heart, but also with genuine pride at her brother’s accomplishment—unusual as it was.

“Well, any food prepared in it does cook twice as quickly—but that can be a good or bad thing, depending on how close an eye you keep on your dinner.”

Vex blinked, then shook her head—the thing was almost too ridiculous not to get, to say nothing of the mental image of a monster’s expression roughly half a second before it got hit by a frying pan. “How much for it?” she offered, haggling mode already engaged.

Antonia didn’t hesitate. “750 gold.”

“For a frying pan!?” The half-elf fired back, ignoring whoever it was behind her that groaned (probably Grog).

“For a cast iron pan with two magical enchantments upon it—enchantments that had to be uniquely crafted in order to adhere to a non-traditional weapon.”

Vex raised an eyebrow at the dwarf. “it’s essentially and enchanted household object,” she pointed out, then watched as the other woman’s expression darkened. Oops.

Nearly all trace of the ‘saleswoman’ persona had vanished. “Degrading my brother’s time, effort, creativity, and craftsmanship will not incentivize me to lower the price.” Arms folded, her glare dared the ranger to make the next move.

“Fair point,” Vex had to grant, quickly changing tactics before she drove the price up. “How much could you come down if we told anyone that asked about this unique item all about this shop and the master craftsman who made it? And your brother could tell people that not only did he make a frying pan a weapon, he also sold it to none other than Vox Machina!”

Silence stretched on for a moment or two.

“725.”

“675 at the most,” vex shot back.

Antonia raised one eyebrow, arms still folded. “You can hardly expect to persuade me to cheat my own brother out of the rightful reward for his work.”

They were a few moments away form meeting at 700, Vex could tell—they simply had to finish out the final few steps of their dance. Despite the growing impatience from the group at her back (at least, from some of them), Vex’ahlia did exactly that. The gold changed hands (700) and the enchanted cooking pan was handed over.

A discussion soon arose over which of them could and should wield it, but Vex ignored that part—she was hardly a candidate for what was very obviously a strength-based melee weapon—and scanned the shop again. This time, a glimpse of something small and brown on the corner worktable caught her eye.

“Is that an owl bear toy?”

Antonia followed her gaze, her entire demeanor shifting towards something that could almost be described as awkward hesitancy. “I-uh- have been teaching myself crochet on days when the store is slow. It’s relaxing, honestly. But, yes, I have been working on some small toys and the like…”

“May I see it?” Vex asked, feeling Vax move up behind her as he overheard the conversation.

Antonia blinked, obviously caught off-guard. “Uh, sure…” she muttered at last, crossing to the table and retrieving the item in question before returning.

It was small—not quite as big as Vex’s fist—and was certainly a stylized, simplified representation that was cuter than it was accurate. The craftsmanship was hardly masterful, either: while Antonia was obviously not clumsy or a rank novice, there were still a few visible imperfections. Still, there was an undeniable charm to the little doll, and with one shared look, the twins were of one mind.

“Do you sell these?” Vax asked. Upon seeing the dwarf hesitate, he continued, “if not, I understand—sometimes you just make things for yourself or have sentimental attachments.”

“I-I don’t mind selling it. I just figured no one would really want it. …I just needed something to keep busy…”

Vex beamed at the suddenly-flustered shop keep. “Well, we know one little girl in particular who would just adore this little fellow—she’s obsessed with owl bears. How much for the little cutie?”

For the first time since the entered the little shop, Vox Machina saw absolute uncertainty cross Antonia’s face as she fumbled for a fair price.

“Uh… three copper?”

This time, it was Vax’s turn to protest. “For a one-of-a-kind, hand-crafted piece?”

“It-it’s not magical, and it’s just yarn and some stuffing,” Antonia pointed out weakly, all her earlier confidence gone.

Vax shook his head. “But the time this would’ve taken to make—one silver at least,” he replied, ignoring the glare Vex was directing at him for this oddly-reversed negotiation.

The ranger turned to the dwarf, wondering if this was an intentional technique to drive up the price, but no—the embarrassment, hesitance and uncertainty were genuine, she could see. Clearly, Antonia was far more comfortable negotiating on her brother’s behalf than her won, and something about knowing that made Vex feel momentarily fond of the other girl—or at least, like she could understand her.

And, in the grand scheme of things, considering their current financial status, what was a silver piece? Velora would be happy with the gift, and perhaps a fledgling craftswoman would get a confidence boost.

“I-I guess…”

…

The town was hardly important, and the Marshstead siblings would likely never gain fame of any import, much less cross Vox Machina’s path again, but at least both parties felt, at their parting, as though a fair bargain had been reached without coming to the point of either hating or permanently angering the other.

And, really, what more can you ask from a retail transaction?

 (AN: Sorry for the length/focus on the dreaded shopping trip. But currently, too much of my time is swallowed by a retail job, and I wanted to redeem it a little—better a family-run enchanted item shop than a generic thrift store. And, no, I have no idea what a fair price is in D&D, I did the best I could with the research I had. But now I kinda want that pan to be a thing somewhere—or is it too ridiculous for a +1 magic (great club, re-skinned as a pan) that deals bonus 1d4 fire damage?)

Immunity (or Make It Work, Part 2) [Loki x Reader] {nsfw}

Summary: Reader reveals the dress she made for the gala, causing Loki to lose all his shit at once. When Loki spies his half brother taking a liking to her during the midst of the party, he gets hella possessive and makes a point of showing her how much he cares (... with a rough quickie in a hallway. You know, romantic stuff).

Word Count: 3,300

Author’s Note: I thought I was done with the first draft of this until I read it over and absolutely hated it, so I rewrote the middle part and now it’s better and my sleep schedule is totally fucked. As if it wasn’t already fucked before, tho. Also, this installment of Make It Work is lowkey (Loki, lol) inspired by @maiden-of-asgard‘s Frostbite series, which is super great and I’m addicted to it and you should 100% go check it out if you love yourself or even if you don’t love yourself, it can be your first step in learning to love yourself. I’m starting to get delirious with lack of sleep, so I’m gonna post this and hope that I can be a functional adult tomorrow. Goodnight, ya horny bastards, I love you.

                                              ~ Muerta 🌸💀🌸

(Part 1)

You had always believed that the key to sex appeal was subtlety. This was apparent in everything you designed, each garment focusing on the suggestion of a person’s body without ever showing too much of it. A bit of mesh or lace, a slight peeking of skin, a cinch in the waist that revealed what sins lie just beneath the fabric; these were all your weapons in making a piece of clothing maddeningly sexy, and you had applied all of them to the dress you’d made at Loki’s request for the gala he was hosting.

You stood in the hall just outside the reception room of the Asgardian royal palace, smoothing out the fabric of your gown and swallowing the lump that had formed in your throat over the last few minutes as you anticipated the arrival of your escort. Hours ago, a hoard of beauticians had been sent to your apartment within the palace, styling your hair and makeup to suit the dress you’d crafted for the evening. Your hair had been pulled back into a tight, plaited bun that fanned out at the base of your head, with a few loose tendrils falling elegantly over your cheeks. Your lips had been painted in a dark berry shade, and you were adorned with large golden earrings and a matching collier and headdress, chosen from a selection that Loki had sent for you. You were stunning, the picture of an Asgardian goddess, and you had grinned smugly at your reflection as you’d inspected your final look. You had transformed your mortal self into a creature that could put the otherworldly beings of the realm you now called your home to shame, and were endlessly proud of what you had done. You only hoped that Loki would be just as impressed.

The god’s footsteps coming down the hall startled you, pulling you abruptly from your thoughts as you turned to face the direction he was coming from, your heart slamming against your ribs. He turned the corner to where you were standing, and when you came into view, he stopped dead in his tracks. His frozen blue eyes drank you in, scanning your body up and down so that no inch of you was left unseen. He had given you a challenge, and you’d obliterated his expectations; the gown you had designed was absolutely breathtaking, made of a silk so deeply evergreen that it was almost black, shifting and changing hues with the light. The neckline was cut into a severe plunge, stopping just below the space where your breasts met, leaving him thirsting to see more of your skin. Mesh panels mirrored each other on either side of the dress’s bodice, extending down into the skirt until they where lost within its cascade of lush fabric, and a belt cast in gold hugged your waist to accentuate the voluptuous curves of your body. The gown’s sleeves were long, laden with more panels of mesh and accented with lace decorated in Nordic patterns, matching those etched into Loki’s helmet. You were exposed to him, but only just, and the promises of what was hidden beneath your latest work had his mind racing. He swallowed, clearing his throat and bowing politely to you.

“I see you took our conversation to heart,” he said as greeted you with a devilish smirk. You grinned back, offering a shallow curtsey in return.

“I was hoping I’d stun you enough to shut you up for once,” you replied.

Loki held his arm out to you, allowing you curl your fingers around the crook of his elbow as he led you to the doors of the reception room.

“Almost, darling,” he hummed. “Almost.”

As the twin doors swung open towards you, you were greeted with the sight of an entire room populated by the lofty, vexing creatures known as the Jotun. You had never seen them in person, but you knew from the history books in the palace’s library that they had a rocky past with the people of Asgard, characterized by war and bloodshed, and Loki was attempting to pose a sort of treaty between the two realms by hosting their royal family. They were enormous, some of them spanning over ten feet tall, and entirely blue in color, their skin patterned with grooves that supposedly meant different things and were unique to each creature. Not a single one of them was clothed in full, each of them sporting various levels of exposure to supposedly assert dominance and status (as you had read), and you noticed as Loki led you further into the room that many of them had their teeth filed into vicious, shark-like points. You looked up at the king standing beside you, shuddering at the fact that his lean, rangy stature was dwarfed by theirs, finding it hard to remind yourself that he was, under his alabaster skin, one of them. You pulled him a bit closer to you, thinking of how tiny your human form must have looked to the giants. Didn’t you read somewhere that they used to keep Midgardians as pets?

“My kin,” Loki addressed the room as he came to stand in the center of it, your shivering self still huddled beside him, “I welcome you to my adoptive home. Being of Jotun blood, raised by the hands of Asgard, I hope to bridge the gap between our two peoples and move our realms toward a peaceful future. Enjoy your time here. Indulge in our culture and our warm hospitality. We are happy to have you.”

He bowed to the crowd before him, and as the band in the mezzanines circling the reception room began to play, he spun you about and led you away from the fray, raising your hand to his lips in a gentle kiss.

“I thought you were fearless,” he murmured into your skin, teasing you. “I can feel you shaking like a leaf.”

“These people are the size of small buildings,” you quipped back at him, giving the hand holding yours a light squeeze and digging your nails into the back of his palm. “I also don’t think I need to remind you that they used to keep humans as playthings in their recent past.”

Loki smirked.

“Reading up on your history?” he mused. “What a good little thing you are.”

For a significant portion of the evening, Loki paraded you around to his guests, showing you off as if you were a prized trophy. His Jotun visitors poked and prodded at you, intrigued by your soft mortal body, the women toying with your hair, petting it and admiring its silkiness, while the men inspected your figure, some of them getting a bit handsy and groping at your breasts and backside with fervent interest. Their touches made you wildly uncomfortable, wanting nothing more than to slap their hands away and inform them that you were, in fact, a sentient being and not just the dumb little pet they perceived you to be, but their intimidating stature and the shaky relationship they had with your employer made you wary, reminding you that they could literally dismember you if they had a reason to – or even if they didn’t have a reason to. Loki stayed at your side throughout the ordeal, however, skirting you away when his guests got too intimate for you to tolerate.

After two hours of being handled by what could easily have been every single frost giant in Jotunheim, you were able to steal away to the large banquet table that had been set up on one side of the reception room, pouring yourself a strong glass of Asgardian mead and stuffing a few hors d’oeuvres into your mouth, trying to regain some of your calm. You had just scarfed your fifth mini quiche when your indulgent stress eating was interrupted by a soft voice addressing you from behind.

“Miss?”

You turned, coming face to face with yet another giant, but noticing that this one was considerably younger than the others, probably only a teenager in Jotun years. He was also more sparsely dressed than the rest of them, leading you to believe that he was a member of the royal family. He gave you a slight bow, his eyes wide and nervous, not leaving yours.

“I am Prince Býleistr,” he introduced himself, straightening his back once again. “King Laufeyson’s half-brother.”

You had heard of Býleistr fleetingly before, knowing him only as the child of Loki’s biological father, Laufey, and the current Queen of Jotunheim. You brushed a few crumbs from your fingers and onto the skirt of your gown, attempting to maintain what little dignity you had left as you dipped into a curtsey.

“It is an honor to meet you, Your Highness” you addressed him.

Býleistr looked you up and down, his eyes gaping as he took in the sight of you.

“King Laufeyson says you are mortal,” the young prince said, sounding almost breathless. “Is that true?”

You nodded, unconsciously taking a step back from him as you prepared yourself for more unwanted contact.

“Yes,” you replied. “I’m from Midgard.”

Býleistr’s eyes widened in wonder at the confirmation, and you couldn’t help but feel slightly endeared by him. He was just a kid, after all, and it was very likely he’d never seen a mortal in person.

“May I…” the prince lingered on his words a bit, as if unsure they were the right ones. He swallowed, then held his hand out to you.

“May I touch you?” he asked.

Shocked by his considerate act of asking for your consent, you silently gave him permission, raising a bewildered hand for him to take. He grinned excitedly, clasping his massive fingers around your much smaller ones and raising your arm above your head, being cautious in his movements as if afraid he would break you. You smiled faintly back as you allowed him to twirl you, spinning so he could take in your foreign appearance.

From across the room, Loki’s eyes fell upon the scene that was unfolding. He watched, indignant, as his sniveling little weasel of a relative spun you about, laying his grubby fingers on your cheeks, your hair, your waist, your back, and Loki felt the searing sting of envy rising in his chest as you allowed it. You actually allowed him to touch you without any of the hesitation you’d had with the other frost giants. Loki slammed down the rest of his drink and glided furiously over to the two of you, fueled by rage and the alcohol in his blood.

Býleistr was holding your hand, marveling at the minute size of your fingers when Loki interrupted the two of you, clearing his throat and causing you both to jump, startled.

“Dear younger brother,” Loki crooned, his lips spread into a malicious grin and words dripping with acrimony, “as much as it pleases me to see you making such diverse connections of friendship, I am afraid I have come to retrieve my favorite toy.”

Loki took you by the arm, not waiting for Býleistr’s response as he wrapped his arm around you protectively, skillfully maneuvering you through the reception room and slipping with you through a hidden side door, into one of the palace’s many empty corridors. You wheeled on him as soon as you were alone, smacking him hard in the chest with the side of your closed fist.

“What. The. Fuck. Loki!” you snapped, hitting him with each word and glaring up at him. He glowered down at you, his mouth turned downward into a furious grimace.

“How could you?” he growled, taking you by the wrists to stop you from beating him.

“How could I?” you exclaimed, incredulous. “How could you, you piece of shit! Why the hell would you let them molest me like that?!”

Loki smirked, his eyes lazily drifting down to where your chest met his as he held you against him, then back up to meet yours.

“I wanted to see your scared little face, my dear,” he chided. “I am the god of jokes and trickery, after all.”

“You’re the god of some kind of fucking bullshit,” you spat at him.

A guttural hiss escaped Loki’s throat as he pushed you forward, pinning you to the wall on the other side of the corridor. His hands splayed out on either side of your head, and he kept you in place by pressing his body against yours, his hips pinning you harshly to the surface behind you. If your senses didn’t fool you, you were certain you could feel him harden beneath the leather material of his pants.

“I tire of your games, my sweet little pet,” he growled mockingly, his lips pressed to your ear. “You have always been such a tease to me, even when you haven’t meant it.”

You simpered, tilting your head back so that you could stare up into his eyes, your hands pressed firmly to his chest.

“I thought you had an immunity to my mortal charms,” you taunted him, mocking him right back.

Loki shook his head slowly, one of the hands beside your head moving to capture your chin between his fingers as he fervidly licked his lips.

“My darling, you are the one thing that makes me weak…” he purred as he leaned in, taking your lips in a heated, passionate kiss that left your body burning and your lungs gasping for air. You immediately kissed back, your mouth opening and tongue clashing with his as your hands moved upward to clasp the sides of his face, fingers tangling in the abyss of his black hair. You could feel him in full now, his erect cock pressing up against your heat through the fabric of your dress, straining against the crotch of his trousers. He was going to fuck you, right then, right there against that wall, and you barely had time to worry about one of his guests stumbling in and interrupting you, as he was already lifting your skirt above your knees, desperate to be inside you.

Your lips didn’t leave his as you reached one of your hands down to palm at his member through the leather dividing you, the corners of your mouth curling into a smug grin at the needy whimper that escaped from his throat at your touch. You could feel the wetness that had been pooling between your legs start to drip down the insides of your thighs, thankful for once for Asgardians’ aversion to undergarments, as it would make the task at hand much easier and much, much more savory. You continued to work Loki as his hands kept traveling up your legs until every bit of skin below your waist was exposed to him, two of his fingers moving to stroke tentatively at the lips of your pussy, letting out a deep growl when he found you soaked and ready for him. He broke the kiss then, moving his lips to knead at your neck, leaving red marks where he sank his teeth hungrily into your flesh.

“Oh, how long I’ve wanted you, my sweet girl…” he purred against your skin, the fingers that had been stroking you gently slipping inside you, working you tenderly as he marked you as his own with is mouth. You let out a soft moan into his ear, the hand that had been resting on his cheek falling to grip lightly at his shoulders.

“Loki…” you murmured wantonly, your lips pressed into the shell of his ear.

As if halted by some greater power, Loki stopped everything he was doing and fell perfectly still. He pulled away from you, just enough to glare down at you, frozen in place as every muscle in his body stiffened. You gazed up at him, wondering if you’d done something wrong, when you noticed the blood red hue that suddenly flooded his eyes, his blanched skin taking on a deep cerulean tone as he gazed at you like he was going to rip you limb from limb. You swallowed, fearing what would come next as Loki let out a guttural snarl and reached down to where you had been stroking him, shredding the material of his pants so that his cock sprang free from them, promptly wrapping one of your legs around his hip and thrusting inside you without ceremony, groaning at the sublime feeling of your silken walls closing around him.

You yelped as he stretched you to your limits, never having had such a considerable width inside you and savoring the feeling of nearly being split in two. It was painful – so, so painful – but in the most delicious way, and you bit down into the meat of Loki’s slender, glacial hand as he pressed it to your lips to silence you.

Loki wasted no time being delicate with you, immediately slamming his hips into yours as he worked himself in and out of you at a beastly, rapid pace, his monstrous groans filling your ears like heavenly music. You were totally and utterly consumed by him, gazing up lustfully into his crimson eyes as his clawlike nails buried themselves in the plush flesh of your thigh so harshly they drew blood. His stare met yours, cutting into you as he took you without mercy or remorse, pounding into you so deeply you could almost feel him in your chest. You peaked within moments, the current of divine electricity swallowing the whole of your being under a veil of carnal bliss. Loki followed soon after, his cum filling you until it began to spill out, his own cry of absolute pleasure echoing through the hall. He leaned over you for a long moment, keeping you propped against the wall as his forehead rested in the crook of your neck, his chest heaving against yours as he panted with the exertion of having given you the quickest, yet most mind-blowing orgasm you’d ever experienced. You were dazed in the aftermath of his sex, uncertain you were still on the same astral plane as you had been just minutes before.

Once Loki had collected himself, the shade of his skin and eyes returning to their Asgardian palette, he slid out of you, clearing his throat as his hands followed the folds of your skirt as it cascaded down your legs once more, his nimble fingers smoothing out the fabric to hide the remnants of the delicious sin you’d just shared. You dragged yourself back to reality, reaching up with trembling hands to adjust the lapels of his coat, fixing his extravagant horned helmet where your touch had set it askew.

You sighed in defeat as your eyes fell on the tattered fabric of his trousers, tugging and clasping his coat closed to hide the damage.

“I spend a month killing myself to make clothes for you and look what you do to them,” you huffed.

Loki chuckled, the sound rumbling in his chest as he leaned forward and kissed your forehead.

“I suggest making the seams more durable next time,” he teased.

“Fuck you,” you mumbled, your words swallowed by his lips as you pulled him into a heated, affectionate kiss. Loki hummed, smirking as you parted.

“Later, my love,” he promised you, taking you by the arm and leading you back into the reception room, lips pressing to your knuckles as he did. “We still have a party to host.”

Secret Garden

I know, I know, it's an assignment book, but I will still include it in my reading log, and I do this because while reading this I had all sorts of questions. So let us dive into our small Q&A session

Q.#1 Why does the author dislike Mary so much?!

It is not really hard to figure out that the author hates Mary at least at the beginning. This poor girl has ALL the qualities to be disliked and even hated by the reader. Almost at the beginning of the book, we get a pretty explicit description of Mary:

So when she was a sickly, fretful, ugly little baby she was kept out of the way, and when she became a sickly, fretful, toddling thing she was kept out of the way also. [1, p. 2]

It seems like the author doesn't miss any chance he gets to accentuate how ugly and disgusting she is in every way possible. She has no manners, she hits people, she waits for everybody to do everything for her and doesn't even think to say please or thank you. Nobody really likes her, and the author seems to coerce the reader to despise her, but I rejected that position. Why do I have to hate the poor girls, who got half-raised by Indian servants and never truly belonged to anybody? Why do I have to hate Mary for her lack of obedience and manners if she has never been taught how to behave? 

I don't think I have an answer, although there is an assumption. The book was written in 1911, and at that time, the didactic influence on children's literature remained relatively strong. Deborah Stevenson, in her article "History of Children's and Young Adult Literature" states:

Didacticism remains a strong element of contemporary children's books ostensibly designed for pleasure.[2, p. 180]

So there we have it, Mary is designed to be disgusting at the beginning of the book because children who do not behave cannot be good. They have to take a spiritual journey, understand how to be a good member of society, stop being disagreeable. Only then they can be worthy of pleasing adjectives.

Interestingly enough, Marina Nikolajeva in her article “Did you Feel as if you Hated People?” states, that Mary is depicted in that way, because the author doesn’t want readers to relate to characters, to merge with their personality.

The “just-like-me” assessment of characters, frequently adopted by novice readers, is restricted by the readers’ experience and does not foster empathy [3, p. 101]

Nevertheless, the author admits that most of Marry's problems are a consequence of the complete absence of her family:

If she had been an affectionate child, who had been used to being loved, she would have broken her heart, but even though she was "Mistress Mary Quite Contrary" she was desolate, and the bright-breasted little bird brought a look into her sour little face which was almost a smile. [1, p. 23]

In this context, the word "desolate" caught my attention. Having looked at the Online Cambridge Dictionary, I discovered the meaning - "extremely sad and feeling alone". 

So Mary is not "ugly", she is not "quite contrary", not "fretful". She is just desolate and unjustly deprived of the basic human need - the need of a family, the need for being loved and cared for.

Q.#2 Is Colin really different from Marry?

Well, no. 

That would be the simple answer and the most evident one, as the author tells us more than once, that Colin and Marry are equal in how horribly they behave towards other people. Nevertheless, while reading, I couldn't help but notice how different author makes us feel about them.

Colin, who is another unfortunate child without a proper family, never gets to be called something as ugly or fretful. He is shown to be pretty egoistic, but from the author's perspective, it doesn't look like he needs to go on a spiritual journey to become "a good child". Moreover, not only once is he described as a beautiful boy, even though he often has tantrums and never goes outside.

He was a very proud boy. He lay thinking for a while, and then Mary saw his beautiful smile begin and gradually change his whole face. [1, p.129]

Now, maybe he is portrayed like that because most of the time, we see the world from Marry's perspective, and she evidently fancies him. That is why, despite him being a "brat", he has a beautiful appearance.

Q.#3 Is the book really racist?

Well, yes.

Although, that answer, just like the previous one, would be the shallow one. Let us dig deeper.

As I already mentioned, we see the world from Marry’s perspective, except only for two last chapters, where we see robin’s and Mr Craven points of view. She is the one who encountered Indian people, and she is ultimately the only source of information about India that all the other characters possess. So, being a spoiled little girl as she is, is it any wonder that she talks about Indian servants in such a humiliating way? I bet she would speak like that about any person who served her, no matter the race or nationality. There was also an interesting dialogue between Martha and Marry:

“Eh! I can see it’s different,” she answered almost sympathetically. “I dare say it’s because there’s such a lot o’ blacks there instead o’ respectable white people. When I heard you was comin’ from India I thought you was a black too.”

Mary sat up in bed furious.

“What!” she said. “What! You thought I was a native. You—you daughter of a pig!”

Martha stared and looked hot.

“Who are you callin’ names?” she said. “You needn’t be so vexed. That’s not th’ way for a young lady to talk. I’ve nothin’ against th’ blacks. When you read about ’em in tracts they’re always very religious. You always read as a black’s a man an’ a brother. I’ve never seen a black an’ I was fair pleased to think I was goin’ to see one close. [1, p. 15]

From this passage, we can see that Martha has nothing against black people. In fact, the notion of “respectable white people” comes out of her lack of proper education and the absence of intercultural communication.

In the world 21st century, it is tough to say something without enraging certain people. I dare say, the silencing imposed on the Internet speech came to the point, that you are afraid to state your opinion without being condemned (Twitter campaign with hashtags RIPJKRowling as the most recent example). 

The same thing applies to the books such as Secret Garden that cannot fit into modern cannon. Should we ban them? Where is the line between book propagandising the racism and the book that has racist characters in? Should we simply deny the existence of such people? And if yes, wouldn’t this denial be more dangerous than just putting the reality of the world out there for children to see? How do we insert that kind of people into a book and at the same time show that what they say isn’t quite right? 

These questions are not part of our Q&A session, because, sadly, I don’t have the answer. I doubt that anyone does.

Q.#4 Why would author put that Yorkshire accent in the text?

That is a question that I asked myself pretty frequently. Actually, I wondered about it every time I struggled to read and understand it... so, every two pages more or less.

When I first encountered it, I instantly remember the books of Stephen King. In almost every one of his books, some people speak a southern American accent, making it hard to understand them. Reading those books, I didn’t bother wondering, what was the point of that kind of speech. Still, in the case of Secret Garden, the answer came to me quite quickly - it is actually a great author’s linguistic attempt to make the reader feel like Marry. 

She comes to a place totally different from what she knew all her life, and even though people speak her language, she still struggles to understand them. It definitely helped me to relate to Mary, because, let me tell you, the Scottish accent is not an easy one to understand! So, I felt (and still sometimes feel) very awkward keeping asking people to repeat what they just said, just like Marry.

Q.#5 Is “The Secret Garden” anti-feminist?

It is not that hard to see, that "The Secret Garden", although started as an Entwicklungsroman, where the main character is supposed to develop and mentally mature, suddenly lost its point. The focus just shifted to Colin, and Mary was not even at the end of the story, discarded as a redundant character. While it may be seen so, there is an interesting article by Linda Parsons "' Otherways' into the Garden Re-visioning the Feminine in the Secret Garden" [4] where she argues that this novel is feminist in its core. Therefore, the author points out the fluidity of the gender depicted in the book. She gives an example of Ben Weatherstaff and Dickson, who are both caring and close to nature, something that is considered to be feminine qualities. 

Also, she argues that the shift of the focus from Marry to Colin is justified. From her perspective, the author's intent to show that Collin is expelled from the Garden. Therefore, it is still Marry's story, because she matured and grew as a person, while Colin, even though healed physically, couldn't reach her emotional level, so he has no place in the Garden. I accept her interpretation, although I would point out, that I can't entirely agree with her last statement "I rejoice that Mary remains forever in the garden" [4, p. 267]. The fairytale-like endings that include nouns such as forever cannot be perceived as positive. The characters should evolve, both mentally and physically, but staying in one place forever would prevent Mary from doing that. 

So at first, it was tough to understand Martha and Dickson, but with time it became more comfortable for Marry as well as for me. She even started speaking in Yorkshire sometimes, and that is a way of the author to show us one of the small but significant changes in Marry. Not only she becomes more kind towards other people, she genuinely wants to learn how to speak their language. Even Colin starts to master it, I guess, this skill he acquires after his magic ritual.

Interestingly enough, in the retold version, characters don’t speak Yorkshire anymore. I think although it makes it easier for children to read it, the book itself loses a valuable lesson of acceptance of other cultures and the assimilation. I would even argue that it’s one of the most important ones, as in our age of globalisation being acceptant of different cultures is a vital skill.

___

References:

1.  Frances Hodgson Burnett “The Secret Garden”, The Project Gutenberg, accessed on: 07 Oct 2020: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/113/113-h/113-h.htm

2. Deborah Stevenson. 19 Oct 2010, History of Children’s and Young Adult Literature from: Handbook of Research on Children’s and Young Adult Literature Routledge, accessed on: 12 Oct 2020: https://www.routledgehandbooks.com/doi/10.4324/9780203843543.ch13

3. Maria Nikolajeva (2013) “Did you Feel as if you Hated People?”: Emotional Literacy Through Fiction, New Review of Children's Literature and Librarianship, 95-107 pp.

4. Linda Parsons “’Otherways’ into the Garden Re-visioning the Feminine in the Secret Garden”, Children’s Literature in Education, Vol. 33, No. 4, December 2002, 247-268 pp.

Downfall [12]

Characters: Jungkook x Reader

Word Count: 2,732

Genre: Assassin AU

Prologue | Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26

After the great success of your exit exams, it wasn’t long until you were spending your final night at the orphanage.

There wasn’t much to say goodbye to, so there was no need to feel sentimental over leaving everything behind. You had already made up your mind when the clock struck midnight on your 18th birthday, and when the new year came along, you were more than ready to get into the car that would take you to begin the new chapter of your life—to your new home.

There was absolutely no turning back.

The orphans were placed into teams and stationed accordingly throughout the numerous bases scattered around Seoul. You weren’t sure how many locations there actually were within the city, let alone the entire country, but much like the rest of the organization’s diplomacies, you didn’t need to know. You only needed to be aware of your own destination, and there was not another point of interest you were more familiar with than this one.

It was headquarters.

You had only seen it through photos or videos shown in class during your later years, but you recognized it as soon as you were able to catch a glimpse of the towering structure in the distance. Never had you seen such a tall building before in your life, but now you were completely surrounded by them. It almost made you feel like a kid again as you stared out of the passenger-side window in dewy-eyed amazement, the vehicle steadily carrying you deeper into the concrete jungle. You started to grow eager at the sight of the first road sign that read “Gangnam”, but once the large letters of “Kim Daily” were fully in your view, you couldn’t help but feel a bit hopeful for the role that awaited you.

The moment you stepped into headquarters, a stern-looking woman escorted you into the elevator and up to the 17th floor. You weren’t sure how to behave around all the new faces or whether or not you should even react at all, but you soon learned that none of that mattered—they didn’t care enough to pay you any attention whatsoever. Yet again, people only focused on themselves and the work that they needed to get done.

There was a place for everyone and everyone was in their place.

Your place was standing inside of your new supervisor’s office, listening to him fill you in with all the necessary information imaginable. Minhyuk was his name; he was a man who looked to be in his mid-30s, although his receding hairline sought to prove you otherwise. If you had to describe him in one word, it would most definitely be bland.

“You’ll get to know your teammates soon enough. You���ll adjust—it’s not like you have any other choice.”

You pursed your lips in an effort to stop yourself from making a snappy retort, especially since it was only the first day. You would rather not set a record for the shortest time until expulsion.

Minhyuk went on to explain the details of the team; you were going to be a new addition to an already existing group. This was fairly common, if not the norm, when it came to creating and altering teams. There was nothing worse than having an entire band filled with new recruits—it would be utter chaos. Besides, there was always a constant flow of agents joining and exiting teams, the latter usually happening within the comfort of a body bag, so you weren’t too worried about being the fresh meat of the group.

The sound of the door creaking behind you signaled the entrance of another person into the office. Your supervisor’s eyes swiftly flicked towards the newcomer before he granted a curt nod and turned his attention to you once more.

“I’m going to leave the duty of showing you around to one of your teammates here.” Minhyuk gestured with his hand in a half-hearted manner. “I don’t believe formal introductions are necessary.”

Curiously, you turned around to greet your first teammate and guide for the day, but when your eyes fell on the person’s face, the proper greeting that was on the tip of your tongue just up and vanished, leaving a single name to replace it.

“Namjoon?”

That was definitely your older brother standing by the doorway, a little stiffly from the looks of it and with an expression to match. You truly didn't expect to see him, let alone be on the same team with him; although, now that he was there, you at least expected him to step forward and say something, seeing how it had been over three years since you had seen each other.

The corners of Namjoon’s mouth lifted upward the slightest degree when he finally managed to speak up, but he was still far from looking like he was happy to see you. Then again, you couldn’t blame him, since you weren’t too confident about your own facial expression at the moment.

“Welcome to Seoul.”

It was a surprise, to put it simply. Whether it was a good or bad one, you still weren’t sure enough to say. All you knew was that the years had created a difficult and drawn-out distance between you two, one that neither party wanted to acknowledge, at least not now. You knew it had to be done sooner or later, but in this case, you preferred the second option.

Luckily for you, it seemed that Namjoon felt the same way.

Instead of loafing around to catch up on the past few years of your lives, he opted to dive straight into business. He gave you a general tour around headquarters in order to familiarize yourself with the facilities and the people—anything to take your mind off of the awkward reunion.

From the start, you knew you wouldn’t stop by all 54 floors of the building, but the total amount of floors you were permitted on was far less than you had anticipated. Maybe it was the fact that you were just a newbie, but you decided not to think too much of it. You just held onto the prospect that you would be able to work up to those areas once you gained some experience and credibility within the organization.

The first place you were not only allowed but urged to spend time in was the armory. That was where you were introduced to your second team member: Hoseok.

At the time of your first visit, he was busy either disassembling or reassembling what looked like four different handguns—you really couldn’t tell with all the different bits and pieces laid out on the table. His soft, dark hair rested above his eyes and his head was tilted down as his focused stare scanned across the intricate mechanisms before him.

Once Namjoon was able to divert his attention from his task with a simple holler, Hoseok was quick to welcome you into the team as soon as you were presented as the new recruit.

Namjoon explained to you that since Hoseok was the team’s weapons specialist, the nature of his job didn’t put him in the field all that much. Although there were quite a few times in which he was deployed on missions for more particular tasks, more often than not, he spent most of his time in this building.

Overall, your first impression was that he was friendly and easy to talk to, but you kept in mind that first impressions only went so far.

You tried very hard to keep that thought in mind during your next encounter.

Yoongi was also available on the day of your arrival, so you had the privilege of meeting him right away. Hoseok pointed out that Yoongi was situated at one of the other repair stations in the far corner of the large room, past all of the other people hard at work at their own tables, struggling with the oil and powder that stained their wares.

“I heard it all already,” was the first thing Yoongi said when you approached him.

“Excuse me?” you questioned. He hadn’t even given you a chance to speak—in fact, he didn’t even bother to turn around to address you. You were just having a conversation with the back of his head; his black hair was hidden under an even blacker cap and his faded olive jacket fit loosely across his shoulders and down his torso.

“I said I heard what you told Hoseok. You don’t need to repeat yourself.”

You were rendered speechless if not just for a second. That was the briefest introduction you never had to make.

“I didn’t know you were so good at eavesdropping,” Namjoon retorted from beside you. Even from your peripheral vision, you could see that his eyebrows were knotted ever-so-slightly—a sure sign of annoyance.

“If you don’t want people listening in, maybe you shouldn’t be so loud,” your new teammate criticized, his tone never changing from the deep grumble that sounded like somewhat of a challenge, yet managing to stay aloof.

“Is there anything helpful you wanted to say?” your brother asked with his body already pivoting away in preparation to remove himself from this vexing man’s presence.

“Yeah,” Yoongi spoke before proceeding to set down the items in his hands and turn around. Stealing a glance at his work station, you recognized the detached scope of a sniper rifle lying next to the body of the gun with a grease-stricken piece of cloth tossed lazily next to it.

Your eyes traveled up to look at Yoongi’s face, and in that moment, his eyes locked onto your own, the action reminiscent of a turret detecting its target. His features were strangely soft despite his cold expression, but the sharpness of his dark eyes gave his gaze an extra sting that you swore you could feel prickling your skin.

“Try not to die, rookie.”

So far, your so called “orientation” was going much differently than you were expecting, although you probably should have learned by now not to hold any expectations. Still, you thought you were done with the main course of surprises once you saw Namjoon, but it turned out that he was only the appetizer.

“I’m sure you’re familiar with the three stooges,” was the only bit of information Namjoon needed to give you before you met the rest of your team later that week.

Taehyung, Jimin, and Jungkook.

Apparently, the universe thought it was a good idea to keep them together. Not that you had any complaints—at least these were some familiar faces you were happy to see.

Taehyung looked very much the same as he greeted you with his bubbly smile, as always. Even as he was entering his 20s, you could see his inner child shining through exterior of the taller, stronger body.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Jimin’s appearance almost did a complete 180. He was always a bit on the chubbier side when he was younger—it was something that never went unnoticed by some of his more troublesome classmates—but now he was considerably slimmer. His once fluffily tousled brown hair was now cut short like you had never seen before, not even reaching the length to be able to cover his forehead anymore.

Jungkook was sort of like a mixture between the two; it felt like it was only yesterday that the two of you last spoke to each other, yet he probably gave you the most awkward pat on the back you had ever received when he congratulated you on joining the team.

Still, it was one of the better greetings you received so far.

You were told that there was one last member you had yet to meet, but it was not until the following week that you were finally able to. In those days that passed with no signs of your elusive teammate, you started to form a preconceived notion of what he would be like, and the image in your head was not pleasant at all.

Jimin was generous enough to provide you with some information such as key characteristics, but by the end of his briefing, you weren’t sure if you wanted to meet him anymore—he sounded like a nightmare. Between the warnings of his multiple missing fingers and the seemingly sound advice of “don’t ask him how he lost his eye”, you thought you were all but prepared for the worst.

Too bad you weren’t prepared for the statuesque man who graced you with his presence. He stood before you offering his hand, each of his fingers still intact, and staring confusedly with his two lively, brown eyes as you stood there with a most likely dumbfounded expression.

At least Jimin enjoyed his little prank, judging from the sound of his cackling echoing from the side of the room where he watched the whole exchange.

Jin was the eldest of the bunch, and contrary to your misinformed preconception, possibly the sanest. Right off the bat, he exuded a responsible and trustworthy aura, especially in the way he held everything together with an air of authority during group meetings. He took the time to explain to you the things that Namjoon missed and even wished you the best of luck, although you were sure he meant with dealing with the team rather than the missions.

Nonetheless, you were glad that you were going to work with this group. Well, if they would hurry up and give you a chance to work with them.

Much like your first days at the orphanage, there was a transitionary period for you to get used to the environment and gain your bearings in the city.

Unlike your previous experience, although similar, you felt like a fish undergoing a climate change. They kept you in your own bubble, waiting for the right moment to set you loose even though you were ready as ever to be exposed to the rest of the world. You were itching to be released, but Minhyuk wouldn’t let you budge—at least, not until you were ready, as he put it.

Not until you were ready. It made you scoff at how ridiculous the idea was. You had prepared for the past thirteen years for this moment, essentially your entire life—you had no idea what they were waiting for or what quality deemed you as “ready” that you didn’t have now.

Thus, the first few weeks consisted of you restlessly spending your time within the sheltered walls of headquarters. You took to familiarizing yourself with the facilities that Namjoon and Jin showed you, and you also did well to utilize the multiple areas to train daily and keep your athleticism and skills from slipping.

You didn’t see your teammates around too regularly, seeing how they were actually being given missions to fulfill, and almost at a breakneck pace at that. The confinement made you anxious; you wanted to leave this building, to receive a mission, to be able to go and do what you were trained for, all while the rest of your team was out doing exactly that.

Well, most of the team.

True to Namjoon’s word, Hoseok was in the armory very frequently, if not every day. More often than not, he was already at his work station by the time you arrived in the morning. He always gave you a kind grin and sometimes even a subtle wave as you passed by, gestures that you politely returned, but the two of you never went as far as to make small talk.

Hoseok’s smile was warm, and the beams that radiated from him seemed more so—the curves of his delicate lips brightened up his face to light up even his dark circles and hollowed cheeks. You assumed those were signs of staying indoors too much, which left you to sometimes wonder if he ever even left the building.

Although you felt welcomed in the presence of his never-faltering smiles, something about him seemed very closed off. Perhaps it was due to the minor detail that you never bothered to have a one-on-one conversation with him. Other than the fact that he was in charge of the team’s weaponry, you realized that you practically knew nothing else about him.

Maybe it was time you changed that.

[SF] Matilda and the Siren

[ XVII ]

Having been lost in a veil of sadness, Matilda would find herself picking up the thousands of shards of broken pieces from her heart each morning. Reminding herself that she were needed somewhere on a future battlefield as an Indigenous Warrior. She closed her Golden Fleece for a short time and gave herself the room to stretch her legs: for they often cramped and resembled the ones she gained whenever she visited the Argonauts near the Black Sea. Matilda returned to her usual fighting and training regimen and she felt a bit silly running so intensively when there wasn’t any actual danger present at the moment. Running outside was one of Matilda’s favorite activities, since she had grown up doing so through the vast Redwood trees that are now protected along a Crescent. Matilda had bet herself that she could run the furthest of any man as a child: giving up soon after watching her favorite runner, notorious for his last name: Gump. It was with this character that she fell in love with the arts and all the joy that it brings, transcending across languages and oceans: Matilda would grow to enjoy her mediocrity in the paid hobby of finding ways to immortalize herself by blending into the background.

Animosity was a large portion of the job, as they directed only Matilda to put on her Traditional jewelry, braided or straightened her hair to see fit for for their scenery as they often loved to use her as a living prop. Matilda grew into the habit of self-descriptions filled with rancor of self-loathing, as the facts stood all around her for ten years. In her teen years she had suffered from a mild curse that caused her to gag each time she looked at herself. This would be the doing primarily of Hera and her vexing(s), but Matilda was able to ward it off with the aid of her two best friends Krista and Jolene as they loved her without judgment, proud she overcame the sickness with time. It was this calling for applause that lead to the events in which she had finally left the Redwoods and met the Kind Hearted Hunters. These two parental units had been so prominent for their songs asking to “Find Another Fool”: they too had a connection to the same social circles of the man known as King Midas. Matilda loved music in a way she could only describe to the Kind Hearted Hunters in a way where she knew she needn't feel silly in describing her tears describing her heartbreak. The Kind Hearted Hunters understood as they had been married since young adolescence and had survived in the trenches during the of a hardest times in their modern music history. The only issue being that the famous due had never been separated: Matilda would be left solo with her heartbreak having never disclosed her attachment and responsibility she felt when being tethered to the Viking. She continued to shine on stage with the Kind Hearted Hunters at her side, and Matilda knew that they had found one another before in a past life. Matilda had surrendered any ambitions to outshine the vocals of the Kind Hearted Hunters, and she loved just being a part of their legacy by association. Their prominence were not of her own achievements to claim. The Hunters had met as teens and wed at the now famed mountains that would later serve location to the birth of Matilda. Their worldwide fame and hype had predated the arrival of her birth, and were nothing more than fabricated mythos to the small broken one they adorned with hugs and called “kiddo”. Matilda stayed steady to the path as she attended the University where she had met the Viking. Heartbreak and the lead to the random day in which Matilda used their family mid-day meal to find the words to break confident word to the gentle couple that she admired so dearly: her plans of retiring from a career of singing and smiling in the background.

She were what the Argonauts kept calling “wee, cute and or cheeky” on the occasion, but overall: Matilda understood that she were pleasant to look at, as though she could be seen as as someone's neighbor (whatever that means…. on the fake scale of aesthetics that people had tended to go by). She didn’t find her own looks as exciting as others evidently, but still managed to find it amusing when the dead-eyed savages openly commented on her appearance: not knowing they were unequivocally yelling at a royal family member within their own chambers stating that they personally felt acclimated to her and that they appreciated her ability to clarify why Matilda had woke up and decided to appear so ambiguous. On the other side of the spectrum: she had been told she bore resemblance to papa on occasion, as he was in fact the respected older brother to her biological grandfather. Matilda often used their similarities to her advantage: holding silly expression with her hands and a furrowed brow to mirror his: standing a fearless six year old behind him, putting on a skit as he continued lecturing: wielding his all mighty power. She enjoyed breaking out in boisterous laughter if only to see if her papa approved of her oddly dry humor as he lowered whatever he was reading suggesting interest. She had grown up being noted for her quick wit and strict charm because her papa had encouraged her to invest in the culture surrounding her interests of the Questionable Queen that stood married to her own blood near the North Sea. Despite having never visited the area, Matilda often held impressions of accent foreign to her own lands when playing with her stuffed toys as a child. Her papa would eventually compliment her natural ability to perform in front of crowds without informing Matilda that it were rare to be able to stand front and center with an unconfused confidence from those who stood withered in the background.

Matilda prided herself on her efforts for sincerity, no matter how the much the cost of her opinions were: and it had left her single and alone after years of unending battles with the dead-eyed savages and beast alike. It would be this skill of sense of self and place that would provide Matilda with a sharp eye and heightened sense for the falsehoods of her simulated surrounding terrains. One day when consulting the Golden Fleece she noted a woman who held a peculiar stature, and noted instantly that she were a Siren. Matilda had only known of one other Siren that lived in the open: the one who would later be imprisoned despite her belonged overrated fame of having a house with maximum capacity sitting lopsided on an overpriced hill. Matilda had known the Sirens appearance as her papa had pointed out her features as a youth when he noted that she were sketchy in demeanor as her eyes flitted aboot and her body slender and birdlike. Matilda had forgotten about the famed monster disguised as a friendly and wise aunt until seeing the second Siren later on. This Siren was odd in movement as she held her shoulders like vulture and her arms heavy as she methodically reminded herself to sway them at her sides instead of trying to fly away. The Siren was mesmerizing to older men is specific, as they fell enchanted by her gaze. The dangers of age being taught through politics. The men lined up on the famed avenue and threw their riches at her feet if only to earn the right to know the Siren and sit quietly and in the background.

It fascinated Matilda to no end-- knowing what the Siren had done for over a decade, as she also realized she had once been in front of her now famed quarters unknowingly in the past. It wouldn’t be until Matilda saw the Siren wore a mask with a beak and a famed black cloth that indicated the end were near. Matilda gazed at her in admiration for ability to lie through her clenched teeth, as she had achieved all financial assistance that Matilda could not. She had made fortunes untold as though they were conjured from thin air, and as she did so would charge the bystanders to view her magic tricks. Matilda had seen her circular house crest before: which were distributed across the land, green with the envy of all those who knew hard work and the reaping of an honest days work. Matilda noted the Siren seemed to expect a lot of donations from her bipartisan counterparts in attendance, but saw now foul play as she observed with amusement: the Siren who seemed to have fluffed her feathers out even further than she had before. It were still rude and immature for Matilda to laugh at the expense of the Siren and her eccentric ways, as she still found it extra that the monster thought it discrete to hide behind the famed black cloth. It were one of the most famed pieces of cloth known to man and it’s unbridled expectations of power to held to that only found on Olympus. It would be this cloth that Matilda remembered her papa: for he had once pointed at the cloth and bestowed her with a Indigenous Warrior secret. He asked her is she had remembered the tall man who had worn the famed black cloth, and she responded with complete honesty that she had known him for his vast wealth but was unsure of his occupation. Despite that being his name. Matilda assumed he appreciated her wholesome nine-year old answer because he smiled and decided she were his first in command because of it. He walked her through the Redwoods in the summer, as he would informed her how that the man would help her defeat a Boar. Once safe in the forest he called him Hephaestus as though they were old combat friends: Matilda knew there had to be some sort of catch as if she were being initiated into the “boys club” at such a young age. She loved her papa, but she also knew better because her papa had also been known for being an asshole: Matilda cast her papa a seething glare and he fell wise as he conceded. He lamented a proposal in which she would be able to change her curse of bad luck and offered her vast fame and riches. He had foregone her opinion and offered her calculative services to Hephaestus to do with as he pleased. He informed her that she had been hand-selected by Hephaestus to hold, protect and battle with a heavy pearl encrusted shield. He informed them that it were to be hidden beneath a common fleece that Matilda used, as there would be others that easily disguised hers in the masses of consumers. The only thing that differentiated the shield Matilda and the other shields that were lined with gold and silicone, is that it was somehow pertinent to the operations of all of his other heavenly inventions. Matilda held no fruition on what that meant at the time, but she remembered thinking that didn’t sound like a very efficient machine if it relied on the “lack-of” human error to be the unit of measurement in which all of the other shields processed their magic from as a central power-source. She would later study the field not knowing that her intrigue on the matter had been sparked by her participation in this promise that she had kept with her second father. She knew despite being a child that somehow that this were her chance to show the famed military leader her exceptionalism once and for all and that the world would have to follow suit. She agreed over eagerly to a dangerous mission undefined and unknown: believing with every fiber of her being that she were mighty enough to earn her title as captain at his behest. She danced about him as he walked slowly and grumpily through the towering forest pointing at every little thing that caught her short attention span, and returned to being a child having forgotten the whole conversation for many moons following. It was after that day that her papa would urge her to finally start breaking her shell: he had known Matilda was true in her bountiful honesty and still a passion for the performing arts. He nudged her try for any leadership position, as they had both noticed the dead-eyed savages would hid her and soft singing voice behind their own children. He encouraged her to hold her voice strong and the words of their ancestors helped calm her tongue as she mastered the language and song of the dead-eyed savages. It would seem that the old and weathered Indigenous Warrior had gained wind by watching his youngest learn their ways as she boasted of her inability to assimilate in spirit. He had once perfected her battle-cry in the forest as forced her train her chords the notes that ring fear in beasts and monsters alike. He did not judge her as her voice cracked and broke, but continued to higher her chin until she held the posture fit for her title. Her voice became strong as the winds whisked the soil into the airs, and her ancestors strength and might filled her body with the air that had waited for her for hundreds of years. Her growls and yells informed the world that she were ready for battle, and that she were officially done being told by the world to stand aside quietly and simply watch the chaos in the background.

Matilda hadn’t thought about those days in the last decade, as she often told herself it were a story undocumented and therefore lacked proof. She missed her papa and his strategic parenting, whenever she were left with more questions than answers. Upon viewing the Siren in the green crest and the reemergence of another who had decided to reprise her role deceiving the world as a just beloved auntie as she hid in plain sight. They had procured vast wealth that Matilda could never even begin to fathom: from all those who felt lucky and invested in their occupation. Matilda prodded and poked at the old men who called themselves investors in the future, and it bewildered her to end how large the Siren built a massive nest that had been funded on these unreliable fronts.

Matilda traveled to her offices that bore the infamous blue crest of hope and it was here that she remembered the location of the nest where the Siren hid. Matilda had observed the birdlike woman long enough to know her charms were cast with her voice which derailed the attention of whoever heard it. Matilda looked around the nest and saw no device that may compare to the creations of Hephaestus and so she did what she did best: she decided it were time to break some shit. The nest was empty and abandoned despite it being needed to save lives: that merit alone meant it were considered a waste. She set down her Golden Fleece on a tall counter and pulled from her travel bag her two favorite weapons: her two magic wands made of silver and gold. Matilda held her head high if only to prove that the day had come in which the world would begin to rue that nonspecific day that they had abandoned her in Hades. She danced in the halls of glass nest hearing music that only she could feel, and hysterically laughed how pleased she were to have found a job that allowed her utilize the demolition skills her dad had once admired on accident. She knew she looked like a madman dancing aboot with her fits of rage and laughter, but she also knew that this was the only way to inform the Siren that she were in the hypothetical hood. Matilda returned to her thuggish ways of breaking anything and everything in sight, and delighted in hearing the small vials of blood break as they hit the glass nest floor with soft tink. She heard a soft voice clear its throat, and as she turned around she were facing a handsome young man. He stood in doorway holding his warm bean juice and adjusting a bandage that wrapped around his head. He seemed unfazed by the mass destruction as he observed her in his lab coat looking nothing less than charmed by Matilda and her catastrophic rage. He stood there silently for an unknowing amount of time watching as this strange naked, petite woman had managed to infiltrate such a secure glass nest undetected. Matilda found it wise that he had not interrupted or contested her: He seemed to understand that she were on a mission for justice and that her half-blood status made her a force of reckoning alone: as she continued to rampage as an organically made human-tornado in the background.

Matilda turned over her shoulder to see the slender young man smiling at her and she let her weapons fall at her side as he stood moderately amused, and not in the slightest bit concerned as he drank his hot magic brown beverage. He seemed so happy that she had destroyed his property…. and that made Matilda stand at ease a bit, but still sheepishly since that wasn’t even her best work yet (destruction-wise). She wasn’t used to dead-eyed savages waiting for her to speak first, even though she were still a lady, and above that….despite the fact she were royalty to the land. She took advantage of his politeness: pushing back her crazed hair to the side, pretending to be tidy for a second, and walked steadily towards the man: ready to shake his hand in turn for his generosity in letting her finish the scene in which she threw tantrum. As Matilda shook his hand she noted that her grip was stronger and more firm than his, but decidedly continued to shake his hand with respect: if only to give him the opportunity to practice and show her that he were taller. He looked down at her hand and as he made eye-contact as she noted he was a dead-eyed savage, but surprisingly he seemed true in his words and assured of his own existence. Matilda could tell that his father or grandfather had honestly never called him “Sir” with respect and so his handshake was weakened without their necessary blessings and teachings. Matilda cared not of his status, handshake, or fortune as they talked and walked in circles around the empty glass nest made of shards. She found him refreshing and noble in his many, many grievances, as he began to express his engineering woes to the Indigenous Warrior. He were thrilled to have company in his corridors who just conveniently happened to be a scientist, and it became clear that the two had coincidentally met with the same intentions of warding off the Siren. The astute man stood candid and concerned as he smiled, as he were free of the Siren and her curses, now wishing to set right all those who had lost blood and fortune to the callings of the bewitched Siren. He affirmed that he had ran out of ways to fix the famed invention now known as the Arc, as the Siren had already been paraded across the land met with the unabashed appraisal of the masses. The spell the famed box had achieved was categorized under spells that cast the illusion of wellness, and the spell had consumed all those who needed medical help the most. The Siren laughed at their physical, emotional and financial pain as she shrieked and cackled in weirdly misplaced octave, as she flitted frantically about with the white coat and mask she wore: despite the presence of the bubonic plague. The Siren had repeated her shallow vexed words filled with the riches of the much sought after false gold paint: even the crazed Boar would become jealous of the woman and her fame. She stared into the souls of the citizens without blinking as she chanted rants of immortality, boasting that she had the power that belonged to Zeus himself alone. Matilda took an analysis of the Arc this Siren had forced others to carry around for her. Matilda had only searching for answers having noticed the Siren in a captured event, as she notably took efforts to stand a golden staff lengths away from her peers and secluded from herself from those she called test subjects and servants. Upon completion of her observations she the man asked her opinion on why it were broken: she smiled stating that there were nothing to analyze or fix: since the machine technically didn’t exist. She laughed to herself as the young man silently smiled nearby: proud that he had finally thought to ask a scientist for the legitimate proof he needed that the sacred artifact and patent had indeed been a front.

Matilda observed the hidden schematics of the Arc and laughed at the parameters that had set by the Siren herself: prioritizing aesthetics and diverting from the reality of functionality. Matilda told the friendly engineer that it was impossible and wondered to herself aloud how it were disturbing that the Siren had conned the citizens to provide their own blood as sacrifice to the Arc, the dormant machine that now projected false hope. Plain and simple: it had became concerning to Matilda that the Siren had even managed to hold up such a large nest of glass lies without further injuring the general public. The young smiling engineer thanked her free services in checking his numbers and schematics, and found comfort in the blunt reports of her scientific findings that were given without bias. The young man had been exhausted from his wound that he kept reopening on his head each night. It had appeared that he had been cursed by the Siren to return to the glass building and forced to bang his head on the wall once every hour that he were trapped in his dreams each night. He smiled at her in a way that seemed familiar to Matilda and so she began to tell the man of her travels walking with purpose from battles in which nobody were armed and ready. Matilda told him to seek further ally with a fellow engineer who stood tall amongst cowards: she would come to his home bearing a light as an excuse. Matilda offered him solitude in plans for future relief and assistance as she informed him his aid would fall from the original woodwork of the massive glass nest: livid the Siren would intentionally diverted a parade of officials from the second lab that were deceitfully used to hide the the truth about the Arcs inactive status. Matilda handed him a silver wand and wrapped the second in a shred of the golden fleece. She said the warmth of the wand would bring him the courage to stand tall, smile and speak the truth in the way that Matilda had been taught by the Kind Hearted Hunters. He told her of his lost friend and watched as her face fell in horror as he ended his story in the Siren forcing her deemed servant to commit suicide: if only to protect her nest of lies from the swinging pendulum of justice that now fell closer. This enraged Matilda: for she suffered from the curse of Hades herself and had never heard the story of the brave man who refused to lie. With this knowledge the engineer finally dropped his smile and lowered his head in shame: knowing now that he had only been cursed to seek justice for his coworker, and that his dream had manifested each night because of it. He said he were fatigued from fighting alone against all of and those vexed by the distinguishable voice and that had stolen their fortunes, only to watch as the cursed dumped their riches and golds of kings into an crumbling glass nest. Matilda could tell that a it were time to prepare her shield up in arms as she began to wander off to the battle, with her royal amour ready to fight for a noble cause. She stood staring out from within the castle: labeled with its green shield of defiant corruption that held monument to the Siren and her failure in its front.

Matilda asked the engineer why he had not told the general public of the crimes being committed by the Siren and he had mentioned that he felt intimidated having seen how they praised the other Siren. When she asked for clarification: he stated that there had been one other...famed for having arrived from Albania before his birth. As Matilda endlessly scanned her thoughts for answers she remembered the face of the beast, as the Siren held a last name that reminded her of shrieking. Evidently it never dawned on her to remember that Sirens were not of any single gender or sex. She giggled as the engineer kept pointing out the Elf-ish like mans frail and sullen features, and she felt silly for having overlooked such defined attributes. The vapid Siren had already been captured and hung from a tree, and the people had rejoiced to see such justice prevail. The engineer had informed Matilda that the glass nest was being under constant surveillance during the day, by a man who bore no light and followed the Siren wherever she went. Matilda questioned the legality of stroking the keys of all those who played the music of the Siren, and saw fit to destroy the darkness that were seemingly non-threatening and bias. She followed the stout shadow during the day and pricked him with infatuation for the Siren: taken from an arrow of Cupid that she had once touched herself by accident. She would report to the engineer each night asking for details about the man who lacked sunlight. They laughed with one another and enjoyed their time together utilizing the nights meant to sleep: to pull thread at all those events that transpired during the day whilst they were forced to live in obscurity in the background.

Matilda and the engineer finally had constructed a plan that managed to trick the sun-less shadow into the glass nest one evening, simply by leaving it a row of crumbs to follow. The stout man followed the crumbs and picking them up to gift to his beloved Siren later, and thought not to the dubious nature in which they lead him to his own laboratory. Matilda told the engineer that actually felt sorry for the sun-less shadow, for she herself had been a fool after touching the arrow once before, and unending guilt and shame for loving the Viking. The engineer avoided looking at her, as she spoke, and as he did so: she remember she were naked. She told the kind man of her curses being tethered to the Viking despite how little he thought of her. The engineer finally had grown angry by her continual enamor and growing excuses on behalf of the Viking and he politely decided it were time to interject. He told her that he valued her ability to see men for all that they are, and her intuition in the future, but suggested she spoke less highly of the Viking. She turned away in shame and asked what he meant, and the engineer informed her that he had observed the Viking as he grew bitter with her for leaving and began to speak ill of her for having been cursed with the darkness of Hades. Matilda objected to this statement immediately: until she realized it were true and began weeping in embarrassment. The engineer saw her as she finally fell silent and ashamed the man she had once wished to wed, and made light by noting at least she hadn’t forced herself to bare the son had told her he wanted. The man finally smiled once more as he knew they were respected allies, and informed her she could do much better than that offered by an aged Viking. Matilda held her knees close as she cried from the embarrassment of denial and tiredness of her naked body being cold all the time. The engineer asked to hold the girl as she cried, and she said she felt unsafe as she were always naked: evidently the Viking had tethered an invisible rope to her without her knowledge or approval. The helpful engineer stood up and left for a moment, only to return holding a black cloth that belonged to the Siren. He gave her the oversized shirt to wear and they soon discovered the cloth held powers as the rope that only the engineer could see: moved upwards over the black material with little to no effort. The shirt fell down her body like an elegant dress and finally gave the woman the warmth she had unknowingly longed for each day. Matilda and the engineer shimmied the rope that were stuck on her endlessly, until it were cinched softly around only her neck that remained protected by the cloth. Matilda asked the engineer to cut the rope that had given her the false hopes to be loved by the viking, and saw that for some reason he were hesitant. Matilda told him she no longer wished to pine after a man who would never love her, and stated it had been childish for believing in his potential in the first place. Matilda cried silent tears explaining that she were tired of being the butt of every joke, and she felt she probably deserved whatever awful things the Viking had already said without her present. Matilda knew her heart was too weak to continue and feel all her failures, and knew believed that cutting the tether were the right thing to do since the Viking had already made his bed. The kind engineer told her that he were truly sorry, and when Matilda went to interrupt him with passivity and excuse for the Viking and his ignorant ways: he fell serious and stern as he raised his soft voice. He stated that it was absolutely unacceptable how the Viking had spoke so ill of Matilda despite her absence, and that as a man himself: he couldn’t excuse the materials the Viking had discussed with the general public on behalf of a woman that he had no intentions of making his wife. Matilda hated being embarrassed since everyone had often called her the village whore already behind her back, and knew her nakedness were meant to humble her from her consumer and addictive ways. It gave no way for Matilda to find further reasons to look up at the Viking, and so she avoiding looking at all dead-eyed savages assuming her long lost husband had preemptively degraded her publicly. After all: the Viking was still a dead-eyed savage, and evidently was inclusive in dehumanizing those of “other” status to be his inferior. To this epiphany Matilda finally knew it were time to let the Viking go, as she couldn’t marry him now even if she had wanted to: he had corrupted his own honor using Matilda as a human-less shield for no reason other than to amplify his own aging ego. Matilda had already been raped soon after birth: all of her curses bestowed upon her at once by the Gods of Olympus at birth. They were puppeteers of her life and projected propaganda that she were born a village whore, and when she rejected the title the dead-eyed savages had their officers that hold law and order: hold their boots on tight on her back as they threw her face on concrete as she was flopped down like a chicken by her already weakened neck….the Gods now saw fit as to gift Matilda with a curved spine and endless tears. Matilda knew that she was now teased by all those who looked down upon her as the retired whore, now transformed hag. Even worse nobody dared to stand near her: as she were cursed and pelted into shock or seizure as Hera continued to hail attacks from afar by way of the lighting of Zeus. It had all been for nothing. Matilda remembered she had actually came to the nest each night to prove her love of the Viking, forgetting that they had barely met. Matilda held up her rope of shame and distaste and begged the engineer to break the curse once more, and watched as he struggled to break the cord. Matilda suggested he break a cut from up and under the magic black cloth, as it made the rope soften whenever they touched. The engineer stated he’d have to cut off part of the collar that had once made the cloth famed worldwide, and to this Matilda giggled and simply said that she knew. She informed the engineer that the blouse were out of date and that the Siren had infected the cloth and all women in white coats with curses of self-doubt and self-loathing, as was seen by all those who watched the Siren at work representing women while in character presenting her best portrayal of what the Siren believed to be a human female. Privilege and self-righteousness had infected the people and their own blood was spilled by the five talons of the Siren, too lazy to check her data. Matilda informed him that his knowledge of her overall actions indicated the curse of constant surveillance found only in the East ruled by the Chimera: to that specification the cautious man simply nodded yes. She argued that she had done nothing wrong with the Viking outside of dreams and a hug, and realized her defensiveness was incriminating to say the least. He informed her that the Viking had selfishly tied the knot to Matilda: even though he was already voluntarily tethered to another. The aged Viking now unknowingly resided with a Siren that bore the crest of a Shell. A strange entity Matilda had never seen or met, only dealt with the encounters of her minion Siren who had been given the task of following Matilda around asking a million questions. This grew tiresome quick but held chaos enough for Matilda to finally leave the Viking, as Matilda had noted the Siren with the shell had ordered first hand that her minion leave her active post of employment to stalk her home with invasive questions. The engineer had stated that he watched as Matilda had lived her life as a pathetic uncrowned King. He admired that she paid no mind and utilized her body to be as a Trojan horse: blinding her subjects who had decidedly mocked her as being the village whore in all her naked glory as she were the most comfortable person in every room: free to be herself and smile with sincerity. The kind engineer felt pity towards her after he had watched Matilda humiliate herself at her own Courts one too many times, and explained he held no loyalty to the Viking and his striking blue eyes: weapons that often bewitched people. Matilda cried tears of shame mixed evenly with disappointment for a pairing she believed were an anomaly for the ages. She sentenced herself to seclusion while she ripped her hair out with despair until the man agreed to break her bonds to the Viking that Matilda had so proudly once loved. The man cut off the rim of the fashion forward neckline, as he finally freeing the lovesick woman from the chains of her true love. He held his breath as he finally cut the endless black material, holding his hand firm and steady as he assisted his friend by finally cutting the noose from around her neck. The magic cloth apparently wielded more power than that of the all consuming narcissistic characteristics of the Viking who had been known for implanting himself as black hole. The friends broke the band away as she stood taller than ever: Matilda was finally free, holding out the invisible knot out and away from herself, up and front.

After being freed from the Viking: Matilda knew once more: there would be no person on this planet that could match her might. She had forgotten who she were, as the cursed rope had betrothed her to seem allergic to all male figures that were not the Viking that held her engaged with his charm. She forgot how powerful she felt knowing each day was a new adventure, and on the occasion enabled and admired the daydreams of even a new kiss. Matilda still returned to the glass nest each night, if only to keep the poor man trapped company as he were captive to the Siren who still ran amok during the day scattering from here to there bragging aboot the Arc that she had built. One night Matilda arrived at the nest only to find the engineer without smile: for he had been tied to a large pole that stood center scaffolding the nest built only of glass shards. Matilda asked where he had put her silver wands urgently and the engineer had said the Siren had her shadow steal the wand she had gifted him after finding out he had lent it to an ally of justice who used it for bravery as he reported the fraud of the glass nest to a void where the outside floor met the wall. To this disarmament Matilda simply said “fuck” and cracked her neck from side to side for a last minute showdown: that she were exceedingly and entirely unprepared for. As she turned to scout her options of terrain she saw two figures standing behind her in the dark. It was both the siren and her shadow standing in the quiet, confused how the small random girl had stolen a black cloth and broken into the secure nest. Matilda didn’t have time for evil villain monologues or self-acclimation so she simply told her young engineer friend to close his eyes. She scanned the terrain as she ripped off a couple pieces of cloth and shoved them into his ears without giving him room to object. Matilda turned about face to conquer the beast: confident that her kind friend was safe from the Siren as he stood behind her strapped snug to a pole in the background.

Matilda had no time for this siren and her shit, as it had been such a tedious process for her to have earned her own white coat: a coat that would mean a lot to women all over the world. As the stark and angular woman eerily swept towards her to speak out her curses: Matilda held up her small hand and informed the Siren that she hadn’t the time to for her bullshit, and that her shrill baritone had no affect on her half-breed ears. The woman began to whisper to her shadow who stood behind her at all times, and to this plot Matilda finally lost it. She grabbed the birdlike woman by her straw hair and threw her down on the floor by her gawky neck: that perfected dead-eyed savage officer throw-down move finally perfected. The woman threw her limbs around tirelessly as she thrashed herself beneath Matilda's small foot. This was an embarrassment thought Matilda, and so she decided to put the bird to sleep by way of dropping elbow. She needn't argue with the lying beast who still shrieked and murmured chants frantically as her mask finally fell away. As the Siren held bulging eye contact: Matilda used her own ancient magic and locked eyes with the blue eyed monster and delivered the final blow on the Siren. Matilda growled at her enemy and inferior binding her to the future with magic chants repeating: stop lying Elizabeth...this nest is not a home...Matilda openly argued at nobody until the Siren finally fell asleep. The small shadow lunged from the darkness to defend his woman, his lover, and ring-leader, and Matilda laughed at the small man for she now realized what the Argonauts meant when they had called her “Wee”. She grabbed the tiny shadow by his trousers and watched as he were off-put by her schoolyard bullying, glaring as he noted she were having fun and not at all threatened. She pulled at the shadow as he now tried to flee, as Matilda had began to drag the man by his trousers across the floor. He fought for his trousers endlessly as he were ashamed to be naked evidently, and to this embarrassment Matilda took strategy. She found the inactive cord she had once freed herself from, and cut off a smaller portion to momentarily repurpose. She tied the man down, and finally wrestled him to her submission, tying the enchanted rope around his penis. She unrolled the chord until it were tied securely around the neck of the Siren, as Matilda encircled the rope to secure a gag in her mouth from a ripped magic black cloth that belonged to the Siren, and she dragged the odd pair across her own yard until she met the famed bay that Matilda had once accidentally set earthquake to. She strung them to the tallest bridge and painted it red to signify the blood that was sacrificed and spilled on behalf of the Siren. She still couldn't believed the public had once referred to the Siren as Helen of Troy: a compliment which had signified Matilda to observe the Siren in the first place out of curiosity. Matilda believed in justice and the pair were minor offenders to the other beasts Matilda had faced and ultimately destroyed. Matilda returned to the post to free her new friend, and they walked back to the ocean together merrily, as they were protected by the hand of justice and the engineer now his own man. A handshake and welcoming presence that he had now earned and engineered for himself. The man no longer stood coward in the shadow of the Siren, but moved with ease as he would go on to surpass her illusion of greatness. His silver weapon armed and ready, tucked away in a pocket that lay neatly on his chest. The man was now a hero to many: known for his words of compassion and truth, mostly for being the grandson that would stand the test of time. The engineer now stood unafraid and surrounded by like minds as they walked back to the bay as a growing army, and saw that as his grandfather proudly lead of the charge: he now knew that there is there is power in numbers. Their might would outmatch any army, as they had all once stood mistreated by the Siren in the background.

submitted by /u/spacecaptainbrooks03 [link] [comments] via Blogger https://ift.tt/2YNdVNk

Critical Role EP:7/13/17

So I don’t write here, I usually don’t have much to say and what I do have to say I don’t think people will be interested in.  Last night however on Critical Role I saw something that for whatever reason I feel I need to write down.  For those of you who watch Critical Role but are not caught up, warning there are spoilers ahead.  For those of you caught up, here is my take on last nights episode why it is important to understand our men and women in the military and what VM is really going through.

Vox Machina as we all know have gone through a lot since they first formed.  Here are (for the most part) a bunch of strangers who through trials and tribulations have become a cohesive unit.  Some of them knew each other before (i.e. Vex and Vax and Pike and Grog) but they were different parts that came together to become a whole.  This is exactly like every solider who enters the military.  When you start you don’t usually know anyone, but you fight and work together and become a family (which is one of the reason why the bond between vets is so high).  

VM has been at war for a while now.  There have been small battles, there have been large battles and they have gone through literal hell and back.  They have all grown in different ways.  Each of them has affected each other in different ways.  Some have fallen in love.  Some have had the bonds of friendship put to the test.  Each and every one of them has scars both physical and mental.  This is also exactly like soldiers who go off to war.  

I bring up the soldier comparison because I feel it is important to understand that last nights episode showed all of the various issues facing our soldiers.  Each of VM represented a different type of internal battle each soldier goes through at different times and for different reasons.  Let me elaborate and break down each character and what internal demon each of them represented (intentional on the part of the players or not).

Grog:  Grog is your typical infantry soldier.  He’s big and he loves to fight.  He feels most comfortable when he is on the battlefield.  What scares him though is that he will only ever be that.  He tries to improve himself (i.e. learning to read) but his fear is that he will never be able to be more than a brute.  Last night he came face to face with an eternity that scares him, because in that eternity (the realm of Ioun) he is useless.  (This is similar to what soldiers go through when they are discharged from the military and thrust back into the civilian world.  Many feel obsolete and useless in a world that doesn’t make sense to them and the skills they have learned in the military have no use in their new “eternity” aka the civilian world).

Scanlan:  There is a Scanlan in every unit.  He is the one who cracks jokes, who keeps the mood light and who is everyones “friend”.  Scanlan though is suffering from a severe case of PTSD from his adventures and during his time with VM his life changed.  Like many young soldiers he didn’t really much care what happened to him because he never really thought about his own mortality.  Then he instantly became a father and he had a family.  His views on everything changed and when once he was willing to do anything he now thought about what it would mean for his daughter if he died.   He couldn’t handle it and at one point and turned to drugs and then eventually he broke and left.  Scanlan was like any young soldier who starts the military and then eventually gets married and or has kids.  He wrestles with his duty for his friends and his duty to his kids.  He knows he could never forgive himself if something were to happen to one of his friends and he was not there, but at the same time he could never forgive himself if he were to leave his kids without a father.

Pike:  I can’t really comment on Pike because Ashley wasn’t there but Pike is your typical Combat Medic.  She knows that she can’t save everyone, but she is going to damn sure try even if it means she dies herself.  (I really hope Ashley is available to RP next game, I really want to see her RP Pike in all of this.).

Keylith:  Keylith is your typical legacy soldier.  She was raised and groomed to be a leader one day because that was her destiny (like any kid who grew up with parents who were officers in the Military and was expected to become one themselves).  She has never felt that her destiny was her own, but she found comfort in her friends.  She eventually fell in love and she thought that she had some control over her life for once.  Then Vax died and came back on borrowed time.  She shut down.  She knows that this mission will mean the end of her love, but she also knows that she has a duty to do and that she cannot shy away from what will happen.  Like a military leader who has to send a loved one into a suicide mission she is angry.  Angry that she was cheated out of a life with her love.  Angry that she doesn’t really have a say in it. Angry that she has to keep on moving forward even though she just wants to stop.  She is also angry because two of her closest friends have done something that in normal circumstances would make her happy, but all she can feel is anger and she is even angry at herself for feel that way.  This is just like every soldier and widow of a soldier who has had to endure the loss of a loved one while at the same time seeing others around happy.  They are angry at the world and angry at themselves for feeling that way.

Vax:  Vax is your typical “fate” soldier.  He knows he is going to die.  He has died and came back, but he knows that this is the end.  Once it is over it is over and he is gone.  There are some soldiers who have this feeling right before a deployment that this WILL be the time they die.  They have this unnerving calm about everything.  They are no longer scared because they know that this is the end, and there is nothing they can do to stop it.  They feel guilt because they know that it is going to cause pain for those left behind, but they also know that they cannot shy away from their task.  They jump into it and take risks they normally wouldn’t take because they know that fate has already decided.  

Percy:  Percy is your typical “Ops” soldier.  He wants to know everything about everything and he thinks that if he can know enough about a certain thing, then he can affect the outcome.  For him the real power comes in the form of knowledge.  He is a scientist at heart and has never had what you would call a “spiritual” moment.  Last night though Percy learned something that he never thought that he would ever learn.  It all means something.  His life, will mean something.  He loves Vex and he wants to spend his life with her, but he always knew that it was fleeting.  What he learned last night is that what he feared all along (being forgotten) is no longer a fear for he will be remembered.  This is soldiers who find a purpose when they are out of the military by trying to do or create something that will last.  Make sure they will be remembered.

Vex:  She is the typical soldier who takes care of everyone.  She is everyone’s mom, sister, friend, etc.  She tries to make sure that everyone around her is taken care of before she takes care of herself.  That is why what is going on right now is so hard on her.  She got married and she is happy, but she doesn’t feel like she can be happy when her brother is on borrowed time and his beloved is in pain.  So she keeps it under wraps and makes sure they are ok.  She feels guilty for coming back when her brother didn’t (not really) and she feels guilty that she is happy when they are not.  Like many soldiers she has survivors guilt and she doesn’t feel like she can show happiness when so many others around her are in pain.

Sprigg:  Sprigg is the old grizzled war vet who fought once and lost all of his friends.  He is the embodiment of the fear, sadness and mental anguish all vets suffer when they lose their friends.  They have survivors guilt, they blame themselves for not dying with everyone else and they usually turn to drugs and alcohol (or in Spriggs case a severe psychotic break which can also happen).  They also feel like they should be doing what they use to do and feel guilt for hiding away when a war is going on, but they don’t feel they can anymore and that eats at them too.  

Last night we saw in the different characters a glimpse of what life is life for our military.  If you have a chance, watch these characters in this episode with this in mind and then maybe reach out to a vet that you know or don’t know.  22 Vets commit suicide every day.  22.  Now you might understand why that number is so high.  While the characters in the show are not real, our men and women of the military are.