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anakiinhighwalker · 11 months

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How they react when you’re injured please? Thank you!

evil laughter. i woll make a part 2 if asked….

— Obi Wan Kenobi

Poor Obi Wan. First it’s Anakin getting blasted and now it’s you in the medical bay getting patched up. He can’t help it at this point; he immediately assumes the worst. It’s second nature for him to worry about the people he cares about at this point. I don’t think there’s a day where Obi Wan doesn’t worry about something, which is both sad and kinda impressive for the old man (affectionately).

He has a bad habit of holding his breath before he sees you. It just adds to his feeling of being suffocated of hearing you get hurt. Is it melodramatic? A bit. But it just makes his love for you all that blatantly obvious; he literally can’t breathe if you’re not okay

Honestly, I don’t think it depends on the severity of the wound—Obi Wan will worry. He’s seen someone as powerful as his master get killed by a simple stab (although it was with a lightsaber). Obi Wan knows that any wound, regardless of how small or miniscule it can appear, can bring unseen consequences with it. Better safe than sorry is his motto, for anything really.

Constant testing, constant checking. I swear by the time Obi Wan’s done inspecting you himself, he’ll have a PhD.

It’s tough for Obi Wan to conceal his worry. He attempts to mask his worry with frustration towards the situation at hand but it can only convince so many people. You don’t know why, but Obi Wan always lets his professional Jedi mask slip when you’re any type of injured. He can’t ever seem not worried over you and there’s been too many close calls where Yoda raises an eyebrow at Obi Wan’s tenderness towards you.

He vents to Yoda that you shouldn’t be getting hurt and that it’s not fair. But he does it in his own, poised manner of venting. He’s very subtle when he’s venting because he doesn’t like to yell nor complain outright; It’s a quiet, seething type. Maybe there’s some untapped anger deep inside of him sitting about, piling up at the very fact someone had the opening to hurt you.

“This is ridiculous. How can the fleet expect to protect the capital if they can’t even protect them? They’re in the infirmary now and it’s because I was too distracted with droids.”

He’s just feeling too many things. Any anger he feels is stemming directly from the fact he wants to so desperately protect you from everything and anything bad. Don’t hold it against him if he’s moody or in a bad mood. Obi Wan loves you deeply—more than a man of his status should—so the aspect of harm coming to you unsettles him to a disturbing amount. That and mixed with his unresolved emotions towards his master’s death? The way the war has shaped and molded him? :(

Please please please reassure General Kenobi. He needs you to straighten him out so he can work properly.

— Anakin Skywalker (Deftones Liker)

It’s like Anakin adapted Obi Wan’s worrying but then added his little Ani twist to it and now it’s Anakin worrying AND being livid. This man has destroyed and mauled droids for blasting too close to you and I’m pretty sure if he could, he would’ve beat the shit out of the senator who messed with you. I don’t think Anakin has a chill button when it comes to you.

He’s too worried, in fact. He can become overbearing very quickly if you don’t check him. I’m talking Obi Wan’s checks but combine that with constant questioning and no chill at all. Anakin will very quickly overwhelm both the nurses and you with his frequent checking. So much so that you’re not sure if you’re secret relationship will be so secret afterwards (not that it was hidden that much in the first place tbh).

It’s even worse if Anakin can find the person or thing that hurt you. Whoever let Anakin roam free with his lightsaber and no therapy is the TRUE menace to society. Because the DAMAGE he will do if he’s unrestraint, oooh Lordy. I’m not even sure if I can say Anakin won’t kill a man for hurting you. You’re way too precious to him to care about someone else’s well-being, and especially if that person hurt you? Bye. They’re goners.

Obi Wan doesn’t panic, he silently worries. Anakin does panics and probably gets overwhelmed from how much he panics. He makes Ahsoka and Rex worry with him unknowingly with how he paces about. He, like his master, also has a habit of constantly checking your wounds and injuries to reassure himself that it’s not that grave. I honestly think Anakin puts a fairly decent amount of guilt on himself since he feels like he couldn’t protect you despite being such a highly regarded Jedi.

Would cry a little in all honesty. Anakins very emotional and he needs you to tell him to relax and to calm down because I really think Anakin can’t do that himself. He puts so much time, effort and love into your relationship that if you were to leave in any way, I don’t think it’s too far off to say Anakin would be shattered.

Angry venting to Obi Wan and Rex. If he doesn’t vent, he paces and overthinks and scowls. Honestly, at this stage is when Anakin could be really be tempted by the dark side if he’s not reassured your recovery. I think ROTS speaks for itself lol.

Once you’re safe and healthy, the way this man is so relieved and he always reminds you how much he loves you.

— Ahsoka Tano

Old trauma flares up. Ahsoka saw so much as a teenager during the Clone Wars and she’s still seen so much now as a leader for the Rebellion. The fact you’re harmed? What’s she suppose to do? Like her master, Ahsoka feels self pity and guilt at the fact she could not stop blaster fire from hurting you.

Ahsoka was never a crybaby when someone got hurt or died, she only has a faded memory of crying a little when Obi Wan was fatally ‘shot’ by a bounty hunter she doesn’t even remember the name of. So she won’t cry when she hears of your injury. But the way any Force sensitive person could feel her sorrow. I honestly believe Ahsoka’s guilt and deep melancholy would have a domino effect on people.

She’s learned to keep her cool and to be refined like a Jedi in combat because if she’s not, she could end up like him. Ahsoka, both with time and with becoming a leader, has learned to remain calm and quiet during tough times. Her quietness is both for good and bad. Good for others, who assume their leader is not afraid and unmoving at the Empire’s threat. But bad for herself—she becomes recluse and guards even the most deplorable, horrid feelings with mental guards.

Sort of pushes you to the back of her mind. She has to focus on the success of the Rebellion and how to undo everything the Empire has done; Ahsoka doesn’t have time to grieve or feel sorry for herself. She has to step up as the leading command of the biggest revolt against the Empire.

Silent over-thinker who really needs a break. She mimics Anakin’s nervous habits without even thinking. Pacing in her room, overthinking, scowling, it’s so ironic how she can be so similar to Anakin when she doesn’t paint herself as a wise, strong and sort of ethereal leader.

When you’re okay, Ahsoka asks everyone to leave you to be. And she finally lets her guard down and hugs you tight, so afraid she would have lost you to whatever battle you were fighting. She was so ready for the pain of the loss that it always gives her a happy surprise you’re always bouncing back better. It’s kinda sad to say, but Ahsoka has been surrounded by loss her entire life so the possibility of you leaving isn’t as frightening as it should be. She doesn’t know if thats healthy.

You kiss her cheek and she stops dissociating. You clear her blurry, rushed thoughts and soothe her sorrows and traumas. :)

— Luke Skywalker

This boy is human disaster Anakin Skywalker’s son. He’s practically BESTIES with worrying and overthinking! He doesn’t mean to worry, since Luke believes the Jedi way is one with mental stability and without struggle of overbearing emotions. But tuen again, Luke’s also a Skywalker. He attempts to appear this graceful Jedi who won’t freak out but we all know Luke is worrying his bowl cut off thinking about you.

I dont know if it’s a Skywalker family thing, but Luke really worries himself horribly thinking about the fact you might, even for a split second, die. That grave idea of death haunts him even if it doesn’t show behind his cool attitude and collected persona. He just deeply cares about you; he adores you beyond measure so the lingering thought in the back of his head of your demise is something that just—frightens the poor guy.

Although worried, he will put heavy amounts of trust and huge amounts of pressure (unknowingly) onto the doctors and medics doing everything they can to ensure you don’t pay an early visit to Luke’s hot dad. Like he’ll put a gloved hand onto the medic’s shoulder, tighten his grip a bit and go, “They’ll be okay, right? I don’t have to worry, right?” with his imposing stance and intense stare. I swear Luke sometimes scares people without meaning to.

Fighting himself a little bit. One side is like, ‘your feelings are valid, Luke. You have every right to be concerned over them—what if they pass like aunt and uncle?’ but the other side is like ‘No Luke, you need to be the Jedi that your dad and that Ben Kenobi wanted you to be.’ so often Luke is between the rift of wanting to feel as selfishly as a human feels but also feeling as selflessly as a Jedi would. What an unfair world, unfair circumstances too. Neither of you deserve this outcome.

He loves visiting you anytime he can, he loves having Han bug you to check up on you even if Han does tease you a little because your leg is broken. (Thank Luke for getting you stuck with Han Solo for the next few days. Fyi, Han is not the greatest bedside nurse. He’s probably the worst bedside nurse. He won’t even put on the hot nurse skirt, either!)

Not much else. If you get better, Luke recovers from his limbo of constant infighting in that noggin of his. If you don’t, well, we don’t have to go down the rabbithole that is Luke’s easy susceptibility into long periods of depression. Stares HARD at older Luke.

When you get back and moving, it’s just a relief for him. :)

— Padme Amidala

Eerily calm, like very eerily calm. I don’t know how she can stand to be so calm but it’s honestly very just Padme for her to not outright show so much explosive emotions; that’s not how she was raised, afterall. Even in her most dire moments, Padme can cry yes but I don’t feel as though she’s the type to have earth shattering outbursts although she does experience. She’s just never displayed them.

It eats at her though, no matter where she is. There she could be listening to some senator go on and on about their trade routes and how the Separatist scum have crested rifts in business and all Padme can think about is you. Just you. Your well-being and recovery is the only thing so very valuable to her in those moments.

She visits often and her aura of calm and poised position comforts you. At least one of you has the ability to remain so level-headed even during such difficult times. Her lessons and etiquettes in manners really kick in, her back sat straight and her gentle hand on yours everything but out of place. Padme is so gentle and softspoken with you that it shocks you she can be such, well, a princess even when shit hits the fan. She really is ready to be a professional senator, isn’t she?

Will argue with nurses and doctors to see you. I don’t care, that woman is doing everything in her power to constantly check up on you. Even if it’s getting Anakin to get up from his couch to check on you or getting 3po go make the journey into the medbay. You’ll either grow exasperated with her persistence to check up on you or you’ll find it incredibly attractive.

Her handmaidens make sure you’re okay too after you’re discharged from the hospital. Sabé stays with you throughout your whole recovery when Padme can’t be with you. And when she is with you, I dont think I can explain how caring she will be. How simply and utterly devoted Padme will become to taking care of you—it will probably make others jealous that such a beautiful woman loves you so much.

Chats with senator Organa about you. Discussing your situation and Organa being the amazing person he is, comforting Padme’s each and every worry. He also just kinda likes the gossip Padme tells him. Not to mention, you and Padme are cute together lol he loves to see y’all thrive.

Kisses. So many kisses. She sneaks in cheek and direct kisses whenever she can; Sneaky kisses, gentle kisses, adoring kisses and apologetic kisses. Padme will do all she can to see you smile, because your smile is the most precious thing to her.

— Mundi

idk but he’ll prolly hit the california girls dance on u lol for getting hurt

ditches u for one of his other wives (is that still canon???)

#star wars #anakin skywalker x reader #star wars x reader #obi wan kenobi x reader #padme x reader #ahsoka tano x reader #luke skywalker x reader #anakin skywalker #obi wan kenobi #padme amidala #star wars ahsoka #luke skywalker #a little gay #anakin is mentally ill but hes valid bc hes sexy

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ghosts-and-glory · 1 year

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It’s true what they say, no one is truly safe from the separated au.

Gang, I’m down bad for the good old separated au right now. I drew foot clan Leo in the rise style and now I have this. I straight up, zoned in so hard on this I got upset when I had to stop to put FOOD INTO MY BODY. I haven’t had this level of head empty dedication for a media since my middle school Star Wars days.

Getting up to the time when the series picks up. Donnie is Draxum’s protege, their relationship is incredibly chaotic and you know Donnie matches Draxum in evilness.

Leo is a foot ninja with little memory from before the Foot. He’s life long best friends with Casey (mlm & wlw solidarity) and was basically raised by foot lieutenant and foot Brute.

Raph is Big Mama’s Nexus champion and her pride and joy. At first he was just to be her bodyguard, more a stand there and look scary kind but being raised next to the Battle Nexus there was nothing she could do to about his interest in it.

Mikey is just a general menace to society, Splinter initially tried to be protective and careful with his one remaining son but if anything it lead Mikey to be more reckless. And of course he does everything with April.

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abloomingsunflower · 4 months

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Meet Snowflake!

[E.L.A oc's go brrrr-..]

[I haven't introduced her yet so- I'm doing it now. This is her official design because I wasn't sure about the old one-]

Basic information:

Snowflake is Albedo's adopted daughter, who apparently can control winter. But she can't control her ice power very well, which results in little accidents to happen often. Hope is training her.

She's 18 years old, a month younger than Lux, 5'6 ft tall and enjoys reading Marvel comics.

Snow is a menace to society/aff

She is Lux's non-blood related long lost twin/j/nsrs

Snowflake is a descendant of Quetzalcoatl, the deity of war. Corr.Nightmare tried to kill her once he found out about her existence. The girl fought back as best she could but was quickly overpowered. Luckily she was saved from "an mysterious winged lady".

Now Snowflake is striving to control her power better and learn more about her ancestor.

(Fun fact: Her real name is Estelle. Snowflake is just a nickname.)

Origins:

It's unknown who her parents are or where they are. But Snow never bothered to find that out.

"They abandoned me, whoever they are. Valid reason or not, I'm better off without them right? I'm sure they must've thought the same. My life is fine as it is, I already have an amazing adoptive father."

Snowflake is actually a part of Quetzalcoatl's soul, his will. All those years ago when he died, a part of him refused to give up. He refused to succumb to the fatal wounds. He refused to let his kingdom fall in the hands of his enemy.

So that strong determination caused a part of his soul to separate from it's owner. It reincarnated as different people over the years, while Quetzalcoatl wandered the earth as a spirit.

Now, Snowflake is the current reincarnation.

Only when Corr.Nightmare gets killed and the kingdom is free, Quetzalcoatl will finally rest and his will shall return to him.

Abilities:

-Summoning weapons made out of ice.

-Manipulating the weather.

-Control over ice in general.

-Can survive just fine in extremely cold temperatures.

-Can sense and distinguish people's different auras, including the dead's. (But she can't see the dead, which makes it difficult to guess who it is. She can find out from the aura alone if the spirit is a threat or not.)

-Can create snow giants and creatures.

[Will be updated.]

Her opinion on the people she knows:

-Albedo.

"We met when I tried to run away from the orphanage. Then as I went further and further away, I bumped into him. He asked me why was I crying, and he comforted me. He took me back to the orphanage and on the way we were talking and getting along. When we arrived, he told the caretaker he wanted to adopt me. Much to my own surprise. Now here we are. He's actually a very supportive dad, the kind of dad everyone would want, to be honest. No matter what, he always thinks about me first. He comforted me when I cried, defended me on arguments, never turned a blind eye on me, and even gives great advice. He is the reason I'm happy."

-Cross.

"That baker my dad likes so much. His pastries are awesome! He's a nice guy, really. I genuinely think him and Albedo would make a good couple, I mean- Have you seen the way they look at eachother?? They NEED to get together already, I swear to god-"

-Dream.

"I love and respect uncle, but- Someone needs to teach him how to be less oblivious of your surroundings. He's blind when it comes to love, and I can tell he would be an easy target to manipulate..- I noticed he looks down sometimes, maybe because of his marriage?"

-Ink.

"The second most beautiful woman? Her? Are you kidding me? Ink is nice and all but not only does her sense in fashion suck, she's also kinda dumb. I'm just being honest! She's a mother, a grown ass woman, yet she's almost never by her husband's or kids' side, or anywhere near the castle. I swear I saw her in a bar drinking once. No, twice. That second time there was a strange man with her. I just kept walking to avoid being seen by her."

-Palette.

"We only really meet when uncle Dream invites me and dad over. Sometimes we talk. Lux told me he used to bully her and frame her for things she didn't do when they were younger. Even now, he's doing some pretty bad stuff. But he looks..Well. Miserable. I almost feel bad for him sometimes. Maybe he is getting his stress out on her? Anywho I can only suggest one thing for him: Therapy. And I will drag him there by the feet if I have to."

-Lux.

"We're complete polar opposites, and still get along just fine. I can't help but see her like a sister I never had. She's got everything! Is a princess, does nice things, is rich and lucky in lottery, has amazing dresses, has a handsome fiancée, is famous and all, and she's very pretty! Like, damn!- I think she really deserves all those. I'm glad she's not like those corrupt rich people, she actually donates to charities and orphanages. I look up to her a lot. In fact, I want to be like her."

-Hope.

"Miss Hope is the one training me and Lux's fiancée. They are so skilled..! It's hard to keep up with them sometimes during sparring. They've beat me countless times.. But I won't give up there! No way in hell. This is to get revenge on that bastard for nearly murdering me.."

-Merciless.

"Him and Lux seem perfect, to be honest. We get along very well. I've read almost all the books he wrote. He's like an older brother to me. Apparently, he wants to be a wizard. He's trying to make fire, like Miss Hope. Though..once I accidentally froze him- I don't understand how it happened, I was just patting his shoulder and then BAM! Thank god we had Miss Hope and their fire. I apologized so much that day..I'm still embarrassed."

-Angst.

"..I've heard about that guy. Isn't that the one that can see spirits? I think he could help me, something with a powerful aura has been following me around for days on end and I need answers."

-Artemis.

"She's that famous singer, and Merciless' little sister. Not gonna lie, she makes amazing music..I listen to it all the time. Some of her songs are calming and perfect for reading. She's also Palette's best friend. I think these two are in love, even their fans are making rumors about them being together-"

-Goth.

"She used to make fun of me and bother me at every chance she got. Along with that group of fans- Until..well, I snapped one day. I caused a snow storm, since I felt overwhelmed. It blew everyone away but her. I think I shoved her away after that, but then realized I didn't die. At first I thought 'Maybe it's my power', until I found out from Idiotka that a grim reaper's soulmate doesn't die from their touch. ..Nothing is confirmed yet. Because apparently Lux and Palette didn't die from Goth's touch either. This situation is very confusing. Anyways, we became friends in hopes of finding out. All we do is hang out and gossip about every single thing we can think of. It's actually nice being around Idiotka.."

-Corr.Nightmare/Alphonse.

"Can you believe Artemis speaks good about a moron like that? He clearly didn't think twice before deciding to attempt murdering a little girl, so why should I feel sympathy for a tyrant? I still remember his face... ... He scares me. What if I fail to kill him?"

-Killer.

"I don't believe she chose to marry him on her own will. What kind of psycho would?? I feel bad for her. She's very pretty too."

-Crescent.

"Isn't that the priest in that one church..? I dunno, I'm not religious. So I don't visit churches at all. But his face reminds me so much of that bastard.."

-Quetzalcoatl.

"My ancestor! I'm gonna call him grandpa, it's easier. Man, I wish I could meet him.. Idiotka took me to this secret library and I've been studying about his history. I have to say, I admire him even more now. As I read all those history books, I pictured the sceneries of the old kingdom in my head. For some reason, everything described there feels so familiar.."

Fun facts:

-She's allergic to chocolate, so she is always eating fruit pastries or vanilla. She found that out when she once tried chocolate cake in Cross' café.

-Snowflake is a fan of horror games and movies, even playing with Goth sometimes.

-She never really had real friends until she met Goth. Snow only had a small group of online friends.

-Albedo's nickname for her is "Tuna", which Snow is always complaining about.

-Snowflake always wondered about the identity of the winged woman who saved her that day. She wishes to thank her.

-She has a true/guardian form <3

-She is the key to Surprise Ending in Sunflower AU.

[If she interacts with Angst and Angst decides to tell her about the timelines, the two of them will try to make Cross and Hope tell the truth to everyone and the game will end.]

Evil Lux AU and all the characters made by @anotherrosesthatfell <33

Snowflake belongs to me.

#a sunflower in full bloom au #evil lux au #snowflake [e.l.a]#character info #oc design #fun facts #idk what i'm doing with life.

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gffa · 2 years

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ok so i myself love the jedi but i just wanted to get ur opinion on the whole "why didn't qui gon just forcefully free shmi and anakin" thing since anakin obi wan ahsoka etc. freed slaves in the clone wars?

(also sorry if anything is wrong grammar i'm not super fluent in english!)

Hi! Because Star Wars is a story where politics play an important role and have consequences and the Jedi have context that's bigger than just one scene. Tatooine is not a planet that is within the Republic, which means Jedi don't have jurisdiction there, it's a Hutt controlled planet, so anything Qui-Gon does there is going to be under a government that is not his own. So, if he kicks up a big fuss there by breaking Tatooine law, then that has consequences with the Hutts who will take issue with it, and he'll be risking it starting off a conflict between the Republic and the Hutts and a lot of people could potentially die there. The Jedi absolutely do not have the numbers to fight a war with the Hutts, this is made clear when Qui-Gon says he can't fight Queen Amidala's war for her and in the bigger picture of the movies+TCW, that the Jedi cannot just do what they want. It's like asking someone from our world, "Why don't you just buy a gun and go kill that human trafficker in your city?" Because it's just not that simple, much as we desperately wish it were. It absolutely does not end there. Further, all of this is happening while Naboo's citizens are being put in camps and being starved and dying, Qui-Gon is on a mission with a sword already hanging over his head. If he could have just used a mind trick on Watto to fly under the radar to free them, he would have, but that didn't work on a Toydarian. Instead, he has to walk a delicate line because he does not have a lot of power in this situation and brute force could very well kick off a terrible chain of events that they cannot afford. Which is one that wouldn't even work, because to truly eradicate slavery, you can't just kill the slavers--who would be killing their slaves rather than handing them over besides--you have to have a replacement for the space it takes up in the society, you have to have programs and government support in place so that education and outreach can be provided, so that housing and food can be provided, so that laws can be made to truly stop it. In contrast, why can the Jedi free the slaves in TCW? Because they have the backing of the Republic and better jurisdiction and they're already in a war with the Separatists, who are the ones supporting the Zygerrians. Now they do have the numbers, now they do have the governmental support necessary, the hornet's nest has already been kicked, so the Republic is willing to stand up and do something about this. And very obviously my point isn't to just shrug my shoulders and say, well, slavery's fine then, because that's very clearly not what I'm saying. Instead, it's that Qui-Gon didn't have the ability to do so without bigger, deadlier consequences hanging over their heads, and that slavery is not a simple, easy fixable answer, otherwise we wouldn't still be struggling with it today in our own world, too, especially when it's not within our own borders and we can't just traipse into other countries and do whatever the hell we want because, like, that kind of interventionism generally does not go well. And Star Wars is a story that is chock full of that kind of context and consequences, like the political domino effect of The Phantom Menace is right there, you know? Political consequences exist in SW.

#meta

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justforbooks · 21 hours

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CJ Sansom

Lawyer turned novelist who enjoyed huge success with his bestselling Shardlake historical mysteries

The novelist CJ Sansom, who has died aged 71, saw the dream of many aspiring writers come true when in mid-career he swapped a routine occupation for the life of a widely acclaimed, chart-topping novelist. By 2020, the former lawyer’s Shardlake historical mysteries had sold almost 4m copies. He built up a fan-base vast enough to guarantee that a new title would enter the UK bestseller charts at number one.

Sansom’s switch, however, was no lucky break but the fruit of deep thought, hard work and struggle against stiff odds. He overcame the blight of intense early suffering to create a much-loved series of novels conspicuous for their intelligence, integrity and humanity. An underlying idealism united the two, very different, halves of his professional life.

His debut novel Dissolution (2003) introduced the hunchbacked Tudor lawyer Matthew Shardlake, who investigates a death at a Sussex monastery menaced by the assault on England’s religious orders led by Henry VIII’s chief minister, Thomas Cromwell. Over the next decade, further Shardlake titles appeared, and succeeded, at regular intervals: Dark Fire (2004), which won the Crime Writers’ Association award for historical fiction, Sovereign (2006), Revelation (2008), Heartstone (2010) and Lamentation (2014), with a plot set in the paranoid, heresy-hunting atmosphere of London during the final act of Henry VIII’s reign.

Set in London, Sussex, Norwich, Portsmouth and York, the books map not just the topographies but the mentalities of mid 16th-century England. They indirectly mirror, too, the political ferments of Sansom’s own age: Heartstone sees a spin-obsessed king unleash a disastrous foreign war. The seventh Shardlake novel, Tombland, its writing delayed by the author’s serious illness, appeared in 2018.

He claimed that the character of Shardlake, the Lincoln’s Inn lawyer disfigured from childhood, dropped into his head “fully formed”. Shardlake finds himself reluctantly immersed in the cruel and devious political intrigues of the 1530s and 40s. He remains a reflective outsider who seeks to help those bruised or crushed by the upheavals of an age of tumult. His disability gives him solidarity with outcast people.

In an interview, Sansom once spoke of the depression left by his early anguish as “the monkey on my back all my life”. The connection with his series hero could hardly be clearer.

Shardlake is both a man of his times – all the books rest on a bedrock of thorough, sometimes original, historical research – and a credible proxy for the 21st-century reader in the dogma-driven era of Henry VIII and his heirs. Sceptical, curious, free-thinking, he has sympathy with the Protestant reformers but feels alienated from the savage realpolitik practised by his patron, Cromwell.

Shardlake dwells in a sharply rendered, richly detailed Tudor England but stands outside it by virtue of his inquisitive, open-minded humanism. “I’m not saying a man like Shardlake did exist then,” Sansom commented, “but he could have, where even 20 years earlier he couldn’t.”

Born in Edinburgh, Chris was the son of a Scottish mother, Ann, and English father, Trevor, a naval engineer. An only child, he remembered his upbringing as Presbyterian, constrained and conservative (“with a small and a capital C”). Later, this private man who shunned attention-seeking gestures would nonetheless emerge as a vehement opponent of Scottish nationalism – part of his general distrust of any “politics based on national identity”, which he found “anti-rational, demagogic” and always destructive.

His Shardlake novels depict the dilemmas and ordeals that face a sensitive, compassionate man in a brutal and treacherous society. Sansom’s own, formative experience of persecution and survival under a despotic system took place at school. At the elite George Watson’s college in south Edinburgh, he endured sustained bullying that left him on the brink of suicide. Much later, he revealed that his “inattention” – which today might be diagnosed as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) – had made him the scapegoat of “vicious” teachers and pupils alike.

He described his school-age self as “seriously mentally ill: completely isolated … consumed with rage, plagued by migraines and tormented by thoughts of suicide and burning down the school”. At the age of 15, he took a “massive” overdose of his mother’s sleeping pills. Despite, or perhaps because of, this teenage misery, he developed a profound interest in history, politics and the workings of state power that would fuel both wings of his career. While still young, he recalled, “I arrived in my head at a sort of radical, independent socialist position which … I’ve basically retained.”

Sansom’s harrowing schooldays led to a spell as a voluntary in-patient at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary. “I think the staff there saved my life,” he remembered, “just as Watson’s almost destroyed it.”

At Birmingham University he studied history as an undergraduate, then stayed on to research a PhD on mid-century Labour party policy towards South Africa. Rather than continue with academia, however, he qualified as a solicitor and spent much of the 1980s and 90s devoted to legal aid work, seeking to help vulnerable people. Living in Brighton, he attended writers’ groups as a hobby but never considered literature as a means to earn his living.

In 2000, his father’s death left him with a small legacy. He decided, without much hope, to try his hand at full-time fiction, though allowed for the possibility that: “I would be back in the law within the year.”

To his surprise, Dissolution rapidly found an agent. Publishers bid eagerly for the title (with Pan Macmillan becoming his UK home). Inspired in part by Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose, it reached two prize shortlists, and won over not only crime-fiction fans but a broad span of readers fascinated by the Tudor period and the distant mirror it holds up to our own fragmented times. Sansom had discovered, as he said, “how like the 20th century it was in its anxiety and uncertainty, even though people thought so differently then”.

Dissolution preceded Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall by six years in its portrayal of Cromwell and his circle – although Sansom’s chief minister is a much darker figure than Mantel’s. Among authors of historical mysteries set in medieval or early-modern England, he became a rare male luminary in a genre dominated by women, from pioneers such as Ellis Peters (Edith Pargeter) to Sansom’s contemporaries, such as Susanna Gregory.

Over the next decade, the Shardlake titles became regular fixtures in the bestseller lists. Adapted versions for BBC Radio extended the books’ appeal, even though Sansom – who continued to live in Brighton – experienced more than a touch of imposter syndrome. “I still half expect to wake up in a meeting about the latest legal aid forms,” he once said.

His mass-market popularity won him some unlikely fans. Shortly before she resigned in 2019, the then prime minister Theresa May bizarrely inaugurated a miniature library (housed in a redundant phone box) in her constituency by donating her copy of one of Sansom’s books. No figure, and no event, could have been worse suited to a writer who believed in a properly-funded public sector and detested the politics of nationalism and xenophobia.

Sansom’s two non-Tudor novels proved the breadth of his talent: Winter in Madrid (2006), with its accomplished depiction of a captive nation, set in the Spanish capital during the gloomy aftermath of Franco’s victory in the civil war, and the remarkable Dominion (2012), which reanimates the hackneyed genre of counterfactual history with its chillingly believable account of Britain as a satellite state of Nazi Germany in 1952. “Given the right circumstances fascism can infest any country,” a character in Dominion remarks.

That novel presents Scottish nationalists as accomplices of fascism and ends with an afterword that excoriates the policies of the (actual) Scottish National party. In all Sansom’s books, history’s convulsions test thinking people who try to stay decent and honest in tough times. He acknowledged that he had “found myself particularly drawn to the moral dilemmas the literate classes often find themselves in at times of ideological conflict – whether Reformation England or the second world war”.

In 2012, Sansom was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, an incurable bone-marrow cancer, and began to receive chemotherapy. Lamentation followed two years later, but medical treatment inevitably slowed his pace of work.

Yet the voluminous Tombland, published in 2018, proved one of the most richly imagined and researched of all his Tudor mysteries. Shardlake is caught up in the wave of rebellions that shake the realm of the boy-king Edward VI in 1549: “A colossal event that has been much underplayed”, in the author’s words. The typically scholarly essay attached to the book framed this emphasis on poor and marginal people as an overdue antidote to “the ‘royalisation’ of popular Tudor history”.

Sansom lived quietly in Brighton, on his own, and worked with a fierce dedication. Illness put a brake on his output but never doused his determination. He avoided the limelight, and once listed among his pet hates Facebook, Twitter and Christmas – as well as the “really ridiculous” television series, The Tudors.

In 2023 Sovereign, the third Shardlake novel, was staged by York Theatre Royal as a large-scale community production at King’s Manor, York, where much of the novel is set. A four-part television adaptation, Shardlake, directed by Justin Chadwick with Arthur Hughes as the eponymous lawyer and Sean Bean as Cromwell, is due to be screened on Disney+ this week.

A good man in trying times, his Shardlake became a firm friend to countless admirers. Erudite but approachable, his creator spoke engagingly about his work in a voice that bore soft traces of an Edinburgh upbringing. Above all, the one-time solicitor ceased never to explore the meaning of justice – or to tell timeless truths about power and its victims.

🔔 Christopher John Sansom, novelist and lawyer, born 9 December 1952; died 27 April 2024

Daily inspiration. Discover more photos at Just for Books…?

#just for books #CJ Sansom #in memoriam

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evilrat-sabre · 3 months

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Welsknight Season 7, EP 1 and 2 a Rat's report

So I started watching Wels season 7 again for reasons™ and decided I should take notes, not only of what he does, but about things I observe around the server, so here is my trying to understand my own notes and sharing with y'all. Idk if I will do it again, but I had fun doing this.

Note: I did it again! NEXT

INSANE "Starter" House! | Hermitcraft 7 - Ep. 1

27:04 length, posted 23 may 2020. Watched 30 January 2023.

Wels starts the video referring to it as Season 6, he says that he just had a nap, and he is ready to go work in "projects"

He finds it weird that no one is online Cub enters the world and gets weirded out with Wels being on the word Wels talks with Cub in the nether hub -Wels calls Cub a vex and this makes me unreasonable happy -Wels refers to season 7 as "the future" He goes through a suspicious diamond portal and ends in Hermitcraft season 7

At season 7 Cub gives him some of Scar's crystals, He grabs two:

"Courage of the lion" and a "A gift of love", because I quote -Love is all you need-

Some time observation notes:

Grass and mycelium mix in the Shopping District, this is before the war.

I see a Mumbo for mayor map, I am still not sure what point in the mayoral election this is.

It's before the nether update: The button is alive.

I probably should mention he builds his starter base, it has a lovely colour pallet.

This is where my episode one notes ends, but I went a little bonkers with episode two notes,

Mines & Landscapes | Hermitcraft 7 - Ep. 2

26:15 length, posted 27 may 2020. Watched 30 January 2023.

He starts mining and talking about the burnout he was going through, apparently he took a 8 months break of minecraft, started streaming and swapped to a more general gaming content creation.

Personal note: This reminded me why I started watching Wels to begin with; the man was receiving awful comments, because of his lack of minecraft posting. I was new to the fandom and hadn't ever watched him before, when I got here he was already going with his now very familiar cycle of posting minecraft and vanishing for some time, maybe posting another game and maybe posting nothing for months. I will not lie, I started watching him of pure spite to the awful people that felt like it was a acceptable comportment to go to this guy's comment section and talk shit about how if he wasn't going to post he should get kicked out Hermitcraft. I said it at that time and I will always repeat: You are aren't entitled NOTHING, Wels and honestly any other youtuber, by default owns you nothing, and being a little hater will only ostracize you from other people from this community. aNYWAY; I got hooked in his Binding of Isaac series, and to today he is my favorite youtuber, and his videos -Minecraft or not- bring me great joy. Okay back to my report.

*Spams clicks his bed when the sun starts to go downs* "Bdubs isn't online, someone gotta fill up" Sir, just admit you have a sleeping problem /j

*Insert epic wither skeleton killing montage here*

The button is dead. Wels comment at seeing it dead: "The Gift machine is broken, good thing I didn't spend a long time camping, I could be hurt"

Wels starts going through the mayoral candidates and starts reasoning why he wouldn't vote to some of them

Mumbo: "I can't in good conscious support Mumbo, because I don't need a spoon" (Personal note: I was so amused I anoted the time stamp 07:15) Scar: Scar offered cats for everyone if he wins and I quote Wels "I don't even like cats" (Personal note: Even your favs can do wrong; sometimes living in denial and turning a blind eye for things is a good thing to do /hj) Doc: "I don't know, where I will even begin" (Personal note: "this green man was occupied having a child", Its a good start of a explanation and "He is a menace and a threat to society" is also a very reasonable one. Joe: "He isn't running for mayor" (Personal note: Yeah, he was running for something even better, the whole Dog catcher thing, may be one of the best things I ever saw in minecraft. "Create a problem that only you can solve, so now you hold political power over your fellow friends and coworkers") So this leaves Wels with two good option False and Stress, he can't really decide so he leaves his concrete vote in both of them. (Rat's reaction : Yesss, vote in our queens, oh brave knight!)

10/10 he would book again

Why is he killing the wither with a axe?? (I know why, but let me fins him weird)

He is doing his starter base interior; I am having House flipper flashbacks, at least it isn't grey.

No one sells feathers, Wels commits murder of the poultry category.

He send letters to his close neighbors, it starts with "Hidey-ho neighbor-" and I am smiling wide and losing my marbles.

Every neighbor receives two blue flowers, with exception of Jevin who receives two yellow ones (Persona note: I find this funny, because Jevin is the only one I am aware that blue is his favorite color)

Some time and world observation notes:

Barge was updated from Ep 1 to 2, Wels complimented it.

I just saw Grumbot- Oh god the shopping district was so ugly. (My actual live reaction)

This is the end of my report for now. God I am nostalgic, Season 7 was the season I got into Hermitcraft, and it fills me with joy seeing if from the pov of my favorite youtuber.

#Rat's hermitcraft report #hermitcraft #welsknight #hermitcraft season 7 #Welsknight Season 7

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hadesoftheladies · 6 months

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sure, the agony of awareness of how wide and vast and deep misogyny goes and the betrayal of the trusted men in your life is painful when it comes to radical feminism. the awareness of the brutalization and violence women and girls face around the world is devastating 100%

but it’s so so worth it for the POWER that you get. knowledge is power. it’s like how menacing shapes in a shadowy room look until you turn on the lights. once you know what it is, you’re just less scared of it.

I’m way more wary of men but I’m also way less scared of them. The evil in the world is no longer a mysterious metaphysical force. I know where the oppression, war, and savagery are coming from. I know why it works like this. Knowing why men and society behave how they do also makes anticipating individual’s actions and cultural shifts easier. I’m not afraid of the future. I’m not uncertain and I’m not unsure about myself.

Women and girls are gaslit from day one about what it means to be a woman under patriarchy. But radical feminism cleared the noise from my head until I could see my experiences clearly. My memories were less fractured, my thinking less scattered, because I recognized how REAL my experiences were and how accurate my impressions of them were. it’s like the pieces are now a whole. My mind is now quieter, with less noise. I can think clearer, which means I can’t be easily bullshitted.

Also, for all the atrocities I’m now aware of, I’m also far from hopeless. I mean, I’ve given up on men. I don’t think they’ll be normal or well adjusted for many more generations way past my lifetime, but I also 100% believe that women and girls don’t have to wait until then to create for themselves lives full of joy, love and freedom. I do think we gain freedom, even in the face of pushback. The funny thing is, the more men try to punish women for resisting, the more aware other women and girls become, the more fuel is added to the resistance. consciousness-raising is probably higher than it’s ever been because of the internet and globalization. women everywhere are able to talk to each other way more about our experiences. men simply can’t keep punishing that without getting pushback. and they can’t kill us all because they’re angry :), they need us more than we’ll ever need them. can’t kill us without killing themselves.

Idk it’s like I’ve gotten rid of the viruses and now things are running better. No makeup, no self-policing, no pressure to conform to femininity, knowing where all the societal disapproval is coming from . . . Less mental distortions and less self-esteem issues and more confidence and more inner peace and more energy and hope than ever. Because im not intimidated by the threat anymore. the lights are on. it’s just a man-made fluke that will not survive the sweeping of time. it’s a sociological contagion, not destiny. It cant hold up forever. It’s breakable. Not in this context, anyways. Men are as malleable as mud in a stream. Programmable. They’re human beings, and like all things change and erode.

Total liberation won’t happen in my lifetime, but you know what is happening in my lifetime? Women and girls dancing to their favorite music. Falling in love, going out to eat their favorite foods and watch their favorite movies, bonding over experiences and memes, screaming at concerts, trying new things whether or not they’re male dominated, going to the gymn and arm wrestling, playing football and learning kung fu, getting paid for art exhibits, creating music that lives in the heads of billions, writing amazing stories that get distributed far and wide, getting kissed and nuzzled by animals, driving fast cars and racing on motorcycles, cutting up their clothes, getting that pregnancy terminated and living free of dread, ditching their wedding gowns and going to the club, making the people around them laugh their ribs sore, healing the past, moving forward as they’ve always done . . .

women in my lifetime are still oppressed. but that hasn’t stopped them from creating so much beauty and joy out of the time they’ve been given.

and im not just hopeful for a better future. im hopeful that women and girls alive today will experience immense joy and inner peace regardless of their past in their lifetime. and that dream comes true every new day.

#radblr #feminism #radfem #radical feminism #women #women’s history

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not-groped-by-an-angel · 9 months

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I still haven't fucking finished s2 of good omens but I have some Big Thoughts about something that happened in the first episode regarding Aziraphale and the Shostakovich symphony he picks up.

To start, I love Shostakovich. I think he is one of the most powerful, moving, artistic composers we have ever had the pleasure of experiencing. He is well known for political tensions and commentary, especially since he was operating under a repressive regime that took it upon themselves to determine what he could and could not produce.

Prior to writing Symphony No. 5 in D (our good friend Aziraphale's pick), Shostakovich had all stage performances of his work banned by Stalin for an opera that was sympathetic to someone who had committed crimes under the pressures of the bourgeois society.

Under the threat of arrest and exile to labor camps, Shostakovich was determined to write music that would fall within Stalin's expectations without his true thoughts being silenced. He laid the groundwork of the piece, saying, "The theme of my Fifth Symphony is the making of a man. I saw him, with all his experience, at the center of the work, which is lyrical from beginning to end. In the finale the tragically tense impulses of the earlier movements are resolved in optimism and joy of living." This was technically, what Stalin wanted. Technically, it fell in line. Technically, it could be used as propaganda.

But here's the thing. Shostakovich is a god damned genius. There are many interpretations and arguments over the exact meaning of his work but the general consensus seems to be that this work was making a mockery of Stalin, a hollow show of someone who was supposed to have found this freedom in his own happiness but is in reality only being forced to go along. There are entire theses dedicated to examining the artistry this symphony is brimming with that allows this to come across, but suffice it to say that Shostakovich had not given up his voice.

Here comes Aziraphale, spending most of his life under the thumb of a strict, heartless governing body that expected conformity and nothing less. Aziraphale, who has rebelled quietly for centuries, who faced his higher ups with forced smiles and polite nods that allowed him to slide under the radar and do what he knew was right.

So, end of season 1, he's caught. Called out by the oppressors, threatened, reminded to conform, conform, conform even as they abandon him. Aziraphale is digging this little niche for himself to find the joy that could come with perhaps, maybe, not being held under such stringent guidelines as long as he keeps his head down, and here comes bare-ass Gabriel, dragging with him right back into the mud.

It's important to note here there are two warring opinions about the performance of the very end of the symphony. One pushes and pushes, ending in something that could be, while frantic, truly joyous. However, some artists' interpretation pulls back, the same notes but menacing and monotonous. Did our hero truly find the light? Or did he fall, once again, under the boots of those who seek to control him?

It sets a tone for the rest of the season. These paths are just as readily available to Aziraphale as well, but both of them have consequences. Both have loss. What is the appropriate balance of loss and life?

TL;DR, yes, I have taken the 14 seconds Aziraphale goes "oh goodie shostakovich" and extrapolated a whole ass narrative about war and duality and subterfuge.

Go listen to Symphony No. 5 in D minor, Op. 47 by none other than Dmitri Dmitryevich Shostakovich for a good and/or bad time.

#good omens #good omens season 2 #aziraphale #shostakovich #i am being absolutely insane #and there's nothing like a good parallel for war stories #i have a lot of feelings about my good friend shosty and i will not pass up the opportunity to be unhinged #neil gaiman #good omens 2 #gomens 2 #shostakovich symphony no 5

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jewishregulus · 1 month

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hold on because your thing with alecto carrow & the carrow twins……… you really did something there

listen okay i could go so crazy about them . i have so much lore trapped away in my brain . but i am going to summarize so fast and quick bc they drive me crazy….

general info abt both of them : they r born in japan bc the carrow family moves there post grindlewald and their mom dies and when she dies they move back to the england but they r poor af after everything so pureblood society looks down on them for being traitors. cue them fighting the entire wizaridng war to be given respect and seen as a genuine member of the sacred 28 and using intimidation and violence to do so… a if i cannot be better than them i will be so much worse moment . their dad is normal and loves them very much they just choose to be evil like that. their mom was a sweet angel also and everyday i cry over her even tho i invented her to be dead . whatever

alecto has a weird misandrist complex in which she hates men but is also performing for them all the time , a man hating lesbian who also can’t escape using the patriarchy to validate her skills and ambition. she loves spiders bc they are matriarchal . she bases her worth off of how well she appeals to others and has so her whole life to the point she barely has a sense of self . she wants to kiss lily evans on the mouth and she worships her like an absolute angel it’s serious and vicious . the few scraps of herself she has left are all about knowledge. she is obsessed w language and translation and tries to learn literally any language she can ever . despite this she still can’t give herself a voice . she wants barty crouch jr dead for the crime of being a man and a degenerate which like fair of her . evan n reg r chill tho bc game respects game . i think if she got the chance to explore Life she’d actually choose to become a teacher like voldemort Made her become , but she would be actually pretty good tbh. her and barty regularly brawl in the teachers lounge. alecto kicks his ass. in the modern college au in my head they are regrettably roommates and each conversation they have sets gay lesbian solidarity back 15 years . alecto is studying classics and women’s studies as a minor …. ik feminism is a big part of her character but chat do not reduce her to this u don’t get it … she has a deep connection to lady macbeth and the movie the handmaids tale . here is her vibe :

and amycus is his mothers son who does whatever alecto wants him to bc he just wants to be by her side. they are so aggressively co dependent . he is obsessed w magical plants and herbology and his favorite thing in the world is a magical venus flytrap he keeps in his dorm that evan keeps putting random drops of blood into the mouth of . his dream career would probably be using magical plants to make new medicines n poisons n such . hogwarts resident weed dealer . therefore he n barty r actually chill . he just misses his mom like so much 😭 he is consistently in morning over the life he could have had . he’s pretty good friends w everyone he’s not like a loner but he is lonely deep in his chest…… of course bc alecto is his sister #feministwomenloveamycuscarrow . every carrow is linked to an insect in my head and amycus is a praying mantis . …. he has the same capability for cruelty like he also is on the field w alecto during the war but like he’d rather be gardening :/. modern college au he’s probably studying biology and is the rlly menacing president of the gardening club. and u think this means he is secretly sweet but he’s literally evil. him n reg have a crazy friendship going in in which they do the craziest romantic shit but it is completely platonic. i’m talking like candle lit dinners . in my head he has a weird situationship w rabastan (who is another story….) but also i have a *whispers* oc….. who in the fic i have planned for them in my head (which i will never write) he ends up w and his name is maxx <3 but i will never talk abt ocs on here . i have some shame. amycus would follow alecto to hell if she asked (he just wishes she would stop going the- *car runs me over*)

here’s amycus vibes

i have so much more i could say abt them . there is so much in my head they have such a deep and complex story … i will take any excuse to yap abt them . anyways they are both gay and one day i will write the alectolily sugar mommy au in which lily is the sugar mommy bc she’s a super famous author n alecto works at an antique book store doing translation n repair <3333 and it’s completely accidental lily keeps paying to borrow these super old books and eventually she just pays for alecto to come over and help her research and then one thing leads to another . and alecto is guffawed when she realizes. amycus. thinks it his hilarious. i think her and lily would have an academic rivals to loves thing going on in canon and in like Any school setting but also just in general. they could be 5 years into their relationship and still competing to be the smartest . i think there is rosekiller alectolily double date hilarity potential. also have a lot of thoughts abt them paralleling to the rosier twins but what do i know … i will leave that to the masters ….

anyways that was my yapping . hope someone felt enthralled .

#alecto carrow #amycus carrow #marauders era #marauders #death eaters #yap tag #there is so much more to say this barelt scratches the surface #unfortunately i work for 9 an hour at a chain pet store so i cannot yap

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fizzybeakon · 3 months

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agent 3 agent 4 agent 8 new agent 3

a knife a spoon a fork a spork

Seafoam/agent 3

she's very not herself anymore, used to be plucky but now she doesn't even play turf wars anymore, she feels like her life has spiraled so far out of control and there isn't anything left yet she wakes up everyday she always wonders what's keeping her in this continuous line cycle of wake up - day to day life/things that need doing - go to sleep - repeat. she's not angry but has a bad temper usually because she wishes her life hadn't take the turns it did if she could go back in time and stop it she would like to just be the kid she was playing turf wars with her old teammates even if that meant giving up the people she knows today (she wouldn't say that to her friends especially 8 whom she values most next to the squid sisters, she would tell Callie this only) 4 reminds her of herself before that's why she quote unquote doesn't like her. Will cut you as a warning - KNIFE

Pranha/Agent 4

very lazy only really able to get up and do anything if her life depends on it or she's dragged/forced into the situation. 0 motivation to do anything except complain and have bad takes (bad takes are just generally dangerous things to get out of doing work nothing super bad) she represents whats carefree and unapologetic. loves turfing its fun but she just can't bring herself to as much these days it has to be the right faze of the moon you dig? "ask questions later we don't need to know the details" fully believes Marie was trying to kill her and Callie wasn't missing until she saw it with her own eyes. Has a really mom - child relationship with Marie even if she says she doesn't will go as far to say she doesn't like Marie but she depends on her a lot and she's like the first person she'll run to when something goes wrong. Spends a lot of time with Pearl they get along because they are menaces to society. Likes spending time with Sushi and showing her cool stuff inklings do. Interacting with 3 is hard because she shoots her down all the time and seems to not want to interact with her but she forces her way in sometimes it's good sometimes it's bad. Will run before being forced to fight her way out cause it's easier and less effort is required - SPOON

Sushi/Agent 8

Can do attitude! she's always willing to work with you go out of her way to help you in anyway she can. Can't leave well enough alone in the best way. Doesn't have time for turfs due to all the things shes planned for herself helping out all the remaining octolings in the metro giving them clothes food and other supplies yet she's the only one who actually joins turfs the most next to new 3. Extremely fascinated with chirpy chips to the point she started dressing like her, that's her favorite musician. Regularly associates with off the hook tries to never not talk to all her friends at least once a day. Checks up on 3 tries to be the coaxing her back into a new life or a the old life. They have a connection and 8 cares for her deeply and wants to pull her from the hole she's put herself in. Very much a busy body, a twin to her brother who was cut from the same tentacle, colorful reminders and lots of sticky notes. Becomes fast friends with deadfish? you get one chance thats it you lose that your getting stabbed - FORK

Salmonie/New agent 3

the most normal out of everyone. I just got here energy. homeless energy using turf wars as a income so she doesn't really have a choice if she wants to do it not. regularly associates with squid sisters and deep cut mostly just Shiver she's kinda scared of Frey and Big man. doesn't really interact with the other agents or come around them she's out living her life with her friends not to say they aren't her friends she just views them more as workmates and never asked for all this craziness, saving the world giant bears and such. Keeps that part of her life a hush hush cause she thinks other kids will think shes weird or down right wont believe her if she did say it. She honestly thinks 3 is too mysterious and needs to tone it down but doesn't have the guts to say it to her face the closest she'll get it "she needs to take a chill pill" she can vibe with off the hook but never heard of them never met them before she heard they were all the rage back when. If you don't stop im cutting you, several chances were given - SPORK

hope that clears it all up for you guys on their personalities

#pranha #salmonie #seafoam #sushi #splatoon #splatoon 2 #splatoon 3 #new agent 3 #agent 3 #agent 4 #agent 8

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collapsedsquid · 1 year

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Is this “Fascism?“

The far right populist movements increasing in power across the “west“ can be difficult to describe, inchoate, self-contradictory. So was classical fascism. Thus endless arguments can be had on whether these are fascist, generally focused on questions like “How serious a threat is this?“ or “Is some sort of ‘popular front’ warranted and to what degree?“ I want to take a different tack on this. I should say that this is US-focused but I think those ideas have penetrated parallel, France or German far-right movements don’t look too different.

Fascism was borne out of global industrialized total war. No we live in global post-industrial cold war. The ‘socialism“ in “national socialism” can be a misleading word but it does speak to the desire to mass mobilization, not just to win national power but then against the world. Now we live in a world of mass de-mobilization, no national pride is worth paying a cent more for gasoline. While classical fascism was the misbegotten stepchild of 19th century nationalism, the current far-right is the misbegotten step-child of 20th century libertarianism. Perhaps it is a betrayal of that spirit in the same way that classical fascism was a betrayal of 1848, but I argue that it still remains and is important.

So no mass mobilization, rooted in libertarianism, what does this mean? Classical fascist movements can be thought of as a desire to manage exploitation, people need to be organized, into the factory, into the army base, and eventually yes into the work/death camp.” In a world of global industrial total war this mobilization was believed necessary by those elites who held power, even if they do not wish war others might against them. And this mobilization was contested by the labor movement, both in the form of brief insurrections but also the day-to-day labor activism that the movements did that were seen to hamper this.

Now though, moving people into factories is no longer a concern of the elite, instead the opposite is causing issues. The labor movement is no longer seen to pose a threat to either the political order or narrow profit. Instead the current issues of the elite are those of exclusion, not exploitation. Non-citizens excluded from the nation, homeless excluded from nice neighborhoods, those that are thought obnoxious excluded from “society”.

“The misery of being exploited by capitalists is nothing compared to the misery of not being exploited all.” It can really fucking suck to be unemployed. The menace of underemployment can strike as well, I posit that for many different measures of “exploitation,“ the most exploited are not the worst off in society. Working in a car factory is less miserable, and more productive, and more highly compensated than working as a migrant farm laborer. Don’t really need that many car-makers though. We got people queuing up to both work in car factories and get permission to cross the border to do farm-work though.

So now it’s all about exclusion, all sorts of people need to be kept in their place, prevented from interfering with Good Society. Here is where the libertarianism comes in. Libertarianism has managed to appeal to a great many people who wish to escape different types of “interference.“ Some wish to escape the drug war. Some are ticked off about the IRS. For some, environmental regulation is something to be destroyed, for some who long for a world of caveat emptor it’s consumer protections against scams. And for many, the interference they wished to escape was the imposition of desegregation.

Some within that movement had their own broad vision of the future of liberty though, rather than the million niggling offenses. The masses, who demand regulation, labor codes, welfare states, these masses are aggressors, intruder on your private property just like an intruder sneaking into your house, who can and should be met with lethal force. What happens to those who depend on the welfare states? Perhaps with this withering away they will find it in themselves to become productive members of society. Or maybe they will not, perhaps they are merely unworthy parasites deserving only to be purged.

There is a book from a libertarian position written in the 90s that posits this, “The Sovereign Individual,“ still beloved of some libertarians. It describes this process of state breakdown as the inevitable result of the post-industrial information economy. The world of nation-states will break apart and people will live in wealthy private enclosed communities. Or, at least, the survivors will, those that aren’t viewed as productive, perhaps because of their culture or ethnicity may not make it. This is turned into a eschatological prophecy for some, the market’s punishment and redemption for turning away from the gold standard. In the 90s, this felt like something that would take care of itself. The regulatory and welfare state and then maybe the nation-state itself would wither away, forced to by the pressure of markets. After the great financial crisis and years of QE failing to cause hyperinflation, this process no longer looks as inevitable. Perhaps it must be forced.

Classical fascism was about mass discipline, this was thought necessary to preserve private property and national dignity, to protect them against the world. The miserable no longer need to be forced into the factory, but kept out from the community. “State power“ needed to be seized, now state power is a bit more ambiguous, perhaps state power can be dispensed with, replaced with private communities, warlords, sheriffs to keep out the undesirables. If you can’t seize legitimate power with a coup, maybe you just destroy legitimacy itself. Instead of mass national expansion, you merely secure key resources and execute potential threats. The death camp can be inverted, instead you have fortress for the elect and a free-fire zone outside.

Post-foucaltian weirdos could see the imposition of mask and vaccine mandates as fascism, these are measures of exploitation, not exclusion, there is no desire to keep the body of the nation healthy, this is not nationalist but post-nationalist. The nation need not be preserved, only deviants kept out.

So what should we expect? Not sure really. I think the main upshot here is a better view of what power is attempting to be seized here.

#still thinking this through but I'll publish it anyways #might revise it #there are a million tangents I could go on

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fallout4-reacts · 1 year

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Could I request a fem/gender neutral soul who used to be a spy/special agent pre war? Thank you!!1!:))

Anonymous asked:

(* sole :))

I know you specifically asked F!Sole and gender neutral, but I must admit that for the sake of inspiration… I used M!Sole a little. I genuinely hope you will forgive me for allowing myself this freedom… And I hope you have fun!

Cait : "Kind of like what Deacon does?" Cait says.

Sole takes another swig of their whisky and smiles thinly.

"Just slightly. I had to enter the opposing ranks, pretend as one of them, and acquire information."

Cait whistles in surprise.

"But who were these sworn enemies?"

Sole's smile darkens significantly. They turn to Cait and drop the bottle with a dry movement.

"The United States of America."

Cait has little ideas about history and a culture based solely on survival. But what Sole just said sends shivers down her spine. She had always suspected that they were far more secretive than they let on, but to realise that their game is so much more filthy.

"What now?" she asks grimly.

"Now? It no longer matters. They've all been burned down. I'm sure those in charge are as well. So it's a beautiful story to tell around the fire, but it no longer means anything."

Sole ends up falling asleep drunk that night. Cait, on the other hand, remains awake for an extended period of time. Sole is not the person they claimed to be. They are not former citizens who have earned a spot in a vault. They are spies who infiltrated pre-war society in order to ruin this country. They may own some of the blame for where the world is now.

Cait is not a highly cultured individual; the majority of her knowledge is limited to her survival, but precisely... Isn't someone like this a menace even now?

Cait would rather not make a choice, but she is certain of one thing: she does not want to walk with them. Instead of lying down with Sole that night, she gets up quietly and puts the greatest distance between them and her. She's not sure if she'll have to regret it. She's not the brightest, but someone who can thoroughly create a life in the old world can lie to everyone in the new. She wouldn't want to find out what this twisted personality's worst flaw is.

Codsworth (f!Sole) : He can't believe Sole just told him that. She deceived, infiltrated Western society, and married an American soldier for the sake of international espionage? She's probably dehydrated or starving. There are no other possibilities. Sole could not be a spy.

"But, Mum, you seemed so happy with Sir!"

"I don't disagree with you, Cods. Nate was a wonderful man who deserved to be respected. However, orders are orders."

"But what about your son?"

"This is collateral damage. Nice damage. I have no regrets, especially given what happened next. It no longer matters, and I don't understand why I should feel remorse."

Codsworth shakes his circuits. No, Sole simply mocks him. But, as she pointed out, it no longer matters. So he'll simply disregard the facts he just heard.

It’s just bad coding. Yes, bad coding. Even General Atomic's pride can be damaged by 200 years of radiation and dust. It's simply a code error. This is not true.

Curie : "Oh! Like Mata Hari/James Bond! How wonderful!" Curie's smile broadens and brightens. She wants to know everything, down to the smallest detail, and about any assignments Sole may have completed abroad. She's curious about everything! Sole is delighted to please her, telling her about their most incredible exploits in the land of the rising sun.

Danse (M!Sole) : "Outstanding."

Danse believes he could do a lot for the Brotherhoods, but he's not sure he'd have the strength or capacity to do what Sole did.

"And your wife had no idea?"

"It had to be this way. Nobody had to know about my second identities, otherwise the entire operation would have been jeopardised."

"So she thought you were going to the front?"

Sole drops the bottle of whisky that Danse is rushing to catch, taking a big gulp while listening to his subordinate.

"I was always in the front. I was mostly on a plain army mission, and believe me, we needed it. But my fluency in languages occasionally took me beyond our borders. I appear to have a pleasant face that exudes confidence."

Danse gags on his sip. His expression changes to suspicious. Sole breaks in laughter.

"Eh! Don't even think about it. It was before the bombs drops. Even if I have some excellent stories to share, I acknowledge that I would not do it again for all of the resources in the world. Cheating is not something that comes naturally to me."

"I hope."

Danse, on the other hand, was a little more wary for a while. As time goes on, he realises that Sole is sincere. So he gets closer to him again, and sometimes, on the edge of a fire, Sole tells him about one of his exploits in the east.

Deacon : "No kidding! I knew you had it in you!"

Deacon is overjoyed to get that information. It's one more than the rest of the Commonwealth, and he enjoys it. He also doesn't mind learning a few more tricks from an expert, even if he considers himself to be rather accomplished at what he does. It actually reminds him...

"Did I ever tell you about the time I infiltrated a super-mutant clan and pretended to be one of them for three months?"

Dogmeat : He leans back, loving listening to Sole speak.

Elder Maxson (romanced)(F!Sole) : He examines the laying shape on his bed with caution. She flung it at him as if it were an amusing fact. He, on the other hand, does not take it lightly. On the opposite, it throws him into anguish she cannot understand.

"Special agent? Like a double life?"

"I was working for the US Army but ended up getting into the enemy's line. I had to try to get information regarding nuclear developments. Getting pregnant with Shaun threw a wrench in the works. I was dismissed with honor."

Maxson feels relieved all of a sudden. She worked for the army, so the organization from whose ashes the Brotherhood rose.

"Do you believe in your own loyalty?"

"Sure. Even in enemy territory, I would have died for my country."

This time, Maxson is relieved. He has no idea how competent Sole was as a spy, but he has no doubts about her sincerity now that she has proven herself with strength and conviction. At last, he does not wish to be doubtful...

Hancock : "Wow. Seriously, you're twisted."

Hancock takes another strong whiff of Jet to get high on this information. When the effect brings him back to the present, he looks at Sole for a moment.

"But is lying so easy for you?"

"Don't be concerned. It's all behind me now. Nobody can be so at ease with lies. It was another era, and there was a lot on the line. It won't have changed anything in the end, you know. But for all the caps in the world, I wouldn't play that game again."

"Not even for the Railroad?"

Sole raises their head in surprise. They then slowly grinned.

"We're not doing it to you, are we?"

"No. Too many people believe this."

"I won't make that mistake."

"Are you aware... that... me neither?"

Sole lets out a small laugh.

"Hancock, I just told you. I mean, I could have just shut up forever."

The mayor sighs slightly and reaches for a new inhaler on the table.

"I hope you're serious. It doesn't survive much longer now, Double Agent, than it did before the bombs."

Sole was staring at the mayor, unsure whether this was a joke or a threat. They shrug, thinking that as long as they don't intend to betray Hancock, they have nothing to worry about.

Gage : "And you're going to double me right here and right now?"

Sole laughs out loud.

"No! Why would I do something like that?"

Porter points his weapon at Sole, who lifts an eyebrow in surprise.

"Do you think I have no idea who you are? Do you think I'm unaware that you're the Minutemen's General? And now you've just revealed to me that you've previously played it double."

Sole breathes deeply and moves closer to Porter, a hand on the barrel threatening to lower the weapon.

"Precisely. I have currently told you. Do you think I'm stupid enough to hand you all the cards if I'm going to betray you?"

The henchman pauses before lowering his gun. No. He has no reason to believe that Sole will double cross him. What would they stand to gain? In Nuka World, they poured their blood together. No one act like a brother/sister in blood to bretray them after. Porter does not believe Sole will turn on him.

MacCready : "I'm not surprised," he groans between his teeth, his gaze fixed on Sole.

They've been trapped in a cabin for several days due to especially bad weather. Torrential rains and strong radioactive winds subsequently followed each other, and MacCready's attitude was at an all-time low. Sole proposed discussing the pre-war period. The sniper isn't overjoyed to learn that his friend was a secret agent for the national security services; not at all. Sole isn't sure if it's because the subject doesn't interest him or because it's so bitter outside, but they're a little disappointed by his lack of reaction. Their friend appears to notice and raises his head, sighing.

"In another life, I was the mayor of a small town." He gives his boss a kind smile. "What was it like, spy?"

"Special Agent. Surprisingly, the most of the time it was dull. There was a lot of paperwork. But I had a couple of memorable missions."

"So tell me."

Nick : Nick comes to a halt, taken aback by what Sole has just said. He usually shows little or no reaction to Sole's references from the past since he doesn't want to give them the false hope of being able to converse with them as if he had actually experienced it. This is the other Nick who lived during this time, and he just has flashes and fragments of recollections to go on—nothing meaningful enough to discuss.

But spy? Who wouldn't be impressed by that?

"Really? I can't believe it!"

"Why?"

"I've rarely seen a spy who can't tell a lie."

Sole is aware that Nick is merely teasing them, yet they are still offended.

"First and foremost, I was an Special Agent, and I know how to lie!"

"Not from what I've seen so far."

Nick's joyously mocking tone has truly affected Sole this time, and they want to shut him but aren't sure how. As a result, they take the first thing that comes to mind.

"I managed to make a synth think I was his friend!"

When Nick stares into Sole's eyes, they realise what they have just uttered. They immediately become worried.

"No! Nick! It's not... I lied! I’m lying! Come on, Nick, I'm your friend!"

But Nick turned back and headed to the road, a gloomy expression on his face. For quite some time all we could hear was Sole pleading Nick to forgive them.

After a few streets, Nick sighs and returns his attention to his partner.

"It's clear you don't know how to lie. When you do it, you are unable to face it."

Piper : "Wow! An actual spy! Are you going to give me an interview about this?"

Uncomfortable, Sole rubs their neck. This one should have been kept. Why not, though? It will make an interesting story for Piper, but it won't affect anything in their current life. That's what they assumed. Mirna looks more menacing than ever the day the story is published, and Sole immediately realises that her prices have gone increased... just for them.

Preston (romanced) (F!Sole) : "A spy? Wow."

Preston slides into the bed next to her, and Sole makes way for him. She begins purring with delight as soon as the man's hands touch her. They had been overburdened with settlement work all week, and she was desperate to find him.

"You know what it was?"

"Somewhere, the trade is still going on. But I did read a few books on Russian spies when I was younger. Wow. It's uh...hm."

Even in the dark, despite his complexion, he’s obviously blushing. Sole can't help but giggle at the effect it has on her lovely Colonel.

"So let me submit you my way," she whispers to him, spreading her legs to ride him.

Strong : "Spy can be eat?"

"No, Strong, it was just a job."

"Job can be eat?"

"No, Strong, that's how folks lived. There are still jobs available here. And being a chef is a job elsewhere. So Fist had a job. And being a fighter is a job, so Strong has one."

"Oh. Strong get it. Spy does what?"

"He sneaks in quietly, listens, and learns about people."

"Boring."

X6-88 : Despite his sunglasses, Sole notices X6's hard gaze on them. They tried everything to make the atmosphere around the fire more relaxed because the Courser isn't the warmest guy in the world, and Sole badly wants to connect with him. For the time being, it's over.

"Eh eh. Eeeeh. That was, um, something like that back then. When you had a talent, the government would take use of it."

"Cheating, lying, and betraying were talents?"

Sole sighs with exasperation. No, confiding to such an indoctrinated Institute member was a horrible idea.

"Rather listen, understand, and find," they growl, completely scowling.

But, to their amazement, they came across what they were looking for—X6's curiosity.

"It readily apparent that the aspect becomes much more interesting from this perspective. Have you considered applying your expertise for the Institute?"

Sole shakes their head slowly, trying not to reveal their true feelings.

"No. It’s in the past. I'll never work as a spy again."

They bite their tongues as they think about the Railroad. Perhaps it wasn't such a smart idea to tell X6 about their spy past when they were spying on the Institute.

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doctornolonger · 1 year

Note

Thoughts on the Vashta Nerada? In general I mean. I think they’re interesting. Though probably very hard to write for. In my mind (that hasn’t stopped Big Finish from trying, idk). What do you think?

If I wanted to write a story about living shadows accompanied by spooky people with skeleton faces, I'd just do another Faction Paradox!

In The Ghost Monument, there's a scene where the camera focuses on a normal-looking pool of water and the Doctor explains that it's full of "flesh-eating microbes, millions of them." This line may have ruined "microorganism swarm" villains for me permanently. Come to think of it, it's the same as midichlorians (The Phantom Menace's intracellular organisms which explain Force sensitivity). Something was undeniably lost when the Force stopped being – to abuse a term – ontologically simple: understood as a monolithic entity rather than something composed of parts. To give George Lucas some credit, I do believe that he would have redeemed midichlorians if the overwhelming fan backlash hadn't prevented him from elaborating further.

youtube

But I digress. In Silence and Forest, Moffat stops just short of "flesh-eating microbes". He's too much a poet for that. The Vashta Nerada are "microspores", an "infestation", a "the dust in sunbeams." He's combining ideas here, multiple angles for the old childhood terror / "familiar made uncanny" attack.* And – okay, he also says they're a "man-eating swarm". You can't win them all.

From a purely materialist perspective, a shadow isn't a thing in and of itself. It's the product of an object and a light source, and it cannot exist independently of either of those things. You might say that your shadow is "holding" something, but really that's just shorthand for "I am holding an object, so the shadow I have cast appears to be holding the shadow cast by the object in my hand." It's literally a trick of the light.

But in Peter Pan, shadows are objects in and of themselves. In that story they function not as they exist in material reality but as humans understand them: entities in their own right. Not a "light-object-patterns", a shadow. And in this lens, nothing stops them from existing separate from ourselves. This pivot from reality to the mind's understanding of reality – so to speak, from territory to map – is how ritual works across human societies, and it's what Faction Paradox is all about. In the territory, there were no days between 2 and 14 September 1752. In the map, there's enough to build an Empire.**

Even within the constaints he's built for himself, Moffat can't stop himself from having it both ways. On one hand, Vashta Nerada are allergic to light and hide in the shadows; on the other hand, they can actually encroach on the light and cast shadows themselves for spooky effect. The Doctor tells us, "Count the shadows" – a line straight out of Peter Pan. Or Interference.

*The FP series uses the same "familiar made uncanny" approach in the development of its mythology, but rather than the dust in sunbeams, its targets are the core elements of Doctor Who itself, and science fiction more generally.

**In fact, this is the only sense in which Faction Paradox can be said to be Faction Paradox. Lawrence Miles insisted that the Faction isn't interested in paradoxes at all; it chose the name Paradox not because of what paradoxes are in the territory but because of what the word means in the map: the opposite of the Great Houses' ideology of organized cause and effect.

Both of these bullets are actually the same point, and they're at the heart of what I tried to say in "Crimes Against History"…

***Apropos of nothing, a theory I'd forgotten I posted 6 years ago:

Or, since Faction Paradox may have been wiped from time at the end of the War, are the Vashta Nerada their now-person-less shadows?

#ama #faction paradox #the ghost monument #vashta nerada #idk what to tag this to capture what i'm saying here #silence in the library #steven moffat #interference #crimes against history #midichlorians #effortpost

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articskele · 8 months

Text

SPEAKING of playlist analysis! Here is my Meta Knight playlist, my favoritest playlist, my pride and joy-

Plus all of the explanations and meanings and stuff under the cut, in case you wanna go in blind first ouo!!

This Will Be The Day: This is Meta Knight joining the GSA and meeting Jecra and Garlude and stuff! He's young and reckless and doesn't yet realize just how serious and dire the war is- So this song is a pure representation of Meta’s current outlook! This is an adventure, a challenge, a revolution, an epic anime fight scene just waiting to happen! And the mention of fairytales and legends refers to Arthur and the knights (Falspar, Dragato, and Nonsurat) and how Meta idolizes them!

Eleanor Rigby (feat. Dream Jumpscare): OHOHOHOHO THIS ONE- And here the bright outlook is shattered as the reality of war sets in!! This one has the most animatic ideas bouncing around- Basically Jecra’s been missing for weeks but he comes back possessed, ambushing a GSA camp in the middle of the night and Meta’s forced to kill him-

AAAAAUGHH THESE LINES THIS IS JECRA AND META KNIGHT IT’S LITERALLY THEM- THE GSA NEVER HELD A FUNERAL FOR JECRA BC HE WAS POSSESSED AND THERE WAS THIS UNSPOKEN WARINESS ABOUT IT- SO META HAD TO DIG HIS GRAVE AND OUGHHHHH AGONIES

And that part at the end where the music slowly builds up is Meta alone on a rocky ledge (the whole thing takes place in like a mesa desert) looking through a journal with photos of him and Jecra- Tears fall onto the pages and it just cuts to him with his mask off just crying as the sun rises over the horizon-

Experience: The fall of the GSA. It becomes more and more obvious that this is a fight they just can’t win. Meta’s forced to watch as ships crash and troops are obliterated around him. Just utter destruction as the few survivors left are scattered across the galaxy. It’s over… What do we do now?

Hush: The start of Meta’s crew, and maybe also his plans to take over Dreamland? Super intimidating, almost secret society vibes as the group grows and they begin construction of the Halberd. This one reminds me of Smash Bros Meta Knight’s almost regal aesthetic with the frilled cape and the detailed armor- I imagine the ending is the crew taking in a young Sailor Dee, like they’re trying to be comforting but it just comes off as menacing lol-

Settle It With a Swordfight: Tonal whiplash time! The other side of Meta's crew and a representation of Revenge of Meta Knight!! Note the more energetic electronic vibe and the guitar, as a callback to the first song and representing Meta’s readiness for a challenge!

Take Off: Meta learning to Chill Out after Revenge of MK, just being with his crew bc the Knightmares are a FAMILY and they LIVE ON THE HALBERD together and they do KARAOKE ON FRIDAYS

Awoken: META KNIGHT IN PLANET ROBOBOT- Both the effects of getting cyborg-ified and all of the guilt and angst involved, and breaking out of it through sheer willpower and Kirby's help! It's very electronic but there's no guitar, like trying to emulate Meta Knight's power but it's noticeably forced and artificial

Pain: OK I KNOW THIS IS LIKE. THE EDGY SONG EVER. But the way I saw it, it represents Meta Knight's will to fight and struggle and improve and keep going and live! There's the full on heavy guitar this time, just the very essence of those burning feelings!! I imagine the "take my hand" parts are him in the New World saving a Waddle Dee from an abandoned building full of beasts

Sword of the Surviving Guardian: Ok this theme was just too much of a bop not to include- But it also shows just how far Meta Knight’s come! As a warrior, as a friend, as a legend. This is a testament to his growth and a toast to his future!

Legends Never Die: OK I ALWAYS IMAGINE THIS SONG IN 3 PARTS FOR EACH CHORUS AND EACH GENERATION; Arthur and his knights (plus Galacta Knight), Meta Knight, and Kirby with the Ultra Sword- OUGHHH it’s so cool and gives me chills every time- Legacies written in the stars and the immortal call of heroism, to protect and persevere and stand up for what’s right

AND THAT'S IT :D The autism was STRONG when I made this as you can probably tell lmao- But for real, I'm extremely proud of this! It tells Meta Knight's story through the music, every song plays a role, I even took the instruments into account, it's great ouo!!

#also yes i know there's a dsmp animatic and a fansong in there- i made this playlist a long while ago akdhfksldf #kirby #meta knight #character playlist #my nonsense #losing it over songs tag <3

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