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notsoheadless · 3 years

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Remember Longcat, Jane? I remember Longcat. Fuck the picture on this page, I want to talk about Longcat. Memes were simpler back then, in 2006. They stood for something. And that something was nothing. Memes just were. “Longcat is long.” An undeniably true, self-reflexive statement. Water is wet, fire is hot, Longcat is long. Memes were floating signifiers without signifieds, meaningful in their meaninglessness. Nobody made memes, they just arose through spontaneous generation; Athena being birthed, fully formed, from her own skull. You could talk about them around the proverbial water cooler, taking comfort in their absurdity. “Hey, Johnston, have you seen the picture of that cat? They call it Longcat because it’s long!” “Ha ha, sounds like good fun, Stevenson! That reminds me, I need to show you this webpage I found the other day; it contains numerous animated dancing hamsters. It’s called — you’ll never believe this — hamsterdance!” And then Johnston and Stevenson went on to have a wonderful friendship based on the comfortable banality of self-evident digitized animals. But then 2007 came, and along with it came I Can Has, and everything was forever ruined. It was hubris, Jane. We did it to ourselves. The minute we added written language beyond the reflexive, it all went to shit. Suddenly memes had an excess of information to be parsed. It wasn’t just a picture of a cat, perhaps with a simple description appended to it; now the cat spoke to us via a written caption on the picture itself. It referred to an item of food that existed in our world but not in the world of the meme, rupturing the boundary between the two. The cat wanted something. Which forced us to recognize that what it wanted was us, was our attention. WE are the cheezburger, Jane, and we always were. But by the time we realized this, it was too late. We were slaves to the very memes that we had created. We toiled to earn the privilege of being distracted by them. They fiddled while Rome burned, and we threw ourselves into the fire so that we might listen to the music. The memes had us. Or, rather, they could has us. And it just got worse from there. Soon the cats had invisible bicycles and played keyboards. They gained complex identities, and so we hollowed out our own identities to accommodate them. We prayed to return to the simple days when we would admire a cat for its exceptional length alone, the days when the cat itself was the meme and not merely a vehicle for the complex memetic text. And the fact that this text was so sparse, informal, and broken ironically made it even more demanding. The intentional grammatical and syntactical flaws drew attention to themselves, making the meme even more about the captioning words and less about the pictures. Words, words, words. Wurds werds wordz. Stumbling through a crooked, dead-end hallway of a mangled clause describing a simple feline sentiment was a torture that we inflicted on ourselves daily. Let’s not forget where the word “caption” itself comes from: capio, Latin for both “I understand” and “I capture.” We thought that by captioning the memes, we were understanding them. Instead, our captions allowed them to capture us. The memes that had once been a cure for our cultural ills were now the illness itself. It goes right back to the Phaedrus, really. Think about it. Back in the innocent days of 2006, we naïvely thought that the grapheme had subjugated the phoneme, that the belief in the primacy of the spoken word was an ancient and backwards folly on par with burning witches or practicing phrenology or thinking that Smash Mouth was good. Fucking Smash Mouth. But we were wrong. About the phoneme, I mean. Theuth came to us again, this time in the guise of a grinning grey cat. The cat hungered, and so did Theuth. He offered us an updated choice, and we greedily took it, oblivious to the consequences. To borrow the parlance of a contemporary meme, he baked us a pharmakon, and we eated it. Pharmakon, φάρμακον, the Greek word that means both “poison” and “cure,” but, because of the

limitations of the English language, can only be translated one way or the other depending on the context and the translator’s whims. No possible translation can capture the full implications of a Greek text including this word. In the Phaedrus, writing is the pharmakon that the trickster god Theuth offers, the toxin and remedy in one. With writing, man will no longer forget; but he will also no longer think. A double-edged (s)word, if you will. But the new iteration of the pharmakon is the meme. Specifically, the post-I-Can-Has memescape of 2007 onward. And it was the language that did it, Jane. The addition of written language twisted the remedy into a poison, flipped the pharmakon on its invisible axis. In retrospect, it was in front of our eyes all along. Meme. The noxious word was given to us by who else but those wily ancient Greeks themselves. μίμημα, or mīmēma. Defined as an imitation, a copy. The exact thing Plato warned us against in the Republic. Remember? The simulacrum that is two steps removed from the perfection of the original by the process of — note the root of the word — mimesis. The Platonic ideal of an object is the source: the father, the sun, the ghostly whole. The corporeal manifestation of the object is one step removed from perfection. The image of the object (be it in letters or in pigments) is two steps removed. The author is inferior to the craftsman is inferior to God. Fuck, out of space. Okay, the illustration on page 46 is fucking useless; I’ll see you there. (21) But we’ll go farther than Plato. Longcat, a photograph, is a textbook example of a second-degree mimesis. (We might promote it to the third degree since the image on the internet is a digital copy of the original photograph of the physical cat which is itself a copy of Platonic ideal of a cat (the Godcat, if you will); but this line of thought doesn’t change anything in the argument.) The text-supplemented meme, on the other hand, the captioned cat, is at an infinite remove from the Godcat, the ultimate mimesis, copying the copy of itself eternally, the written language and the image echoing off each other, until it finally loops back around to the truth by virtue of being so far from it. It becomes its own truth, the fidelity of the eternal copy. It becomes a God. Writing itself is the archetypical pharmakon and the archetypical copy, if you’ll come back with me to the Phaedrus (if we ever really left it). Speech is the real deal, Socrates says, with a smug little wink to his (written) dialogic buddy. Speech is alive, it can defend itself, it can adapt and change. Writing is its bastard son, the mimic, the dead, rigid simulacrum. Writing is a copy, a mīmēma, of truth in speech. To return to our analogous issue: the image of the cheezburger cat, the copy of the picture-copy-copy, is so much closer to the original Platonic ideal than the written language that accompanies it. (“Pharmakon” can also mean “paint.” Think about it, Jane. Just think about it.) The image is still fake, but it’s the caption on the cat that is the downfall of the republic, the real fakeness, which is both realer and faker than whatever original it is that it represents. Men and gods abhor the lie, Plato says in sections 382 a and b of the Republic. οὐκ οἶσθα, ἦν δ᾽ ἐγώ, ὅτι τό γε ὡς ἀληθῶς ψεῦδος, εἰ οἷόν τε τοῦτο εἰπεῖν, πάντες θεοί τε καὶ ἄνθρωποι μισοῦσιν; πῶς, ἔφη, λέγεις; οὕτως, ἦν δ᾽ ἐγώ, ὅτι τῷ κυριωτάτῳ που ἑαυτῶν ψεύδεσθαι καὶ περὶ τὰ κυριώτατα οὐδεὶς ἑκὼν ἐθέλει, ἀλλὰ πάντων μάλιστα φοβεῖται ἐκεῖ αὐτὸ κεκτῆσθαι. “Don’t you know,” said I, “that the veritable lie, if the expression is permissible, is a thing that all gods and men abhor?” “What do you mean?” he said. “This,” said I, “that falsehood in the most vital part of themselves, and about their most vital concerns, is something that no one willingly accepts, but it is there above all that everyone fears it.” Man’s worst fear is that he will hold existential falsehood within himself. And the verbal lies that he tells are a copy of this feared dishonesty in the soul.

Plato goes on to elaborate: “the falsehood in words is a copy of the affection in the soul, an after-rising image of it and not an altogether unmixed falsehood.” A copy of man’s false internal copy of truth. And what word does Plato use for “copy” in this sentence? That’s fucking right, μίμημα. Mīmēma. Mimesis. Meme. The new meme is a lie, manifested in (written) words, that reflects the lack of truth, the emptiness, within the very soul of a human. The meme is now not only an inferior copy, it is a deceptive copy. But just wait, it gets better. Plato continues in the very next section of the Republic, 382 c. Sometimes, he says, the lie, the meme, is appropriate, even moral. It is not abhorrent to lie to your enemy, or to your friend in order to keep him from harm. “Does it [the lie] not then become useful to avert the evil—as a medicine?” You get one fucking guess for what Greek word is being translated as “medicine” in this passage. Ding ding motherfucking ding, you got it, φάρμακον, pharmakon. The μίμημα is a φάρμακον, the lie is a medicine/poison, the meme is a pharmakon. But I’m sure that by now you’ve realized the (intentional) mistake in my argument that brought us to this point. I said earlier that the addition of written language to the meme flipped the pharmakon on its axis. But the pharmakon didn’t flip, it doesn’t have an axis. It was always both remedy and poison. The fact that this isn’t obvious to us from the very beginning of the discussion is the fault of, you guessed it, language. The initial lie (writing) clouds our vision and keeps us from realizing how false the second-order lie (the meme) is. The very structure of the lying meme mirrors the structure of the written word that defines and corrupts it. Once you try to identify an “outside” in order to reveal the lie, the whole framework turns itself inside-out so that you can never escape it. The cat wants the cheezburger that exists outside the meme, but only through the meme do we become aware of the presumed existence of the cheezburger — we can’t point out the absurdity of the world of the meme without also indicting our own world. We can’t talk about language without language, we can’t meme without mimesis. Memes didn’t change between ‘06 and ‘07, it was us who changed. Or rather, our understanding of what we had always been changed. The lie became truth, the remedy became the poison, the outside became the inside. Which is to say that the truth became lie, the pharmakon was always the remedy and the poison, and the inside retreated further inside. It all came full circle. Because here’s the secret, Jane. Language ruined the meme, yes. But language itself had already been ruined. By that initial poisonous, lying copy. Writing. The First Meme. Language didn’t attack the meme in 2007 out of spite. It attacked it to get revenge. Longcat is long. Language is language. Pharmakon is pharmakon. The phoneme topples the grapheme, witches ride through the night, our skulls hide secret messages on their surfaces, Smash Mouth is good after all. Hey now, you’re an all-star. Get your game on. Go play.

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septiembrre · 3 years

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I'm a little late but I just saw your post from a year ago about latinx rep in good girls and its sad reflecting back on it and how the show could've done better. Rio was just another stereotype, I hate how he was ambitiously latino and there was just no connection to his culture. Was he first, 2nd, or 3rd Gen? If he was 1st Gen it didn't make sense to have the family speak English. One thing that always annoyed me is how OOC he was at times and how the writers purposely made him out to be like some brown aggressive misogynistic man. They didn't bother making him complex. In a way I'm glad the show got canceled. As a Mexican woman the way Rio was written was racist.

Wah, I’ve been sitting on answering your ask. I wanted to tease your ask apart and respond to it sentence by sentence. But... my brain kept rechazandolo, so now I have feelings dump instead.

Since Good Girls ended, I have been parsing through how I feel about S4 and GG overall — sometimes more positively, sometimes more negatively. Then, I flip to reminding myself it’s not that serious (it's just tv! this is supposed to be my leisure activity!). Then, I waffle back to reflecting.

So, no textual analysis just feels and whining under the cut. I know folks are still mourning the end of the show and I don't want to yuck anyone's yum. Tagging with #ggnegativity.

My short answer is that Good Girls is my beloved, sometimes joyful, sometimes hurtful, complicated little show. Even now that we’re no longer getting new episodes I’m wary of sifting through the information we have about Rio because it’s a mess and it seems like a lot of his character was poorly thought out (ahem, all those dumb messages from Bill Krebs confirming multiple instances of lack of intentionality or care!).

I say this because I was tempted to start responding to you by riffing off of your comment with, “y'know, now that you say that, I think he’s third or fourth gen…”, pero who cares? And the point was never specifically about what gen he is, or even more specifically about... lol, I was going to say it doesn't matter what nationality he was, they just needed to pick one. Ugh, but the wording of that is too glib. The lack of intentionality behind these details feels sanitized to me, it feels very white gaze, it feels lazy.

However, I could have forgiven a lot of this weak character construction if his baseline, plot-related characterization on-screen was more consistent. But, Rio was often used as a plot device in a way that often fell flat for me, a weekly recurring bogeyman whether his antagonism made sense or not. On one hand, I feel for the creative team, because I think they were in a hard place, trying to avoid romanticizing Rio, and trying to seemingly backtrack the sexualization of him in Season 2, but... Idk, it's complicated.

Retrospectively, it’s sitting with me how much Good Girls is rooted in whiteness. While it's something I discerned before (lol, most obviously with 2x13 and in S3 with Lucy's disposability), you know how some shows get to their third or fourth season and finally start investing in their marginalized characters? It’s a crappy thing to hold out hope for, they're crumbs! But, I was. And we did get some Rio worldbuilding. But, ultimately, it felt weak to me -- under-conceptualized or under-worked.

For example, I liked Nick as a Bigger Bad who drove Rio and Beth together. I also thought that Nick's non-existent moral code was a lovely foil to Rio's, and that this contrast humanized Rio in a way that he needed. It also cast a new light on Rio's behavior of the earlier seasons, outside of Beth's perception in a way that I thought was healthy and needed. Great, meaty stuff! However, Nick and Rio's relationship came across as shallow to me. There really did not seem to be a lived-in quality to their scenes. The show really struggled with that element overall -- even with the three lead protagonists (their decades-long history with each other and interactions between their families being largely absent). I wonder why they made that choice.

It's strange because on the flip side we got a hefty amount of contextualization for MLM guy Vance and Annie's bf Kevin... Even that cop who Mick killed! All white men, too.

Me da pena.

Or maybe the thing that bothers me is that those scenes between Nick and Rio didn't center Rio's perspective effectively? Despite the one-on-one scenes being outside of Beth's framing (Rio being a secondary character typically tethered to Beth's story arc), there still was a lot of distance between Rio and the viewer? Like I think of Vance in his kitchen with his wife and child, and the way we as viewers were brought into that to empathize with him, and I think of the distance of Nick+Rio boxing scene or the scenes at the bar. Argh! It's hard to pinpoint without the textual analysis I feel too grumpy to do. It was such a narrative choice to keep Rio aloof and I side-eye it.

Anyway --

Overall, the writing room/show creators/decision-makers didn't seem to consider Latine/x/a/o viewers throughout the crafting of Good Girls and that sucks. It really feels like I'm being told to conform to the white gaze in watching the show, and after 2x13 that makes me feel prickly and defensive. A part of me yearns to do a rewatch to map Rio’s character (and inconsistencies) but I still yield joy from Good Girls — it’s been my main comfort story during the pandemic. I also rendered joy from Season 4 specifically — some of those scenes between the leads at the end were phenom!!

I am leaning into what's bringing me joy right now, so I feel hesitant to stew in critique, even while I also feel some sort of need to make sense of the hurtful racializations. I have a compulsion to write them all down on the same post or list -- somewhere where I can see them all at once and understand. But, at the moment, it’s not a use of my time and energy that feels good. Opting into fics and writing is bringing me a lot of joy during hard times.

I have to close with one final whine, that I am SO fatigued with television options right now. I find myself desperately wishing for more TV out there whose priority audience isn't only white folks. Good Girls isn't alone in its treatment of Latinx characters, or alone in mishandling characters of color or gay characters, or prioritization of empathy for white het male characters, but certainly, creating something more thoughtful shouldn't be so hard.

#preguntitas #gg negativity #lol this is basically a long journal post #good girls and latinidad #nbc good girls

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detectivesofty · 3 years

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like fine wine | j.h.

Summary: your first meeting with Jay’s team didn’t go down as you had it expected it to go.

Pairing: Jay Halstead x younger!Reader (this might get more parts (as in a series), if you guys like it)

Song I listened to while writing: Pump It by the Black Eyed Peas

Author’s Note: I legit have no clue how old Jay is (and believe me, I was doing some intense research) so let’s just say he’s in his early thirties (aka 31) for the sake of this fic, okay? Okay. Happy reading!

Warnings: cursing, unusual age gap (??)

Word Count: 2,2k

Requested: yessir

Anonymous asked: Can you write an imagine about the reader being quite a lot younger than jay and the reader overhearing the unit talking about her

“Okay, you can do this,” you muttered to yourself, nervously running a hand through your hair before you walked the rest of the way to Jay’s district, careful not to jostle the baked goods in your hand. The moment you stepped inside the building, you realized that you couldn’t have picked a worse day to visit him though. The station was packed with police officers, civilians and in the middle of the room was the infamous Sergeant Platt, whom you’ve heard a lot about. Intimidated, you approached the desk, smiling shyly at the older woman.

“Hi, I am here for Jay Halstead, my name’s Y/N Y/L/N,” you said but Sergeant Platt barely looked at you as she rifled through a stack of papers.

“Detective Halstead is on a case right now, if you’re here to give a statement, I can redirect you to one of my officers. Officer Elliot!” she called but your eyes widened and you quickly shook your head.

“Oh, no! No, no! I am not here to give a statement,” you quickly said, “Uh, I am Jay’s girlfriend?”

Sergeant Platt paused at that and for the first time she looked you in the face with raised eyebrows. “Oh! Oh. I see, I see.” She eyed you very distinctly, before she cleared her throat, putting the paper stack down. “I’ll check upstairs and see if he’s busy right now. Please just… Wait here?”

You nodded and Sergeant Platt came out of behind the desk and made her way upstairs slowly, while looking back at you several at times. With a sigh, you leaned against the desk, startling when you heard your name being called.

“Y/N!”

“Kim, hey!”

Kim Burgess came up to you with a surprised smile, wrapping an arm around you. “It’s so good to see you! What are you doing here?”

“I know how important the team is to Jay and he always tells me he wants to introduce me, so I thought I’d come by and bring you some bribes,” you answered, bashfully showcasing the baked goods in your arms. “But I probably should have checked in beforehand, Sergeant Platt seemed really irritated at the intrusion.”

With laughter, Kim shook her head. “Nonsense! Don’t mind Platt, she’s always like that. And we always appreciate treats. Come on,” she said, inclining her head. “I’ll bring you up.”

Despite Kim’s reassurance, you felt incredibly nervous walking upstairs to the Intelligence unit. Kim pushed you forward gently, pushing you to introduce yourself, but the team seemed to be deep in a conversation, standing around a desk. Jay was nowhere to be found.

“Y/N Y/L/N, 22. English major at the University of Chicago, trying to live my best life?” a bearded man, sitting at a desk, read out. “I mean, Jay’s not on any of her socials, so there’s no proof of them dating.”

“Guys,” Kim said, trying to make them aware of your arrival, but they were far too deep. Were they looking you up on the internet? This was going to be fun.

“Ha ha Sergeant. Good joke. There’s no way Jay has a girlfriend, least of all her. She is way out of his league. She even has a tattoo.”

“Oh my god.”

“Get it together, Ruzek,” a Latin woman snorted. “You’re still on probation with Kim.”

So that must be Adam, Kim’s on-and-off, currently on, boyfriend.

Sergeant Platt put her hands at her waist, shaking her head. “I am telling you. She introduced herself as Jay’s girlfriend. Why would she lie about that?”

“Maybe she isn’t lying,” a dark skinned man said, shrugging his shoulders. “Jay has been quite secretive recently. Maybe he has a new girlfriend.”

“To be fair, if I were Jay and had a 22 year old girlfriend, I wouldn’t have told me either,” Adam said, leaning back in his chair.

“Yeah because you’re an idiot.” A new voice popped up and Jay suddenly appeared next to you, wrapping an arm around your waist. “Guys, this is my girlfriend Y/N. Babe, this is Adam, Kevin, Hailey, Vanessa, Sergeant Platt and you already know Kim of course.”

“Hey guys,” you said, waving at them with a huge grin and Adam promptly toppled out of his chair, cursing.

“Fuck.”

With a roll of her eyes, Sergeant Platt gave you a acknowledging nod before she went back downstairs. The rest of the team greeted you warm heartedly with hugs, immediately feasting on the food you’ve brought while Hailey held you at an arm’s length, nodding appreciatively at you. “I do not know how you pulled her Jay. She is way out of your league, I stand by my words.”

“Yeah Jay, where’d you guys meet? Was she one of the volunteers at your nursing home?” Adam cackled, which earned him a slap up the head by Kim.

“Told you,” Vanessa mused and Adam only glared at her.

With a laugh, you leaned into Jay. “We met at a coffee shop,” you said, keeping the story short on purpose, but your boyfriend immediately pounced on a chance to tell the story of how you met.

“She poured coffee down my lap!” he added and everyone laughed, while your cheeks tinged pink.

“I didn’t pour coffee down your lap. I knocked a coffee cup into your lap, that’s different.”

Jay rolled his eyes fondly at you. “Semantics,” he said, before launching into the story.

Yawning, you read through the last page of an article and you dotted down some notes before you closed the tab of the article, stretching your arms. You’ve been at the coffee shop for a couple of hours now, trying to catch up with some work. For some reason, you worked the best in a coffee shop. At home, there were too many distractions and the library was just… Too quiet.

A coffee shop was the perfect balance of quiet and loud.

You opened up a new document, feeling ready to begin writing. Grabbing your coffee cup, you realized with a grimace that it was empty. Another coffee then. With your wallet in hand, you walked over to the counter, Clarissa already giving you a smile.

“Another cappuccino?”

“Yes please,” you chuckled. “And perhaps a blueberry muffin?”

“Coming right up.”

“Thanks Clarissa,” you said with a smile, paying before you moved over to the bar stools to wait for your order. You allowed yourself to check out social media, looking up when Clarissa called your name. In a haste, you stuck your phone into your pocket, reaching over the counter to grab the plate, but in the hurry, your hand knocked over a coffee mug and the liquid spilled directly into the lap of a man next to you. The lap of a very gorgeous man.

“Oh crap, I am so sorry,” you quickly apologized as the man jumped up, hissing as the coffee seeped into his jeans.

“It’s fine,” he ground out but judged by the look on his face, it wasn’t fine at all. You grabbed a stack of napkins and started patting down the wet patches on his jeans in a panic, until two large hands wrapped around your wrists, stopping you.

“Would you stop patting down my crotch?” he asked with a hint of a smile and your cheeks got even redder, which you thought was impossible.

“I am so sorry,” you said, straightening back up when you saw the badge around his neck, your eyes widening. He was a cop. Oh god, he wasn’t going to arrest you for touching him inappropriately, was he?

“I am not going to arrest you.”

Fuck, did you just say that outloud?

“Yes,” he answered and you willed the ground to open up and swallow you whole. Meanwhile the cop looked amused and he let go of your hands, taking the remaining napkins to dry himself off. “You know,” he said. “I usually take women out for dinner before we go to second base, but I guess there’s a first for everything.”

You closed your eyes and pinched the bridge of your nose. “Please stop, this is already embarrassing enough for me.”

Tossing the used napkins in a nearby trash can, he gave you a smile. He was really hot. You just wished you hadn’t just made a fool out of yourself in front of him.

“I’m Jay. Halstead.”

“Y/N Y/L/N. Officer Halstead…?” You guessed but Jay shook his head with a laugh.

“Detective actually.”

“Damn it,” you muttered, shaking your head. “That’s even worse. You’re probably a part of some fancy task force, too, aren’t you?”

“Have to disappoint you there, I am in Intelligence with the CPD,” he told you and you sighed.

“Perfect, you handle all the hardcore cases, right?”

Jay shrugged, tilting his head. “Eh, you could say that.”

“I am an idiot.”

“You’re not. Let me buy you a coffee?”

“Absolutely not!” you exclaimed, frowning deeply before you turned to Clarissa. “One cappuccino and one of whatever he was drinking please.”

“One cappuccino and one black coffee, got it.”

You gave Jay a look. ‘Black coffee, really?’ you mouthed and he just shrugged with a grin, handing Clarissa his card, which you nearly slapped away.

“Clarissa, don’t you dare let him pay,” you told her and the both of you offered your cards to the barista.

Clarissa luckily took your card and shrugged at Jay’s look of affront. “Sorry, seniority rules.”

Jay raised an eyebrow at that and took his defeat, turning to face you. “So how old are you?” he asked, somewhat curious but at the same time, really nonchalant. You were sure that Jay knew that you were younger than him. But you didn’t want to read too much into it.

“22.”

You weren’t sure if you had imagined the flash of disappointment that crossed his face but he quickly schooled his face into a neutral expression.

“So not really seniority then?” he joked and you huffed in exasperation. Your conversation was cut short by Clarissa calling your name.

“A cappuccino and a black coffee.”

Along with the two coffees, Clarissa handed you your long forgotten muffin with a conspiratorial grin, to which you rolled your eyes. You then stood in the middle of the coffee shop with Jay, coffee mug and muffin in hand.

“So, you’re studying here, huh?” Jay asked, nodding towards your made-shift study space in the booth.

“Mhm,” you hummed, cracking a smile. “For some reason I can focus really well here.”

Jay smiled at you before rubbing the back of his neck. “Alright, uh so… I gotta go. Lots of bad guys out there to catch.”

“I am sure there are,” you mused and he gave you one last smile before he turned to leave. You bit your lip and as he reached out to push the door open, you called out.

“Wait!”

He turned back to look at you with a raised eyebrow.

“How about that dinner?”

“That is hilarious,” Adam snorted and the rest of the unit laughed in agreement. You huffed, turning so you could hide your face in his arm. Every time Jay told that story, he got the same reaction.

“I hate it when you’re telling the story of how we met,” you mumbled and you felt the vibrations in his body when he chuckled.

“I know you do, but I love it.”

“You still haven’t told me why you’re slumming it with old Jay,” Vanessa said and you snorted out a laugh.

“Are you kidding? Jay is hot, have you seen his arms?” You asked, wrapping your hands around his bicep. “Besides, everyone knows that men are like wine. You gotta give them time to mature.”

Now it was Jay’s turn to flush and the entire unit ooh-ed simultaneously. Kevin nodded with a grin.

“Never let go of that one, Jay.”

The group was suddenly broken up when an older man came into the room. “What’s going on in here?” he asked with a husky voice. So this must be the infamous Sergeant Hank Voight.

“Sarge, this is my girlfriend, Y/N,” Jay said and you smiled at Voight, holding out your hand.

“Pleasure to meet you sir.”

Voight raised an eyebrow at you, shaking your hand gently. “Pleasure’s all mine. How old are you, kid?”

“22, sir.”

“I could be your dad.”

Jay scoffed, rolling his eyes and squeezed your hand. “You could be my dad, Sarge.”

“Fair enough,” Voight grunted with a laugh. “Alright we got a case.” He motioned for the rest of the team to follow him while Jay turned to you with a smile.

“Thanks for coming. I know I always told you that I’d introduce you to the team but never did it. Figures you’d take it in your own hands, huh?” he tucked a strand of hair behind your ear and you grinned at him, shrugging with your shoulders.

“Thought it couldn’t hurt.”

“‘course you did. Listen, I gotta go, but how about I’ll take you out for drinks tonight and we’ll hang out with the guys? Properly?”

“Sounds like a great plan,” you nodded and Jay grinned at you, kissing you softly.

“Awesome. I’ll see you tonight then.”

“Can’t wait.”

🏷️list: @itsdesiree86 // @anotherfan07 // @its-laur-laur // @life-treatments // @rebel-without-care // @hylandsedits

Bolded means I can’t tag you. Please message me so we can figure out the problem!

#like fine wine #jay halstead fanfiction #jay halstead fanfic #jay halstead fic #jay halstead imagine #jay halstead imagines #chicago pd #chicago pd fic #jesse lee soffer

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the-breath-in-air · 3 years

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Apparently right-wing Christians are trying to drum up outrage over Lil Nas X’s Montero (Call Me By Your Name) video...

...which I find so tired because, the thing is, queer folks have been using satanic and Christian iconography in art forever, pretty much. So here’s a list of some queer movies with Christian iconography, themes and plot. They’re a bit different from Lil Nas X’s video, in that he was more going for a “embrace sin” vibe (which I love) and a lot of these aren’t quite that. But regardless, here we go - off the top of my head, and going in chronological order:

Sebastiane (1976) Written and directed by Paul Humfress and Derek Jarman; the film tells the story of Saint Sebastian (his exile and eventual martyrdom). Unlike most other Biblical movies, all the men are naked (or nearly naked) the entire time - and Sebastian wants to submit himself to his god in a very erotic way. Also a couple of Sebastian’s comrades are gay and in a relationship. The entire movie is in Latin (with English subtitles) and the production values are very 1970s - which can be alienating to an audience in 2021, but if you want to see a little piece of queer cinematic history, it’s worth checking out if you can find it.

The Garden (1990) Written and directed by Derek Jarman; the film is a non-narrative arthouse film. It centers on a gay couple who are living an idealistic life (i.e. in the Garden of Eden) and then their life is interrupted by homophobia. There are other little scenes that cut between the main story of these two men - but they all have Biblical undertones of some kind. Jarman filmed this in response to the UK’s Section 28, apparently. Bit of a warning - the film has some really violent moments of homophobia and transphobia.

Lilies (1996) Written by Michel Marc Bouchard & Directed by John Greson; this film is based on the play by Bouchard. It starts with a bishop visiting a prison, ostensibly to hear the last confession of one of the prisoners. But he quickly discovers that was a ruse to get him to the prison - once there, it becomes clear that this bishop actually has a history with one of the prisoners. And then a group of prisoners basically put on a play that depicts their teenage years and the story unfolds from there.

But I’m A Cheerleader (1999) Written by Brian Peterson and Jamie Babbit and directed by Jamie Babbit; the story is a comedy about a cheerleader who is sent to an ex-gay conversion camp. I think most folks here on Tumblr have probably heard of it before - and if you haven’t checked it out yet, it’s well worth it. It doesn’t have any explicit religious imagery or story, but ex-gay conversion is Christian-adjacent.

Latter Days (2003) Written and directed by C. Jay Cox; a semi-autobiographical film is about a Mormon missionary who goes to Los Angeles and moves into an apartment next door to a gay man. This is a romantic comedy so, obviously, when the Mormon and the gay neighbor meet, there is immediate sexual tension. The acting and writing can be a bit hit and miss, but it’s a lovely little movie. Also, keep your eye out for Amber Benson, Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Rob McElhanney.

Angels in America (2003) Written by Tony Kushner and directed by Mike Nichols; this is a miniseries based on the play by Tony Kushner. It’s essentially about AIDS and being gay in the 1980s in the United States (specifically New York City). Not only is there a lot of Christian imagery, but also some of the main characters are Mormons.

Saved! (2004) Written by Michael Urban and Brian Dannelly, and directed by Brian Dannelly; this movie co-stars Mandy Moore as Hilary Faye, a truly horrendous cross-section of mean girl and evangelical. The story is ostensibly about another teen girl, Mary, who gets pregnant while in high school. But keep an eye out for a side plot about gay conversion camp.

Save Me (2007) Written by Robert Desiderio and Craig Chester, and Directed by Robert Cary; this film is about two adult men who meet a gay conversion camp (and, of course, eventually fall for each other). It’s essentially a romantic drama. A couple of things set this apart from other gay conversion stories. For one thing, these two main characters are in their late 30′s, which makes their situations a bit different - this isn’t a coming-of-age story about finding yourself or rebelling against parents. For another thing, the people who run the camp are insidiously well-meaning and have their own complex motivations for creating the camp.

The Falls (2012) Written and directed by Jon Garcia; this is a trilogy of movies (The Falls, Testament of Love, & Covenant of Grace) about two Mormon missionaries who fall in love while on their mission together. These are the only movies on this list that I haven’t seen. Based on the trailers, the story of each movie seems to be about how their relationship is either broken apart, or brought back together, as the two characters navigate their connection to Mormonism.

The Miseducation of Cameron Post (2018) Written and directed by Desiree Akhavan and based on the novel by Emily M. Danforth; this film is about a teenage girl whose guardians send her to a gay conversion camp. While there, she befriends a couple of others there who are equally skeptical about the camp. And the story unfolds as she comes to grips with who she is and makes a decision about what her future is going to be.

Boy Erased (2018) Written and directed by Joel Edgerton and based on the memoir by Garrard Conley; this is a film about a boy whose parents send him to a gay conversion camp. This is the one film I considered not even listing, since Joel Edgerton is not queer and the film itself really feels like a gay story made for cis hetero audiences. However, it is based on Garrard Conley’s memoir, so I’ve included it.

#lil nas x #montero #call me by your name #sebastiane #the garden #lilies #but i'm a cheerleader #latter days #angels in america #saved!#save me #the falls #the miseducation of cameron post #boy erased

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leapyearkisses · 3 years

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For the director's cut: Could you do Nice Work If You Can Get It? (Eliseo/Padgett)

That fic... Changed me. I'll never forget it TBH.

Yes, I'd be happy to! This one was really fun to write, and it was the beginning of two OCs I am very fond of now (and who I am happy to know made an impression on quite a few people!).

(If anyone enjoys this director's cut thing and wants to see one for another of my stories, ask away. I had a lot of fun!)

Commentary in bold below the cut! NSFW, mess, deliberately sneezing on people, m/m

This story started from a prompt about one character hiring someone to get them sick. An intriguing idea!! But it was one I actually struggled with finding a groove for when I started out. I actually started a few different scenarios with different character dynamics before I figured this one out. I have a 2600-word WIP of a different version of this in my "unfinished" folder.

"All right... close your eyes." Eliseo swallowed and did so, blocking out his bedroom, the red-gold sunset light pouring in from the windows, and Padgett, who was straddling his hips. He could still hear, quite easily, the other man's labored breathing and feel the heat of his thighs... and his crotch. Eliseo was under no illusion that he was in an incredibly compromising position at the moment. He hadn't thought much about the.. particulars when he'd first decided to strike this deal. "Are we really doing this?" he asked, voice weak.

I can't really write fetish porn without including actual porn lol, so from the beginning it was sexy even without the snz. In this version, the POV character is Eliseo, who is the "naive" character in a way. I pretty much write pairs where one character has the fetish and their partner does not but is indulgent. The one with the fetish is usually embarrassed about it or somehow naively realizing they like this weird-ass thing. Padgett laughed, voice tumbled and edging on hoarse. "Hey now. Not getting cold feet are we, my lord?" His exhale ghosted over Eliseo's forehead and his tousled black hair touched Eliseo's cheek.

Padgett is the confident character, and he brought the humor to this scenario! Eliseo cleared his throat. "No..." He could imagine the other man's smug look. They'd known each other long enough now that the image rose unbidden to his mind's eye. Padgett's eyes always glittered like opals when he was scheming something. Padgett surprised him with a tender touch on the shoulder, and he almost opened his eyes again. "The safe word is 'pumpernickel,'" he said, managing not to chuckle. "We can stop whenever you want... Hhk-" He fought off a gasp. "Decide hh quickly, though." Eliseo shivered. "I'm okay. Let's do it." He didn't want to admit it, but Padgett's reassurance did put him at ease, even if this had been his idea. He relaxed and tried to lose himself in the late afternoon heat. "Yehh-s, my lord." Padgett leaned forward and took a shaky breath. It stuttered and caught on invisible hooks, sounding at once to be full of potential and then gone again, like a ghost at the window. Eliseo could feel his body tightening again with anticipation, especially when Padgett gasped and leaned back. "Hh-... hah--

"A ghost in the window" eehhh this is kind of overworked. I like to write descriptively even when it isn't necessary. "Huh-ktschht!" A warm rush of air burst in Eliseo's face, almost immediately followed by a watery spray over his forehead, closed eyes, and nose. His instant reaction was to curl back, or try to, and he had his hands braced on Padgett's chest before he could think about it.

I had never written anything quite this scandalous as it were. There hadn't been a lot of snzfic I had read where there was direct, purposeful contagion like this or quite so much mess description directly on the skin, the face even. So I was sweating while writing this lol. "Hey now," said Padgett, delayed by a sniffle. His tone was light. "Easy. You specified this in the contract, remember?" He rested his hands lightly on Eliseo's wrists. "How are you feeling about it?"

CONSENT IS THE SEXIEST THING. We get this instinctual edge of revulsion from Eliseo because he has not acknowledged to himself that he likes snz yet and also he has never allowed anyone to do this to him before because why would anyone do this? Eliseo found he was holding his breath, but- Well, that would defeat the purpose of this exercise. He cautiously let it go and then opened his eyes. Padgett was gazing down at him, looking neither smug nor concerned, just curious. "I- this was on instinct," Eliseo murmured. After a beat, he lowered his hands, and Padgett let him go easily. "Yes, I imagine so. It's natural." Padgett smiled then, and then his expression crinkled. "Wh- hh- want to do it again? Hkt-- hhh..." Eliseo forced himself to surrender again to his pillows. "Yes." Again, he closed his eyes. Padgett shifted forward on his lap and oh- but then he was sneezing one more. "Huh- hktsschit!" Again, the spray. This time it dusted over Eliseo's nose and mouth. He fought to keep from thinning his lips and... took a deeper breath. Padgett hadn't moved, was still fighting with his own lungs, reeling in another insistent sneeze like a stubborn trout. "Huh- hh... hh hh huh-" He made an annoyed sound. "Hah-- hah-krttschtts!" Eliseo felt droplets of saliva decorate his cheekbone. Padgett sniffled thickly.

I think artists often point out how funny it is that when they're drawing they mimic the face of the character. I do this with sneeze sounds (IF I'M ALONE). I tend to like softer sounds for my characters, so a lot of sibilance creeps in. "...Bless you," Eliseo murmured. He was feeling hot. Maybe it was Padgett on top of him. The man was running a fever. "You are... doing the job admirably." That earned him a laugh. Padgett shifted his weight to his heels, which did interesting things to his cock's relation to Eliseo's own. "Thanks, I guess? I never would have thought anyone would be hiring for this, much less you." "Circumstances are dire," Eliseo intoned without a hint of irony.

Eliseo is a card. I love him. Of the two of them he is much more my preferred "type." He is similar to my mage character Llewellyn but less fussy. "Mmhm." Padgett sniffled again. "You must really hate weddings. Couldn't you have just gone on a hunt or something this weekend instead?" Eliseo sighed. "No. My sister would do anything to ruin my plans if I tried to avoid the party any normal way. But luckily, she's terrified of germs. I think a miserable head cold will be the ticket." Like hell he wanted to sit through another of his sister's weddings. Every time it was some new, world-changing drama. He wasn't even sure whether the groom this time was noble born. No doubt the reception gossip would be scathing. What absolute drivel.

There's a little "my lord" up there before, but this is kind of where the setting is characterized - Eliseo is a noble and this is a time and place where nobility matters. However, it's also anachronistic, because germ theory is a thing. They're kind of in a pseudo Regency/Victorian world where I just write whatever feels like the most fun. "Lucky also that you have me around, hm?" Padgett's next chuckle turned into a bit of a cough. Eliseo patted his knee awkwardly. "I- well, yes. Very. But believe me when I say that I would not wish for you to be so stricken if I had the power to stop it."

People with shitty immune systems are my jam. Even if it's really unlikely, I love it. Sometimes especially if it's unlikely. Like mister high elf Llewellyn, or if they're a god or angel or something. Or in a world where if you had that bad of an immune system you probably would have died of diphtheria or pneumonia by now. "Of course, my lord." Padgett rubbed his nose. And though his breath hitched a few times in the following moments, he stayed where he was. Eliseo blinked. "Are we...?" Done? He didn't really think the exposure had been long enough. "I am ready." Padgett blushed a little. Blushed? "Sorry," he said. "I can kind of feel that, uh, the uh, next ones are going to be kind of... wet. I could blow my nose." His voice trailed off, wavering again. His nostrils twitched, and Eliseo did see within the promise of moisture. Perhaps it was the taboo of it, but Eliseo was alerted instantly to a sudden thickening of his cock. It pressed at his trousers with some gusto as Padgett sniffled again. Eliseo swallowed. "No. No, this is good. This will... help."

After consent, MESS is the sexiest thing. That's just how it goes. I don't make the rules. Padgett gave him a considering look, at least as well as he could between soft gasps and squinting against the itch in his nose. "If you're sure, my lord." "Just- call me Eli, like you used to," said Eliseo, stumbling over the words. He wasn't sure where they had come from, but now they were bare between them. Still, perhaps a bit of affection wasn't so odd compared to what they were already doing. Eliseo closed his eyes on Padgett's startled look.

I wasn't sure where this came from either. But suddenly they were in love and I was cool with it. Eli btw is pronounced like the name (Ee-lye) but Eliseo is pronounced Ell-ee-zay-oh in my mind. It's of Latin origin and means "God is my salvation" according to that authority Babynames.com lol. Padgett means "attendant" so that was chosen partially because he's Eliseo's employee but also because Padgett is just a SUPER English-sounding name. I really enjoy looking up name meanings and representing different traditions in my characters. I tried to give Eliseo's family members Latin names, too, although they're not mentioned here. "Eli," Padgett said, and he sounded like he'd just come home from a long war to find the hearth kept warm for him. "I will." He leaned forward again, bracing himself. "Now, I'm going to- to hih-- to snhhsneeze, hah-- haktschtsch! Hrh- Hnkgstschhiu! More spray this time, more wetness, and Eliseo gasped himself when he felt a thick drip against his chin. Padgett hadn't moved. When Eliseo tentatively looked up, he saw his friend caught in a limbo of urgency. His green eyes were shut, eyelashes fluttering. His nostrils, gently pink now, flared. A clear trail hung from one of them, quivering as Padgett panted. He looked wild and fever bright and teetering on a precipice. Eliseo ignored what it might mean that Padgett's desperate expression, his wet nose - even the mess - suddenly went to his cock. He was hard, looking up at a portrait of a sneeze.

Sometimes you just have to stop writing for a second and drink some cold water or something. Carefully, he placed a hand on Padgett's thigh. "It's okay," he said, words coming of their own accord. "I've got you." Padgett's fingers tightened fitfully in the sheet as he shifted his weight again. He was making soft, irritated noises. His nostrils flared and Eliseo saw another drip lying in wait on the cusp.

Fingers tightening fitfully in a sheet is a thing I love to describe. If you binge-read everything I've written, you will find that I write snz and sex in a very particular way over and over. Because that's what I like! And I'm super glad readers like it as well! But I can basically only find the motivation to write what I enjoy (when I write at all... .__.), which is why I only write m/m or nb characters and such. When the urge became too much, it was like watching a wave finally crash down. Padgett's breath caught; he tensed and leaned back. Eliseo hurriedly closed his eyes again, and none too soon. "Hhhhrektschuckh!" He felt the mess streak his face, fly to spatter his mouth and nose and chin. Padgett moaned and then gasped again, chest swelling with air.

SCANDALOUS "Hah- Huhrttschuh! Hshtt! Hah- hsshtt!" Again, he teetered, teasing the air with shivering gasps. Then, he abruptly folded with a crush of vowels and congestion. "Hggtschiucht!" A baptism, pondered Eliseo's brain as it detached from reality momentarily. Pinned as he was to the bed by Padgett's sex, he couldn't move when he felt himself coming just as abruptly as the sneeze. Somehow the slick wash had become a mounting sense of urgency in each of his muscles, racing from his fingertips and toes to his abdomen, where, quite unbidden, his cock had tugged all that energy into a gut-wrenching orgasm that sent the shockwaves back out with renewed vigor. Padgett whined, and Eliseo took him firmly by the shoulders and drew him in for a messy, off-putting, contagious, blindingly good kiss. "Wow," said Padgett, when they finally broke for air.

Wow, lol. I have a great imagination. I wish I could make myself write more often. "Don't ask me why," Eliseo muttered, but he refused to be made a fool of by embarrassment. "C- come here." He shifted to sit up further and put his hands on Padgett's hips. "I want-" He wanted. "This. Yes?" Before he could stop himself, he swept his tongue over Padgett's mouth, under his nose, to rest at the edge of a nostril. He tasted salt. It was not entirely pleasant, but whatever pilot was captaining his body right now didn't care. He could still feel his cock pulsing against his trousers.

Also the first time I wrote anything like this, but Eliseo was like go big or go home, so. Padgett moaned. "It feels... odd. But, my lord, you can do what you- I mean, Eli." He was breathless for different reasons now. Eliseo laved the tender skin above Padgett's lips, then licked up his septum. When Padgett shivered, Eliseo kissed him again. Slowly, he cleaned away the mess from Padgett's face. When he was finished, neither of them knew what to say. Eliseo was hard again.

Huahaha Eliseo can have an unrealistic refractory period. I don't really give a shit how accurate this stuff is when it would get in the way of the enjoyment. Not to the point where people are just going in without lube or something crazy like that, but being willing and able to go again is just sexy, so that's fine. Finally, Padgett laughed shyly. "I think you'll be catching your cold, Eli." Eliseo blushed and shrugged. "I should hope so. I am-" He bit his lip. "I'm not ready to stop. Will you stay the night? I'll look after you." Padgett kissed him, tenderly drawing them together. "I would like that, very much."

And then they DEFINITELY banged. I hadn't conceptualized their specific history together at this point, but Eliseo and Padgett were FWB while younger, so the "surprise" at meeting again like this in a sexy fashion is more like "Oh, are we doing this now, as adults with drastically different social standing?" and less "Hey, are you into me??"

I got more than one request to write the direct sequel to this, but I dunno. I usually prefer one character in the pair to be the one who is sneezing, and writing Eliseo sick isn't as fun. Partially because I'm much, MUCH more interested in the shy/embarrassed/"voyeur" dynamic, so someone who gets off on their own sneezes really does nothing for me. I do have a WIP of Eliseo sick that is a direct sequel to Carriage Shenanigans, but I have no idea if it will ever get finished.

Thanks so much for the request for this very fun exercise!

#lyk writes #snz #eliseo jorvald #padgett foxborough #elipadge #director's cut commentary exercise

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faggotri · 3 years

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But we’ll go farther than Plato. Longcat, a photograph, is a textbook example of a second-degree mimesis. (We might promote it to the third degree since the image on the internet is a digital copy of the original photograph of the physical cat which is itself a copy of Platonic ideal of a cat (the Godcat, if you will); but this line of thought doesn’t change anything in the argument.) The text-supplemented meme, on the other hand, the captioned cat, is at an infinite remove from the Godcat, the ultimate mimesis, copying the copy of itself eternally, the written language and the image echoing off each other, until it finally loops back around to the truth by virtue of being so far from it. It becomes its own truth, the fidelity of the eternal copy. It becomes a God. Writing itself is the archetypical pharmakon and the archetypical copy, if you’ll come back with me to the Phaedrus (if we ever really left it). Speech is the real deal, Socrates says, with a smug little wink to his (written) dialogic buddy. Speech is alive, it can defend itself, it can adapt and change. Writing is its bastard son, the mimic, the dead, rigid simulacrum. Writing is a copy, a mīmēma, of truth in speech. To return to our analogous issue: the image of the cheezburger cat, the copy of the picture-copy-copy, is so much closer to the original Platonic ideal than the written language that accompanies it. (“Pharmakon” can also mean “paint.” Think about it, Jane. Just think about it.) The image is still fake, but it’s the caption on the cat that is the downfall of the republic, the real fakeness, which is both realer and faker than whatever original it is that it represents. Men and gods abhor the lie, Plato says in sections 382 a and b of the Republic. οὐκ οἶσθα, ἦν δ᾽ ἐγώ, ὅτι τό γε ὡς ἀληθῶς ψεῦδος, εἰ οἷόν τε τοῦτο εἰπεῖν, πάντες θεοί τε καὶ ἄνθρωποι μισοῦσιν; πῶς, ἔφη, λέγεις; οὕτως, ἦν δ᾽ ἐγώ, ὅτι τῷ κυριωτάτῳ που ἑαυτῶν ψεύδεσθαι καὶ περὶ τὰ κυριώτατα οὐδεὶς ἑκὼν ἐθέλει, ἀλλὰ πάντων μάλιστα φοβεῖται ἐκεῖ αὐτὸ κεκτῆσθαι. “Don’t you know,” said I, “that the veritable lie, if the expression is permissible, is a thing that all gods and men abhor?” “What do you mean?” he said. “This,” said I, “that falsehood in the most vital part of themselves, and about their most vital concerns, is something that no one willingly accepts, but it is there above all that everyone fears it.” Man’s worst fear is that he will hold existential falsehood within himself. And the verbal lies that he tells are a copy of this feared dishonesty in the soul. Plato goes on to elaborate: “the falsehood in words is a copy of the affection in the soul, an after-rising image of it and not an altogether unmixed falsehood.” A copy of man’s false internal copy of truth. And what word does Plato use for “copy” in this sentence? That’s fucking right, μίμημα. Mīmēma. Mimesis. Meme. The new meme is a lie, manifested in (written) words, that reflects the lack of truth, the emptiness, within the very soul of a human. The meme is now not only an inferior copy, it is a deceptive copy. But just wait, it gets better. Plato continues in the very next section of the Republic, 382 c. Sometimes, he says, the lie, the meme, is appropriate, even moral. It is not abhorrent to lie to your enemy, or to your friend in order to keep him from harm. “Does it [the lie] not then become useful to avert the evil—as a medicine?” You get one fucking guess for what Greek word is being translated as “medicine” in this passage. Ding ding motherfucking ding, you got it, φάρμακον, pharmakon. The μίμημα is a φάρμακον, the lie is a medicine/poison, the meme is a pharmakon. But I’m sure that by now you’ve realized the (intentional) mistake in my argument that brought us to this point. I said earlier that the addition of written language to the meme flipped the pharmakon on its axis. But the pharmakon didn’t flip, it doesn’t have an axis. It was always both remedy and poison. The fact that this isn’t obvious to us from the very beginning of the discussion is the fault of, you guessed it, language. The initial lie (writing) clouds our vision and keeps us from realizing how false the second-order lie (the meme) is. The very structure of the lying meme mirrors the structure of the written word that defines and corrupts it. Once you try to identify an “outside” in order to reveal the lie, the whole framework turns itself inside-out so that you can never escape it. The cat wants the cheezburger that exists outside the meme, but only through the meme do we become aware of the presumed existence of the cheezburger — we can’t point out the absurdity of the world of the meme without also indicting our own world. We can’t talk about language without language, we can’t meme without mimesis. Memes didn’t change between ‘06 and ‘07, it was us who changed. Or rather, our understanding of what we had always been changed. The lie became truth, the remedy became the poison, the outside became the inside. Which is to say that the truth became lie, the pharmakon was always the remedy and the poison, and the inside retreated further inside. It all came full circle. Because here’s the secret, Jane. Language ruined the meme, yes. But language itself had already been ruined. By that initial poisonous, lying copy. Writing. The First Meme. Language didn’t attack the meme in 2007 out of spite. It attacked it to get revenge. Longcat is long. Language is language. Pharmakon is pharmakon. The phoneme topples the grapheme, witches ride through the night, our skulls hide secret messages on their surfaces, Smash Mouth is good after all. Hey now, you’re an all-star. Get your game on. Go play.

#love it here #just a regular post :)#aaron shouts

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nelllraiser · 3 years

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fall damage | bex, frank, & nell

PARTIES: @inbextween and @nelllraiser. SUMMARY: bex’s magic lessons continue, but an uninvited visitor crashes them. CONTAINS: bloodkinesis.

Nell couldn’t deny that she was excited as the crisp morning air tickled the insides of her lungs, and she walked amongst the thick trees of the Outskirts as her and Bex ventured out behind the Vural Home. The forest was already tall and broad here, but the two girls were still within the line of the perimeter spell the three witch sisters’ had set around the home. Nell hadn’t wanted to wander too far from the home, not entirely keen on some normie finding the two of them practicing magic and throwing questions their way. Bex needed all the encouragement and concentration she could get, and interruptions such as those were less than welcome. Stopping beneath one of the largest trees, Nell began to scurry up it’s trunk with little trouble, confidently grabbing branch after branch until she was nearly forty feet above ground and looking down on Bex. “Alright!” she yelled down to her student. “So I brought you out here to learn one of the very first intentional pieces of magic spellcasters tend to learn! How to fall slowly!” Technically...it was a toddler-grade spell, taught to little magical beings in the hopes that they’d be able to save themselves from nasty falls when parents couldn’t get there in time. But Nell wasn’t going to tell Bex that. “Are you ready for the demonstration?”

Bex was still infinitely nervous about all this magic training business, but if she wanted to find any sense of normalcy again, she had to accept it. And she had to accept that she also had magic. While she’d found some solace in the words of the books Morgan had gotten her, there were still the pressing questions of why her and how had it happened. But...those weren’t important here today. It was the earlier hours of the morning, but Bex was used to being up at this time, so her body, though exhausted, was okay with it. She followed Nell out into the forest, keeping close, wondering where she was taking her and what they were going to do today. She was even more confused when Nell started climbing a tree. She really hoped Nell didn’t expect her to climb that tree-- Bex was very bad at climbing things, but very good at falling down them. “Umm, sure!” she called back, stepping out of the way and giving a thumbs up of reassurance. Maybe that would hide the unsureness of her voice. “Fire away! Or, um-- fall away?”

“Alright! Here we go!” There was an excitement to Nell that wouldn’t have been present otherwise. Magically making herself fall slowly was about just as exciting as making a sandwich after a lifetime of doing it, the novelty having worn off somewhere around age five. But the fact that Bex was willing to learn added a newfound spark to the spell, and Nell was eager to see how Bex would react. Letting the Latin spell fall from her lips, she then let herself fall as well- dipping her foot off the side of the tree as gravity began its work. Instead of plopping into a mess of flesh and broken bones at the base of the tree, Nell fell gracefully at a controlled speed, the tip of her toes making contact with the forest floor the same way a feather might drift to its landing place. “So- we’re obviously not gonna start with you in the tree, but that’s the general idea!”

Bex's heart might have pounded out of her chest had her ribs not been there. She watched with bated breath-- and tightly wound anxiety-- as Nell poked her foot out off the branch, then simply leapt off as if she wasn’t forty feet up a giant tree. She almost called out when it first happened, but then, suddenly, right before her very eyes, Nell was simply floating down as if gravity had just turned down for a moment. Bex had to blink, rubbing her eyes. She followed Nell’s body the entire time as she floated down, feather light, and touched the ground with a simple ease. She scurried over to Nell, as if somehow this were fake and Nell really was injured or hurt or not here-- but she wasn’t. She was fine. Bex patted Nell’s shoulder to make sure she was real and that she wasn’t dreaming again. “I should let you know right now, I’m afraid of heights,” she squeaked, clearing her throat. “Also, how did you do that!?”

Nell chuckled as Bex got the bulk of her initial reaction out, the summoner's grin bright as the other witch seemed to meet Nell’s magic with more curiosity than horror. In only a couple of months, the younger girl had come so far, and Nell couldn’t help the swell of pride that filled her everytime she was reminded of this truth. “That’s okay- I’m not gonna make you fall from the tree. And who knows? Maybe once you master the slow fall you’ll be a little less afraid of heights knowing that they don’t pose a danger to you anymore.” As for how Nell did it. That was a simple answer. “With a spell. Spells help give magic shape in a more concrete way. Like cooking with a recipe instead of by instinct. Here- I’m gonna write it down for you. How much do you know about Latin?” Nell asked before summoning a paper out of thin air into the palm of her hand, beginning to write the proper words onto it before handing it off to Bex.

Bex let out a long sigh of relief. “Oh thank fuck, becaue there’s no way I could do that right now. Let alone climb that tree.” She looked up at the tree, then back down to Nell. “I don’t think it’s the danger as much as the...height itself. I get real bad vertigo. And anxiety. But, well-- maybe it will help! It’s like...exposure therapy, right?” She shrugged and nodded along with Nell’s next statement as if she somehow understood what she meant. It made sense, but she was still wary of accepting magic and spells and everything at face value. Though concocting something with a recipe sounded more logical than magic being some sort of inherent power that people controlled. “I know all about its historical roots and etymology, as well as the spread and decline of the language all through the ancient times and what modern and medieval languages it inspired. But, speaking it? Absolutely none.” She took the slip of paper and frowned at the words. “Is there any way we can translate this into Hebrew? I’m much better at that.”

Nell chuckled at Bex’s reluctance, not exactly surprised by the fact that the younger witch had little interest in jumping out of trees or climbing them in the first place. “I mean I wouldn’t expect much else from a nerd,” she teased gently, knowing the term had never actually bothered Bex. “But yeah! Maybe it could be like exposure therapy if you wanted to try it. Either way it’s just a good spell to know for if you ever do need to stop yourself from splatting like an egg on the ground or whatever. A basic safety spell.” Nell’s excitement grew like a balloon inflating itself as Bex spoke of her Latin knowledge, already thinking of how naturally spells might come to Bex if she already had a good understanding of the language. But it was quickly popped by the witch’s last few words of knowing little about actually using it. “That’s alright,” Nell said in an attempt to quickly hide her disappointment. “Hebrew?” She mulled the thought over for a long moment, brows furrowed together as she thought. “I mean...I guess I don’t see why not? I just don’t know how to translate it. Maybe we could figure it out together though.” And maybe she’d ask Adam to teach her some of the language so that she might be better able to assist Bex. “So this is basically what the spell’s saying-” Nell stretched to write on the paper where she’d written the Latin, taking a moment to change it into a decent enough English version of the incantation. “Now you could turn it into Hebrew, and we can try it.”

Bex huffed at Nell and stuck out her tongue. “Boomer.” She looked at the piece of paper in her hands, not noticing the growing excitement on Nell’s face. Latin had just never been a language she’d had any interest in learning to speak, there was little point to it. All she needed to know about it was its roots, its influence, and why it died out. Then again, being able to read it might help. She looked at the English words Nell wrote down and nodded slowly. “Easy enough,” she said, saying the words individually in Hebrew as she read them from the English. She couldn’t help but feel excited at the idea, though. This was how old languages were translated, how people of different cultures were able to communicate with each other, through shared languages and translating it back. It was incredible. She looked over at Nell. “I-- think I’ve got it. What um-- how should I try it? I’m not jumping from a tree. Or climbing one. Maybe I can drop a rock, or a tree branch. From a safe height. Like--” she glanced around, “--like from on top of that small overhang. Does that work?”

“The difference is that it’s true when I call you a nerd, and it’s absolutely not when you call me a boomer,” Nell retorted playfully as she stuck out her tongue in Bex’s direction. The witch didn’t have the slightest idea of whether or not Bex had translated the words in a fashion that would continue on the magical integrity and purpose of the spell, but she supposed there was only one way to find out. “Oh, absolutely not,” Nell began with a shake of her head, apparently not even on board for Bex jumping from an easily manageable height. “We’ll start with this.” She grabbed a stick from the ground before holding it in front of Bex and letting it fall to the ground, displaying the usual speed with which it sank. “It’s never a good idea to try a new spell on yourself. Not when you haven’t experienced what it’s like to channel it, and see where you might go wrong. Otherwise the magic might end up doing something you didn’t intend for it to do in the first place. Especially when it’s been recently translated to a language it wasn’t created in. So we’ll try it with the stick first.” Without further ado, she handed the lackluster piece of wood over to her pupil.

“Right, that all-- makes sense,” Bex said, scrunching her face up. She wasn’t entirely sure it did, but she understood the base meaning of it all. Practical magic. She could do that. Float a stick, or not let it fall too quickly. She could do that. She reached out to take the stick Nell offered her and held it in her hand as if it might spontaneously combust. Most things did with her, so it was a fair worry. Cast a nervous glance over at Nell, before she focused back on the stick. All she had to do was give it intention, right? Wasn’t that what Nell had said? Intention. She narrowed her eyes at the stick, let herself feel the flow of energy that always-- always-- made her nerves spike up. It always-- always-- had meant something bad. But maybe this could change that. A stick, some words, and a friend. Bex said the words and let go of the stick-- she almost wanted to slam her eyes shut as if something bad would happen. As if the stick would fly up, or backwards, or splinter, of break. But it didn’t. It floated, almost as if it were a feather, and not a stick, and landed softly on the ground and Bex stared at it for what seemed like hours before she looked back up at Nell. “Did I do it?” she asked with bated breath. “Was that-- did I do it?” Even though she knew the answer.

Nell could barely contain her excitement as she watched the stick drift towards the ground, her hands shaking with excitement as her smile grew wide. Somehow she managed to keep it contained until Bex asked her question, not wanting to break the other witch’s concentration and ruin her success. “Yes! Yes, you did it!” she laughed brightly, never getting tired of the pride rushing through her veins as she watched Bex flourish and grow. “That was perfect! You really are such a fast learner, Bex! And your instincts! You’re so good at listening to them and letting them guide you in the spell! Did you want to try again? On something heavier?” She was already summoning a skull sized rock from the other side of the clearing, willing it to drift closer to the pair of them.

Bex was already bending down to pick up the stick again, this time holding it with a confidence she rarely found herself feeling. Nell was just as excited-- it was in her voice, her eyes, the way she bounced on the balls of her feet. Perfect, she had said. Perfect. For once in her life, she’d done something right. Something good. Something perfect. She was already dropping the stick again, watching it flutter down when Nell offered to try something heavier. The rock was floating towards them already and Bex looked eagerly at Nell. Yes, she wanted to try so badly. Yes, she wanted to do more things that made Nell proud. Yes, she wanted to use her magic. She reached out for the rock and held it in her hands. It was heavier than she thought. She poured her entire focus into the rock, held it out and-- it thunked to the ground loudly. Bex crinkled her nose. Picked it up again. Tried again. Another thunk. She frowned and looked at Nell. “What am I doing wrong?” Something felt off. She felt like someone was watching them. She turned her head to look around. Her focus was off. “Do you feel that?” she asked, turning again.

The change in Nell was like the flip of a switch. As quickly as her joy had appeared, it was gone in a flash as she felt a familiar ping against her wrist. The perimeter spell had gone off, and the signature that crossed it wasn’t one the magic had seen before. “Stay there, Bex,” she commanded in a tone that left no room for argument, stepping closer to the young witch as Nell pulled one of her knives from its well-masked hiding place. She didn’t even have the time to commend Bex on her magical intuition, knowing the girl might have also felt the spell around the Vural property flicker seeing as they’d been training so close to it. Uttering another spell in Latin, Nell stomped a foot against the ground, sending out a pulse of magic that would tell her the location of any life signatures larger than a small dog. There. Somewhere behind the trees, someone was lurking. Brandishing the blade in their direction, Nell’s jaw was set tight when she spoke again, her voice rough and demanding. “I know you’re there. Come out before I make you come out.”

Frank had been watching Odelia for a while now. His arms shook with the memory of his father’s instructions. He had been given a duty and he was failing it. He had only one goal and that was to keep Odelia safe and he was failing it. He’d never thought it would get this far, that it would get this bad, but here she was, practicing magic with someone in a quarry of trees. She was magic. No one had told him she was magic. This wasn’t what he’d signed up for. But he couldn’t stop now, his heart wouldn’t let him. He knew she was being influenced by fae. He knew it. That girl, the brunette he’d seen her with so many times, the fae-- she was controlling her. But his senses weren’t going off now, which meant she wasn’t around. He stepped free of the treeline, holding his hands up, even as they shook. “I don’t want to fight,” he said, nodding at the knife pointed at him. “I just came here to talk. To Odelia.”

Oh, so it was bad. Bex immediately scurried herself behind Nell, the irony of the situation lost on her. Nell’s short frame barely covered her, but she felt somehow much more safe now. Nell was drawing a knife and brandishing it towards the treeline as she stomped. Bex felt the pulse go out and shivered, stepping closer to Nell. All she could do was float sticks and sometimes fix broken pots. Neither of those were practical in this situation. And then the figure stepped from the bushes and it was-- “Frank!?” Bex exhaled, stepping out from behind Nell. It was both relief and a tight anxiety that gripped her. “What are you doing here? Talk about what?” She stepped unknowingly closer. “There’s nothing to talk about. And how-- how did you find me?”

Frank? The boyfriend? This was him? Nell gave him a thorough and well-practiced once over, as if she were sizing up a new fighter in the Ring. The shaking in his hands didn’t comfort Nell in the least. “Her name’s Bex,” she replied haughtily, taking an instant disliking to the young man. “Well you’re on my property, and it sure doesn’t seem like Bex even wants to talk to you. So why don’t you leave, and then you can avoid the fighting that you don’t want to do.” It was the first time Nell had ever displayed this side of herself in front of Bex apart from speaking of how she occasionally stabbed people online. But speaking and doing were two different things. How had he found her? If Bex didn’t know he’d been coming, then he had to be halfway decent at tracking or keeping tabs on people. “Stalking’s not fucking cute, Frank. So get to the point or leave.” Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Corpsey come to investigate the new intruder on his mistresses’ land, a low and moaning growl erupting from the reanimated corpse as he took in the picture of Nell holding a knife poised towards a stranger.

Frank didn’t know who this other girl was, but she was extremely hostile. This was going to be harder than he thought. Coercion wasn’t an option anymore. Sighing, he dropped his hands and shrugged. He had to do this. He had to. He drew in a deep breath. His father had prepared him for a day like this. The fae’s hold was getting stronger on Odelia, it must be. Otherwise why would she act like this? Why would she shrink away from him? He was supposed to be her guard, her parents had made sure to instill that in him. Make sure nothing happens to her, at any cost. She was important, they needed her and she needed them. She needed him. “Sorry,” he said, “Bex.” His eyes locked with hers. He held out his hand. “Your parents are just worried. They want you to come home. And so do I. Where it’s safe.” His eyes got sharp, and he glanced over to the other girl for a moment. “Please. Don’t you trust me?”

Bex looked between Frank and Nell. They were both so on edge. It was just like when he’d come to find Mina. She didn’t want anyone to fight or get hurt, especially because of her. She stepped between the two and turned to look at Nell. “Nell, i-it’s okay. He’s not going to hurt me. He’s just--” she looked back over at Frank, “he’s just trying to do what he thinks is right, isn’t that right, Fra--” she started, but in the next moment, hands had wrapped around her stomach and were yanking her backwards. She fell into Frank’s grasp as he pulled her away from Nell, and started heading back for the treeline at an incredible speed. Wait, hadn’t Morgan said he was a hunter? Someone with special abilities? To sense others? Did he think Nell was like Mina? She didn’t have a lot of time to process anything before she started struggling against him. “Put me DOWN!” she shouted, fists hammering into his arms. “PUT ME DOWN! NELL! HELP ME!”

He moved with a speed that told Nell he couldn’t be simply human. That much was obvious with the way he’d managed to grab Bex in the near blink of an eye. What exactly he was, she couldn’t yet say. Either way it didn’t matter as Bex cried out for help, and Nell saw red. She flashed towards the man and Bex, hand clutching her knife with a determination that screamed its use would be imminent. “Put her down.” Nell growled through gritted teeth, the words being less of a demand and more of a command. It only took Nell a split second for the magic to flow into her veins and reach out to the blood that was singing within Frank’s, claiming it as her own. Tearing his arms away from Bex, she was none too gentle as she freed the dreamwalker, and she remembered how Kaden and Montgomery had screamed when she controlled them like this— the pain nearly unbearable as she forced their bodies against their own will. She hoped Frank screamed too. No one would threaten the people she cared about. Not on her property. Not while she still had breath to spare in her body.

Frank was sure that he was homefree by now. Odelia struggled but she was no match for him, even with her magic. Once they were somewhere safe, he could explain. Tell her everything. Why he was so worried, why he kept coming back for her, why that girl was so dangerous. But then a pain, steady at first, then blistering all at once, over took his body. His arms wrenched away from Odelia without his command and he toppled backwards, screaming into the leaves. His body twisted against his will as he struggled against it. Unwilling iron boiled to the surface in his blood. It calmed the strain for a moment, and he managed to sit himself up, scramble back to his feet before more pain seared through his veins. “What the hell are you!?” he shouted at the other girl, teeth clenched. His eyes fell to Odelia, who was already retreating. “Odi, n-no--” he strained, “come back! I can help you! I can save you!” From this girl, from the fae, from her parents-- from the magic that kept her hidden. He could save her.

Bex tumbled to the ground. Leaves shuffled around her, spraying every which way as Frank screamed. Her eyes gaped wide as she watched him fall to the ground, his agony apparent in the sound of his screams. She slapped her hands over her ears and shoved herself away, searching desperately for anything solid to hold onto. Where as Nell? What was going on? She let go of her ears and pushed onto her hands and knees, mud wetting her jeans, her palms. This time it wasn’t a vampire baring down on her, it had been someone she knew. Someone she’d once trusted. She hoisted herself up and ran. Because that was all she could do. Floating sticks wouldn’t save her from a vampire or a zombie or cockatrice. And it wouldn’t save her from a once friend who had turned against her. She ran straight into Nell and wrapped her arms around the other girl’s and tugged. “Let’s go, please,” she cried, “Please, I want to go.” Before he got back up, before he came closer, before Nell did something she’d regret. “Please.”

Nell didn’t bother to answer Frank’s question in the way he wanted to her, simply advancing on him until she had him prone in front of her, still in her grip and control as she brought her knife to his chin, using the tip of it to tilt his face towards her’s. “It doesn’t matter. What matters is I’m someone who’s not afraid to kill you.” She let the knife slip a fraction of an inch, her eyes burning as she let the edge of it slip across Frank’s neck, mirroring the scar she had along her own skin in the same place. A trickle of red began to drip from the thin line, the pressure on the blade being just enough to break skin. “And won’t hesitate to do it if you hurt Bex.” The witch was already considering it as she toyed with the feeling of the hunter’s life lying in her grasp, and how good it’d feel to snuff it out, to make sure he never even got the chance to hurt Bex in the first place.

Bex’s grip on her arm had Nell’s head snapping towards the girl, her gaze still full of the promise to kill as she looked towards her student. A small frown came over her lips as Bex asked to leave, to get away from this place. She couldn’t do this. Not here. Not now. Not in front of Bex. Her features softened in the slightest, looking over Bex’s face with care and concern as the young witch broke through the surface of Nell’s tunnel-vision. “Alright. Okay- we can go.” Looking towards Frank, she let the knife linger a moment longer before withdrawing it, taking a step back with a careful and protective hand drawing Bex along with her. “If I find you here again, I’m not gonna tell you that you’ll leave alive. And I’m patient when it comes to things like this. So don’t think it’ll be over quickly.”

Frank did not fight back as the angry girl with dark skin descended on him. Sometimes, his dad had told him, it’s best to take the loss and live to fight another day. He would remember her. He would remember the people around Odelia who thought they were protecting her. He would remember that he needed to find her alone next time. He didn’t move as she slit his throat, pain wasn’t anything new to him. This kind, at least. His veins still buzzed. He’d have to ask his mother about that. About what this woman clearly was. Had to be. He swallowed, sat up as she backed away, putting a hand to his throat to wipe away the trickles of blood, iron filled. If only there was fae around. He looked at Odelia one last time as well, frantically tugging at the other woman. There was hope there, then, otherwise she’d have let her kill him. He stood up on wobbly legs and backed away. “Fair enough,” he mumbled, before turning to limp away, like a dog with its tail between its legs. Next time, he would succeed. He had a better plan now.

The look on Nell’s face scared Bex for a moment. She knew the anger wasn’t directed at her, but she’d never seen Nell like this before. If Bex had not asked her to, would Nell have killed Frank? But he didn’t deserve it...did he? Her eyes went up to Frank’s retreating form, meeting his gaze. She looked down and away, tucking her head into Nell’s shoulder. She wanted to go home, back to Morgan’s. Back to Mina. Somewhere she felt safe. She tugged again on Nell’s arm, stepping backwards. A twig snapped below her foot and she looked down at it. Ruined, broken. She wished they could have just kept floating sticks, or rocks, or anything. She tugged on Nell’s shirt. “I wanna go back,” she said quietly.

Nell waited until she felt Frank pass back over the property line, taking a moment to once again stomp her foot against the ground, magically searching the area for life signatures. He was gone. For now. It didn’t sit right with her. He was a threat to someone she cared about. Just like Montgomery had been. But there was little she could do when Bex was beginning to crumble in front of her. Letting her arms wrap about the taller witch, she brought a comforting hand to the other girl’s back, rubbing a steady line against her. “It’s alright. I’m not gonna let him hurt you, okay?” She pulled back to look Bex in the eye, the witch the younger girl was most familiar with returning slowly by the second as Nell began the journey from the place in her head that was screeching for Frank’s blood, to the one that could take the time to make sure Bex felt safe. “Let’s go. We can work on this another day, alright?” Slipping her hand into Bex’s, she gave it a squeeze, just like she had when the two of them had been trapped in Bex’s dream. “Let’s get you home.” Taki appeared from seemingly nowhere, blipping into existence through the bond he shared with his summoner as he made his way over to Bex, tail held high. Promptly, he began weaving his way through the girl’s legs, his own attempt to settle the poor creature who consumed so much of his witch’s time. “He’s not gonna bother you again,” Nell promised, knowing she’d do anything to make good on the words.

#// this is fine #soft #wickedswriting #ch:bex #ch:frank #chatzy

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ludopisgone · 4 years

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ReyloCon

Hello everyone, I hope this message finds you well. I am writing this with a heavy heart. ReyloCon used to be something I was truly excited to be a part of, and I feel that the joy I had has been taken away. I’ll probably leave this fandom as well, as it has been proven to be toxic and way too fast paced (and I am talking specifically about Twitter, where most of the community has found their home).

I struggled long and hard with the decision to post this - personally, I just want to be over and done with this. But now that the call for "minority creators" has gone out, I just want to protect people from getting hurt in the same way I was. In addition to that a new survey has gone out, and I'll explain why it's an issue for me later in this post. I have tried to reach out to members of ReyloCon in private, but all I received was silence.

I got into the ReyloCon Discord server as soon as it was created, because I found some tweets about it. Being very excited about it, I started planning about what could have been, writing in a Google doc every workshop/activity/panel I could come up with and invited other people to the doc hoping that they could add something of their own. That doc is still something I hold close to my heart, it’s simply the very first step towards a more completed spreadsheet that would have been created later to keep track of everything.

I’ve collected these screenshots from a very early conversation I had with one of the “leaders” of ReyloCon. Details about my complaints under the cut.

EDIT: I want to clarify that I don't wish for the con to be canceled. I am still enamoured with the idea of a con for reylos by reylos. I don't wish I'll to any of the organizers any. Maybe all I'm looking for is an apology, but I can safely say that even I don't know what I want from them. I wanted for me to get this off my chest. I needed to do so.

When the formative meetings were called, it was not taken into account that I was not available at 2-3 in the morning because I’m mentally ill and take medication to regulate my sleep cycle. I was then blamed for missing those meetings. Could they not have been rescheduled? Or the results shared with me? Could some form of accommodation not have been found?

I brought a lot of ideas to the table, and several of them are still being used. Good enough to use but I’m not good enough to receive the credit or remain part of the team? I found it especially insulting that the Ancient Mythology project was taken away from me - an Italian, and was given to a BNF from another country. This is something that closely resembles cultural appropriation, it’s not your history, you don’t have a language formed by Latin and Ancient Greek for at least a good 80%. You probably have never seen a Roman anything, or a Greek vase. That’s my history. It’s not yours. It’s Italian history.

The final nail in the coffin was a simple miscommunication. As you can see, I was asked if I could do some research so that we knew what to ask to creators. I should also point out that even though my English is decent, there’s definitely a language barrier. I will never understand English the way that a native speaker does, and that’s just because it’s not my language. I decided to contact these creators because I like them and think they’re great. I’ve since spent much time listening their YouTube videos. As you can see, we see that message from two different perspectives, hers from a “implication” side, and mine from a “didn’t say it, didn’t mean it” side. I decided to leave the Discord server after asking her if I should have and got out of the private messages and I realize now it was a mistake. I contacted one of the mods to get back into the server to talk with this leader so that I could at least explain my point of view.

As you can see from the screenshots it didn’t end well. I tried to reason with this leader and I tried my best not to remove myself from this situation, because that’s what happens to me when confrontation happens due to past trauma. I don’t take it badly when people tell me to calm down, because I know it can get too fast in my mind. And then the objectives. I didn’t know what their objectives were because, to put it simply, they were nowhere to be found. I was asked how old I was and to somehow “prove my credentials” like having passion for a shared project isn’t enough to give what you can give. I did say I was going to reach out to these creators, they didn’t tell me not to do it.As I understand, US American non-profits must be accessible and transparent - ReyloCon in its present state is neither.Is this the kind of thing you support? Is this the kind of people you want in your project? Can anyone be blamed for not wanting to be any part of this? Look at this whole mess, and this is from one of your “leaders”? They try to style themselves into a "safe space" for minority creators. And yet they expelled me for being a minority creator. There is no place for non-US folks on this team, and any attempt on their part to be "inclusive" can safely be taken as mere lip-service.Non-US fans need not apply.

TLDR: They stole my ideas, are still profiting from the work I put in, and then they kicked me out because I have health issues, don’t understand English perfectly, and live in a different timezone.

#reylo #reylocon #reylo fam #reylo community #fandom discourse

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hideawayintheimaginationworld · 4 years

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I am Machine: Chapter 10

Foxy was now more irritated, “It moved! Where did it go???”

The four Rockstars had come back and saw the Lonely Freddy that Bonnie found was no longer in the kitchen, and in a way it was like they had completely imagined seeing it.

“That thing couldn't have moved by itself,” Chica reasoned, “Maybe Helpy took it somewhere... He was acting kind of strange with it...”

“Said it was a human I think... I thought Lefty had told Helpy he needs to stop telling lies,” Freddy commented.

“He wasn't showing any indication that he was lying... But obviously what he said can't be true!” Bonnie added.

Lefty whistled behind them, the four had turned and saw him standing there with Helpy and the Lonely Freddy.

“If you are quite done now.... I must share some important information with you.”

“I’m going to tell a story.”

Lefty was on the stage, Alec was standing next to him not wanting to be near the others just yet plus Lefty was acting like a shield between him and the other animatronics.

“What's the story about?” Bonnie asked him.

“What's that thing doing ‘ere?” Foxy pointed his hook at Alec, who felt like it was a threat so he backed away slightly.

“I will answer that.... Just let me tell you all a story....” Lefty responded.

Security sat on a nearby chair, sensing what was coming now.

“I don't see how some stupid story is going to explain that abomination.”

Alec had backed away further, Lefty had kneeled down and grabbed his shoulders and spun him to face him, “It's okay... They won’t hurt you.... They’d have to go through me which isn’t an easy feat.”

Alec nodded acknowledging what he said. Lefty then turned back to the group, “The story is about a brother and sister,” He stood up then continued the story, “They live with their parents, the brother is a teenager, the sister is younger... The family came to Freddy’s to celebrate the girl's 10th birthday, what must be kept in mind is that the brother doesn't like his sister.”

He was telling what happened to him as if it was some sort of story.

“Why not?” Bonnie asked.

“Because not all siblings get along....” Lefty explained. “Now at the party, the girl won a Yarg Foxy plushie.... She was thrilled to win it but not for herself... She handed it to her older brother knowing that he loved Foxy.”

“That sounds really generous and sweet! What a lovely girl!” Freddy smiled.

Alec signed, they hadn’t even met Hazel and they already liked her, she just had that effect on people.

“The brother was disgusted... She was trying to make a fool of him, he didn't want it. She kept trying to give it to him wanting for him to stop hating her, it was an offering of friendship, the brother didn't take it.... He couldn't deal with his parents telling him off for acting so badly on his sister's birthday, so he ran away from them.”

“He found himself in a backroom. He finally had reflected on everything... He realised..... He was the villain, and his sister truly did love him... It was him who had brought real damage to the family... He was going to make this right, not just to be forgiven... But to show he could change because he loved his family.”

“What a lovely story-”

“I'm not finished. Don't interrupt me,” Lefty snapped at Freddy who visibly backed away in fear.

“Now.... What happened next... A Lonely Freddy had started to talk to him, just talking to a lonely kid like how it should right? No.... That wasn't the case....” Lefty shook his head closing his eye.

“The Lonely Freddy had hypnotised the teenager asking him as many questions as he could, the teen couldn't get away, he couldn’t move... Couldn't escape from it, it had sunk it’s teeth into the prey it had under his control.”

They started to look uncomfortable. “The teen had a thought... He could close his eyes and everything would be alright... And he was. It was gone when he opened his eyes, but the room was bigger, everything seemed bigger and he couldn't figure out why...”

No one looked interested in interrupting Lefty, they paid complete attention even if they somewhat looked confused about Alec's story.

“He went to look for his family, ready to apologise, he had gone into the party room where his family was.... But he was already sitting there.”

“How...?” Freddy quietly asked as Lefty continued.

“He wanted to cry and call out his imposter but he couldn't say anything, he couldn't call for help, his family ignored his existence not realising their real son was trying to get their attention so he could be helped and they wouldn't even understand it because... He didn't entirely know what happened either.... He finally figured out what happened to him, when he saw his reflection...... He had been placed in the Lonely Freddy's body. He was no longer a human.....”

“That story is disturbing... Why tell it?” Freddy looked around uncomfortable.

Lefty frowned frustrated, “For crying out loud... Haven't you made a connection? It's not a made up story,” He growled.

The words, It's not a made up story seem to sting deeply. Everyone suddenly looked like they had seen a dead body on the ground.

The robots suddenly advanced towards Alec who backed away again but Helpy had grabbed his hand either to comfort him or to stop him from running.

“This one.... He's the teenager from your story???” Freddy asked.

“So he can't talk. How do you know this?” Foxy asked sounding slightly sceptical.

“I can talk now... I just couldn't initially...”

After Alec spoke everyone froze, even Lefty didn't say anything.

It was Bonnie who let out a scream of horror, “Oh my god! That's a human!!!” He instantly heard that as a teenager not a robot, “I had hurt a child!!!”

“Lefty, how did we miss this??? Why didn't you tell me?” Freddy asked.

“So everyone understands?” Lefty asked, “Because I won't be repeating myself, for the sake of my sanity and Alec here.”

“It explains why you've been acting stranger than usual,” Bonnie nodded, “But why didn’t you tell us??”

“Exactly Lefty!” Freddy chimed in, “Why didn’t you tell us anything?? We always keep each other in the loop!! You could have come to me sooner! You’ve obviously have kept him for a while because the Lonely Freddy's were destroyed after one jumped up on you and attacked! You should have told me as soon as your knew!!”

“And told you what? I don’t think you would have believed me unless I showed you proof!” Lefty snapped his fingers. “I had trouble initially believing this actually happened under my watch! Under Security’s watch! Alec.... Slipped through a crack I thought we fixed... He seems to be the only one so there will not be an incident similar to the six children in 1985....”

“It was an awful day in our history...” Security shook his head.

“Still... I'm trying, I'm really trying, I'm searching everything we have, I reason that this can be reversed!”

“So we just leave you to it?” Chica asked.

“I don't see how you can help unfortunately, magic, bad soul messing up magic, must have done this, so magic must be able to undo this,” Lefty said, “But we must keep Alec save from any possible threat until I can fix this.... The threats include humans who will deactivate him including Michael, Jeremy and any other employee, mystical monsters and those who seek Soul Remnant.... His... His imposter will also be a threat... God if Lonely Freddy realises Alec could still be alive, he’d want to silence him..... Forever.”

“Why?”

“Are you serious Bonnie?!” Chica snapped, “Lefty just told us a robot stole a person’s body! Do you think that thing will give up easily?”

Lefty nodded, “Exactly! I know that thing won’t give up!”

“What about that spell ye once said? The undoing spell?” Foxy asked.

“ “Undo what harm and destruction that has been brought, set things right again, erase this devastation”? That's a simple spell, for simple things. I suspect with Alec, I might need to write a spell, you can't compare fixing a broken foot with a soul that's been stuck in the wrong body,” —Foxy nodded agreeing. “I know it's difficult magic... Maybe something like “Hypnotic eyes that have taken, return to your body and let the lost soul go back home”. I wouldn’t know if these spells work and if it comes to an incantation having to be said, I want it to be perfect.”

“It needs to be perfect!” Security agreed, “Unfortunately... I know, there could be consequences...”

“I am aware,” Lefty answered.

“What?” Freddy asked not understanding.

“If we don't do it correctly....” Security bit his lip, “The worst-case scenario is that..... We accidentally kill Alec.”

The talk of death unnerved Alec. Lefty spoke, “I will not allow that to happen!! I will not let Alec die!! That's why I'm taking my time with my research... I found blueprints of Lonely Freddy, I have a deactivated Lonely Freddy I've pulled to pieces to inspect, I printed off 50 different customer complaints about Lonely Freddy, I'm looking at every mechanic slash technician report that details any breakdown, malfunction, and anything strange, I'm reading through my own book collection plus Otis's and Security's, it's over 200 books!”

“Haven’t you gotten a headache from so much reading?” Chica asked, “Maybe we could help also, speed this along.”

“Do you even know what to look for?” Lefty questioned sceptical.

“Well, I could certainly read a few,” Security nodded. “Unfortunately Chica, some of the books aren’t translated to English.”

“What languages are they?” Bonnie asked, “I know some French.”

“Italian, Latin and Chinese, do you understand those languages?”

“Wait, I think one of Lewis's friends are Italian,”

“If you're talking about Carla, yes, she is Italian,” Lefty answered, “But we've never met her... She certainly won’t know us. I've seen pictures of her and from what I understand, Carla lives somewhere near Rylanders Street, which is over an hour walk away.”

Rylanders Street?

Alec's address was 73 Rylanders Street.

“How would you know it takes an hour to walk there?” Bonnie asked.

“Lewis drove me near there once, when he took me to visit Mr Emily... Who use to live nearby in Sanders Place,” Lefty answered immediately.

“Lefty, Lefty, I live there, I live on Rylanders Street,” Alec told him.

“That's nice to know but I can't take you there yet, there’s too many factors to consider, the neighbours and potentially security cameras recording in the area... Not to mention inside your house your family and the imposter who won't go down without a fight.”

“Getting caught is a big problem essentially,” Helpy said.

“Exactly, we have no plan yet, we need to decide based on the methods that are available to us, and what options we have, what our plan must be,” Lefty replied seemingly only speaking to Alec now despite the Rockstars were still there. “I won't go there until I'm confident, either me and Lewis or maybe even Benedict can drive you there once we have a solid way to swap you back into a human... Ideally without letting your parents see it.”

Lefty had a key to open the front door. Alec knew it. Lefty had likely gone there, he could have found his address somehow, most likely when they planned Hazel's birthday, Lefty could have found out his address and already went there at one point. How else would he have known it takes an hour to walk there?

Why would Lefty go without him? Alec just wanted to make sure his family was alright, that's all he was asking for.

“Let's talk, just me and the Rockstars,” Security suggested, “Lefty, take Helpy and Alec to the kitchen and get some lunch before you starve.”

“Sure,” Lefty answered. The two bears trailed behind him as he left the room.

When they were in the kitchen, Alec spoke to Lefty, “You have a key, could you take me home at any moment I asked?”

“If you're asking right now if I'll take you tonight, the answer is no,” Lefty answered.

“I just want to see my family and make sure they're okay, Lewis told me it's been a few months, I miss them-”

“I understand what you’re saying,” Lefty cut him off in a rude sounding tone, “But there is a bad storm coming tonight. They think we're going to have it some point after 10pm, maybe earlier, and it's daylight saving time also, we wouldn’t be able to safely leave until at the earliest 8:30pm, it'd be cutting it too close. I do not go out in thunder storms, it's dangerous.”

Alec grumbled, getting angry in response to Lefty, “Would you ever take me home?”

Lefty looked extremely offended, he scowled, “Of course I would! Not tonight! We would put ourselves in danger! I would take you tomorrow!”

Tension.

“I don't like this...” Helpy had spoken.

Lefty closed his eyes and took a deep breath, “I’m sorry for getting snippy. I haven’t slept well since... Well, you told me about this... I've started having those nightmares again...”

“The ones with the strange man?” Helpy asked him.

“I think I'll turn in early today... Once we eat...” Lefty muttered, “I need sleep.”

“Yes, get some sleep,” Helpy nodded.

Alec needed to go and look.

He couldn’t wait any longer.

Now he had the opportunity.

He would steal Lefty's key. He'd be back before the storm started and no one would know he was gone.

The child is planning an escape.

First Chapter | Previous Chapter | Next Chapter

#five nights at freddy's #fazbear frights #I am Machine-Story #Lonely Freddy #FNAF Alec #Lefty #Helpy #Security Puppet #Rockstar Freddy #Rockstar Bonnie #Rockstar Chica #Rockstar Foxy #All the Rockstars in one chapter #Now I'll shift focus to other projects for a while #New Arc next for this Story #Alec's got a plan #Bonnie now realises he screwed up #Mentioned: Hazel

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deans-mind-palace · 4 years

Text

Suspirium (Pt.4)

Pairing: Prof!Sam x Reader

Summary: You’re in your last year of your Classics and Mordern Languages studies and you’re majoring in Latin and English. Then you get assigned to a different Latin teacher. And damn, he loves his subject. Too bad that he’s also hot. What is just a childish crush soon develops into something way more complicated.

Word Count: 1,891

Warnings: Latin & Slowburn

Author’s Note: A lot of Latin and Catullus but I wanted you to show Prof Sam’s lectures and the reader’s life besides university. And there’s a surprise at the end. Enjoy.

Suspirium - Masterlist

You slammed your locker shut and hurriedly stuffed the white blouse into the waistband of the black skirt, when the door to the changing room had already been opened. You stood up straight immediately. Chest out and stomach in. You took a deep breath and tried to appear confident, while you were getting ready for a reprimand. A man in a black tuxedo came rushing through the door. "Y/N! Where the hell were you?" The man was a little fatter and his head was all red. His expression was ugly and distorted and he was dabbing the sweat off his forehead with a white cloth from the pocket of his jacket. "François. I am sorry. I really am. I-I lost track of time!" you tried to explain yourself. Your self-confidence was gone. "What is this, Y/N? You work in a star restaurant. I expect discipline. I'm trying to rely on you. Tonight is a night with important guests and I need you. We're behind schedule. The reputation of the restaurant -" the man with the French accent complained. But you already finished his sentence. "depends on each one of us. A grain of sand in the clockwork will stop the whole movement. I know." You knew that speech by heart. Normally you would have taken that motto to heart, but... "Mon dieu." He brushed across his moustache and massaged his temples while his anger subsided. "We'll talk about it later. I need you now. The kitchen is a mess because the food is not being served quickly enough." He pushed the door open and you followed him out into the hall and into the kitchen. There were all kinds of steaming from different pots. Jacques waved a frying pan in which he was flambéing something and blurted orders around. A kitchen boy pushed some plates into your hand in a frightened way. His eyes were wide open and he didn't seem to be used to the harsh tone that prevailed in the kitchen.

He had red hair and countless freckles adorned his face. The plates swayed in his hand and his arms trembled under the weight. You gave him a sympathetic smile and took the plates away. "The roast beef with sesame crust on mango chutney and the sea urchin cores with green asparagus to seventeen. Hop hop!" François directed you out the door and into the dining room. Immediately, the soft murmuring of the guests, the clinking sound of wine glasses being clinked together, the clattering of cutlery on dishes and the gentle tones of the piano floated through the air. With calm and firm steps you brought the food to the white-laid table and set it down in front of a couple wearing chic evening gowns, as is obligatory in this expensive restaurant. With a professional but reserved smile, you silently handed the food as you had learned it, and with an elegant gesture of your hand you poured some water.

It was shortly after one o'clock when, after almost seven hours, you stuffed your skirt into your locker and slipped into your jeans. In one flowing movement you brushed the hair out of your forehead and took a deep breath. Your body ached from a hard day, your head was buzzing and you longed for your bed. Tomorrow you already had a lecture at 9am.

In a hurry you took a look at your mobile phone. You could hear the clinking of plates, which had been washed and dipped into the sink, sounding muffled from the kitchen. Brooks had written to you a few minutes ago. He knew your working schedule by heart and knew that you had just finished. Actually, you were too tired and didn't feel like talking to your best friend on the phone, but you knew the longer you delayed the call, the worse it would get.

Quickly you dialed his number. After the ringing tone he answered immediately. "Hey, Brooks." You had trouble suppressing a hearty yawn. There was not a hint of fatigue in Brooks' voice. "Y/N, what secret are you keeping from me?" he demanded amusedly. Your friend was a man who came straight to the point. You should be fine.

"How was your first lecture with Professor Winchester?" Brooks asked. It took your tired brain a moment to realize that he meant Sam. "The typical introduction. Sam seems nice." You were biting your tongue when his first name left your lips. Brooks, of course, noticed this little detail right away. "Sam, huh?" repeated his name with a smirk, almost as if he had to test it on his tongue first. "Did he offer you his first name because he is so young himself?" the man on the other end of the line asked curiously. This time you couldn't suppress the yawn. "Hmm, exactly." You told Brooks everything he wanted to know about the lecture. After a while, he settled for the information and decided to let you go to bed. The last night bus spat you up a block from your stop and you were glad when you fell into your cuddly bed and could pull the fluffy blanket up to your chin.

The auditorium was already filled with students talking wildly, but Sam hadn't appeared when you sat down. The day before yesterday, right after the first lecture, you had gone to the university bookstore and got the materials he requested. You put Latin for the Illiterati, a dictionary and a small book of poems by Catullus on the table. Your pens and your notebook followed. All heads turned to the door as Professor Winchester entered the room and walked forward with long, determined strides past the filled rows of seats. The red sweater stretched across his sturdy stature and a grey jacket hung over his shoulder. There was silence in the lecture hall as Sam prepared his lecture.

He cleared his throat, which was completely unnecessary as he already had all the attention on him anyway. His gaze glided briefly to you and you gave him a smile. He winked at you in a friendly way before his gaze wandered over the rest of the students. "We will begin today with Catullus." he began today's lecture. Your fellow students listened to him eagerly.

"Who can tell me something about Catullus as a person?" he asked. Immediately your hand shot up. But he called a student a few rows behind you. "Gaius Valerius Catullus was a Roman poet from Verona. He was probably born in the first century B.C. He aspired a political career at first, but he was not satisfied with the opinions of the triumvirate consisting of Caesar, Pompeius and Cato, so he began to write insulting poems about the three great men of Rome." Sam raised his hand and the student stopped his monologue. He cleared his throat again and walked up and down in front of the first row. "Who can tell me when Catullus died?" he asked the next question. Again your hand shot into the air. But again he did not call you. "Whatever dates you wish to give me, ladies and gentlemen, I doubt very much they are correct." You lowered your hand and listened carefully. "For the fact is, we know almost nothing about Catullus' life. We can only make guesses. So who can tell me about Catullus?" He raised his hands in invitation.

"Come on. Call in your answers, don't be shy, pretend we're in the ancient senate of Rome. Do you think it was organized that way? Come on, let me hear you." Your fellow students looked at each other in surprise. For a moment there was hesitation in the air, then they started calling in. "He wrote a life's work of 116 poems." "Catullus admired Sappho." "Exactly. And his best friend was Nepos." "He was also one of the Neotericists." "Not to mention that he died when he was 30. Circumstances unknown." "Nonsense. He died of lovesickness." Sam just nodded, but that sentence made him stop and listen. He lowered his hand, a simple gesture, and the confused cries ebbed away, almost as if he was the fixed star of the lecture hall. He was the sun in your star system and you were just meaningless planets circling around him and drawn to him by higher powers like moths to light.

His gaze wandered over the students, who waited attentively for his next words. He took the thin volume of poetry from the desk and held it in the air. "As mentioned earlier, Catullus wrote 116 carmina." He paused and looked at the book. "Page 38, carmina 85, please." Immediately, the rustling of book pages could be heard. At that unobserved moment, he glanced at you. His hazel eyes pierced yours.

He averted his gaze and raised his voice. Like a Roman rhetorician, he stuck out his chest and began to read the poem with perfect accent. For a moment you thought you were standing on the Forum Romanorum listening to the Roman messenger telling about Caesar's victories.

"Odi et amo. Quare id faciam fortasse requiris. Nescio. Sed fieri sentio et excrucior."

Sam looked up. "Who can translate this for me, please?" Again you raised your hand and this time he noticed. "Ms. L/N. Please do us the honor." "I hate and I love. Wherefore would I do this, perhaps you ask? I do not know. But I feel that it happens and I am tortured." you translated the ancient words fluently. "What do you feel when you read these words?" Sam asked and his eyes were only on you. It felt like for a moment there was just the two of you in this room. The other students around you disappeared. "Pain, unrequited love, despair but also anger," you replied. "Why did he write this?" You took a deep breath. This was your specialty. Now you had the chance to prove yourself. "Most of Catullus' poems are about his love for Lesbia, a married woman with whom he had an affair. The name Lesbia is only a synonym. There are speculations that the beloved is the elder Clodia. She was the wife of a consul. Even though they loved each other, Catullus was not sure of her love. He was torn apart by her failure to return his love unconditionally."

I heard whispers behind me. "Her name was Lesbia! You can see by her name that it was never going to happen." You rolled your eyes, and Sam snorted in amusement. "Well, Mr...?" "Winter, sir." the student helped him. "Mr. Winter. You're not wrong. Homosexuality was not uncommon among the Romans. It was frowned upon, but nobody really cared. Especially the patricians could do what they wanted. But I think that's not true in this case." Sam smiled before he talked to everybody. "Now, I want you all to analyze this poem as homework. Are there any hidden messages? Innuendoes? Stylistic devices? I want to know everything. I want the papers on my desk next week. Good? Then you're dismissed for today."

Sam was standing at your level and you were about to pack when a little note landed on your desk. 4:00pm. My office. S. Surprised, you looked up, but you only caught a glimpse of Sam's fluttering jacket as he disappeared from the lecture hall.

Tags beneath cut. Wanna get tagged? Drop an ask or comment in or add yourself to the Sam taglist with the link in my bio.

Sam Tags: @ashthefirefox @rintheemolion @fortheentries @vexhye @traceyaudette @zeppette @thewintersoldierswife @outofnowhere82

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nad-zeta · 4 years

Text

Match up (´∩｡• ᵕ •｡∩`) ♡

hey!! matchup for ikesen pls? (i hope this ain’t too long hsjdjd)

i’m a straight intj-t female. i’m a lawful neutral, slytherin, & scorpio, and i have a younger twin sis. i’m 5'5 ish (still growing!). my black medium-length straight-ish hair is usually in a ponytail & i have dark brown eyes.

i’m vvv secretive, smart, competitive, ambitious, deep, open-minded, passionate, dark, insecure, observant, resourceful, and mature. i’m generally a shy/quiet person (esp. at first, n w/ boys since i’m in an all girls school), but i’m really talkative when it comes to topics i love, and when i’m already comfortable. sometimes i get too arrogant/confident. i’m quite distant and i easily get jealous, annoyed, lazy, n bored. i’m also a fast learner, hopeless romantic, daydreamer, thrill-seeker, & pessimist/realist! i help others a lot, but i find accepting help hard.

i love receiving praise, attention, & affection, along with cleaning and organizing (but i’m quite messy myself). i love a bunch of stuff, esp. gaming! i also love reading/writing, astronomy, history, war (i love the thrill of it!), weapons (esp. snipers, swords, n bows!), mythology, nature, learning new things, & testing myself. i want others to always tell me the, brutal truth even if it hurts (i don’t see the point in sugar-coating n lying to make others feel better), but i’m really good at lying.

i have a great memory, but i’m quite forgetful. i also really like messing w/ others and i have a rbf. some are intimidated by me, it’s funny. i’m vv good w/ technology too, and i’m GREAT in school. esp. math, science, history, english, and french (foreign language!). i love the language latin a lot (and other aesthetic stuff sm!), along with mystery and the like. (but not horror. i’m kind of a coward, but i like the feeling of being scared? idk?)

i coop up my emotions a lot, along with otherthinking. i also hate a lot of stuff, such as being weak in front of others (crying), others being better, and blind faith. i usually love being alone but at times it gets too lonely. it takes a while for me to open up, i rarely trust others. i don’t really take good care of myself, and i try to block out my emotions, so i tend to be apathetic at times. i swear a lot and i’m loyal. it seems like idc, but i care a lot a lot. it’s vvv embarrasing crying in front of others—i hate it. i tend to carry all the weight. i usually give and take care of others more than the opposite. i think to myself a lot. i’m have a lot of contradictions, n i’m complex tbh.

i tend to get carried away, so pls tell me if it’s too long! take your time, no rush, take care of yourself! stay safe, n tysm in advance ♡

Hi hi Love! Thank you so much for the request hehe i hope i didn't make ya wait too long!🌻 Lol this was not too long at all, the more details the better!❤😊 And can i just say u sound like a super cool person🌻🔥 I hope you are keeping safe and well! And i hope ya enjoy!❤❤😊 @x-jodi-x

So I match you with…………. Nobunaga

The first time Nobunaga sees you, he is hella intrigued like, not only did a smol creature like you manage to save him from a burning building but you were also now even too shy to look him in the eyes. You were like a crazy walking contradiction, bold in the one moment, yet meek and reserved in the next. He brought you back with him to the castle and named you as, the princess of the Oda forces. It took you less than a day to get bored with your title as princess and opt to help the maids out with cleaning and organizing the castle.

By the end of the week, all the castle staff were super impressed by you, not only did you introduce them to new easier ways to get the job done, but you also managed to sort out and organize the dreaded archives.

Nobunaga had been watching you and he was most amused by you, you had this ability to intimidate all those around you, yet you were always there to lend a helping hand. You had even managed confused the castle mother, your work for the castle had always been so diligent and precise, yet when he walked into your room to bring you a letter, it was like walking into a hurricane. He never thought someone with such efficient cleaning and organizing skills could live in what could only be described as a clutter box.

Nobunaga had taken a BIG interest in you and had summoned you to his room to pull his classic, warm my bed pick up line, except what he didn’t expect was that you would truth bomb his ass. He was sister shook, he had never met such a blunt, brutally honest woman in his life, not only that but every second word coming from those beautiful lips were, swear words. You low key lost your patience with him and for a second you forgot your shyness at the door, as you were now in gamer rage mode. Cue Nobu smirking, he had truly stumbled onto the most amusing fireball.

The two of you spent the rest of that night just sipping on some tea and chatting. Nobunaga’s interest was definitely peaked as, in your rejection of his offer to warm his bed, you had told him off in at least 3 different languages. As future conqueror of Japan he had also picked up a few languages in his travels and via the foreigners who would visit his ports. So, he definitely surprised you when he started speaking Latin to you. You couldn't help but be impressed, this also low key helped you open up a little more to him, as the two of you seemed to have found common ground. Nobunaga couldn't help but smile a small smile at how talkative you had become, especially when the two of you started talking about topics that interested you. Not only that but when he had pulled out the game of Go for the two of you to play, you definitely gave this boy a run for his money.

The next morning Nobunaga had announced that you were to accompany him to the next war. You had no time to even get a word in, as before you knew it you were on the back of his horse on your way to the battlefield. Nobunaga smirked as he imagined you covering in fear, in the corner of the camp, so imagine this boy’s surprise when you walked around camp with the most carefree smile on your face. Just before he could question it, the enemy forces managed to break through the ranks and was now riding straight into the camp.

You acted on instinct, you loved weapons, so you were well versed in the art of using various weapons. From the corner of your eye, you could see an enemy archer aiming to strike Nobunaga down. Without a second thought, you had grabbed one of the bows laying by your feet and took aim. “Oi Nobu duck!” those were the only words that left your mouth before the arrow you had fired, went slicing through the air to strike down your opponent. Nobu got back up and looked behind him to see that you had skillfully taken down a hidden archer.

Nobunaga without a second thought, mounted his horse and gave you a hand up and rode out into the front lines with you. The two of you made an unstoppable team slicing through the enemy ranks, and earning the Oda forces a swift victory.

The ride back to the castle was filled with chats, laughs and light banter between you and the devil king. He found you incredibly interesting, the adrenaline pumping through your veins had cause that arrogant and confident side of you to show. You loved war for the thrill of it, you were a master of many weapons and to top it all off, you spoke to him as your equal. You had shaken this poor man to his core, never in his whole entire life had he met a woman like you. So shy and reserved at first, yet a true fireball laying beneath the surface. Needless to say, this boy was falling and falling hard for you

Often the two of you would spend nights together, deep in conversation about anything and everything or playing a game of GO. Nobunaga loved your open-mindedness and your ability to pick up on concepts quickly. He also low key likes your ability to be an excellent liar, as it made the candy heists together all the more interesting. Especially if the two of you would be caught together, in the middle of the hallways dead at night, pockets full of candy. You always seemed to manage to get the two of you out of the extended scolding and lecture sessions with Mamahide by blatantly lying through your teeth. Although, even-though you were an excellent liar, your lies never did seem to work on Nobu as he could always tell if you were bending the truth slightly. You also appreciated that Nobunaga was just as blunt as you, never sugar coating the truth and always speaking openly and honestly with you.

It is also definitely a favourite past time activity for you and Nobunaga to team up and mess with people. If the two of you aren’t sneaking alcohol into Masamune’s water during banquets or tricking Hideyoshi to reveal all his deepest darkest secrets, the two of you are messing with each other. Both of you stubborn cuties are also very competitive, so you best be sure that the two of you have a running bet, to see who the ultimate prank master is. These pranks range from harmless, for example crude drawings on official reports, to more hardcore, shoes on top of doorways and glue on each other’s chairs. Although all that change one day when the two of you decided to team up and work together as a unit to pull pranks instead of work alone, and that is the day the two of you got together.

Both of you by this point was head over heels for each other, but neither was willing to admit their feelings. That is until one-day Nobunaga took you on a romantic getaway to one of the neighbouring regions. You weren’t too sure exactly where he was taking you, but you loved adventures, so you decided to roll with it.

The two of you arrived at a hot spring where, to your surprise Nobunaga waited on you hand and foot. After a long relaxing soak in the soothing water, you walked back to your room to find Nobunaga sitting in the centre of the room with a Go board in front of him. “Come fireball this shall be our final game, winner takes all.”

It was a long and hard game, and you enjoyed every moment of it from the smack talk, to the getting frustrated at unpredictable moves. But in the end, the results were most unexpected. It was a draw, “It seems I have truly met my match with you fireball.” He had intended to win this game and fully conquer your heart, but instead you had just proved to him how equally matched you were for him. Thus strengthening his resolve to confess his feelings and make you the one and only queen of his heart.

Nobunaga couldn’t hold back his feelings for you any longer, the next evening you walked into your room to see it filled with flowers, he had told you how much he loved and adored you, and he asked you if you would be the one and only conquer of his heart. The two of you then met it the most passionate of kisses. The rest of the weekend away, Nobunaga spent pampering you, the one true love of his life.

Nobunaga absolutely adored every part of you. He loved that you were just as jealous as he was, often being twice as clingy and affectionate towards him whenever a visiting princess arrived. He loved your writing and would often rest his head on your lap after a long day and insist you read to him, the newest piece of your writing.

He adored that you kept him on his toes with all your various interests, and he loved how you just knew a bit of everything.

He would especially enjoy holding you in his arms at night as the two of you share a drink out on the balcony. He loved to listen all your stories about mythology, as he affectionately stroked your back.

This softy boi knows that, you tend to bottle up your emotions and that you hate crying in front of others, so whenever you are feeling down or faced with problems, he is by your side in an instant. Clearing his schedule and handing off all his duties to Hideyoshi, so he can envelop you in his love, and shower you with endless amounts of affection and attention. He would patiently hold you in his arms, as he coaxes you by rubbing small soothing circles on your back, to tell him all that burdens you. He would do absolutely anything to make you smile and melt away all your insecurities. He would always be there, to wipe away every one of your tears, while whispering in your ears just how much he adores you.

He knows that you are entirely selfless and tend to neglect yourself, so you best be sure he is going to be by your side and give you all the help and support, whether you asked for it or not. If you forget to eat, he will bring you every meal, and make time to eat with you, just to make sure you are getting enough nutrients. If you are working too hard and not getting enough sleep, he will pull you into his arms and let you rest your head on his chest, while he gently stokes your hair, to coax you to sleep.

Nobunaga absolutely loves to sneak a few passionate kisses with you in the hallway on his way to his next meeting, just as a way to remind you, just how much he loves and adores you. He is also forever giving you words of affirmation for everything you do.

The two of you can often be found snuggled up together on the balcony of your shared room just exchanging sweet kisses and words of love

Other potential matches…………… Kenshin

I hope you enjoyed this dear, it definitely turned out a lot longer than expected whooops! 🙈🙈❤😊

#matchups #ikesen matchup #match ups #oda nobunaga #ikesen nobunaga #nobunaga oda #ikemen sengoku nobunaga #nobunaga matchup #submission

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oh-boleyn · 4 years

Text

catherine / infamy

words: 5733, one shot, language: english

anne / jane / katherine / catherine

this was posted on ao3 some days ago and I have been since debating to post it here or not. except for this series I will stop posting here probably, and just move to my ao3

TW: I think this one only has as tw Catherine's story (kidnapping, dying in childbirth, etc) plus self deprication... if anyone thinks this one needs more tw please tell me

the commentary between scenes are things I got from internet about Catherine Parr

Catherine Parr will always be known as the queen who got away.

(…)

Her breath is heavy, the air denser than it should be.

But it slowly gets better, to the point she opens her eyes and the light doesn’t hurt. Sitting, she can recognize Katherine Howard, the girl for who she was a lady-in-waiting. Anna of Cleves is also sitting, a lost expression on her face. A woman with blonde hair that makes her think of the various portraits she saw in the palace. Just by counting the people in the room, she can easily assume who the rest of them are.

After all, she was the last of them.

(…)

Catherine’s father died when she was five years old and so her education was left to her mother, who educated Catherine to a high standard.

(…)

Catherine never loved moving.

Usually she got too attached to a place, and changes were definitely not her favourite thing.

(Moving centuries felt like a torture – not that she would ever admit it out loud.)

Their new house was small, smaller than any castle she ever lived in. She had to share a bedroom with her godmother with whom she never had a relationship, and the third queen, mother of the kid she saw getting the crown.

Sometimes at night the house made her think of Snape Castle. Of nights fearing for her life. Being the survivor didn’t mean her life was any easier. Those nights she preferred to avoid sleeping in case the faces of John and Margaret might appear in her dreams.

Instead she would just scroll through articles and articles on her phone, trying to understand any actual device that was out to the public, or what did spot on meant. At least being productive made her feel less useless. After years of new information missed, she could really use new research.

(…)

Sometimes alternatively spelled Katherine, Katheryn, Kateryn or Katharine.

(…)

Catherine can’t help but feel powerless when thinking about Katherine Howard.

She was just a child. A teen, who Catherine couldn’t save. Her mind didn’t work fast enough to help the girl, who died such a tragic, grotesque death, leaving Parr her place as queen. Maybe if Parr was smart enough, she could’ve done something else.

But she wasn’t.

She loved to lie, to make everyone believe her, but deep down she knew nothing more than that, a lie. An elaborated act that took years to construct. A character, a fake line, an improvised scene that went day after day. Because Catherine didn’t think of herself as intelligent, just a very good actress, fooling everyone into thinking she was smart.

She wished it was true.

Instead she had to live with the guilt of knowing what she did. She was not the hero, not the survivor, not the scholar queen.

Catherine Parr was a fool who couldn’t save Howard, nor Margaret, nor Elizabeth, nor Lady Jane Grey. Her hands were filled with the blood and tears of all the girls at her care; she never had the chance to rescue, instead just assisting to their downfall. And her mind won’t stop her from repeating the names time and time again.

(…)

Catherine was known for her love of learning and for her fluency in languages such as Latin, French and Italian.

(…)

“What do you want to know?” The last queen questions.

Her godmother had been moving the whole night, buzzing around her. It was almost becoming annoying, except that there was a warmness, an incapability of getting mad knowing how close her mother and the woman once were.

“What makes you think I want to know something?” Aragon retorts.

“You seem nervous, if you want to know something just ask ahead. I won’t get mad.”

She internally prays for Aragon not to ask her something about Spanish, or worse, Latin or Italian. Languages felt more complicated and overwhelming in the twenty-first century, featuring strange mixes between them.

(Apparently, Spanglish was a thing.)

She is not sure if any other question would be good, at all. Catherine is supposed to know all the answers, to be educated, to distinguish, to be useful. Since arriving in this century her mind has been confused, mixing up languages and dates. Blocked, broken.

“Curiosity is not such a good trait.” The older woman speaks, almost robotically, just repeating words she probably heard time and time again.

Catherine would be lying if she said that was the first time she heard those words. Her curiosity was not exactly an attribute in her past life, but she maintained it through the end of her days, always looking forward to learning. A craving for intelligence heavier than the one for safety.

“It’s alright, really.”

“What happened when I died?”

The question comes out quickly, making Parr hold a breath.

“When you died…” She starts, trying to remember only important details. “Anne and Henry were still married, but she lost the pregnancy. She had three miscarriages. You can imagine how Henry reacted.”

Catherine nods, aware of Anne’s thick scar.

“Jane went next. I can’t remember a lot from her reign, for it was short and I wasn’t at court at the time,” she winces, trying not to show her stiffness when talking about it, “Henry asked for her to be painted in every family portrait, even after she died. He really tried to secure the line of succession for Edward, what a shame he died so young. In his attempts to have another son, Henry married Anna. She wasn’t bad, just probably a lot for him to handle.”

“She seems like a lot.” Catherine speaks, judging tone in her voice.

“Don’t say that, she is actually sweet. Henry couldn’t kill her, politics involved, so they settled for an annulment. Then Katherine came. She was naïve, a child. I was a lady-in-waiting for her, and it is true she might have been childish, but she was –is, I suppose– a good person.”

“I feel like all of them know more than me,” Aragon explains, “but I don’t want to read about them, it’s like invading their privacy.”

“I did. Most sources are from after we died, none of them completely true.” Catherine admits. “We should be able to tell our story.”

“We should.”

(…)

Catherine is known for reuniting Henry’s children with their father and bringing them back to court.

(…)

The opening night for the show is nerve-wracking to say the least.

Anna almost cursed at Catherine because, after all, it was her idea. Parr stays silent, knowing that the fourth queen is nervous to her very core. She also knows that the show has to be done.

They could only live off doing interviews for some time. She learnt that the internet worked in mysterious ways, and nothing stayed new for too long. People grew tired, and interviews were less and less often.

But after the play, it feels right. Even her godmother is smiling, her own reluctance to create the play long forgotten. People cheer around them, the band still firm on their spots but clapping their hands.

For a moment it feels good to be in the spotlight.

(…)

Catherine was an attractive and intelligent woman, who combined the intelligence and wit of Anne Boleyn with the prudence and diplomacy of Catherine of Aragon.

(…)

“Anne, wake up.”

Boleyn opens her eyes. Her hands were still holding her phone. That little technological device that holds so much information about everything. Catherine wonders what she was doing, what could have been so important that she didn’t go to bed.

“You should go to your room, Kat and Anna might be waiting for you.” She says with a soft voice, trying not to wake anyone else in the house.

The second queen has big, bright green eyes. There is a sparkle of wit that Catherine can’t shake her head off. She looks like Elizabeth, the same curiosity shining through. The way she carries herself, as if she still was the queen. The secrecy, how every word holds another meaning.

Anne stood up, going to her bedroom.

“Goodnight Anne.”

“Night, Parr.”

Elizabeth is dead, and they aren’t. Catherine never had a chance to amend their problems, instead she died. Never getting to see Elizabeth as queen was going to be something she would always regret.

The internet said she was a great queen, and it didn’t surprise Parr at all.

(…)

Elizabeth was won over by Catherine’s warmth and intelligence.

(…)

Catherine Parr was never a protagonist, and she prided herself on it. Being a writer was more important to her. Narrators lived long enough to tell the heroes stories. She was observant. Silent, but good at knowing all the gossip. Being invisible was an advantage, it could keep you alive.

(That is if you didn’t die because of childbirth, obviously.)

Even in the play, she made it known. Her make-up in earthly tones, and she wears a blue costume. Blue was serene, trying not to be noticed. She didn’t talk as much as the other queens, relegating her story just to her last verses.

Catherine Parr was a narrator, not a protagonist, and she was aware of it.

That was why, when watching the queens, she felt so inclined to give them as much attention as she could. Catherine wouldn’t write their stories, that would be not okay if she tried to keep the fake peace that reigned the house, but she could surely find striking inspiration at any moment.

She discovered that none of them were having the best time in their new lives. They didn’t treat it as a brand-new chance to be happy, instead they were bonded to the past, to their own time. It felt like whatever brought them back just did it so they could act as robots half of the time, not trusting each other to talk seriously for more than a couple of minutes.

Catherine wonders if the other queens also notice how much she is struggling.

(…)

However, the quick-thinking Catherine Parr managed to save her head by pleading with Henry and persuading him that she had only argued with him in an attempt to help him forget about the pain caused by his leg ulcer and to learn from him.

Henry forgave her.

(…)

They move. Again. She knows it’s for the better, but she can’t help feeling weirded out by the new house. At least it allows them each to have a room of their own, a privacy she certainly craved.

She takes the basement, which is the colder room in the house. It feels comfortable, after all the years of living in palaces makes you feel that way about cold, big rooms. Her bed, even if it is double size, doesn’t fill more than a quarter of the room, leaving her space for a big desk and a bookshelf.

Catherine counts all the books once before starting packing, twice after saving them and another time as soon as she arrives. The feeling that she probably lost one doesn’t disappear, even if she doesn’t know what book she lost.

(Maybe because most of her books are destroyed after five hundred years of not caring for them.

Not like those books are useful anymore.)

(…)

According to Foxe, she began “frankly to debate with the king touching religion, and therein flatly to discover herself; oftentimes wishing, exhorting, and persuading the king.”

(…)

Doing research is exhausting to say the least.

The bright white screen makes her eyes ache after watching it for a while, and her hands don’t work quickly on the keyboard. She can’t even write as fast as she could in her old life, her letters clumsy and often having problems with gripping the new pens.

What makes it the worst, is that she feels so stupid when trying to do it. Languages vary when time progresses, that much she always knew, but trying to read an article sometimes becomes impossible, with words such as quantum entanglement or Newtonian physics. It infuriates her, not being able to understand.

Once upon a time she knew it all, about God, history, languages. But now it felt as if her brain just stopped working. Everything went faster than she could, leaving her behind, useless to a new world into which she never asked to be brought.

Sometimes she hates modernism and its complexity.

Still, Catherine puts on an act every day, talking about penicillin and ibuprofen, explaining history to Anna and focusing on appearing smart. Because, after all, that was all she ever knew. All she ever had was owned for being smart, to know how to play a King’s game, and getting away with it.

If she wasn’t smart, she was nothing.

(…)

Catherine certainly believed herself to be in danger and, had she not acted decisively, it is likely that Henry would have allowed her to be arrested and, perhaps, executed.

(…)

“Cathy, por favor, ayúdame con esto.” Her godmother asks, while going through some files. “I know you were good at Spanish.”

Parr holds a breath. She once could speak it fluently, but lately it’s pained her into having problems with it.

“I was reading this book, and wondered if della and del were still being used? Or is it old Spanish?”

Catherine didn’t know the answer at all. How was she supposed to? If she could barely understand it. She wanted to scream, to explain that she had no actual clue. She wanted to pull away her façade of being smart and just admitting that it was too hard for her.

“I think it’s safer to use de la instead of a contracción.” Cathy says, praying to be right.

“Gracias querida.” Aragon winks at her.

Parr was really hoping she was right.

(…)

Catherine Parr - The Scholar Queen.

(…)

Catherine was a writer, she even went as far as publishing books under her name, the name of a queen, in a patriarchal society.

Catherine Parr was a writer because it was all she had ever done. Every reason why she wanted to be remembered was because she was a writer. She didn’t care about her husbands, not even Thomas who she truly thought she loved. She didn’t want to be remembered as a queen, only as a writer.

(She sometimes thought that if being a writer was enough for her, in that case, she would’ve lived longer, but of course she needed to have a man in her life.)

Talking about her past as a writer gave her the peace of mind she didn’t have for standing behind men her whole life.

Behind a great man, there is always a great woman.

Except that she was behind John Neville, a distant catholic cousin who’s actions ended up with her being kidnapped; Henry the VIII, an egomaniac poor excuse of king who got as far as killing two of his wives (almost her killed too); and last but not least, Thomas Seymour, a power starved moron.

Was she just like them? Was she the only one guilty of her past life? An egomaniac who couldn’t save Katherine Howard? A power-starved former queen who let harm come to her most loved stepdaughter? Or just a moron who couldn’t protect anyone, not even herself?

Catherine was a writer, because thinking about her own mistakes was harder than just doing what she always did, telling other people’s ones.

(…)

Catherine Parr was in fact the cleverest and most passionate of Henry VIII's six wives, says Derek Wilson.

(…)

Catherine wasn’t a big fan of the rain.

She didn’t mind it, and enjoyed the sounds of the water drops when she was writing, but being in closed spaces sometimes became too much, too claustrophobic. She loved walking just a little every day, going to the theatre in the afternoon or to the grocery shop, but with the weather it wasn’t possible.

Usually on days like that she would just get herself isolated from the queens, her anxiety building up as she tried to behave and not explode. Try to pass as if she doesn’t even exist, guarding her feelings and nerves to herself.

She told the queens she would be writing in her room, and to just call her when it was time to eat. No one checked up on her. No one gave her tea, or coffee. Even when the clock hit the time for dinner –she had been staring at it for the last five minutes, hyper aware of the time being–, they called her up three minutes and fifty-two seconds later than what she would have liked.

(…)

In her will, dated 23 March 1545, Margaret stated that she was unable to render Catherine sufficient thanks 'for the godly education and tender love and bountiful goodness which I have evermore found in her Highness'.

(…)

It feels harder on her than the rest of the queens. The feeling of not belonging, of not understanding. Even with Jane their relationship is not close — not that it can be, the third queen always storming off or barely talking.

She feels like an outsider, not knowing where she is standing.

Catherine has always been cordial, but there’s a thought in the back of her mind that says that it is only out of duty. Of an old debt to her mother, and not real love. Even after long talks over tea, and trips to the mall, Cathy feels that their relationship is still empty. Out of place, fake.

Parr can’t help but dream about feeling loved again, truly loved, something that she has not known for a long time. But it scares her, Margaret ended up dying young, Elizabeth had to suffer, Jane Grey had a horrible death.

Maybe she didn’t need their love, because each time someone loved her, they ended up dead.

(…)

Catherine enjoyed a close relationship with Henry's three children and was personally involved in the education of Elizabeth I and Edward VI.

(…)

She enters the kitchen, just to see Anne and Anna with an apple pie in the middle of the table.

“I want pie.” She states.

“Magic word?” Anne teases her, a smirk on her lips.

“Je t'aime beau cul.”

Boleyn laughs, in a way that it makes her stomach turn. It’s mocking, clearly not laughing with Catherine, but rather at her.

“What? What did I say wrong?”

“You pronounced the last part wrong, it’s beaucoup, no beau cul.”

Catherine can feel her face turning red, almost burning. Of course, she was going to mess up pronunciation after years without trying. Now Anne was mocking her, and she felt ridiculed, uncomfortable.

“Why is it so funny?” Anna interrupts, maybe picking up the humiliating situation, “she just messed up pronunciation, it’s not that bad.”

“Instead of saying ‘I love you so much’ she said “I love you, nice ass’.”

Parr chuckles painfully, dreading Anna’s giggling.

“Don’t worry, mon petit chou.” Anne grabs a plate and settles a slice of the pie. “A sweet, for a sweetheart.”

She winks an eye to Parr, easing the air around the writer.

(…)

The dowager queen promised to provide education for her.

(…)

Catherine tries to get it out, to calm herself down after a nightmare.

She takes some paper and a pen, even though it feels uncomfortable in her hand, and tries to write about it. Catherine forces the memories on her brain. Attempts to remember every detail, the face of fear Margaret held, frustrating not to confuse it with the face of the girl dying. Parr thinks of John, of the aggressive men he became.

And she writes messy and clumsy letters, focusing only on what she has to say and not how she says it. Working hard distracts her for almost the whole night, finishing with a good amount of paper in possession, and her hand smeared with ink.

Catherine considers reading it, but ultimately decides against it, walking to the kitchen as fast as she can.

She lets it burn, page by page, word by word. Parr lets it burn as if she never cared for it, something so personal that it won’t be good for even her to read. She knows that the queens will ask the next day, but she can’t help herself to care. She lets it burn.

(…)

She loved fine clothes, jewels and intelligent company.

(…)

Catherine wishes she had a real idea of when to stop, but apparently, she wasn’t born with it.

Most of the time, the queens won’t shush her, instead acting as if they hear what she has to say. Acting being the key word. Once Cathy was so into her monologue, she would discover how uninterested her eyes looked, wandering around the room and just humming in response instead of talking actual real words. In that moment she would try to cut herself short, wrap the idea quicker than expected.

Anna would try to keep up, being amicable enough, but the inadequacy was something the survivor couldn’t shake off. Even when the fourth queen tries to talk, Cathy will already anticipate the truth. She pitied her, knowing how her life was and ended, and it was just a way to show it. She pushed Anna away, not telling her any weird facts. She didn’t want to be a poor fool.

(…)

In 1543, she published her first book, Psalms or Prayers, anonymously.

(…)

“I’m just… so afraid to talk sometimes.”

Catherine thought that, but the words didn’t come out of her mouth, but rather from Boleyn’s.

“I got killed for that, and I can’t help it. I feel like I need to control everything.”

“But you don’t.” Parr confirms. “Also, you can’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“You can control yourself, with whom you hang out, you can control things such as the tone of your words, but if someone wants to hate you, they will. You can’t control nature, not yours, nor from others.” Catherine ponders.

She wishes that she could follow her own advice, but it’s hard. That doesn’t mean that Catherine is not hoping for Anne to do so, to be happier than she is. Maybe that if she can help the woman, Parr can redeem herself.

“Thank you, I think I needed to hear it.” The green-eyed talks.

“Don’t worry, I’m here for you.”

She brushes off the guilt of being egoistic that tries to settle on her mind.

(…)

According to biographer Linda Porter, the story that as a child, Catherine could not tolerate sewing and often said to her mother "my hands are ordained to touch crowns and sceptres, not spindles and needles" is almost certainly apocryphal.

(…)

Catherine wants to give up writing, knowing that it doesn’t feel the same anymore. Everything is too personal, too old, too weird. Old languages long forgotten mixing with new ones, words that haven’t existed before now complicated to use.

Apparently, Shakespeare by himself invented around a thousand seven hundred words. Just by one person.

The idea of the new vocabulary overwhelms her mind. So much she doesn’t know and is not sure if she ever will. But a part of her longs for it, for the feeling of release that writing could sometimes bring. Catherine has faith about being able to be valuable, to tell stories, to do good, to give something to the world.

Parr decides to just take her time, to write as best as she can. She can’t do more than her best.

(…)

Between October 1536 and April 1537, Catherine lived alone in fear with her step-children, struggling to survive.

(…)

“Are you okay, Catherine?” Kat asks.

It was her third attempt at it. Nothing she wrote felt right. There was just so much missed, so much to do. She couldn’t focus on the paragraphs.

“Yes, just can’t seem to get this done.” She straightens her spine.

Did always sitting hurt as much?

“What is it about?” The teenager wonders.

“Just about Spain history, and the colonies.”

“Can I read?”

“Yes. I will make tea.” Parr handles the computer to the girl.

She stretches her spine and goes around preparing the drink.

Catherine is not sure if she would let any other queen read what she wrote. Katherine is different, had always been. Even in her time as queen, even when it all happened. She was smart, but not outspoken. Polite yet truthful.

“It is good, really.” Howard says.

“I can sense a “but”.” Catherine laughs anxiously, dreading the critic.

“You are only taking one side; you should know how Spain sent a lot of people from the church on missions to re-educate the natives. Las misiones Jesuitas. Politics and religion were more connected than what this made it look like.”

“That’s… Very true.” She feels bad about not emphasising it as much but brushes it off for the sake of the conversation. “I didn’t know you were interested in history. It’s great,” she insists when Katherine looks at her with big eyes, “if you ever want to work together, you know where to find me.”

(…)

Her second book was a success and widely praised.

(…)

Organizing was never her favourite thing to do. She loved to be messy, scattered paper all around her. Pens out, in the most unexpected places, just in case creativity strikes unexpectedly. The way her manuscripts could look so good, better now that she gave herself time to practice her letters surprised when people saw the chaos in the one she wrote.

Jane was the opposite, neat, having high expectations of finding whatever she left in the place she left it. She was exigent, hard on herself to be organized, in places where Catherine couldn’t care less. That was until everything became way too much and she had to just clean a little. Parr admired Jane, appreciated how much she did, how smart and balanced she had learned to become.

With her papers settled, her pens saved, she gives a look at her room. It feels quiet, harmonized.

(…)

The popular myth that Catherine Parr acted more as her husband's nurse than his wife was born in the 19th century from the work of Victorian moralist and proto-feminist, Agnes Strickland.

(…)

Someone knocks the door to her room twice, and Catherine gets surprised. Almost nobody came to her room, it being almost the farthest one from the rest of the queens. She also never gave any indication of having nightmares like Katherine, so no one would check on her.

“Come in!” She says, despite her wonder.

“Hey there.” Aragon greets. “I just got Kat to sleep.”

“Another nightmare?”

“Yes, but those are getting better, I think. Therapy is helping.” She explains. “But I wanted to check on you.”

Catherine makes room for her in the bed, which she quickly understands. The divorcee sits in the bed, and the survivor wraps herself, getting comfortable in the hug. It’s familiar, an old memory from court in a past life, but a good one. A peaceful, tranquil moment before knowing better.

“Oh, hermosa.” The first queen squeezes her goddaughter. “What’s going on?”

“I’m just… so tired.” She confesses.

She doesn’t precisely know of what she is tired. The intrusive thoughts of hundreds of years, Thomas and how she was a fool. Of hiding her silliness, trying to be better, always better, but never reaching an end. She is tired of feeling bad, of feeling locked into her own expectations. She feels tired of trying to be happier, to be smarter, to be liked.

And there are so many feelings that she just breaks, sobbing into her namesake’s arms.

“Even geniuses need sleep, amor.”

“Don’t call me that.” Cathy bickers.

“Call you what?”

“A genius. I’m not.” She cries. “I want to be dumb; I want to stop overthinking for a second. I’m not smart, I promise you I’m not but please stop expecting things from me I can’t be a disappointment.”

“Mi vida.”

Aragon makes a pattern on her back, trying to soothe her. It doesn’t precisely work, instead she just continues sobbing, letting lots of tears that she has saved for such a long time flow freely. She sniffles out of pure frustration, of having so many thoughts that she can’t even process them.

“I love you, so much.” She affirms. “You have literally blown me away. I know I might not say a lot, but you were always special, since you were little.”

“Don’t say that, I don’t want to be.”

“But you are, and you have surpassed all my expectations, always. You can breathe now; you get to take a break.” She kisses her forehead. “I love you, and would still love you if you are the smartest person in the world or the stupidest. You are so smart, you don’t have to always stick out, or be good at everything. You deserve to just fool around sometimes, and that won’t change who you are.”

When Cathy collects the courage to look her in the eyes, she can swear that there’s a sparkle of pure love and affection in the eyes of her godmother. A sparkle directed at her.

(…)

Biographers have described her as strong-willed and outspoken, physically desirable, susceptible (like Queen Elizabeth) to roguish charm and even willing to resort to obscene language if the occasion suited.

(…)

She doesn’t know how, but something in the air feels lighter, it feels better. Life becomes easier, the house now slowly becoming a home, with the six queens slowly getting better. Catherine can notice how much cooler it turns out to be once they started learning more about each other, understanding something no one else would.

(After all, nobody else was a five hundred years old reincarnated Tudor queen.)

Parr wishes for it to mean that she could live her life relaxed, joyful. But instead she cries every time she notices how lucky she was, the guilt of knowing that she hurt so many people she cared for. A heavy backpack she won’t ever be able to get out.

She doesn’t think that she deserves forgiveness for her acts. And it pains her, hoping for a reality where she was good, for one where she was just the survivor, to one not full with the tragedy her life was.

Each time she says gold star for Cathy Parr, she feels numb. With a bit of luck, she convinced the audience she merits it.

(…)

Catherine's good sense, moral rectitude, compassion, firm religious commitment and strong sense of loyalty and devotion have earned her many admirers among historians.

(…)

There is a silence, and for a moment they stay like that. But the survivor speaks up: “Did you love him?”

“Yes.” Anne states easily. “Or no. I probably didn’t, and he most certainly didn’t either, but I think we both believed we did.”

“Do you love him?”

“No, do you?”

“Never did.”

“Be careful, your neck is quite delicate… I don’t think it would be hard to cut with a sword.”

Catherine tries to mask her thoughts, releasing a faint “Funny.”

Anne probably doesn’t know; she is aware of it. With all the fake comments about the second queen that were a lie, she had decided to not look for much information about her fellow queens, and Catherine was not willing to tell her about how her life nearly ended. It felt selfish, it was just a close call, not a real one like Anne’s or Katherine’s. Still, the idea of her head being amputated from her body followed her, like the ghost of a broken promise. The thought of her life in danger of ending still at the back of her mind.

“Did she love me?” Anne asks, surprising Parr.

“I think she did.” Catherine waits for a moment, before continuing. “I’m sorry for what I did to her.”

With those words she breaks down, trying to hide her tears. She has no right to cry for her own wicked acts, to be comforted by Anne, but that’s what is happening now.

“It’s fine.” Boleyn says, her voice just above a whisper. “I forgive you. She forgave you. We were different people back then.”

“But I did it. No matter what you say, I did it.”

“And I wasn’t an angel either. I acted the wrong way because of my fears. To gain and maintain power. I’m not proud of it,” her eyes, that until that moment were lost, now staring intensely Catherine, “but if you keep living in the past you can’t become a better person in the future.”

(…)

Parr is usually portrayed in cinema and television by actresses who are much older than the queen, who was in her early 30s when she was Henry's wife and was about 36 years old at the time of her death.

(…)

Catherine wished her story was better, for it to have a happy ending. To say that she married Thomas after Henry, and that it was like a dream, that they had children and grandchildren, grew old together and she was loved until the end of her days. She longed to say that she could remember her baby's face, or her first steps or words. Desires to tell everyone that she taught her everything she knew. But in reality, it was not true.

Catherine Parr never had her happily ever after like a queen from a children’s book.

The survivor indeed never had her happy ending, not even when coming back to the modern times. She still put more pressure on herself than what she should've. Tried to always be trusted, to always be useful and to help her everyone. Pushed herself to the edge, trying to be the best version of herself. Got more stressed than necessary, stayed up sometimes too late for her liking, drank more tea and coffee than she should’ve.

Her life became a bittersweet one, a balance found between her tragic story, the guilt she would always feel, and the chance of a new beginning.

Some days were happier than others, some talks were lighter. Freedom and restriction battling over, but giving her enough cheerfulness to go back when things got harder. Working with Katherine over the history they both knew and missed, discussing the newest scientific discoveries with Anna and Jane, grabbing lunch with Anne and tea with Aragon.

Her life was not happy, but it was relaxed. It gave her the chance to just let herself feel emotions, the good, the bad. To write without deadlines. To be calm, to live this new opportunity fully. To learn about herself, to be the protagonist of her own story.

To be loved.

#six the musical #six fanfic #six fanfiction #six the musical fanfiction #six the musical fanfic #catherine parr

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ick25 · 4 years

Text

Rockman.EXE Axess Episode 1 Review.

Presenting Rockman’s new Style... Change.

I can’t promise that I am gonna review the rest of the episodes of Axess nor will I make it very long since I have already stated that this is my least favorite season, but this Corona Virus situation is already driving me crazy so I might as well vent my frustrations here.

Fun fact:

This season never aired in Latin America so I had no idea that there were more seasons beyond the virus buster episode. I watched it in English thinking that it was an episode from the first two seasons that I missed, it started with the same made up intro from the last season, but to my surprise the episode opens in Net City, something I don’t remember ever seeing in previous episodes, and then I saw Megaman’s art style and my confusion became excitement right before I heard the English dub the made me cringed so hard that it almost ruined the show for me, until the writing did that later on. (But I like Rockman’s english voice, it’s kinda hot n.n)

Episode tittle: Cross Fusion!

The episode opens with Rockman fighting two Navis at once in the Net Coliseum, and I’m already loving the art style and how they don’t show his face during the battle until Netto’s voice tells him that he already got their battle pattern. It was like they were saying, “ It’s him! it’s the Rockman you know and love after so long! And he looks slightly shinier too”!

BTW, I’m watching this with Spanish subs, that were sadly not made by yours truly.

Anyway, Netto sends the long Sword and the Yo-yo chips that appear with a new cybernetic themed background and... WOAH WOAH WOAH! TWO DIFFERENT ART STYLES IN THE SAME EPISODE?!

You thought I wouldn’t notice?

Not even five minutes in and this episode is already hitting me with inconsistent art to save in animation, which wouldn’t be so bad if it wasn’t noticeable.

Rockman defeats the two Navis and returns to Netto who gives us but a glimpse of the new PET design before the tittle card appears.

But worry not, for the next scene shows us what the Advanced PET model looks like with this short and kinda lame commercial.

“Believe in the heart of the chips”, it’s the vibe I’m getting here.

And I also never thought it would be possible for the Spanish subs to write something dumber than “Plug-in your heart”. (It’s roughly saying, “Do plug-in into your heart”)

We then join Netto skating with Meiru on her scooter who is basically shaming him for acting weak in his battle until the end, and do you see something wrong with this image?

That’s right, good ol’ Rush is there on Meiru’s scooter for no reason, except to remind me that Rockman will never materialize in the real world like him.

Then they bump into Chisao, yes, Chisao, who wastes no time in telling the audience that Dekao is in Jawaii for some reason.

What little Mr. exposition forgot to tell us is why is he there instead of Dekao.

Netto and Meiru invite Chisao to go with them to Scilab, which is now gonna be a very recurrent place, to deliver a bag to Netto’s dad who is in Japan working on something, and once he’s done he’ll go back to abandoning his family to travel the world.

He is working on a top secret experiment, so everyone is of course invited to watch it.

These are Officer Mizaki and his Navi Prismman, who are not gonna be important until very later in the season where they’re affected by this show’s equivalent of drugs, but right now they are gonna remind us of the dangers of human trials.

Eguchi Meijin makes a comeback, since the last time we saw him he was making a late advertisement for Battle Network 3 in episode 51. He tells Netto and the others that the experiment is called Cross Fusion and that it is the next step after the Virus Buster episode where Dr. Hikari brought a bunch of cyber data into the real world, which is bringing a Net Navi into the real World through its operator’s body? That was already possible without the human body!

What is the purpose of Cross Fusion then? Other than to turn the series into a superhero kind of show for western audiences.

There is no real explanation of why they want to do this or why Cross Fusion is the only way to achieve this purpose. Why not simply materialized the Navis like in the last episode? You can’t really argue that it was the viruses intervention that made this possible, because a “good” scientist would try to reproduce this result without risking the life of a human being, there certainly must be other ways to do so.

It seems that the only excuse they have is that Netto’s dad was not aware that this event happened because he was asleep during the entire episode, and if Netto never mentioned it even once.

“I wanna risk my life too since that experiment reminded me how cool it was when Rockman materialized back in Jawaii when your Dimensional Core program was corrupted by viruses, so I would most definitely die just to see that happen again.”

Dr. Hikari: O_O

Yuichiro obviously denies his son’s suicidal request but just then, viruses take over Scilab, and the room they are in is locked down with the ventilation system sucking in the air giving them 15 minutes before they run out of oxygen.

We cut to a commercial break where we see a spoiler of Netto getting his wish right after his dad said no.

It’s just Rockman with a different outfit design and brown hair and eyes.

As per the norm, Netto and Meiru plug-in their Navis with new animations that are gonna be recycled since they changed the art style once again.

Rockman and Roll are sent into the computer via infrared beams and we see that the computer is full of Mettools and Spikey viruses, while showing us Roll’s bum for some reason.

I feel robbed, I want my Rockman butt shot!

Time to change the art again.

Here is something new that I like, they are now showing how the Mettool viruses can block shots.

This probably means that these are high level Mettools since those are the ones that block attacks in the games.

I also like how they get creative with the chips they use like the Aqua Sword.

Even Roll’s Aqua Tower looks more powerful.

You almost feel sorry for those viruses.

They even make the Black Hole, a chip I find pretty useless in the games, look epic.

Or maybe I’m just not using it right.

They keep running out of air, and once again Meiru has to show that she is the weakest of them all by fainting right before Roll is attacked by a Fire Dragon virus. Netto’s dad catches Meiru and manages to plug-out Roll just in time so... Oh, hmm, that doesn’t look right.

It would be fine if she was his daughter, but that isn’t the case so it just looks wrong. Adult men shouldn’t be holding little girls like that! O~O

Rockman then avenges Roll with another cool Aqua Sword animation.

https://66.media.tumblr.com/0ee15af9e77ae94c845bcdf6895629db/tumblr_n3ipukz8hC1rzkxhio8_250.gifv

Sometimes screen shots can’t do a scene justice.

More Spikey viruses appear and the culprit is then revealed, a new Navi named Savageman AKA Beastman.

Stop holding her like that, it’s weird!

Rockman attacks him with his cool Aqua Sword move, but he only deletes the Spikey viruses around him. Then he uses his Rock Buster and starts shooting at Beastman who isn’t affected by any of them.

I’m sorry? What Beastman is saying here is that to him, Rockman is just a puppet being controlled by a human, showing us that the anime is once again differing from the games, but I’ll talk about that later.

Netto hears that they only have 3 minutes left of air and decides to destroy what we learned from the first season by suddenly making him an expert on Program Advances without the help of the Aqua Custom Style, this time it’s the Z- Cannon or Zetta Cannon.

I honestly like the new animation for the Program Advance, every time Netto inserts more than one chip they appear as little blocks piling under each other until the third chip comes in and pushes the first block up. This easily shows how the chip programs are compatible with one another since that is how a Program Advance is activated.

The Program Advance seems to be effective as Beastman logs out, the computer is back to normal, the room opens up again, and the day is saved... Or so we thought!

This is were the episode starts to feel a little rushed. Right after this we get another mysterious figure who clearly isn’t the Navi we saw watching Beastman’s performance just a couple of minutes ago.

First episode and we already have two more bad guys introduced? And to make things worse, this second villain shoots some type of missiles from outer space that surround Scilab and traps it inside a Dimensional Area.

Yeap, that’s right, the Dimensional Area Netto’s dad is still working on has somehow ended up in the wrong hands, and they made it even better! Because get this, not only does it allow viruses to materialize in the real world, but Navis as well! Cross Fusion has already become pointless! However, the show doesn’t see it that way.

The Mettool and Spikey viruses, along with Spark Bees this time, begin destroying Scilab. Since they are all inside a Dimensional Area, Netto remembers what Meijin said before and decides to go try his luck with Cross Fusion to save everybody, and runs downstairs to get a Synchro Chip.

Considering that Cross Fusion is still being tested, would this be considered something brave or very stupid?

Netto encounters the Mystery Navi from before who is stealing all the Synchro Chips, and tries to Ash Ketchum his way into stopping him.

Seriously, what is it with young shonen protagonists and trying to attack a powerful non human antagonist face on?

After that failed attempt, Shademan calls Beastman who also materializes to destroy what remains of Scilab while he runs away with the Synchro Chips, except for two chips that he clumsily drops when grabbing them all with one hand. Netto sees the chips and decides to use them to fight Beastman, and what surprises me here is that Rockman doesn’t really object to this despite knowing that it could be dangerous, and he has always been seen as the smart one.

Obviously, Cross Fusion is a success as we get the typical anime transformation sequence, but to be honest, I’ve seen better.

No, the first statement is more accurate. This is a fusion.

And this one too.

Two different characters that merge together to create an entirely new being that shares traits from both predecessors.

No, in fact, It is not Netto turning into Rockman, it’s just Netto in Rockman’s clothing. The only difference here is that Netto fights more aggressively than Rockman.

Except for that time Rockman stabbed Stoneman in the eye, he never really maims anybody.

After this, Netto tries to use a Battle Chip but forgets that you need a PET for that, a PET that disappears somewhere after Cross Fusion. So he decides to use the Rock Buster, but since they’re in the real world, the buster gets a super boost that sends Netto flying, with the shot leaving a hole not only on the building, but on Beastman himself.

So... I love seeing shots of Rockman’s muscular body, but when you give it to Netto it just doesn’t work for me because you know his body doesn’t look like that, making this feel out of nowhere.

Also, “Flipante”? I’m pretty sure these subs are from Spain because they use a lot of words that I’ve never heard before.

Since Beastman was maimed and mortally wounded, he runs away, the Dimensional area disappears an the episode ends with Netto back to normal with his PET reappearing again, him fainting, Rockman calling out to him worried that he might be dead, and an aerial shot of a partially destroyed Scilab.

What do I think?

Well, if you read my previous post, “The problem with Megaman NT Warrior Axess”, you already know my main issues with this season, starting with how different it was from the first one.

Like I mentioned before, Axess never aired in Latin America so it took a while for me to realized that there was another season. I got used to watching reruns of the first season over and over again because of how much I loved it, and after I watch this episode for the first time, in English, I was very, very confused at the end. I immediately felt that something was wrong, that the show was gonna be different and I wasn’t sure if it was gonna be a bad thing or a good thing. It turned out to be both because the writers couldn't settle on a tone for this new season, so I was ambivalent from beginning to end.

I’m just gonna mention the good things. The general animation is way better that the majority of the episodes in the first season, the new visuals give it a more cybernetic feel to it which goes perfectly with the theme of the show. Roll and Meiru do more in battle, even though Meiru is still the weak girl character that needs to be saved by a big strong man, ew. The new PET design and the infrared beams they use to send the Navis into the Cyberworld is much more futuristic than the cords from the previous season that are vulnerable to being cut, which, again, is very fitting to the theme, as well as the animations when inserting chips and activating P.As.

The idea of Viruses and Navis materializing in the real world is revolutionary, I just don’t like how it is set up.

The Advance PET was introduced in Battle Network 4, while Beastman appeared in Battle Network 3 as a World Three Navi and having an operator named Inukai. Here, however, Beastman is a solo Navi that is called a Darkloid, and instead of being man-made, Darkloids are portrayed as A.I beings that were spontaneously created from...Bug frags, I think? Yeah, that’s another thing I don’t buy from Axess.

The mystery Navi is Shademan who was introduced in Battle Network 4 and is in fact a solo Navi, but he was created by Dr. Regal, the other mystery character that appeared, but Shademan is also a Darkloid here.

Say what you want about Forte and Gospel, but their origins are purely man-made and make sense, and even if viruses and bug frags are also man-made, having something instantly created out of Virus remains doesn’t make sense unless a higher power is involved, which hasn’t really been specified in Axess.

If you are one of the few people who read my posts, I appreciate your support and are free to share your opinions too.

#MegaMan NT Warrior #rockman.exe axess #megaman battle network #anime #dub vs sub #spanish sub #my review #ick25

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thepeakyfckingblinders · 5 years

Text

Insānĭa || Alfie Solomons x reader || Part Two

↬ Part One ↫

⤠ MASTERLIST⤟

Anon requested/summary: “Hi luv can you write a Jealous Alfie that’s leads to in ur words good old fashioned rough sex pretty please 😉”

Warnings: swearing, dirty talking, smut, rough sex, oral sex, jealous Alfie getting me on my knees

Author’s notes:

Sooo, I’ve definitely decided to use this kind of titles for fics about strong feelings such as jealousy because Latin is a magnificent, very expressive language that allows you to grasp every single shade of a word and fully understand its meaning

I had to split this in two since it was awfully long: ↠ Part One ↞

Alfie -and Tom Hardy in general- is one of my most remote wet dreams, I truly hope I did a good job with this one ♡

Always remember that jealous rough sex is okay as long as you both enjoy it and you don’t get hurt, otherwise no one has the right to force you into anything, actual violence is never a good thing. Please, if you’re a victim of any kind of abuse, talk to someone who can help you, nobody should go through something like that alone.

I’m sorry for being this late, but I’ve been really busy in the past days and writing is never just easy, it demands concentration and effort, plus I don’t want you to be disappointed, so I’m always extra accurate while working. I hope this is worth the wait!

Let me know what you think and tell me if this is what you expected ♡

I’m Italian, English isn’t my first language, so I apologize for every possible mistake I made. Also, please, help me improve my writing by telling me if there’s something wrong

ENJOY!

Insānĭa [insaniă], insaniae feminine noun I declension

1. madness, insanity 2. fury, frenzy 3. excess, extravagance 4. profligacy, luxury

[...]

“Oh, c’mon, love, no need to be this irascible! He is a gorgeous man, you can’t deny that” In truth, you couldn’t care less about that eyetie, still you kept using that coquettish tone, knowing how easy it was for you to find his weak spot, indeed Alfie immediately got close to your face, slightly squeezing his menacing eyes. “Are you fucking trying to make me mad on purpose, y/n? eh?” His palms loudly collided with the wooden surface on each side of your legs, his plump lips were now only a few inches apart from yours, his hot breath warming your flushed cheeks as you pierced his dilated pupils with a lustful gaze.

“Maybe.”

That lascivious whisper shattered against Alfie’s mouth a second before you impatiently kissed him, your fists covetously clutched his white shirt collar as he started fondling your back, then pulling you even closer by vehemently gripping the lower part of your pinned hair, while, with a few brusque movements, his other hand lifted your skirt above your hips and took care of your ivory lingerie which was swiftly pulled to one side. “You’re mine” A grave moan erupted from your throat when that indisputable claim hit you, together with the sudden feeling of two of your lover’s fingers plunging deep into your already soaked core. “Do you hear me?” Alfie growled through his teeth again and your foreheads intimately joined to one another, so that he could keep his voracious stare entangled with yours, a mellow grin took form on your luscious face and you pecked his lips with hunger, brutally pulling his hair. “All yours” As his fingertips expertly stroked your insides, your lecherous remark came out in a muffled gasp, lost between the incessant whimpers leaving your open mouth; you desperately clung to his strong shoulders and hid your head in the crook of his neck, sensing a well-known knot dangerously growing in your stomach, until Alfie’s touch abruptly left your skin, causing you to exhale an instinctive cry of protest. You watched him quickly get rid of his shirt, making you even wetter due to the stunning sight of his muscular abdomen, then he approached you again, unbuttoning your corset with urgency while your bare collarbone was covered in small bites and tickled by his whiskers. Once your voluptuous chest was left exposed, at his complete mercy, Alfie let out a croaky groan, revelling in that aphrodisiac view for a couple of seconds, before his warm tongue assailed your smooth skin, drawing fast circles around one of your nipples as the other was cruelly cupped in his callous left palm. Your breathing hastily became heavier when you felt his lips lingering the area between your breasts and then ruthlessly going down, until he knelt to assault your centre, and you couldn’t hold back a guttural scream, totally overwhelmed by that ardent feeling. Without a chance to stop your movements, you found yourself eager to climax, as your legs widened even more and your fists aggressively tangled his hair, in order to dive his head further between your soft thighs.

Alfie looked up at your figure, astonished by your wild beauty, while he kept devouring you with ferocity, he loved the way your body quivered with blind pleasure because of him, and he knowingly brought two fingers to work along with his tongue, eventually seeing you melt under his touch as frenetic moans escaped your craw. “So fucking sweet” He whined, getting back on his feet as soon as you released, just to luxuriously kiss you again; the taste of your own juices invaded your mouth, your head still spinning from your orgasm, when his hands briefly grasped your free locks, then moving to your bottom, in attempt to pick you up and carry you towards the closet placed next to the door. Goosebumps mantled your burning skin, due to the harsh contrast with the gelid surface of the antique cabinet, but your mind was too dizzy for you to react to that sharp contact, so you just abandoned yourself to your lover’s grip, letting him take off the messy rest of your clothes. Once you were totally naked in front of him, Alfie impatiently pulled your legs apart, tinkering with his trousers for a few moments, before you could sense his throbbing tip rubbing against your entrance, having your hips spontaneously tilt in his direction. All of the air brusquely left your lungs as soon as he filled you with one vigorous thrust, his thick member sank deep into you and he held still for a while, profanities leaving his lips because of that intense delight. Your nails scratched his back multiple times and your legs intertwined behind his back as Alfie gradually increased his peace, he roughly cupped your chin while his other hand rabidly held you in place by your waist, leaving red marks on your flesh. A loud shout erupted from your throat as he furiously reached for a precise spot more than once, so that, prey of your fervent ecstasy, you dragged his face towards yours in order to rapaciously bite his lower lip. “A-alfie” His name echoed through the room and sounded like an unholy prayer coming from you, still that wasn’t enough for him, thus his hips started ramming into yours harder and faster, while he blurted out animalistic noises against your glowing neck. “Louder! Let them hear who you belong to” Alfie was literally growling, still furious about the previous events, he kept mercilessly thrusting into you, producing clamorous thuds with each violent impact, as you threw your head back in pure bliss and continued to scream his name, steadily raising your trembling voice after every lunge. “Good girl, look at me” His fingers grabbed your chin again when he muttered that order with his usual husky voice, and he forced you to move your face enough to capture your irises, blurred by pleasure, with his own, greedy and firm. “Only I am allowed to fuck you like this. Only I can make you scream like this” He never looked away from your half-shut eyes, neither he stopped his frantic movements, while he whispered those arousing words, almost like it was a secret yours to keep; you simply nodded, unable to pronounce real sentences by that time, since you were busy crying out loud, a span away from his nose. Then, all of a sudden, Alfie held both of your wrists in one of his large palms, pinning your arms above your head, against the curtains covering the opaque windows of his office. “I want to feel you tighten around my cock, ‘want you to cum for me again”

His thumb went to ably stroke your clit, but the truth was that his adamant tone alone was enough to drive you over the edge, you finally reached for your second release, as your whole body tensed and your thighs started shaking, still gathered around his solid waist. Alfie slowed down his thrusts while he relished the last sporadic convulsions of your walls, riding the end of his own orgasm and moaning your name with his closed eyes turned to the ceiling. You immediately collapsed onto his toned chest, as he started tenderly rubbing your exhausted shape, both your heavy breaths being the only sound breaking that sudden silence, until you sleepily giggled against his collarbone. “What?” He mumbled while covering the skin of your shoulder with sweet butterfly kisses. “I was just thinking that I’ll never be able to show my face in this office again”

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missbeautyandherbeast · 5 years

Text

Enough (now on the right blog)

Donatello x Reader

Summary: All your life you had been ‘overweight’. And no one would let you forget it, and certainly not your family. A few years and moving out seemed to fade the problem a bit but there were still side effects. But nothing you couldn’t handle... right? You had a new life and an incredibly loving boyfriend to always pick you up...right?

A/N: This is deep stuff. Please, all of you, read with caution. this isn’t a light topic and I know that. I am not asking for advice or your opinion, I am writing about my feelings and experiences through an outlet that lets me sort through them easier. This is a sensitive subject for many of you as it is me, be a decent person.

Warnings: Eating disorders, body dysmorphia, panic attack, fluff I promise.

@im-a-loser-for-tmnt-deactivated

I had known the turtles for a few years. They found me my senior year of high school and I was halfway through my college career, it deciding to run longer than I thought because I switched my plans so that I was going to double major.

Raph teased me constantly about my intelligence and good girl persona and I let it slide. He was jealous. I could live with that. And I had, from a lot of other people too. And I knew I was smart; my 34 ACT score was attesting to that. I didn’t brag though. Donnie did enough of that on my behalf.

Before we had gotten together, I would lend him my textbooks. Whether it was Calculus, or Latin, he went through each one, always asking for more. I eventually got a library card just so that I could keep getting him more books. That turned into us studying together—I needed my Latin book after all, and though learning it sucked hard, it wasn’t as bad when Donnie was by my side trying to untangle the language with me. Now that I was in my third semester of it, we were both pretty good and had well over a thousand flash cards.

I could tell that he was disappointed by my lack of science textbooks. He knew that I was an English and Classics major, I didn’t need science for that. I took my social science of Psychology during my first semester. He never pressed me on it, but I could always see his eyes searching for them with each book I brought.

I had my prejudices against science. Were they reasonable? Yes, but not in the way that anyone else would, think. And Donnie didn’t know I had them at all, yet he was smart, he probably inferred it. He still didn’t press it. Until one night when we were talking about something completely different did the topic come up.

“You need to eat.” His eyes narrowed, offering me the mostly empty box of pizza.

It smelled mouthwatering and looked so appetizing, but I refrained. I had already eaten twice today. That was all I allowed myself.

“I’m not hungry,” I mumbled, closing my eyes and leaning back on the couch. “Just tired.”

“Because you haven’t eaten enough.” His tone was a bit harsher than before, and he said it as if it were obvious.

“I ate today!” I almost growled. “What more do you want?”

“You need more energy,” He backed down at my aggressive tone. “You’re doing a lot more these days, all of the back and forth from here to home to college. You need energy.”

I looked up at him to see a soft expression on his face, pleading. I shook my head and folded my arms.

“No,” I whispered, unsure of my voice. “I’m not going to.”

He sighed and threw the box onto the coffee table then rubbed his face, giving into my stubbornness.

“And why not?”

Maybe my battle wasn’t over.

“Because I will throw up.” I tried to say it as nonchalantly as possible, but Donnie knew me, he could hear the pain and sadness underneath.

Without a word he pulled me into his lap, cradling me as if I were the most precious thing in the world. I wanted that to be true, but it felt so far from the truth.

“You know you’re beautiful,” He murmured into my hair softly.

I wanted that to be true too. Shrugging, I rolled my eyes. He chuckled sadly.

“I guess it doesn’t help that I think you're sexy then?” He mused slightly.

I almost laughed. I would have if this weren’t the subject. Instead, I held my tongue. He sighed again, something thoughtful this time.

“Of all the things, why would you fret over your looks, my love?” He pondered. “You seem to like me, and I’m not exactly the ideal body image.” His joke wasn’t lost on me, I just wasn’t in the mood.

“You weren’t raised being told to look like an athlete and being so far from one,” I whispered. “And now... I’m in a school with thousands of volleyball players and sorority girls and...” I trailed off.

“No one wants them any more love, if you haven’t noticed, you’re kind of in style right now. Call it what you may, a fad or something more, but you are accepted in society as well as in my heart.” He murmured, rubbing my arm. “And speaking medically, you’re fine too.”

I went absolutely rigid at his last sentence. Suddenly I needed out. I couldn’t take him touching me. My senses shut themselves down, as the words I yearned to scream clawed their way up my throat.

“I will never be accepted medically. I will always be overweight and unfit to every doctor and physician.” I bit out venomously, making my way out of his arms. Tears stung my eyes, but I blinked them away. “And I can’t change that.”

My voice sounded uneven as I balled my hands into fists. Donnie was shocked at my outburst and quickly tried to pacify me.

“Those charts are always wrong, Y/n, love.” He stood, coming toward me. “They account for male body types, not females, and you’re biologically different,” I backed away, shaking my head.

“Please, just leave me alone,” I begged and headed for his room, the one we shared whenever I stayed.

I slid down against the closed door and no longer fought against my tears. Sobs wracked my frame as I tried to curl up smaller and smaller.

I was never enough. I could never be enough. Science would never accept me. It would always tell me I’m wrong. It will always tell me that I’m not beautiful. How can I argue with what everyone calls fact?

There was a small knock on the door, maybe an hour later.

“Y/n?”

It was Donnie. Of course, it was. His voice was small and timid.

“Love, please,” He begged. “I’m so sorry. I know I went overboard. I’m not used to hearing you talk like that, hurting so badly. Please, don’t shut me out. I’m glad you told me,” He paused, as if he were to debate continuing. “I’m sorry I didn’t listen to what you were actually trying to tell me. I’m sorry that I butted in and overreacted. Please, I didn’t mean to make it worse like I did.” I could hear him take a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I’ll be out here when you’re ready.”

Silent tears made their way down my face once more at his words. I pulled myself off the floor and headed for the bathroom. After a long hot shower with the water scorching my skin, I found an old hoodie that I could hide in for the night before I made my way to Don’s lab.

He was there, like I knew he would be, staring blankly at his computers, not giving them much attention. I paused and bit my lip. Something in my action tipped off his acute senses. “

Y/n?” He asked, his eyes hopeful and filled with sorrow.

“I showered,” I announced slowly as if the task were more of a feat.

He gave a soft smile and opened his arms for me. I made my way to him slowly and curled up in his lap. “I know I didn’t help the way I wanted to,” He confessed in a low voice. “M’sorry baby girl,”

I didn’t speak for some time and I didn’t meet his eyes.

“Society accepts me.” I began. “You accept me, even I do at times, but...” I shook my head. “They never will.”

We both went silent at my words, Donnie absentmindedly rubbing my arm again.

“It’s why I hate science. And will never take a biology class.” My voice was hoarse. “And why I don’t go to the doctors when I’m sick.” I chose my next words carefully. “They put me on trial with false facts. Facts that change over the years... and I’m still found guilty. I’ll never be enough for them.”

Donnie nodded at my little speech and rocked me gently. “You’ll always be enough for me,” He pulled me closer, “Right where you are. All the hurt and brokenness, it’s enough to me.”

For the first time in my life, I was enough for someone, just the way I was.

#donatello x reader #donnie x reader #tmnt donnie #tmnt donatello #tmnt x reader #tmnt 2016 #tmnt donatello 2016 #eating disoder things #body dysmorphia #you're beautiful #i promise #itll be okay

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