#at this point i have legitimately decided that i will fuck up what i choose bc i'm not bothering to figure out what's technically canon
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@plutoconjunctascendant replied to your post “The Charmed wikia is like. a really cool resource...”:
okay and here's the thing: it's literally not stated in tdmd that paige is a gemini, phoebe just says there's a cluster of planets in gemini, meaning wyatt was born with a gemini stellium & this has Nothing to do with paige >:/
I don’t know shit about horoscopes or astrology, nor what a stellium even is so I bow to your superior wisdom on that one (the only thing I know is that I’m an Aries :) )
I think that the Gemini thing is based off of this conversation, which sounds like Paige was supposed to be a Gemini if you don’t know anything about astrology (aka me)
Phoebe: Have you been experiencing uncontrollable emotional mood swings in the last week?
Paige: Am I that transparent?
Phoebe: No, but read your horoscope. Jupiter, Mars and Saturn are all in Gemini.
But also that is my point exactly!! They just casually have that "In the episode The Day the Magic Died, Phoebe stated that Paige is a Gemini.“ when a) she’s not b) this isn’t a source despite being referenced as one and c) they outright have her first trivia point that she’s a Leo!! Pick a continuity please!!
SPEAKING of birthdays though, would y’all like to know where they got the date for Piper and Phoebe’s birthdays? The Warren Family Tree. Which casually has Penny give birth to Patty before she turns 14, like no!! Don’t reference that!!
#plutoconjuctascendant#charmed#abi speaks#at this point i have legitimately decided that i will fuck up what i choose bc i'm not bothering to figure out what's technically canon#canon lost its timeline rights anyway with witchstock so.#dont get me wrong i appreciate the wikia bc its useful but also. the point of me looking at it is#so that i DON'T have to pick through the show to find what's canon and what's not
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This is probably a super unpopular opinion, but I genuinely don't know why people are putting so much weight on the destruction of the "eggs"—players or fandom.
I actually thought they were holograms at first, just some kind of digital avatar for the purpose of the game, but I guess it makes more sense if they're statues. But honestly, I feel like even calling them "eggs" is purely a manipulation tactic.
If you think about it, they are literally just big rocks with the equivalent of a paper sign that says "this looks like your kids" taped to it. Any connection they have to the actual eggs is, for all intents and purposes, completely based on assumptions. Up to this point, nothing the eye has said has solidly connected them to the kids beyond their appearance.
Big rocks are not the same as children. Not even if they look kind of similar. There is no reason for the parents to believe that they are—or are connected to—their real kids, except for paranoia. If breaking a statue leads to an egg's death, I wouldn't blame the person who broke the statue. I would blame the person who decided that in the first place, the person who created the entire situation.
It's like the thought experiment that goes, "if you were in front of a button that, when pressed, would end global warming but also kill a random person somewhere in the world, would you push it?" There is no situation where I'd think it was reasonable to blame the person in front of the button for any death or destruction that came as a consequence. I'd blame the person who fucking built the button in the first place, and had the power to end global warming but decided to make it into a twisted game.
From my perspective, the only legitimate moral conflict here is whether the characters choose to try and break the game that's presented to them, to go along with it because they fear what will happen if they don't, or simply refuse to play at all. Just like the elections.
Anyway tl;dr—with the information we have, I think the "eggs" don't have any meaning except messing with the characters' heads, and if any of the actual kids die as a result of the situation I think the puppet master is to blame. Not the puppets.
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Every time an app gets an aesthetic/organizational update a lot of people flip shit, can't actually name anything they hate about it besides that it's different (or say a bunch of complicated shit that sounds like actually informed design opinions, but isn't, and boils down to "it's different") and then within a few weeks get used to it and chill out.
(Bonus points for trying to coordinate mass ways to punish the app owners/designers/employees that basically amount to annoying the shit out of them, wasting their time, or fucking up their data, all of which make their jobs harder, which makes improving the app and responding to legitimate concerns harder.)
Can y'all knock it off? Can we all try taking a week to try something before deciding we hate it? And if you do still decide you hate it, figure out why for REAL (this setting is harder to find, this functionality got lost but I really needed it and there's no alternative in the new setup, et cetera). And then be mature about submitting useful and constructive feedback that devs can actually work with? And not flooding their feedback with unconstructive things making it harder to find the things they need to find?
I feel like we're getting into a "kid who cried wolf" situation. If we make the biggest fuss every time anything changes, including over stuff we would really adjust to just fine in a week or two, and make devs' lives miserable over it, they're not going to be able to tell when they change something in a really bad way. Because we react exactly the same. How are they supposed to interpret user feedback when it's always such a mess?
Every app is going to look different every so often. It's going to get updates based on the feedback people have provided since the last update and evolving ideas about what structures work best. If we want the next update to be BETTER we need to be serious about submitting SERIOUS feedback the devs can actually work with. Not stuff that makes it harder to find important feedback. Not stuff that makes it harder to tell what will really improve people's experiences the most.
I'm not saying everyone upset about one thing or another is wrong so don't come at me about your least favorite thing about the update and how I'm an idiot for thinking it's okay. I'm just saying a lot of people are upset before even having had the time to decide what they're upset about and a lot of people are trying to "take action" in ways that will probably make things worse.
Just like. Think about it. Are you mad because something is different and you're not used to it yet? Are you mad because someone else said they're mad so you figure you should be too? Think about it for a minute. Try it out for a few days. Still mad? Cool, see if you can articulate it in a coherent way and submit feedback. Post about it if you want, but ask whether you're making a constructive or useful post, or just trying to get other people riled up. Want to coordinate a mass effort to fuck with the people who run the app? Maybe think about whether it would actually incentivise them to make the changes you want.
Just. Think. Please. Before we lose the trust of every app team that WANTS to listen to us can't trust feedback anymore because we choose not to say constructive things and just try to fuck with them. Like I'm so scared that legitimate concerns will be lost in the flood of "I'm having fun being angry on the internet" and devs will never be able to find it and respond to it. And then they'll just give up.
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youtube
Comment on this 4 second video of Dib being incensed that leadership roles in Irken society are decided by something as stupid as height;
"Honestly my main beef with the movie is that it still paints Zim as the antagonist when in reality he's a legitimate victim of an expansionist military regime. Even worse, one that doesn't want him and does its best to belittle him. People also like to conveniently forget if it wasn't for him the Earth would have been destroyed MULTIPLE times. From the moment he was born the Irken armada decided his life. It's one of the themes I really hoped they were going to run with. Zim coming to realize he has agency in his own life and doesn't need the approval of the Tallest. But instead Dib chooses to try and expose him at the keynote not even for the protection of the Earth. Just to prove he's right. Dib has a spaceship in his garage because of his involvement with Zim and it still isn't enough to be right. He needs everyone to acknowledge he's right. On the whole its a very good depiction of pride and how A LOT of characters in the series suffer from it. Zim is prideful, Tak is prideful, Dib is prideful, The Tallest/Professor Membrane, and even Gaz to an extent. "Pride goeth before destruction, and an haughty spirit before a fall."
I feel like Dib being consistently portrayed as able to see through BS and point out obvious social problems that no one else notices or cares about makes him the perfect person to help Zim realize he's as much of a victim of the Irken Empire's agenda as a perpetrator of it if they were willing to go there.
In the comics, he is aware that Zim has had the ability to feel love or friendship (mostly) bred out of him, but he hasn't yet moved beyond the idea of "he can't feel love, that makes him a monster" to realizing "they took away his ability to feel love, that's really fucked up".
I like the idea that maybe once Dib reaches that conclusion he'd try to help Zim, but Zim would reject him because he doesn't want to admit to being a victim. Dib would get upset and whine to his dad about how he tries so hard to save people and doesn't know what he's doing wrong or what he can do if they refuse to listen. Membrane tells him that no one can ever really save anyone. The best you can do is give them the tools they need to save themselves. Membrane gives the world solutions to hunger, climate change, and pollution, but the world has to choose to implement them, and often times they don't, which is why the world is still a dystopia despite his best efforts. So Dib figures out that the way to help Zim isn't like, trying to assassinate the Tallest and start a revolution on Irk to liberate him and his people like in an escapist power fantasy. The way to save Zim is to give him what he needs to save himself.
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i’m not going to pretend to be certain one way or another about what level of agency muir intends to give gideon in becoming kiriona/in aligning with john, because i think the level of uncertainty we’ve been given is both important and intentional, but i do think it’s specifically interesting how every other character we see be resurrected in some way and renamed by john it’s heavily implied that he also altered their memories and/or personalities; we see the renaming of titania and ulysses when he turns them into literal zombies entirely under his control and we see that the other lyctors, at some point, had different names and that their resurrection involves john altering them, and we see in some ways that kiriona falls right in the middle of those two - renamed like both of them, and still dead like titania and ulysses were and with her body having been altered by john and able to be “turned off” by ianthe at will, but also moving to some extent under her own power and retaining aspects of her personality (or her entire personality, depending on the reading - and i do think there are multiple legitimate, supported readings here)
and i think what’s specifically interesting here is that the set up of the original lyctors forces us to see them as complicit with john even though he does change and alter them - it is impossible to ignore the fact that m—- and a—- and g—- and c—- (and p—- and n—- and the nun and a—-‘s little brother!) stood with john through acquiring the first nuke, through killing hundreds of people, through necromantically piloting a world leader, etc. they’re fully complicit in the nuclear death of earth’s population even though most of them turned on him last minute, which translates over to being complicit in his empire, where we see the exact same pattern of them standing with him until eventually, later, individually deciding to betray him for whatever personal reasons they individually have. they are inarguably complicit, regardless of what alterations john made to them!
in contrast, titania and ulysses, at least prior to the resurrection, had no control, no ability to go against john at all, and so without knowing more about their resurrection and function as lyctors, it becomes almost impossible to say whether or not they had agency, ability to go against him, etc, and so all we know is that john used their bodies after their deaths in a way in which they could not resist against or do anything about
so by placing kiriona in this middle ground between the two, where we don’t know if she’s working with him entirely by gideon’s choice or if john altered her mind in some way, she’s in between total death and true resurrection, her wounds are still there but she isn’t rotting, the question becomes a question not of “is this her choice” but a question of “regardless of if this is her choice, how complicit is she?”
even if kiriona is mentally altered in some way, she’s only in this situation because she learned and embraced the cavalier role to such an extent that she died so that harrow could go lyctor. even if kiriona is mentally altered in some way, gideon was only in canaan house in the first place in order to earn the ability to “go free” and join the cohort. and, in contrast, even if she hasn’t been altered in some way mentally, she literally does not have physical control of her own body. kiriona isn’t a portrait of how people choose to align themselves with empire, but rather she’s the centerpoint of three books’ worth of themes about complicity, imperial corruption, death as something which the empire owns and corrupts, family, and memory. to say definitively that kiriona is only aligned with john because of trauma and her behavior is exactly how gideon always behaves in this situation or to say definitively that gideon would never act like this and so kiriona must have had her memory fucked with or her soul altered in some way i genuinely think is to miss the point - regardless of how much quote unquote agency gideon has in the way kiriona’s behaving and who she’s expressing loyalty to, she both has no power over herself (ianthe can and does shut her off!!! she spent her entire life obsessing over her body as a method of escape and now her body has been physically altered by john!!!) and is complicit, has been absorbed into the imperial seat of power and is being used as a weapon by that seat of power, etc.
additionally, this is a series heavily interested in themes of agency around death and how death is constantly being exploited by john and necromancers. it is important that gideon died on purpose (although obviously under. external pressures lol) and has been brought back in a manner which robs her of control over her own body, and i think being willing to engage with that and with what we’re told about the original lyctors and how john used them is important to a reading of kiriona
#locked tomb series#kiriona gaia#gideon nav#i don't like. think that gideon's too good and pure to be an imperialist or anything but i DO think that. there's a lot of information we've#been given for a reason#and also i think that the idea of her memory or soul or whatever being altered in some way doesn't actually undercut gideon's ability to be#complicit/whatever but rather adds an Important And Interesting Dimension which is worth thinking about#also i have. no idea what the tone of this is but it's not meant to be condescending or dismissing or anything i just#have been rotating her in my head for a While but also am currently not. super capable of functionally stringing words together#anyway it. he renamed her. ianthe can shut her off. gideon wanted to join the cohort. gideon is pretty easily manipulated. gideon always#wanted parents. these things are all true#ntn spoilers#locked tomb trilogy#this isn’t meant to be Engaging In Discourse btw i just am. obsessed with her.
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PROPAGANDA
Jason Todd
Jason is as someone else put it succinctly "a mass-murdering terrorist and tax-evader". He does evil, the story constantly condemns him as evil and sinful and thuggish and stupid and uneducated and overemotional. He does have a lower and more selective kill count than Luke Skywalker, John Wick, Disney Mulan, etc. So you got part of the fandom writing an annoying flood of fan fiction about him being a warm soft nice guy skipping through the daisies with his fam (hey have fun, guys). Then you got another side picking out the worst ex-canon comics for him (while they ignore the worst ex-canon comics for their own fave characters i.e. "my fave only did evil because of a mind-control potion, but Jason always chooses to be evil even though the story and the writer himself said he was crazy and broken and suffering from magic insanity")... and accuse him of being a cop (he is a cop-hating cop-killing terrorist murderer criminal thuggy thug thug constantly being hunted by law enforcement in a world bursting to the brim with actual copaganda while the heroes regularly cooperate with police—so many anti-fans are misusing the term copaganda because they hate this fictional character to the point they want to train people to be blind to actual copaganda). Jason is absolutely a villain—and he returned to his hometown when it was a battlefield with hundreds killed in the latest conflict, ruled over by a child-killing torture-enthusiast. War is always wrong and evil, and Jason was raised to be a soldier in that war—and when the promises of justice and safety never came true, he decided to seize power through murder. Jason is evil. He is inarguably a lesser evil than what usually plagues the town. Innocent people are alive because he got his hands dirty. He is such an asshole. People like him should not exist. He shot a 10-year-old in the chest, and nobody not even the 10-year-old cared the next day because it really wasn't a big deal. He was kidnapped by a billionaire with a taste for young boys, and it's literally not a big deal. His crimesagainst fashion are unforgivable tho.
Batman's adopted son and second Robin that got killed by the Joker and came bag to enact a revenge plan by becoming a Gotham drug lord. He had a duffel bag of 8 decapitated heads at some point and planted a bomb on the Batmobile and then got his throat slit by Batman to save the Joker. He stole his older adoptive brother's (first Robin) identity and blew up a high school but he forbade Gotham's drug rings from selling to children and actually became an anti-hero in Gotham and killed the people Batman wouldn't (rapists, drug lords, etc.). He attacked his little adoptive brother (third Robin) and beat him to a bloody pulp. He also slept with Batman's baby mama. He raised a fucked up Superman clone with kindness. He has lead teams of Outlaws on multiple occasions that love him. He's on good terms with many (not all) of Gotham's vigilantes.
Listen. I love the guy, I love him dearly, but I feel like people these days are trying to make him like completely justified in everything he did?? And like you can see where he’s coming from, sure, but my man did absolutely beat Tim Drake, a teen, half to death for the crime of being Robin. He’s morally gray! He had decapitated heads in duffle bags! Let my guy be morally gray please stop woobifying him
Jason Todd is regularly stripped of his autonomy in fandom to make him more palatable and “redeemable”. They attribute his legitimate trauma, annger, and pain driven actions to “pit madness” a side effect of the way he was resurrected. Not only that but so many people don’t even know what he actually does when he comes back, it’s like a shitty game of telephone where each person tells the next a slightly altered version of his return and at the end everyone thinks that Jason hates the kid who took up the Robin mantle after him and wants to kill him and that he is mad at Bruce for no reason and all Bruce needs to do is tell Jason that he is loved (despite Jason having a lot of evidence to the contrary) and everything will be all better. His values and beliefs and convictions are treated as invalid and his trauma is something he needs to just get over because it’s inconvenient and harmful to everyone else and doesn’t he know that everyone else was also traumatized by his death?
vigilante who kills people • traumatized as hell • has trouble differentiating between good deeds and selfishness • shot his little brother on the spine • tried to kill his other two brothers • operates under the belief that controlling evil is the only way to help innocents • has an immesurable love for the people of Gotham and really wants them to be happy and safe!! • please for the love of god fandom stop talking about him as if the bad things hes done are forgiveable AND as if the good things he's done don't matter
Gonna be honest even canon misinterprets him. There's no winning. All you need to know about DC universe is that multiple different writers have had a go at writing him and every time he is wildly different which is maybe why people interpret him very differently?? Canon interprets him in a he did everything wrong way a lot of times and fanon interprets him in a he did nothing wrong way because he is blorbo to many, when he is very much someone who did a lot of shit wrong but also had a lot going on, while thats still not an excuse for like, a lot of maiming and murder, and (usually) later in the timeline he is less trigger happy and has evened out from villain to morally grey, his whole "redemption" to being morally grey is usually up to fan interpretation whether or not they're chill with letting him keep murdering bad people or they say no murder in general, and whether or not bats is chill with the whole he keeps murdering people thing since he has a staunch no murder stance. Also!! a lot of people in fanon write in the whole pit insanity thing as a way to excuse a lot of the things he did while in his full on villain era, and like,,, i don't think that was canon??? like i straight up think the whole pit madness thing was made up but a lot of DC canon is wibbly wobbly already so its hard to say. hope this wasn't too word salady but i hope you understand that whenever you are consuming any piece of media, canon or fanon, with this man in it you have literally no idea what you are stumbling into you, you are playing fucking spin the wheel, which flavour of Jason Todd are we reading about today. I will say though, canon does objectively treat him like dogshit and only really brings him back every now and then as a punching bag for Batsy whenever they want to have edgy emo abusive dad bruce wayne because comic writers think found family is for chumps and so is being a good parent and actively resist it with every ounce of their soul :/ so I understand why fanon strays so far away, it's just that fanon also can't seem to agree on the degree of morally grey he is?? idk someone save Jason it's the worst custody battle of the century between canon and fanon.
Miguel O'Hara
he is dj internalized homophobia. he is so so sick in the head
#misrepresented morally grey#round 2#bracket c#both bracket#batman#jason todd#spider man across the spider verse#miguel o'hara
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If anyone is curious about what I've been up to-
Never ask me to interrogate safety again-
This script is at least over thirty pages. I've interrogated this point to the fullest and have concluded it is a completely bad faith argument. I will not be engaging with it again, and anyone who brings it up to me depending on how they do it will be blocked or blatantly ignored.
In short fuck this argument.
But why some may ask -
Well, wait for the video to find out why. Or imagine how you'd feel writing over thirty pages of script going over the real threat every prisoner poses just to come to the startlingly realization that one of these prisoners is completely fucking unrestrained, folded the guard like laundry their first trial interrogation, has the person taking on the job of guarding the prisoners (Kazui) mention if this prisoner were to team up with Kotoko that would be the end of Milgram in his second voice drama, and then have it be shown they needed to be physically chained up for a proper interrogation to be had in their own second voice drama.
Just to have that prisoner currently be sitting at seventy percent innocent with no interrogations to the risk of prisoner safety being done. Actions or, in this case, choices speak louder than words. The fact that in this case consistent voters have decided to vote the individual who has been objectively framed by the narrative as one of the most dangerous individuals here with a myriad of canonical evidence pointing to this being the case shows-
That the point of safety is a fully bad faith argument that is not being fairly applied across trials. At this point people voting her guilty for this reason should just say they fucking hate kids. Because taking into consideration what Milgram has shown us in regards to the other prisoners, people definitely don't care about safety as much as they're pretending to when it comes to Amane.
I have not seen anyone hypothesize about the stated and illustrated threat to prisoner safety that Mikoto is. Or telling people to go listen to his first voice drama highlighting him jumping the guard. Or even doing the reasonable fucking thing and highlighting Kotoko the only prisoner to jump several others and arm themselves with multiple weapons. Literally Mikoto and Amane didn't do anything during the intermission but defend themselves and mind their business.
So, why are they being treated as threats now simply because Kotoko decided to escalate things to violence while Es was asleep. None of the other prisoners took it to that point, and if no one was injured to begin with, Amane wouldn't have been retraumatized by seeing Shidou have to help through administering treatment. Because he wouldn't have had to give anyone treatment at all. Like actually fuck this argument. Stop using two uninvolved people who are simply reacting to a situation they didn't choose to be in for the actions of someone who choose to make the situation worse.
In short interrogating this point in earnest has made me a worse person and if anyone ever brings up safety regarding Amane's case around me again I will simply assume they don't really care about it and are just repeating a talking point they heard from Twitter and the YouTube comments section that they didn't take more than ten minutes to think about.
Voting Amane Guilty for safety reasons is like putting an outlet cover on the wall while a tornado is barreling towards your house. You'll feel like you're doing something in the moment, but ultimately, it's basically nothing.
I'm tired and have little faith in the state of human empathy and critical thinking skills if this is really what some people consider a legitimate defense for voting her guilty. Before anyone hits me with did you interrogate the downsides of voting her Innocent the answer to that is-
Yes.
However the safety point took up a fucking large chunk of the script. Which Star and I finished recording our lines for today, so there's at least that.
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Balalaika: Black Lagoon's Monster
This post is going to be another long one so strap in. Once again, it's soley on Balalaika, but I may stray off a bit too.
Since I already adressed in my last big post about her differnces in manga and anime, this is going to center around how well her depiction (normally) is in the maga. Don't get me wrong, Anime Balalaika is terrifying as well but the manga in some panels takes it up a notch.
I'll share the specific panels that made me decide to cover this topic anyway.
All of these are terrifying. Legitimately I forgot how brutal the manga panels were in this. I'll go down each one and point out how I think they're effective in their use of envoking fear.
In the first image she is grinning with her teeth bared, and you can see how sharp they are. It's like she's a shark that got the first whiff of blood. Take notice of the man (I honestly forgot his name).
His teeth are depicted as well but there are just two that seem pointy. Even so, they're not as jagged or rigid as hers, in fact they look more blunt, akin to a prey animal.
Honestly her lipstick makes the whiteness of her canines pop out more and I'm wondering if she actually even thought of the tactical advantadge it gives in terms of intimidation. Probabaly not, but hey, let me headcanon here. I would assume she chose pink since it's more natural yet it still pops. And I'm not sure how well the red lipstick would go with her red suit, which would obviosuly be a lot duller due to its fabric.
Anyway, both her and the man's eyes are not shown. I'm not an artist but it's very important here and I think I can explain why.
Eyes are the window to the soul. Or at least the most reliable way to know what emotions someone is feeling. You can't quite fake a look if your eyes stay the same. So by removing the access to emotions, it acts as a blocking point. We don't see their eyes, therefore we can't really see the extent of what they're feeling. We can only assume or place ourselves in the situation to guess what emotions might be present.
A good refernce would be the monster under the bed. You don't know what it looks like, but you use all experience or imagination possible to create one that will scare you. So by not seeing Balalaika's eyes or his, we can only conjure up worse images than what could actually be presently there.
Eyes are also what most classical artists use to convey pain. Here are the most notable examples.
We literally cannot even comprehend the type of pain this poor man is in. Ok, maybe not that much but choosing to limit the pain to the rest of his face does hide whatever expression he is making. Even so, there's not a whole lot to accurately measure his pain. There is only his teeth, grinding in pain, and blood. Not a whole lot to go off of.
But one notable detail is his feet. They are not touching the ground. In fact, he is actvely trying to stop himself from choking to death in her grip. Also, her heels make her considerably taller since his feet appear to be sliding against the ground. He's probabaly only a couple of inches off the ground but consider Balalaika.
She's 5'10, only wearing heels, already disarmed him with her back turned, and during this entire exchange with Rock is holding him steadily above the ground. That may not mean much but to me it's a lot.
He is a full grown man. The estimated average height for Japanese males is 5'7 and their weight is 138lbs.
Need I remind you that she kept this man up so he was actively choking, and still was able to snap Rock around onto a car hood with one hand.
This guy is fucking dying and she's not breaking a sweat. (Queen behavior tbh)
Onto the second panel. I want to focus on Balalaika's face. Her eyes have an emotion I can't find the word for. Playfulness I guess? Or some type of manic state of power or happiness. You can just tell by her raised brow and the slant of her eyes that she's just toying with Rock here. It's all a display of her raw strength.
The next panel is worse in my opinion. Her entire scarred side is blacked out. Sickingly, her right eye looks more like a socket since the scar overlaps it. And the blackness of her suit makes her look like some grim reaper. Overall, I'm scared shitless.
Yet the final image was the last straw for me.
That look from her, the solid stare that is directed at Rock (the audience in effect) is terrible. She doesn't have the same joy from the prebvious panels. That could be due to her mouth being hidden but it's one of rage and suffering. Look back to the classical depictions of eyes. Looks a bit similar, right?
Also, personally the one that looks the most alike is the Fallen Angel by Alexandre Cabanel. Which to me is so ironic that it's sad.
Another sad thing is that the pupil size in the last panel, or specifically in the right/scarred eye can be a result of the scarring. Which to me seems to be affected a lot under bright light or is just permanetely damaged in that imitation state that pupils do when introduced to it. I would say the former, just to fit another headcanon neatly; her office only holds seemingly softer lights, notably the orange/yellow one on her desk.
Finally, the worst and most important fact is that in these panels Balalaika admits it's been a while since she's done hand to hand combat. What?! She just took an armed man down and she's not even at her peak soldier state. As Boris says, playing mafia does dull the senses.
So yeah. Rememember that we have literally never seen Balalalaika attempt to be as physically pro-active as Roberta. She hasn't had a reason too. It's just jaw-dropping to think what Balalaika's true combat prowess is since we've only seen glimpses of it. Better yet, how good was she as a sniper to get her nickname?
Only our imagination can help us there, but considering the feats of Roberta Balalaika's sniper shots must be inhuman.
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on that note, if you were going to rewrite the sisters/write a similar group, what sort of approach would you take? ( planning on doing something like that if the motivation gods bless me)
i've made some big changes for the sisters for my beanie blog (pspspsps @askwcbean) but I think it really depends on the group you're trying to create. I wanted to keep the Sisters as a sustainable, self-growing group but keep some of the flaws (their strong sense of a gender binary). I don't want to make a utopian society out of spite, but I do want to make a society that could reasonably survive. Soooo (a combo of my ideas & stealing from others):
my collection of bullet point ramblings under the cut
The Sisters are very open to those willing to join and learn. They are a collection of loners, rogues, and kittypets. Not only does this keep our bloodlines less janked up, but it makes sense as to why the group can keep a reasonable amount of cats - they aren't closed off like the clans.
They'll often adopt abandoned kits, cats who are in bad situations, and generally anyone who is willing to learn and work with the group. This is a group that relies on diplomacy and good relations with others, they should be very open to outsiders.
Get rid of the super special bloodline thing. It's both a personal and practical thing, it doesn't work for a group like this. Have being able to see spirits be something you can be taught
I'm not giving Tree super special ghost powers. Sorry, I'm going to forever make fun of his novella it's so fucking stupid. He can see ghosts and has a heightened sensitivity to them, but it takes multiple Sisters and Brothers to be able to summon ghosts into views.
Keep the "Mother" kittypet origin story.
But how do they function? Well, the Sisters seem to operate a fairly small group, it doesn't really make sense to me for them to need a centralized structure. So, going for a decentralized system in the Sisters, power is distributed across the group and there is an emphasis on teamwork and decision making on all parts.
Choosing representatives for when meeting new groups tends to fall on reputation, charisma, and experience. Moonlight was chosen for these reasons, but she does not control the entirety of the group, though cats will lean on her words when she gives advice. She doesn't have legitimate power like a Clan leader, she relies on social influence and respect. Her word isn't law, but she does carry some weight due to her experience.
The Sisters have a fairly strong gender binary: Brothers, Sisters, Mothers, Fathers. You can be one or the other, they'll try to work around those who feel they don't fit for either role....but it doesn't always work out. I lean towards this not being decided by agab, you can shift from Brother to Sister and vice versa, it's those cats that don't exist in that binary who may feel out of place (but this is a wip idea and I want to tweak it more before i commit. i know for sure that Bean is one of those cats who doesn't want to fit this binary and is why she left to take up a "Brother" role despite not seeing herself as a Brother. I don't want them to treat them poorly, though it can happen, but that there's a lot of...reluctance to try and expand their ideas for these cats).
Toms don't get kicked out as babies. It's dumb, sorry everyone who likes that. There's no real logic to it besides a very half-assed attempt at trying to expand on the Sisters beliefs and even then, a kid with no training would get the shit kicked out of him by the wilderness lol
So, Brothers are socialized and trained on how to survive on their own. They're given information on medical herbs, hunting and gathering skills, best material to build dens and where to find a makeshift one in case of an emergency. Once again, this is not suddenly thrust upon them, they are socialized, this is something that they are believed to be as completely natural and an expectation for them.
When they are sufficiently deemed to be ready, the Brother is sent out to find a territory. They just don't just wander around (because I mean...the Sisters fill that role. They're nomadic). This is where I am yoinking a bit from others (notably bonefall's take on them), these territories act as base camps for the Sisters during their travels when they need to restock on herb supplies, have an injured or pregnant member, young kits, etc. That's why it's so important to them to have as many wide varieties of camps across their travels, and it's why Tree and Moonlight have some tension upon their meeting.
Boy picked a bad territory in their opinion, but in his defense, he didn't pick it for the Sisters. My base idea for these is Tree had a bad bad outing, but it needs work. I'll keep their strained relationship, but I'd like a little more depth to it just than the Erins beloved eeeeevvuuuulll mommmmyyyy (sooo scary!).
The Sisters believe they have a duty to help put spirits to rest, as well as help more malevolent ones find peace in the afterlife. They help with hauntings, lingering spirits, malicious spirits, etc.
They work in groups! The more malicious the spirit, the more Sisters it will take to pacify them and eventually release them from whatever is trapping them to the mortal plane.
Annnd so far that's what I've got! I have some more spirit lore over on my Bean blog, but this has been my working ideas for the Sisters themselves. Hope it helps :D
#deer rambles#new lore just dropped on the beanie blog :3c#okay i'll stop advertising it i prommy#but yeah! i feel like the sisters are fairly easy to fix#and i don't mind keeping their flawed sense of gender#it makes them interesting and it provides good conflict when focusing on them#besides. if ur gonna criticize them how about we criticize how the books keep positing motherhood as every she-cat's destiny
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💚💖les mis
💚: What does everyone else get wrong about your favorite character?
i sincerely hope people have gotten better with this since i was truly active in the fandom but ohhh my god the 2013-15ish trend of treating marius like a completely incompetent goofball. this would reliably send 16-17 year old me into an absolute blind rage i'd be fucking crytyping in my fury like HE PASSED THE BAR EXAM HE TAUGHT HIMSELF MULTIPLE LANGUAGES STOP ACTING LIKE HE'S STUPID JUST BECAUSE HE'S NOT VERY SOCIALLY COMPETENT anyway i stopped typing in the middle of writing that ^ because i just Realised. the autism...
💖: What is your biggest unpopular opinion about the series?
opinion about the Work Itself - i still do not get why people went sooo hard dunking on specifically russell crowe's performance in les mis 2012. i liked his acting very much. yes his vocals weren't fantastic but come on. if we've got to choose an enemy here we should be focusing on hugh jackman's high notes in bring him home. crowe was just underwhelming jackman was actively grating to me
opinion about The Fandom... i've said it before & will say it again but i genuinely think the collective modern au fanon that overtook this fandom as the movie blew up on here genuinely completely ruined the les mis fandom as a whole and at this point i'm frankly not entirely sure if it can be fixed. as someone who'd been in les mis fandom for a few years prior to that point (first on livejournal/abaisse/deviantart with the old guard, then moving over to lurk on tumblr in the 6 months or so before the movie came out) it legitimately felt like watching an invasive species get introduced and wreck the biodiversity of an entire ecosystem. like i sometimes fantasise about writing One Good Fanfiction that will remind people that actually diversity of headcanons/ship combos/etc is Good For The Fandom but then i realise how few people will probably even bother to read it at this point if it's not the same fucking combo of bland completely ooc enjoltaire and whatever background ships we've all collectively decided to bat for this year & i think. it is simply not worth my time or effort to be perfectly honest
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Today I think I made a pretty big step in my transition. I have no idea how long this is gonna be but I just wanna get my thoughts out somewhere.
So I've been up since 6, drove to training at the airport 2 hours away and then back. The original plan was to head straight to my therapy appointment since it's off the same highway I use to get home, just a farther exit. But on the way home I was feeling kinda numb and tired and I was gonna be uber early to my appointment so I decided to head home first. I think that decision was important.
Now, instead of being in my flight uniform all fancy masc and hollow I went home and center myself, dressed up a little (it's really alot but AHHHH) in some pants and the first fem shirt I've ever bought from a very femmie / woman's clothing store. On my own might I add! I only got it a few days ago and did NOT think I'd wear it so soon.
Now I'm sitting on a bench waiting for my appointment in 20 minutes. It's pretty, it's beautiful out and I feel so fucking good. Nervous, but good.
The first time I've been out and about seriously fem and not just within my neighborhood. I wanna scream and cry good god.
There's flowers beside me and a bunch of construction which feels very accurate to what I'm doing rn. Pretty (flowers) but changing and building (construction).
I think I realized today that I don't believe in destiny. There have been so many points in my life where I've felt like I've been at a crossroads. Choosing to change school in grade 6, leaving french emersion, the highschool I went to, getting into aviation and leaving home for another city during covid, and today. Today I decided it was better to feel like me than it was to feel comfortable. Fuck. I'm really me today.
After going through a brake up at the beginning of this month (and still kinda going through it still lol), I've done a fuck ton of growing and it HURTS. Like legitimately painful, but I wouldn't be here today if it hadn't happened. So to all the memories that hurt, fuck you, but thank you.
Okay this could go on forever but I love you all and thank you for being such a funny happy place for me. I mean it with my whole heart, thank you💜
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Okay but like- what if Bella fucking fell hopelessly in love with Carlisle after meeting him in the hospital for the first time? XD
Oh no.
Carlisle Chooses Not to Notice
He's tending to Bella, she's looking at him with stars in her eyes, she very clearly finds him attractive but he's been here before. This happens to Carlisle often, (hell, even with his own wife) and it's not something he pays much mind to or even comments on.
It's a little inconvenient and awkward that this is the girl Edward keeps almost eating but he doesn't expect to ever run into Bella Swan again.
He goes about his routine as normal.
And then, of course, Edward decides he's in love with Bella. (Well, Alice decides it, Edward later agrees.)
Carlisle Chooses Not to Notice (Again)
He has no idea what the fuck is going on with Edward and is far more concerned about that. At this point, Bella's feelings, whatever they are, aren't even on the radar. What Carlisle does know is that Edward is a clear danger to Bella Swan and Edward has been acting insane for the past few weeks.
This goes by for a while (unbeknownst to Carlisle, Bella's been asking all sorts of questions to Edward about his dad. Edward doesn't realize this is a bad sign because "yes, Carlisle is amazing and we are all unworthy of him and his beautiful face")
Bella and Edward's relationship somehow progresses despite Bella not actually being into Edward. This, in fact, helps as Edward pointedly does not want to be in a relationship with a girl who is in any way interested in him. Edward saves her in Port Angeles, Bella tells him she's found out his family are vampires ("And wow, Edward, your vampire doctor dad sounds so amazing"), they go to the meadow where Edwrad confesses he wants to eat her (but his dad doesn't because Carlisle's that amazing).
The underpinning of the pair's relationship becomes their mutual infatuation with the entirely oblivious Carlisle Cullen, who has no idea this is happening. Where, in some other world, they talked about lions and lambs they now say, "You're totally a lion, Edward, but your dad is like a lion who has gone to therapy to be a lamb."
It's weird.
And then Carlisle gets roped back in.
Edward wants Bella to visit the house and tells his family, hours before, THAT HE'S IN LOVE DAMMIT!
This proceeds much like canon up until the point Bella actually enters the house.
The Tour from Hell
Carlisle thought he'd just stand on the stairwell with Esme, holding her back from eating Bella, and then off Edward would go to talk about fuck all with Bella Swan. The human suddenly in his house.
This whole thing has been weird but at least Edward's happy?
Instead, the pair stop in front of him.
"Can I help you?" Carlisle asks.
Edward explains that Bella asked, specifically, for Carlisle to give a tour of the house and talk about their family history. See, Edward thinks this is reasonable as Carlisle was there the longest (and can then talk about how amazing Edward and Carlisle are).
Bella asked because this is the only legitimate venue she can have to talk to a married vampire, and she needs to imprint the sound of his voice in her memory. (Bella cries herself to sleep every night because Carlisle is married, Edward thinks it's perfectly natural that her dreams are filled with her screaming, "CARLISLE! I LOVE YOU!" in agony)
Carlisle finds this weird, he'd have thought Bella would be intimidated or she'd want to be alone with Edward, or she'd want to hear all this from Edward. However, he doesn't want to ruin his son's chance at a relationship so he agrees. Esme is sent outside to not eat Bella and Carlisle walks them through the house.
Where he gets increasingly weirded out as Bella keeps asking about him and.. skipping over Edward.
Carlisle tries to discuss Edward's mother, turning Edward, and Bella goes, "uh huh, yeah, Edward, that's great. Can we talk more about what you were doing for the previous century?"
Bella, in fact, keeps looking at him and barely even glances at Edward (for all that Edward is happily smiling at them both, perfectly content that his wonderful Bella and wonderful Carlisle are hitting it off so well).
The alarm bells are going off in Carlisle's head.
It also gets very awkward as Carlisle's not sure if he's supposed to talk about Edward having run away to eat criminals or not.
The tour ends and Carlisle's very grateful. Then he's less grateful when Edward announces that he's going to invite Bella to baseball the next chance they get.
James and the Gang and it All Goes Downhill
James happens.
This time, though, Bella insists that she go with Carlisle to protect her. Edward, in a state of panic and rage, agrees as Carlisle will both protect her the best and this allows him to go full Batman without Bella watching him become Vengence.
Carlisle would really rather not but... okay.
Because of this, they don't go to Phoenix, as that's a stupid plan. They go to the middle of fucking nowhere in the wilderness instead. There, Carlisle and Bella get far too much alone time.
Bella tells him she's alright dying because she got to meet his wonderful family. She'll be a ditch digger who once had a wonderful day!
Carlisle points out that she means Edward, she got to meet Edward.
"Yeah, sure, whatever," Bella says.
Carlisle doesn't want to ask, but he must. What does Bella even like about Edward?
Bella, realizing that Carlisle will never go for her because he's married (and this is part of the reason she likes him) blathers through a ridiculous lie of how she's totally into Edward. Totally.
She ends up describing Carlisle's features and vampirism as the reason she likes Edward.
"That sounds nothing like Edward," Carlisle thinks to himself, but he doesn't dare say it.
Eventually, Carlisle is told by Alice that the only way to end this game is if Bella's turned. Edward really really really doesn't want to do that, (and Carlisle really really really doesn't want to do it either for a lot of reasons), but this isn't the ballet studio with James dying and Bella dead.
He's putting his entire family at risk, Bella's entire family, by not turning her when she's insisting she wants to. Of course, Edward will also never forgive him and he just knows their relationship isn't going to work out.
I imagine as the hunt goes on, he has no choice, and he does it.
Bella and Edward Get Married
Edward, of course, is inconsolable but he can't bring himself to blame Carlisle. In this case, destroying Bella would be destroying her sacrifice to save his family. So he puts on a brave face and continues their relationship.
Bella, now only allowed to be in the family if she continues her relationship with Edward/doesn't act like a homewrecker, pounces on this.
Carlisle just tries and fails to smile and hopes he's wrong about everything.
#twilight#twilight meta#twilight headcanon#twilight renaissance#twilight shipping#bella swan#edward cullen#carlisle cullen#edward/bella#carlisle/bella#meta#headcanon#opinion#shipping
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Until it Sleeps
Tony Stark x OFC Soulmate AU
(Metallica Really? Part 8)
Summary: The aftermath of the Battle of New York
Warnings: Mentions of violence, cursing
Word Count: 2.3k
A/N: Sorry that it took literally a year for me to get this out. Writer’s block and having kids is no joke.
Masterlist
Previous / Next
Tony ended up being in the hospital at the tower for one more day before he demanded to be let out. Stating that it wasn’t like he died or anything. You took a deep breath trying to calm down the tempest that was your emotions before deciding, screw it and letting him have it.
“Actually,” you state your teeth and fists clenched trying to reign in your frustration, “you did die Tony. Your heart legitimately stopped, we still aren’t sure how long it was stopped but we know, for a fact, that your heart stopped. You were dead Tony, I saw you die, and yet here you are in all your arrogance stating that it wasn’t that bad. Well, dying may have been fine for you Anthony Stark but I don’t know what I would have done if the Hulk hadn’t acted like a giant green monster defibrillator and restarted your heart. You may not care about your health or life but I do dammit.” You take a deep breath turning away from Tony hoping that he didn’t notice the tears in your eyes before excusing yourself to go get a coffee without looking back at him.
You head to the cafe across the street for a coffee and some time alone to calm your racing heart. You also use this time to allow some of the tears that you had been holding back to fall, you have always hated being an angry crying but you can't blame just your anger for these tears. The past couple of days had been some of the hardest most emotionally turbulent since Tony got kidnapped, but at least that time you didn't see him get hurt or die right in front of you. You take another deep breath and allow yourself the time to think about everything that has happened and process all the emotions roiling around. Tony will survive without you in the room long enough for you to calm down and drink your coffee. As you sit in the cafe staring out the window you remember the burning you felt in your mark as his heart stopped. Fuck, you will never be able to forget that feeling and the accompanying sense of dread and despair at the thought of losing your soulmate, of losing Tony. You then begin to wonder when will be the right time to tell him about it, maybe you should just bite the bullet and do it. But if you do that then there is no guarantee that he will believe you and you might just lose him anyway. Wouldn't that be just your luck... no you decide that fate has a plan for it. So, you should wait until his mark shows up since there is no other way that he would believe you.
Deciding to head back to the med level of the tower you also choose to grab Tony a coffee, it would be your way to apologize for yelling at him... even though it was justified. You walk into the room and notice that Tony is still laying in the hospital bed instead of running around like you expected him to be.
“I thought you wanted to get out of bed as quickly as possible,” you state wondering what could have changed his mind.
“I do,” He answers, with a small shrug not taking his eyes off of you, “but you and the doctor brought up some great points and I have agreed to be released in the morning on the condition that I stay in the Tower for at least a week before going back to California. For observational purposes. But luckily that will also give me time to fix up my suit and start talking to construction companies about fixing up the Tower.” You can see his new suit ideas swirling around in his eyes as well as the pad of paper that he has next to him that is full of building notes and to-dos. You allow yourself to crack a small smile at his antics and roll your eyes. Of course, he would decide to use the time he is being told not to work, to work, not that you were surprised.
“If you are going to spend the time looking for people to help rebuild the tower then maybe you can look at finding ways to help rebuild the rest of New York while you are at it?” You ask while handing him his coffee sitting back down in that stupid uncomfortable chair. You hear him 'hmm' to himself before listing all the pros and cons of your idea under his breath and asking JARVIS to remind him the next day to do just that. Grabbing your tablet you start getting some work done, you send a list of the approved contractors that initially built the tower to Tony, set a reminder to look into clean-up companies for everything left behind after the battle, and last but not least schedule a maid to clean Tony’s California house at the end of the week so that it will be ready from his return.
When Tony leaves at the end of the week to go back to California, you decide to stay in New York for a little longer to make sure that the cleanup team created by Stark Industries is working smoothly. You also want to be available to make sure that there are no snags from the government being the government. Your planned upon two-week deadline flies past and there is still so much work to get done that it ends up being a full month before you are able to make it back to California and Tony.
After landing back in California you decide to stop by Tony’s house first before making your way back to your and Sarah’s apartment. Stepping into his mansion which is still too big but not nearly as clean as usual you realize that Tony might not be as fine as he told you. After searching throughout the house for him you shake your head at your own stupidity and make your way down to his lab, because honestly where else would he be? You find him slumped over a piece of a suit that you had never seen before, fast asleep.
“Oh Tony,” you whisper to yourself before quietly making your way over to him. You crouch down and gently touch his arm and he startles awake flinging his arms out as if to ward off an attack. You take a step back to keep from getting accidentally hit. “Tony!" You call out, trying to get his attention. "Hey, Tony, sweetheart it’s just me Liza” You watch as he seems to shake himself out of his half-asleep state and try to focus on you.
“Liza?" he croaks out trying to get his eyes to focus. "You’re back?” Your heart breaks a little at the uncertainty in his voice.
“Of course, I’m back," you say crouching back down next to him. "I'm sorry it took a little longer than planned but I was always going to come back to California.” You try to keep your concern for his current state out of your voice as you talk to him, slowly reaching for his arm. “Ok Tony, let's get you in bed to sleep.” You gently pull on his arm to get him to start standing up with you but he pulls back out of your grip and looks at you wildly.
“No!" His voice is loud in your ears as he starts to ramble. "I can’t sleep I have to keep everyone safe, I have to make sure that everyone is safe..” He keeps murmuring about keeping people safe as he turns back to what he was working on before he fell asleep. You place your hands softly on his cheeks and slowly get him to turn his face to look back at you.
“Tony," you state leaving no place for argument, "it is not your job to keep everyone safe, you can’t possibly keep everyone safe.” He cuts you off with his pleading reply.
“But I have to keep you safe, you have to be safe,” His eyes have taken back on the wild look as if he is desperate for you to understand. “You have to be safe. You and Sarah and Rhodey. It’s my job to keep you safe.”
You start to gently rub your thumbs over his cheekbones trying to calm him down while keeping eye contact with him. As his rambling begins to taper off you are able to speak to him again. “Sweetheart, we are safe, I’m here with you, I’m safe.” You place his fingers over your pulse point, “Focus on what you feel, feel my pulse?” you wait until he nods before continuing. “Focus on my pulse, see I’m ok, I’m healthy and here, and you don’t have to worry about me right now.” You watch as the tension begins to leave his stance as he is able to pull himself back from his panic. Once you can tell he’s back and doing ok you are able to convince him to get some sleep, since, going by the size of the bags under his eyes, he hasn’t been sleeping much. You walk with him to his room and help get him into bed, before he is willing to let himself rest he makes you promise that you won’t leave while he’s asleep. You promise and once his breathing even out you begin looking at options for a therapist, knowing that you would never force him to go but you would still suggest it, maybe you could talk to them too.
About an hour into his nap, Tony starts to whimper and move around, you reach over and grasp his hand giving it a squeeze so that he knows you are still there and he clams back down. About thirty minutes later he starts to thrash around and just holding his hand isn’t helping anymore. So you do the only thing that you can think of, You crawl into the bed next to him and pull him against you. Tony’s arms immediately wrap around you and pull you as close to him as he can before he takes a couple of deep breaths and relaxes back into sleep. You debate if there is any way for you to get back out of the bed without waking Tony back up but quickly conclude that it isn’t an option. Instead, you let yourself relax against him and lay your arm over him, it isn’t long before sleep takes you too.
Waking up in the morning you are a little confused since you are warmer than normal and there is a weight over your back and your pillow is moving. Then your pillow starts talking… "Well," you hear Tony's voice rumble through his chest, "this isn't how I expected to wake up but I'm definitely not complaining." You can mentally see the smirk on his face as he spoke and your eyes widen. You quickly push yourself off of your boss and out of the bed.
"Oh Shit, I'm sorry you were having a nightmare and it was the only thing I could think of to help.” You start to panic and can't get yourself to stop talking and apologizing until Tony cuts off your detrimental tirade and smiles at you.
“Liza, thank you.” He says, stopping you in the middle of your sentence, shocked.
“Thank you?” you repeat, “Wha, wh, Thank you?” Tony smiles even more at your confusion.
“Yes Liza, thank you. That was the best sleep I’ve had in a month, it's daylight outside so that means I actually slept all night. So yes Liza, thank you.”
You blink at him a couple of times before slowly nodding and saying you're welcome. You start to move around the room looking for the shoes that you took off before getting into bed and continue to speak. “Well, I should probably be getting to my apartment, Sarah is probably worried since I told her I should have been there yesterday.”
“Oh Liza,” Tony interrupts snapping his fingers like he just remembered something. “You and Sarah don’t have the apartment anymore, I had a house built, one for each of you but if you want to continue living with Sarah at her new house you won’t hurt my feelings.”
You stare at him for a moment completely at a loss. “You, you had a house built for me?” Your confusion is evident in your voice and the look on your face. “Why?” you ask honestly puzzled.
“Why?” Tony parrots, “Because, you are one of the most important people in my life and I don’t want you to ever have to worry about paying rent or making ends meet. I want you to be happy and taken care of.” He states, honesty painted on his face and in his voice.
You continue to stare at him for a little while longer trying to figure out what is going through his head. A smile slowly takes over your face as you stare at the man in front of you. You had always known that there was a softer side to Tony but sometimes he hides it so well. Then of course he had to ruin it.
“I also can’t let people think I don’t take care of my employees especially not those that as close to me. Think of the press I would get for that!” You just snort at his antics before bidding him goodbye and telling him that you would check on him again either later that day or the next. Before you can get out of the room he calls out “Thank you, Liza. Oh, and can you have some Shwarma sent over?”
@graniairish, @freeshavocadoooo
#Avengers#avengers fanfiction#avengers imagine#Tony Stark fanfiction#tony stark x reader#tony stark imagine#Tony Stark x Original Female Character#marvel#marvel imagine#soulmate#soulmate tattoo#soulmate au#ironman#iron man fanfiction#Metallica really?
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I noticed you're still taking prompts and the last fic with Qin Su/Wen Ning had me living, so:
WRH looking at WQL who is very firmly/deceptively but like, still kindly???, doing shit to prevent Qin Su and JZY getting married, and WRH like: "Ohhhhh, you *do* have ambition! It's just ... Fucking weird. Well, I can work with that."
And/or WQL being/becoming WRHs heir and everyone being a little ??? about that.
WRH meanwhile like: "he's a little confused but he's got the spirit".
When Wen Ruohan hears that his nephew has kidnapped Jin Zixuan's intended bride and brought her to the Nightless City, he is certain that Xu'er got the news wrong.
"Don't be absurd," he snaps, staring daggers at his son over the rim of his teacup. “How could A-Ning have kidnapped her? The girl is well within her rights to visit whomever she pleases, betrothed or not; and do we not have Qing’er to serve as her chaperone? Those two have been friends for years.”
“But father,” Wen Xu persists, with great, trembling beads of sweat standing out on his forehead like dewdrops. “He and Maiden Qin are in the ancestral hall now, bowing to Ning-ge’s mother and father! A-Chao saw them!”
Goaded nearly out of his wits, Wen Ruohan rises from his chair and makes his way to the ancestral hall. He expects to find Wen Ning kneeling in the shrine by himself, since his nephew often visits the place to make offerings to his late parents; but to his astonishment, it is exactly as Wen Xu told him.
Qin Su is kneeling at Wen Ning’s side, lighting a stick of incense for Wen Ruohan’s sister-in-law; and at the sight of their joined hands, A-Xu lets out a defeated groan and sidles back towards the door.
Wen Ruohan reaches out and catches him by the scruff of his robes. “A-Ning,” he says pleasantly, as Wen Xu straightens up and corrects his posture before bowing and taking his leave. “Would you care to explain what you and Qin-guniang are doing here?”
“We are married, Shufu,” Wen Ning replies, meeting Wen Ruohan’s gaze without so much as a flicker of fear. “I am Wen-zongzhu now, and it is my right—and duty—to wed as I see fit. I have chosen Qin Su, and now we are husband and wife.”
“I do not object to that,” Wen Ruohan points out, “but why must you choose a betrothed woman? It will make trouble with the rest of the jianghu, though I do hope my new daughter-in-law agreed to your union.” He narrows his eyes. “Maiden Qin, were you truly kidnapped?”
Qin Su laughs. Her eyes crinkle up at the corners as she smiles, and when the full force of that smile falls upon Wen Ning—well. Wen Ruohan supposes he can rest at ease with the knowledge that this must be a love match, though Wen Ning will likely insist otherwise to the jianghu for the sake of his father-in-law’s reputation.
“No, Uncle,” she says merrily. “I did not want to marry Jin Zixuan. My late mother begged my father not to wed me into that house—it was the only choice she ever made in my upbringing—and when I fell in love with Wen Ning, I decided to run away with him. I saw no need to break my own heart as well as my father’s old promise to Mother, so here I am.”
“And the marriage is legitimate?” Wen Ruohan demands, turning back to his nephew. “Was it witnessed? Qing’er is still young, and she is your sister. If it was only her, you must perform the wedding rites again.”
“It is legitimate. A-Su and I were first married in Laoling last month with her tangxiong and tangmei in attendance, but she couldn’t leave the Qin estate until the day before yesterday.”
Wen Ruohan pinches the bridge of his nose. Suddenly, it strikes him that his deceased xiongzhang was right about how difficult it was to raise children; for they could be like Wen Chao, bothersome in infancy and mild in young manhood, or else they could be like Wen Ning: filial in their early years, and nothing but trouble after they were grown up.
Qing’er, good girl that she is, has never given Wen Ruohan a moment’s worry. But she has time to grow, and her will is even stronger than her brother’s, so who knows what might happen after Wen Qing becomes a woman in her own right?
“Should we expect Qin Cangye come knocking at our doors?” he says wearily, after the newlyweds rise to their feet and give him a formal greeting. “Or did Qin-guniang run away without letting the poor man know where she was going?”
“We left a note, Shufu. I stamped it with my personal seal, so he should arrive by the day after tomorrow.”
“And I suppose he’ll bring Jin Guangshan with him,” grumbles Wen Ruohan. “Very well. Will you prepare for a siege, Wen-zongzhu?”
Wen Ning blinks, caught off guard by the title; for he has not been Wen-zongzhu for long, and if Wen Ruohan had not forced the boy’s hand by retiring, he would rather have passed his birthright on to Xu’er than bear the responsibility himself.
“No,” he answers, after a beat of silence. “Jin Guangshan betrothed his son to A-Su for shares in my father-in-law’s gold mines. Jin Zixuan does not care for her, so he will not let it come to bloodshed. Besides, even if he wanted to marry A-Su, we are already wed, and the marriage is consummated. We are one; there is nothing he can do.”
“What is more,” Qin Su says quietly, “he and I might be brother and sister.”
This stops Wen Ruohan dead in his tracks. “What?”
“A-Ning and I went to visit one of my mother’s maids before we eloped,” she replies, speaking with some difficulty. “She had not heard of my betrothal to Jin-gongzi, for she left Laoling years before Father signed the engagement contracts—but when she learned that I had been promised to Jin Guangshan’s son, she told me that Jin-zongzhu forced himself on my mother the year before I was born.”
Wen Ruohan blinks.
“This is why you eloped?” he asks, turning back to his nephew. “You have my blessing either way, nephew, but—”
“I wanted to ask Qin Cangye to break her contract with Jin-gongzi, but A-Su wanted to elope from the beginning,” Wen Ning says, lowering his head. “After we met with Bicao-ayi, I knew it would have to be done in secret. A-Su, she—she and her mother were blameless. If there was to be any fault found, I would rather it be with me.”
“The elopement would have been remiss of you, if matters had not been so, but our clan is strong. We can bear it.” Wen Ruohan pats his nephew on the shoulder. “For now, you should rest and tend to your wife. I will deal with Jin Guangshan and Qin Cangye when they come.”
So Wen Ning and Qin Su bow to him once again, kneeling with their brows pressed flat to the ground before departing hand-in-hand. Wen Ruohan remains behind to burn incense for his late brother, and pray for good fortune for his nephew and niece-in-law; and before he leaves, he lights another stick of incense on behalf of the couple’s future children.
And his prayers come to fruit, as all good prayers do; for Qin Su’s first daughter is born ten months later, and her arrival transforms her weeping father into the happiest man in the world.
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17 and/or 18 for writer ask meme, please?
17. Talk to me about the minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me about the lore, the history, the detail, the things that won’t make it in the text.
So glitter and gold started as a prompt response to @garbria, and in the replies to that post we started bouncing ideas and then I realized the idea of a fake dating AU would be hilarious. But I wanted to do a fake dating AU where the issue is not miscommunication, but kind of the opposite. Over communication. And also for the fake dating to have stakes but not the usual fare that comes with a bit of betrayal or hurt.
And I wanted to write a comedy, just something lighthearted and fun, and so the final prompt was: fake dating AU, where Nyx volunteers to be Cor's lover to get Cor out of hot water, but where no one actually believes them, while they go extra hard into it. So now Nyx and Cor have this very complicated story they've sold themselves on, but the people they're trying to con (Regis and Sylvia) have seen through them since day one, and are instead popcorn-gif-ing at the shenanigans.
The fun is the fact they're so well matched and they're very in love with each other but privately doing the song and dance about how much the other likes them and if the other is interested in like... long term relationship, as opposed to the fun back and forth of their con. And like, everyone around them can see the obvious resolution, but they've got hangups and their own stuff to work through.
And then I just keep throwing shit at them because it's fun.
Like, I didn't need to do the worldbuilding for it, but like. Why not? Why not a new world with new rules and new shenanigans? Why not a Cor that's actually a LC and then what that would mean for the world? Why not add an entire massive subplot about magic and the gods and what's going on in the world? It's a brand new romantic comedy about Cor and Nyx and their idiot life choices, written by me, why the hell not.
So there we are, bits and pieces have been shared but I don't want to spoil what's coming. I'm having a lot of fun for it! :D
18. Choose a passage from your writing. Tell me about the backstory of this moment. How you came up with it, how it changed from start to end. Spicy addition: Questioner provides the passage.
So this is an awful passage to choose but I think it's something a lot of people missed? And it's one of my favorite bits of characterization in the sun is out, and how it anchors Cor and shows his connection to Aulea:
Specifically, Cor declaring that he's "decided" on the answer, regardless of what the actual answer is. It's the kind of nonsensical thing you don't really expect from him. He's so solid and composed and generally agreeable. Cor is very chill throughout the sun is out, he makes a point to not get ruffled or angry. And when he is, he's very clear on why he's upset.
So this blindsides Nyx, because the whole fight over Nyx's stasis is very... it's not fun. It hurts and it's awkward and it's a solid mess. But I wanted to highlight that bit, because I wanted to show what Cor is like, when he's pushed into a corner and he's lashing out: and what he is, is basically Aulea. He treats Nyx the same way Aulea treated him, because Aulea is still the measuring stick he uses to figure out the world, and when he encounters something he can't deal with, he legitimately regresses into that dynamic, toxic as it was.
Here's Aulea's version of it:
"I've decided" is the code phrase: it means taking agency from the other and setting the rules and refusing to negotiate. It's deeply, profoundly fucked up. Cor knows, viscerally, how upsetting it is to be on the receiving end of that.
But Nyx has accidentally triggered him and basically set his PTSD on fire without meaning to - Nyx asked him to kill him, or at least try, and Cor thought he was over Aulea, he really did, and then he remembers she asked him to kill her to, in a way, only she didn't have the decency to tell him doing what he did was going to kill her, until he was done, and welp.
Welp.
It's a very vulnerable moment, for Cor, it's the closest to shattering Cor has been in the entire series. And I love that Nyx snarls and hisses and doesn't bend to it, not the way Cor did to Aulea, when she did it to him. If Prompto hadn't been hurt, they'd have been in a very precarious situation, but Prompto being hurt reminded them both, viscerally, that they're in it together, and therefore allowed them to put their feelings on hold until they were sure their son was fine. That reminded them of their priorities and the larger picture and allowed the feelings to soften somewhat.
Without that buffer, though? Oh, they would have fought horribly and possibly split up for a while before they cooled down and figured out how to reconcile, but it would have been fairly painful, because they're in the space where they'd be saying things they probably don't really mean, but they're hurt and triggered and frothing about it.
It's such a big thing for them to survive, together, that everything that comes after is just "I mean, we survived that, anything else is child's play." I had a tremendous amount of fun mapping out that fight. :D
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Which Disney movie do you consider overrated? (Pixar counts)
Peter Pan from 1953. And I'm gonna choose violence here. Skip this post if this is your favourite film.
The most glaring problem with that film is of course the racist depiction of Native American tribes. Sadly, a film can be technically well made while also being racist, so it's not the racism part that makes me think that this film sucks from an entire film making standpoint.
It's the depiction of Hook, and to an extent, Peter Pan. In the original story, Peter Pan represents childhood, but also immaturity, while Hook represents adulthood and all the shit that follows it. While Hook is more of a villainous character, he's not the villain of the story, while Peter Pan is not the absolute hero protagonist and paragon of virtue of the story. He's also pretty fucked up. Pan and Hook are symbols, and of opposite sides to boot, and that's why they're antagonists in the story. Wendy is a character, learning about both and in the end pretty much choosing neither.
So Disney took that and turned it into a black-and-white hero vs villain story while forgetting that the original is about Wendy learning what growing up is all about.
Hook is turned into a caricature of a villain while also being mocked for having a very legitimate fear of an animal that wants to eat him. I don't know, maybe it's because I don't have childhood nostalgia for this film, I first watched it when I was like 14 and I was like dafuq did I just watch. Like I was legitimately cringing and feeling bad that Hook was being made fun of. Phobias and trauma-related fears are no laughing matter.
And look - I'm not saying you can't have a villain who is comical. Cruella de Vil from 101 Dalmatians, which came out a few years after Peter Pan, is also a comical villain... but she's not a ridicule. Roger may make a song mocking her, but it's more of a dark humor song going like "She's the devil and she will eat you alive O_O but not really" while Peter Pan went like "LOL Hook is afraid of an animal that ate his hand and now wants to eat the rest of him he's such a coward LOL!" And no, I don't think it's fair to see a man who's willing to kill children in cold blood and to try and bring him down by laughing at a very rational fear he has. If it was used as a weapon against him and taken seriously - like the Lost Boys or Pan calling upon the crocodile so that Hook will panic and they can escape - it would have been a cool, albeit a little dark (though not too dark for Disney, especially for that era) idea, though not uncalled for compared to what Hook does. But no they just lol about it. It's hideous.
And in general I find that version of Pan unlikable, super annoying and an immature brat - which is funny because that's what Pan is supposed to be in the original story! He's meant to present to Wendy the "bad" sides of staying a kid forever. But Disney just presents him as a hero who learns from his mistakes like NO BITCH the whole point is that Pan doesn't grow up! He doesn't grow more mature and he's NOWHERE near being a person to look up to.
I agree that it's an iconic film but when you actually tear it down it's insulting to people with phobias and/or traumas, poorly translated from the source material, shallow as fuck, and also racist. 0/10 probably the only good thing that came out of it was whatever money the mouse decided to give to Great Ormond Street Hospital for using the rights to Peter and Wendy. (If you don't know what that is, J. M. Barrie, the author of the book and original theater play, gave the rights to the aforementioned hospital so any production getting the rights to make any production of it would essentially pay the hospital, which is a cool af idea. I think that right-holding reached its end a couple years ago and lo and behold what did the mouse do? A live action Peter Pan film :)
#I am not normal about this (derogatory)#lentachorum#ask and ye shall receive#nette chooses violence
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