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#just an absolute disaster of a human being. i want to be a more complete person before anyone decides they wanna put up w me forever

happy74827 · 3 months

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Cool Rider

[Steve Rogers x Female!Reader]

Synopsis: When another date ends in disaster, and Steve shows up in an attempt to “cheer” you up, you’re instantly against everything. But it’s Steve, and you should know by now that he never takes no for an answer.

WC: 3859

Category: Fluff

A lot of people liked my other Steve fic, so I felt inclined to make another. This time with a lot more fluff (you’re welcome @summerrivera777777).

『••✎••』

Needless to say, you were shocked when you heard the roar of a motorcycle.

You didn’t do well with dates. In your 24 years of life, you had a total of one boyfriend, and he was the absolute worst. So, in the last six months, you have been avoiding all social activities like the plague and focusing solely on yourself and your future.

That meant that you had become very comfortable being a hermit and avoiding any and all contact with other human beings. You were happy that way.

So why was a man who looked like an absolute God sitting on a motorcycle at the front door of your house?

Well, because you broke that rule a week ago.

In all fairness, the man was cute. A nerdy, awkward kind of cute. And he was a gentleman. And you were lonely.

So, when he asked you for your number, you were too lonely to turn him down. You hadn’t expected him to call, and you certainly didn’t expect him to ask you out on a date. But you also didn't think you would have the willpower to say no.

So you accepted, and it turned out to be the biggest regret of your life. The “nerd” was actually a complete dick, and after 30 minutes, you just wanted to go home. But you couldn’t because he refused to pay for the meal, so you were stuck there with him.

The worst part of the night was when he got into his car and tried to follow you home. He kept insisting that he just wanted to be a good guy and make sure that you got home safely, but you were sure that he just wanted to see where you lived and probably get in a few gropes along the way.

Luckily, you were able to lose him about three blocks from your house. It was a good thing, too, because your phone had died a couple of blocks ago, and you were afraid that if you got caught by him, you wouldn't have a way to call for help.

The next day, you made an executive decision to stay the hell away from men, with the exception of a few nice, safe friends. That was how you ended up here, seven days later, hiding in your room and ignoring your doorbell.

The bell kept ringing, and you knew that whoever was out there wasn't going to go away anytime soon. Groaning, you threw your covers off of your body and stomped towards the front door.

You threw open the door, ready to rip someone a new one, when your angry speech caught in your throat.

Steve Rogers was standing on your front porch.

He was a friend from work, to simplify a very long story. You met him two years ago when you started at SHIELD. You were a tech genius, and you worked closely with the Avengers to keep their equipment running.

Steve was always sweet and funny. You had a lot in common and were very close. After a while, you started hanging out with him and his friends, Natasha, Sam, and Bucky. It was great.

As exceptions to men go, he was definitely a big one. He was a walking god, with the physique and the looks to prove it. And here he was, on your front porch, holding keys that belonged to the motorcycle parked out front.

You looked at the motorcycle, then back to Steve, before your face went blank.

"No."

"What?"

"No."

Steve cocked an eyebrow. A smile tugged at his lips as if he were amused. "No?"

"Nope. Whatever you're trying to sell, I'm not buying."

"Why would I be trying to sell you something? I’m not even selling anything."

"It’s an expression, Steve, Jesus." You said, throwing your hands up in exasperation. Steve might’ve been your best friend, but the guy was such a 90-year-old sometimes. "If you think that I'm going to get on that thing with you, you're wrong. It's death on two wheels."

His eyes widened in surprise, a laugh bubbling in his throat. He looked over his shoulder at the bike, then back to you.

"That's... a little dramatic, don't you think?"

"I'm serious, Steve. It's not happening. I don't trust that thing, and I'm not going to die in some freak accident."

He crossed his arms over his chest, the sleeves of his leather jacket tightening over his biceps. His smile didn't fade as he spoke, which only annoyed you more.

"It's not going to kill you. I’m quite insulted that you would think that I would put you in danger."

"You're an Avenger. You put me in danger just by existing."

His lips twitched, and you had the feeling that he was holding back a comment.

"Look," he said, leaning against the door frame. "You haven't come out with us in weeks, and I'm worried. It's not healthy to lock yourself in your house all the time. With the job we have, there's never a guarantee of tomorrow, and if I were you, I'd want to spend every day living it to the fullest."

His words caught you off guard. He was right. It had been almost two months since you had gone out with the group. You just couldn't find the motivation. You were content being at home, alone. You had gotten a little lax in your friendships, only going to work and coming straight home. And now, with the… issues… with your date, you just didn't have the heart to try again.

You could feel your resolve starting to crumble, but you tried to stay strong.

"That's a low blow, Rogers." You grumbled, crossing your arms over your chest. "But my answer is still no."

"You think that was a low blow?” He scoffed as he pushed himself away from the door and took a step forward.

He was so much taller than you, and his presence was overwhelming. With the added tightness of his clothing and the confidence in his eyes, it tricked your eyes into seeing him as bigger than he really was. He was big, of course, but right now, it felt like he was towering over you.

Your heart began to race, a flush spreading over your cheeks.

"You clearly never played football because if you did, you'd know that this was a real low blow."

Without warning, he grabbed you by the waist and threw you over his shoulder.

"Hey!" You squealed, slapping your hand against his lower back. He was wearing a black shirt and jeans, and you could see the muscles ripple in his back with every step that he took. "Put me down!"

"You're going to have fun today."

"Steve! Put me down right now! I swear to God if you don't-"

"You'll what?" He laughed, the deep rumble making your stomach flutter. "Punish me?"

You huffed as you pounded on his back with your fist. You weren't mad at him, really; you just didn't know how to respond.

Steve practically dragged you outside. You were sure that you looked ridiculous, but you were thankful that you lived far enough away from your neighbors for no one to witness this. When he finally set you down next to the motorcycle, you gave him a glare.

"You're an ass, Steve Rogers."

He gave you a smirk as he swung his leg over the bike, his leather jacket tightening around his arm as his muscles flexed. Personally, you hated leather, but the way it fit him...

"Steve, I’m not wearing the right clothes."

He was quiet as his eyes swept over you. You were wearing shorts and a tank top since it was the middle of summer and you were hot, but he was looking at you like you were covered head to toe in leather.

"We can go buy something and change in the bathroom or something."

He seemed to think for a moment before he gave a single nod.

"Sure."

He started the bike and motioned for you to get on behind him. Goddamn it, Steve.

Sighing, you swung your leg over the bike and wrapped your arms around his torso. It was an incredibly intimate position, with your body pressed up against his and your faces mere inches apart. For a moment, you didn’t even realize when he swung a helmet down in front of your face.

"Put this on, Scaredy-Cat."

"Shut up, I'm not scared. Just... concerned."

He raised an eyebrow at you, his smirk still ever-present. You rolled your eyes before slipping the helmet onto your head.

The engine rumbled beneath you, and Steve revved the engine a couple of times, laughing when you squeaked in surprise and gripped him tighter. You could feel the laughter in his chest, his muscles moving under your fingers.

"Hold on tight, princess. Wouldn't want you falling off."

"You're a dick."

"Language."

"I will push you off this bike."

Steve didn't say anything; he just pulled the kickstand up and eased the bike into drive.

You squealed when the bike began to move, tightening your hold on Steve and burying your face in his back. He didn’t seem to mind; he just chuckled and sped up a bit.

You tried not to scream as he maneuvered the bike through traffic, weaving in and out of cars. It was a terrifying experience, especially since you had the distinct impression that Steve was taking advantage of the situation and driving recklessly.

You felt the wind on your legs and the constant hair strands whipping into your face, but you refused to look up. The speed, the closeness of the cars, and the fact that there was nothing keeping you on the bike except for Steve made it impossible to even think about moving.

When Steve finally stopped the bike, you had your eyes closed tight, and your body pressed completely up against him. Your arms were wrapped around him so tightly he was surprised you could breathe.

He took a moment to enjoy the feeling before gently prying your hands off of him and stepping off the bike. He turned and reached out a hand for you, waiting patiently for you to move. When you didn’t, he moved back towards the bike and took the helmet off your head.

You were breathing hard, trying desperately not to show how scared you were.

"It wasn’t that bad."

You shot him a glare, which made him grin.

"Just... shut up."

He laughed and helped you off the bike, wrapping an arm around your shoulders and pulling you close. He was a gentleman, of course, and you couldn’t complain about the feeling of his hard body pressed up against yours, but the sudden closeness was a bit overwhelming.

"Ugh, I think I have whiplash."

"Liar," said Steve with another laugh, be dramatic. You liked it, admit it."

"Whatever, why are you even kidnapping me, anyways?"

"I told you. It's not healthy to sit in a dark room, alone, all day, every day."

"First, rude.” You said, giving him a nudge in the side. He let out a small sound, which made your eyes widen in surprise.

"Did that hurt you, oh Captain, my Captain?"

"It didn't hurt," he grumbled, rolling his eyes. "And second?"

"What?"

"First, rude," he mimicked in a high-pitched voice. "Second?"

"Oh! Yeah, why are we actually doing this?"

That’s when Steve paused. Your heart instantly dropped at his hesitation. Steve only hesitated for two reasons. The first reason would be if he were completely at a loss for words, and clearly, by his recent attitude, that wasn’t the case. So that left the second reason: because he knew something that he either didn’t want to tell you or something he wasn’t supposed to know.

With recent events, it wasn’t difficult to guess what was happening.

"Natasha told you, didn't she."

You were already pulling away from him, ready to go back home and hide in your bed for the rest of eternity, when he caught your wrist.

“Hey,” His voice was softer, and there was a hint of sadness in his eyes. “It doesn't matter. What matters is that you have a good time today, alright? So, forget about what happened, forget about what Natasha said, and just focus on having a good day. Okay?"

“I don’t want a pity date, Steve. It’s nice that you care and everything, but-”

"I'm not pity dating you." His voice was firm, and his face was hard, the complete opposite of the way it was just moments before.

"Then what do you call this? My actual date sucked, and I've been cooped up in my house, so you thought, 'Hey, why not take her out and show her a good time?'"

Steve let out a sigh and shook his head, his fingers loosening around your wrist. "No, no. That's not... I'm sorry."

The change in him was drastic. He seemed to shrink in on himself, and his head drooped like a kicked puppy.

"Steve,"

He lifted his head and looked at you, his baby-blue eyes filled with guilt.

"You have no idea how badly I want to punch that guy for treating you like that.” He spoke softly as if the words were only meant for him to hear. But, as the saying goes, the walls have ears, and the parking lot was pretty damn quiet. “But that's not what this is. You're my friend, and I hate to see you sad. I'm not here just because of a stupid date. I'm here because I care about you."

There was a pause, a heavy silence hanging between the two of you. He was looking at you expectantly, a pleading look in his eyes.

"I'm not going to make you talk about it if you don't want to."

"Okay,"

"And I'm not going to bring it up again unless you do.”

"Okay."

"And, I'm not going to ask you for anything in return, maybe a little more conversation, a smile, maybe a laugh, but other than that..."

A smile slowly crept onto your face. He had the uncanny ability to make everyone else smile, regardless of their mood, and he was the only one who could do it. It’s not that his jokes were particularly funny because they weren't, but it was the way he said them.

He was an awkward, nervous mess most of the time, but when he was confident when he was in his element, there was no stopping him.

"You sure you want to waste all your energy on me, old man?"

His lips twitched at the nickname, his eyes brightening. "For you, doll? Anything."

And there it was. That goddamn smile that made your heart skip a beat and butterflies erupt in your stomach. He was just too sweet, and it was completely unfair.

"Come on," he said, wrapping his arm around your shoulders and tugging you close. "Let's get you something nice."

You smiled as you walked next to him. As much as you hated the motorcycle ride, it was nice to spend some time with Steve. He parked outside a Target, and the two of you walked in, immediately making your way to the women's section.

You took charge almost immediately, going to the racks and picking out different things. Steve followed behind you, carrying your armfuls of clothes as you added more. You went through rack after rack, throwing the things that caught your eye into his arms.

After about the tenth outfit, you turned around and saw him standing there, his arms filled with clothing and a smile on his face. You ignored it or tried to, as you turned back around and went to another rack.

When you finally finished, you had an armful of outfits, and Steve was practically weighed down. He didn't seem to mind, though, and you had the feeling that he had enjoyed his role as a pack mule. When the shopping was done, you ran to the bathrooms and changed into the outfit while Steve waited outside.

A pullover hoodie and a pair of jeans, the closest thing that Target had to leather. Not exactly what you wanted, but it would work. When you stepped out of the stall, you found Steve sitting in one of the chairs, flipping through a magazine. Such a 90-year-old, again.

He looked up when he heard the door open, his eyes sweeping over your form.

"Where to now? The ditch?"

Steve rolled his eyes, a smile spreading across his lips. "You’re an avid book reader, right? What's the biggest bookstore in the area?"

"Are we going to Barnes and Noble or something?"

"If that's what's closest."

You paused, watching his expression. There was no sign of teasing, no hint that this was a joke.

"…Really? Barnes and Noble?"

"Is that an issue?"

The disbelief must have been written on your face because Steve gave a loud laugh, throwing his head back.

"Oh, come on. I can be spontaneous!"

"Sure," you mumbled, trying not to show how happy his statement had made you. He remembered a stupid fact about you that you had told him months ago. And he had stored it, not forgotten it.

You felt like you were in the twilight zone, but you weren't complaining.

Steve bought the outfit and threw the tags away, and the two of you got back on the motorcycle. It was easier, this time, with the knowledge that he had cared enough to listen to your ramblings. Maybe he cared enough to calm it.

You had your face buried in his back, not out of fear this time, but out of comfort. You couldn’t see him smile as he sped up, but you could feel it.

At Barnes and Noble, he sat and watched as you wandered the store, a smile on his face. He didn’t say anything, didn't pressure you into talking, didn’t even try to join in; he just sat and listened as you read him the summaries of the books. You didn’t even mean to; it just kind of happened.

One moment, you were looking through the books; the next, you were reading the synopsis out loud to Steve. He didn’t say anything, didn't make any indication that he was listening, but you could tell by the way his head would turn towards you when you spoke. And once again, Steve was your personal pack mule, carrying the books that you were interested in.

By the end of the night, he had an armful of books, a satisfied smile on his face, and you were laughing. You couldn’t remember the last time you had laughed this much, the last time you had felt so happy.

When you got home, the sky was dark, and the moon was high. Steve followed you inside and set the books down on the coffee table. He had refused to let you carry them, insisting that they would get ruined in your hands. You didn't bother fighting him on it and allowed him to carry them.

"Do you want a drink or anything? Something to eat?" It was obvious you were slightly nervous now, but Steve didn’t seem the notice… or even care at this point.

"No, thank you. I should probably be getting back."

"Oh." You paused, not really wanting him to leave, but you couldn’t ask him to stay. You were friends, that was it, and nothing more. "Okay, yeah."

"Well," he started, his fingers flexing by his side. "I'll see you soon, then?"

"Yeah," you said, giving him a smile. "See you soon, Steve."

He looked like he was going to say something else before he gave you a soft smile and walked out.

Once he was gone, you shut the door and let out a sigh. Today was perfect, and you hated yourself for it. You hated yourself for enjoying yourself, hated that you were able to push away all thoughts of him. It was like the universe was taunting you, dangling the perfect guy in front of your face, and you couldn’t have him.

"Why him, huh?"

"I can still hear you." Steve's voice echoed through the house despite his absence in it, and you internally groaned as you got up to stare out the window. Damn, his super hearing.

You pulled the blinds aside and watched as Steve got on his bike, his helmet still in his hands.

"Steve."

He paused, turning his head towards the house. He couldn’t hear what you were saying now that he was by his bike, not with the closed windows, but he could see the silhouette of your body against the curtains. You lifted it up in an instant, an invitation.

"Steve.” You repeated, and this time he heard it. Loud and clear.

"Yeah?"

"Did you really mean it? That this wasn’t a pity date?"

Steve paused for a moment, his lips slightly parted. After a moment, he rested his helmet on the handlebars and made his way back to you. He stopped inches from you, slightly bending down through the window.

A smile and a simple glimpse at your lips was his only answer. He looked back in your eyes, his expression soft, waiting. He was leaving it up to you, not wanting to push, not wanting to scare. He wanted it, but he wasn’t going to force it.

It was all the incentive that you needed.

You reached through the window and grabbed his jacket, pulling him forward and crashing your lips together. It was desperate and slightly awkward since you were halfway through the window, but neither of you seemed to care.

Steve reached forward and grabbed the side of the window, pushing it open even further and lifting you through. You let out a surprised squeak, which quickly turned into a moan as he pressed you up against the house.

His lips were warm and softer than you expected. You wrapped your arms around his neck, pulling him closer and deepening the kiss.

After a few moments, Steve pulled away, his forehead resting on yours and a smile on his face.

"Okay, this wasn't a pity date."

Steve let out a laugh, the breath puffing against your face.

"Good. Glad we established that."

"What was this, then? I've been told that Captain America wasn’t one to put out on the first date."

"Oh, yeah. Definitely not. I'm a gentleman."

"Then what's this, Steve? What was today?"

His arm tightened around you, and he pressed his lips against your forehead, taking a moment to gather his thoughts.

"Like I said, I can be spontaneous."

"Spontaneous," you mumbled, letting out a laugh.

"And," he continued, pressing a kiss to the tip of your nose. "It seems good girls like a little bad every now and then. You especially, given your choice of dates."

"So, is that what this is? Captain America showing me a good time?"

"No. This is Steve Rogers showing his girl a good time."

"Your girl, huh?"

"Yeah," he murmured, his lips inches from yours. "My girl."

And when his lips met yours again, all you could think about was the leather jacket, the motorcycle, and the promise of more.

And a whole lot more bad.

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sunshine-jesse · 6 months

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Ashley Graves Did Something Wrong

TCOAL plays a lot of fun games with the ways it makes you perceive events. From the title screen itself, to various pieces of official art, it primes you to accept certain narratives surrounding the game. Namely, the one that Ashley is very not good. She is, in fact, very bad! And it's pretty easy to see why- many of her actions fit neatly into the mold of an abuser. She's controlling, she tries to deflect blame, gaslights Andrew into making him take the blame for things she pushed him to do to begin with, and harasses other women to ruin his relationships with them.

It's all so easy, and makes so much sense. Case closed.

Right? Well, no. But actually yes! But actually, it's not that simple.

Y'see, as I said, the game establishes this framing from the get-go. It introduces us to our, uh, heroes and tells us in no uncertain terms that Ashley is bad and Andrew is a non-entity. It sets this framing intentionally so that many players will engage in a little quirk of human psychology called…

Confirmation bias!

I'm sure we all know what that is, right? Well, for those who don't, it's when we start with a bias towards something- or an idea of how things SHOULD be- and view every piece of evidence as confirmation that said bias is correct. The game, very blatantly, does this with Ashley's actions by priming us to see them as part of an abuse dynamic, with her as the primary abuser. And, indeed, it's not too hard to dig into Andrew's behavior and figure out that he, too, is fucked up and awful and come to the conclusion that their relationship was mutually fucked up and abusive. I did that in my last two essays, so I won't cover that ground again here. With this, it's easy to think that they bring out the worst in each other and that any relationship they have would be toxic, fucked up, dark, and every other word or phrase that describes the same idea, whether it makes them happy or not.

… But what if I told you that this, too, was an intentional misdirection?

So. Let us, for a moment, completely remove the framing that their relationship is toxic. Let us remove the framing that their relationship is abnormal or aberrant. Let's even remove the framing that either one of them is responsible for the harm of the other. I'm not arguing that any of this is not the case. Please, for the love of god, do not think that I am, if only so you can take the rest of what I have to say seriously. What I'm doing is trying to examine the two of them free of as many preconceptions as I can, using nothing but textual evidence and inference to figure out why Andrew and Ashley treat each other the way they do.

I will later examine why they MIStreat each other too, but first comes the reasons they treat each other well.

I'm going to start with Andrew, because, despite being the more complex of the two, it's actually pretty easy to figure out why he treats Ashley the way he does based on what he says. Let's go all the way back to the earliest known incident between the two in the story, where the two of them were at their most, uh, "pure," for lack of a better word: The cupcake scene.

Leyley was supposedly a problem child. She was neglected by her parents, disliked by her friends, and had nobody else but Andrew to rely on. She got nothing- absolutely nothing- from anyone else. And so, Andrew decided to celebrate her birthday, by buying her the cupcakes she wanted, by giving her what she lacked from others. By providing for her, and taking care of her. All he wanted was to make her happy, more than anything else. And, as Nina learned the hard way, at the expense of everyone else.

He doesn't lack empathy, per se. Andy just loves Leyley more than he loves anyone else by such a wide margin that his desire to provide for her overrides his fear of consequences… until those consequences threaten to separate the two of them.

That is a very Gender Roles thing to do. More on that later.

So. Ashley. Everyone's favorite disaster. Why does she treat Andrew the way she does? What does she provide for him? Well, isn't it obvious? She, too, wants to provide for him. Remember, she wanted the lemon cupcake because she thought it's what HE wanted. She also does most of the chores around the house. She prepares food, cleans the house, and does their laundry. She also provides for his non-sexual physical needs by offering him comfort whenever he needs it. It makes her feel useful. Wanted. Needed.

Ah, another very Gender Roles thing to do. See where I'm going with this?

The two neatly fit into a standard husband/wife relationship in a lot of ways. It's THE platonic ideal of such a relationship, actually! They make each other happy and provide WHAT THEY THINK the other really wants. It's really cute and perfect! As long as you ignore all the bad.

ignore all the bad …ignore all the bad… But we obviously shouldn't ignore all the bad. That would be ridiculous.

What I want to do is, instead, examine where the bad comes from, and why it's there. With the abuser/abused dynamic in mind, it's pretty easy to come to the conclusion that a mutual desire for control and power over the other is the sole determining factor. It's arguably the Central Theme of the game, and maybe a big part of what Nemlei is trying to convey. But, like, why should it end there? Why should that be where the analysis ends? There's a reason for everything.

They don't want to control each other for its own sake. They don't want to control each other solely to cover their own insecurities.

So why?

Ashley, first. She's obviously an insecure little monster, having never received the validation that she needs to really come into her own as a person. She keeps seeking it. Keeps trying to provide for Andrew. Keeps trying to make herself useful. Now, let's look at her calls towards Julia:

"DO YOU THINK YOU'RE BETTER THAN ME!? Just because you can fuck him and I can't?"

Ah, wait, hold on a minute.

"You think that's love?! Are you fucking delusional?? Cumdumpsters like you are just that."

Where does that wording come from?

"He will never love you. Not like he loves me. I am the only one. I am everything."

She doesn't need validation just for the sake of her insecurities. She needs it because she needs Andrew to be happy, and in her mind, she's the only one who can provide it. She knows him better than anyone else. She can see how happy she seems to make him, and that nobody else can do what she does. She knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that she makes Andrew more comfortable than anyone. She knows how important physical affection is to him. She can feel it. She doesn't lack empathy towards his plight or feelings; she has more of it than anyone, actually!

But Andrew, crucially, never seems to provide her any validation for this, even though she knows better. That's why she's so insecure.

"But wait," you might say, "didn't he, literally, fucking kill for her?"

Yes. But he always tries to place the blame on Ashley or use her as a scapegoat, when he was the one who pulled the trigger. He never accepts even the smallest amount of responsibility. And if a man can't even take responsibility for the violence he inflicts on others, what does that say about him? What does it say about how much he actually cares? oh. more gender roles. huh.

In Ashley's mind, that validation isn't validation because he didn't do it to prove he cared about her. He did it to shut her up. And… he never says anything to the contrary. He refuses to. All his validation is depressingly, overbearingly conditional.

His words always come with a caveat. They're always said in spite of something. They lack warmth. They lack kindness. They lack affection. She is never, ever given a key to lock the door to her insecurities…

…even though Andrew obviously has that key. He just refuses to give it to her.

But why?

Society! :D

There is something so fundamentally, obviously wrong with the way Andrew feels towards Ashley. She is a tar soul. A pariah. So horrid that her parents don't want her, so obviously bad that even demons don't want her. And yet Andrew, in spite of everything, still wants her. He wants to take care of her, when society tells him not to bother. He wants to protect her from other men, and even from herself. It manifests as jealousy because…

He, too, thinks the only one qualified to provide for Ashley is himself, because he was the only one who ever had. Violence comes so naturally to him that he takes it for granted. He kills for her, threatens to physically assault her when he thinks she's putting herself in danger.

It's so second nature to him that he thinks it should obviously be enough. But it isn't. His violence is so second nature as to be passive. It's non-committal. And what Ashley wants is committment.

But because of how society views Ashley, and how the world would view a romantic relationship between them, he can't truly commit to her. He can't give her the validation she really needs, because everything and everyone has told him that it's wrong. That she's wrong. And all his parents ever taught him is to be afraid of how others will react to that wrongness.

hey look, a man fearing the commitment a woman wants from him! more gender stereotypes!! I wonder what this game is trying to say!!!

Maybe I'm crazy or something. Maybe I'm just looking into it too deep. But I don't really care. I don't care if this is the intended reading, and neither should you. The fact of the matter is that most of the things that define them as toxic are not their fault. Most of the reasons they mistreat each other come from without, rather than within. The only reason they can't love each other is because the world tells them not to. Because it expects them to fill certain roles, to be certain people.

But Ashley can only ever be herself.

Maybe someone who's an actual expert on this subject matter could weigh in and give a true feminist reading. But me? I'm just here to point out patterns. I'm just here to point out facts. And one of those facts is that, to the world around her, Ashley did something wrong: She was born.

The Steam reviews of this game are fucking funny, but a lot of them say one thing that couldn't be further from the truth:

"I can fix her!"

No, you can't. She's only 'broken' in the context of her environment.

But in the words of another analyst:

It's madness to expect tar to behave like water.

So cut them some slack! They might finally succeed in a world that wanted nothing more than for them to fail. It's not our right to take that away from them.

#the coffin of andy and leyley #andrew graves #ashley graves #gaming #gravecest #tcoaal #tcoal #im going all in #and none of you can stop me

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heesdreamer · 1 year

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SILENCED (1)

MASTERLIST

GENRE ➩ enhypen zombie apocalypse au!

SUMMARY ➩ navigating life 1 year post end of the world was already difficult as you avoided rotting corpses with hefty appetites and groups with various bad intentions. things get harder when you run into a group of survivors, 7 boys who make it impossible to run away.

WC ➩ 10.7k

WARNINGS ➩ all things that zombies bring like gore and death lol, sexual content, main character death etc

AUTHORS NOTE ➩ this was originally a one shot story but under request from people that read my stories before i post it’s going to be a multiple part series! hope you enjoy the first installment as it builds up the world and characters plz let me know your thoughts and guesses (NOT PROOFREAD)

Whenever you pictured the apocalypse, the end of the world that people often talked about over drunken hypotheticals or PG-13 level horror, you pictured it loud.

Thunderous even, a deafening mixture of screams and cries behind the roar of fire and destruction.

You imagined utter chaos and it was never quiet in your head when you did so, a clear built scenario that you never paid too much mind to, considering the absolute fantasy of it all.

So now that you were almost a year deep into the official end of humanity, you were a bit thrown off by how different it was from your previous assumptions. Sure, there had been fire and screams and it definitely wasn’t lacking chaos, but most days you found yourself in complete ear ringing silence.

The soundtrack of your day to day life rarely extended past birds chirping, the crunch of leaves and loose sticks under your boots as you attempted your way through forest filled terrain.

It’d taken you a while to leave Seoul, first being held back by fear and panic and then not wanting to leave the comfort of your known surroundings.

It was easy to figure out how to survive there after a while, knowing when it was safe to leave your apartment and scavenge the nearby stores and when it was time to draw the blinds and let’s hoards pass by undetected.

You’d sit with bated breath as you listened to soft groans and bodies bumping against your front door as they mindlessly made their way down the hallway and eventually off to find something that had made a noise or distracted them.

When you imagined the apocalypse before you hadn’t really considered the different types that could occur. You suppose chemical outbreak or maybe even a world war could’ve been possible, far fetched but possible nonetheless. Maybe even multiple waves of natural disasters, wiping out cities and land masses in its wake.

Somehow, the dead rising hadn’t crossed your mind.

The creatures that had lingered outside your door all those months ago weren’t like anything you could’ve possibly dreamed up in your anxious mind, defying science and all rationality with their mere existence and hunger based drive.

It didn’t bother you as much now, having spent weeks frustrated over the mechanics of their mobility, the reasoning for their immortality.

Now you felt somewhat close to them, these days hunger being your main reason for existence and almost your entire train of thought from the moment you woke up to the second you fell asleep. This was the same thing that had finally driven you from the city, the stores running dry eventually and leaving you no choice but to turn to nature for nutrients.

You thought about this comparison now as you came to a slow stop, lowering yourself down into a crouch as you listened to the branches snapping off in the distance.

The knife in your hand felt heavier than normal, eyes darting around the forest as you took in your surroundings and made a quick escape plan in case it was more than one undead, in case you needed to run and run fast. You didn’t want to leave just yet, having followed a deer into the woods a few hours ago and you were in desperate need of an actual meal.

Shifting your weight onto your heels, you listened to the sounds come closer and then stop when they reached a bush a few yards ahead of you.

Your head was cocking in confusion, grip tightening around the leather of your knifes handle as you waited for it to continue its approach. The bush rattled a few times, keeping your attention tightly locked on it as you held your breath.

“Put it down.” A low voice was sounding behind you and you froze, feeling the cold metal pressed against the back of your head before you even registered the fact that somebody was speaking.

It’d been weeks since you’d heard something so real, something so human other than your own voice and you felt a sudden wave of dizziness at the fact you were clearly stuck.

For a brief moment you considered spinning in place and attempting to disarm him, relying on your own swiftness taking him off guard and beating his reactionary speed that would cause him to pull the trigger before you even saw what he looked like.

This plan was put to rest quicker than you could think it through, the bush rattling again as another figured pushed its way through the thick leaves. You watched his face pull into a wince when he saw you and you furrowed your eyebrows.

“Hyung.” He muttered and you heard a sigh from behind you, their plan clearly not entailing this interruption. “She doesn’t have anything on her.”

The one behind you didn’t say anything about this, still not taking his gun off you considering the fact you’d made absolutely no move to lower your own weapon like he had originally instructed you. You remained still despite a wave of fear washing over you at the realization you had nothing of value for them to take other than yourself, a sudden reminder that the apocalypse was scary but being a woman was scarier.

“Go.” He was speaking again, still in that low timbre and the boy from the bush winced again, shaking his head like he wanted to deny the order but also taking an instinctive step forward like he was accustomed to taking them.

You couldn’t get a grasp on their dynamic or what they exactly wanted from you, the boy stood in front of you looked nervous like he had a thin idea of what would happen and he didn’t agree with it. You considered for a second if this was a situation worth trying to talk your way out of, eventually deciding to just let things take their course with your limited options.

“You don’t need to kill her, let’s just leave her here and go back.” He was taking another step forward and he continued to look over your shoulder, eyes only darting down to yours for a second in a silent plea for your cooperation. “She doesn’t know which way we’ll go”

“She was tracking.” The boy behind you was immediately noting and you almost cursed under your breath at the fact he was right. If you wanted to follow them you could, their tracks in the dirt obvious to you now that you’d spent months learning the skill.

“Then we tie her up and leave her, but we don’t need to kill.” He was shaking his head in exasperation and you could hear the boy behind you let out a frustrated sigh.

You had no doubt in your mind that if he was alone he would’ve killed you without a second thought, swift and silent in the way he had approached you from behind and keeping his gun firmly pressed against your skull. Despite your confusion you were silently thankful for the others boys resolve, although it came off as weak to you.

“If you’re going to tie me up in the woods you might as well kill me yourselves.” You were speaking for the first time and both boys reacted immediately.

The one behind you was shifting on his feet to stand firmer, pressing his metal into you while the other in front was giving you a helpless look, clearly upset you had immediately undone any progress he was making for your release.

It was silent for a few moments after that as they looked at each other and you wondered what conclusion they were coming to with just their glances. You hadn’t done yourself any favors in your statement but it was true, leaning you defenseless this close to dark was more of a death sentence than a bullet in your brain.

“We can take her back with us.” The boy from the bush was eventually whispering in a last attempt at keeping you alive, hands coming forward in a plea. “Not as a guest just as a prisoner for now, until we figure out what to do with her.”

You almost laughed at him but decided against it although figuring there was no possible way that would be allowed considering two seconds ago they were about to kill you. However the silence, and lack of immediate rejection, from behind you made you second guess.

You were being pulled to your feet before you even could process him moving again. “You’re explaining it to him, I’m not taking the heat for this.”

His tone was harsh but tired and you were startled at the fact he was actually taking you with, even more fear sinking in as you realized the ‘him’ he was referring to meant they weren’t out here alone. For some reason you hadn’t considered them being with a larger group.

The other boy didn’t say anything but you imagined he gave some form of silent acceptance considering the fact you were suddenly being moved forward harshly with your hands held behind your back.

You hadn’t seen the second boy yet but you were unnerved considering he was able to hold both your wrist together with a single hand, still keeping his gun pressed between your shoulder blades as you moved clumsily through the woods.

From their dynamic you had assumed they were alone, your first mistake, and that he was the leader out of the two of them. Hearing his words about explanation you realized the hierarchy wasn’t that simple and there was clearly somebody they both answered to outside of each other.

“Are your hands okay?” You looked to your left to see the kinder boy following you as you walked, staying at your side with his gun tight in his hands now.

The boy behind you sighed at his question and you weren’t sure exactly how to answer. They were hurting and if you saw any way out of this you would’ve complained, made a sarcastic comment that could potentially get your ass kicked if they weren’t feeling up for jokes at the moment.

Instead you offered him a small nod and turned back to face forward so you didn’t trip.

Your options now were to die here and now, act out and become more of a hinderance than their willing to deal with. Or go along with them and most likely end up being killed eventually anyways, maybe after at least one more night of sleep. You kept your mouth shut for the time being and kept walking.

“We should’ve blindfolded her.” The boy behind you was muttering after an hour or two went by and you vaguely heard the sounds of chatter and fire crackling off in the distance now. “He’s going to lose his shit.”

“Maybe we have Jake talk to him first.” The other one was whispering from beside you as the three of you slowed to a stop, accessing the situation before approaching with a stranger in toe.

It was clear to you now that this group was far larger than you had anticipated. They continued to whisper new names and you listened to the overlapping conversations off in the distance, your heart beating so fast it hurt as you skimmed through the different scenarios this could end in.

While they were distracted you were taking your chance, throwing your shoulder backwards to hit the first boy and taking off in a sprint back the way they had taken you from. You ignored his cry of shock and the others frantic plea for you to stop and come back as you whipped through the trees.

The sun was setting now so any tracking skills you had was completely useless, relying on nothing but your feet and the surrounding terrain as you attempted to put as much distance between you and the others as possible.

You could hear the two who had brought you back with them starting to yell out for help and despite cursing under your breath in frustration, you didn’t blame them and saw it coming before you even ran. You were a stranger and now you knew exactly where they were located, going from a hostage to a threat in seconds.

It had only been 20 minutes of running before you had exhausted yourself from lack of pacing, slamming against a tree and bending over with your elbows to your knees to try and catch your breath.

You could hear shouts in the forest behind you along with groans that brought on the harsh reminder you had more than one enemy in the woods. Their yells and loud feet over leaves and sticks were going to continue to bring more of the dead down on you and you were starting to panic completely.

Before you could think about it anymore or start running again, something heavy was slamming into your side and you were hitting the ground hard.

You flew across the leaves and mud before flipping over onto your back with a shout and scrambling away from whatever had rammed you before you even registered what it was. Another boy, not the one from the bush, was bouncing back to his feet considering he’d also hit the ground after he tackled you and was approaching you swiftly.

He looked furious but you couldn’t tell what type of weapons he had in the dark, kicking you feet out as he gained on you and hitting him in the knee.

A groan fell from his lips and he bent to grab his leg as you pulled yourself off the ground and instinctively reached down towards your thigh for your knife, finding the holster empty and immediately remembering it’d been taken from you hours ago.

He chuckled at your obvious dilemma although it lacked humor, an annoyed expression on his face like you were wasting his time. He was suddenly lunging at you again and although you were fast, he was definitely bigger and you let out a scream as he pinned you back down onto the floor.

Your stomach was pressed tightly against the dirt and you felt his knee land on your back, holding your arms tightly so you couldn’t break free from his hold again.

“Stop fucking moving already.” He was grunting from above you as you continued to thrash and attempt to kick at him despite slowly coming to the realization there was no getting free.

“Hyung.” Another voice was screaming out, obviously following the sounds of your cries and screams to find you. You twisted your head against the dirt to see the boy from the bush approaching you with a few others behind him.

“Sunoo go, you’ve done enough.” Your attacker was spitting from above you and you saw a flash of hurt over the others face, immediately taking a step back towards the rest of the boys who were watching the scene with varying expression.

Sunoo, the one who had brought you here in the first place, was clearly experiencing guilt as he looked down at you but you weren’t sure if it was for you or for causing an issue for his group. One of the boys behind him was reaching a hand up to grab his arm, pulling him backwards softly so he didn’t have to watch.

“Heeseung it wasn’t his fault.” You didn’t recognize the boy who was speaking now, approaching from the side, but you immediately could tell from his low timbre that he was the one who had held you at gunpoint. “I fucked up, we didn’t know what to do.”

“You kill her.” Heeseung was forcing the words out through gritted teeth and you were squirming again underneath his knee, the pain in your back excruciating as you started to find it difficult to breathe. “Or you leave her to the rotters, but under no circumstances do you bring her back to camp.”

Sunoo was glancing at the boy who had said something with a furthering expression of guilt and upset considering the fact those ideas had both been rejected by him. You thought about saying something, about pleading for your life or negotiating a deal where they could bring you far away and leave you somewhere you couldn’t find your way back.

You quickly decided against it considering how serious the boy above you was speaking, also piecing together this was clearly who was in charge and was being discussed in the woods previously.

The others boys were watching in the distance and you were trying to count them to see how outnumbered you were, eventually giving up considering how dark it was and how dizzy you were getting from being pinned against the floor. It was definitely more than you could handle and there was clearly no use in trying to out run them again considering how silently and quickly Heeseung had caught up to you the first time.

You hadn’t even heard him before he came out of the trees and it’d only taken him a second to bounce back onto his feet despite the tackle almost completely knocking the wind out of you.

He had you beat in all aspects and you didn’t feel like poking the bear would be the best move if you wanted to survive the night. That might not be up to either of you however considering the low groans that were starting to fill the forest.

Between the darkness and the almost echoing night air you couldn’t quite tell which direction it was coming from and judging by the way the group of boys starting to look around with their weapons raised, they couldn’t either.

You were being pulled up off the floor before you could think for another second and you sucked in a big breath now that your lungs were no longer restricted, immediately faltering when you were aggressively yanked around as Heeseung started to move towards the boys.

He was flinging you around like a rag doll and you heard him give out a low whistle, the others immediately forming a semi circle defense while everyone started to move in sync through the forest back towards where their camp was. It was a practiced routine and you would’ve been impressed if you weren’t technically their opponent right now.

“Pick your damn feet up.” He was speaking lowly into your ear with irritation and you let out a grunt as he continued to drag you.

“If you gave me a fucking second maybe I could.” You were spitting back and thrashing your torso forward slightly so his grip on your arms would loosen, he didn’t say anything about this and just glared at you as he let you get your balance so you could travel back to the base faster. “Thanks.”

He scoffed but didn’t reply to your sarcastic comment, traveling swiftly in silence on guard in case more than one dead came out from the dark woods.

By the time you got back to the camp, the fires were put out and nobody else was around. You weren’t sure if that’s because it was late or because everybody who lived here was apart of the group trailing behind you.

The camp was mainly made up of tents, some smaller like they were only fit for a pair and some large with big wooden stakes to hold them up. There was a few RV’s you could see from where you were standing and some trucks that could possibly run but for the most part they were large rust buckets littered with blood and dirt residue like the rest of the worlds vehicles.

You were being pulled into the largest tent before you could finish your observation and sat down in a chair furtherest away from the opening. You almost made a comment about them thinking you’d run again but you decided it wasn’t the best idea.

Only two of the boys followed you inside after Heeseung, the one from earlier who had attempted to take the blame off Sunoo and another you didn’t recognize.

“So what’s the plan then?” He was the one who spoke first and you glanced at him from under your messy hair, shifting uncomfortably as Heeseung tied your hands behind the chair tightly.

“First this idiot needs to tell me why he brought her back in the first place.” After he was finished and confident his ties were strong he was circling back around and approaching the familiar one, you couldn’t see his face anymore but his back was tense and straight. “What were you thinking?”

He cocked his head slightly but he didn’t seem deterred or intimidated by Heeseung’s demeanor, only breaking eye contact to spare you a quick glance.

You wondered if he was worried you’d give up the fact it was Sunoo who had practically insisted they bring you back. It was interesting that despite telling him he had to be the one to take the heat originally, he had immediately stepped up for the blame once he realized Heeseung was truly angry.

“She’s a tracker.” He brought his gaze back to the other boy as he spoke calmly. “She would’ve found us if we just left her and I saw no other option.”

The boy you didn’t recognize was looking at you now with a curious expression and you turned your head to look at him for a second, not able to get a good read on what he was thinking or what side of this argument he would be on. You wondered if this was the one mentioned earlier, Jake.

“You should’ve killed her Jay.” He was holding your gaze as he said it and you were taken back by his comment, not expecting him to be so blunt and cold.

Jay, despite being the one to originally put a gun to your head, also looked thrown off by this and faltered in his calm expression for a second and he looked at him. “Are you serious?”

“Jake’s right.” Heeseung shook his head, confirming your previous suspicious and Jay let out a small laugh of disbelief, taking a step away from the two boys back towards the entrance.

“I’m just supposed to blow her brains out right in front of Sunoo, just because there’s a slight chance she’d follow us?” He was holding his hands up in frustration and you shifted uncomfortably in the seat again, causing their heads to turn towards you.

Heeseung was approaching you swiftly and you watched him as he took large steps, gasping when his hand was reaching up to grab a solid chunk of your hair in his tight grip. He pulled slightly to make you look at up him, bending slightly so he could hold eye contact with you.

“How many people are in your group?” He was speaking steadily and low but you could feel the warning in his tone.

You were shaking your head in denial and confusion but stopped when he tightened his grip and repeated himself louder and more agitated. “How many?”

“I don’t have a group, it’s just me.” You were wincing and trying to hold his gaze, failing miserably due to the pain and intensity. Your eyes went over his shoulder to look at Jay and you gave him a desperate look. “Tell him it was just me.”

He didn’t say anything and you didn’t expect him to, only asking out of pure panic and as a last ditch attempt to plead your case. You weren’t afraid to die but if you could help it, it wouldn’t be in some random groups tent just because you were in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Heeseung was loosening his grip on your hair as he looked at you but keeping his hand on the back of your head, a silent warning in case you decided to act out in any sort of way. You watched him with your breath held as you waited for him to say something or react in any sort of way. He was just studying your expression like he was attempting to seek out some trace of a lie on your face.

“You can track.” He was stating suddenly but you took it as a question and nodded repeatedly as best as you could with how close he was to your face. “Can you hunt?”

You were nodding again but slower this time, not quite understanding where this was going. He was looking over his shoulder back at the other boys and Jake gave him an incredulous look that only confused you further before you slightly pieced together what he could he implying.

“You’re not serious.” He was laughing but it was devoid of humor, glancing at Jay who was stony faced as he looked at you. “Heeseung, you can’t be serious right now. Let her stay?”

You felt a wave of sickness pass by as he confirmed what you were thinking and you hoped you didn’t look too appalled visibly. You didn’t like this idea anymore than the thought of them killing you, never being in a group by choice. You didn’t necessarily play well with others and certainly not after they held you hostage and tackled you in the woods.

“She hunts.” He said it like it was obvious and you couldn’t deny the fact it was a valuable asset nowadays as human-made resources slowly died out. You’d noticed it yourself back at your apartment, having to venture out further and further every time you went for a run.

“Riki hunts.” Jake was quickly shutting him down and your interest piqued.

“Riki is learning to hunt but it’s not enough.” Jay was adding into the conversation now, still looking at you as he spoke like he had been since he entered the tent. “It’s almost winter and we can’t keep taking these day long trips every time we’re low…. and we’re always low.”

It was silent for a few moments while they looked at each other in frustration and you once again tried to understand the hierarchy and dynamics at play here, falling short every time. Eventually Jake was scoffing and exiting the tent, slamming the flap down as he left in anger.

Heeseung swiped a hand at Jay, dismissing him too and you didn’t miss the small nod he gave you before turning on his heel and following after the other boy.

That left you and Heeseung alone in the tent and he was taking a step away from you finally, watching you curiously as you took a breath finally and held his gaze tight in yours. You felt a dull ache in your back from his knee and your wrist were screaming for release from your constraints.

“Think of it as a trial.” He was turning away from you for a second as he started to talk and you stared daggers into the back of his head. “I don’t kill you now and in return, you don’t do something stupid.”

You watched him as he started to face you again with a stern look on his face, a hint of youth underneath the hardened exterior, and his eyes shot down to your feet and then back to hold your gaze. “Don’t give me a reason to kill you.”

——

You hadn’t spoken to him again but he didn’t seem too bothered by your silence, only muttering small commands as he dragged you out of the tent and towards one of the RV’s.

You were being left there for the night and you tried not to move much after he cut your restraints with a warning full glance, not wanting him to mistake your movements for another attempt at an escape. Despite not wanting to be there any longer than you had to, your chances were slim out in the woods by yourself.

You figured it wouldn’t hurt to stay a few nights, slipping out whenever you had gained their trust and didn’t need to sleep in a guarded metal bucket.

He’d left you with one of the boys you recognized from earlier in the woods, the one who had gently pulled Sunoo back after he started to get scolded. He looked the opposite of gentle now as he glared at you from the foldable table on the other side of the RV, gun hanging loosely on his lap and he watched you.

“Is there something on my face?” You were eventually muttering, not able to stop yourself as irritation bubbled to the surface.

You hadn’t asked to be brought back here, not even remotely putting yourself in this situation, yet everybody was acting like you were purposely causing issues or trying to harm them.

“You shouldn’t be here.” He was shaking his head and the deep tone of his voice threw you off slightly considering how young he looked.

Despite his youthful features, you could tell he was just as weathered and worn by this new world as everybody else was, you included. His eyebrows were pulled tight and his skin was darker in random sections like he had permanent dirt stains.

He was watching you as you observed him quietly, fidgeting slightly the longer you scanned his features and frame.

He was tall, a lot taller than you and even the other boys you’d encountered long enough to get a good sizing up done. You tried not to focus in on the tears in his clothing or the blood stains surrounding his knees and hands, not wanting to make him more uncomfortable than you already were.

“If you don’t want me here, why not just let me go?” You were shrugging like it was a nonchalant thing to ask, feigning ignorance that he clearly didn’t buy judging by his scoff and annoyed expression.

“And get in trouble for no good reason? Are you stupid or do you think I am?” He was letting his gun lean against the table, deciding you were more of a bother than an actual threat.

You shrugged but didn’t talk to him again for a minute of offer him a response to his question, knowing it would just further upset him. Considering the two of you were clearly stuck with each other for the night you didn’t see the point. “I’m Y/N.”

He was sighing as you spoke again, your voice softer than before as you shifted on the uncomfortable half bed Heeseung had sat you down on. You watched him watch you for a few seconds before he finally responded.

“Riki.”

——

You weren’t sure when you had managed to fall asleep, at some point just laying flat on your back and listening to the sounds of the forest off in the distance as they mixed with Riki’s soft breaths on the other side of the RV.

Apparently you had considering the fact you were being shook awake aggressively, jumping up with a start and reflexively striking the person who had woken you.

“Dude what the fuck.” Jake was standing near your bed and shielding his face from any further assault, a pained look on his face. You gave him an incredulous stare at his reaction, not quite sure how he expected you to react to being vibrated awake by a stranger who had encouraged your death last night. “Make yourself useful.”

He was turning and leaving after that quick statement and you groaned, flopping backwards onto the uncomfortable mattress for a second before kicking up and out of the bed, following him outside before he got too far away and you were lost in the camp.

“You’re going out with Heeseung today.” He was explaining as you jogged to catch up with him, trying to ignore the stares and whispers from the other boys as you passed.

“Does that mean I get my knife back?” You were asking him despite already knowing the answer and he shot you a quick glance at the sound of your voice, looking away as you furrowed your eyebrows.

“First piece of advice, don’t ask stupid questions.” He was stepping forward towards a different tent than last night, holding the flap open with a raised arm until you got the hint and ducked underneath it with a muttered word of thanks. He followed behind you and you saw Heeseung and two other boys sat around the tent, gearing up.

Sunoo was there and he faltered for a second when he saw you, another look of guilt washing over his face as his shoulders tensed. You gave him a small nod but it didn’t seem to appease him in anyway.

The other boy wasn’t looking at you, instead focusing on the disassembled gun in his lap as he meticulously cleaned it and cleared his throat. His hands were fast and swift, no hesitation or question in his expression.

“They’re going on a run too.” Heeseung was speaking and you looked up at him to see who he was talking to, surprised to see him already watching you. “We are heading off in the other direction.”

You were nodding and fidgeting in place, not quite sure how to respond to him in a way that didn’t immediately showcase your frustration. You weren’t thrilled about going out into the world with no weapons and no clue if this guy had good intentions, maybe this was his way of killing you as quietly as possible. He obviously wasn’t expecting you to hunt with your bare hands so you weren’t sure why he was bringing you along.

Still, you didn’t bother arguing with him and after a few more minutes of prep you were following him into one of the trucks off away from the main camp.

“There’s a town about an hour away.” He was muttering eventually as he drove, the heavy rumble of the old engine almost putting you to sleep if it wasn’t for the aggressive way the truck jerked every time he amateurly changed gears. “We cleared it for food but at the time we weren’t thinking about other types of supplies.”

You were watching the side of his face as he spoke and he spared you a glance at your silence. “You think there’s still stuff left now?”

“Possibly but it’s worth a shot. There’s a reason you’re out here and not in Seoul just like us, a lower populated town means maybe less survivors passed by when everything went to shit.” He was sighing as he spoke but seemed hopeful as he tried to convince you.

He wasn’t wrong for the most part, you had traveled to a more rural area in hopes for less of the dead and more towns left undiscovered. You figured if this didn’t end soon then there would be no place left that wasn’t completely cleared out.

Heeseung was large and sturdy but you didn’t miss his sunken in cheeks and darkened eyes, clearly lacking vital nutrients and a healthy lifestyle. It wasn’t that jarring considering you hadn’t met anybody who was doing particularly well but being in a group with larger numbers certainly made things a bit more uneasy.

You took a second to study him as he drove, trailing your gaze from his black long sleeve down to his matching cargo pants. His weapon holster was tightly pulled around his thigh similarly to how yours normally sat and you were suddenly reminded how defenseless you currently were.

“How do you know I’m from Seoul.” You didn’t necessarily feel like talking to him anymore than you had to but if you were going to be stuck with him in charge of your life, maybe some small talk wouldn’t hurt.

“Riki.” He spoke bluntly but it answered your question considering the fact you’d spent most of the night talking to the younger boy after the tension between you had calmed down. “Nice to hear you actually talk occasionally.”

“Maybe I’m more inclined to speak with people who haven’t tried to kill me.” You were quipping back and he let out a small chuckle at your sudden change in tone, not taking any actual offense.

You understood why he had done what he did and he knew you understood but that didn’t mean you were happy about the way things had went down and were continuing to go. You didn’t want to be with them and that much was clear but at some point he had figured if you had somewhere to go, you would’ve put up more of a fight.

The truck jerked particularly hard around another turn onto a dirt road and he swore under his breath, yanking at the shift knob until it slightly smoothed out again.

He gave you an awkward glance out of the side of his eyes and you tried not to chuckle at his terrible manual driving skills. You figured eventually everybody would adapt to things they hadn’t needed to before but it was slightly amusing to know most of the world was desperately trying to adjust to things you’d always had available to you.

You didn’t bother telling Heeseung you could drive a stick shift better than anything else, having been taught in one back in high school. He didn’t need to know how good you were at setting camouflaged rabbit traps or that you weren’t half bad with a bow. Your skill set was better kept a secret until you could get as far away from this group as possible.

By the time you were finally pulling up to a small town, if you could even call it that considering it was just a few old wooden buildings and shops in a U shape, Heeseung seemed to have relaxed a bit.

“We’ll be in and out.” He was carefully instructing as you got out of the car and you nodded although you were feeling frustrated about having no weapon. “Stay close by in case you run into an issue okay?”

Despite your upset and undeniable feeling of vulnerability, the run was going smoothly for the most part. You were quick to enter buildings behind Heeseung as he checked for undead and you had actually managed to get a bag full of supplies that could help the group through the winter.

Your guard was lowering slightly considering you’d come across little corpses, the small town seemingly sheltered from the horror the rest of the world had been subjected to.

Neither of you talked much, the mission being at the front of your minds and you were thankful for the lack of distraction.

It wasn’t until you were on your fourth building, some old auto shop with a connecting garage, that you realized how mistaken you had been. Heeseung was still outside the front door, fidgeting with something old and rusty that you couldn’t quite place.

Whatever it was, he seemed determined to unearthed it from the weeds that had grown around it and you impatiently shoved past him into the store. He offered a small scoff as you pushed through but didn’t bother chasing after you or demanding you wait, also making the mistake of being relaxed.

The second you entered the shop and the door closed behind you, a small gap left open considering the door was also subjected to the growing nature that almost converted the entire building, you smelt it.

Throughout the many months you’d been getting accustomed to the apocalypse and all it’s trials and faults, you still hadn’t adjusted to the overwhelming stench that came along with awaken corpses. It was especially murderous when they moved in masses or were left rotting since the start.

“Heeseung.” You were calling out in a hushed voice, slowing down your steps and looking around the store with confusion. You ignored the fact it was the first time you’d said the boys name and how casually it slipped out, listening in to his small hum of acknowledgment from outside. “Do you smell that?”

You could hear him setting down the metal thing he was obsessing over and pushing the door open swiftly, looking at you with a worried expression.

Before he could speak or confirm your senses, you were hitting the floor with a shriek.

It took you a second to realize why you had fallen but the moment you started to think straight again you could feel the tight bony hand wrapped around your ankle, having dragged you down onto the dust covered floor. You sucked in a sharp breath and scrambled back the best you could, kicking at the walker who had gripped your pant leg.

You could see it now, halfway stuck underneath one of the fallen shelves and desperate in the way it’s jaws snapped around nothing.

You were still kicking it when you realized the groans suddenly starting up were far too loud to be coming from the single walker in front of you, understanding with a wave of panic that your shriek had clearly awaken whatever amount of dead it was that was causing such an odor.

“Fuck.” Heeseung was entering the store swiftly and rushing over to you, immediately stomping the rotted skull of the dead that was holding you with his boot.

Ignoring the amount of blood and brain matter that sprayed out on your face at his action, you accepted his hand and let him pull you up and off the floor.

There was no time to dust yourself off as you both heard crashing and groans coming from the connected auto garage, clearly full of dead that had been starving for far too long. They were pouring out in pairs from the small doorway and you and Heeseung stood frozen as you tried to think of a way out of this.

They were coming from both sides of the aisle, filling up the only exit route back to the open door and sufficiently trapping you in the store.

Your fingers were twitching and reaching down to your empty holster, cursing once you remember you had no weapons on you and turning your head to glare at Heeseung who was already watching you with a panicked expression.

His eyes shot behind your head and you almost jumped out of the way, expecting something dead and hungry behind you, before he was reaching a hand out to grip your arm and pull you with him.

You didn’t object despite your confusion and you followed him swiftly, groaning loudly when you understood he was leading you towards the back of the shop where a small maintenance closet was hidden behind some tool carts and brooms.

“Hurry up, help me.” He was shouting back at you as he started to throw things out of the way and you unfroze, helping him clear the way to the door.

You were spinning around once finished to see the hoard closing in on you, a flustered shout pushing past your lips. “Heeseung.”

“I’m trying.” He groaned, his leg propped up against the wall as he kept trying to pry open the old rusted door with all his weight.

Finally, he was stumbling back in your direction and you grabbed his arm to stop him from falling into the awaiting arms of the dead that were now only a few feet from being able to grab onto you. He was immediately catching his footing and ushering you into the closet before closing it tightly behind the two of you.

You sat with bated breath and you waited to see if it would hold, the bodies of the corpses smacking against it as they clawed and practically shrieked with hunger.

Heeseung was holding the doorknob tightly so it wouldn’t spring back open and although it was dark, flashes of light that managed to break past the dozens of shoes outside the door, revealed to you his fearful expression that didn’t help calm your nerves.

You opened your mouth to speak and ask him about what you were supposed to do but his eyes were shooting to your in a glare, his free hand coming up to cover your mouth as he shushed you.

Your eyes widened at the fact he was suddenly touching you, looking down at the hand over your face and then back up at him as he swiftly ripped it away and shook his head, gesturing to the door like you were stupid for trying to make any noise.

He didn’t look at you again as you furrowed your eyebrows in annoyance but nodded in understanding, realizing he wanted to wait until they had settled before showing any sign of life. They could definitely smell you and had no reason to give up, only driven by hunger, but you figured eventually something would come by and distract them.

Which gave you some hope that you could get out of here safe, not wanting to die stuck in a smelly auto shop closet with Heeseung, but you also let out a small sigh knowing you’d be waiting here for a long time.

For the first time since you’d been rushed inside the small space, you took a second to look around. It was tiny, so small that if Heeseung was standing straight and not bending slightly to keep the door held shut, his shoulder would be touching the other wall.

To make matters worse the opposite width wasn’t any bigger, the toes of your boots smushed against his with no room to scoot backwards or make less contact.

Eventually he was slowly letting go of the metal door knob, moving barely an inch every ten seconds as you both waited to see if they were going to suddenly rip the door open and devour you whole. It was clear after a few minutes that it was sturdy enough to keep you hidden behind it for now, you’re not sure you could say the same about the next few hours however.

Heeseung sucked in a much needed breath and leaned backwards against his side of the closet, his knees pointing out towards you in result.

He was watching you with a curious expression and you glared at him in silence, not sure if you were allowed to talk yet or if it would result in his large hand over your mouth again.

“In and out.” He was whispering it so quietly it almost looked like he mouthed it. You could still barely see him but you could hear the smile in his voice as he joked about your failed plan, the light catching his eyes as he peered down at you. “You good?”

You were nodding but shifting uncomfortably, suddenly remembering how close of a call you’d had now that things were calmed down enough for you to think properly.

“It really had me for a second.” You whispered back to him and shook your head, avoiding his gaze as you looked at the vibrating door. “I shouldn’t have let my guard down like that, it was stupid.”

“Then we’re both stupid.” He was muttering back and you tried not to be too curious why he was being so nice to you despite his harsh leadership within the group. “At least you weren’t alone.”

You were scoffing and shaking your head, his boot scooting forward towards yours in a warning to keep your noises at a low volume. He couldn’t exactly make out your expression considering you were placed lower than him and getting less light on your face but he could practically feel the death stare you were sending his way.

“It’s easier to be alone.” You were countering in a stern tone. “If I’m stupid alone I’m just dead but if I’m stupid in a group then I’m guilty. It’s on my hands.”

“It would’ve been on mine if you’d gotten bit back there.” He was cutting you off and you stopped abruptly, looking at him with parted lips. “But the same thing goes for if I die out here, if I don’t get back to camp, back to my family then that’s on me too. Not trying just because you’re alone isn’t an excuse.”

His tone was heavy now and you felt bad for getting him so frustrated considering how carefree he’d been for most of the day, possibly enjoying not having to direct orders and commands for a few hours. You imagine that if he was able to he would’ve stormed off and left you with his heavy statement.

Instead the two of you sat in the silence of what he had said and listened to the groans only a few inches away from your heads.

You were shifting suddenly and he looked back at you in question when you accidentally bumped against his stomach, not having room to move your arms anywhere.

“Is that why you lead them then?” You tried to keep your voice soft and questioning, not wanting him to mistake you for accusatory.

You didn’t want to fight with him again especially since he had saved your life not too long ago, potentially twice with his quick thinking to get the two of you into the closet.

“It just happened.” He was whispering back and his tone was slightly guarded. “We knew each other before and when.. everything went to shit they came to me one by one.”

“I was scared shitless, I mean sure I’ve chauffeured them around for a few years and I’d handle calling in our takeout orders but now I’m supposed to keep them alive?” He sounded flustered and you listened to him quietly, letting him talk.

For some reason it hadn’t occurred to you to wonder how long they’d known each other. They seemed comfortable and they worked fast and efficiently like they had experience with it but you’d seen similar things in groups who met only at the beginning of all this, being forced to learn how each other works to survive.

You briefly remembered Riki saying something about high school and Jay but you didn’t fully make the connection, maybe you just didn’t want to.

But listening to Heeseung so earnestly talk about the responsibility he carried as the leader and the eldest you felt a wave of understanding, immediately followed by the desire to run far far away from the inevitable care that comes along with a group this tightly knit.

“We left Seoul the first week in Jungwon’s old van.” He was continuing on and when you raised an eyebrow in question he was nodding in realization. “That’s the one who was cleaning the gun, he’s out with Sunoo right now.”

“How many more of you is there?” You hoped he didn’t think you were asking him in an attempt to get information on the group that would assist you in your escape, although you halfway were.

“Just Sunghoon, I don’t think you met him.” He was mumbling and you thought for a second before shaking your head.

That made a total of seven and a wave of fear washed over you at the thought. As of now you were leaving no matter what and as of now they weren’t going to let you just go easy, meaning in some form this was your opponent. Seven men who were capable and seemingly willing to kill you if necessary with the exception of one or two.

Heeseung’s silence made you think he knew what you were thinking and he shifted so he was standing again, no longer leaning against the wall.

This put him even closer to you and you held your breath at the proximity, only letting it out in a moment of shock when his hand was coming up suddenly and touching your face like it had earlier.

You were jumping backwards, at least as far as you could in the tight space and he was shushing you with furrowed eyebrows and a finger to his lips, glancing at the door in worry and then back to you as he continued what he was originally doing.

It took you a few seconds to remember the walker he had stomped on, to remember the blood and rotted skin that had splattered all over you.

Heeseung was gently wiping your face off with his hands, using his sleeves at times for the areas that were particularly covered. You felt your cheeks flush in embarrassment, his large hands stiffening for a second when he realized how awkward this situation was.

He was taking his hands away swiftly and clearing his throat, shuffling backwards again and avoiding looking at you. It was silent for a few minutes and you felt suffocated by it.

“You didn’t lose anybody.” You broke the thick air by speaking again and he flinched before looking down at you. “Since Seoul, did you lose anybody?”

His eyes flashed with something heavy and sad and you imagined he was thinking about his family, slightly curious why he had left without them and what had happened before the other boys showed up alone at his doorstep. Then he was shaking his head to answer your question.

“Then maybe you’re more fit to lead than you thought.”

——

“Was he scared?” Riki’s voice was ringing in your ear again and you groaned softly, leaning back on your pillow and trying your hardest to ignore his constant questions. “I mean, I’ve never seen Heeseung scared. What was it like? Did he cry a little bit?”

After a few more hours had passed in the closet, your suspicion was correct and eventually something passed by that caught a few of the undeads attention. The stragglers had wondered outside the auto shop and the rest immediately followed the noise and movement.

Heeseung and you had waited another half an hour just to be sure before slipping out finally, backs aching from standing straight and rigid for so long.

You’d gotten in the truck with the supplies you found earlier in the day and headed back to the camp, not wanting to risk your luck any further and needing to beat the night as the sun slowly set.

The boys had affectionately greeted the two of you when you arrived, or more so Heeseung as you hovered awkwardly behind and watched them all. You saw a boy you didn’t recognize and figured he was Sunghoon, finally having faces to all the names.

They all carried different expressions of worry and upset and you watched them scan his skin for injuries or scratches, eyes crinkling with relief when they saw he was safe and returned to them. Your heart felt heavy and your stomach turned as you watched the display of care and love towards each other.

You’d caught Jake’s eye for a second and he narrowed his at you, causing you to swiftly give him a nod and slink back into the RV you’d been assigned to.

The same RV that you were now groaning in as you listening to the young boy, the youngest boy as you had found out yesterday, talk your ear off with questions about what it was like to be stuck in a closest with his hyung.

“He cried like a baby.” You were muttering and he laughed softly before shaking his head, able to tell you were lying to him. “I’m serious, my shoulder was soaking wet by the time we got out of there.”

“You know you’re funny when you’re not glaring at me.” He was remarking and you scoffed softly. “The others don’t joke around anymore so I don’t either.”

He sounded younger than he looked when he said it, voice steady like he didn’t even process the weight and sadness of what he was saying. Maybe he’d already started to forget what it was like to be a teenager with no responsibilities.

For a second you zoned out picturing him before the apocalypse, a younger Riki wearing a school uniform and excitedly chatting with the older boys. Maybe he was shy or maybe he was just as talkative and mischievous as he seemed to get the few times you’ve talked to him.

You were abruptly broken out of your daydreams when you heard shouts coming from outside the RV, immediately sitting straight up in the bed and locking eyes with Riki as his widened in fear and concern.

As far as you knew, everybody had turned in for bed. Heeseung didn’t like any one leaving their tents after dark, a heavily suggested curfew seeming to be followed religiously and you couldn’t think of good a reason for the boys to be disobeying this.

You were standing up swiftly and making your way towards the small door, being stopped by a hand wrapped around your arm.

Riki was shaking his head with a panicked expression, pushing you back into the RV. “What are you doing? You can’t go out there.” His voice was urgent and he took a step between you and the door.

His protective expression was making you feel sick and your expression turned stony, moving to push past him but stopping as the door was flung open without either of you touching it.

Sunghoon was stood panting, looking up at you guys from the surface level. He took a step up the RV’s metal steps and glanced behind him with a hard look on his face. Now that the door was open you could hear the shouts louder and also the groans that accompanied them.

“We have to go.” He was rushing out and your mouth parted slightly, looking between him and back to Riki who Sunghoon had been watching since he opened the door.

The younger boy was shaking his head as his shoulders dropped and you felt a wave of upset and guilt for him wash over you, knowing this had been his only home for the past year considering the fact he wasn’t permitted to runs as often as the older boys.

“I’m sorry Rik, there’s too many we don’t have any choice.” Sunghoon was shaking his head sternly but his eyes were soft as he looked at his friend. “You need to pack and we have to go, both of you.”

His eyes moved over to you hesitantly and he lost the affection in his gaze, you didn’t take any offense to it and nodded your head as he turned to rush back to help the others buy some time. You touched the younger boys arm and he jumped slightly before looking down at you with a heavy expression.

“Let’s pack your stuff okay?” You whispered and your unusually gentle tone just made him feel worse, curling in on himself slightly as he nodded and started to grab what little belongings he had scattered around the RV in an attempt to make it feel more like a home.

He was done quickly and you were getting ready to exit the vehicle and join the others when he was grabbing your arm again to stop you.

You almost turned to scold him for wasting time and not letting you go but stopped in your tracks when you realized he was holding a gun out in between your bodies, gesturing for you to take the weapon.

You considered saying no for a few seconds, knowing Heeseung and the other boys wouldn’t be happy with you for accepting and most likely would also scold Riki for giving it to you in the first place. The need to survive overtook this and you took the gun from him, nodding in appreciation.

The second you stepped outside you understood why the only option was to abandon the camp. The dead were pouring in from every side of the forest, their groans mixing together and attracting more and more every minute that passed.

Your eyes were darting around try and spot the other boys but you couldn’t see them in the chaos, feeling frustrated and panicked as you heard Riki’s breathing getting more strained from beside you.

Eventually you spotted Sunoo at the same moment he saw the two of you as well as he was rushing over to you with a serious expression, eyes bouncing around to check if it was safe to stop and talk.

“They’re out past the river.” He was explaining swiftly and you nodded despite having no idea how to get there. It seemed to make sense to the two boys however because they were quickly turning on their heels and disappearing into the woods, looking back a few times to make sure you were following behind them.

Sunoo was running ahead of both of you and your heart clenched watching him take out a few stragglers that were making their way towards the over run camp, his knife effortlessly going into their rotted skulls as he kept rushing through the woods.

Eventually the groans got quieter and you could hear the light splash of a stream, catching sight of the other boys huddled together before the saw you.

“They’re here.” Jake was announcing when he picked his head up and saw the three of you approaching. He stood up and rushed to meet you halfway, checking Sunoo and Riki for injuries before his eyes landed on you.

His gaze trailed down to the gun clenched in your hands and for a second you thought he’d take it from you, demand you leave or maybe try to kill you here and now so they didn’t have another thing to worry about. Instead he took a step closer and briefly scanned over your body, similar to the way he was doing to the others.

“I’m okay.” You breathed out and you weren’t sure why you said it, just wanting to get his concerned look off of your frame as soon as possible. He nodded his head but lingered on your for a second before turning and walking back over to the others.

You followed behind him to see what the boys were surrounding, watching as they all pointed at a crinkled map and spoke in hushed voices. They carried bags on their shoulders and you vaguely noted that Jungwon’s was full of the guns he was always taking such intense care of.

“We’ve been that way man.” Jay was sighing and shaking his head and he pushed Jake’s finger away and moved it further down the map. “From here to here it’s not clear, dead ends or there’s just nothing left.”

“Well we can’t go north.” Sunghoon was countering and you could see a large red X over the area he was referring to. You wonder how long they’d been planning an escape plan with no luck.

You listened to them talk for awhile with a sick feeling in your stomach, wondering if you should help and throw out the idea that was brewing in your mind. On one hand this was your chance to escape considering they had no home to even protect anymore, you could sneak out or hold the gun in your hands to one of their heads until you were far enough away that they wouldn’t follow.

This could be your only opportunity to be back on your own, not owing any sort of debt to a group that was dealing with their own conflict.

Riki was looking back at you suddenly with a worried expression and that thought was immediately out the window as you let out a small sigh, upset at yourself for what you were about to do, before stepping up towards the boys.

“I know a place.” You were rushing out and they all turned to look at you. Heeseung’s eyes were softening at your sudden want to help and you nodded at him. “It’s a few hours south but I stayed there for a few weeks before I kept moving away from that area.”

“You think it’s still there?” Jungwon was asking, his first time speaking to you directly since you’d arrived to their group. His voice wasn’t as harsh as his glare though and he seemed genuinely curious, not suspicious of your motives.

“It was gated.” You shrugged and bent down, bumping into Heeseung’s side and causing him to sway in his crouched position. You were touching the map and felt relieved to see the area you were referring to wasn’t crossed out or circled. “It might not be but it’s worth a shot. Plus we don’t have many options.”

“We?” Heeseung’s voice was soft from beside you and you turned your head to look at him, flushing slightly when you realized how close to each others faces you were.

“Yeah.. we.”

——

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balkanradfem · 3 months

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I was thinking the other day about how often biblical stories imply that any sort of species can be started with just one and one female of the species, and sells this as the correct (maybe only correct) way to start things. Like Adam and Eve, they're supposed to be the starters of humanity, one (presumably young) male and one again, presumably young woman.

It repeats again with Noah's ark, where two animals of each species are collected, one male and one female, so they could all 'start their species anew'. Noah's family also is presumed to be the regular, one male + one woman, enough to re-start the humanity.

I understand that these stories were written to establish and force the idea of nuclear family being necessary, good and the start of everything, and if you don't think further than 'oh yeah one male and one woman are capable of making a baby' and you stop thinking there, you might be sold with these stories. But if you think about it for a second further, the implications of this are absolutely atrocious.

One young male and a young woman, are never accompanied by their parents or their grandparents in the stories. They're purposely isolated from their families, or are presumed to not even have family, which means none of them has any support, anyone to go to for advice or help, nobody to rely on to do the massive amount of labour of having and raising even one child. This is already where it falls apart, two young people do not have the knowledge, experience or wisdom to raise a small child, alone. They need their mothers, they need their grandmothers, they need elders and community in order to be able to function - first of all tell me who is delivering that baby they're having? Where is her midwife? It's never mentioned how she gets through childbirth in those stories, apparently she just 'figures it out', while in reality birth is dangerous, and women need both emotional and physical support during labour. There's nobody in this story who knows how to deliver the child safely, or how to save one or both of them should the things go wrong. They both have a chance of dying and then the species is dead. This is all ignored and pretended not to be an issue.

So next in the story we're led to believe that these two young people have made a (mistake) baby and are raising it alone and this is fine. Even funnier is that they often first have a male baby, as an effort to repopulate their species, I mean yeah thats gonna do you a lot of good for sure. Two young people of the opposite sex, without any elders, community, family or support, have one significant power imbalance - the male will usually be physically more powerful, while the woman will be more intelligent, resourceful, adaptive, thoughtful, resilient, and infinitely more vulnerable during the times of labour. It has been shown again and again, that in these circumstances, males do not find it appropriate to protect and treasure the women, but they use their physical advantage to overpower and control her, and her reproductive abilities. But in the stories this is 'fine' because she should 'listen' to this dumber, bigger, less intelligent, more aggressive, more demanding, more exploitative, more dangerous, less useful creature who is completely parasitic and depending on her kindness, intelligence, ability to make food, reproductive abilities and sense of forgiveness of his crimes towards her, to survive. Women are apparently just supposed to be hosts for parasitic males, while isolated, not given a way to overpower him except poison, which is then again depicted as 'bad' because she should just resign to live in servitude to the creature if she wants to prove that she is 'good'. This is bullshit.

Let's look at the next stage, where even more disasters await us. So they raised their child, or children, who have only had these two people to look up to, so they've likely picked up the patterns of 'male is to be served or violence happens, women need to keep their head down and obey or the violence happens', and now the children are supposed to repopulate the species. With? whom? This concept relies entirely on incest? With children who have been raised on learning the massive power imbalance? We're supposed to have sisters accept sexual slavery from their brothers at this point, if we want to have a species of humans? The bible is promoting this?

The bible at this point realizes they've fucked up and write down 'well the sons just went to the nearest village to find girlfriends' OH YOU NEED A VILLAGE NOW DON'T YOU? Now you remembered that actually no, you will now rebuild a species without just one male and one woman and in fact, villages are necessary, and your story leads straight into incest and sexual slavery of women. Presumably the women in the village have whole families and not just two people put in this unnatural position of parasitism and power imbalance. But we don't know, we're supposed to remember 'one male + one woman is correct and nothing else is okay', when the concept is fucked up from the starts and they eventually cave and introduce a village, but do it casually like it doesn't really matter and the story totally wouldn't end up in forced incestuous pregnancies and making a mess of human gene pool.

It was so important for the bible to establish, and re-establish this concept because that is the only way for males to be able to isolate, use and control young women. The concept where women don't have their own mothers, grandmothers, sisters, aunts, families, friends, and villages to protect them from abuse, that is the only scenario where one male can sit on his butt, call himself the 'provider' and then raise his voice and his hand whenever she doesn't do exactly as he says. It's disgusting, and there's nowhere else this can go except abuse. Males will never be unwilling to use their physical advantage to hurt and control women, and we've watched it for centuries, they were more willing to kill women than to accept that we have the right to vote,, the right to divorce them, the right to abort at will (they're still more willing to kill us than to accept this right). No woman is safe in an union with one male, without her family, friends, and a network of support. To live her entire life normally, she needs to rely on the knowledge, experience and wisdom of her elders, so she wouldn't have to do everything alone, and learn everything alone. Male, in return, usually learns all the tactics of manipulating and isolating a woman and will use those, so she needs to be ready and have strategies to defend herself, to be able to escape if it comes to that.

And sometimes, even when the woman has all the support in the world, the male still ends up killing her, because he gets a chance to do it, and it's always at the distraught and horror of everyone who loved her.

Thinking back, the concept of nuclear family had to be invented because males didn't feel like they were able to control the women enough. They likely needed to establish this because they noticed that women were able to go on uncontrolled, they were too 'free', too supported, too resourceful to just trap and control. They needed to convince women that the right thing to do was be alone with one male person who just happens to be stronger and that in fact, not doing so is dangerous and wrong. The concept of nuclear family put the control right in their hands where they wanted it, and it's still ongoing, and we're sick of it. It's a trap.

If you don't believe these stories have influenced our views, think about how males sometimes dream up concepts where they're the 'only male left on the planet', in company of the woman who they're interested in. They relish in these fantasies because they believe in that scenario, they're entitled to rape her. She isn't entitled to resist because then she's responsible for the downfall of humanity, for not repopulating the species, and they feel that this responsibility has to fall so heavy on the woman's shoulders that she will not possibly try to resist him. Women still do, women say right away that if they were the last one, they'd kill themselves instantly. Because we know and understand there's no repopulating the planet with just male and one female. There's just female sexual slavery and incest.

Possibly even the story of Adam and Eve is just a fantasy concept of one male who looked at a woman who was able to say no to him, and thought 'well, what if we were the only humans existing. How would she be able to refuse me then'. And he realized she couldn't. So he wrote it down and sold it as the ideal utopia created by god himself. And we've all been hearing his fetish fantasy like it's gospel. And then the rest of the story is focused on how wrong Eve is for resisting the rules of the male, and the even more powerful male god, how she'll be punished for eating a piece of fruit. We should have never fallen for it.

#anti religion #anti christianity #adam and eve #religion critical #radical feminism #radfem #feminism #noah's ark #bible stories dismantled #bible supported incest but changed its mind at the last second #anti marriage

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bonefall · 5 months

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Hi Bones!! Thank you for you hard work on this project and for sharing it with us!

I've seen your posts about weird representation of society (regarding the "natural order of things") in xenofiction, especially in lion king, so I wanted to ask:

could you recommend any xenofiction media that has all (or most of the) animal species sapient? Or is the only solution to make just one or two species sapient while the others (especially prey) are plain animals?

Really sorry if you've seen this ask from me before - my account had a weird laggy period when I couldn't send or receive messages and asks, so I don't know if you got the previous one! I just know that now it's fixed so I double all the asks sent haha

Honestly I'm not totally sure! If any 3rd person has some good recommendations for "every being is alive" xenofiction types, feel free to weigh in.

If you want to jump in with me though, I am following the webcomic Africa. It updates every Wednesday. Africa is about a mother Leopard on the verge of a great ecological disaster, the relationship between her children and the animals around her, and the strength of both instinct and choice as the characters face an uncertain future.

Since it's ongoing, I still don't know how it's going to end and can't judge it as a full work! But it's absolutely fascinating and I think the author is doing a fantastic job so far. Bonus points for the way it portrays humans, btw.

No more spoilers though, if you're interested, it's on Webtoons.

(I'm also planning to read Oren's Forge soon. Ask me about it again in a few months over on Bonebabbles and I'll give you my thoughts)

As an aside though, funny you mention it because like... ever since I was a kid I've had a story I want to tell with the premise. It's a scintilla I've kept close to me for well over a decade but haven't done anything official with. So this is actually a theme I've thought about a lot.

It's rare to see it done well though because like... its very premise butts heads with reality. The "natural order" that an animal follows is not something it moralizes. A tiger doesn't have the capacity to think about how fucked up it is to kill to stay alive, the deer doesn't know that if its population isn't controlled it will destroy the forest.

They're animals. They don't HAVE that agency. Your dog does not care about being sterilized. A snake doesn't differentiate between a pinky and an adult mouse except in terms of if it will fit in its mouth. But the minute you put human morality in there... they have the ability to reason, create and agree on the rules of a society, make choices about MORALITY.

If nothing is going to change about their world, you just end up putting human arguments about "natural order" in their mouths and, well... start telling a parable justifying this "natural order."

(Genuine) Does what I'm saying make sense? Animals DON'T rationalize or negotiate. HUMANS do.

So the minute you're approaching a world with that logic, like it or not, you are invoking those "arguments from nature." And you're putting them in a being that is not fully an animal or a human, but an anthropomorphic mix which CAN rationalize but WON'T make an effort to change their world.

(Which is why tbh the best examples i know of are works with a theme of "change.")

OH WAIT I also remember another that's interesting!! Leafy: Hen into the Wild actually has a fascinating take on it. It's not interested in "moralizing" or really being about an animal society. It's a very emotional sort of movie, and it's about joys in adversity, the freedom that choice gives you, how bad things are going to happen and you can never completely prevent them.

INTENSE movie emotionally, the ending will wreck you (especially in the English translation which leaves out a really important theme making it feel abrupt x_x) but it's really good. Check that one out.

OH and also You Are Umasou. That one has more pitfalls imo (it does try to moralize a bit) but it's super unique as a movie. And is about dinosaurs.

#Don't take my opinions as gospel tho #There's no ONE RIGHT WAY to tell a story or handle a theme #And every person can have a unique reading of any story #Some stories can even be interpreted super differently by going in with different readings #Media isn't a box you take the lid off of to loot for objectively correct objects #It's more like eating a meal #Examining ingredients/tropes and how they were used #Trying to identify what the author set out to do and if it accomplished it in its current form #And sometimes idk chicken noodle tastes like hot saltwater in one moment but then hits different 2 months later when surrounding--#--circumstances (like being sick or cold) make it hit different #Point im getting at is that we could objectively say 'they used chicken and noodle' in this dish #But analysis and opinions and expressing them are an art of their own #Bone babble #Anyway prolly gonna be quiet the rest of the day so I can do clanmew prep lads #Media analysis #Xenofiction

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robininthelabyrinth · 10 months

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Hello it's last anon thank you for letting me give a prompt

So I really liked your pairing of LQR/WRH/Lao Nie and after seeing wwx's parents in the last episode of the donghua it got me thinking, How about WRH/WCZ/CSSR? WRH maybe saves them in yiling and they end up hitting it off (WRH might do it in the beginning just spite jfm by stealing his former best friend and crush) and the Wei family settles in nightless city, wwx grows up with the Wen heirs and wen Qing and wen Ning and that affects the events of Canon

(I wouldn't mind smut tbh if you want to include it, they're all hotties lol)

Thank you so much for letting me send a prompt 🙏😭❤️

ao3

“I don’t suppose you can help with this,” Wen Ruohan said to Lan Qiren, who had the unmitigated gall to look amused at him, as if he’d brought this disaster down on his own head or something like that. “Aren’t you supposed to be friends with that awful -”

“Cangse Sanren and I are indeed good friends,” Lan Qiren said peaceably and tonelessly, possibly just because he was trying to annoy Wen Ruohan to death. “I am therefore very familiar with the fact that there is absolutely nothing I can do to stop her from proceeding precisely as she wishes.”

That was not what Wen Ruohan wanted to hear.

“You’re her friend,” he said, deciding to focus on the important part. “Take her away.”

“You’re the sect leader of the Nightless City,” Lan Qiren rebutted. “Order her to leave.”

Wen Ruohan couldn’t do that.

Well, he could. By all rights, he ought to have done it a month ago, when Cangse Sanren had first marched into the Fire Palace and said, “Oh, this will work perfectly! I love it, you’re so thoughtful!” and started rearranging the entire place into some sort of workshop for herself, possibly involving grain storage. He’d meant to, but he’d been a bit distracted at the time – Wei Changze had wanted to know what all the machines did, and he’d had an endless number of clever ideas on how some of them could be repurposed for things other than torture, some of which had been really very intriguing.

Anyway, it wasn’t as if Wen Ruohan had time to attend torture sessions any more, not with three loudly yelling children running around all the time. Wei Wuxian might be the youngest of the lot, with both Wen Xu and Wen Chao as his elders, but he’d managed in a very short amount of time to make himself the undoubted leader of the pack and spoiled beloved youngest all at the same time. There had even been avid discussions about how they would need to bring other children over to visit in order to better socialize the children. He’d already summoned some cousins over, Wen Qing and Wen Ning, which meant that soon there would be even more children…

It was a headache, really.

Absolutely.

Wei Changze and Cangse Sanren were driving him up the wall.

They were also regular visitors in his bed, something that would very likely rapidly stop being the case if he actually kicked them out of the Nightless City.

“This one’s on you, Hanhan,” Lao Nie put in, grinning wildly at him. Now there was one that was completely unmoved by the news of Wen Ruohan’s new relationship – everyone else had reacted, whether by Jiang Fengmian’s profound embarrassment, raging jealousy, and quiet fury, Jin Guangshan very obviously trying to calculate some way of using this to his advantage, and Lan Qiren immediately going over to question his friends’ sanity – and that was pretty annoying in its own way. After all, Wen Ruohan had really only invited the two rogue cultivators into his bed in the first place as a matter of spite, a way of excising his rage when he’d heard the rumors about Lao Nie potentially taking on a third wife.

He hadn’t expected them to stay.

He hadn’t expected to want them to stay.

Which he didn’t! They were a mess, each one worse than the next – Cangse Sanren was barely human most days, like some sort of feral demonic beast that had accidentally achieved human form and continuously forgot (thanks to her prodigiously bad memory) that she was supposed to be pretending to be normal, and Wei Changze was remarkably similar to Lao Nie in the sense that he’d never taken anything seriously in his life, except for the fact that his humor was lighthearted and unleavened by the hints of trauma and tragedy that lurked behind Lao Nie’s unbridled hedonism. There wasn’t anything that he wouldn’t let slide off his shoulders, forgetting a beating as soon as it was over…Wei Changze might be a lot less vicious than Lao Nie was, but he was reckless to the extreme, in a way that made absolutely no sense. Wasn’t he supposed to be a servant? What was he doing rushing out into the field with a sword and smile and absolutely no advance planning whatsoever? Even Lao Nie wouldn’t do that!

Anyway, they were a handful.

They were maddening.

They were the most interesting thing that had happened to Wen Ruohan in years.

“Your input is not required,” Wen Ruohan informed Lao Nie, who shrugged expansively. “Unless you have something constructive to add.”

“No, no, nothing constructive, you know me, I’m not built for that…but I’m glad that you’re happy.”

Wen Ruohan stopped where he was.

“I’m not right for you,” Lao Nie said, and even though he was still smiling, same as always, there was something sharp in his eyes – the same sharpness that had caught Wen Ruohan’s interest in the first place, like a beautiful dagger that you longed to touch even though you knew its biting edge might cut. “You know, I know, even Qiren knows it…you’re happy now, and that’s good. That’s all I wanted to say.”

Wen Ruohan wanted to say something.

Preferably something cutting, something about how it was too late for Lao Nie to regret – except he didn’t think Lao Nie did regret, because Lao Nie did not live a life of regret. Lao Nie had enjoyed their time together, had been as sincere and true as he was made to be and no further. But, and maybe it was because he’d never expected to keep Wen Ruohan for very long in the first place, he’d felt little sorrow at it ending, instead feeling nothing but joy on Wen Ruohan’s behalf at seeing him happy, even if it was with another.

Wen Ruohan didn’t understand that. He’d always loved too fiercely, too well; he’d always yearned to keep that which he cared for close to him, nearby, somewhere he could protect them and keep them.

Even Lao Nie…Wen Ruohan had been enticed by Lao Nie’s ruthlessness, his bloodthirstiness, his Nie sect temper tempered with a nasty sort of cunning that had made him remarkably successful at expanding his sect’s reach in the north, and he’d been flattered at how persistent the other man was in pursuing him. It was only later, when he’d gotten used to having him around, that he had started to feel jealous…

“They’ll be good for you,” Lao Nie said. His eye twinkled. “You could use a bit of chaos in your life.”

Wen Ruohan shook his head. “I’m trying to get rid of them,” he protested, but even he didn’t believe what he was saying. “They’re a menace. Especially Cangse Sanren – do you know that she’s literally doomed? I swear, I spend all my trying keeping her from getting herself killed…”

“Don’t you enjoy defying the heavens?” Lan Qiren asked, rolling his eyes as if Wen Ruohan were missing something obvious. “I would have thought that someone carting around a heaven-sent calamity would be a perk for someone like you.”

…it rather was, wasn’t it?

“Whatever. Fine. Leave it, I’ll figure it out myself,” Wen Ruohan grumbled, then turned his narrowed eyes on the two of them. “Now for something you can help with: My children need more socialization or else they’ll genuinely think Wei Wuxian is a good example of other children. Sect Leader Lan – you’re a teacher, aren’t you…?”

“Well, yes. But –”

“What a wonderful idea!” Lao Nie clapped his hands together. “I can send my two boys to Qiren to teach, too! And we can definitely bully Fengmian and Guangshan into sending theirs. It’ll be…oh, I don’t know. A regular summer excursion!”

“In my sect?” Lan Qiren asked, arching his eyebrows. “Why me?”

“Because you’re a teacher, of course. Anyway, are you saying you don’t want Cangse Sanren to crash at your place for a few months..?”

“She’s not going anywhere,” Wen Ruohan said at once. When both of them smirked at him, he scowled. “Even if I wanted her too, she’s not. It was a statement of fact, nothing more.”

“Then perhaps we should all come visit the Nightless City instead,” Lao Nie said. “It could be like a miniature discussion conference, except limited to the Great Sects – we could go night-hunting and such while Qiren teaches the children.”

Was Lao Nie proposing an orgy? He’d better not be proposing an orgy, not if he genuinely intended to invite Jiang Fengmian and his wife or Jin Guangshan and his to attend…

“Of course, if it’s focused on the children, maybe the adults aren’t entirely necessary to invite – well, except for you, as the host, Qiren as the teacher, and me as the person who came up with the idea…”

Lao Nie was definitely proposing an orgy.

“…I’ll see what Cangse Sanren and Wei Changze have to say about it,” Wen Ruohan allowed. But only because he thought that it was something they would very much like, and he’d been completely out of ideas on what he could get a couple as notoriously disinterested in material goods as a courting gift – he hated not being capable, that’s all it was. There was no other reason than that! “We’ll see.”

“Did I agree to this?” Lan Qiren asked, frowning. “When did I agree to this –”

“You can’t say no,” Wen Ruohan said. “I’ll set Cangse Sanren on you if you do.”

“…I see that I’ve agreed to this.”

Lao Nie laughed, Lan Qiren sighed, and Wen Ruohan…

Wen Ruohan resigned himself to keeping Cangse Sanren and Wei Changze around a little longer.

Just a little.

#mdzs #wen ruohan #lan qiren #sect leader nie #cangse sanren #wei changze #my fic #my fics #posting a few of these today to finish clearing out this one word doc

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loveackermannn · 1 year

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I PROMISE. –.ೃ࿐ 𝐥𝐞𝐯𝐢 𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐫𝐦𝐚𝐧.

➺ 𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲; 𝐚𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐟𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐨𝐟 𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐠𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐚, 𝐥𝐞𝐯𝐢 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐧 𝐭𝐨 𝐞𝐬𝐜𝐚𝐩𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐦𝐭𝐡 𝐨𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐞 – 𝐚 𝐬𝐢𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐮𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐥𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡 𝐨𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐫.

➺ !! 𝐬𝐩𝐨𝐢𝐥𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐚𝐨𝐭 𝐬𝟑 !! 𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐟; 𝐛𝐥𝐨𝐨𝐝, 𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐬𝐭 & 𝐝𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐡.

➺ 𝐚/𝐧; 𝐢𝐭'𝐬 𝐛𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐚 𝐰𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐞 𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐢 𝐰𝐫𝐨𝐭𝐞 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐨𝐫𝐞 𝐝𝐞𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐥𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐧 𝐦𝐲 𝐮𝐬𝐮𝐚𝐥. 𝐢 𝐡𝐨𝐩𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐨𝐤𝐚𝐲 < 𝟑

Upon the fall of Shiganshina, ashes over ashes and the bitter blood that splattered everywhere – the air was ultimately consumed by loss and denial. Such a disaster blanketed the miles of land that was once known to be livened by the citizens that inhabited it, only for it to be reduced to nothing.

It left a sour taste in your mouth as you sat beside the man who hadn't said a word since the final blow of the beast titan. Exchanging mild glances to your peripheral, you could tell just by his demeanor that he had experienced something just as worse as seeing his own mother and comrades die – He had lost a part of himself.

Levi who was referred to as Humanity's Strongest only to be rejected by his own emotions by nightfall. Captain is what they called him, but you knew him as Levi. Even as he sat in complete, unmoving silence, you still saw him as your Levi. His eyes were devoid of anything remotely alive and you couldn't fathom what must've been going through his head. He was almost doll-like despite the dirt and dried blood that scattered across his uniform and even in his tangled hair. You could still make out the paleness of his skin underneath all of the muck along with the scars that littered his face. His lips were parted, a bit dried and you could hear the faint intakes of breath that would pass through his nose and out through his mouth.

As you directed your eyes downward to his hands resting in his lap, they were calloused and rough – more than usual anyway. His knuckles were stained with the same blood of his dying comrades as he carried them away to the wagons, the same blood of the damned beast titan he swore to finish off for good one day, and the same blood of his dying commander.

He felt absolutely numbed to his core, destroyed from the inside out and he felt as thought he was suffocating. His breathing had suddenly stopped their regular patterns of inhaling and exhaling to now what seemed like he was holding it in.

The moment you noticed, you immediately cupped his hand into yours as he jerked back at the sudden contact of your skin against him. You finally met his eyes after hours since the battle had ceased and from what you could tell, he was about to break.

Tears dared to fall from his ducts, but he refused to let them – he rejected vulnerability, he couldn't possibly be this way in front of you.

"Get the fuck away from me."

"Levi, please. You're hurting, I know you are. Let me help you-"

Something in him snapped, though he didn't mean to. He didn't want this to happen.

"You can't fucking help me! No one can! I can't fucking do anything right, I let them all die and I- I-"

Warmth. He felt warm.

You wasted no time in pulling him against you with your arms secured around him in a comforting embrace. He made no move to push you away like he had done a few moments ago – instead, he welcomed it with every fiber of his being and soul. He welcomed it as if he needed it for such a long time. His arms idly stayed by his sides as he relished in how your scent lingered onto him the more you pressed yourself closer. He took note of how your disheaveled appearance very much ressembled his own – tainted and ruined.

But you were still so utterly beautiful.

For once in his lifetime since it had all gone bad, Levi had finally felt safe. He tucked his head into the crook of your neck, hiding away from the cruel reality of the world he lived in. He let himself fall limp in your arms as he gathered the courage to wrap his own around your body. He could stay here forever if he wanted to – in all honesty, it was one of many dreams he had. To live somewhere far, far away with the existence of you in his future. He's envisioned it before, without your knowledge of course. But for as long as this hellish nightmare had to last in this universe, he needed to wait.

In every universe he'll wait for you.

And so, being in the safety of your arms was all that would be enough for him.

Internally, he cursed himself for being too harsh in response to your physical gesture and it was in moments of vulnerability that he had so wished he could accept it more openly.

I'm sorry... I'm so sorry...

"It's okay Levi."

You were too good for him he thinks, you deserve the world, everything and anything the universe could offer – he would move mountains for you and pull the sky down to give you the stars.

Levi pulled away momentarily and cupped his palms against the sides of your face. This was the most intimate he's ever been with practically anyone and it made his heart flutter to be within this close of proximity with you.

He finally spoke softly, breath grazing your face, "Please live for me Y/n and I will do the same. I cannot imagine losing you. I can't. So please, stay alive." Levi sounded as if he was pleading, begging, for you not to disappear. His fingers tensed on your cheeks and as you came to an understanding, your own fingers laced between his own. It was your gentle reminder that you weren't going anywhere.

"I promise, Levi."

#chaloveslevi #shitrambles #levi ackerman #captain levi #levi heichou #attack on titan #shingeki no kyojin #levi scenarios #levi x y/n #levi ackerman x reader #levi x reader #shingeki no kyoujin levi #levi ackerman imagine #levi comfort #aot #snk #angst w comfort TT

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checkoutmybookshelf · 5 months

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From Criminial Mastermind to Fairy Tale Hero: The End of Artemis Fowl

Here we are, everyone: The final Artemis Fowl book. It has been a journey revisiting the first series I was old enough to follow and fandom, and it's wild to me that we're finally at the end. Especially since I picked up the first Artemis Fowl book in late elementary school (I'm genuinely not sure when though, because the first book came out in April of 2001, when I was in fifth grade and it's very possible I didn't pick the book up until sixth grade, which would have put me at 11, same age as Artemis in that first book) and the final book came out in 2012, when I was in my junior year of undergrad. So at that point, Artemis, Holly, and Butler had been part of my life for a long time. And now here we are, to say goodbye to them again after this leisurely re-listen/read. Let's talk Artemis Fowl: The Last Guardian.

Artemis grew and changed so much across eight books, which makes sense because holy cow do kids change a LOT between 11 and 15. We get so busy living life in those years that we don't really think about how much we truly learn and grown between prepubescence and full-on teenagerhood, but that is a time of massive change, and I think that more than anything else really justifies how Artemis goes from a chillingly vampiric child to a teenager with enough compassion and empathy to understand that sometimes the right choice is a heroic self-sacrifice for the people that your people (both humans and the people, in this case) love. Artemis also did a really interesting version of that thing so many teenagers do where they hit a point where they can't just phone in their abilities anymore and have to actually put effort in, but for Artemis it was emotional rather than intelligence. And yet even when making said heroic sacrifice, we have the absolutely beautiful callback to the end of book one, where Artemis drugs his mother, Butler, and Juliet to keep them from being harmed by the bio-bomb. To stop Holly from preventing him from stopping Opal, Artemis sedates her. The more things change, the more they stay the same...

Except where best villain ever Opal Koboi is concerned. By this book, Opal is so disconnected from reality that she is willing to risk literally going nuclear to escape captivity, and then just...casually sparks off the apocalypse because if there is one thing our girl wants, it's to be Empress of the World, and if that means using spirit zombies and an ancient fairy doomsday device, then I guess it's a good thing she's already versed in black magic. Or something. Opal is fully and completely off the rails at this point, and if you catch yourself referring to yourself as "Mommy" in reference to the spirits of several scores of ancient elven berserkers who would--barring a geas--murder you for it, you might want to stop and take a long, hard look at your life choices. And maybe don't forget that you've cloned yourself, because that's the kind of little detail that can completely ruin your chances of being Empress of the World.

Holly quite possibly deserves every medal that exists for managing to drag Artemis's extremely out-of-shape butt through increasingly dangerous and high-stakes missions while navigating fairy politics and *checks notes* breaking up with her commanding officer after a disastrous date where they both got kicked out of a crunchball match. (And once again...HOW DARE Colfer leave this in exposition and not show us this amazing disaster of a date!?!?) Holly has also just been through the emotional wringer with Artemis and every time he decided to double-cross or lie by omission to bring off a plan and every time he does something infuriatingly human that drives up her blood pressure and yet makes the mission succeed. And then she has to sit there and watch him die to save humans and fairies. Seriously, the fact that Holly Short is a functional being rather than a hot mess is nothing short of a miracle.

And then we come to Butler. Long-suffering, super fucking over it, broken-hearted Domovoi Butler. Artemis got DAMN lucky that the whole "put my spirit in a clone of me" plan panned out, because if it hadn't, Holly was entirely correct: Butler would never have recovered. Butler and Opal might be my two favorite characters in the entire series at this point. That's not where I started--for a very long time, Holly was my favorite character, and Commander Root still gets an honorable mention--but as a grown-ass adult (I'm not doing that math for you, if you want to know that I'm old, you do the math), I cannot escape how dedicated, competent, kind, and just AWESOME Butler is. I feel like the vibe here is very similar to the thing that happens when you watch Sound of Music as a kid and either Maria or one of the kids is your favorite character, but when you come back to it as an adult, Captain Von Trapp is EVERYTHING (RIP Christopher Plummer, we loved you). Butler has a similar vibe but in a different genre.

So, I was an adult and had enough experience of watching fandoms to see the mixed reactions to this book being released. People were sad the series was ending, people were disappointed because the series had seemingly drifted, and people loved it. My reaction was pretty mixed, because I had a lot going on, I knew there were good things here but I was also kind of missing the heisty, criminal mastermind vibes, but also OPAL KOBOI. So I was pretty unsure how to feel about this book when it came out, and then I didn't reread it for literal years because I went to grad school.

Returning to this book now, I have suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuch respect for how Colfer tied up the series and how he pulled off a new Irish mythological cycle, but updated for the twenty-first century. I have enough life on me to appreciate the changes Artemis goes through, and enough literature degrees to have a new and deeply fulfilling perspective on the series structure. Last Guardian is not my favorite book of the series--it's not even in the top three--but I think that what it does is genuinely impressive and I love how you can finish this book and go instantly back into the OG Artemis Fowl. The story does not, strictly speaking, have to end. And that is a vibe I can 100% get behind.

I deeply love the Artemis Fowl books, and I cannot recommend the series enough. They have so many strengths, are incredibly well-written, and they live rent-free in my head even now as an adult.

#artemis fowl #eoin colfer #artemis fowl the last guardian #artemis fowl and the last guardian #domovoi butler #holly short #opal koboi #children's literature #children's books #books and reading #books & libraries #books and novels #books #book recommendations #middle grade sci fi #middle grade books #middle grade fantasy #middle grade fiction

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plenilune · 4 months

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what a weird year it's been! this time last year I remember being so high on not wanting to die for the first time in years that I was ecstatic to greet 2023 and find out what I could do in it -- I don't feel that way this year, buffetted about by circumstance and my stupid human body and brain, but I don't feel defeated. I feel like I made a good first pass at a piece of work and now I'm going to take a hack at another draft. I made some good ground. not all the ground I was hoping to make, but a lot I wasn't expecting. I feel good about my ability to keep building a life and a self I can be more and more joyful to occupy.

I tried a lot of new things and some of them didn't work but most of them did. I said yes to a lot of weird shit. I had so many experiences this year. I'm glad I spent a night dancing and smoking on the fire escape outside a masonic lodge and being absolutely drenched in rain. I'm glad Corey and I went on a gorgeous queer group ride with a bunch of other queer cyclists through the streets of our favourite parts of northern Kentucky and then bicycled back home together. I'm glad I had a not-quite-one-night stand and bused home as the sun rose golden and alive and lovely. I'm glad I re-learned the importance of dancing at clubs until I can barely move. I'm glad I saw Oldboy in the cinema and was so adrenalised that I jumped up and down on the sidewalk and screamed waiting for my bus home. I started painting back patches and sewing things onto my clothing and making jewellery and collaging and cropping all my tshirts and sweaters.

I started writing again .god, I started writing again.

and I broke my phone, my glasses, and my computer and struggled financially and took a nightmarish disaster trip to Philadelphia for my grandmother's funeral and I lost access to meds for reasons that were completely my own fault and thus sunk into a mire of depression and fatigue for several months that could have been completely avoided. I struggled to connect to people and struggled to feed myself and been a goddamn wreck. I didn't really accomplish most of the things I thought I was going to, that I started with eagerness and energy at the beginning of the year.

but hell. I built some shit. now I can keep building on top of it. I feel like a completely different person sometimes now, with different possibilities. I fucked up and lost and careened into walls of bad luck over and over this year but I feel better for and about it than I have in a long time. okay, that's new muscles. okay okay okay. new page, new draft, we can go again.

anyway. this year I want to push forward more deliberately on some of the stuff I found out I could do this year -- obviously I am continuing to work on my goddamn space heist book, but also specifically pursue block printing, drag/burlesque, bass, and making zines in 2024 instead of just experimenting with them. bicycle more, cook more, invest in people more, Not Go Off My Meds At Any Point, play more video games, watch more films. (I watched over sixty this year! after barely watching films for so long I didn't know what my own taste was any more, and feeling the shame and confusion of having once been a kid who wanted to go to film school but didn't know what movies they liked any more.)

anyway. here's to all of you who have kept me alive and interested in the world this year. my beloved partner is making arriabbiata and playing jazz in the next room. I have to work first thing tomorrow but tonight I'm going to finish the first season of Better Call Saul and poke at my novel and the day after tomorrow I'm going to have tea and listen to music and sew patches onto my jacket and best flannel. I'm going to keep finding new things to be alive for. I'm going to create a self I want to live inside. I'm excited to know what things are going to happen to me in 2024. I'm excited to learn about new ways to feel joy.

goodnight, 2023. you were a mess and I loved you more often than I didn't.

#the diary #the new year

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crowleyscleaninglady · 7 months

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GO Fanfiction list

This contains part 1 and 2 of my list of recommendations. There are 12 on here now. Some are about 9000 words and others are almost 250,000, and I have read every single word. Three of my favorites are Stitch me up, Slow show, and Or Be Nice

******Stitch Me Up (medical au)*****

If you read any of the fics from this list this is the one. I was literally distracted at work last week because I was thinking about it. There is angst, fluff, spice (like really spicy), comfort, ughhhhh it has it all.

This is the fic that started my medical field au binge.

Link to fic: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23157691

Pretend for Me (fake dating)

Fake dating in order to trick the Archangels. This one is so beautiful and the ending makes me tear up (happy tears) every time

Link to fic: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20535329

Their tumblr: @obsessivelollipoplalala

In Plain Sight (fake dating)

This is the companion piece to Pretend for Me. I 100% this should be read after the first one, it makes it feel so much more complete

Link to fic: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21741256

Tumblr: @obsessivelollipoplalala

*******Slow Show (tv show costars)*****

They are co-stars on a TV show. The backstories on this one are so beautiful. I forgot this was a fanfiction at multiple points and thought it was a work in and of itself.

10/10 I will recommend this to anyone who will listen

Link to fic: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20395261

Tumblr: @mia-ugly

Give me a title, I’ll give you my heart (single dad)

Aziraphale is a single dad to an adorable and mischievous Adam, Crowley just moved into the neighborhood. This had me kicking my feet and giggling.

Link to fic: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21160262

Tumblr: @nohaijiachi

Ink Blots and Forget-Me-Nots (tattoo and flower shop)

Literally all of the best tropes in one well written fic. Tattoo shop and flower shop. Friends to lovers to enemies to lovers

Link to fic: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19455634

The Crime Boys AU (mafia bosses)

This was so dark and beautiful. If you like dark themes and dark romance these are the fics for you!! Make sure to read the tags on this one, but it’s so so good.

I read Dark Angels, Golden Serpents first and then Dark Angels, Darker Serpents. It can be read either way.

Link to fic: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1924780

START OF PART 2

******Or Be Nice (musician and bookseller) ******

Author description:

Crowley and Aziraphale are neighbours. And...it does not go at all well, until it does.

A human AU in which Aziraphale is a bookseller, Crowley is a drummer, and they are both petty disasters in the worst/best way.

My thoughts: If you read anything on this list make sure it is this one. This fic had me up until 4:45 in the morning because I could not put it down. The characterization here is absolutely perfect. I was giggling and kicking my feet at it. Also there are in text images that push this fic over the edge to be one of my all time favorites.

Tumblr: @charlottemadison42

Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28427940/chapters/69660750

In Knowing, In Silence (they are angels)

Author description: After being punished in Heaven for being in love as angels, Aziraphale and Crowley spend the next 6,000 pretending their relationship never happened.

My thoughts: The naivety of both characters is beautiful. They are just both full of so much love and don’t know how to deal with anything. It is cute and fluffy and then it kinda rips your heart out in the best way possible. It is one of the fics that make you feel something when you read it.

Tumblr: @obsessivelollipoplalala

Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/50313406/chapters/127105990

Epiclesis (Aziraphale can hear Crowley’s prayers)

Author description: Prompt: Angels can hear it when you pray to them. Crowley has been praying for 6000 years.

My thoughts: A very beautiful representation of the idiots to lovers tag. I want to give both boys a hug and also tell them how stupid they are. I can 100% see this fic happening and I really enjoyed it.

Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27836200/chapters/68148130

What Angels Want (Crowley can hear Aziraphale’s thoughts)

Author description: Set post-s1. Aziraphale finds a "communication spell" in one of the books in his shop. He decides to try a modified version of it in hopes of finding out if Crowley feels the same way about him. Nothing seems to happen, and Aziraphale assumes the spell is a dud.

Unfortunately, Aziraphale is bad at magic and through the kind of silly logic only fan-fiction can provide, it turns out Crowley can now read all of Aziraphale's thoughts about his favorite demon!

Join these two silly heads in a silly mini-adventure featuring some very un-angelic thoughts and one very scandalized Demon. Please do not take this seriously, this is just for fun and not representative of how I view the canon characters!

My thoughts: If you like dirty talk then this is the fic for you!!! This fic was a lot of fun to read. It gets very dirty but I absolutely loved it.

Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/47184475/chapters/118884859

#i sacrificed a lot of sleep for this #good omens fanfiction #good omens fanfic #good omens fanfic rec #good omens human au #good omens ao3 #ao3 recs #good omens makes me emotional #ineffable husbands #ineffable idiots #aziracrow #crowley x aziraphale

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chvoswxtch · 8 months

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I feel like Foggy doesn't get enough love. I would like to request a vault track from Speak Now for him, please!

you know what, you're absolutely right. foggy nelson doesn't get enough love and i'm tired of y'all acting like he's not a babe so let's get into it

as a reminder, from the vault means it's spicy! (minors dni)

headcannon below the cut

innocent (foggy's version) (from the vault)*

he is anything BUT

now don't get me wrong, foggy definitely strikes me as the hopeless romantic type

I can see him enjoying some sweet, slow, passionate love making- wanting to make sure his partner feels loved and desired, that they feel every ounce of pleasure he can possibly offer (he's definitely a giver), and he always puts his partner's needs before his own

I see him being more of the submissive type in a typical setting

but do not let that sweet smile fool you

bc underneath that physical embodiment of sunshine in human form is a FREAK

alexa play freak nasty by megan thee stallion

now, while foggy is usually all sweet smiles and friendly behavior, he can get aggressive and be dominant if need be

exhibit a: beating the shit out of those guys with a bat to protect karen in s1

exhibit b: calling reyes' bluff in the precinct in s2 (basically all of s2 foggy, mans was done with everyone's shit)

exhibit c: running for district attorney in s3, publicly calling out tower and fisk despite the negative consequences, standing in bullseye's way just to protect karen even though he had no weapon or way out (he's been hanging around matty too long) and just all around being a bad bitch the whole time (he had big dick energy all season)

honorable mention: that haircut in s3, you can't tell me that man doesn't fuck

exhibit d: (pun intended) dicking marci down after the bulletin incident right there on the couch leaving her at a loss for words (i'm pretty sure she just says "wow")

it seems like when he gets pushed too hard, or when he's completely done with everyone's shit, he basically snaps and stops playing nice

I personally find this hot and I think his partner would too and would absolutely volunteer to let foggy take out his frustration on them

maybe he's having a bad day, his current case is a shitshow, matt is being a human disaster like usual, karen is out doing something that's sure to spike his blood pressure, and the only relief he can find is fucking you over his desk hard (we're talking the desk gets moved to the other side of the room, hard)

but it's not all stress related fucking

foggy is extremely playful and flirty, and I think that translates into the bedroom, or wherever the two of you find yourselves (again, I see him as normally submissive, so if you tell him to do something, he's gonna do it)

maybe you get really excited watching him win a case in the courtroom, and you decide he deserves a little reward for working so hard lately, so you shove him into an empty supply closet and blow him right there in the court house. but foggy, being the man he is, insists on returning the favor, leaving matt to rush out of that court house in horror

and don't even get me started on drunk foggy

he's definitely gotten a little handsy and fucked you in the bathroom at josie's, or out in the alley against the wall, bc neither one of you could wait until you got home

in conclusion your honor, this man fucks, I rest my case

#court's 3k followers celebration #court's 3k friends celebration #the eras tour (court's version)#foggy nelson #foggy nelson x you #foggy nelson x reader #foggy nelson headcannon #foggy nelson request #foggy nelson smut

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sayakxmi · 10 months

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One of the ways I like to imagine post-"canon" DirkJake is the dynamic, where it's actually Jake who is more responsible and down-to-Earth(sea) rather than Dirk. Partly because I find it pretty funny, and partly because I feel like it'd really work for them.

On the one side there's Dirk, who's a classic Derse mess, but always obsesses over being in absolute control of everything, on the other is Jake, who badly wants to be more chaotic, but he's actually pretty collected deep down.

They end up actually creating an atmosphere where Dirk doesn't feel the need to always be at the top of his game, he can let himself be a bit more of a human disaster that he is, knowing Jake can take it. Jake on the other hand can consciously allow himself to be the one more responsible, and to have the control he's used to being constantly deprived of.

But it's not that they do a complete one-eighty, just between each other they lean a bit into one direction rather than the other, and get to enjoy the things they've wanted coming from the person they love, who's also much better at installing it - Jake enjoys Dirk's chaos, call it a little adventure every other day, one that he knows won't harm them in the long run, and can actually be used as a funny anecdote later on, whereas Dirk enjoys the structure Jake creates in their lives, as well as not having to handle all the serious things himself. They manage to balance each other out.

EDIT: by post-"canon" I mean "Canon to my own personal AU that I might or might not be working on (I am), because the real canon disappointed me far too much to deserve my support, and when that happens I just start working on a rewrite". That's why it had quotation marks! Sorry for not clarifying that earlier!

#dirk strider #dirkjake #jake english #hs: pfh #hs: pfh earthsea #homestuck #jake learns how to take care of others while dirks learns how to be the one who others take care of

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destinygoldenstar · 2 months

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Human Pomni Was Evil? (TADC Theory)

Keep in mind this is a theory and is absolutely open to be totally wrong.

We know the Digital Circus characters, minus Caine, we’re once human and not from here.

And there might be a good chance the new characters shown in the recent trailer are also A.I. The reason I make this assumption is because some of them are similar in style and theming whereas the tent crew is unique from each other. And Jax asked Caine in the episode if Pomni was one of his NPCs.

Why would he ask that if every NPC looked the same and were all the mannequins? If that was the case he’d instantly recognize Pomni was a new character. But no. He had to ask the question.

Does that mean these new characters are one off? Probably not. I do think they’re gonna be important. But this might be the aspect that separates them from our main six.

But that’s not what I’m here to talk about and suggest an idea of.

What kind of people were these characters before the circus?

They have no memories. For we all know, they could’ve been completely different people in the real world than we see them as in the circus.

The sweet motherly Ragatha could’ve been a wicked stepmother or something.

The bully Jax could’ve been the victim of bullying in the real world.

The erratic and fragile Kinger could’ve been a mindful therapist.

The shy, anxious Pomni who seems all innocent and naive in the circus could’ve been a truly malicious evil being or a full on criminal.

Especially that last one is an interesting idea that came in my mind.

One of my biggest theories so far is that Pomni’s human self worked at C&A. Makes sense right? A lot of people have said this. She pauses at a desk as though she recognizes it and has a mental break as a reaction to it.

Just because you don’t remember anything consciously doesn’t mean your subconscious loses that memory entirely, especially if it sees something triggering.

But did she help make the game? Honestly, idk. She could very well not have.

Either way, what if C&A itself is a very shady company?

The ringmaster of the game, the main AI, is Caine.

What if this AI is a self insert by the game developer?

Here’s what I think happened, in my theory mind:

The real Caine, not the AI but the creator that made Caine as a self insert, tried to design the Digital Circus in the 1990s (the tech’s quality in the office) as a revolutionary innovation in gaming. So some employees back then became test subjects for it. One of them being Kinger. Cause he was here the longest according to the show. (So they didn’t all show up at once)

But it went horribly wrong, the test subjects are lost in the game forever, and the creator is wanted and charged for the losses.

But he got away and continued his operation, illegally distributing the game to anyone naive enough to not know what scams are. Thus making him a full on criminal with other criminals as his employees developing the game to perfect it. To make it the perfect escape from reality.

Also explains why their tech would have never been updated.

Fast forward to this keep going on till 2023. Which means we could safely assume human Pomni wasn’t even born yet when the disaster happened.

If she was an employee, she was also one of these shady people who knew exactly the harm they were doing, but did it anyway because selfish money and profit.

Especially if, say, Pomni was raised into this criminal setting her entire life.

Maybe she’s the creator’s daughter who had too much to drink with a co-worker one night. Idk.

That would probably be an interesting explanation for why Caine is often going to her for advertising purposes. (Other than her being the MC) Obviously Caine isn’t Pomni’s dad. But Caine being the AI self insert of the dad of human Pomni. Would make him a more familial figure.

Especially since I don’t think Caine himself is evil. He’s just being an AI and doing his job and trying to ensure the safety of the residents of the circus.

Human Pomni could’ve been born and raised into the shady life and became an employee when she was old enough and had the training. Making her be a helper on the circus.

“Well that doesn’t mean human Pomni was evil. She could’ve been different.”

I Doubt it. When you’re born in a life, you’re heavily influenced by that life. If you were born and raised in an evil nation, you will likely have the mindset of that evil nation because that’s how you were nurtured to see the world. You wouldn’t know anything else.

Plus that mental break Pomni had.

This could very well be the real Pomni slipping through.

She isn’t this shy sweet bean. She’s actually an evil maniac.

But how did she end up in the game if she knew what it did?

There’s multiple ways.

As punishment for doing something wrong in the company.

It was a sudoku-cide to get out of the real world.

She wanted to fix the mistakes the company made for some reason.

But does that mean her digital self has to be evil too? From the story this is based on ‘I have no mouth and I must scream’. Probably not. Maybe she’s actually the savior like Jesus or something. Idk.

I expect this theory to be completely wrong and contradicted when Episode 2 comes out.

#digital circus #the amazing digital circus #amazing digital circus #tadc pomni #tadc caine #tadc theory #tadc jax #tadc ragatha #tadc kinger

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katy-89 · 9 months

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I loved Cersei in the show, but damn, Cersei in the books is….HOLY SHIT.

She's insane! Basically, in the books:

-The relationship between Jaime and Cersei is completely one sided. Her affair with her brother is simply an extension of her narcissism. Cersei is Jaimes worst trait.

-She blames her washerwomen for “shrinking her dresses” because she refuses to admit she’s gaining weight 😭

-She thinks that Tyrion is hiding in the walls, after he killed Tywin 😭

-When she was trying to seduce NED of all people i was like "no way!" i wasn't expecting it. It was just a power move, yeah, but girl….it's NED LOL

-Her obsession with Rhaegar Targaryen OMG i had no idea! She said he's more beautiful than Jaime :O The mourning dress that Cersei is wearing when they summon Sansa to write the letters is all black with red rubies on it . . . just like the armor that Rhaegar was wearing when Robert killed him IMAO she was cosplaying as Rhaegar. I'm surprised me how much Cersei thinks about him 17 years after his death, she looked like….a normal person.

-Alienating competent people who would have been loyal, like Kevan and Jaime, and instead surrounding herself with fresh faces of dubious loyalty like Aurane Waters, the Merryweathers and Qyburn.

-Alienating the Tyrells who are literally her only ally, feeding the entire city, and saved her ass from Stannis. She's actively planning their entire downfall DAMN

-Using the money the crown owes to build a fleet for the bastard from a rebel house who vaguely resembles Rhaegar. Aurane Waters LEAVES with the fleet under her nose 😭 How did Rhaegar make HER that delusional? 😭

-Making an enemy of the Iron Bank NO WAY

-Overturning the prohibition on the Faith Militant, thus allowing a fanatically true believer she was always going to be on the wrong side of an army.

-In addition to the Iron Bank and rearming the Faith, she was setting up Tommen for disaster by never letting him practice, like, being a king. And not even for the right reasons! It would be one thing if Cersei just wanted Tommen to be a kid or whatever, that would be a sympathetic reason (although still short-sighted), but she just can’t bring herself to do anything that might mean sharing her power.

..........

She's so different than show!Cersei omg

I AM the biggest fan of Cersei. She is the most entertaining villain in the series. It's internalized abuse that you can sympathize with, which humanizes her, but also her very own vanity and greed and paranoia, so you can revel in her failures. It's absolutely phenomenal.

One of her most savage moments is when she "consoled" Margaery by saying she'll make sure Loras gets the greatest monument when he "dies" 🤣

HAIL THE MOTHER LIONESS 🦁

#asoiaf #cersei lannister #game of thrones #jaime lannister #rhaegar targaryen #house lannister #house tyrell #got #tyrion lannister

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just-some-common-bitch · 2 years

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I just want to add something to the Try Guys conversation we’ve all been collectively having for well over a month now. I’ve seen these points iterated several times but I am your local Loud Greek™️ and will be sharing my opinion.

for those of you who haven’t seen the SNL Try Guys sketch, don’t bother wasting your brain cells on it. it’s truly awful. every part of it was horrible. condensed into a few sentences, they greatly exaggerate the reactions of Eugene, Zach, and Keith, and greatly downplay Ned’s affair. I’ll get more into detail further down the post. look for this emoji: 🖕🏻

now, Ned has a direct connection to the SNL writer’s room. he went to Yale alongside and is admittedly friends with Will Stephen, who wrote/helped write that insanely tone-deaf Try Guys sketch. (proof in this tiktok here). he allegedly has up to three friends in the SNL writer’s room, but I was unable to find any sort of solid proof of the other two.

there are two possible scenarios behind this incredible play by SNL. 1. Ned contacted Will and threw a tanty about how he’s the victim and he’s being treated so unfairly and Will agreed and pitched/wrote the sketch 2. Ned did not contact Will but Will on his own thinks/thought that Ned is the victim and was being treated unfairly so he pitched/wrote the sketch - in both of these scenarios, Saturday Night Lame decides that, since the Try Guys news has turned the entire internet upside down, the sketch needs to air in order to get some of that sweet Gen Z attention. which is the single funny thing about this, since the only reactions I’ve seen (save a handful of fuckheads) have been every flavour of pissed about this. either way this sketch came to life, it looks really bad for Ned and hurts literally everyone involved way more.

🖕🏻 alrighty! time to deep dive into the absolute fuckery of this sketch. trigger warning (tw) for infidelity, homophobia, and trauma. - they turn Ned’s full-blown affair - let’s not forget, he called it a relationship and the guys confirmed it had been occurring for a while - into a single kiss. they verbatim call it a ‘consensual kiss’. this is not only a blatant lie on SNL’s part, but it completely eradicates the inherently problematic nature of Ned sleeping with a subordinate for several months. even if we take Ariel and Will (Alex’s ex-fiancé) out of it, sleeping with an employee is quite literally illegal. - the other guys dropped Ned because he did something very illegal with his power as a boss. they also admit that he was dropped because of his betrayal to their brand and image and trust as friends, but they had no choice but to remove him from the company because of his misconduct. he was not let go because he cheated on his wife. he was let go because he caused a giant HR and legal mess in their company and 2nd Try LLC would have been in big trouble had they kept him on. SNL jokes that Ned only kissed his subordinate and didn’t tell his friends and how heinous and awful and sdfajklgrjfsdb and that’s why he was fired which is. A COMPLETE FUCKING LIE. - SNL make a joke out of the fact that the guys call it trauma. the audience laughs every time the Zach character says the word trauma. how completely devoid of human decency do you have to be to find humour in the life-altering fuckshit these men went through? yes, it’s not the kind of trauma that victims of abuse or SA or natural disasters go through, but they had their trust violated and had to cut off a dear friend of theirs. the entire world has been talking about this since it dropped. that kind of attention is fun for nobody. let’s not forget, Zach, Keith, and Eugene are in charge of an entire company in the middle of all of this. they had to remove one of their best friends, a co-creator, from their staff, and figure out a way to buy him out in order to keep their company (their LIFE’S WORK) afloat through all of this. the stress of that alone is enough to cause trauma. dealing with HR and lawyers and keeping the internet’s information pool in check atop all that must have been torture. THAT is trauma, point blank period. - SNL has a history of sexual misconduct allegations that have not been handled. I’d link articles, but there are literally too many to sort through. just google ‘SNL sexual misconduct’ and you’ll find some. the fact that SNL’s history matches up better with their sketch of Ned’s out of control penis than Ned’s actual out of control penis is very telling and very gross. - they make an INSANE caricature of Eugene Lee Yang. for those of you who don’t know, Eugene Lee Yang is a Korean-American actor and filmmaker and one of the 4 original Try Guys and owners/co-creators of 2nd Try LLC. he is also openly gay. in the sketch, Eugene is played by Bowen Yang, who is also an openly gay Asian actor. however, Bowen’s take is... not great. he really plays up the true, genuine anger and pain and exhaustion on Eugene’s face in the original video and turns this Eugene character into the hostile, angry, aggressive POC character. not only that, but they give ‘Eugene’ a very stereotypical gay accent. it’s very harmful and very problematic, considering neither of the white guys are made fun of in nearly the same way at all. - the sketch makes NO mention of Ariel (Ned’s wife) or Will (Alex’s ex-fiance). they also keep referring to Alex as a Food Baby, and not Ned’s employee. if you are unfamiliar with the Try Guys and viewed this sketch, you would be inclined to believe that SNL was not exaggerating that much and you’d assume both Ned and Alex are/were single during their affair and that Alex was not Ned’s subordinate. this is extremely disrespectful to the victim most hurt by all of this, Ariel and Will. AND! Ned has two fucking children with Ariel. for the sake of rubbing salt in the wound for a failed funny haha, Ned’s entire family has been erased. I cannot even express to you how angry that makes me. poor Ariel and Will have done absolutely nothing wrong and are being punished over and over and over again.

Ned Fulmer is a piece of garbage human and whoever greenlit that SNL sketch is too. justice for Ariel, Will, and everyone at 2nd Try LLC.

I hope I got everything I needed to say with this. I’ll reblog this and add more if new information comes out or I come up with more opinion blurbs.

#ned fulmer #SNL #snl try guys #try guys #try guys ned #ned fulmer is a cheater

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