#may 2020 be kind and bountiful to us all
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Hey, That's-
Originally Uploaded on DeviantArt as WinxPossible on May 12, 2019
Re-Uploaded on Wysp as ThatTallCherryTree on April 26, 2020
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Original Description:
"-us..."
"With mom."
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You know, with all the gorgeous fan art one can find when they look about Sonic Underground, I don't remember seeing many pictures of the family together. We had only one actual picture in canon and some kind of mural in Mobodoon and that's it.
And from the fandom side of things, I can only recall instantly atop of my head two of such nature: one with the triplets as babies and their father still alive and well and one after they reunited with their mother.
But for all the angst potential, nobody even considered making a pic where Sonic, Sonia and Manic find a painting of them as babies with Aleena, before the Coup and the bounty placed on their heads. Making them think of a life they could've had if a certain someone didn't decide to become a tyrant. A shame, really. I would love to see what people come up with.
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No comment.
#Sonic Fandom#Sonic Underground#Sonic the Hedgehog#Sonia the Hedgehog#Manic the Hedgehog#Queen Aleena#Spiders Scribbles#Spiders Art
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Thoughts and doubts about giving WoT another shot
So I dropped the game in 2017 or 2018 when I got fed up by the new 3/5/7 and 5/10 matchmaker. From old screenshots I can see I returned to the game for a very brief period in may 2020, but I seemingly didn’t catch on. It’s now been 3 years it’s starting to scratch an itch.
Some weeks ago I noticed on YT QB’s video about WG killing the future of WoT with the upcoming patch. I started tuning in on his streams, watched the game, started missing it, and then came news that WG is rolling back the P2W on the new patch. And now a few days ago Rex comes back to tumblr... almost like a sign.
But watching the game now I’m doubtful it’s in a good state -
*seemingly endless powercreep with tons and tons of new tanks and especially premium tanks that are ever more powerful and better armored, in QB’s streams I see so much gold spam from everyone.
*confusopoly, but maybe only for me. All kind of tokens and coins and drops and rewards, and of course, a battle pass.
*multiple levels of equipment with bounty and improved and bounty improved or something. Those require bonds, that only the better players can reliably earn, just making the better players stronger. Or maybe something’s changed and I’m wrong about this.
On the other hand I think I see some improvements -
*more used to be mods now vanilla.
*2 equipment builds that you can switch before the start of the battle. And field mods.
*seems like these days there are lots of x5 exp and rewards, making it seem to me like it’s a lot easier to grind exp.
Today I stumbled upon a page about an update to matchmaker where they made it far more likely to play same tier games, and a lot less likely to be bottom tier, allegedly. I don’t know if that change ever rolled out in an update, but if it did and works as described then it could be a good reason for me to return and stay.
@ironshoe-industries and @artyrambles, have you guys been active in the game these past few years? Could you give me some feedback if you have, has the game changed for the worst or for the better?
#wot#world of tanks#maybe someone else here active in the game could give feedback#if there is anyone alive under the tag
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ALL THAT’S FIT TO DJGITALLY SPIT
ENTRY00011 / JUNE 22, 2022 / DOLDRUMMER IN A BAND OF OUTSIDERS
We're in the thick of another summer slog. It's a never ending nothingness that I never warm to. It's rather gross. Even the artificial wave-like-Wurlitzer air of an average indoor office ice box is exhausting. If you know me well, bones are less brittle and fat is far more welcoming during the winter months of Kansas City. I rarely feel "just right," but I'm accustomed to acceleration of emptying the tank this time of year.
In addition to the season, we've been shoveling a lot of extra piles of emotion. This adds to the benefit of hiding out and hunching over even more, as well as feeding from a joyful bounty that a couple of three-month-young kittens bring. Nearly two months with the brothers and they are far more my keeper. As for the art, I'm still creating at the same clip, just in-between said scratches I'm perfecting some internal archival housekeeping and external online scrub-dubbing. It's a marathon process I'm trying to better digitize and document over the last few years as quickly deteriorating disc media reservoirs dump into oceanic hard-drives. I'm doing this before "the cloud" inevitably IV drip dries soft-drive spells straight to "the brain."
OK (Computer), you ask. What does this all mean? No clue. At least the stuff you can't see. I'm not on social media much, though it can be argued Tumblr fits in there, rather I'm enjoying my own curation and pace in a pick 'n' choose paint-by-number (emphasis on the numb) make and model. Of late I've added a new "ART SPACES" section to my core Tumblr site. After 20 years of many make spaces with little space in which to make, I thought it was a fun way to share my time spent in various bedrooms and basements. It's really nothing special and lacks vital ingredients to say much more than pinpoint a time and a place. I personally fill-in the rest. Or, perhaps it's a refresher for any visitors of the era. I'm omitting some, such as brief couch surfs, interim catch-alls, etc. There's simply just a date and photo for each main location / configuration, and maybe I'll get the want and guts to share more nuts and bolts and connectors as time passes. I love the challenge of making a space work (at least the what and the where of those I've worked in and worked with), as well as the actual work put into it. And let's not forget the work trickling out lends itself to each. The thread may be similar, but the inspiration, mileage and results can be surprising.
As mentioned in my previous update, online sharing has now spilled into utilizing the voice of Medium, and I kind of dig it on a personal scale of "medium-rare" use. I've recently flooded my page with favorite 2015 poetry releases, and working towards those I self-published in 2020. Not to mention a few other writing samples, tributes, etc. It's good to have a better umbrella for this stuff. As with all of my creative activity over the years, if others get something from it, then that's the cookie jar at Grandma's.
-djg (Photo: My current space in 2013 before completely filling it.)
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Putting the full text of the NYT article that the first tweet was responding to underneath the cut.
Link to the original tweet: https://twitter.com/speechleyish/status/1275990670663012352
Link to a couple of more serious threads about exactly why the biennial “Durian: the Freakshow Fruit” articles are so annoying:
https://twitter.com/amirulruslan/status/1276088736296472577
https://twitter.com/amirulruslan/status/1276313332492845056
Eating Thai Fruit Demands Serious Effort but Delivers Sublime Reward
Many delicious species in Thailand, “the Great Power nation of fruit,” require laborious peeling and careful chewing. Then there’s the sticky fingers and occasional disappointment.
By Hannah Beech
June 22, 2020
BANGKOK — All across Bangkok, fruit juice is dripping off chins, dribbling down arms and splashing onto the city’s sidewalks.
This is peak fruit season in Thailand, when the rising mercury concentrates the sugars in the tropical bounty that is native to Southeast Asia.
The region’s fruits are like no other. There is a fruit encased in prickly armor that smells of a deep, dank rot. There is a fruit that emits a sticky sap when peeled and another that stains fingernails mauve for those craving its succulent flesh.
And there is the rambutan, which means “hairy thing” in Malay. With its crimson skin studded with green feelers, the egg-sized fruit bears more than a passing resemblance to a coronavirus. It is yummy.
With pandemic travel bans in place, Thailand’s economic mainstay, tourism, has been battered. The country of 70 million has had to rely even more on exports of its agricultural products, and a national fruit lobby group predicts that overseas fruit shipments will increase by at least 10 percent this year, despite the coronavirus.
Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha has called Thailand “the Great Power nation of fruit.” Last year, the country ranked as the world’s sixth biggest fruit exporter.
But most of the fruit is exported to Thailand’s regional neighbors, with China its biggest customer. The prospects of expanding to large Western markets like the United States may be appealing, but face some daunting obstacles.
Less than 3 percent of Thailand’s fruit was exported to the United States. Distance is one problem, as are worries about fruit flies accompanying the imports. But the main reason for the low figure may be that Southeast Asia’s indigenous fruits have what Fuchsia Dunlop, a British author of Chinese cookbooks, calls a high “grapple factor.”
Many of the region’s fruits require serious commitment to eat: laborious peeling, careful chewing and the frequent spitting out of seeds to which meat stubbornly adheres.
To snack during office hours on a langsat, a demure cousin of a lychee with a peel that oozes a kind of natural super glue, is to submit to sticky fingers and sticky keyboards. Soap doesn’t help.
The meat is perfumed but each bite is fraught, lest teeth accidentally penetrate the bitter seeds. The langsat is worth it, but only just.
Unlike a banana’s easy extraction, dissecting a jackfruit is to hack through a jagged sheath, then painstakingly pluck out rubbery polyps that taste like overripe Juicy Fruit gum.
The process can consume an afternoon, and there are fruit vendors whose careers are dedicated to peeling jackfruit — a single specimen can weigh up to 120 pounds — and other complicated fruits.
At Talad Thai, Bangkok’s wholesale fruit market and the largest in Southeast Asia, there is an entire building dedicated to citrus and a gymnasium-sized section only for the mango, of which there are more than 200 varieties in Thailand.
The fruits at Talad Thai are often transported and peeled by migrants from neighboring Cambodia or Myanmar.
“I was so poor that I had to look for work in Thailand,” said Sing Dy, who was unloading a truck of fruit as sweat drenched her coronavirus face mask.
She hasn’t seen her children back in Cambodia for six months because of the pandemic travel ban, but she still sends most of her $20 a day salary back home.
Each year, regional newspapers relate various jackfruit-related deaths, mostly involving someone lingering under a tree with fruit looming above. In May, a man in southern India was injured by a falling jackfruit and required spinal surgery, only to discover at the hospital that he also had the coronavirus. (He recovered.)
In terms of showiness, the rambutan jousts with the dragon fruit, a neon pink mini-football covered in acid-green tendrils. To some, the experience of eating a dragon fruit, which grows on a cactus indigenous to South America, is a letdown after all that dazzling packaging: It’s a bland mush with tiny seeds that can require floss to dislodge.
Thais tend to approach milder fruit as a canvas for the fermented, spicy flavors that dominate the country’s cuisine. So guavas, rose apples and pomelos, the world’s largest citrus, are often served with a chili, salt and sugar dip to enliven the experience. Tart fruits, like green mangoes, are balanced with a sweet condiment that includes fish sauce, dried shrimp and shallots.
If someone’s fingernails are dyed purple at the tips, it likely betrays a preference for the mangosteen, a palm-sized orb that looks like an extra in a Super Mario Bros. video game. Beneath its woody rind are juicy segments that strike a Socratic equilibrium between sweet and sour.
Even a peach has nothing on a mangosteen when it is perfect, but the mangosteen is rarely perfect. Many are afflicted with a blight that tarnishes the white flesh an ugly mustard hue. Which fruit is blemished is unknowable before peeling, and so to eat a pile of mangosteens is an exercise in disappointment.
The salak is also called the snakeskin fruit because its casing is undeniably reptilian. Inside is a not-quite-crunchy flesh that, like so many of Southeast Asia’s native fruits, hovers between delectable and decayed. Some scientists have theorized the smell attracts rainforest primates, whose consumption and dispersal of the seeds helps the fruit take root for another generation.
The most infamous fruit, which stinks of death, is the durian. Buildings and taxis in Thailand have no-durian signs next to no-smoking signs.
The durian’s flavor elicits passionate, and polarizing, responses, with few indifferent about the fruit’s appeal or repulsiveness.
On the outside, the durian resembles a medieval torture device. Nestled inside the spiky shell are kidney-shaped lobes of custard. The flavor is somewhere between an off-peak Gorgonzola and a crème caramel, with a whiff of skunk.
Orangutans adore the durian. In Indonesia, where expanding palm oil plantations have destroyed the apes’ natural habitat, orangutans occasionally raid fruit orchards for sustenance. Farmers have responded by shooting them.
Even if the smell could be put aside — which is, frankly, impossible — the durian would still probably have the highest grapple factor among Southeast Asia’s endemic fruits. Thai exports of the fruit are mostly destined for China, where consumers tend to be more willing to work for their meals.
The durian’s greatest supporters hold out little hope that it will ever capture the United States market the way the kiwi charmed Americans in the 1970s, when marketers renamed the Chinese gooseberry after New Zealand’s national bird. It helps that the kiwi, with its fuzzy peel, is cute and easy to eat.
While some of Southeast Asia’s indigenous fruits are available in specialty markets in the United States, the flavors lack the vibrancy of those grown at home, aficionados insist.
Ubolwan Wongchotsathit is a second-generation fruit magnate, and she used to fly her durian as far away as Dubai and Melbourne before the pandemic forced her to use land and sea routes instead.
“Americans say they hate the smell of durian,” she said. “I don’t understand. It is sweet love.”
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Something of Your Own
Pairing: Din Djarin x reader
Words: 1.8k
Tags: Hurt Comfort, angst, happy ending
Summary: Din takes you in after your village is destroyed
AN: Originally posted on AO3 in November 2020
Sitting against the wall in the hull of the ship, you rolled the small silver ball over towards the kid. He catches it and gets distracted looking at his tiny reflection again. He chirped happily, probably overjoyed to have a playmate on this lonely ship, and tries to roll it back.
You had only been traveling with the Mandalorian and his foundling son for a few months. So far it wasn’t so bad. You had been taking care of children almost your whole life, and this child was surprisingly easy to care for. Entertain him for most of the day, feed him often, hold him while he falls asleep, and he’s a perfect angel. Your new traveling companion had made him sound like a little terror. You supposed that was because he couldn’t afford to give all of his attention to him. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it. Well, that and having nowhere else to go.
The Mandalorian had come to your village asking if anyone had heard of a people called The Jedi. No one in the village had. You had never seen a Mandalorian before either. He had asked if there were other villages nearby he could ask. You offered him a place to stay for the night, and set out for the neighboring villages in the morning. He was reluctant, but the child seemed so attached to you. Continually trying to climb your skits and touch your face. So he agreed.
He regretted that decision. The nights on your planet were long, and dark. And his that darkness a massive ship flew overhead, landing on the outskirts of the village. Armored soldiers poured out of ship, and began breaking into homes. Demanding to know where to find the Mandalorian and his charge.
The Mandalorian awoke to screams and sound of blaster fire coming from somewhere else in the village. His helmet went on and he leaped from the bed, plucking the sleeping child from the pram, and yanking open the door to the bedroom. Only to find you at the door about to knock.
“Help us!” You shouted. He thrust the child into your arms, and went back to put on the few pieces of armor he had removed to sleep.
Coming back out of the room, he grabbed your shoulders roughly “Take the child back to my ship, lock yourself in there and do not let anyone in” You were frozen in terror, clutching the baby to your chest. “Go!” He shouted
So you did. Out the back door, and behind the row of homes and businesses you had lived in your whole life. Blindly you ran for the ship. The sound of your friends and neighbors screams pounded in your head, how the baby was sleeping through this you could not fathom.
Finally reaching the ship you climbed in, and sealed the door. You sunk to the floor, exactly where you sat now, and you waited. Tears streaming down your face. You had no idea how long you sat there, if you fell asleep at any point. The ship’s hull was pitch black and soundless, save for the soft breathing of the baby and your muffled crying.
The sound of the being opened from the outside scared you. Jumping to your feet, and retreating further into the darkness hoping you wouldn’t run into anything. Dull orange light streamed into the hull, and you heard your name being called out. It was the Mandalorian.
You emerged from the darkness, tired puffy eyes looking at him expectantly. Suddenly you were more terrified than you had been the entire night. Your village. Your home. Your whole life. What had happened? What was left?
You advanced towards him. But he stopped you with a gentle hand. “I’m sorry” that was the only thing he could say. An apology. Fresh tears sprang to your eyes. You pressed the child into his arms, and ran passed him.
You didn’t know what you would find when you got there. All you knew was you had to see it. You didn’t stop running until you saw the smoke rising from the ashes... your entire life had been reduced to rubble. You sobbed, like never before.
Eventually the Mandalorian had followed you back into the ruins of your village. He asked if there was somewhere you wanted to go, if you had friends or family. This was it. This was your whole life. You had nowhere to go. He offered to take you with him.
“Come with us. You can leave whenever you’d like. And I can pay you for your help with the kid,”
It was the only option you had, so here you were. Rocketing through the stars, on your way to an uncertain future, with a baby and a man who’s name you didn’t know and face you will never see.
You were pulled from your thoughts by the sound of Mando’s footsteps descending the ladder from the cockpit. The baby toddled over to the landing, having lost all interest in the silver ball rolling back towards you. Mando bent down and picked up the child, he approached you as you stood up.
“We’ll be landing soon,” he told you “There’s someone I need to talk to on this planet. And they have a market where we can resupply”
You nod quietly. After these last few months, you were still mourning the loss of your village. Going into towns and markets on other planets was exciting but it made you long for home. You had never left your home world, visiting other planets exposed you to things you never would have imagined in your wildest dreams.
Planets covered in dense forests, others with endless expanses of water, not to long ago you had been to a planet that had man made structures covering every surface area... You had come from a farming planet, that sold crops and livestock to intergalactic traders. You knew there were other worlds in the universe, other species, but it was so much more vast than you could have imagined.
The planet you were visiting today was beautiful. Enormous mountains jutted from the ground, fields of tall grass and wildflowers, and clear springs. The village was busy, full of travelers stopping for more fuel, supplies, a place to stay for the night, or just somewhere to stretch their legs and breathe fresh air.
Mando watched as you step off of the ship, holding his son.
“Have you ever seen anything so beautiful?” You asked the child softly. He replied in his garbled little chirps.
Mando felt his chest tighten. The guilt of being the reason you had nowhere to go weighed heavily on him. But bringing you to beautiful places like this, that you may have otherwise never experienced made him feel a little bit better. He didn’t want to admit he was taking you to some of the more interesting places he had visited in his travels, and tried to find nice places for you to stay and take care of the baby when he had to catch a bounty.
“Ready?” He asked. You smiled and nodded, following him towards the town.
Every time they stopped a new planet, Mando knew there was a chance you would not continue with him. But if truth be told, he didn’t want that to happen. He had grown fond of you these last few months. Having a second set of hands around to do things on the ship and someone to make sure the kid was always looked after, were more than welcome. But it was more than that, it was you. You were kind, and gentle. Respectful of his culture, and eager to learn and see everything. He didn’t want you to find a new place to settle. But that wasn’t his choice to make.
He thought about this as you walked together through the market. You held the child against your chest, letting him look out at all of the people and shops. You pointed out various things to him, and spoke with such care.
He left you with some credits, and instructions on where to meet back up with him when you were done shopping and he was finished with his meeting. He had been trying to give you more credits than you needed recently. A couple weeks back, he had snapped at you in a hurry to leave the planet he had left you and kid on for a few days...
“Get your things, we’re leaving”
You stood up, with the child in your arms and walked out of the small inn. He didn’t miss your words under your breath as you passed him.
“I don’t have any things,”
You were right, all you had was the clothes on your back. And the credits he gave you after returning from cashing in on bounties. It was his fault, and he knew it.
You walked around the market, trying to make sure you had enough of a variety of foods to take with you onto the ship. You picked up some strips of bandage cloth, and bacta pads as well. Your companion made more use of those than you would like to admit.
You passed by a clothing stall, and stopped short. Looking down at the kid in his tan robes. It wouldn’t hurt to get him a second set, he did get dirty a lot when you stayed on a planet for a few days. You stepped into the stall, and began looking to find children’s clothing.
The fabric the clothing is made of on this planet is so vastly different from the clothes your own people wore. You ran your fingers over a pair of dark brown trousers.
“What do you think little friend?” You asked the child “maybe we both need something new”
Mando approached the massive shade tree, seeing you and the baby leaning against the trunk and sharing a piece of fruit. He saw that you had several packages of supplies for the ship sitting next to you, and a leather pack. He also noticed the child wore new, grey robes. And you. You wore new well fitting trousers, tunic, boots and coat. He couldn’t help but notice how attractive you looked. The child scampered towards him, and raised his little arms. He shouldered the child, and offered you a hand to stand up.
“You look nice,” he said, somewhat dumbly.
“Thank you,” you replied, taking his hand. You gathered the packages and supplies. “I figured I would need some better clothes if I’m gonna keep up with the little womp rat” You scritched behind the child’s floppy ears. The baby cooed at your touch.
Mando felt comforted walking back to the ship. If you were willing to spend money on things to better help you take care of the kid, maybe you would stay longer.
Din Djarin Tag List: @spideysimpossiblegirl
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Yashahime Translation: NewType Magazine October 2020 Issue
Please do not repost this translation without my consent! This includes screenshots of any type and amount. If you wish to share this translation, simply link to this post.
For more information regarding the use of my translations, click here.
This is an old article that was published back in September of 2020, before Yashahime began airing so please keep that in mind as you read this.
REBOOOOOT!!
The Challenge for the Next Generation
The Half-Demon Girls Who Fight in the Modern and Feudal Eras
“Inuyasha” is an original story by Takahashi Rumiko that was adapted into an anime in 2000 and became a worldwide hit. The story of the fierce battle with the demon, Naraku, centering around the “Shikon Jewel” said to grant any wish, was put to an end by Inuyasha and Sesshōmaru with the assistance of Kagome and others. After the battle ended, Inuyasha and Kagome married and with the conclusion that they were starting a new life, the curtains on the story drew to a close.
10 years have passed since then. Now entering the Reiwa era, production on a new story about the daughters of Inuyasha and Sesshōmaru entitled “Hanyō no Yashahime” has begun. Production of the anime is being done by Sunrise, who also produced the Inuyasha series. Satō Teruo, who was the assistant director in “Inuyasha The Final Act”, will be taking on the role of director. With series composition being done by Sumisawa Katsuyuki, animation character design by Hishinuma Yoshihito, and Wada Kaoru overseeing the music, the “Inuyasha” staff have gathered once again. The perfect production set-up as been put together with Takahashi Rumiko herself drawing the main character design.
“Hanyō no Yashahime” is an original story by Sumisawa. The protagonists are three girls. Towa and Setsuna are twin sisters and Sesshōmaru is their father. Moroha is the daughter of Inuyasha and Kagome, but she has lived alone since childhood, so she does not have any memories of her parents for the most part. Looked down upon by demons and shunned by humans, what will the girls, who are “half-demons”, battle and what sort of future will they strive for? We had producer Naka Toshikazu and animation character designer Hishinuma Yoshihito, talk about the composition of the plan and their feelings on the production.
The New Charms Coming from the Girls
Higurashi Towa
A half-demon girl who has Sesshōmaru’s blood and is extremely skilled in martial arts (possibly inherited from her father). In order to take back her younger twin sister, Setsuna’s, “sleep”, she decides to return to the feudal era.
Towa wears a uniform with slacks, but one can tell she is a girl by her body line and facial expressions. The white hair she inherited from her father, Sesshōmaru, and the red streak in her hair are characteristic.
Setsuna
Sesshōmaru’s daughter. She makes a living as a demon slayer. Having had her sleep stolen by the Dream Butterfly, she does not have any memories of her childhood and has forgotten her elder twin sister, Towa.
Setsuna is calm and collected. One can sense that personality from her cool expression as well. She wears a white fur just like her father, Sesshōmaru.
Moroha
Wielder of the demon sword, Kurikaramaru, and known as “the monster killing Moroha”. A bounty hunter who specializes in slaying demons. Inuyasha and Kagome’s quarter-demon daughter.
Moroha, who’s characteristic black hair is similar to Kagome’s, wears a big ribbon on her head that is like Inuyasha’s ears. Her mischievous facial expression vaguely feels like her father’s.
[There are bios on their weapons as well, but it’s information that’s already known so I’m skipping it]
It Started with Wanting to do “Inuyasha” Again
— Where did the plan for “Hanyō no Yashahime” stem from?
Naka: Even after production for “Inuyasha The Final Act” ended, the staff and cast headed by producer Suwa (Michihiko) (associated with Yomiuri TV at the time) gathered and continued to go on once a year trips with Rumiko-sensei. There, Suwa-san said, “I want to do an “Inuyasha” TV anime again.” and it seems that was the start. Then the conversation went to if it’s a story about the second generation, we can make it an original story. Sumisawa-san came up with a number of different story concepts and proposed them to Rumiko-sensei. After much back and forth, it was ultimately decided that the daughters of Sesshōmaru would be the protagonists of the story. The anime adaption basically began to proceed immediately after that.
— What do you think is the secret to “Inuyasha”’s popularity?
Naka: It boasted top class popularity not only in Japan but also on major American streaming service, Hulu, and its popularity overseas was very high. This means that the content (of the story) is strong. During a time when Sumisawa-san wasn’t making a concrete move, a fan at an overseas event that he attended said, “I would love for you to make another “Inuyasha” anime.” and he said that that has been one of his driving forces. Currently, it has been streamed and broadcasted in over 30 countries, so in a broad sense, it’s a title that can be dispatched worldwide.
Hishinuma: The setting is the feudal era, but it doesn’t follow true history. In the end, slaying demons is the main (focus), so you can enjoy without having any knowledge. There, it has Rumiko-sensei’s serious drama with the periodic love story and comedy mixed in. That gap is what I think makes it fun. Most likely, the number one reason why there were so many young (children) fans was because the story was easy to watch and understand.
— Regarding the production of “Hanyō no Yashahime”, what points of the previous work were you conscious of?
Naka: Putting together components that were different from the “Inuyasha” charm in every sense. In the previous work, it was a story about a son surpassing his greater demon father. If Inuyasha’s son was the main character and the parents made appearances, the parents would take all the juicy parts. No matter how hard the son tries, he could never surpass his parents. Hence, when we were told that the protagonist would be Sesshōmaru’s daughter, I myself was able to accept it without issue. Moreover, I felt that that would be more fun. It’s easy to imagine what Inuyasha and Kagome’s child would be like, but you could say Sesshōmaru’s children, twins no less, stir up the imagination. Rather than following the structure and story of “Inuyasha” as it was, we thought we could create a work that those who watched the original story could easily accept.
— What sort of meaning is behind the strong impacting catch phrase “Sesshōmaru has a daughter” shown in the teaser?
Naka: I think the appeal of “Inuyasha” is the love triangle between Inuyasha, Kikyō, and Kagome, as well as Sesshōmaru being very cool. That being said, it’s no use tracing the same love triangle structure. Thus, by hitting the spot of sisters Towa and Setsuna being separated, there’s a prominent difference between the previous work, and above all, it would grab the interest of fans who wanted a new work. We’ve remodeled the setting and story, but from a picture and production perspective, it has inherited the comedic feel and screen tempo of a Rumic work.
— Hishinuma-san, what did you think when you saw the drafts that Rumiko-sensei drew?
Hishinuma: I instinctively thought if the lineup was these three, then something fun could be created. Rumiko-sensei advised me not to be too conscious of the “parent” when designing the character’s facial expressions and movements. If these kids were around 20 years old, they would’ve had aspects similar to their parents, but they are simply 14-year-old girls. As I drew, I thought about what these 14-year-old girls, who are a little than what Kagome was back then, would think about as they lived their lives.
— In what way did you make revisions using the draft as a base?
Hishinuma: Setsuna and Moroha, who live in the feudal era, were just like the draft I received, but for Towa, who lives in the modern era, I had to redo her hairstyle a little bit. She has short hair so thinking about how she moves, I did things like adjust the placement of the highlight (in her hair) and add a few details to her uniform. Also, she wears male clothing so in a sense, I tend to draw her roughly, but I consciously make sure that the look in her eyes and her actions are that of a girl.
— What did you enjoy during the character designing process?
Hishinuma: Coming up with the grown-up versions of characters that appeared in the previous work like Kohaku, Kagome’s younger brother Sōta, and Miroku and Sango’s son Hisui, was a lot of fun. Kohaku is set as the head of the demon slayers, so I imagined he built up a lot of experience and matured into an adult. However, he may have let his guard down which could be the reason behind the scar (on his face). I imagined those kinds of things as I drew.
Naka: We’ve put in many different components that both new and old fans can enjoy, so it would make us happy if you could look forward to the broadcasting.
To Fans! Two Points!
It is OK If You Don’t Know the History
The story itself is created in a way that one can enjoy it without having any knowledge of “Inuyasha”. In addition, Naka stated “You don’t need to have any knowledge on the feudal era, so please enjoy it leisurely.” Towa and the others who run around between 2 eras; the expectation of the three girls’ activities heightens!
Pay Attention to the Characters Aside from the Main Ones As Well
Other characters like Miroku and Sango’s son, Hisui, as well as others connected to “Inuyasha” will make an appearance. In addition, there will be designs aside from the main characters that will make one go “They look similar to someone from that work” …? Enjoy Rumiko’s work in every nook and cranny of the screen!
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starker reclist - PWP
What better way to celebrate RDJ’s bday than spreading some pwp love, amirite :D I decided to just share these without the usual commentary because there are only so many ways to praise hot smut and I’m not that well versed in English lol. Some fics are plottier, some are porn with feels, others are unapologetic filth. Suffice to say they are all sublime and top notch wanking material, 10/10 recommend. Please mind the tags and stay safe. Happy meals! 😈
Last updated: April 25th, 2020. All new additions will be marked with ***
• a little bit scandalous by @paspleurer (3k, completed)
Summary: “What do you think about dessert? I’m thinking the creme brulee, but—”
“You could eat my ass,” says Peter. "After you've already come inside of it."
Tony sets the menu down on the table with jarring force.
• A Special Love by @darker-soft-starker (completed)
Summary: “You know - the thing where I tell you that I’m too old to be kissed on the lips,” Peter answers, reaching out linking their hands together over the gearstick. "Where I tell you none of the other fathers kiss their sons like we do and isn’t it weird?”
Author’s warning: Incest roleplay (no actual incest), semi-public sex, exhibitionism, public foreplay, armour kink, slight incidental daddy kink, nff.
• Babysitter (AU) by @readysetstarker (5.4k, completed)
Summary: Tony was desperate. Ten minutes before he was supposed to leave for work, brushing his daughter’s hair in the bathroom and promising her a fun day at the zoo with her babysitter (he had already paid for the tickets online, the receipt for them sitting on the counter), he had gotten the call that she wouldn’t be showing up. He needed to be at work to negotiate a deal with investors, they needed him there, but she had been adamant about not showing up and hung up on him mid-plea.
• Ballerina!Peter and Construction worker!Tony (AU) by @starkerforlife6969 (completed) Part 2 is winterironspider
Author’s warnings: mild dub con (super mild, Peter turns out to be a mega-slut and we love it), innocent peter, feminisation, multiple orgasms, rimming, mild cock warming, mild cock-slapping.
• Berries and Cream by @stfustucky (5k, completed)
Summary: There's no way in hell they're going to fit all the Avengers into two cars, not unless Peter sits on Tony's lap. And there's no way in hell Tony is going to survive the ride all the way back to the tower unless Peter stops squirming like that. Unfortunately for Tony, Peter doesn't seem inclined to sit very still tonight. Whoops.
• Breaking Character (AU) by @cagestark (8k, completed)
Summary: Tony Stark, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist, and spy for SHIELD. Working with another SHIELD spy, the infamous Spider, he will take down an infamous human trafficking ring in New York. But the act they have to put on will demand more from Tony than he ever thought he'd have to give. Not that he minds.
• Bruisable and Sweet by @bloomblood (completed)
Summary: Tony has a meal in Peter’s humble, college dormitory bed.
• Captured (AU) by @areluctantsblog (1k, completed)
Summary: In another a universe, reluctant as he may be, Peter Parker has to find out that being Spider-Man inevitably means being a celebrity, too. As far as he’s concerned, the only good thing resulting from this is that from time to time he gets the chance to lay eyes on the fashion industry’s most handsome face, that of photographer Tony Stark’s. When one day Peter is sent on a photo-shoot with the living legend, things take an interesting turn.
• Coming Untouched by @starker-stories (4k, completed)
Summary:
“So, is it true?”
“Which thing? I presume you stood there, outside the door, eavesdropping on our entire conversation,” Peter said, miffed.
“That you can make yourself come without touching yourself even once during your… session?”’
• Context Clues (A/B/O) by Anonymous (8k, completed)
Summary: Peter is crying. Those had been FRIDAY's exact words, and the reason Tony had run upstairs and bypassed the privacy lock on the kid's door. Context is kind of everything.
• Desperado (AU) by @starkercrossedlovers (completed)
Summary: Desperado Tony come to town and takes Peter with him when he goes.
• Drabbles by @starkerforlife6969 (290k, ongoing)
Summary: These are all starkerforlife6969’s tumblr drabbles/stories in one collection, aside from the Mafia Boss One. Mostly starker, but there will be winterspider and spidershield and spiderstrange.
• Eight Stops (to make you mine) (A/B/O) by @starkerkeyz and @the-mad-starker (9k, completed)
Summary: He clutches onto the alpha's forearm and gives Tony another nip, harsher with his spiked up desires. "Eight stops," he tells the alpha, "that's all the time we got. Think that's enough…?" They can only have a quickie but Peter thinks it just might be the best sex he's ever going to get. He gives the alpha's cock another squeeze, trying to convince him to say yes. "Plenty." Tony unbuckles Peter's pants one handed, smirking against pale skin. He rubs his stubble into the omega's lightly bitten scent gland just to rile him up.
• From Across the Bar by @readysetstarker (3k, completed)
Summary: Tony took a slow sip and listened to a pair of new broadcasters talk about upcoming sports games and a player’s most recent scandal about steroid use. He couldn’t have cared less, personally, but there was nothing else on and he wasn’t really here to watch television. Not if the cute brunette trying to scope him out without being noticed had anything to say about it.
• From Thy Bounty by @ibby-writes and feyrelay (30k, completed)
Summary: Tony’s eyes are always dark, but now there's almost no iris left. He looks hollowed out. There’s something terribly hungry there, despite the feast they've filled themselves on.
• Further Assistance by @learned-foot (4k, completed)
Summary: Besides, it would be unethical not to tell Peter what he saw, right? He’s pretty sure that would violate some sort of boundary. And if the kid wants to go down the path of creative experimentation, it’s kind of Tony’s duty to make sure he does it safely. He basically has to help.
• half doomed and you’re semi sweet by noctiphany (2k, completed) underage
Summary: “Peter,” Tony says, his tone flat, and Peter shudders. “Peter,” Tony says again, impatient and with a hint of threat. “I’m waiting.
• Heal Me by Mezzymet (7k, completed)
Summary: His love for the man probably bordered on hero worship but....you could love someone and not be in love with them. Obviously.
• I could be your whore, Mr. Stark by @stfustucky (10k, completed)
Summary: Peter needs a cover story for his shady behavior as Spidey, and half the school thinks he's an escort anyways, so Peter just leans into the rumors. Tony, being the good friend and teammate that he is, agrees to corroborate the cover story by letting everyone think Peter is his own personal slut.
• Indulge Me by @learned-foot (370 words, completed)
Summary: Peter likes it best when Mr. Stark is rough and taking. Read it together with Under Someone Else.
• Jealousy is Ugly (Except When It's Not) by @yadds (4k, completed)
Summary: Peter has a boyfriend. Tony can't stand it.
• Kinktober 2019 by @readysetstarker (38k, completed)
The whole list is amazing, my personal favorites are the glorious upskirt/semi public sex (ch 6). the breathtaking mirror sex (ch 7) and the sweet praise kink (ch 9).
• Just a little bit, just enough by @bitter-lemon-water (25k, completed)
Summary: So somewhere in between devastation, uncertainty, fear and disconcertment—Peter settles. Alternatively: Tony pulls. (Peter lets him.) (Peter wants him to.)
• Just Listen to Me by LeafyGreenQueen773 (3k, completed)
Summary: After the spider bite, Peter's senses are “dialed to eleven”. That includes in bed. Peter talks Tony through what feels best to him.
• Later for later by @unsettledink (15k, completed) sex pollen, top!Peter
Summary: “You,” Peter says, again, mouthing at Tony's skin. “I want you. I trust you. This is a terrible, terrible idea, Tony knows. The worst. And yeah he's normally all for terrible ideas, but this is… no. (The one where Peter gets hit with a sex drug, and Tony is not prepared for this shit.)
• Me, You & A Tattoo by @starkeristheendgame (4k, completed)
Summary: Peter gets Tony's name tattooed on his ass after a not-bet with MJ. Really, it was just a matter of time before Tony found out.
• Morning (A/B/O) by @starkerstarkerstarker (completed)
Summary: Peter’s breath hitches, eyes on him like he expected him to do more, but when he doesn’t, when all he does is lift a brow, he frowns, his bottom lip pushing out. “If you want something, princess, go ahead.”
• No Control by @paspleurer (500 words, completed)
Summary: Mr. Stark’s conditions are simple— no touching himself, and no talking. And Peter wants to be good, he really does— but his senses make it so hard.
• Paint my Body Gold by @spidey-stuff (14 k, completed)
Summary: Tony is desperate to rid himself of his inappropriate attraction before the last barrier holding him back crumbles as Peter's 18th birthday rapidly approaches.
• Perfect by @learned-foot (639 words, completed)
Summary: There are a lot of things that should make Peter embarrassed right now, starting with the fact that the first time Mr. Stark kissed him—about half an hour ago, though it feels like another world—he came in his pants within seconds.
• Peter in Heat (A/B/O) by @starkerforlife6969 (completed)
Summary: Peter’s presenting and Tony knows exactly how to take care of him.
• Red Light District series (AU) by @starker-stories (17k, ongoing)
Summary: Everyone knows that Tony Stark is a playboy who has dozens of women passing through his life and through his bed. What everyone doesn't know is that Tony Stark is deeply closeted, longing for something he can't ever have -- a life and a love with another man.
• Reversal by @learned-foot (4k, completed)
Summary: Sometimes, Tony is the one who needs to be praised.
• Still Use Work by @learned-foot (6.5k, completed)
Summary: Peter has a problem. Tony attempts to solve it. To be helpful, obviously. That’s the only reason.
• Sweet for me, my Honeybee by garbagesinboy (10k, completed)
Summary: Peter's got a sweet tooth, and Tony's got a problem. In which Peter Parker consumes way more sugar than the average human ever should, and Tony Stark suffers many many boners.
• Tremolo by @lilsoshie and @marvlouse (4k, completed)
Summary: “You’re gonna ride me,” Tony decides, easing his fingers free and cherishing the unhappy whine the move inspires. “Up, come on.”
“Tony,” Peter says, a complaint, an exhausted plea.
• The Third Idea by @cagestark (12k, completed)
Summary: Tony walks in on Peter jerking off twice in one week, and realizes that his lover needs a little more from him. So he gives him less; a week without cumming should do it.
• This fire is out of control by feyrelay (2k, completed) sex pollen
Summary: There's really not enough room in their hiding spot to fuck, but Peter's temperature is rising from whatever they've been given, and Tony-Well, Tony's determined.
• Once Upon a Time, there was a Sloshed Bunny and a Guilty Man by @starkerchemistry (completed)
Summary: drunk!Peter dirty talks Tony on the phone.
• Up to Eleven by TheArtistFormerlyKnownAsG (15k, completed)
Summary: He watches those five minutes. Watches them again, and again. Tries to tell himself that he’s seeing something other than what FRIDAY is showing him.
• wasn’t built in a day by orphan_account (7k, completed) dubcon
Summary: Peter files “massive hard-on for Tony Stark” under “things I can’t tell Aunt May.” It’s tied at the top of the list with “I’m Spider-Man” and “I’m responsible for Uncle Ben’s death.”
• Weird by tuesday (2k, completed)
Summary: It wasn't weird, okay? A lot of people wanted to have sex with the Iron Man armor. A lot. There were entire forums and Instagram and Twitter accounts dedicated to it. There had been internet wars fought solely over which Mark was the sexiest. There was endless speculation over whether Tony Stark was among their number and whether and how he actually had outfitted one of the armors with the ability to make good on all that sleek, sexy promise.
It wasn't weird.
"It's a little weird," Tony said.
• what’s the point of a clear raincoat with no hood? by CarnivalGoldfish (7k, completed)
Summary: Tony buys Peter clothes because he likes Peter wearing what he bought him. Peter realizes this is not normal.
*** when the world has dealt its cards by thisismydesignn (3k, completed) underage
Summary: Tony Stark has never claimed to be a role model, let alone a good influence. Case in point...
• You Learn Something New Every Day by @sbiderslut (4k, completed)
Summary: This man looks right at them and remarks, happily unaware of the kiloliter can of worms he just RPG-ed wide open, “The bond between you and Mr. Parker is truly remarkable, Tony. You could practically be father and son.”
• Your Eyes Only by tuesday (4k, completed)
Summary: It was an accident. Tony did not, as a rule, check up on Peter these days, and while he had kept the monitoring programs, they were there in case of emergency.
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Matching Heartbeats: Sokkla Saturdays 2020
Day 5: “I melt in your hands”
On FF.net//On AO3
So. It really had come to this. Of all things, her first mission ever truly had to turn out like this.
She hadn't underestimated him when he had nearly shattered her bones with his club, had she been careless enough to stand closer to him or failed to evade his attack. No properly-trained firebender would ever be quite so stupid as to believe themselves superior to heavy weapons, especially one that looked as heavy as that damn club. Yet she had expected he would only be a warrior, at the time: she never expected him to be the brains of his group, for this was merely their second encounter, and while she was still assessing the enemy as they crossed blows in the abandoned town the Avatar had lured her to, she had never quite expected… well, that there would be a truly smart foe in the other team, to put it in some way.
"I know when I'm beaten," she had said, eyeing the group that surrounded her, her hands raised in the air. "A Princess surrenders with honor."
She had noticed they were whispering, though: just as she saw Iroh had been focusing on the earthbender, that tall warrior boy had spoken to the short, new member of their team too: the waterbender and the Avatar were listening as well, her brother, of course, was only focused on her… so many potential targets, what to do?
She chose to attack Iroh in the end, but it happened just as the earthbender attacked, too: a sudden surge of earth, and all her limbs had been restrained, held down: she tried to evoke fire, but the strain of this completely awkward position, prostrated on the ground, didn't allow for it.
"Quick! Look for something to tie her up, I don't know…!" the warrior boy had ordered… just as her brother screamed:
"AAAAAAH!"
Ugh. He was always so melodramatic.
She struggled against the restraints… only for the earthbender to take things further: she found herself buried to the neck in the ground, gasping for breath, panicking as she realized she couldn't move at all. What to do, what to do…? There had to be a way out, she just had to think…
"I found shackles!" exclaimed the waterbender, from inside one of the buildings: she and the Avatar had taken to rummaging through the nearby ghostly town to follow fit with the warrior's demand.
"Great! That'll be way better than rope, she'd just burn through that…"
"Oh… wait, Zuko!"
The waterbender returned with the shackles, but she handed them to the Avatar as she approached the firebenders: Azula's brother was crouched by their Uncle's inert form… and upon realizing the Avatar and his friends were approaching him, he shouted:
"Ugh! Get away from us!"
"Zuko, I can help!"
"LEAVE!" he exclaimed, and now he outright attacked them: wow, that was rude. And here Azula thought they were friends… it would explain why he had been so incompetent as to fail to capture them throughout the past months.
Yet just as she thought Zuko would get what he wanted, and she'd be left buried in this damn place for eternity, the tall warrior boy turned towards her. Azula scowled at him too, and he huffed, hands on his hips.
"No way we're leaving. Not without our prisoner, anyway," he said, stepping towards her.
"I'm not your…! You'd best stay where you are, or I'll make you pay for this!" she exclaimed, knowing her bravado was empty. What could she do, spit fire at his boots? Maybe he'd be outraged about it… and then he might outright kick her face. Which would be utterly deplorable and humiliating. What on earth had just happened? Why was she in this completely unacceptable situation?
"You know, I can move those shackles with my bending, lock them around her wrists underground," the earthbender revealed, with a mischievous grin. "That way she's not going to be a problem!"
"Wait, wait, wait!" the Avatar said, eyeing them all warily. "Are we… going to make her our prisoner? Really? But… why?"
"I'm with Aang on that. Why do we want her with us?" the waterbender asked, eyeing her fellow Water Tribesman – who Azula suspected would be her brother – and the earthbender with utter confusion.
"Well… to change up the game somewhat? It's always the Fire Nation trying to capture us, right? And this way, we know this one's not going to catch us again," the warrior suggested. "Not if we keep an eye on her ourselves."
"Ridiculous… my friends will find me. And then they'll defeat the whole lot of you without breaking a sweat," Azula said, with a proud smirk. "And if, somehow, you managed to avoid them, every Fire Nation soldier will attempt to find me once my captivity is known. You won't get away with this, and you'll pay for it with your lives, whether by my hand or anyone else's."
"You sure?" he had asked, raising his eyebrows. "Because, hey! We're already being chased by a lot of Fire Nation people and so far, we're doing pretty good! Honestly, you and your friends were the scariest ones to chase us so far, so it kind of feels like you were the best the Fire Lord could send already? Which means… now that we took you down, we're feeling pretty good about our odds against everything else they could send at us."
He smiled sardonically. She scowled, angrily. And while the Avatar and the waterbender appeared unconvinced still, they soon surrendered, and the damned warrior boy got his way: she was shackled and unearthed afterwards, and while she could presumably wield basic fire against them, she couldn't possibly perform a full kata within these restraints. She'd have to use more than firebending to escape… she'd have to use her wits. And that she intended to.
She would leave a trail of breadcrumbs for Mai and Ty Lee to follow. It was hard to decide on which breadcrumbs, but eventually she took to lightly burning the ends of her hair, by raising her shackled hands to wipe her face. The hairs would be in danger of floating off their own accord in the breeze, but hopefully they wouldn't be blown away too fast for her friends to follow her trail, much as they had followed the damn bison's…
And soon enough they wound up on said damn bison who, to Azula's chagrin, was fully clean now, and apparently not shedding anymore. It growled at her, and she scowled at it too. Shaggy beast…
And then she got dragged up to the saddle, where the three benders fell asleep, and the non-bender, despite having huge bags under his eyes, decided to stay awake and keep watch, for she couldn't be trusted. And of course she couldn't be: who wouldn't be mistrusting of their captive foe? It was natural. She had to figure out a way to turn that caution of his against him… or turn it into something else, instead.
"You look terrible. I bet you're far more handsome when you've had a few hours of rest," she said: men were fools in many ways. Perhaps a girl's compliments, however shallow as they might be, would sit well with him.
The reaction was just as she had expected it: that her plan would work at all, however, was rather startling: he was visibly flustered, eyeing her with uncertainty, but he appeared perfectly shyly pleased by the compliment nonetheless.
"Well, yeah… you'll likely see that later tomorrow, I guess, once I do get enough rest," he said, with a shrug. She did succeed at goading his ego, of course she did… perfect.
"Will I, now?" Azula replied, raising her eyebrows.
"Yeah… as long as you don't try to escape beforehand, anyway," he said, shrugging. Azula scoffed.
"What makes you think my friends won't find us before that?" she asked.
"That they haven't found us yet, I think," the warrior boy admitted, with an awkward grin. "You three dangerous ladies seemed pretty intense, but something – or rather, my instincts! – tell me that you're the brains of the group. Were you the one who decided to chase after us on that creepy machine? Where did you get something like that, in the first place? And those mounts… you've got to be some real top-of-the-line bounty-hunter or something, huh?"
"You think I'm a bounty-hunter?" she asked, amused. "So you don't see the family resemblance either?"
"Family resemblance…?" he said, blinking blankly. Azula raised her eyebrows. "Woah. Wait a minute, are you…? You're Zuko's sister? Hell, no, I don't see it!"
"Oh, really?" Azula smirked. He scoffed.
"You're way prettier, like, by a landslide. And you're smart. Huh. I think you got the family jackpot, come to think of it… which, huh, who knows why the Fire Lord's family has anything good in their lineage, but if there's anything at all, looks like you hogged it all up for yourself."
Despite everything, Azula laughed. Why did she laugh, she didn't know. The warrior chuckled too, scratching the back of his neck. Were they flirting, without meaning to? Or was this just honesty? She was having a hard time telling… for it was the first time any boy had called her pretty.
"Is that why you decided to keep me as a prisoner? Because you were smitten with me right away?" she smirked. The warrior scoffed. "It's alright, you can admit it…"
"And why would I admit something that's not true? I mean, come on, if it were a matter of being smitten, I'd much rather keep you chasing after me," he smirked. "Boys love the idea of being chased violently by beautiful girls."
"And girls love the idea of being hogged up possessively by handsome boys," Azula retaliated.
They both snorted. And then they laughed.
Was she seriously laughing with the enemy?
"Could you two idiots quit with the weird flirting and let me SLEEP?!"
Toph's shout certainly landed on its mark. Both a Princess and her new enemy-captor-possibly-new-friend merely nestled on a saddle quietly for a while, blushing and hoping the other one couldn't tell under de cover of darkness.
"Though…" she finally broke the silence about ten minutes later: she could tell he was still awake, and his head jolted towards her quickly. "Would be nice to know your names, at least. If nothing else."
"Oh… heh. I'm Sokka," he said, smiling awkwardly.
"Sokka, huh…?" she said, enjoying the sensation of uttering the foreign name's syllables. Curious feeling…
"And you're…?" he said, raising his eyebrows.
"Azula," she replied. Sokka eyed her appreciatively.
"Azula it is, then," he said, with a small smile. "Uh, the rest of us… the bison is Appa, the lemur is Momo, my sister there's Katara, and that's Aang, the Avatar, and…"
"Shut. UP!"
"… And the grumpy one's Toph."
"Right."
They did fall silent then… and the gears in the Princess's mind continued turning. No, this situation was far from ideal… but if she forged a bond, however basic it might be, with one of her captors, there was a far higher likelihood of escape than by only waiting for Mai and Ty Lee to find her. Those two usually were reliable enough… but who knew how far the breeze would blow the miserable trail she'd left behind herself. Not to mention, if that damn bison took off with them, she'd be as good as beyond their reach before long. No, this wouldn't do. She would find a way out of this situation by herself, and she'd obtain a ton of intel on the enemy in the process, too. It would be difficult to endure for a while… but it didn't hurt that the boy she'd chosen for her scheme wasn't that far from her type anyway. A little lankier than her preference, sure, but he could fill out more muscles with the years and…
And why was that even important? It wasn't. She had to focus.
That he was somewhat handsome – and she used both words quite loosely, no, she didn't like him, she wasn't a schoolgirl with a crush or anything like that – only helped matters anyway: she wouldn't have to feign her interest in him, at least, where it concerned his physical appeal to her. Everything else was a matter of delicately weaving a net of perfect deceit until he was so wrapped within her web that he'd be caught completely off-guard once she betrayed their fun little group…
It was just a matter of patience until the right moment to strike arrived. She wouldn't be a problem prisoner, she'd accept her fate… for now.
Flying on the bison was a strange, yet not entirely unwelcome experience, despite it practically sentenced her to not be found by her friends anytime soon. The group she was stuck with was… slightly strange, without a doubt. The waterbender often eyed her warily – she likely still disagreed with the notion of keeping her captive, and wanted nothing but to see Azula vanish from sight as soon as possible. The Avatar seemed careful too, but before long he started to talk more cheerfully, and Azula wondered if he had decided she was trustworthy already. The damn lemur had often climbed over her lap, and she had to shoo it only for the Avatar to laugh it off and say 'Momo was just happy to make a new friend'. As if she'd ever be friends with a large-eared rat…
The earthbender, to her surprise, seemed to be almost as new to the group as she was. She asked occasional questions about how things worked in the team, and it became apparent she had only joined them recently, just as Azula had suspected – her absence back in Omashu could have had many explanations, but that they'd only recruited her recently made perfect sense. And of course, the one she had decided would be her target was the non-bender… who was sleeping at the far end of the saddle, drooling awkwardly, with his limbs splayed in any direction, as though he were a carelessly discarded toy. She wondered how someone could rest in quite such relaxation when he had an enemy so close by… did he truly take their last conversation to signify she could be trusted? Or was it he trusted the rest of his companions to keep her in check? Or… perhaps he knew she wasn't stupid enough to try anything while hovering so many miles above ground, in foreign lands, when she had no idea where they were going.
"What exactly is our destination, if I can ask?" she sighed.
"We'll know when we get there," Katara said, simply. Azula's eyebrows twitched: this one was absolutely ruled out of her plan to earn goodwill from her captors. Anyone else would be fair game, save her. And that lemur. She really didn't like that flying rat.
They only reached that destination – a canyon – after about ten hours of flying, after which the bison apparently couldn't keep going any longer. Yet the Avatar seemed thrilled about where they'd wound up, and the warrior was also in a blissful mood after napping for most the day on the creature's saddle. Of course, the waterbender didn't stop giving Azula the stink-eye as they unpacked, though as the others seemed to be warming up to her, to a fault, Azula decided to poke the hornet wasps' nest instead of enduring the judgment and scowls.
"You really seem to dislike me quite strongly," she said, casually. "Which I find odd, seeing as it seems you've been chased by my brother for far longer than me, and yet you offered him a helping hand back when I attacked our uncle. Is it you feel threatened by my presence somehow, or…?"
"Threatened? Yes. Because I'm pretty sure you're exactly where you want to be," Katara rebuffed, shooting her another harsh glare. "And yeah, Zuko's been worse than you, so far. But that you're his sister doesn't help in the least. And I wasn't really offering my help to Zuko but to Iroh. He gave us a hand back in the North Pole, so…"
"Is that so…?" Azula asked, unable to mask her genuine outrage at those words. Katara scoffed.
"You do remember, still, that we're not your friends? You yourself said it, didn't you? Enemies and traitors, working together?"
"Right, but I just thought that perhaps you had a soft spot for Zuzu since he'd chased you for so many months… I figured maybe I had to up my game so I'd earn some goodwill around here, but I guess it's not that simple," Azula sighed. "Working against my nation seems to be the only way you'll trust me, huh?"
"And even then I don't think Katara will let go that easily," Aang said, smiling awkwardly, though he blinked a few times when his words were almost interrupted by a loud cackle: "Uh… Sokka?"
"Zuzu?! Y-you call him Zuzu?!"
Azula glanced at the warrior with unabashed amusement: he DEFINITELY was her target. And yet, to her surprise, the earthbender snickered too… and the waterbender snorted before covering her mouth with a hand. Oh, maybe this wouldn't be quite as bad as she had anticipated… if they could bond over trashing Zuko, she had plenty of material to work with.
"I wasn't laughing!" Katara exclaimed, and yet everyone laughed at her denial just as well.
"Of course I call him Zuzu," Azula smiled proudly, as Sokka gazed at her with brimming amazement. "I don't presume to know how it works in your culture, but in the Fire Nation, the younger sister's official job is to embarrass and torment her older brother as best she can."
"Oh, it's the same in the South Pole, surprisingly," Sokka declared, smirking at Katara, who stuck out her tongue in his direction. "Though it's true too that the older brother's job is to protect their little sister… a thankless job, but we are just that selfless."
"Pfft! You don't have to protect me! I can protect myself just fine, thank you very much!"
"Sure thing! You know, it's not just about combat, it's about everything else! Who's the one who goes hunting and foraging and finding food for us…?"
"The one who's ALWAYS hungry?"
"And who did you tell to get a job when YOU were hungry? That's right, it was me! And I went and got one, and nearly died in a STORM while you didn't get a job of your own, but did I complain? Not even once…!"
"You're complaining now…" Toph pointed out, smirking, but the argument seemed poised to continue regardless.
Azula watched them bicker, however, and a rather strange sensation nestled in her chest upon hearing their words… upon processing them. Was that really what a brother was expected to do? In other cultures, maybe… it was ridiculous, though, and she scoffed at so much as the idea of picturing her brother getting a job for her sake, or going hunting or foraging for her. That wasn't likely to ever happen… not that she needed it to, of course. She did fend for herself, unlike Katara. She had been apart from her brother for three years, and she saw no need to rely on him. She didn't truly need anyone…
Hours after a rather simplistic dinner – Sokka caught a small animal that didn't taste very good to Azula – the group was set to rest again. The earthbender crafted an earthen tent for herself, the waterbender set up a traditional tent for herself, the Avatar was resting on his bison's saddle… and again, the warrior seemed determined to keep watch.
"You're on guard duty again tonight?" Azula asked, raising her eyebrows. Sokka nodded.
"It works, doesn't it? I got plenty of sleep through the day anyhow, I can take it," he shrugged. "You should get some rest too, Princess…"
"You'll still watch me as I sleep, won't you?" she teased, smirking. "Quite interesting to be the object of someone's observation to such extent…"
"Uh… yeah. Because you're a prisoner. And I don't want you pulling any funny business on us," Sokka said… and yet he was smiling. Ha. He found amusement in her teasing just as well.
"Oh, surely that's not all there is to it," she said, beaming mischievously. He chuckled and shook his head.
"There's not supposed to be more to it…" he said. "But anyway, you didn't sleep all day like I did, so you should rest now. You can even borrow my sleeping bag, if you want."
"Borrow your…?"
It hit her then that it wasn't a matter of older brother protectiveness: that was just what he was like. He protected people… even if they didn't deserve his protection.
"Only if you promise you won't set it on fire just to mess with me or anything mean like that, okay?" he said, smiling at her before reaching for his bags and unfolding the sleeping bag for her.
What a rare act of kindness… of generosity. What would he gain from this? What did he think he'd gain from it? Nothing, surely: he had to be stupid to think she had truly lowered her guard with no ulterior motive… and she could tell he wasn't stupid. At least, not when it came to things that mattered. So why show her any form of kindness…?
Once she was halfway inside the sleeping bag, she realized there was more to this apparently selfless act than met the eye: her stomach lurched at the scent of the sleeping bag, and she shot the owner an accusatory glare.
"W-why would you…?! Are you trying to kill me?!"
"What?" he said, raising his eyebrows. "Oh! Oh, yeah, Toph says it smells weird, huh…? Woops. Heh, I forgot. Okay, okay, I'll wash it as soon as I can! Sorry… but it beats sleeping on the hard ground, doesn't it?"
"That depends on how sick I am in the morning…" Azula huffed, covering her nose, hoping that breathing through her mouth would be enough for her to ignore the stench.
"Well, I do hope you don't die! I promise, that wasn't an attempt to kill you. You haven't given us any useful information yet, so what's the point in trying to kill you at all, huh?"
"Ah, that's why you keep me alive, and not so you can watch me sleep," Azula asked, raising her eyebrows. Sokka smirked and nodded.
"True. Not that I'm complaining about the other thing, but I've got my priorities sorted out," he declared. She bit her lower lip but smiled.
Was this really what it was like to flirt with a boy? She'd never truly made any progress with anyone on that front before. This one seemed rather responsive to her advances, though… well, it would be useful practice for the future, at least. She could count on him for that.
"Good night, then," she said, keeping her head safely out of the sleeping bag, in hopes to inhale fresh air rather than the stale scent of the sleeping bag.
"Good night, Azula," he responded. It was weird that her gut felt tingly upon hearing him say her name…
The next day, however, took Azula by surprise: the Avatar had actually chosen this location to train, it seemed. And when Sokka was finally taking his time to sleep, the earthbender took to teaching earthbending lessons to the Avatar, and all his attempts to rest were thwarted completely. Once Sokka finally gave up resting, he took off to hunt, and Azula tagged along: while it was rather useful to learn more about the mechanics of earthbending, to unravel how to fight against it more effectively, she couldn't be careless and disregard her main pursuit. And as tempers seemed to flare often in the Avatar's training session, she ended up tagging along for Sokka's hunting trip instead. It would be useful to learn how hunting was done, if nothing else…
… Or so she thought, until Sokka fell into a hole, after chasing after a moose-lion cub, and despite he begged her for help, there wasn't much she could do for him: she pulled at him, jerked his hands upwards, and he only seemed to sink further. Funny how ironic life was, considering she was the one stuck in the ground similarly just two days ago…
"I'm going to die stuck in here, aren't I?" he groaned, after Azula's final attempt to heave him out failed.
"It's a possibility," she acknowledged. "I could be more helpful, you know? If I weren't shackled…?"
"Not much luck with that, I'm afraid…" Sokka groaned. "I… don't have the key myself."
"Ah. Then I'm befriending the wrong Water Tribe sibling, aren't I?" Azula said. That, at least, got a smile out of the warrior.
"Damn. And here I thought I was your type," Sokka said, nonchalantly.
"I didn't say you weren't. Just that, if you don't have the power to get rid of these, you're not much use to me," she said. Sokka chuckled and shook his head.
The rest of the day was surreal: the small moose-lion cub Sokka had been trying to hunt decided to play with him, carelessly so, even bringing him an apple that Azula found a most ironic gift for the avid meat-eater. Sokka groaned, swore he'd go vegetarian, made countless baseless claims… and yet not once did he beg her to go ask the others for help. Odd, considering two of his friends were earthbenders, albeit one more trained than the other…
And then the actual, chaotic mess began to unfold: Aang, apparently sick and tired of Toph's harsh training methods, stumbled into Sokka and his awkward situation. He failed to airbend him out of the hole, and then proceeded to pity his poor efforts at earthbending with a rather unexpected string of unfortunate wording, such as claiming to be stuck between a rock and a hard place… Azula couldn't stop chuckling, earning herself Sokka's harsh glares in retaliation… and that was when the mother of Sokka's new friend, the saber-tooth moose-lion cub, had appeared on the scene.
"Aang, just earthbend me out of here!" was Sokka's most common request, but the Avatar appeared to want to do anything but earthbend… leaving both his restrained companions to somehow fend for themselves as the furious creature sought to attack them.
It was fair and good that the Avatar's airbending seemed to distract the moose lion on occasion… but at one point it became apparent that it would trample Sokka most deliberately unless it was distracted. And while Azula could barely bend, with her hands shackled as she was, she leapt between Sokka and the creature and shot a small plum of blue fire in its direction.
That, of course, only seemed to make the creature angrier: Aang had to intervene then, casting a powerful gust of wind that finally alarmed the creature enough about these humans and their potential abilities, and it left through the forest at last.
And then Toph took advantage of that momentum to force Aang to earthbend for good. The Avatar was astonished to finally unlock the secrets of the art… while Azula and Sokka were merely relieved they had survived a nearly lethal encounter with a beast that could've killed them both.
Katara was delighted to see Sokka safe and sound once they were all free to return to camp, though she scowled at Azula, ready to blame her for her brother's disappearance…
"Azula stuck by me the whole time I was in that stupid hole," Sokka sighed, smiling and clapping the Fire Nation Princess on the shoulder. "I kind of thought she'd make a run for it? But… she stayed! And then even tried to save me from the moose-lion, but she just made it angry instead…"
"Really?" Katara said, blinking blankly, utterly blown away by the explanations.
"Animals… don't like fire. Clearly," Azula said, sighing.
"But she still tried to help me! And that really took me by surprise," Sokka grinned. "You know, you might fit better with our team than I thought all along. Aang! How about getting a new firebending teacher? Jeong Jeong was a pain anyway, so we could just recruit Azula for it and…!"
"W-wha…?!" Azula gasped. "Did you forget I'm supposed to be your enemy?"
"I think you're the one who did, eh? You tried to save my life today!" Sokka grinned, spreading his arms as though to hug her, and Azula squirmed out of his reach, hoping fruitlessly for her cheeks not to be as red as she suspected they were, going by the heat that surged underneath her skin.
Had she forgotten she was their enemy? No, not really. But was she growing to enjoy their company…? His company, in particular?
Perhaps a little.
Many strange things seemed to happen to the Avatar and his friends… and being caught in the middle of so many happenings was a rather novel experience for Azula. While she wasn't quite the most sheltered noblewoman in the Fire Nation, the idea of traveling abroad with a group of teenagers and children close to her age, with no one to enforce real discipline, no rules beyond those they agreed upon, no stability beyond the ground underneath their feet – or the saddle on which they flew – wouldn't have crossed her mind at all until it became her reality.
After the wild encounter with the moose lions, they went on a strange vacation spree that she found utterly laughable – they took vacations carelessly, willfully ignoring that her father was surely gearing up to strike against the Earth Kingdom's bastions? Truly? – and that resulted in a highly questionable trip to the Si Wong Desert. It didn't help that a group comprised by one too many weirdos decided to recruit a grown-up who appeared to be even more airheaded than Ty Lee – some professor at Ba Sing Se's university –, and that Sokka had decided his vacation would take them to a Library. Oh, it was a real pain that his decision would be the first one that was slightly appealing to her, in all this mess… despite the obvious fact, of course, that visiting a Spirit Library sounded completely, utterly absurd to the Princess of the Fire Nation.
"Does this place even exist?" Toph asked, eventually, as they soared across the desert on the sky bison's saddle.
"Some say it doesn't," the professor replied. Azula scoffed.
"Unsurprisingly so. Why would a Spirit Library be located in a desert, of all places?" she asked. "Utterly inconvenient."
"Well, a desert probably has plenty of room to host a big Library, right?" Sokka said, casually.
It was absurd logic, as far as Azula could tell – might as well claim there was plenty of room at the bottom of the sea, too, and if the idea was to keep everyone away from the damn place, it was far safer underwater than in a desert –, but so much as looking at Sokka right now, while he was shamelessly shirtless, was a bad idea. Why he had decided to strip off his upper body's garments, Azula didn't know, but while she didn't believe she was a prude, she couldn't dare look at him if there was a chance he'd catch her. So far, she had merely glanced at him on occasion… and admired his lean body. Yes, that was harmless, it wasn't like she'd tried to make a move on him – not like she truly knew how, anyway. But if he so much as suspected what effects his shirtless figure was having on her mind, he would never let her live this embarrassment down. And curses, she didn't need further problems while traveling with this group…
"How about the fact that this is something… spiritual?" Azula said, with a sardonic grin.
"You know, that part's been bugging me too," Toph said, flopped upon the saddle as she was. "The heck does it even mean, a Spirit Library? Are spirits even real?"
"Of course they are!" Aang exclaimed, beaming.
Azula huffed, glancing – despite her better judgment – at Sokka as though to ask if he truly believed such nonsense… only to find a rather surprising, disheartened expression on his face. She frowned: what was that? Melancholy? Misery? Longing? Why would the mention of spirits make him react that way?
He was the one to spot something eventually: a tower in the middle of the desert, apparently. And yet, before long, the group realized the Library was actually underground, somehow. Curious, despite herself, Azula requested that they allowed her inside the Library too: while Katara hesitated at first, Azula agreed to the conditions of being shackled again once they were done climbing inside the building, and to everyone's surprise, she did nothing to hinder their mission – fools that they were, truly, for expecting otherwise. What was she going to achieve by attacking them in the middle of a desert, of all things? So Toph and Appa lingered behind, and the rest of the group entered the tower by climbing through with a rope.
Her initial disbelief was rewarded with the most incredible location she had ever set foot upon, and she had been raised in a Palace, of all things. But nothing was quite so astonishing as the giant owl: Sokka had to clap a hand over her mouth as they hid behind a pillar, hoping not to alert the terrifying otherworldly being of their presence. Alright, fine, spirits were real, and she sure wanted nothing to do with them. Yet the fool professor had ran out and revealed himself… and soon enough Azula caught herself watching as each of them offered knowledge of some sort to the creature. The Avatar's wanted poster had been accepted, though… that rang a bell.
"I'm sorry it's so crumpled," she smiled awkwardly, as she offered the giant owl another wanted poster, this time bearing the faces of her brother and uncle.
"Both of Fire Nation make?" the owl spoke. "Quite an astonishing find. I appreciate these additions to my collection."
Oh, she was saved. She had folded one of those posters carelessly into a pocket a long time ago, and that it was still there was a damn miracle… for, otherwise, she might be doing something even more ridiculous than Sokka's splendid knot. In Azula's opinion, it wasn't all that bad… but the owl was far from impressed.
"You're not very bright, are you?"
Wow. Those were harsh words to speak to someone who was, in her opinion, the second smartest person in this very group. The comment, of course, didn't sit well with the warrior, who scowled as the owl welcomed them into the Library and left them to their own devices.
"Bright enough to fool you," he said, bitterly, before setting out to rummage through the Library's contents.
The owl's comment had unsettled Azula too… though she wasn't entirely sure why it bothered her so much. She felt an impulse to reassure him, even if she wasn't sure it would be welcome: she did think he was smart. If anything, that owl appeared rather foolish to her for not being able to see it. And yet every time she wanted to speak out, she failed to find the strength to utter the words: why? Was it because they were too honest, this time around? What was wrong with her? Was she…?
… She wasn't. There was no way she was developing actual, serious feelings for this boy, was she?
Yet she kept following him through the Library, watching as he stuffed his bag with scrolls, and she watched with curiosity until he shot her a sharp glare.
"What? You think I shouldn't do this?" he asked.
"I wasn't judging you in the least, no," Azula said, blinking blankly. "Did you think I was?"
"… Maybe?" Sokka pouted, skulking towards another area of the Library.
"If anything, I'd think it's fair. After that owl's comment about you, I'd gladly ransack this place, too."
Sokka slowed on his footsteps and glanced at her with uncertainty from over his shoulder. Azula blinked blankly: had she said anything wrong? She had hoped to have conveyed her feelings nonchalantly enough that he might not suspect she had any deep motivations to speak them…
"You… you're really something, huh?" Sokka said, lowering his gaze. "You do remember, right? That… we're supposed to be enemies?"
"You think I'd forget?" she asked, though her heart sank at that question. That had to mean she was developing a stupid, one-sided attachment, right?
"W-well, it's just… when you say stuff like that, I end up thinking, well… stupid things, I guess," Sokka sighed. "Things I shouldn't. Especially not after… everything."
"Everything?" Azula asked, blinking blankly as she stared at his back. "Well… granted we didn't start off with the right foot, but… I thought we were getting along better lately. That you were happy I'd stood between you and an angry moose-lion? I wouldn't be surprised if you decided my being Fire Nation makes all that worthless, but…"
"It doesn't make it worthless, it makes it… complicated," Sokka said, gritting his teeth. "But that's not it. Not really."
"Then…?" Azula asked, raising her eyebrows.
"I… look, I don't want to talk about this, usually," he said, breathing deeply. "And I don't know if you'd understand, anyway. But I… lost someone. Someone I liked, a lot. It happened in the Siege of the North, and… it still hurts. And sometimes when I look at you, I remember how that felt, and it's great for a second until I suddenly just think…"
"That you shouldn't be feeling this way about anyone else?" Azula ventured, warily. Yet, to her surprise, Sokka shook his head.
"That I shouldn't be feeling this way about someone I'll probably lose too, anyway," he said. "You know why we're here. You know what we're doing. You know I'll fight the Fire Nation, no matter which side you choose to stand on. And… no matter how friendly we've been, you'll choose your own people, won't you? Just… as I'd choose my own, if our situation were reversed somehow. There's… there's no happy ending for this, is there?"
Azula gritted her teeth, frowning… no, no, there wasn't. But… did this mean he liked her too, to a fault? He'd be the first boy to ever… no, the very first person she'd know for a fact had ever liked her, in whatever sense of the word. Was it wrong to fixate upon that now, when he was stating something as important as this? They were enemies, no matter what came next…
For she couldn't turn against her father, could she? She couldn't just become a traitor… she couldn't turn against her people.
Not even for the first boy she had ever grown to like this way.
"I'm not saying we can't be… well… okay, I don't know what we can't be, to be honest," Sokka sighed, turning towards her once she stayed silent for too long. "Or what we can be, either. But you'll want to stop us from attacking your nation, and we just want to set the world free of the Fire Nation's control. We want balance back. And unless you're having second thoughts about your life's mission… I don't know how things will work, from this point onwards."
Azula sighed but shrugged. Sokka gulped as she raised her shackled hands in a gesture of surrender.
"You're not wrong. Not in the least. If you want the truth? I… was trying to get to you. I thought maybe befriending a member of your group would be the best way to break out of this imprisonment, somehow. So… you don't have to worry about a thing. I was completely dishonest the whole time."
"Huh… the whole time?" Sokka asked, though his voice carried a tinge of disappointment that took Azula aback. It wasn't a surprised disappointment… but rather, an expected one.
"You… knew, didn't you? That this was why I…?" Azula said. He shrugged.
"I guessed. I hoped otherwise, but… what's the point?" he smiled sadly, shrugging again. "That… makes it easier, doesn't it? Because the whole time, I knew that was probably what you were after, so…"
"So, we were on the same page" Azula determined. Sokka nodded, too.
"Good thing we cleared the air," he said. She nodded.
"Then, I… will leave you to your research, whatever it may be," she said, simply. "I… will go do something else, in the meantime."
She walked away quickly, wondering if he'd call for her or stop her, anything dramatic and apparently romantic as that… and of course, it didn't happen. Ugh, she was an idiot. She was an idiot. Her heart was beating so sadly… why would a heart beat sadly? That made no sense! And yet each miserable beat seemed to propel nothing but misery through her system. Idiot… she really had grown fond of him. Too fond. What was wrong with her? What kind of fool grew to like the person who had taken them captive?
But she knew why… she did. He was the first person to laugh loudly at her jokes, and his smiles were the warmest that had ever been directed towards her. He was sharp, just as she was… he was strategic, cold-blooded, analytical. All of that sat well with her. Too well, if anything. But perhaps that was wrong, wasn't it? It had to be. Surely their similarities, the ones she had been surprised to discover existed between them, weren't all that strong in the end… or, if they were, weren't conducive to a good relationship. Yes, that was it. That was certainly the likeliest of truths. But… it wouldn't hurt to confirm it.
The disaster began when she was halfway through scouring across the romance section, seeking any books or scrolls on compatibility: the building trembled suddenly, and sand leaked through the walls. The whole group seemed ready to scram, and she caught up with them… just in time for Sokka and Aang to race back inside, and for Katara and the damn professor to stay behind.
"What is going on?!" Azula asked. Katara gasped, eyeing her warily.
"And to think… I took for granted you'd be the one to cause more trouble around here!" she admitted, with an apologetic grimace. "Run! We have to keep him distracted!"
"The giant OWL?!" Azula asked, astonished. Katara huffed.
"Who else?!" she asked.
Azula huffed, wondering what to do. There had to be a strong enough distraction, something that the creature would be too incensed by to remember it was chasing any of them…
Oh. Well, that was a risky gambit, but it was worth trying anyway.
"Katara! Remove these shackles, now!"
"Are you sure about what you were saying before you found that paper, Sokka?" Aang asked, as they moved the dials of the calendar in the planetarium room. "I know what you mean that it's probably better to let her go, but… are you really sure? You seem to really get along with Azula!"
"And that's going to be a problem in the future, don't you think?!" Sokka squeaked, eyeing the dials anxiously – not close enough, another attempt, maybe the next date would do…
"Well… I don't know how it's not going to be one, if anything," Aang said. Sokka scowled.
"What'd you mean by…? Oh, we're close!" he exclaimed. "Next one!"
"I mean… you're already so worried about her that you're pulling away in fear of getting hurt, or hurting her!" Aang said. "You really think seeing her off will change that? You're still going to care, if we bump into her in a battlefield! That's not going to change now!"
Sokka gritted his teeth and eyed Aang with uncertainty as he pulled the lever one last time. Why was that little guy so wise when he shouldn't be? Yes, at this point, he'd definitely hesitate if he found Azula in a battlefield. He'd never have the guts to go through with fighting her at his best… and then she'd kill him, surely, because she was raised to uphold her nation above all else. There was no reason for her to hold back… especially when her apparent interest in him had been feigned just to obtain a fleeting friendship that would buy her way out of the group.
Which… he had been about to give her.
Was he really about to give the girl the chance to fulfill her plan perfectly?
"It's this one, Sokka! Look, it matches!"
He hadn't even noticed the planetarium's lights were dimmer this time. He made sure to jot down the right date for the eclipse and then he dragged Aang out of the room at haste… only to find something was very, very wrong in the Library now.
"YOU MONSTERS! CRIMINALS! YOU DEFILE MY VAST COLLECTION FOR THE LAST TIME!"
"What…?" Aang gasped: the owl's voice seemed to come from the lowest depths of the Library. Was he truly down there, rather than chasing Katara up here?
They reached the landing where they'd left the rope… to find only Katara and Zei nearby. Sokka's heart nearly stopped.
"Where's Azula?!"
"She's…!" Katara grimaced, glancing downwards…
An inferno of orange flames burned brightly down below. Aang and Sokka gasped: they had found out about the burning of the Library's collection of the Fire Nation… and they knew exactly how angry Wan Shi Tong would be upon losing more of his collection now.
"What…?! What's she doing, hell…?!" Sokka exclaimed, clasping the railings of the Library's topmost floor glancing down at the inferno below before shouting: "AZULA!"
He wouldn't have believed it if he hadn't seen it: a sudden speck of blue in the sea of orange took him by surprise, more so when it continued to increase in size, constantly: was she jetting herself out of the Library's basement?
"She's coming back! Oh, she's actually…!" Katara gasped.
"We need to get out of here!" Aang said, unfolding his glider. "Grab onto the rope, Katara, Sokka, Professor Zei! I'll fly us all out as fast as I can!"
"Oh, but…" the professor hesitated… when there was no time to hesitate at all: Sokka and Katara clasped the rope they'd used earlier, glancing at the man in chagrin. "I won't find another collection like this. I'd much rather stay…"
"Are you kidding me…?!" Sokka exclaimed, but Katara gritted her teeth and urged him to grab onto the rope tight… for Aang was pulling at it already. "Professor Zei! You're going to die if you stay there!"
"Sokka, there's no point…" Katara said, gritting her teeth as they flew off… as the rope dangled before Zei, and he refused to take it.
And it turned out to be a good thing, for by the time Aang, Katara and Sokka had only just reached the exit, Azula was about to catch up to them: half the rope caught fire, and she nearly tore the whole window to shambles when her explosive firebending brought her out of the Library in a hurry.
She tried to ease her fall into the sand, but it wasn't easy. She could hear Sokka calling for her – was he for real? Was he really worried about her…? Oh dear, why was her heart beating that much faster upon that thought…? – but the adrenaline and the excitement over what she'd done was still bursting through her as she landed rather wildly on the sand. It hurt, she was definitely going to bear a few nasty bruises… but she'd be okay. She'd distracted the damn owl, and now…
"Azula!"
Two hands caught her shoulders, and suddenly she was being hugged. Hugged. When the blazes had someone hugged her this tightly, this intimately before?
Surely Katara could tell this was a rather awkward situation for her, as she returned Azula's near-frightened gaze with her own… though Aang wasn't quite so interested in whatever was happening with them. No, he had much bigger concerns in mind, for now that the Library was gone, there was no one but them and Toph in the wide expanse of the desert:
"Where's Appa?"
If she'd decided to bet on it, she would've sooner thought the first member of this strange team to lose its mind and decide to lash out at everyone aggressively would be the damn lemur.
That Aang would be distraught by the loss of his bison wasn't quite that impossible to understand. That he would unleash that frustration upon his friends, though, took Azula by surprise: even goody-two-shoes like him had dark sides, then? And yet he hadn't even asked about whether or not she was okay after her rough landing, disregarding how Sokka had demanded she was kept unshackled before helping her walk through the desert, an arm around her waist, and also disregarding Azula's rejection of Katara's offer for waterbending healing, for the Princess suspected that, without the damn massive hairy creature, they'd be stuck in a desert for eons, and wasting what little water they had on healing a few bruises seemed a bad idea.
And where she had expected Sokka to push her away, now he seemed to be doing the exact opposite. Why? It made no sense. Not that she needed it to, she rather liked being held by him… somewhat. She guessed. It was comfortable. That was all there was to it. Yet their last conversation hadn't been that friendly, and now he seemed to be protecting her with all his might…?
"Are you… alright?" she asked him. Sokka blinked blankly and gazed at her with unexpected shyness. "You're being, well…"
"I'm trying to help. I mean… it's my fault you set the Library on fire," Sokka grimaced. "And then you got hurt. I… I'm sorry."
"Ah? Then going back inside instead of running away when the damn building started to sink was your idea?" Azula said, huffing sarcastically. "Had I known it was you and not Aang I wouldn't have burned anything at all…"
He laughed and shook his head, and she smiled. It was weird… but it felt like they were back on track, suddenly. Maybe they wouldn't become anything else… but this was fine. This worked, for now.
Of course, what was happening with the rest of the team was a whole different story: Toph was riddled with guilt over not being able to stop the sandbenders from stealing Appa, Katara was confused over whatever was brewing between her brother and Azula, but more than that, she was aghast by Aang's terrible mood, too. He had taken to gliding frantically, searching for the bison to no avail. The sandbenders were gone… as was his best friend.
"Katara, can I have some more water?" Toph asked, suddenly. Katara warned her against consuming too much of it, and Azula agreed, silently, despite she accepted the small amount of water Katara offered each of them through her bending.
"Can't be that healthy to drink someone's bending water, huh…?" Sokka reasoned, before making a face of disgust. "Ugh! You used this on the swamp guy!"
"No wonder it tastes swampy," Toph said.
"Well, there's not much I can do about that. We can't find much water around here, can we?" Katara said, gazing around at the endless expanse of desert before them…
"Maybe we can!" Sokka exclaimed suddenly, beaming. "Look!"
He grinned before releasing Azula from his hold just to rush towards a cactus he'd spotted not too far from where they stood. Well, there was water inside plants, why deny that? And yet…
"You shouldn't eat strange plants, Sokka!" Katara told him: Sokka had already taken to slicing the cactus with his weapons, though, offering her a glimpse of the watery interior.
"I know it's not every day this happens… but I agree with Katara for once," Azula said, watching Sokka with uncertainty: Momo had taken to drinking with him, of course… that damn creature was a menace, Azula was certain of it.
"It's very thirst quenching, Azula!" Sokka grinned, motioning at her to approach him. "Come on, it'll do wonders for you, especially after all you bent in the…"
He stopped talking suddenly, only for his body to start reacting rather weirdly to the juice he'd just ingested: his pupils dilated, he shook his head violently, he smiled awkwardly, some of the juice trickled down to his chin…
"Drink cactus juice! It'll quench ya'! It's the quenchiest!"
Both Azula and Katara stared at him in chagrin… while Toph merely raised her eyebrows, entirely confused by what her feet were sensing: was Sokka waggling like a worm on the sand, for some reason…?
"Okay, that's definitely too much for you," said Katara, grimacing. "We have to keep moving on."
"Hey, who lit Toph on fire?" Sokka asked suddenly, before turning towards Azula. "It was YOU?!"
"U-uh, no? I didn't light anything on fire…! In the last, uh, two hours?" Azula said, blinking blankly…
And yet Sokka didn't seem to be all that appalled by the notion of her setting anything on fire. Instead, he was smiling brightly at her, and that only felt more ominous than anything else.
"You know what?!" he exclaimed. "Your fire's WATER TRIBE! Can you believe that, huh, huh?! You're Water Tribe, deep down! I knew that was why I got you so well, eh, eh, Azula?! You're like… wham! And I'm just… whosh! I melt in your hands, girl!"
"You… what? I have absolutely no idea what you're trying to say… and I'm not sure I want to," Azula swallowed hard, as Sokka waved his arms around recklessly.
"Oh, you know what I'm saying! You should marry me!"
The words stunned the three girls, outright. Sokka only smiled carelessly… while the lemur twitched awkwardly behind him. Azula's face was rather red now… and not precisely because of the sunburns a whole day in the desert would result in.
"Y-y-you… that's not a proposal, is it? Or is…?" Azula said, blinking blankly.
"You know what? I want some of that cactus thing," Toph decided, beaming. Katara flinched.
"Not a chance, Toph. I think one love-crazed, cactus-addled weirdo is enough for today…"
"Hey! I'm not in love with any of you, I won't start proposing willy-nilly…"
Azula stared at Sokka again, utterly blown away by their words: in love…? Was Sokka…? No. That wasn't right. That made no sense. That was just a weird joke between friends, wasn't it…? Just as the jokes she'd usually pull on Zuko and Mai back when they were kids…? For they couldn't be serious. Sokka couldn't be serious. The cactus juice was messing with his head… or was it making him more honest than he was before?
Suddenly, a gust of wind, and a rush of sand dust, startled the whole group: they turned towards its source to find it appeared something had exploded deeper in the desert, perhaps, by the pattern of the shifting sand…
"What's that?" Katara asked.
"N-no idea," Azula mumbled, quickly. It was a good idea to change the subject, yes. Weird sand clouds were much more intriguing and important than whether Sokka loved her or not…
"It's a giant mushroom! Maybe it's friendly!"
… Upon hearing those words, Azula's mild suspicions that maybe he was serious about his proposal went up in smoke, vanishing without trace, much as the giant mushroom had.
"Shouldn't have given you that much credit," Azula sighed, looking at Sokka. "Hey. We should get moving. No point in admiring the mushroom anymore."
"Oh! Okay! Let's do something else now!" Sokka decided, beaming.
She didn't foolishly believe she could anticipate to any of Sokka's weird decisions or words while he was in this strange, intoxicated state…
… And yet she never would have expected his new idea would be to kiss her.
Her face flushed red violently, more so when she heard Katara gasping behind her.
"Is he waving at the giant mushroom again…?" Toph asked, but Katara didn't appear to want to respond… not even when Sokka pulled away at last, beaming.
"You taste better than cactus juice!" he declared.
"Y-you…! T-that was my first…!" she exclaimed, blushing madly as she covered her mouth with her hands. "You're…! At the very least you should've had the decency to do that while you were on your right mind!"
"Oh, you didn't like it?" Sokka asked, blinking blankly as he tilted his head sideways. "Must be you need to drink cactus juice too! It's the quenchi-…!"
Azula smacked the small plant bowl he'd held in his hand so far, doing away with the remaining cactus juice, and Sokka gasped, digging at the sand desperately as though searching for the now lost liquid that had leaked through the ground.
"Nooooo! We're dooooomed!" he exclaimed. Despite the situation had been rather strange, Katara laughed softly now, and Azula only rolled her eyes and scowled at the foolish boy she certainly liked far better than she ever should have.
Yet as difficult as it was to navigate the desert for hours with an awkwardly rambling companion such as Sokka, it seemed to Azula his nonsense made the matter livelier, kisses or no… especially when Aang returned. He had been rather unpleasant about collecting water from a cloud that crossed the sky, right under the moon… namely because he had hopelessly thought it was his bison. Yet Azula's attention was caught by something else: Sokka's comment.
"Why would Princess Yue need Appa? She's the moon! She flies by herself!"
She had read reports of what had happened up north. Her father had briefed her of it directly, too. At one point, the moon had been blocked, its influence faded, all because of Admiral Zhao's decisions, apparently… she had thought it was a nonsensical claim, for waterbenders losing their power completely? It sounded like a rather helpful phenomenon, but a confusing one too. How had it come to pass at all…? Especially when it hadn't lasted very long, too: the waterbenders were back on track not long after, and the battle was lost.
According to her father, Admiral Zhao meant to destroy the Moon Spirit that day. Whatever that meant. She had given the matter little credit at the time, but was the Moon Spirit this Princess Yue…?
She resolved to ask Katara once they had a chance to take a light break, upon bumping into a sand glider that Aang helped steer most unwillingly. The waterbender was busy watching the compass, ensuring their course was true, and Azula offered to support her with that, for it was better to talk to someone rational than to talk to Sokka right now…
"What, exactly, happened with this Princess Yue?" she asked. Katara froze, glancing at her warily.
"You're wondering… why, exactly?" she asked.
"He brought up that he lost someone before. He didn't elaborate," Azula explained. "I didn't know what he meant, but… it surprised me a little to hear him talk about the Northern Water Tribe's Princess."
"Well… Sokka had a thing for her," Katara said. Azula damn near cursed herself for feeling disappointed upon hearing those words, even if she already knew them to be true. "But she was supposed to marry someone else? And yeah, I do think she liked him too, but… then she became the moon and there was no way they'd be together anymore."
"She became… the moon?" Azula said, with an awkward grin.
"She explained that she was stillborn," Katara said. "And then the Moon Spirit touched her when she was a baby: it brought her to life or so. When Zhao killed the Moon Spirit, she gave her own life to remediate things… she took the Moon Spirit's place and sacrificed herself to save everyone."
"And… she left Sokka? Just like that?" Azula asked, puzzled. Katara shrugged.
"She had a duty. He understood," Katara said, simply.
A duty. A duty to her people… to fulfill what was expected from her. And in the process, she had surely broken the heart of the boy she liked, even if she had never meant to.
No wonder Sokka had claimed to be ready to let her go even before anything serious started between them, too.
He was still his most carelessly goofy self as they traveled across the desert, but Azula found herself looking at him with different eyes now. How odd that a young man with such heavy burdens could be so reckless and silly when he wanted to… her lips still tingled where he'd kissed them. Ugh, it wasn't something she should be thinking about fondly, of course not… but that he might truly like her was still a most dazzling concept, one she wasn't sure how to cope with yet, let alone now that she understood the true source of his apprehensions.
She ended up finding a way to cope with it by watching over him once they stopped at a massive rock their compass led them to: Sokka claimed he felt better, but upon attempting to taste a gross substance on the wall, Azula decided he simply wasn't recovered yet. She slapped his hand violently and he gasped as she pulled him towards her.
"No eating weird sticky nonsense that's stuck to a cavern's walls!" she growled. He blinked blankly, staring into her eyes with innocent confusion.
"Why not…?" he said.
"Because if that tastes like crap and you kiss me again, I'll set you on fire," Azula declared.
"And I don't think anyone will stop her this time, Sokka," Katara smirked. Toph snickered too as Sokka winced… and yet he found Azula had taken his hand in hers, pulling him through the cavern with her.
"You're just… going to hold my hand now?"
"I can't trust you to behave yourself if I don't," Azula said, curtly, hoping not to betray just how nervous she was about acting this way…
Yet she could see, from the corner of her eyes, when Sokka bit his lip and smiled. Was he happy to hold her hand…? Or was he simply happy that someone was looking after him so closely, protecting him, when he was always the protector…?
She couldn't help but continue defending him once the buzzard wasps attacked: she shielded him with her body, even using her fire to chase away the beasts. Busy as she was ensuring the groggy Sokka wasn't hurt, she couldn't do anything to protect the damn lemur – she KNEW he'd be trouble eventually, damn little thing – when one of the buzzard wasps took him away. Katara was busy serving as Toph's eyes, just as Azula had taken to shielding Sokka herself, so it was Aang who saved him… rather violently too. But when the Avatar and the lemur returned to the team, and the buzzard wasps appeared to gear up to continue their attacks, towers of sand chased away the creatures… and that was when the sandbenders had appeared.
Tired as she was, puzzled by too many things at once, Azula barely paid attention to the exchange, checking on Sokka to ensure he was okay… and then the most terrifying of all moments began when the Avatar lost his temper completely.
This time, however, Sokka took to protecting her: he had seen this before, Azula realized. He collected Toph too, one arm around each of them, and helped them get away from the whirlwind of wild sand, stirred by the savagely furious Avatar. It was a display of power unlike anything Azula had seen, and she could barely take her eyes away from him: he had been so small, so innocent in her eyes, merely twenty-four hours ago… and suddenly he was the most punishing force of nature she had ever witnessed. Suddenly he wasn't just a symbol of everything her father had raised her to defeat, a potentially dangerous bender… no, he was already as dangerous as he pleased. And, as powerful as Fire Lord Ozai was… could he ever go against someone with such unnatural, otherworldly bending and win? Even if he was but a twelve-year-old boy?
Somehow, Katara managed to calm him down, if it could be called that. All the while, Sokka held Azula closely, her face pressed against his chest, his heartbeats reassuring her, despite she was anything but soothed… despite she suddenly found her world had taken yet another tumble on that chaotic, catastrophic day, and she wasn't sure how she'd compose it, or herself, ever again.
Finding water again was so refreshing, and drinking it cleared his mind completely, it seemed to Sokka. Katara was far more cheerful now, though that she decided to jump into the water by doing what she had called a "waterbending bomb" was probably not the best use of her improved mood – she soaked the maps Sokka had stolen from the Library, and she had to dry them under her brother's fierce glare.
All the while, though, one member of their group was unexpectedly aloof… and perhaps self-conscious. She had washed, rinsing off the dirt and dust from days on the road, but she hadn't joined the others at playing in the water. Sokka had expected her to join him in deciding which route to take to Ba Sing Se, where they hoped to find Appa… but so far, nothing. She had never been this distant, and she sat at a distance as a group of refugees, passing through the area, offered them useful information regarding a secret way into Ba Sing Se that the Fire Nation was fully unaware of. Even once they started on their way to Full Moon Bay, she was quiet and distant still, walking at some distance from the rest of the group.
"Say, uh… you two talked a bunch, while I was cactus-juice addled?" Sokka asked his sister casually, once he pulled her away from chatting with the refugees they'd just met. "I think, at least? I don't really remember most of what happened anymore, but…"
"Ah, you're not sure why she's being all that distant and weird now? Probably because you kissed her without permission," Katara declared, beaming. Sokka's jaw dropped. "Not that I know for sure if she's mad about that, but you know… surely doesn't help much, does it?"
"I…! Oh, no. She'll hate me now, won't she?" he groaned. "But… wait, when did I do that, again?"
"At the start? You'd just drank the damn thing and then you said you melted in her hands? You were being really weird about her," Katara said, smirking. Sokka raised an eyebrow in Katara's direction.
"And that… somehow doesn't bother you that much?" he asked. "I thought you didn't like her."
"Well, it's hard not to like the only other person who wasn't completely helpless while we traveled through the desert," Katara sighed. "Besides… I mean, yeah, she wasn't nice at first, and she did chase us, but she's definitely never done anything as bad as Zuko did. She's been with us for a while, she's not chained down anymore, and she's still done nothing to hurt any of us. I don't know, Sokka… maybe she's not that bad."
"I agree," he said, smiling at her. "I… I really think she isn't, either. Though, well, I guess we could be wrong. But the way she helped distract that owl, and she's tried to help keep me safe so many times… it's weird, you know? She jumps in front of me all the time…"
"She probably likes you too, see?" said Katara, smirking. "Which… I guess, from a rational point of view, it might not be a great thing? I mean, I know why you'd be apprehensive, Sokka, and if you think this isn't worth trying it's okay, but… I'd expected worse from the Fire Lord's daughter."
"Yeah… me too," Sokka smiled, glancing at the Princess, who walked far ahead of him and Katara.
"Just… talk to her? I guess?" said Katara, shrugging. "Maybe you still have a shot, somehow."
"Even if I kissed her when I shouldn't have, huh…?" he mused.
There were several reasons why he wasn't all that sure about this… and yet whenever he thought back to the past weeks of being allied with Azula, he couldn't help but feel warmth nestling in his chest. She was something else, wasn't she? And he… he was very much attached to her now, whether it was wise or not. Whether he had tried to push her away or not. And if he ever kissed her again… well, he'd make sure it was the right way, this time around.
He decided to talk to her once they reached the ferry station: Azula had been unusually quiet so far, and he guessed it was time he apologized for the cactus juice mess, anyway.
"Uh… hey, Azula?" he called her, unusually shyly, as they lagged behind at the end of their group: the station was very crowded, but they managed to find the line to request for passports anyway. "I, uh, wanted to say I was sorry for troubling you back in the desert. I didn't mean to, but… I guess I did a lot of things I shouldn't have."
"Oh?" Azula raised her eyebrows, intrigued by his words. "Such as…?"
"W-well… I shouldn't have had cactus juice, for starters," he smiled awkwardly. "And I shouldn't have, well, kissed you without asking…?"
"Without… asking?" Azula repeated. Sokka's face flushed. "So… you think it's fine if you ask?"
"W-well! Only if you say I can, even if I ask. T-that is. Well. I think so?" he said, swallowing hard.
Azula blinked blankly at the taller boy. He was so nervous… so endearing, too. She certainly didn't expect to grow genuinely fond of him, and she had resisted the notion for a while… but she was inevitably interested in him now. And his babbling wasn't helping matters at all.
"Hmm… well. I guess… I'll have to think on that permission, then. Just as that woman seems to be thinking about ours," Azula said, grimacing. "If only this were the Fire Nation, we'd be on a ferry by now just because I'm here…"
"Heh, yeah. No doubt," Sokka smiled awkwardly. "Though… we should try to not let anyone know you're Fire Nation, you know? A lot of people here probably were fleeing the consequences of the war, and if they knew…"
"Ah, true enough. Can you lend me your clothes?"
Sokka froze in place, staring at Azula in disbelief as she smirked teasingly at him. Yet she didn't take her words back.
"I mean… you lent me your sleeping bag before. I suppose your clothes will be smelly too… but no one would assume I'm Fire Nation Royalty if I'm smelly, right?" she said. Sokka's face was redder and redder by the minute.
She couldn't help but laugh as he failed to find words to respond with. Flustered as he was, he stared at her with disbelieving amazement, ignoring that Toph was securing passports for them to cross Full Moon Bay… and also ignoring that someone had walked up to him suddenly.
Azula frowned when the female guard suddenly forced Sokka to turn towards her: she was immediately tempted to jump between them, again finding protective instincts triggered when Sokka was concerned… did that guard think he was a criminal? Did they realize that whatever story Toph had fed the woman at the passport counter was bullshit…?
"Tickets and passports," said the girl. Sokka blinked blankly, inching away from her.
"Uh… I don't have mine right now. Go ask our, uh, team leader? Toph, over there," he said, before turning to Azula again. "Y-you don't really… I mean, if you'd told me you wanted to wear my clothes I would've washed them more thoroughly! We were at that waterfall, it would've been a good idea…"
"I was… messing with you," Azula said, smiling awkwardly: the girl behind Sokka appeared utterly perplexed by how he'd disregarded her words… and by the contents of the ones he was saying to his companion, too. "Is something wrong?"
"U-uh, no, I mean… no," said the girl, smiling dryly. Sokka glanced at her once more and she bit her lip. "You really… don't remember me?"
"… Am I supposed to?" he said, with an awkward smile. "Sorry?"
Azula covered her mouth with a hand, attempting not to laugh too boldly as the guard grimaced and sighed, walking away, defeated by Sokka's apparent forgetfulness. He turned towards Azula again, utterly perplexed.
"I… don't know what that was about," he said. "B-but anyway…!"
"I only hope she's not someone you kissed once too and then proceeded to forget about for no reason," Azula smiled. Sokka scoffed.
"Hell, no! I'm sure I don't know her!" he declared, pouting. "I've never seen that face before!"
And it wasn't a lie, not truly: never seeing Suki without Kyoshi Warrior makeup certainly hadn't prepared him for recognizing her without it – or without stronger clues aside from that confusing teasing.
The mood between Sokka and Azula appeared to make more sense now, although the underlying tension remained: Azula wasn't happy, however, when Aang determined they would give up their comfortable trips on the ferry for the sake of traveling across the dangerous Serpent's Pass with the same refugees from before. Sokka appeared just as miserable about the loss of their tickets and passports… and just as paranoid about the Serpent's Pass once they started to traverse it: at one point rocks nearly crushed them, and he shielded Azula with his body while Toph spared them from the falling rocks.
"Thanks, Toph…" Azula said, trying not to be flustered as Sokka pulled away slightly.
"U-uh… didn't mean to… yeah. Well. You're okay, though… right?" he said, biting his lip. Azula nodded weakly.
"You two need to climb a tree," Toph sighed shaking her head. The two of them shot her a confused glance. "You know? That song, people climb trees and make out there or whatever…?"
"Toph!"
She whistled carelessly as she walked past them, leaving Sokka and Azula flustered before each other. It wasn't enough, of course, that things were slightly awkward between them… their friends, naturally, had to make it worse.
But not a lot could make matters worse for Azula, as things stood. Once they made camp at last, in the middle of the night, she sat gazing into the line of the horizon, where the dark sky and the Mo Ce Sea seemed to merge together. The moon, Yue, as she'd finally come to know, hovered there… perhaps watching. Perhaps wondering if she could be half as good for that boy as she might have been. Perhaps knowing that Azula was plagued by the exact same conflict that had stolen her away from him…
And just thinking about him seemed to summon him: Sokka bit his lip as he took his seat beside her. He cleared his throat awkwardly before finally blurting out the actual words he'd wanted to say all day.
"What's bothering you?"
Azula raised her eyebrows and glanced at him. Awkward as he was, his eyes were full of concern.
"I… just can tell you're not okay. You're really quiet, and… well, I guess maybe it's because of how things turned out at the Library? Maybe it's because you don't want to enter an Earth Kingdom city…"
"There's a lot of reasons why I'm not okay," Azula said, simply, rubbing the bridge of her nose with her fingertips. "But… I guess the moon up there is the bigger one."
"The… moon?" Sokka said, gulping. "Huh… you talked to Katara about Yue, didn't you?"
"I'm not going to be an unreasonable asshole… I won't say that because I fancy you, you should've never had any history with anyone else before you met me," Azula said, with a sad grin. "If that's what you thought, anyway. But… I think once she told me about this, I understood. She's the reason why you tried to push me away in the Library, isn't she?"
"N-not for the reasons you might think," Sokka said, gritting his teeth. "It's not that I… that I don't like you as much as I did her, or anything like that. I just…"
"You don't want to lose anyone else the same way you did her. And you'd lose me, for sure."
Sokka gritted his teeth, his fists tightening. Azula breathed out slowly, gazing at the sky.
"I've gotten too caught up in this weird adventure," she said. "It's… nothing like I'd anticipated my first big mission would turn out. I thought I'd be successful, that I'd catch my brother and uncle, defeat the Avatar, overtake the whole Earth Kingdom singlehandedly… and so far, none of that has happened. Instead… I became a prisoner. And I… ended up befriending my captors, to the point where… where I don't even try to run away despite I'm no longer in chains."
"It wasn't that bad, though, was it?" Sokka asked.
"No. But it will be bad, in the future," she said, gazing at him earnestly. "I don't know what I mean to you… but I do know that I'm not much better than your Princess Yue. My loyalty is for my nation. I… I intend to fight by my father's side. Even if we're friends… even if we're more than that, as soon as I can find anyone trustworthy, I'd double-cross you. And then we'd be back to being enemies. And…"
"And?" Sokka said, his voice sad… though he was immediately alarmed by the chagrin on Azula's face.
"And… your Avatar? He… he's going to kill my father, isn't he?"
The question took Sokka by surprise. His eyes widened… for he had never thought of the Fire Lord as someone's father. As someone anyone genuinely cared about. And yet Azula's anguished face spoke lengths about how much he meant to her.
"It doesn't matter how hard we fight, how we push to win the war… I saw what he did when he lost his temper with those sandbenders," Azula said, gritting her teeth. "Not even with Sozin's Comet's return will we be able to stop him if he's trained enough by then. There's… there's no point, There's no happy ending, you said it yourself. And with him… I'll go down, too."
"N-no! No, Aang would never…!" Sokka started, but he froze: yes, Aang would have to kill Fire Lord Ozai, he had always assumed as much. Defeating him would likely require more than just demanding for his surrender. There was no chance in hell Ozai would step down for less than death… and yet: "He'd never hurt you. He'd never be able to hurt someone who was his friend."
"Not even if that friend is fighting alongside a man who'd do a lot worse to him than steal his sky bison?" Azula asked, eyeing Sokka in disbelief. "On top of that, I… I don't even know how I'll ever… how I'll ever fight you guys, if it comes to that. Any of you. I've learned so much about your skills, your abilities, your strengths and weaknesses… and I don't want to even picture going against you anymore. I…"
"Then don't picture it. Don't oppose us!" Sokka said, reaching for her hands with his. Azula blinked at the contact and gazed at him in confused disbelief. "Look… you don't want your dad to die? I get that. I don't want mine to die either. Granted, the war's not my dad's fault but… never mind, that's not the point! The thing is… Aang is a pacifist. He's a good kid. If it comes to it, maybe he won't want to kill your dad at all, and he'll find another way. We can all find other ways! You… you know him. You know your father better than anyone! If you want things to change, if you don't want us to defeat your nation, then… help us!"
"How does that make any sense…?" Azula asked, Sokka shook his head.
"Work with us," Sokka said. "See the world with us. Understand how many mistakes the Fire Nation made. And then, when we go see the Fire Lord… you can help him see reason. And if he won't? Then… we can try to defeat him without killing him. And you can take his place."
"I… what?!" Azula exclaimed. Her sadness was now replaced by utter disbelief. Sokka smiled awkwardly.
"Look… this is crazy, you and me. Maybe it's… too fast? Though, it was really fast with me and Yue too, so I don't know how to go slow, if anything" he chuckled "But I don't know how I'd fight against you either… not for real. I want you on my team. I want to be in yours. And heck… as big and burly and strong as the Fire Nation has tried to be, if you can tell already that the Avatar is going to overcome everything and bring back balance, what's the point of fighting? Your people will pay the price if the war continues to escalate and if Aang's involved, it will be turned against the Fire Nation eventually, just as it was in the North Pole. There can be a happy ending, Azula, if the war just… ends. If we don't have to go that far to make it stop. Look, I hate your dad… but if you can make him pull back his army and make amends as best he can for all the harm he and his forefathers did, I'd never ask for his death. I wouldn't need it. I don't need him to die, I just… I just need the world to make sense again. I just need a world where people don't have to die like Yue did. A world where… where I wouldn't lose you the way I lost her."
Azula didn't say anything for a moment, despite Sokka was gazing at her intensely, holding her hand as he was. He bit his lip at her silence, unsure of what to do… until she leaned closer, her lips hovering inches from his…
And then she lowered her head, pressing her face to his shoulder instead. Sokka bit his lip as her hand tightened around his, as her eyes closed tightly.
"You don't have to make a choice right away, right now," Sokka whispered, his thumb stroking the back of her hand. "But… you can choose anyway. Whatever Aang says or thinks… as far as I'm concerned, destiny can change if you want it to. If you fight to make it so."
Destiny…? Was that truly what guided them? Was there a force that kept them locked into set decisions and choices… or were they altering the world with each new step they took to oppose what was expected of them?
Azula raised her gaze, finding Sokka still watched her. She gritted her teeth before leaning in far more decisively: her lips brushed his lightly, and this time he kissed her wholeheartedly, no longer in as clumsy and silly a manner as he had while drinking cactus juice. That had still thrilled her when it happened, despite she hadn't wanted to feel giddy about it… but this? His arms held her closer, and her heart was beating so fast she thought it would burst from her chest. She liked this… she liked him. She really liked him.
Maybe she felt something stronger than that, even. For it seemed so did he.
She probably should have been losing her mind about how absurd it was to fall in love with the enemy. About how ridiculous it was to find herself so appealed by a Water Tribesman she had barely known for a few weeks. About how outrageous it would be that the exemplary, ideal Princess Azula had cast everything into the wind, forsaking all notions of being saved, of being found, of being her father's perfect child and heir… but somehow, the heart she had kept in check for so long was beating powerfully anew, filling her very soul with emotions and feelings that floored her. Emotions that she had thought she'd never feel… let alone for someone who embodied everything she should have never loved at all.
And yet that didn't stop her from falling asleep holding his hand that night. It didn't stop her from walking with him the next day, sharing awkward smiles, as she pondered her future some more. As she reasoned that there were so many choices left ahead of her: she could still push him away, if anything compelled her to… she could run away in Ba Sing Se, if she wanted to. Just so… she could stay, if she wanted to.
Granted, things weren't quite so cheerful anymore when the giant serpent attacked. That was quite the disaster: Toph fell into the water, leading both Sokka and Azula to jump in for her and swim her back to safety while Aang and Katara deflected the giant creature's attacks and ensured the refugees got through safely. And then? Then the pregnant one decided it was the ideal time to have her baby. Yes, of course Azula knew that wasn't something anyone just decides on, but she couldn't have picked a worse timing… yet huddling together with Sokka as they dried up after their incursion in the water wasn't the worst thing ever. And while the Avatar had still been somewhat miserable, it seemed he was far happier once Katara finished helping deliver the baby, and things should have moved along better from that point onwards, as they escorted the refugees to the city itself…
Until Aang saw the drill.
She knew what it was as soon as he described it. She knew exactly what was happening: it was a stratagem her father had plotted and concocted from a long time ago, commissioned to the inventor who had taken up refuge in the Northern Air Temple. It was on its way to tear down Ba Sing Se's walls, and it would breach all the way to the Earth Kingdom's Palace if it was uncontested… and it would be. It would be.
It was a won battle already. There was no way the five of them could stop them… and did she even want to stop them?
They climbed the Outer Wall and watched how Earth Kingdom troops were fighting back; the very sight of them told Azula she would have to make her choice far sooner than Sokka had intended her to. He eyed her with uncertainty often, though he didn't reveal his doubts… despite Azula could see in Aang, Katara and Toph's expressions that they were doubting, just as much as he was. It was the first time she had confronted her own nation by their side… and for all they knew, she would turn the fight around and help her nation, instead.
The so-called Terra Team attacked the drill relentlessly, but to no avail: their earthbending would never withstand the drill's might. The tanks that accompanied the drill had been cast away quickly, or so the earthbenders had believed, but they retaliated before long. And while the earthbenders fought fiercely, and defeated some of the firebenders, in the end their resistance amounted to nothing.
"So, the question is…" Aang said. "How are we going to stop that thing?"
All eyes turned towards Sokka, who had been studying the drill intently. He blinked blankly upon sensing he was being watched.
"Why are you all looking at me?" he said, grimacing.
"Because you're the idea guy," Aang answered, quickly.
"Oh, so I'm the only one can come up with a plan?" he retorted.
Well, no, no he wasn't the only one. But no one had asked her yet. And she wondered briefly if no one would.
"Azula?"
It was, of course, Sokka who called her name. He eyed her hopelessly, despite his tone seemed to suggest he clung to some sort of hope, regardless. The others watched him intently, and the Fire Nation Princess waited quietly for him to finish what he was saying.
"Do you know anything about this thing? Anything about how we can defeat it?" Sokka asked. Azula breathed deeply and raised her eyebrows, holding off from answering for almost ten whole, endless seconds:
"I might," she finally said. Sokka's eyes widened as the rest of the group gasped.
"Please, tell us!" Aang said, stepping towards her. "So many people will be in danger if we do nothing… Azula, I know you were our prisoner, but now? You're our friend. Please… help us save Ba Sing Se."
Her fist tightened. She frowned heavily. Cornered, forced to make up her mind, just as she was trying to enjoy the freedom of having a choice… brilliant.
"There's only one way to take down that thing," Azula said, dismissively. "And it's from within. We need to get inside the drill."
"Wait… we?" Sokka said, blinking blankly. Azula huffed, raising her eyebrows.
"Did you think you'd do this without me? That I'd sit out on my own plan?" she asked.
"Well… no. But, you know, you don't really have to join in if you don't want to," said Sokka, swallowing hard. "I know this isn't, well, anything you wanted to do, so…"
"Not like I have much of a choice anymore, do I?" Azula said, bluntly.
She proceeded to explain what she had in mind… and to her surprise, Sokka added his own ideas to her plan just as well. At first, her suggestions seemed to startle the others, for it sounded like a rather risky venture, one that could backfire so easily… and yet there was no other way. They had to trust her… to trust she knew that drill. To trust she wouldn't turn against them, even if her strange stiffness, her sudden distance, suggested she might.
They made their way down the wall again, gathered under a crevice: Toph whipped up a dust cloud and then a tunnel for them to travel through, unseen. Once they reached the drill, Sokka spotted a possible entrance, and Aang helped hoist each of them into the drill until Toph seemed to get cold feet at the last moment, choosing to stay on the ground and fight back from outside the drill instead.
"Okay, so we need the layout of this machine if we're going to figure out the best spots to break," Sokka said, looking around himself. Pipelines ran through the system, powering it, and before long, he settled on breaking one that appeared to be a source of gas rather than any other substance.
"What are you doing?!" Katara exclaimed.
"Someone's going to have to come fix it!" Sokka grinned. "And it'll probably be an engineer. We can just steal the drill's plans from him and be done with it!"
Azula bit her lip as she retreated into a dark corner with the group. Soon enough, an engineer did show up. Katara stepped out into the open…
Only for a sharp kick to her lower back to knock her to the floor.
"Wha…?!" Aang gasped. "KATARA!"
He had no time to respond: a sharp blow to the back of his neck knocked him unconscious just as well.
The last one left, of course, was Sokka. His eyes were wide with hurt, and Azula eyed him apologetically before striking him down too, digging her knee into his stomach.
"What is…?! What?! Princess?!" the engineer exclaimed.
"Ugh. It was about time," she said, rolling her eyes- "Please, help me bring those three to War Minister Qin. Clearly, one can't be captured around here and expect assistance, can they?"
"We heard you were missing in action, but we trusted you'd prevail!" exclaimed the engineer.
"Enough with the pointless excuses!" Azula shouted, freezing the man in place with her harsh words. "We have work to do. That city will be ours."
She glared at Sokka, who squirmed, the only one still conscious, on the floor. He gazed at her pleadingly, but her eyes' sharp, golden steel offered no respite. She had made her choice. She would simply have to figure out if she could live with it.
"You're ALIVE! It's a miracle! You've returned to us, Princess!" War Minister Qin was exclaiming happily, and Sokka would shoot glares at him from the top-most observation deck's floor. His sister and the Avatar, tied beside him against a railing, were doing the same thing, now they were back to their senses. "Oh, the Fire Lord will be thrilled that you are, and that you brought the Avatar with you, too! Today marks a grand victory for our great nation!"
"That it does, War Minister, for sure," Azula declared, languishing carelessly on a throne-like chair that still stank of the War Minister's stale perfume. Of course, the man had been happy to sit here until she had arrived. No doubt, despite all his apparent bliss over her return, he was definitely distraught about having to share his triumph with her. "Are we progressing well so far?"
"Perfectly on schedule, Princess! We should make contact with the outer wall within the next ten minutes!"
"Ten minutes, is it?" she said, raising her eyebrows. "How utterly sluggish and slow is this damn machine that it would take that long? This… this is truly a pathetic strategy. Did that Mechanist design this machine deliberately to stall us?"
"Well…! We have, yes, suspected as much, but… surely that's not the case! And even if it were, we'll keep going, Princess, of course!" said the War Minister.
Azula huffed, raising her chin haughtily.
"Full speed ahead, War Minister."
"F-full…? Well, we are going at the safest speed we can…"
"Full speed, I said!"
"R-right! Yes, Princess!"
It wasn't a good idea, he knew: the system was delicate, despite how sturdy it was from the outside. Any overloading of materials could cause a clog within the machine's drill, and if that happened… oh, her recklessness could doom their whole enterprise. She shouldn't demand for this, but how to say no?
The drill began moving faster, digging up earth from down below to move forward. A sharp glance at the three that sat, gagged and restrained, on the floor… Azula rose to her feet, and the War Minister nearly winced as Azula gestured at the periscope.
"Please, keep watch. Ensure we're headed in the right direction at all times, War Minister."
A rather ridiculous order, and yet again, the War Minister rushed to the periscope and abided by it. All other eyes on the command module were set on their respective tasks, too, for they were busy setting up everything so the Princess's full-speed order would be heeded…
And so, none of them saw the Princess step towards the three captives and burn off their restraints.
It was a rather strange but amusing pandemonium: Aang's airbending took everyone by surprise as he crafted a whirlwind inside the command module. Sokka rushed towards his weapons and Katara's water pouches, which the War Minister had requisitioned: together they took to taking down the rest of the engineers within the room… while Azula had a rather violent firebending showdown with the two Imperial Firebenders within the module, tasked with the protection of their mission. The War Minister screamed desperately, no doubt searching for a place to go… only for Sokka to deliver an uppercut at him, knocking him unconscious right away.
"HA!"
There wasn't too much time to celebrate yet, though: he rushed to help Azula, tossing his boomerang to distract one of the firebenders. The Princess smirked at him, taking the opportunity to deliver a most lethal charged fire blast at the firebender's stomach from the soles of her shoes, after she performed a somersault that left Sokka gaping in wonder at her skill. The next firebender attempted to attack only for Azula to dodge him, trip him with a firebending kick, and leave him for Sokka to finish off with a powerful blow of his club to his helmet, a sure way to knock someone out.
By the time the two main firebenders were done, everyone else was either surrendering or had given up already. And so, Azula made her way to the machines, switching each value to its opposite one as violently as possible, both to ensure the drill would either collapse fully or at least move in the wholly opposite direction.
"We did it! We stopped the drill!" Aang exclaimed, hugging Katara excitedly.
"And it didn't even reach the Outer Wall!" Sokka said, beaming brightly as he helped Azula with busting the machine. "Princess, your plan was GENIUS!"
It wasn't long before some loud explosion resounded through the mechanism: of course, so many careless commands would eventually be too many for the machine. It would break down – without exploding, hopefully – and it would be out of commission for good, as long as the Earth Kingdom's authorities took the machine and dissembled it safely…
Azula released a deep breath before turning to smile at Sokka. He stood beside her, grinning just as brightly as he had when he had been intoxicated… though far more earnestly, this time.
"I was sent to hunt down a traitor and a failure…" she said. "And I guess I'm the traitor now, huh?"
"Definitely not the other thing, though," Sokka said, beaming. "I always knew you were the best your dad could send after us! Look at this! You tore them down in one go! This was…! You're just…! Hell, I…"
"You have something to say, yes?" Azula asked, amused. "Are you going to sing praises about me? Declare me the greatest being that ever lived? Or perhaps will you say embarrassing things such as 'I melt in your hands' once again?"
"Y-yeah, well…" he chuckled, his hands on her shoulders. "You know what? Yes, I can say I definitely melt in your firebending hands, Azula. Especially after today. I know what this means to you. I know how much you're sacrificing for, well… us. But I think… or rather, I hope? That it'll turn out okay in the end?"
"I sure hope so too. Because if not, you'll have to refund me for all this faith I'm putting in you," Azula said, pointing at him and pressing her index finger to his chest. Sokka chuckled, lowering his gaze. "Make sure I won't regret this, alright? Tall, warrior boy?"
"I can think of an idea or two to achieve that, dangerous, beautiful Princess," he grinned.
His brow pressed against hers just before he kissed her, fully. Aang blinked blankly as he watched them – as did the conscious crew members of the drill, gaping in utter disbelief at their Princess's shameless behavior: wasn't she supposed to be the good kid, as opposed to her brother?
"Woah," Aang managed, but Katara laughed beside him, tugging him away, towards the people they'd have to keep watch over.
"Come on, it's not polite to stare," she said.
"You're taking this way too well, huh?" Aang grinned. Katara shrugged.
"What can I say? I guess she grew on me, just a little," she smiled. "Besides… this way you'll have a firebending teacher, right?"
"And she'll be the best teacher ever!" Sokka declared, revealing he and Azula had stopped kissing by then, though his arm remained wrapped around her shoulders. She gasped.
"Hey! I never did say I'd do that, did I?" she asked. Sokka laughed and shrugged.
"And why wouldn't you?" he said. "It'll be fun!"
Azula groaned and shook her head, though she smiled as her friends laughed together. Her friends… new friends, who hadn't wanted her for her title, her position, her privilege. Friends who had shared their meals, even their bedding with her, who had worried about her, who had protected her… and whom she had protected, just as well. It was a strange sensation, one she wasn't sure she had ever felt before… but as she stood there, an arm wrapped around Sokka's waist, watching his most goofy, cheerful grin, Azula guessed she melted in his hands just as well, for this was exactly where she wanted to be.
"So… do you really think Zuko is going to be somewhere around here?" Ty Lee asked, nonchalantly, at Mai. "Maybe we really should've gone back to find Azula… she would've tracked him easier than us."
"We had the beasts, she had nothing. If she didn't come back to us, it's because she couldn't. There's no reason to think she would've done any better than we have," Mai sighed.
The damn ferry station was a pain: she and Ty Lee had secured outfits to blend in as Earth Kingdom, dreary colorful stuff she would never wear if she could help it. Then, they'd tracked down two people and with her knives, threatened them out of their passports and tickets. They had raced away, crying… and Ty Lee had certainly seemed sorry for it, but Mai wasn't too bothered about the matter. Surely Azula would've done worse to people if she'd wanted what she didn't have, right?
But the damnable ferry just wouldn't arrive, would it? The sooner they reached that damn huge city, the sooner she'd be close to tracking down Zuko…
"Uh… huh? Mai! Mai!"
Mai's eyes drifted towards the direction Ty Lee was pointing at: the passports lady was speaking to two newcomers: a short, balding man with a silver beard… and a young man with dark hair, and a rather violent scar across his face.
"You… you figured it out! You found him!" Ty Lee exclaimed, beaming. "Aww! This is soooo romantic!"
Despite the discomfort of the situation hadn't decreased in the least, Mai smiled: maybe this ferry station wasn't so bad, after all.
#sokkla saturdays#sokklasaturday#sokkla#sokka#azula#what is wrong with me#why are these getting longer and longer#send help#... now then as for what's going on in this one?#Azula in Team Avatar AU :')#an idea from a thousand years ago#finally implemented because why the heck not#it started as an inverse capture fic#and now here we are#:'D#... also sorry @ Suki for this one#but#the odds were against you#*shrug*
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Wild and Sensational Romance: 6 Reasons to Binge-Watch C-Drama “The Wolf”
Dec 17, 2020
Source: www.soompi.com
“The Wolf” is a costume and romance drama starring Li Qin as Ma Zhai Xing, a government official’s daughter who befriends a wolf-raised boy (Darren Wang) in her teenage years and is forced to quit contact with him due to a political conspiracy. Eight years later, she meets the boy again, but only to find that he has become Prince Bo, the royal prince working for the King. Their love-hate relationship is intensified by the appearance of bounty hunter Ji Chong (Xiao Zhan). Struggling between self-consciousness, power, and loyalty, the two are inevitably involved into a battle to defend their deep-rooted love.
“The Wolf” has attracted wide interest and discussion since its premiere. Here are a few reasons why.
A perfectly chosen male lead
The first male lead—the wolf boy and later Prince Bo—is played by Darren Wang. He’s a very dynamic character who grows through interactions with the human world and an exploration of his inner self. Although it’s Darren Wang’s first costume role, he has done an incredibly good job, especially in acting out the two very different personalities of the innocent wolf boy and the ruthless Prince Bo. In showing the mixed images of wildness and tender human touch, Darren Wang is arguably the best choice!
A charismatic female lead
Clever, brave, and caring, the female lead Ma Zhai Xing is the kind of girl we can easily warm up to. As a teenager, she believes in the wolf boy’s natural kindness and potential to be a good person. It would have been a little flat to have a female lead who’s only cute and smart throughout the show like in many other dramas. Thankfully, her layered charm begins to shine through as the story unfolds. Driven by a sense of justice and responsibility, Ma Zhai Xing grows into an independent woman who’s not afraid to speak up for herself and fight for what is right, which is a respectable trait.
Li Qin, who plays this role, draws the audience closer to the character with extraordinary acting. There are many scenes where every emotion she’s executing can be felt and related to. Her phenomenal acting can also be found in costume dramas “The Song of Glory” and “Joy of Life.”
An attention-grabbing second male lead
Xiao Zhan in this drama brings us lots of surprises. Ji Chong, the role he played, is a bounty hunter with a free and righteous soul. His romantic affection towards Ma Zhai Xing is very obvious, and he is constantly and unrequitedly in want of confirmation from his beloved. This character requires enormous emotional input from the actor, and Xiao Zhan delivered. The actor’s distinctive charms also stand out in his more masculine looks—different from his image in “The Untamed,” but equally eye-catching and enjoyable. His potential in playing villain-like characters is a real bonus for fans of old and new.
“Wild boys” tamed for love
Romance that blooms from human girls taming wild-raised boys is becoming a classic sub-genre with works like “A Werewolf Boy” having us rethinking the power of love and humanity. “The Wolf” adds another breathtaking story to this collection and keeps the audience wondering whether this wolf boy, after being tamed as human, will be finally tamed to give and receive love.
In addition to the wolf boy, this drama has one more “wild boy” that captures our attention—Ji Chong. His transformation after meeting Ma Zhai Xing can be explained by nothing but his deepened emotional bond with her.
Refreshing OST
The soundtrack contained in this drama is another point worth mentioning. The drama was filmed three years ago, but the songs feel refreshing and totally in pace with the times. Taiwanese singer Jolin Tsai, also known as the “Queen of C-pop,” sings three songs, including the opening theme “Who Am I”. The melodious singing keeps bringing back precious moments of the ill-fated couple.
Gorgeous scenery
The only element that may distract you from the storyline is probably the scenery. The astounding plateau landscape is not made from special effects. It was shot at Shangri-La City in Yunnan, China even though it’s pretty rare for drama production teams to do so due to issues with cost and time.
When they filmed there, the actors and the production team were challenged by the harsh natural conditions, but with dedication, they were finally able to present us with this visual feast that goes far beyond expectations.
With a classic setting plus good acting, a captivating plot, and high-quality production, this show will definitely give you all the feels you need!
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What are the benefits of eating healthy?
A healthy diet usually includes nutrient-dense foods from all significant food teams, including lean proteins, entire grains, healthy fats, as well as vegetables and fruits of lots of shades.
Healthy eating additionally implies replacing foods which contain trans fats, added salt, and sugar with more healthy choices.
Complying with a healthy diet has lots of health and wellness advantages, including structure strong bones, safeguarding the heart, protecting against condition, and also improving mood.
This write-up takes a look at the leading 10 advantages of a healthful diet plan, and also the evidence behind them.
1. Heart health and wellness
According to the Centers for Illness Control as well as Avoidance (CDC) Relied on Source, heart disease is the leading cause of death for grownups in the United States.
The American Heart Organization (AHA) state that virtually half of UNITED STATE adults live with some form of heart disease.
Hypertension, or high blood pressure, is a growing problem in the U.S. The problem may result in cardiac arrest, cardiac arrest, and also stroke.
Some resources report that it is possible to stop up to 80% of premature cardiovascular disease and also stroke medical diagnoses with lifestyle modifications, such as boosting physical activity as well as healthful consuming.
The foods people consume may lower their blood pressure and also aid maintain their heart healthy.
The dietary methods to stop hypertension diet plan, known as the DASH diet, includes lots of healthful foods for the heart. The program recommends the following:
consuming lots of veggies, fruits, as well as entire grains
selecting fat-free or low fat dairy items, fish, poultry, beans, nuts, as well as veggie oils
restricting saturated and also trans fat intake, such as fatty meats and full-fat dairy products
restricting drinks and also foods that contain sugarcoated
restricting sodium intake to less than 2,300 milligrams per day-- ideally 1,500 mg daily-- and also boosting consumption of potassium, magnesium, as well as calcium
High fiber foods are also critical for keeping the heart healthy and balanced.
The AHA state that nutritional fiber assists improve blood cholesterol as well as decreases the risk of heart disease, stroke, obesity, and type 2 diabetes.
The medical community has actually long recognized the link between trans fats and heart-related diseases, such as coronary heart problem.
Limiting particular types of fats may additionally improve heart wellness. For example, getting rid of trans fats lowers the levels of low-density lipoprotein cholesterol. This sort of cholesterol triggers plaque to gather within the arteries, enhancing the danger of cardiovascular disease as well as stroke.
Lowering blood pressure may also promote heart health and wellness. A person may accomplish this by limiting their salt intake to no more than 1,500 milligrams per day.
Food makers add salt to numerous refined and also instant foods, as well as a person who desires to lower their high blood pressure need to avoid these items.
2. Minimized illness risk
Consuming foods that contain anti-oxidants may decrease a person's danger of establishing toxic cells by safeguarding cells from damage.
The presence of complimentary radicals in the body raises the risk of illnesses, but antioxidants may help remove them to lower the probability of this condition.
Several phytochemicals located in fruits, veggies, nuts, and vegetables work as anti-oxidants, including beta-carotene, lycopene, as well as vitamins A, C, as well as E.
According to the National Institute, though humans trials are undetermined, there are laboratory and pet researches that link certain anti-oxidants to a decreased incidence of complimentary extreme damage.
Foods high in antioxidants include:
berries such as blueberries as well as raspberries
dark leafy eco-friendlies
pumpkin and carrots
nuts and also seeds
Having weight problems might increase a person's danger of creating illness and also related to poorer end results. Maintaining a modest weight may minimize these risks.
In a 2014 study, researchers located that a diet plan abundant in fruits reduced the risk of upper stomach tract illness.
They likewise located that a diet regimen abundant in vegetables, fruits, and also fiber decreased the threat of colon cancer cells, while a diet abundant in fiber lowers the risk of liver bad cells.
3. Much finer state of mind
Some evidence suggests a close relationship between diet plan as well as state of mind.
In 2016, scientists discovered that diet regimens with a high glycemic load may cause increased symptoms of clinical depression and also tiredness.
A diet with a high glycemic load includes lots of polished carbs, such as those discovered in soft drinks, cakes, white bread, as well as biscuits. Veggies, entire fruit, as well as whole grains have a lower glycemic tons.
If an individual believes they have signs of depression, speaking to a doctor or psychological health professional may aid.
4. Boosted digestive tract health and wellness
The colon has plenty of naturally occurring bacteria, which play important functions in metabolism and also food digestion.
Particular pressures of germs additionally produce vitamins K and B, which profit the colon. These pressures likewise may help battle hazardous bacteria and also viruses.
A diet plan low in fiber and also high in sugar and also fat changes the intestine microbiome, enhancing swelling in the location.
Nonetheless, a diet regimen abundant in vegetables, fruits, legumes, and entire grains provides a mix of prebiotics as well as probiotics that assist good germs thrive in the colon.
These fermented foods are rich in probiotics:
yogurt
kimchi
sauerkraut
miso
kefir
Fiber is a briskly accessible prebiotic as well as is bountiful in beans, grains, fruits, and also vegetables. It also promotes routine defecation, which may aid prevent digestive tract illnesses as well as diverticulitis.
5. Boosted memory
A healthy diet plan may assist maintain cognition as well as brain health and wellness.
A 2015 research identified nutrients and also foods that shield against cognitive decrease and mental deterioration. The researchers discovered the complying with to be valuable:
vitamin D, vitamin C, as well as vitamin E.
omega-3 fatty acids.
flavonoids and also polyphenols.
fish.
Among other diet regimens, the Mediterranean diet regimen includes most of these nutrients.
6. Weight reduction.
Preserving a modest weight may help in reducing the risk of persistent wellness issues. Having obese or excessive weight are threat factors for a number of problems, including:.
cardiovascular disease.
kind 2 diabetes.
poor bone density.
Lots of healthful foods, including vegetables, fruits, as well as beans, are reduced in calories than many refined foods.
An individual may identify their calorie needs making use of support from the Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2015-- 2020.
Preserving a healthful diet plan free from refined foods may aid a person keep within their day-to-day restriction without keeping track of calorie consumption.
Nutritional fiber is certainly vital for managing weight. Plant-based foods contain plenty of dietary fiber, which aids control appetite by making individuals really feel fuller for longer.
In 2018, scientists found that a diet rich in fiber and lean proteins take to weight-loss without the need for keeping an eye on calorie consumption.
7. Diabetic issues management.
A healthful diet regimen may aid a person with diabetic issues in:.
handling blood glucose degrees.
maintaining blood pressure and also cholesterol within target arrays.
avoiding or delaying complications of diabetes.
keeping a modest weight.
It is vital for people with diabetes mellitus to restrict their intake of foods with added sugar and also salt. They must also consider staying clear of deep-fried foods high in saturated and trans fats.
8. Solid bones as well as teeth.
A diet plan with ample calcium and also magnesium is essential for solid bones and teeth. Maintaining the bones healthy may minimize the risk of bone concerns later in life, such as weakening of bones.
The adhering to foods are abundant in calcium:.
low fat milk products.
broccoli.
cauliflower.
cabbage.
tinned fish with bones.
tofu.
legumes.
Food producers typically fortify grains and also plant-based milks with calcium.
Magnesium is abundant in many foods, and also a few of the very most resources consist of leafed eco-friendly vegetables, nuts, seeds, and also entire grains.
9. Getting a good night's sleep.
A range of aspects, consisting of rest apnea, may interrupt rest patterns.
Rest apnea happens when the respiratory tracts repetitively end up being obstructed throughout rest. Risk factors consist of excessive weight, alcohol consumption alcohol, and also consuming an unhealthy diet plan.
Minimizing alcohol and also caffeine intake can aid a person gain relaxed sleep, whether they have rest apnea or not.
10. The health of the future generation.
Youngsters find out most health-related habits from the adults around them, and also parents that design healthful eating and workout habits have a tendency to pass these on.
Eating in your home might also assist. In 2018, scientists located that youngsters that regularly ate meals with their families eaten much more vegetables as well as less sugary foods than their peers who ate at house less often.
In addition, youngsters who participate in gardening and also cooking in the house might be more likely to make healthy dietary and also way of living selections.
Brief suggestions for a healthful diet regimen.
There are plenty of little, favorable means to boost diet plan, including:.
exchanging sodas for water and also natural tea.
consuming no meat for at the very least 1 day a week.
ensuring each dish contains around 50% fresh fruit and vegetables.
exchanging cow's milk for plant-based milk.
eating entire fruits rather than juices, which include less fiber and often consist of added sugar.
avoiding refined meats, which are high in salt as well as may enhance the risk of colon bad cells.
consuming extra lean protein, which people may find in eggs, tofu, fish, and nuts.
A person may likewise gain from taking a food preparation course, as well as learning just how to incorporate even more vegetables into dishes.
Summary.
Healthful consuming has lots of health advantages, such as minimizing the threat of heart disease, stroke, weight problems, as well as kind 2 diabetes mellitus. It may likewise enhance an individual's state of mind and give them with even more power.
A medical professional or dietitian can supply pointers on eating a much more healthy diet regimen.
Source: What are the benefits of eating healthy?
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AU-gust 2020 Prompts
Masterlist
23. Arranged Marriage - Charles/Shaw, Cherik
A remix of my fic Tribute to the Horde, where instead of an arranged marriage with Erik, Charles is set to marry Chieftain Shaw with Erik being one of his Generals. I’ve been inspired recently by some really great remixes of this story, and it got me thinking enough about this verse that this decided to come out lol.
(Dubcon as per the original story, though there’s nothing explicit in this ficlet sorry.)
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Erik is just finishing his noon meal when Shaw comes to collect him, steering them both in the direction of the Chieftain’s tent. He sets a brisk pace, ignoring various greetings and well wishes along the way, leaving Erik to acknowledge them all with a quick nod of his head. The urgency isn’t surprising, as he knows what awaits them in Shaw’s quarters; Erik just doesn’t know what he’s doing here, hours before the ceremony’s planned start.
After all, Erik - and the other Generals Azazel and Emma - have already greeted Westchester’s Prince upon his arrival to the encampment, and accorded him the full honor of a proper Genoshan welcome.
It’s more than Shaw cared to arrange for his soon-to-be mate, leaving it to his Generals to make the choice to do so – or not – on their own.
“So, what do you think of Westchester’s tribute, Erik?” Shaw asks, as they make the way up the incline, Erik following after his adoptive father into the main living area of his lodging. The prince is taking tea with Hank, and smiling a little as they converse in his native tongue, though his expression closes off the moment he and Shaw enter the room. “Is he worth as much as the Markos say? I wonder at their claim; that he remains a virgin yet, at the ripe age of seventeen. A pretty thing like him…I find it hard to believe that father and son have never had him together on his hands and knees.”
Hank flushes a deep red, coughing uncomfortably at the blatant disrespect, though Shaw merely smiles indulgently at the Prince and presses a light kiss to his hand. Quick introductions are made, which Hank translates for the two parties, no doubt ameliorating Shaw’s boorishness with pretty if meaningless words. It’s disingenuous, Erik thinks, to let the boy think Shaw is capable of decency or kindness; better to let him know Shaw as he is without any pretence from the start.
“Ask him if he’s really a virgin still,” Shaw orders, still wearing his most charming smile.
Deeply mortified, but forced to comply, Hank relays the question with a few hastily muttered words. It has an instant effect on their guest – as Shaw undoubtedly intended – with the Prince’s face turning red and thunderous as he snaps a brisk, unhappy retort.
“His Highness wants to assure you that his virginity is intact,” Hank says, “and that his people would not dishonor the treaty between Westchester and Genosha with any deceit.”
Erik scoffs. Shaw thinks very little of the treaty he signed with the Markos, viewing them merely as puppets to be threatened and kept under control. The reason the Genoshans haven’t conquered Westchester is entirely for their own benefit, and Shaw’s; because it’s much easier to demand tribute than take on the governance of an entire kingdom full of people.
“That’s good to hear,” Shaw says gleefully, even though Genoshans place no special value to a person’s virginity, unlike what he knows about Westchester tradition. Erik has lived long enough in Shaw’s shadow to know it’s purely about the man’s own pleasure and amusement; his delight in getting a mate he can mold to satisfy his every desire and whim. “You may leave us now, Hank.”
“But he doesn’t—”
Shaw cuts him off with a wave of his hand. “The Prince needs his rest now, before the ceremony begins. We won’t be needing your translation services, Hank, until tomorrow at the earliest.”
To Erik’s surprise, Hank looks ready to argue with Shaw, no doubt to advocate for the Prince and ensure his understanding of their customs. It is a kindness, he knows, that would only anger their Chieftain, and Erik shoots him a warning glare before he can make things worse for himself and for Charles.
Resigned, Hank bows his head to Shaw and says a quick farewell to Charles before exiting the tent.
“Now, let us take a better look at our prize, shall we dear boy? A preview of what the evening will bring?”
“I don’t think—”
Ignoring him, Shaw takes the Prince by the elbow, and gently but firmly pushes him beyond the tent flap and into the inner bed chamber. Startled, and clearly a little frightened of being alone with two alphas, Charles follows only reluctantly as he’s guided to a spot beside Shaw’s fur covered bed.
“You are very beautiful,” the Chieftain murmurs, brushing his hand against the Prince’s cheek, making him blush as he leans close and inhales the sweet omega scent. “I wonder…will you cry the first time I knot you, pretty one? Or will you beg me to fuck you harder with those red, red lips?”
Though he can’t understand a word being said, Shaw’s intent is abundantly clear, and yet Charles doesn’t flinch or try to pull away from his grasp. Instead he takes a deep breath and steels himself, his expression a mixture of resignation and defiance, and Erik can’t help but agree with Shaw that he’s never seen anything more beautiful than Westchester’s tribute to the Horde.
And when Shaw reaches for Charles’ collar, and rips the whisper thin robe clean off his body, Erik finds that he cannot stop staring; cannot stop devouring all that silky flesh and longing to run his fingers along every inch of smooth, unblemished skin.
He does not have to be told, to use his powers and remove the hideous chastity belt, and then sliding the plug out of him with a soft, wet schlick.
Charles opens his mouth a little and shudders, but remains standing dutifully in place.
“Come now, my boy,” Shaw cajoles, as he runs his hand slowly down the curve of Charles’ back to the slope of his buttocks, pinching and prodding and making him gasp. “By tradition, the princeling will be my mate yes. But I am quite happy to share with you, and the others, so we may all enjoy this endless bounty.”
“You would let us…beyond the ceremony? But the people—”
“What will the people care,” Shaw scoffs, as he rubs a finger along the rim of Charles’ entrance, making him whimper when he slots the entire length in, “as long as the Bearer gives us plentiful heirs? He’s an omega, Erik, made for pleasure and for breeding. It would be a waste not to share him with the most trusted of my clan.”
To bribe them, his Generals, and keep them in line, though Erik can’t deny that the Prince is a very tempting and generous incentive.
“We must do this properly, and wait for the bonding ceremony,” he hears himself say. “I won’t dishonor his place amongst our people by denying him a public mounting.”
Shaw grins, as he tugs Charles down and onto the furs, soothing him with light touches and a tender kiss on the brow. “Yes, we will wait to mount him properly at the feast, as is his right. But there are other things we can do now, my boy, to make his first time that much easier…for his sake.”
Looking down at the omega spread before him like a feast, Erik can only nod, and push his own finger in to join Shaw’s inside that delectably tight passage. “For his sake, yes, we should help as much as we can.”
#gerec writes#cherik#charles/shaw#arranged marriage au#day 23#au-gust 2020#august writing challenge#tribute to the horde au
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HAPPY 2020s ENDING Y’ALL!!!
Enjoy a little blog-exclusive Shades AU that I affectionately refer to as the No Jedi Allowed AU, feat. everybody’s favorite prequel-era Mandalorian bounty hunter.
Sometime this last summer, while trying to work past writer’s block, I toyed with a little AU idea for funsies, I made a post about it, said I wasn’t going to do anything else with it, and left it at that. Until a month or two ago when, still in the throes of writer’s block, I took that little AU idea and figured “fuck it, I’m not working on the next chapter, but at least it’s writing SOMETHING Shades related” and made a real thing out of it.
This is Part 1. Future parts will come out at some point in the future, I’m thinking about making these a holiday special or something haven’t decided yet. (And really it’s only blog-exclusive because I cannot make a series on AO3 and remain anonymous so...)
Enough rambling. Please read, I hope you all enjoy this look at how things might have gone a little differently if a couple Jedi didn’t end up going all the way out to Tatooine to stick their noses into Hutt business.
Please assume content warnings given on AO3 may apply to this story as well. Also, beware spoilers if you are not fully caught up on the main story.
No Jedi Allowed AU - Part 1
Jango Fett heaved a long sigh as the door closed behind him. He had just finished up a long job for Jabba, one that should have been quick but ended up requiring well over a week of stake outs and reconnaissance, but in the end he got his man, as he always did. Jabba had at least expressed his gratitude suitably, in money and amenities. He had given Jango one of the better guest suites and was probably going to send up one of his better girls for a night of entertainment.
Jango began shedding his armor, considering what he would do with the slave girl. He really didn't have the energy to draw anything out. He hoped it wasn't going to be a new girl, explaining how things work was more effort than he cared to expend. Really he just wanted a shower and to sleep, but he wasn't about to leave his stuff unattended with a stranger on the way.
There was a light rap on the door.
"Enter."
The slave entered pushing a dinner cart. Jango breathed a sigh of relief. "Skywalker, nice to see you again."
She flashed him a small smile. "Been a while, hasn't it, Jango?" She paused just over the threshold and let the door lock behind her. "The usual tonight?"
"Sure." He finished removing his armor and set it aside carefully aside. "Get yourself ready, I'm hitting the shower first."
He stepped into the 'fresher, leaving Skywalker alone. Ten minutes later, he was stepping back out, with the provided robe draped around him. His clothes were a little rank, and the quick rinse he gave them in the shower wasn't enough to really clean them. They'd get a proper wash when he got home.
Skywalker had set up dinner, laying out the food and drink from the cart on the little dining table for him. She was perched at the holotable, flipping through the selection of games. There weren’t many games, as most visitors to a Hutt pleasure den were usually otherwise occupied in their rooms, or wanted to watch porn.
"How's dejarik sound? I'm not feeling anything particularly strenuous tonight."
"Fine." Jango sat down in the free seat. He grabbed the complimentary bottle of liquor and poured himself a healthy glass. He offered Skywalker a drink, but she declined. She did pick at the fruit he offered to share. There was always more food than he could eat, and he knew the slaves didn’t get fed nearly as well as guests.
She made the first move on the dejarik board. "How's Boba?"
They fell into comfortable conversation about Boba, about Skywalker's sister, about the recently finished racing season – Jango congratulated Skywalker on another victorious season. They played a few lackluster games of dejarik. That was a bit unusual, Skywalker was a worthy opponent, and she didn’t usually lose more than once or twice.
He beat her soundly for the fourth time in a row, the board resent, his turn to make the first move, but instead he checked the time. "I think I'm going to turn in. It's late enough."
"Yeah," she agreed distractedly. She fiddled with the edge of the gauzy white shawl wrapped around her. She looked pale, uneasy.
Jango gave her another critical, searching look. Her behavior was odd enough, was she supposed to be spying on him? Bribe him, coerce him, assassinate him? He knew Jabba wasn’t opposed to taking out a troublesome being with some poison served by a pretty face, but Jango hadn’t done anything to offend his second-best employer recently. The Hutt had no reason to want him dead, or otherwise intimidated.
Maybe Skywalker was just having an off day, or dealing with some other problem. He wasn’t going to ask. Wasn’t his business.
Her outfit tonight was white and copper, paper-thin linen wrapped in layers to be made suitably opaque, with copper metal accents to draw the eye and match the heavy collar around her neck. It was one of her softer, looser costumes. Aside from looking pale and anxious, Skywalker looked pretty good, a little softer, better fed. Jabba kept his slaves starved and stick thin, save for a few exceptions for the fetishists. This was a change, but not a poor one. Maybe Skywalker was being treated better after another successful racing season.
He turned off the holotable and stood up to stretch. The bed was looking very comfortable, and he wanted to get out of here early tomorrow morning.
Skywalker didn't move. "Jango, I need your help."
He fell still. This was a first, she had never asked for his help before. He'd taught her a few tricks to defend herself against handsy patrons who hadn't paid for the privilege to touch her. Maybe someone was a little more aggressive than she could handle. But Jabba had enforcers on staff whose job it was to take care of people like that. There wasn't anything else he could do for her. She had nothing to ask him to smuggle of planet, and there probably wasn't anything she knew of that he could bring to her. Which meant she was about to ask him to do something very stupid and probably impossible.
"What is it?"
She turned her wide blue eyes to him, her lower lip was caught between her teeth, and she worried it as she considered her next words. He could read her indecision clear in her face. His heart sank. If she was so afraid to even say the words, it couldn't be anything good.
"I need you to free me and my sister."
Jango actually laughed, a single, dry bark. "You're joking." She wasn't. "You want me to steal you from the Hutts? Never gonna happen. Jabba would kill us both for just considering it."
She didn't seem particularly disappointed with his rejection. She implored, "Please, Jango, you're our only hope for freedom."
"No. No way." Even if he wanted to, Jango wouldn't risk earning Jabba's ire, no matter how much he liked Skywalker.
Yes, he felt sorry for Skywalker and her little sister. Being born slaves was unfortunate, but it was their rotten luck that they ended up being owned by Jabba the Hutt. If anyone touched Jabba's property, or thought they could steal from him, they were dead already. Jango had been hired several times to bring in a bounty on someone who had done exactly that. He was not going to put himself on Jabba's shit list.
"I'm pregnant!" she blurted out. "Please, Jango, I can't let my baby be born a slave too." She shifted her arms, removing the shawl from around her waist, and there was the unmistakable roundness to her belly. "I don't even know if Jabba will let me keep my baby."
Jango sighed heavily. "He let you keep your sister."
"Because I didn't give birth to her, because he needed leverage over me after my mom died." She drew a shaking breath; he could see tears gathering in her frightened eyes. "He hasn't even made up his mind on whether he'll let me have the baby. Any day now he could take them from me if it stops me from being able to serve. He'll cut the baby out of me, he'll kill them. And if I do get to have them, then what? He'll steal them from my arms, or just use them like he uses Shila. Please, Jango, I can't go on like this. I want my baby to live. I want to raise them. I want Shila to grow up and know what freedom is."
Jango didn't move, didn't speak, his eyes stayed on Skywalker. His brain was already picking at the idea; it wouldn't be too difficult to – no! He was not about to ruin his career and risk his life for a pregnant slave girl, it's not like the baby was his. What stake did he have at all in Skywalker's future? None! If he tried helping her and they got caught, Boba would be left fatherless. The boy might never know what became of his father. But Anakin... she was the victim of her circumstances. Her little sister and her unborn baby were innocent of the whole matter. They were just slaves.
It wasn't like Jango was opposed to slavery, it was a lucrative evil for the dark corners of the galaxy, and it kept him paid, fed, and employed. He was a mercenary; he wasn't a saint, or even really a good person. Killing was never personal, it was for the job, but he still had a code of honor. And abandoning Skywalker after she asked for his help, after she had exposed herself to be in such a vulnerable position… that was breaking his code.
Would he be able to live with himself if he left her here to her fate? If Jabba stole her child, would he ever be able to look her in the eye again? And Boba... was this the kind of example he wanted to set for his son? Disregarding the lives of children and babies because he didn’t want to risk his own neck. Shameful. Dishonorable. No true Mandalorian would sacrifice a child’s life for their own comfort.
"Ossik," Jango hissed under his breath, dropping back into his seat. "Okay. Fine. I'll get you out of here."
X
Freeing Skywalker and her little sister was easier than Jango suspected it would have been. Granted it was easy for him to go where he needed in the palace, and nobody looked at him twice. He met Shila Skywalker, the little ad'ika he had heard so much about from her older sister. It was clear they were family, they shared the same face, but where Anakin was fair haired and blue-eyed, Shila was dark haired and brown-eyed. Reportedly she looked like their mother, Shmi, but Jango had never met the woman. Shila was young, only three years old, and she was quiet and shy, and frightened of Jango; a fact that was not helped at all when Jango had to cut the slave chip out of the child's stomach. It was just beneath the skin, and he didn't have to cut deep, so he was able to be very quick about it, but it still had to be done without pain killers.
It hadn’t been pleasant or fun for any involved. Skywalker had to hold the child down, keeping her hand pressed over Shila’s mouth to muffle the screams. But Jango had been the one with the knife. It would probably be some time before the child trusted him.
She flinched away from him with a whimper, hiding her face in her sister’s shoulder when he offered his hand after it and apologized. “Sorry, ad’ika, but you were very brave.”
The elder Skywalker, on the other hand, hardly made a sound when Jango carved out her chip from her shoulder.
With the girls freshly unchipped, Jango smuggled them unseen into his ship and stowed them in a hidden compartment in his cargo hold. It was specially lined to block life signs from most scanners, and certainly anything Jabba had his hands on out here. He left at dawn, nobody looked twice as he had made several comments before about leaving early, and he had never made a habit of staying very long in Jabba's palace in the first place.
Only when he was safely in hyperspace and clear from any Hutt influence did he release his cargo from the hold. Shila had been soothed to sleep by her sister, but Anakin was fully alert and terrified.
"Thank you for doing this," she said gratefully. "Jango, I don't know how I'll ever be able to thank you. You saved our lives."
"Don't thank me yet. Just because I got you out of there doesn't mean you're safe. Jabba's not going to like losing you."
"I know." Her hand moved behind Shila, rested against her belly. "But you've given us a chance."
A few hours later there was a small explosion at Jabba's palace. Nobody was injured, and the damage was minimal, but it threw everyone and everything into hysterics. In the chaos, it took time for someone to take count of the slaves, and then they noticed two very valuable slaves were missing. Search parties uncovered the hastily buried tracker chips, coated in dried blood and sand. Jabba's wrath was terrible and he turned the planet of Tatooine upside down looking for Anakin Skywalker.
X
Jango landed Slave I on the storm tossed landing pad, rain drummed against the hull. It was midday, though the rainclouds were so thick it might as well have been midnight. He dropped from the cockpit down to the passenger hold, where Skywalker sat with her sister.
Anakin, he supposed he should get used to calling her by her first name. They were aliit now. Whether she knew it or not, when Anakin had thrown her lot in with him to gain her freedom, Jango had brought her into his tiny clan. There really was no way to get around it. Releasing the Skywalkers into the galaxy to fend for themselves was as good as putting a blaster bolt in the back of their skulls. Jabba would have them back and dead, or worse, by week’s end. There was safety, at least, in a clan, security under the Fett name; even if the clan had doubled it in size overnight.
Shila was sleeping soundly, curled in her sister's arms and lap, but Anakin was alert and worried.
"What's that noise? An attack?"
The rain was so familiar to Jango, he tuned it out automatically. "What? No, that's the rain. Water falling from the sky," he had to clarify. He realized rain probably wasn't a word that ever got thrown around on Tatooine.
Anakin glowered at him. "I know what rain is. My mother told me." Her cheeks went pink. "I just didn't realize it made much noise."
Jango gave her some credit. "It is coming down rather hard out there. Come on. We'll get you inside and into more suitable clothes."
Kamino was cold, and the cloner's kept their facility chilly. Anakin's service costume was not going to cut it. He opened the cargo ramp, a blast of cold, wet air swept in.
He heard a gasp and a yelp behind him, Shila had woken up. Anakin tried to comfort the child in Huttese, but Jango could see her own eyes were wide with fear. This much rain and water had to be a shock. But Jango was hungry, tired, and ready to change into something more comfortable. He didn't want to stand here until the desert natives got used to rain.
"Come on," he said again, taking Anakin by the arm and pulling her forward. They walked quickly from ship to facility door, Jango keeping his grip firm so Anakin didn't slip and fall on the wet walkway, her shoes were less suitable for the slick metal than her clothes were for the climate. By the time they stepped inside, Anakin was shivering. Whether from the cold and wet, or everything else, he wasn't sure but thirty seconds in the downpour had turned her costume downright indecent. The flowy white linen had turned translucent and plastered against her body. It made the curve of her belly even more obvious.
It was a good thing Skywalker was so distracted looking around at everything else to not notice him staring and frowning at her. Well, more accurately, staring at her abdomen. A seed of doubt quickly settled and bloomed in his mind – not the first to grow since he agreed to free the Skywalkers, and he squashed it like the others. Having a baby around soon was going to make things interesting.
He sighed softly and shook his head. That little bastard was going to cause him a lot of trouble, he knew it already. After all, it had been the baby that tipped him over to helping the Skywalkers in the first place and inevitably put him on Jabba’s shit list.
How long would it be until Jabba put a bounty on his head? He couldn't possibly be so lucky as to escape without suspicion.
Jango stepped off down the hall, wondering whether the Skywalkers should be seen by a doctor first or if he should just take them home. When the ad'ika began to complain of the cold and the wet, he bypassed the corridor turn that would lead to the medical wing.
Their apartment had that mild, unlived in scent when he stepped in. Boba would have been left with his Kaminoan caretakers while Jango had been gone for a few weeks.
"Come on. We'll get you dried and change clothes before getting you to a doctor."
"Doctor?"
Jango stepped into the 'fresher and dug out some clean towels. He buried his derisive snort in the linen closet. "I doubt Jabba wasted any expenses on having you checked out, didn't he?"
"No, he didn't." Anakin folded her hands over her belly. "I thought for the longest time it might be dead inside me, but I've started to feel them move."
Jango handed her two towels. "How far along are you?"
"Almost six months."
Anakin bent to wrap Shila in the fluffy towel so she didn't see Jango frown at her. He was no expert, but he was almost certain most women were bigger by the time they were five or six months pregnant. Sure, she looked pregnant, but only barely.
"You sure about that?"
Anakin stilled, but nodded, her voice was low and confident. "Yes. I know exactly when it happened."
Jango wasn't going to press the issue. The Kaminoans could figure out the nitty gritty biological details. He moved to the bedrooms, "I'll find you some dry clothes. Won't fit all that well, but they'll be warmer and more suitable than that costume." He pulled a shirt and a pair of pants with a soft, drawstring waistband from his closet. The Kaminoans would have no trouble fabricating something more suitable for Anakin and Shila to wear, but this would do short-term. The little girl's clothes were the basic pants and tunic of Tatooine, but Anakin's costume would be entirely unsuitable for Kamino's climate, not to mention just daily life.
Jango grabbed a shirt from Boba’s room for Shila. It was big enough to be a dress on the child, and the sleeves fell past her hands, but it was workable with a few adjustments. Anakin's clothes were just as ill-fitting, but she didn't complain. She just had to pull the drawstring tight to keep her pants secure around her waist.
"It's only temporary," Jango assured her as she tugged at the oversized shirt. "We'll get you some better fitting clothes ‘fabbed once the Kaminoans get their measurements."
"It's fine," Anakin said quietly, fingering the shirt fabric, it was probably sturdier than anything she'd worn in a long time. Jango's clothes were made for warmth and wear. "This will do."
Jango took them back from the apartment and into the cloning complex, through the cold white hallways to the medical facility. It wasn't empty, it never was. With how many clones the Kaminoans spat out, the medical facilities were always busy; someone was always hurt or sick or injured, or having their genetic aberrations evaluated for viability. But the entrance from Jango's side of the facility kept him separated from the main body. He had mentioned the cloners to Anakin before, but he wasn't sure how much she had picked up on though. It had been a passing conversation as he taught her how to play sabbac. He felt like explaining it in whole might be a bit much for the newly-freed slave.
His side of the medical facility was a little clinic set aside from the main body of the medical wing. It was just one room; the medical bed dominated one side, while cabinets of medication and supplies lined the other walls. There were two doors, one they came through and another that went into the larger facility.
Jango flipped a switch on the panel by the facility door, it would summon a doctor. It must have been a slow day because a Kaminoan stepped into the room a few moments later, one of the doctors. Her big eyes scanned over Anakin and Shila before turning to Jango.
"What can I do for you today, Jango?"
"Doctor Wey Luma, this is Anakin and Shila Skywalker, new additions to my aliit. They both had subdermal chips removed that need patching up, and health checks, and Anakin's pregnant."
Kaminoans weren't nearly as expressive as humans, but Jango could see the excitement in Wey Luma's face. The doctors working with the clones were human specialists, but it wasn't like they came across any pregnant ones in this facility. She would probably become a scientific celebrity just on the fact that she got knocked up. He hoped Anakin wouldn't mind the scientists pawing at her. Probably not, she had enough practice with drunk Hutt patrons, and the Kaminoans wouldn't want to fuck her.
He turned to the Skywalkers, "Wey Luma will take care of you. I need to make some arrangements for your stay here."
"Okay." Anakin nodded and set her sister on the bed at the doctor's encouragement. Jango left the room and pulled up his comm.
He made a call to Taun We to arrange for a bigger apartment, they would need more space with Anakin, Shila, and a baby on the way. Plus supplies and clothing for the new additions.
And it was time to get Boba back from his caretakers and introduce his son to his new aliit. By the time he stepped back into the exam room, Anakin was perched on the medical bed, and Wey Luma was practically buzzing with excitement.
"Such hybridizations are almost unheard of," the doctor trilled. "You could provide us with priceless data."
Anakin looked nervous. She chewed on her lower lip while her hands rested over her little belly. "Would that mean you'll make sure the baby is healthy?"
The Kaminoan paused, confused. Jango stepped in quickly. "They'll take care of you and the baby regardless of whether you agree to let them study you."
"Oh, yes, of course," Wey Luma insisted quickly. "We would not withhold medical treatment. But… you would just do us an enormous favor if we were able to study you and your child."
"What's so special about it anyway?" Jango asked before Anakin had to agree to anything.
"He's half-pantoran. Humans and pantorans typically do not mix genetically."
Jango grunted in understanding. He understood only the most basics of genetics, and he imagined Anakin understood even less. "She'll think about it."
There was nothing else they needed from the doctor, so Jango took them back home.
Taun We was waiting with Boba and a small crate of supplies, the new clothes. Kaminoans were nothing if not efficient; the clothing fabricators must have gotten Anakin's measurements from the medical scans.
There wasn’t time for more than the quickest introductions, as their apartment had to be packed up and everything moved into bigger quarters. A squad of droids expedited the process, and after only a couple hours, they were fully moved into a new apartment.
Taun We and the droids left the newly expanded Fett clan alone to get properly acquainted.
“Boba,” Jango put a hand on his son’s shoulder, pushing him forward ever so slightly. “This is Anakin and her sister Shila Skywalker.”
Boba’s dark eyes traced over the Skywalkers. Confusion curled in his head, father had never brought home anyone before, much less a woman and child. He’d met a few of his father’s more trustworthy associates before, but Anakin didn’t look like a bounty hunter or well… much of anything. What was it about them that had prompted such a sudden uprooting? Why were they now living together?
He’d heard Jango and Anakin muttering about a baby earlier during the move. Was that why? Was she his father’s… girlfriend? Was Shila his half-sister? A natural born Fett heir?
Jango’s grip tightened on Boba’s shoulder and he quickly remembered his manners. “Hello.” He nodded quickly to Anakin and Shila, and then turned to his father for further explanation.
“Anakin and Shila are alit now. I expect you to treat them as such.”
Aliit? Them? That word meant something in Mando’a, Jango wouldn’t throw it around casually. But he knew his father’s adopted clan lines, he knew the branches and offshoots, and distant relations belonging to the family that had taken his father in as a boy. Skywalker was not one of those family names.
“Where did they come from?”
“Tatooine.”
That illuminated very little for Boba, but he could hear the mildly dismissive tone in his father’s words. Now was not the time for more questions.
Jango pushed Boba forward a little more. “Anakin and I need to talk. Can you keep Shila entertained?”
“Oh, okay.” Boba craned his neck a little to peek behind Anakin’s legs, where Shila was hiding. “Shila?” The child buried her face in the back of Anakin’s thighs.
Anakin smiled slightly and scooped her hand behind the child’s head and pushed her forward towards Boba. She said in gentle Huttese, “Go on, Shila, go with Boba.”
Shila stumbled forward, gripping tightly to Anakin’s sleeve. Her eyes were wide and frightened, and Boba didn’t miss the way she flinched away from Jango.
“Introduce yourself.” Anakin prompted.
Shila stuttered out in Huttese a quiet little, “H-hello.”
Boba looked back to his father once again, asking silently if Shila only spoke Huttese. His father nodded curtly, yes.
No worry there, Boba was near fluent in Huttese, so he smiled at the little girl and said back to her, “Hello Shila, I’m Boba.”
Her eyes lit up when she finally understood his words. Boba offered his hand and the child took it. He led her off down the hallway to her new bedroom, right across the hall from Boba’s.
“Let’s see what kind of toys we can find.”
Boba thought he was getting a little too old for toys, but the move had unearthed a lot of old stuff he had nearly forgotten about. He pulled the box down and set it on the floor for Shila to explore while he moved to the open door and tried to listen to whatever his father and Anakin were discussing, but they were speaking too quietly for him to overhear. Jango was clattering around the kitchen, preparing their evening meal, but also making enough noise to purposefully discourage eavesdropping.
Annoyed and disappointed, Boba turned back to Shila. She had tipped most of the boxes contents out onto the floor and had promptly ignored all of them for the plush Aiwha that was almost as big as she was. It must have been a gift or something, though Boba had never particularly cared for the stuffed animal; or many plus toys in general. Shila seemed to like it, though, so he held no qualms bestowing it upon her. Shila was so delighted and excited over the gift, she even dragged it out to the kitchen when they were called for dinner to show Anakin what Boba had given her.
Shila was all set to sit the Aiwha at the table with them for dinner, but Anakin had her put it back in her room. Jango wouldn’t have cared either way – it wouldn’t have been the first time a toddler would have insisted that a favorite toy had to be a dinner guest – but Anakin was still trying to figure out her place in this whole affair, so he wasn’t about to step in a parent her baby sister. Not yet at least.
Shila was still very much frightened of him, even without his armor and the knife, it would be some times before she warmed up to him. Probably when the pain and scar from her tracker faded. Having everyone around her able to speak the same language helped, but Jango knew the child couldn’t only know Huttese for forever. Galactic Basic was a must, as was Mando’a, and Kaminoan would be useful too. He had no doubt Shila would pick up new languages quickly, children that young learned fast. Anakin on the other hand needed to start Mando’a lessons as quickly as possible, picking up the language would be harder for her, but it was something she had to know.
Nobody in his aliit would not be fluent in Mando'a.
"You keep using that word," Anakin observed over dinner. "'A-leet' what does it mean?"
"Aliit means family, of the same clan."
She frowned at him, her brow furrowing in suspicion. "But we're not-"
"You are newly freed slaves. You have no clan or family. You're foundlings and I have taken you in, so now you are part of my aliit. The galaxy is safer for you this way, you have protection."
Anakin stared at him, caught between gratitude and suspicion. “Does this mean we will have to change our names?”
For practical reasons, it would be safer for Anakin and Shila to adopt new surnames; it reduced the chance people would recognize her by name. But he understood the importance and attachment beings could have to family names. If he told her she had to change, she would probably do so without complaint, but that might make her resent the name, resent him and this gift of freedom he was giving her. Then again, this wasn’t something he felt was within his power to decide for her. “Not if you don’t want to.”
Anakin nodded slowly, considering something else. “Does that mean we’re trapped here?”
Trapped wasn’t the word that Jango would have chosen, but he knew where she was coming from. What was the point of being free if you had nowhere to go except back to slavery? With no home, no family, no resources, or friends to turn to Kamino could feel like a trap.
“For now,” he said reassuringly, “You are safe here, and hidden. Kamino is not widely known to the galaxy, nor will the Hutts think to search for you here. And there’s no chance of anyone seeing you and turning you back over to him. If you find staying here to be truly interminable, I can make other arrangements for you, but it will take time.”
Most of the suspicion left Anakin, though Jango could still read a little unease in her. Freedom would take time to adjust to, and it had been less than a day. Her eyes skimmed over him and to the dark, rain-lashed windows that made up a wall of their living area. She managed an uneasy smile and said lightly, “Well, it is very different from Tatooine.”
#long post#not kidding y'all#this is over 5k of story#story related#no jedi allowed au#shades of tatooine#anakin skywalker#jango fett#boba fett#star wars#Jango is ace and there is nothing that will ever convince me otherwise!
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C7 and C9 for the worldbuilding ask meme, please!
Worldbuilding starts with you! (Ask prompt, OPEN)
C7: Do gods exist? Tell us about a god or goddess that resides in the world.
Salmonid gods and deities are something I’ve been wanting to make a full post on for a while, now! Not every Salmonid is fully superstitious, nor do they all believe in the same gods, or that gods exist at all, however there are multiple deities that the Salmonids have within their mythos and lore.
We don’t know much of anything of religions in Splatoon, however given the core lore the games provide, these deities likely do not exist.
I DO have sketches of all three of these, as I’ve been sitting on this idea for a while, however I don’t have a good way to include those here. It’s long enough as is! But maybe someday I’ll finish them up and give them a proper post (But if you wanna see the sketches, all ya gotta do is ask!). In the meantime, have this:
Mother Maridae: A large Maws-like deity who is considered the mother of all life. Her constantly shedding scales birth new Salmonids, with each scale representing a new person. She has a promenade of Smallfry who swim about her like a luminous halo.
Before Smallfry hatch, Maridae gives them the care and love they need. She is benevolent and kind, and treats everyone under her care with love and respect, making her quite the idealized mother. When Salmonids perish, they return to her care. There you can either offer your scales to her and move on to the afterlife, or you can become one of her scales to be reborn into a new life.
She was the inspiration behind the Maws class. While Maws can be biologically male, most that choose to be a Maws are female, wanting to follow after Mother Maridae’s path.
As a deity, she represents fertility. It’s common for parents planning to fertilize eggs to pray to her, or make offerings for a bountiful and healthy nest.
Twins Keiko and Koichi: This deity is based directly after twin Salmonids that once existed, centuries ago. Considered the first Goldie to ever be hatched, the twins were born conjoined from the neck down, with their tail splitting into two. Upon the birth of the sisters, Salmonids thought that they were sent directly from the heavens, and were to act like deities upon the earth.
Unfortunately, due to their condition they lived a very short life, barely making it to their teens before they passed away. Myths say that the twins shed their mortal form and returned to the heavens, having fulfilled their duty.
Common myths claim that when the sisters are in good company, fortune will shower upon the Salmonids, and they will prosper and be wealthy. Their agreements result in the birth of Goldies, who are, in their own right, considered deities upon the earth.
When the sisters are arguing however, the Salmonids believe that misfortune will fall upon them. During this time, no Goldies will hatch, and they believe that the sisters finally stop arguing once a Goldie is hatched. In my more personal headcanons, the Salmonids have not seen a Goldie hatch for some time, and they consider the war between themselves and the Inklings a result of the twins arguing, and their current misfortune.
As deities, the twins represent fortune and prosperity. While some Salmonids will ask them for good fortune, it’s considered bad luck to ask them for a Goldie child.
Gardener Anno: A Salmonid deity who wears a cornucopia of foods, and rides on the tail of a giant eel named Dalfon. Anno is the god of the harvest, and his eel companion is the god of rain. This deity in particular is based off of a constellation, and farmers would refer to the position of his stars to decide the perfect time to plant their crops.
Common belief is that Anno tends to the soil and breathes life into the crops. Then Dalfon comes, bearing storm clouds on its belly, to bring forth the much-needed rain. Some depictions show the rain coming straight out of Dalfon’s sides. When the pair leaves, the harvest is over, and he sleeps until winter comes.
Every harvest, the Salmonids offer a portion of their crops to Anno and his eel, as thanks for his assistance, and the food. They believe that if the food is dissatisfactory, such as if one were to offer the worst of their harvest, Anno would be enraged and strike a famine upon their soil for the next year. Various Salmonids have their theories as to what his favorite food is, however this usually reflects their most supple or preferred crop. The most popular is corn.
The Steel Eel class is heavily inspired by Anno and Dalfon. The original purpose of the Steel Eel was to be used to water crops quickly and effectively during a drought, however they were easily repurposed for war.
As a deity, he represents prosperity, however he and his eel are both considered fickle gods, and some may consider him a representation of famine during a bad year.
That’s all I have in regards to deities at the moment. I may come up with more should the inspiration strike me, but I’m quite happy with the lineup I have now.
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C9: Is medicine further advanced than our own or is it less so? If magic exists, does it play a part with healing the sick or injured?
I don’t think magic really “exists” in Splatoon! You’re probably not really looking for that but I may as well say it!
As for Salmonid medicine, it’s getting better. I’d say they’re a few decades behind Inklings (i.e. Inklings are in 2020, while Salmonids are in 1960/70), so they don’t have as much access to the medicine and treatments that those in Inkopolis would. They’re quickly catching up, but the overfishing and oppression is really not doing them any favors at present.
Not much else to say! They’re very intelligent, but can only work with what’s available to them.
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02/19/2021 DAB Transcript
Leviticus 7:28-9:6, Mark 3:31-4:25, Psalms 37:12-29, Proverbs 10:5
Today is the 19th day of February welcome to the Daily Audio Bible I’m Brian it’s great to be here with you today as we round the corner here. We’re at the end of another week just about and we’ve transitioned into two new books this week and we’re getting’ moved into those and enjoying that. So, let’s…let's continue…let's continue with the journey. We’re reading from the Common English Bible this week. Leviticus chapter 7 verse 28 through 9 verse 6.
Commentary:
Okay. Let's…well…let's talk about harvest today. Jesus talked about it. And, you know, harvest…harvest is definitely a scriptural…a scriptural term that Jesus talks about, being the Lord of the harvest or sending workers, the laborers are few to go into the harvest. So, this is definitely a scriptural term but it’s…it's an agricultural term as well. We understand that seedtime and harvest that's…that's how we get our food. And, so, if you are a farmer you want to seed to go into the soil, you want it to…to yield fully to its full potential, and we understand these things. So, Jesus is talking about different kinds of soil that the seed gets planted into and depending on the kind of soil really dictates the kind of harvest. So, the seed can be awesome seed but planted in not so awesome soil it's not gonna be an awesome harvest, but good seed planted in good soil does produce a great harvest. Jesus was teaching this in a story, in story form, in parable form, as He often did. And it's easy enough, and this is a popular…popular enough parable that we sort of understand the lay of the land. And Jesus was pretty explicit in giving an interpretation of the parable that He had given. We all want that 100-fold harvest, right? We all want a bountiful harvest in our lives. Maybe we need to start thinking about gardening. Maybe this is the point in our journey through the year and our journey in life that we need to turn inward and see our heart, see our hearts as a field of soil. What kind of soil is there? Because whatever kind of soil is there is going to dictate the harvest, no matter how good the seed is. So, God is nourishing us through His word every day here as we take this journey through the Bible. This is good seed we could say, but are we, are our hearts good soil for this good seed. So, if the seed falls and cannot take roots then it’s just gonna lay there on the surface and it's gonna get snatched away. If…if our hearts are hard and stony and difficult, then there's nowhere for the seed to take root. And if we’re just distracted and anxious and full of worry or we’re just distracted and chasing other things, other desires…well…then the soil of our heart is thorny and it's gonna choke the seed out. We can understand this. We can even…we should be able to visualize this. We’ve seen rocky ground we’ve seen thorny ground. Like, we should understand this and we can even visualize how difficult it would be for a bountiful harvest to grow under those conditions. If our hearts are in that condition than they are not going to yield the bountiful harvest, we are hoping for. In other words, God’s gonna do His part here, but we have some gardening to do. We have our part. Our role to play in. And maybe it's time to dig up the stony ground and do away with the thorn bushes and make ourselves fertile and ready for anything that God wants to bring in this adventure that we call life, this dance that we are in together with Him.
Prayer:
Jesus, thank You. Thank You for this wisdom. It's very clear. It's abundantly clear. We know the hard places in our lives. We know the thorny places in our lives. We know the shallow places in our lives. And we just need help. We need You to guide us and show us how to become good soil. So, come Holy Spirit as we contemplate this, as we consider, as we meditate upon this, show us the areas in our heart that need some gardening. Come Holy Spirit we pray. In the name of Jesus, we ask. Amen.
Announcements:
dailyaudiobible.com is home base, and that is indeed a website, it’s where you find out what’s going on around here in a virtual community like ours. That's where the Global Campfire burns day and night. No matter where we are in the world we can reach out. Of course, if you’re using the Daily Audio Bible app all of this is available as well. So, be familiar. If you don't have the app yet a make sure you go to your app store, get the Daily Audio Bible app and download that. And it is…it is the most comprehensive way of entering into community and moving through the Scriptures that we have. It kinda keeps track of where we are on our journey. And as we move through the different sections of the Bible we get to see that we have accomplished that section of the Bible. So, just be familiar and check that out.
Check out the community section. Of course, this can be done at the Daily Audio Bible website or in the app. Check out the Community section. That’s where the Prayer Wall is and it’s such a centerpiece, such a foundational part of who we are as a community, that we accept each other, we understand that we are all in process, that we…we…we are all under renovation, that this is a process and that we have to have an incredible amount of grace for each other. Can you imagine how much grace our Father has on any given one day for His children. So, the least we can do is offer grace to each other. And we do that so well by accepting each other where we are and being willing to just walk a stretch of road together, pray for one another, shoulder each other's burdens. And one of the places to do that is at the Prayer Wall in the Community section. So, be familiar with that.
If you want to partner with the Daily Audio Bible, if this mission to have a Global Campfire, that we can step out of the chaos and have at least one place in life that's an oasis that we can count on every day than we can step into that place and just get our head screwed on straight, right? Just get our heart reoriented to God through the Scriptures. If that is life-giving than thank you for your partnership. There is a link on the homepage, at dailyaudiobible.com, If you’re using the app you can press the Give button in the upper right-hand corner, or the mailing address is PO Box 1996 Spring Hill Tennessee 37174.
And, as always, if you have a prayer request or encouragement 877-942-4253 is the number to dial or you can just hit the Hotline button, the little red button up at the top in the Daily Audio Bible app and share from there no matter where you are in the world.
And that is it for today. I'm Brian I love you and I'll be waiting for you here tomorrow.
Community Prayer and Praise:
H family it's Mica I haven't called for over a year. So much as has happened I could never catch you up in about a minute and 30 seconds; however, I…I did really need you guys help. You’re the closest thing I have to a family for a long long time. And I’ve spent a year homeless and been in a domestic violence shelter and lost all my stuff add my car and I was put in jail and you name it. Right now I'm out because of an injury from work and because there's some hold up and misunderstanding about the last time I was on unemployment. I am waiting for the determination so that I can get my workman's comp and things like that because I was injured back on January 7th. I haven't been working since. I've been borrowing money from people and leaning on people and I am just tired of it. I need I…need things to go right and I need __ things to stay away from me. Most of all I…I need to be right with God again and I need a family too. Please family help me __.
Hello Daily Audio Bible family this is Natalie. I'm calling because I just wanted to leave a quick prayer for… I've been listening to a lot of the prayers of the people and I just wanted to just do a little prayer for each and every person. I may not know the name or the…where you're from but I know we are all connected in God’s family and the spirit of God is with us and…and He can intercede on our behalf. So, heavenly Father I thank You Lord this day for each and every person who's called in who had a prayer or who had a concern Father. You tell us Lord Jesus that Lord we are connected as a family and we can come boldly before Your throne to ask for mercy in our times of need oh God. Father I pray for those that are sick Lord. There was one gentleman who said he had a heart attack, and he was struggling…they diagnosed him with bipolar Father and we…we…we come against that Father because we know Lord God that You are the author and finisher of our faith and we know that by Your stripes we are healed Father and I pray for healing on those people Father God. What man says is one thing but what God says the final authority. Father I pray for those people that are struggling with their jobs, with their families, those that are not saved Lord. I ask Lord God that You Father God Lord You said that we just need to plant the seed and You would do the growing Father. Father I pray over those people Lord Jesus that have…have…have been one Young lady said that her…her Father committed suicide in December of 2020. Father I pray for peace in that family Lord Jesus. Father You said that You would work all things together for the good of those that love You and are called according to Your purpose. And, so, I pray Father God that everything that we go through in our lives, everything that she is going through and her families going through that Lord You would…You would receive the glory from at all. You said what the enemy meant for evil You will turn it around...
Hello Daily Audio Bible family this is Ethan of Ashburnham MA in the USA. I have a prayer request that I've been meaning to ask for…for a long time. I have a friend his name is Chris he's going through some sort of crisis that I won't go into detail here. He…he's walked away from Christ and truth be told I am really scared for his future. I know I shouldn't be. I'm not responsible for his future but I am. I just…without Christ there's this void in him that he's trying to fill with everything money can buy, physical items, but as we all know those don't fill us up. And also, I'm starting to become concerned that this is becoming an unhealthy relationship for me. I feel like I have to be in his life to just try and bring him back to Christ but that's not my responsibility. I shouldn't be doing that and subjecting myself. Please pray for my friend Chris. God knows who I'm talking about. He's been my dear friend for over 15 years, and he was one of the few people I thought with absolute certainty would never abandon me during a time in middle school when I thought nobody liked me. He's been one of my closest friends for over 15 years and I'm heartbroken of the way that he's becoming but I choose to trust in Christ and His strength.
Hi guys this is Margaret from Southern California. I'm calling in for Tiffany and Tony of Cleveland. Tiffany had called again asking prayer for joy after the loss of her daughter Gianna. And I remember your original first call and my heart sank because I can relate to this loss of your precious daughter. I lost my baby girl 11 years ago. She was a full-term stillborn baby girl, 9-pound beautiful baby and I delivered her still. And I know she went to heaven when she was in my tummy but at the time, I couldn't see straight for anything and I absolutely lost all joy. And I just want to encourage you guys that God has brought me alone and my husband so far these past 11 years and we truly have joy. We feel that God has done everything for us and as far as healing and mending our hearts and giving us more children after that and…but mostly I think that He's giving us a perspective of knowing that she's in heaven and we're going to be with her again. And I want to encourage you guys. Gianna, you're going to be with her again. And one day down on earth is one day closer to heaven for eternity and perfection with Jesus and I just can't wait for that day. And I just want you guys so badly to be able to experience that. And you know what, it may not be tomorrow but just keep…keep on keeping on and have that faith that the Lord will deliver you from this despair. I love you friends.
Good morning DAB family today is the 16th day of February and I'm just sitting in my car. I just finished listening to Daily Audio Bible for the 15th. Again, Brian it's just amazing listening to you. So, this is Janet from…from the UK and I'm just calling to ask for prayer for my mom. It's been 2 weeks. She's been diagnosed with breast cancer. And even though she lives in America I live in the UK I do have a sister and brother that's in the US also but they're not really active in her life and she's literally at the house by herself, but thanks be to God we do have friends that are taking care, helping to take care of her. But I’m going to try to go over to the UK. So, I'm asking for prayers, journey mercies as I leave from the UK to go to America to help take care of my mom. And I also pray for my mom because she has like diabetes and all these other stuff that…other combabilities as they call it. But I'm asking for prayer because I know I have the best…I have the best family, the most prayerful family powerful in prayer. So, I'm asking family that you help me pray that God will see us through, that He would just give us one day at a time as He normally does and that we’ll appreciate it and that my mom would be OK. Thanks family. Thank you so much for your prayers. God bless.
Hi family this is Melissa from Albertville Alabama. Brian, Jill, and Ezekiel bless you for all that you do for the body of Christ. I have a…a…a couple of prayer requests. And my sisters pastor his name is Darrell Davis his son was shot and he's not doing well, and he's developed Covid. Please pray for that family. And my nephew Elijah, I've called in several times. He has alopecia and he’s suffering from mental illness. He has left home and said he didn't want to anything to do with our family or God. He’s somewhere in California. We have no idea where he is. Please pray for him. Kingdom Seeker Daniel, Lord your call. I'm praying for you brother. I'm praying. God is so able. My sister who has metastatic breast cancer I didn't catch your name. God knows who you are. You said you had a compression fracture, I think. I'm praying for you. Jeremy Neph, please call if you can let us know how you're doing. So many calls have been so heavy on my heart. Just y'all just keep praying. Don't stop praying. God has us. I'm going through some health issues right now. I can't even go to church. But God is good. I love you family. You all keep us prayed up. Bye-bye.
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week of march 22nd, 2020
aries: both the sun in your sign and your ruler mars (in capricorn) are in their exaltation and they are using those good vibes to be very busy. you should probably follow suit! it is a time for conquering.
taurus: the later portion of the week sees your ruler venus in trine first with magnificent jupiter, her fellow benefic, and then with pluto for a good time (i’m not being sarcastic! this is creative, erotic energy!).
gemini: this week is a bit of a lull after an intensely mercurial period, but NEXT week sees venus enter your sign. so now is not the time to be flighty or flaky - keep as taurean as you can and make the switch to fairy mode next week.
cancer: you and your opposite sign capricorn are the cool heads in times of crisis, and this does have the astrological feel of a time of crisis. is the crisis as real as it feels? to be determined. but either way, you’re seen as a beacon of hope and rock solid strength.
leo: your solar ruler squares the nodes as it settles in with chiron. it’s THE best possible time for therapy because healing your past heals your future.
virgo: finally some peace and quiet? well, it depends on your specific placement, but the extremely virgoan among you will get something of a rest, for now. but maybe a “rest” is more like a chance to catch up.
libra: the sun crossing through your partnership house lights it up, especially as it participates in some tense aspects. it’s a fluorescent highlighter to your partner’s shortcomings, and to your own. but that sort of active study is needed to make improvements.
scorpio: your ancient ruler conjoins your modern one, followed by a rendezvous with venus. rarely does one encounter such an erotic astrological aspect. but there is a darkness to it. this is not a simple or innocent love affair. so be careful.
sagittarius: the earthy quality of the trine between your ruler jupiter and venus in her verdant domicile is not as ethereal as you may prefer, but it is a fortune and a blessing nonetheless. prepare for bounty incoming.
capricorn: like the sign of the crab, you’re everyone’s strength in a crisis. probably whether you like it or not. you appear less nourishing than your opposite sign but are bountiful and magical all the same, and hard times do bring out your softness.
aquarius: any murkiness of mercury retrograde and its subsequent shadow period begins to clear up, naturally but also with the aid of the sharp focus of saturn now in your sign. yes, that was all kind of begun last week, but it intensifies now and with little else to affect your sign at the moment, the lessons become obvious.
pisces: things are beginning to return, in your daily routines, a bit more back to normal. or perhaps it is more that a new normal is being established, that the weirdness is finally integrating.
#weekly horoscope#horoscopes#astrology#transits#signs#zodiac#aries#taurus#gemini#cancer#leo#virgo#libra#scorpio#sagittarius#capricorn#aquarius#pisces
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RP Journal: 08/23/2020
What do you even do when someone confesses to love you… and you in no way love them back? How do you go back to being “just friends” when nothing between you will ever be the same again? I’ll question every motion, every gesture, every act of kindness -- is this the act of a friend or is this a man continuing to try to subtly woo me?
(Courtesy cut for length)
Then there were the things he said: that he reserved the right, as my friend, to tell me when I’m wrong. To tell me I’m /wrong/ like he’s the only one who knows what’s right for me. There were things he did: like expecting me to just accept this newly-brokered friendship when not moments before he’d been near weeping and upset because I’d played Brightsong for Edgard and not for him. There was the unspoken expectation that I had to /trust him/. Trust. Him. The same man who took what I’d told him about Tristane only to use it against me in an effort to illustrate how much he cared about me. He took the innermost feelings of my heart and weaponized them. And /this/ is a man I’m supposed to trust, a man I’m supposed to willingly listen to as he tells me I’m /wrong./
What if he decides that I’m wrong about Edgard or Rae-Hann? About Zunh or the Bounty Call? Twelve’s Grace, he acts more like some surrogate father than he does a friend! I’m not some girl-child that needs /anyone/ to tell me how to live my life. I think it’s time I put him back at arm’s length. Dealing with his constant mood-changes, how every experience with him is like some different facet, some entirely different person… there’s no constant in him, no stability. He’s more often a source of distress for me than he is the balm for it.
He’s left me a note to say he’s gone back to Ul’dah. Back to the place he says has nothing for him. The man must enjoy having nothing, because he almost always runs back to it like a lodestone to the north. At least in that he’s been somewhat predictable. Gods, is he infuriating, though.
I didn’t even want to stay in the same room with him after that. Everything felt awkward and uncomfortable to me -- all while he just smoothly transitions from weepy, to smiles and pleas for friendship, to argumentative and expecting me to trust him, to suddenly offering me tea with this hesitant smile. One of these faces is the real Lorrendor Hauland, but there’s no way on the Twelve’s green earth that I could have ever told you which. I don’t know him at all. And I don’t think I’ll /ever/ understand him.
I left. I left my own house because of how angry and upset I was. How confused. All I wanted or needed right now were friends. FRIENDS. I’ve made that adamantly clear that I have no intention of becoming involved with anyone now. Not when I have the Saurotaun to hunt. Not when the Saurotaun could mean my death. I know I’ve said that, multiple times, but it’s as if my feelings don’t even matter. He couldn’t even respect my boundaries on that. But I’m supposed to trust him. I’m supposed to /like/ that he does these things and accept that as friendship. All while he decides to do this the very night before a major hunt for me. Is he trying to get me killed?
Before long, I found myself at the archery butts in Tailfeather. It was one of many places in the Forelands that I went to whenever I needed space or some time to myself. I loosed a number of arrows into the target dummy, trying to quell and calm my thoughts. I didn’t need to be distracted on the hunt. I had to find my focus again.
That damnable dragoon came flying in to spear the target I was working on, nearly getting himself shot in the process! I swear if I knew that dragoon’s middle name, I’d have used it just so he knew how much trouble he was in! As it stood, Edgard Beaumont is an idiot.
But he’s oftentimes an idiot that knows what I need, exactly when I need it. After momentarily beating him with the fletched end of one of my arrows, I ranted and vented to him about all that had transpired with Lorrendor. I almost feel sorry for Ardi, this isn’t the first time he’s had to listen to me rant about that man, I doubt it will be the last. Yet, he still stood by me, beatings and all, letting me vent my spleen until I felt better.
He very gently ventured his own opinions on the matter; that perhaps Lorrendor was conflicted about what he truly wanted, even a tad jealous of the kind of friendship Ardi and I share. I don’t know what it is about Ardi that makes him so easy to talk to, maybe it’s his devil-may-care nature, or the fact that he actually listens to me, instead of trying to talk over me or down to me like I’m some little girl who knows no better. He suggested that maybe Lorrendor has some issues of his own he needs to work out. Gods, like the rest of us don’t?
I eventually told Ardi that I felt like Lorrendor would ultimately hurt me, far more than I could ever hurt him. That’s where we had a difference of opinion. He went on to say that he’d seen how dangerous a woman I was with a bow -- and a sandwich.
For a long moment, I just had to stare. The sheer ridiculousness of the statement and, yet, it’s absolute truth just caught me off-guard. I laughed. I laughed so uproariously I think they probably heard me all over Tailfeather! But it felt good and was a welcome balm for my anger and confusion. With me in better spirits, it was easy to fall into the endless dance steps of our usual banter. Parry-riposte-counter.
He went on to ask me about the Elite Hunt on the morrow. And then he presented me with a gift. It was a new hunting knife, gleaming and sharp, with blue and purple leather bound around the hilt. I knew the significance almost immediately, given that he’d chosen the same colors as I. To match, he said, fingering the Feather Token still woven into his hair. He said he doesn’t usually give gifts, but that he really wanted to do something for me since I’d gotten him the token.
Truth be told, I’ve never really gotten gifts that weren’t from Sillesti. When Rae-Hann gave me the gift of the koi in the Gold Court fountain, I thought that was endearing; he was trying to provide an experience I’d been cheated of in order to make me happy. Then there were the bracers from Lorrendor -- well, one of the Lorrendors, the side of him that I thought had been trying to change and just be a good friend -- enhanced with materia to help my shots strike true. A thoughtful gift that actually made me think he’d been listening for once.
And now this from Ardi. It was thoughtful, useful, and completely in keeping with who I am as a person. It doesn’t surprise me that he knows me well enough to make this kind of selection. What does surprise me is how we’ve come so far from those nights in Ul’dah when I thought he was little more than another smarmy ladies’ man looking for his latest overnight conquest. How did that, somehow, turn into this? Honestly, I couldn’t ask for a better friend.
I rewarded his kindness with a kiss on the cheek. Granted, I had to stand on tip-toe to achieve it, damned ultra-tall elezen, but I managed. Gods, the look that crossed his face was priceless, such a myriad of emotions all in an instant: excited, goofy, embarrassed all highlighted by the definite blush that crept over that pale Ishgardian skin. Part of me wanted to laugh and say, “Got’cha!” in payback of all the times he’s gloated over me blushing in the past. The larger part of me, though, just wanted to enjoy the moment.
This change in Edgard… Ardi is such a far cry from the man I remember in Ul’dah. Of late, he’s seemed happier, more content, less burdened than I remember seeing him. When he speaks to me of his beloved Valentina, it’s oftentimes with joy and a smile, instead of frowns and displeasure. Truth be told, I can do much the same with him when I talk of Tristane. There’s an inherent feeling of trust here now, as if I could tell him anything. Sure, he might laugh and poke fun, but he’s still there for me. He still listens. And in his way, he cares.
He’s oftentimes a better friend than I am. Especially when I try to push him in the river. He’s also a worse friend, because he decided to pull me in with him! We laughed, I splashed him with water until he retreated to claim the high ground. Now soaking wet and thoroughly cheered, it was time to go back home. I somewhat dreaded facing Lorrendor again, but with Ardi alongside me I can take on dragons and whatever else the world has to offer. One Lorrendor had no chance.
As we’d gotten out of the water, Ardi flicked one of my ears with his fingers, at which I protested since my ears are highly sensitive. I swear by the Twelve, revealing any weakness to Edgard Beaumont is a lesson in mistakes made. On the walk home, he made it a point to get extremely close to my ear to whisper something salacious. Gods, it tickled! And it… nevermind. He went on to gloat about how I should never show my weaknesses to an enemy.
I countered with the observation that I had no enemies here. Only my partner. And my partner was entitled to all my truths, strengths, and weaknesses. He said he’d trust me with his weaknesses, but he had none.
Mm-hmm. We’ll see about that, Ardi. We’ll see!
In the side margins of this entry are what appear to be a song, complete with lyrics and tiny musical notations.
With eyes of frost
Like frozen glass
Not mirrors like in eld
Lies beauty that
None surpass
Within which one is held
Tumblr Mentions
@therpperson for Edgard Beaumont
@yokasaris for brief mention of Rae-Hann
#Journal: Rhythm of the Night#Aultena Sephimiri#FFXIV#FFXIV RP#FFXIV Roleplay#Balmung RP#Balmung Roleplay#Balmung Roleplayer#Crystal RP#Crystal Roleplay#Crystal Roleplayer#Character Journal#Lorrendor Hauland#Friendship: Elf-Dad Forever#Edgard Beaumont#Friendship: Pathfinder#Ship: Two Idiots One Heart
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