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sortasirius · 4 years

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“Unity” and the Broken Boys

BOY Y’ALL BETTER SIT DOWN BECAUSE THIS IS AS LONG AS CAN BE AND I TOOK OFF WORK TOMORROW SO I’VE GOT TIME

This is....one of the best episodes in the show. Yeah, in all 325 of them, this is hands down one of the best.

First of all, stan Amara for clear skin.

That silent treatment babey, right out the gate with the Angst. Tbh Dean deserves it.

“Like I said, killing Amara, Jack dying...that’s the only way.”

“The only way. Our one shot. Our Last chance. You ever get tired of saying stuff like that?”

“We don’t have to like it, alright? But you and me, we gotta get it done.”

Amara is such a welcome energy in this whole episode. She’s warm and understanding, whip-smart and probably more powerful than Chuck. I love her.

Sam is a wonderful, understanding, loving dad. I love him eternally. He loves Jack so much, he’s trying so desperately to do what’s right for Jack but also what’s right for the world. Jack made this choice, but he can’t live with it. How do you support your child when their life is at stake?

“Come on man. Blindly following orders, lying to Amara, sending her to her death. Does any of this feel right to you??”

“It doesn’t matter how we feel! You know what? Stay. Stay. Someone has to be the grown up here.”

“Yeah well someone has to keep fighting for Jack!”

“He knows what he signed up for!”

“Last I checked, we don’t give up on family.”

“Jack’s not family.”

Y’all should have heard the noise I made. What a fucking line.

“I know how you feel about the kid, I care for him too, I do, but he’s not like you. He’s not like Cas. He’s just not.”

“I’m- I’m ready.”

You can see the regret, the heartbreak in Dean’s eyes. You can see how he wants to take those words back the moment he said them, and for Jack to hear them? It’s unthinkable.

Sam and Cas I’m just so fucking emo dude.

“Sam, you stayed behind to find another way huh? I woulda done the same.”

AMARA

First of all, LOVE this structure.

Amara and Chuck have such a fascinating dynamic. Rob and Emily do a great job (as they have all along) by clearly being siblings but...heightened. You can just tell they both exude power, and the other is the only one they consider an equal.

“You and Dean had that whole weird...thing.”

“That wasn’t you writing?”

“Ugh, not that part. Gross.”

What I took away from this is what I’ve suspected all along. They HAVE free will, just not total free will. Dean and Amara’s connection wasn’t Chuck, there are parts of the story he didn’t write. Obviously, this comes into play later.

I also have a hunch that Chuck doesn’t write romance. I also think that in particular will come into play.

“Balance. Something we’ve never tried before. Creation and destruction, light and dark, brother and sister united again, but on behalf of one world, this world. True balance. The way it was always meant to be. But you can’t. You only care about your pleasure, your story. Well, I guess that makes you the villain.”

“Villains get all the best lines.”

We see again and again this season, Chuck is irredeemable. He doesn’t care about the angels, he doesn’t care about the world, he doesn’t care about anything. He is a petulant toddler who has broken his toys. And when he realizes he’s trapped, he gets angry, he shouts and screams, completely at odds with Amara’s peace.

“You can’t hold me here forever.”

“I can hold you long enough.”

DEAN

Pain is the name of the game in this section homies. Because not only are we dealing with Dean’s pain, we’re also dealing with Jack’s. Jack says he understands why Cas and Sam mean more to Dean, but Dean clearly doesn’t, he, once again, wants to say more, but is stopped, still stopped by his fear: his fear of not beating Chuck.

Alright guys, gals, and non-binary pals. Let’s talk about Adam and Seraphina.

Adam. The first man. And Seraphina. The angel.

“My old lady. She’s the only one who could put up with me all these years.”

Yeah okay. Volume at 100 I get it lmao.

But also: Adam wants God dead not because he and Eve were kicked out of the Garden, but because he went after their sons. The theme of protecting the children strikes again.

“Killing God is your plan?”

“Yeah, Billie’s been giving us a hand but Sera and me, this is our baby.”

This juxtaposed directly with Dean’s own pain at what he has to do to kill Chuck, to gain his free will: the cost of his child.

Adam’s rib.

And who else might get his ribs hurt, only to be likely healed by an angel?

It’s fine, that’s fine. I’m fine with that.

“Jack, I don’t know how to explain it but, when I found out about Chuck, it’s like I wasn’t alive. Not really. You know like my whole life I’ve never been free, but like really free. But now? Now me and Sam, we got a shot at living a life, without all this crap on our backs. And that’s, that’s because of you. So, I want to say, I need to say...thank you, Jack. Thank you.”

I’m gonna have to do a separate post about just Dean in this episode, because there is so fucking much to talk about, but there are a couple of things that I think are important: Dean realizes how wrong he was, to say what he said. He knows that it’s not true, this is the way he’s always coped with loss, by pushing the person to be lost away, but for Jack to hear it? He can’t stand for that.

And:

Dean has finally pushed through the barrier. He won’t be quiet in the face of his doubts anymore. This is a breakthrough for him, and, of course, there are more to come.

SAM

Sam and Cas, my chaos duo.

The box, the inscription, the door.

Death’s library, filled with dead reapers.

And there it is. The Empty.

It tells Sam the plan, the plan for Billie to take God’s place. For everything to go back to the way it’s “supposed to be.”

This has always been the game, since season 13. This is the longest of long games.

Sam fuckin Winchester, lying his way out of a confrontation with the Empty like the legend that he is.

He comes back with a new purpose: to stop Billie’s plan, and here’s where we get to the heart of the episode and maybe the heart of the season.

“You hear that? Dean, brought to the edge of doubt. His sense of duty, his rage winning out in the end. And poor Sam, always gotta know everything. Can’t leave well enough alone. This is my ending, my real ending.”

The gun comes out, pointed at Sam.

Hmm...what did I say during 15x05? Oh yeah, this.

And:

Dean would never survive killing Sam, but he’s willing to do anything, anything to earn his freedom. His ending, where one brother kills the other and then kill himself.

Why, you might ask, did Sam not mention that the angels would be sent back to Heaven, why does he not mention Cas? I’ll tell you why, or rather, Becky will.

Plus, Dean looks back at Cas IMMEDIATELY when Sam says that, when he mentions Eileen, and THAT’S the first time he hesitates. He can’t lose Cas. But at the same time, he’s willing to do anything to have his freedom.

“Sam we don’t have a choice, Jack’s about to blow!”

“We always have a choice!”

You know me, just sitting here thinking about choice, the ability to choose, and how that translates to their free will.

And Sam...I don’t think there will ever be characters I love as much as these.

“I don’t care if Billie gets what she wants! I don’t man, I’d trade it all, I’d trade em all for Chuck. In a heartbeat!”

“What about me?”

“You’d trade me?”

“Chuck has to die. He has to! Otherwise he’ll keep us tap dancing forever, and I can’t live like that man, I can’t live like that, I won’t!”

“I know you feel like that right now, okay? I know you do, but you gotta trust me. My entire life, you’ve protected me. From Dad, from Lucifer, from everything. I didn’t always like it, you know? But it’s the one thing in the whole world that I could always count on. It’s the only thing I’ve ever known that was true. So please, put the gun away. Just put it away. We’ll figure it out, Dean, we’ll find another way, you and me. We always do.”

Okay I feel like this is going to be one of those scenes that I cry watching for years to come. Because fuck. After fifteen years they finally admit that not only did Dean protect Sam from Lucifer, but he protected him from John. John. On a par with Lucifer.

Dean and Sam have, for so many years, sacrificed themselves for the other. Dean’s demon deal, Sam and the trials, every season they have fought to see who can die the quickest for the other. But this? This is them fighting to stop the violence, to stop from killing the big bad. This is them growing, in our eyes, in real time. Sam has always been able to get through to Dean when no one else had a prayer, but for Dean to listen, for Dean to take his words to heart, to stop the hunt for Sam, for their family, that’s how you know they do have free will.

(Btw Chuck’s eye effect when he dusted Amara was sick as fuck but I’m emo for my boys so.)

Chuck knows it’s a loss, he knows that his story has, once again, been thwarted by the boys making their own choices. And he’s pissed, but in his anger, we get a bomb dropped on us.

“Spare me your contempt Castiel, the self-hating angel of Thursday. You know what every other version of you did after “gripping him tight and raising him from perdition”? They did what they were told. But not you. Not the one off the line with a crack in his chassis.”

Are you fucking kidding me?

Also, just worth bringing up this one as well:

Every Castiel pulled Dean out of Hell. Every one told him the same thing. And yet, immediately, with this Cas and this Dean, something was different. Because what has everyone seen about Cas, from the moment he met Dean?

And there’s our endgame people. Laid out on the line.

But we ain’t done yet, fam.

We’ve talked about the handprint, but you know:

So there you have it, our prep into the “monumental” 15x18. I have spec on that, of course, but I think a novel is long enough for this.

What to take away: Dean’s rage was always Chuck’s plan, they do have free will, their love for each other, for their family, is what will stop Chuck’s control, Death is about to come back with a vengeance, Cas’ deal is at play, and, most importantly, Castiel and Dean Winchester are a blind spot for Chuck, something he has never, not once, controlled.

#welcome to my essay lmao #supernatural #spn #spoilers #my meta #spn 15x17 #destiel #dean winchester #sam winchester #jack kline #castiel #amara #chuck shurley #lilly liveblogs supernatural

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myhumanweakness · 4 years

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I don’t want to be a huge asshole, but...

There are a lot of people trying to find a modicum of positivity in the finale. It’s not about this Destiel-Bibro war that’s happened over the years, it’s not about Cas, it’s not about any of the superficial drama. This finale was the weirdest mixture of OOC and in character writing I have ever seen.

Things that are in character:

The brothers put each other first. They are each other’s safe place and stability. Up until the very end. Sam respected Dean’s wishes, stayed with him in his last moments, and let him go gracefully. Sam even went on and had a full life so Dean’s sacrifices weren’t in vain.

For Dean, Heaven wasn’t perfect without Sam there. And he had this huge sense of relief and happiness when Sam arrived.

Jack deconstructed the walls of Heaven so that it was a vast place where everyone could be together. They weren’t living out their “best memories” anymore. They were creating new memories eternally with each other. And Bobby recognizing that Jack is like Dean’s son by saying, “That boy of yours...”

Cas helped build the Heaven that he always dreamed of. Cas always had such a high standard for Heaven, and it always fell short. He helped Jack build a home that was warm and comforting and beautiful and open and loving and true. Everything Cas stood for.

Bobby, the man Dean adopted as his father, was there to share a beer with him (just like Dean shared with his dad in his childhood). And Bobby was happy and confirmed that Dean is in a Heaven he deserves.

Sam mourning Dean’s death for the rest of his life, but also living his life to honor Dean. Classic Sam.

Dean using his last moments to tell Sam how much he loves him and how proud he is. Sam deserved to hear that because we all know Sam looked at Dean as a parental figure.

Things that are OOC:

Sam not marrying Eileen. The show created this HUGE story arc around Sam and Eileen and their real love and connection. And then they shoot this finale and couldn’t even get an actress that looked like Eileen to stand it the blurry background. Like, I don’t care what you say, it’s NOT open to interpretation. Sam did not end up with Eileen. All of you people who are Sam stans, who say you want your character to be happy and live a full life should be livid. Sam ending up with Eileen wouldn’t have canceled out the fact that Dean was/is his number one person. Dean gave his blessing for Eileen, and he loved her and welcomed her into their lives because he knew Sam loved her and had a genuine connection with her. Having them together would not have ruined the ending in any way. Sam still could have ended up with Dean on that bridge.

That woman with the blonde/light brown hair is NOT Eileen. They couldn’t even get an actress with dark brown hair to keep hope alive that they ended up together. Absolutely awful.

Dean just accepting Cas’ death and not even talking about it, other than to say, “Yeah I think about em’ too.” I don’t care if you don’t believe in Destiel or that the love was reciprocated. Dean EXCLUSIVELY said multiple times that Cas is a member of their family and a brother to the boys. He said the words, “YOU”RE MY BEST FRIEND.” I’m not saying Dean should have scarified himself to go pull Cas out of the Empty (because we had 40 minutes to wrap up 15 years). But the fact that Dean was like: I’m gonna eat some pie and just not acknowledge any feelings or thoughts and act like nothing ever happened is SO OOC. If your best friend died tragically, you’d have something to say about it or act like you had something to say about it. And that’s not to say I wanted Dean to be miserable and hurting. I’m happy he got a dog and found some normalcy. But they lost SO many people, and he’s just walking around cool as a cucumber? When every other season/episode where they lost someone important to Dean he was a mess. And I’m not just talking about Cas- we all obviously know how Dean behaved when Cas died/was missing/Lucifer was controlling him. But even when Jo and Ellen died. Even when Mary died. Even when Bobby died. Even when John died. Even when Crowley died. Even when Jack died, Dean was shown hurting. Suddenly everything is cool and normal there’s no pain or anything? The fuck? A brief moment of acknowledgement. That’s all it needed.

I will never forgive the writers for ending Dean’s story that way. A rusty nail impaling him (probably in his pulmonary arteries/aorta based on the angle) on some random hunt after he finally exhaled the episode before and said, “We’re finally free.” He sacrificed his ENTIRE childhood and life for his brother and the world and so many other people, and he didn't even get to enjoy being a human on the Earth and living a life for more than a week. What! Dean was always a character filled with tragedy, and yeah, maybe he did have to die. You can make that argument. But like that?! AND. AND! Sam held a funeral for Dean and DIDN’T INVITE ANYONE! What!!! No one was there to toast to Dean and share their memories and give him the send-off he deserved. Sam just burned his body alone. Never. That would have NEVER happened. Sam loved Dean SO much and looked up to him and thought the world of him. Dean was his big brother who was fearless and strong and the best hunter on this Earth (and probably every other planet), and he didn’t celebrate his life in the end?

Cas not showing up in Heaven is absolutely insane. INSANE. It doesn’t matter what you think of their relationship, the show has proven that Cas is important to Dean (even if you think Cas is way at the bottom of the list, he’s on it!). Dean’s ideal retirement/endgame was him, Sam, and Cas on a beach, drinking cocktails, with hula girls. That was the future Dean wanted for him and his family. And you’re telling me that Cas helped Jack build the best version of Heaven possible, and the minute Dean Winchester arrived Cas wasn’t there to greet him. Even just to say “Hello, Dean.” Even call Dean’s phone and say, “Welcome home.” Cas would have been the one greeting Dean in Heaven, with Bobby. Requited or not, it’s canon that Cas is in love with Dean. You don’t just ignore the opportunity to see the person you’re in love with. And... and! Even if Cas didn’t greet Dean in Heaven immediately, he would have appeared in the Impala during the drive. He would have met the brothers on the bridge to welcome them both home. Cas loved Sam too. He would have been there. The three boys together again. Team Free Will!

I love Cas, and I know a lot of Cas stans feel buried and betrayed and hurt over the show doing a “is he there or isn’t he?” thing. And that is completely valid. I can’t even express to you how sorry I am that so many of us in the fandom are hurting. But I know this show. And this show has always made it clear that it was/is always about two brothers. Fine. But Dean Winchester, the most caring and loving human in the entire universe, deserved better. I am so sick to my stomach that Dean’s whole life was him convinced that there was only one way for his story to end and it was him dying tragically. For years he never let himself even entertain the thought of living a life because he 1) didn’t think he deserved that or was worth it 2) it just wasn’t in the cards. We watched Dean grow so much, SO MUCH, that we finally saw him talking about the future and having hope for the future. And yeah, maybe he wouldn’t get the future he talked about with the retirement on the beach, but he would have lived long enough to experience life outside of just “playing whack-a-mole” and being God’s favorite story and puppet. Dean didn’t even get to enjoy his freedom and humanity. They took a character that they purposefully pushed through so many stages of character development to attain hope and faith and self-worth and promise, and killed him.

What the fuck!

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robininthelabyrinth · 4 years

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What would happen if Jiang Cheng found A-Yuan hiding in the tree stump at the Siege of the Burial Mounds and decided he's going to take in this toddler Wei Wuxian's was raising and raise him, in the memory of what WWX promised to be for JC?

sequel to this aka Delight in Misery (ao3)

“Sizhui?!” Jiang Cheng roared as he stormed into Lan Wangji’s room. “You named him Sizhui?”

Lan Wangji had already long ago become inured to Jiang Cheng’s huffing and puffing. Anyway, Jiang Cheng had medicine in his hands when he stormed in, which meant that he wasn’t bothered enough by it to come yell at him outside the usual time - and that meant that whatever it was, it was no big deal.

Accordingly, Lan Wangji didn’t give the yelling any more thought than it required, opting instead to turn onto his stomach in silent invitation.

Sure enough, Jiang Cheng came over to sit on the bed, grumbling the entire time he undid the bandages on Lan Wangji’s back and starting to spread the soothing balm onto the slowly healing wounds.

“I can’t believe you picked ‘Sizhui’ as a courtesy name for A-Yuan,” Jiang Cheng said, sounding thoroughly disgusted and more than a little disgruntled as well. His hands, however, were as gentle as his voice was harsh. “Sizhui. Was carving ‘Lan Wangji loves Wei Wuxian’ into the woodwork too subtle for you?”

Being face down made it easier for Lan Wangji to hide the way his lips twitched.

At first, he had been disturbed at the notion that his grief for Wei Wuxian’s loss – an endless well of despair, an injury that would never heal – might in some ways be balanced with instances of joy, and yet, in time, he had slowly come to accept it. After all, Wei Wuxian himself had never remembered pain for more than a moment; he would not have wanted Lan Wangji to deny himself the pleasures of A-Yuan’s cheerful presence, the peace of being surrounded by Wei Wuxian’s belongings, the amusement of Jiang Cheng’s sarcastic commentary that was so thoroughly ungracious it could only be laughed at.

The adjustment had not been easy. Lan Wangji was broken in both body and heart, lingering too longer in regrets of the past, while Jiang Cheng had walked a fine line on the verge of true madness, periods of calm interrupted suddenly by grief so intense it manifested as hysterical anger and furious lashing out, his own servants trembling to see it - it was only when Jin Ling had ended up with them, a safe haven for him in his younger years while Lanling Jin sorted out its own internal issues, that Jiang Cheng had started to calm down. His nights were still full of nightmares, brutal soul-shattering screaming ones that Lan Wangji suspected matched his own, but there were now entire days in which the man who kept him company (because apparently “seclusion” wasn’t considered a real word in Yunmeng Jiang, and “alone” was translated to mean “with me”) was a serious, earnest sect leader with a penchant for snide quips rather than the devastated wreckage of a human being he had met upon the Burial Mounds.

They had not been particularly close, before, and their personalities weren’t exactly compatible. And yet, to his surprise, Lan Wangji found that he didn’t miss the serenity of the Cloud Recesses as much as he thought he would, but rather appreciated the noise and clamor that Jiang Cheng brought into his life.

“ – like two drops of water, both of you,” Jiang Cheng was saying. “Sizhui and Rulan! These are people’s names! They’ll have to bear them their entire lives! Do you think when they’re adults they’re going to enjoy telling people, ‘oh, yes, well, you see, the people who named us had absolutely no sense of dignity or proportion, so –’”

“How is A-Ling?” Lan Wangji asked, feeling his ears go red. He had known about Jin Ling’s courtesy name since long ago, but he hadn’t known until Jiang Cheng had told him that the name had been bestowed by Wei Wuxian, or that Wei Wuxian had praised his sect and maybe even him in the naming – it sometimes made him wonder if his feelings, which he’d long believed to be unrequited, might not have been so hopeless after all.

That didn’t mean he wanted to talk about said feelings with Jiang Cheng, though.

Luckily, Jiang Cheng’s attention was very easy to divert when it came to his precious nephew. “Good! His teeth are finally coming out properly, so we won’t have to deal with all that wailing and gnawing anymore – I thought we’d have to lose A-Yuan’s fingers to all that biting before it ever happened –”

“I thought you told him to stop.”

“Of course I did. Did he listen? No. He just looked sad and obedient whenever I looked at him, and snuck his fingers into the crib whenever I didn’t – I should’ve gotten you to give him the order. He actually listens to you.”

Lan Wangji hummed in response, listening as Jiang Cheng continued in his usual manner to update him about the development of the children they were raising – teething for Jin Ling, Lan Yuan’s rapidly swelling waistline (he was almost recognizable as a child again instead of the pile of bones he’d been after he’d recovered from his fever) and the need to start him on physical conditioning soon, the investment of time and effort that all three of them were putting into trying to convince Jin Ling that his first word should be ‘jiujiu’ – and then, from there, about developments at the Lotus Pier more generally.

At first, Lan Wangji had thought there was a purpose to these updates, that he was meant to give some sort of advice as payment for taking up food and resources, but after a while he realized that Jiang Cheng just wanted someone to listen to him.

He didn’t seem to have anyone else that would.

“– finally finished the full set of docks, so maybe the fishermen will stop beating my ears in about it,” Jiang Cheng was saying. “And yes, damn you, your idea about opening up hotels was both very popular and very profitable – just goes to show that your Lan sect’s reputation for being above it all isn’t in any way justified, you lot make money better than the Jin sect…your brother came by again.”

Lan Wangji tensed.

“Stop that! Your back’s bad enough without adding knots to it.” Jiang Cheng pressed down on one of them purposefully: it hurt for a moment, and then released, and Lan Wangji involuntarily relaxed as the relief spread through him. Jiang Cheng either had a very good teacher in massage or a natural-born talent for it; Lan Wangji hadn’t yet figured out how to ask which it was. “He’s still looking for you, that’s all, and it’s starting to take a bit of a toll on him; he looks like he hasn’t slept in a while. I’m starting to almost feel bad about it.”

It was very classic Jiang Cheng, Lan Wangji had found, to orchestrate a punishment for someone and feel bad about it almost immediately thereafter. It was no wonder A-Yuan had him so thoroughly wrapped around his little finger.

“You can tell him, if you want,” Lan Wangji said reluctantly. Telling would mean seeing, and while he missed his brother very much, he was still very angry over everything that had happened. “I do not want the Lotus Pier to suffer for having harbored me.”

“Stop being so damned self-sacrificing,” Jiang Cheng said, and Lan Wangji wasn’t looking but he could hear him rolling his eyes. “I don’t care how much you enjoy it; I for one can’t stand it. Anyway, if my Jiang Sect can’t hold our heads up against another sect’s anger, we don’t deserve to be called a Great Sect. It’s like I told you: the moment he actually admits that you’re missing, rather than being all ambiguous and vague about it, I’ll tell him.”

Lan Wangji was secretly glad, even though he knew it was petty of him.

The thought of how frantic Lan Xichen must be after all these months, the idea of him not sleeping, of him travelling to all the sects to ask again and again if they’d seen him…the thought of it hurt, he didn’t deny it. But it didn’t hurt as much as finding out that Wei Wuxian had died with no one by his side – as finding out that his brother, who knew what Wei Wuxian meant to him, had known and deliberately omitted to tell him.

Just as Jiang Cheng was deliberately omitting to tell Lan Xichen the truth now.

“The sect would lose face,” he finally said, offering up an explanation for his brother’s actions, both then and now.

“Yeah, well, fuck your sect,” Jiang Cheng said. “I picked my sect over my family, too, and where did that leave me? Now it’s all I have left.”

His hands stilled for a moment.

“…except you and kids, I guess,” he said, sounding especially bitter about it in the sort of way that Lan Wangji had learned indicated that Jiang Cheng was having an attack of feelings and not particularly enjoying the experience. “You’re not that annoying.”

That was practically stating that Jiang Cheng would die without them.

“Mn,” Lan Wangji said, and after a moment Jiang Cheng continued rubbing in the salve. There was even a brief moment of silence, probably Jiang Cheng being thankful that Lan Wangji didn’t call him out on those feelings. Normally, Lan Wangji would just enjoy it, but… “You could have children of your own.”

Jiang Cheng choked, his hand slipping as he nearly fell over. “What?”

“Children,” Lan Wangji said. “You could marry.”

Not that marriage was a requirement for children, as Jin Guangshan continuously seemed to demonstrate – according to some of the gossip Jiang Cheng had recently reported, he’d recently brought another bastard son home.

“I’m trying, aren’t I?” Jiang Cheng asked, indignant. “I’ve gone on three matchmaking dates –”

Lan Wangji was well aware. He had been the one to whom Jiang Cheng had exaggeratedly complained after each one of those disastrous dates.

“Deliberate sabotage,” he said, because even without having left the four walls around him in months he could figure that much out. “Why?”

Jiang Cheng hesitated, then snorted. “Well, let’s hope not everyone’s as perceptive as you. It’s the agreement I made with the Jin sect to allow me to raise Jin Ling – no other children.”

Somehow, Lan Wangji hadn’t expected that.

He swallowed, his throat suddenly tight. He knew, of course, that there was nothing Jiang Cheng wouldn’t do for his last living blood relative, even risk having his Jiang sect turned into nothing more than an inheritance to be gobbled up by the Jin sect, but he hadn’t realized – that the Jin sect would take advantage of the grief and trauma that Jiang Cheng suffered, the same grief and trauma that he himself suffered from every day…

It made him taste bile.

“Though you’ve nearly screwed that up, you know,” Jiang Cheng said, sounding suddenly amused. “Back’s done, by the way.”

Lan Wangji sat up and turned his head to look at Jiang Cheng. “How?”

Jiang Cheng rolled his eyes. “Well, given your injuries, I’m the one out there teaching Lan Yuan all the basics, aren’t I? The Jiang sect hasn’t started accepting disciples that young yet, so he stands out. Everyone’s starting to say that he’s mine.”

“His surname is Lan.”

“And Wei Wuxian’s was Wei; that never stopped people from talking, did it?” Jiang Cheng scowled a little at the reminder he’d just given himself; as Lan Wangji had found out these past few months, Jiang Cheng was a master of the self-inflicted injury. “The latest I’ve heard is that I fell in love with some lady from the Lan sect who left her child with me when she died – honestly, it’s a bit sad that they can’t think of anything more interesting. Why would I be stupid enough to make the same mistakes as my father?”

Lan Wangji frowned. Jiang Cheng’s voice was shading near to actual pain, rather than his usual bark without a bite – he had let slip enough about his childhood for Lan Wangji to have figured out that the old jokes about the Jiang sect leader’s favoritism for Wei Wuxian were not jokes at all.

More like an old wound ripped open so many times that it would never heal.

It was no surprise, then, that it hurt him to be cast in the same role.

“You could always tell them that the lady still lives,” he said mildly, pretending his words weren’t hurting himself this time. Maybe Jiang Cheng had a point when he said that Lan Wangji enjoyed self-sacrifice. “Only that she’s ill, or in confinement, and cannot be seen.”

“Not a chance! Like I’d ever do something like that,” Jiang Cheng said, and Lan Wangji very briefly loved him for his immediate rejection of the idea. “Besides, if I say that, what do I do when you do come out of here and claim him? Everyone will think we’ve been sleeping together.”

Lan Wangji politely didn’t mention the occasional night that Jiang Cheng spent huddling by his side, wild-eyed, until the nightmares went away, or the way Jiang Cheng would occasionally lend a hand with certain physiological reactions that Lan Wangji could not bear to deal with himself, turning what might have been a trigger for self-hatred and near suicidal despair into a process as mundane as the baths he still needed help taking; neither of those were what was meant.

“No one would fear that you would have children if they thought you cut your sleeve,” he pointed out, not sure why he was pushing the issue. Even if people did say that, it was only rumors, after all, and temporary ones: when Lan Wangji could walk again, even the most pointed would swiftly fade in favor of ones that slandered Lan Wangji’s reputation instead.

“I’m still hoping to get married eventually,” Jiang Cheng said. “Just – after Jin Ling is an adult. Once he’s sect leader, he can release me from the promise I made. No harm done, assuming I don’t die first.”

Lan Wangji nodded. It made sense, though for some reason he felt some dissatisfaction.

“Though,” Jiang Cheng continued, looking thoughtful, “it might not be that bad an idea to spread some rumors. If I never commented on it, people would never know for sure if it was true or just slander by some dissatisfied female cultivator after one of my horrible matchmaking meetings.”

“It would still affect your reputation.”

“Like I care,” Jiang Cheng scoffed. “Let them talk! If anyone is stupid enough to think that the contents of my bed have any impact on my abilities, I still have Zidian to show them the error of their ways. And I will, too; don’t think I won’t!”

Lan Wangji abruptly felt lighter inside. Of course Jiang Cheng wouldn’t care; he hardly ever cared about anything other than his sect and the children – and anyway, just because Lan Wangji had never told Jiang Cheng directly how he felt about Wei Wuxian didn’t mean that he hadn’t guessed. He had given Lan Wangji Wei Wuxian’s bedroom, after all. “I would never be so foolish.”

Jiang Cheng huffed and tossed his head, then turned to say something that he promptly forgot in favor of gaping at him. “Hanguang-jun, what are you doing with your mouth?”

Lan Wangji allowed his smile to widen. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Stop it! It’s creepy! Go back to being humorless and dull this instant!”

“No.”

“This is my sect and you’re my guest; you have to do what I say.”

“No.”

“You’re worse than A-Yuan,” Jiang Cheng complained. “At least he pretends to listen. I’ll have to raise Jin Ling to be properly obedient.”

For some reason, Lan Wangji didn’t think he would have much luck with that.

#mdzs #jiang cheng #lan wangji #lan sizhui #jin ling #my fic #my fics #delight in misery #accidental life partner acquisition #lacommunarde

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itsybitsylemonsqueezy · 4 years

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Oh gosh i literally LOVE your analysis thank you. And what about Majima??

Awww, thank you very much ^^; I’ve been having a good time writing these, I”m glad people are enjoying them. And everybody’s free to ask for seconds too, if interested. *breathes deep* Hoo boy, you pulling out the big guns there. Okay lads, settle down, it’ll be awhile.

character: hate them | don’t really care | like them | LOVE them | THEY ARE MY PRECIOUS

I would give my life for Majima Goro. But I won’t because that would trigger him to fuck and back. Best boy, golden son, I am mad fucked up about him. I don’t even have time to explain all my feelings about Majima fucking Goro. You can tell because I can’t go a single fucking post without mentioning him. *whispers* I love him.

ship with: Y’know how sometimes things are popular and you don’t get why? This is not one of those times. It’s cliche, but Kiryu Kazuma is the popular option here For A Reason. Like, I started Zero not knowing a fucking thing about Yakuza, as I think many do. And I wasn’t at all sure how Majima and Kiryu were going to be with each other, I had heard that they were the going ship and that seemed legit enough. Kiryu’s a nice boy, Majima’s a nice boy, they’d probably get on. But you make it through Zero and they don’t meet, not even once. They vaguely hear about each other and if they thought enough about it, they’d probably figure out that each other was holding the other half of their story, but there’s only that 5 second meeting in the epilogue, after the entire game is already fucking over and... Oh Shit.

That, my many gendered gentry, was an imprinting in live time.

But first, let’s back up a second, because I bet you’re all wondering about the Other important love in Majima’s life. So Makoto, Makoto... As I discussed in my Saejima post, after Anagura, Majima is living to die. That’s it, that’s his only goal in life, to get back into Tojo and wait there so his brother knows where to find him when he comes to kill him. He’s not looking for any other attachments in life. Because that’s the way Majima loves, body and soul, his whole existence dedicated around one thing. And he’s already signed himself up for sacrificing himself as repayment for Saejima’s sins and wasted years in prison. But then this... tragedy happens. This hit that isn’t a hit, this villain that’s really a victim. Everything goes wrong and Majima is left with do I commit the unthinkable to shorten my wait for my brother or do I forgo my brother’s rightful revenge to save this innocent? And Majima can’t. He can’t.

He could never kill and he can’t turn his back on someone who needs help. And she does need him, specifically, there’s no one else. Anyone else couldn’t be trusted, or if they can be trusted, they’re dead. Majima is the only person he and Makoto can trust so he’s just here, doing his best, trying to keep her alive in the face of everything he wants and all the power and hate the underworld of Japan can offer. He would sacrifice his one goal of staying alive for his brother if it means keeping Makoto safe. Is that love? Oh yes, but not the livable kind. You don’t come back from that kind of dedication. Majima loves Makoto as gods love: completely. It is without judgment and without reason. That’s not the love of one finite person to another finite person, admitting, exploring, and cherishing all the flaws and limits therein, it’s not even the love of a parent to a child or vice versa. It is infinite love, all-consuming and all-destroying. It is not cognizant of personality, worthiness, or risk. It just is. In many ways, Majima does not know Makoto, he doesn’t see her, neither, ironically, does she see him. These are not two equals of mutual interest enjoying who each other is. This is a far less personal and far more profound experience. It’s like a calling, a quest. And it’s not something a stable relationship can be built on because it doesn’t actually have anything to do with who Makoto is in her day-to-day life or who Majima is in his embodied, finite experience. This is love as a philosophical point, as a moral decision.

It is the greatest thing I’ve seen in my life that he lets her go. That sort of love will destroy you if you let it, it crushes your existence, your personality and sense of self, entirely into that of another. And you can’t live as a part of someone else, you cannot actually live for someone else, not sustainably, no matter how badly you want to. It’s the strongest thing I’ve ever seen done that Majima has the power to walk away from her and walk away from that sweet, blinding death. To choose a finite, flawed, embodied, but his own individual existence rather than let himself be consumed in an idea. And that they walk away from each other where they can both survive it. Where the idea of what was and what might have been doesn’t drive them into despair of all earthly, finite joys. Because who would choose to have a normal, dirty, working life where you are required each day to be an individual with your own wants and desires that are spurned and rewarded by turns of luck rather than the pure, golden existence of perfect moral agape? And I’m so glad that they walked away before they could be blinded by it, again, ironically enough.

But the fact that Majima is capable of that level of love is truly terrifying. And then how fascinating that he walks away from it. That he chooses a harder, darker life that will have the normal range of joys and disappointments. The restraint it takes. The incredible, unbending sense of self and to decide that there are selfish, individual things worth caring about, even if you had the chance to become selfless for the rest of your life. I don’t think we talk about or think about that Majima walking away there was a moral choice. He wasn’t walking away from happiness, he was walking towards a different happiness. And, most importantly of all, even though he is still waiting to be killed by his brother, the fact that he walked away means that Majima is much healthier and much less self-destructive than he was at the beginning of Zero. He could have escaped it all if he went with her. But he doesn’t. And that fucking blows my mind.

I love that Majima grows after Zero. That his absolute nihilism changes as he allows himself to care about people again, maybe even care about himself again. Especially after Shimano’s death, he starts to develop relationships and things that he cares about as soon as it is safe to do so. He decides that he isn’t going to waste away waiting for his brother, he will live in this time, even if it has an expiration date. He will build something he cares about. And I think, in no small part, knowing Kiryu gives him the courage and the will to do so.

Because Kiryu is this shooting star in the dark night of Majima’s world. He is this mighty pillar standing amidst slag and waste. Kiryu does things that are right because they are right, with no thought to his own gain or risk. Kiryu does things that are right at tremendous personal risk and will fight through people trying to stop him. And Kiryu will win. Not only does Kiryu agree with the way Majima thinks and feels but, mother of god, eh actually has the power and strength to survive.

Think about that. You’re Majima Goro and every day since you became yakuza, you have been kicked down, tortured, and abused just because you wanted to do the right thing. You have watched countless friends, allies, and enemies be shot and killed in front of you because they were trying to do the right thing. You have no choice but to do right in the secret places of your heart, to do good only in ways that can never be traced back to you, in ways no one would confuse for being good, kind things. Because it will get you killed, or worse, it will get the people around you killed. It’s not paranoia, you’ve seen it happen, your nightmares are filled to the brim with the blood and horror or good people dying just because they were good and it’s your fault, it’s all your fault because you didn’t warn them, you let them get close, you let them see you were a good person and you can NEVER. EVER. let that happen to anyone again.

And then there’s Kiryu. Stupid, mutton-headed freak with the arms of a lumberjack and a heart as white as lilies. He’ll be dead tomorrow, you know it. He’s too good, he’s too kind, and he’s not afraid. He’s not damn near afraid enough. He has no idea what’s waiting out there to snap him to pieces. But he’s there tomorrow. Not even a scratch on him, still standing, still strong. You try to warn him, you try to beat him in a way he can survive so that he learns to never try to be good again. But he beats you. He actually fucking beats you and what the fuck are you supposed to do with that? He’ll still die anyway, there’s no way he’ll live where so many have been slaughtered. And he’s still there tomorrow. You pester him, you follow him, you watch him closely, to see what he does, who he is, how is it he’s still alive? It must be some trick, he’s either not as good as you think he is or not as strong or, or... something! Because it’s impossible, it’s impossible that anyone could, that anyone could...

And he smiles. He smiles at you, like he can see right down to that tiny, beating, pure heart you’re trying every second to wrap in barbed wire. And you’re done. You’re fucking done for. He smiles and... it’s all fucking over. Whatever happens now, whether he dies or lives, it’s too late. He’s everything you ever wanted and it breaks you that he, somehow, wants you too. Because who would smile at you if they didn’t know you? Oh, he’s dumb as rocks still, but... the way he looks at you, in those moments when you fuck up, in those moments that if someone was watching, they would see you. And he sees you. And worse, he thinks he likes it. And... oh god. You love him. This will all end in tears.

But it doesn’t. Kiryu’s alive and the same and that’s... that’s wonderful. And that’s the love of two people, two people who see each other and know each other and, god help them, like each other. Despite it all, the risk and worry and the problems, they just... get along. That’s why I ship it.

(I also ship Kiryu/Majima/Tachibana sometimes and we’ll save my essay on that for an entirely different post.)

brotp: Saejima Taiga, obvs. I will not repeat my sentiments on why that’s the brotp here, there’s the Saejima post for that. But I also put Nishida and Kage right up there as Majima’s best bros. You got Nishida out here doing his best to keep his boss from dying and facilitating Majima’s ridiculous courtship ploys and trying to articulate Majima’s feelings for him when Majima Won’t because Nishida cares So Fucking Much about Majima. And he knows that Mjima hates it when people care about him, he knows Majima actively does tno want you to like him but... Nishida’ worked with him for too long not to know what a good, kind person Majima really sis, even if he’s trying his best not to show it. And god damn it, but Nishida’s not going to let him live in misery when he’s got a heart of gold like that.

And Kage too, he and Majima look out for each other. They enjoy the odd cage match and a morose drink of fine liquor. They’ve both seen tragedy in their lives and Kage tries his best to convince Majima not to give up all hope. That Kiryu boy, he really likes him. Even Kage can see it. He’d be happy to... no, no, alright. Just thought he’d say.

Because Majima has that effect on people. He makes friends wherever he goes because he’s a good time, he’s generous and kind and has a knack for picking up people who are down. And he’d do anything for you if you didn’t have a friend in the world. He has so much love to gives and slowly, slowly, with time and healing, with the death of Shimano and the return of his brother, slowly Majima is allowed to feel safe in loving people once more. And it warms everyone’s heart to see him happy and whole with a family and friends. Everyone he’s touched just wants him to be okay, after all he’s done for the world, please, just give him this little bit. It’s all he ever wanted.

general opinions: I Am Love. I LOvE HiM. I lOVe. I LOOOOOOOOOOOVE. I Love HIm. *sobs*

#Majima Goro #There's more to say. There always is. But I'll cut it there for today #Yakuza #ask Lemon #blurred-voices

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a-mandala-rose · 4 years

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You Spin Me Right Round...

I’ve never written a meta post about an episode before, so with only three episodes left, I figured this is the perfect time to start. It typically takes me a few days to process and gather my thoughts, because much like Dean this season, I’m rather slow on the uptake. By the time I have something to say, it usually feels like the moment has passed. But what the hell. We’re three episodes from the end and I have FEELINGS.

To start, I’m going to back up a moment and talk about 15X16 (see “slow on the uptake,” above). Lots of fans, myself included, found themselves frustrated with watching what at first glance seems to be your run of the mill MOTW episode. A *good* MOTW, for sure, but still, with only four episodes left to go, it felt like we should be past this by now. In fact, “aren’t we past this?” seemed to be the theme of the entire episode and that alone should have clued us in that despite appearances, this episode was anything but just another MOTW. If that was too subtle, Billie’s pointed “you’re working a case? Now?” should have been a dead give away that we needed to look deeper. And many tried, but the most a lot of us could come up with was the brothers’ big emotional argument at the end and even that was a giant moment of “been there, done that.” Why at what should be a pivotal point in the series are we rehashing the same arguments we’ve been watching for the past 15 years?

Jumping ahead to 15X17 for a moment, we see Dean absolutely breaking down. He’s losing it. Imploding. Leaving aside all of the problematic comments about and to Jack (we’ll come back to that), Dean lays out the crux of the problem when he and Jack are talking in the Impala: he doesn’t know what’s real. Like he’s been saying all season, he’s lost the perspective to be able to tell what about his life has been his choice and what has been Chuck’s machinations. He’s stuck in Chuck’s hamster wheel. Going ‘round and ‘round. Repeating the same scenes, lines, hunts, and arguments on a loop. Wait…why does that ring a bell?

Back to 15X16 and NOW it makes sense. Why are we stuck in yet another MOTW episode? Why is Dean lying to Sam again? Why is he once again sacrificing someone he loves, leading them “into the meat grinder?” Why is he backsliding on all that great emotional growth we saw last season? Why is he repeating the same destructive patterns that thanks to Kaitlyn, we know he’s been stuck in since childhood? IT’S THE HAMSTER WHEEL. Round and round we go…but whose hamster wheel is it?

Back to 15X17, LOTS going on in this episode and I’m not going to touch on all of it. But some highlights [and these are in no particular order because 1) I’m scatterbrained as hell and 2) the fuck does it matter anyways, because as we’ve established, we’re just going around in a big ass circle here]:

We see some absolutely masterful manipulation by Chuck. Manipulating Dean in order to manipulate Amara because he knows thanks to their “bond,” she’ll never turn on Dean…unless he betrays her first…which brings us to two of the biggest points in this episode. First off, we learn that Chuck didn’t write the Dean/Amara bond, which, as many more brilliant meta minds have pointed out before me, mirrors Dean and Cas’ profound bond, which we learn at the end of the episode was also NOT written by Chuck (and in fact pisses him off quite a bit, to put it mildly.) This reminds us that though he claims to be omniscient, Chuck is definitely NOT omnipotent and while he may be able to control space and time, one thing he can’t control is human emotional bonds and relationships. And this friends, this is important. In fact, it’s everything.

Right before Chuck confesses that Castiel is, as Cas fans have long insisted, the very embodiment of free will (more on that later), Sam references Eileen, which, yes, is very sweet, but also...also, is a call back to their relationship, specifically, to Eileen’s fears that her feelings for Sam weren’t genuine. She wonders what about her and Sam’s relationship was real and what was Chuck, which we knew at the time was a mirror to Dean’s “What about all this is real?” The answer, of course? “We are.” And now we have confirmation: emotional bonds/relationships are REAL. They might be manipulated by Chuck, but they aren’t created by him and clearly, he can’t understand them. That’s illustrated several times in this episode. His reaction to Dean’s “icky” bond with Amara. His inability to "feel the love" of the angels she took him to see. His cold manipulation of his sister. The throwback to the way he threw Adam and Eve, his first human children, out of the Garden and then used their sons to further his own plans. His consternation with Castiel for not doing as he was told after he raised Dean from perdition.

Chuck doesn’t understand and didn’t create emotions. Which seems obvious wen you think about the fact that his first sentient children didn’t have them. Emotions are a specifically HUMAN creation and that is what makes humans so frustrating and incomprehensible to Chuck. It’s why he hates them. Not only are a few of them very disobedient pets, as a whole they've created something he cannot. What a blow to the ego that must be.

The second thing referenced by Amara and Chuck’s conversations about Dean is his betrayal of her. Chuck’s telling Amara that Dean is sending her to the “meat grinder” is not a coincidence. That language is a deliberate mirror to Dean accusing his alternate future self of sending Cas to the meat grinder in The End (That’s only one of several parallels Unity makes with The End. For a much more thorough accounting, check out castielslostwings’ Twitter thread.), which, as I referenced above, also parallels Dean’s willingness to send Jack on a suicide mission. What do these things all have in common? Each time, Dean is ignoring his own instincts, his own “moral compass,” in favor of a plan. In The End, he regrets his choice to say no to Michael…to veer from Michael’s, aka God’s, aka Chuck’s plan and is trying to recreate it by killing Lucifer/Sam. Now he’s following Billie’s plan, even though it clearly feels wrong to him. We can see that in the way he tries to distance himself from Jack. The way he tries to convince himself that Jack isn’t family. That he’s different from Sam and from Cas, even though he’s told Jack before that he IS family. Even though when he was angriest with Jack and distraught with grief over Mary, he still told Belphegor that Jack was “our kid.” We can see it too in the way he reacts equally defensively when Sam brings up how they’re about to betray Amara in 15X15 and again in 15X17 when we can see Dean flinch when she tells him they’ll always help one another. This feels wrong to him, but he’s doing it anyways because he thinks he has no choice.

Looking back over seasons’ past, the two ever-present themes in Supernatural have been free will (obviously) and found family. They’ve always been intertwined. We’ve watched time and time again as Sam, Dean, and Cas choose one another. But now we have those two themes coalescing more than ever before. Every time any of them chooses “the plan” over their family, shit goes sideways. And now we know it’s because, as Chuck has made pretty damn clear in his manipulation of Billie’s plan, he’s omniscient and he controls all time and space. All plans are HIS plan.

But what doesn’t he control? Emotions. And the bonds they create between people. It’s in choosing one another that Team Free Will has always thwarted Chuck’s plan. Dean refusing to go down the path laid out for him in The End. Cas refusing to "hurt Dean Winchester." Sam refusing to reap MoC Dean. Dean refusing to shoot Jack in that cemetery. The boys refusing to hurt one another, again and again and again. The boys choosing one another again and again and again. And I think that's what Chuck really wants to break. Why he's so obsessed with getting his ending. This is what Becky was getting at in her critique of his story. Chuck doesn't understand his characters, because he doesn’t understand feelings. He hates this creation of humanity that has become more important to them and more defining of them than anything else, including him. So, he wants to conquer it. He wants to manipulate the situation to make his characters choose something of his divining over their emotional bonds to one another. Those bonds he didn't create and that he, in all of his omniscience and power, cannot sever.

15X17 confirms that free will is real. Cas chose to disobey. That wasn’t written by Chuck. And speaking of Cas, let’s look at our biggest two parallels of the season: Dean and Cas. (Sorry Sam. Sit this one out.) Cas, who Chuck has just identified as the epitome of free will. Cas who, once a mindless soldier, abandoned heaven’s plan. Who found his new purpose when he chose to become a father. Who follows his instincts over the plan because “something went wrong” and “the plan changed.” Versus Dean. Dean who has spent this entire season feeling trapped. Who keeps choosing “the plan” over his family and finds his cage getting smaller by the minute.

Back to 15X16. I asked before whose hamster wheel is Dean on? Dean says it’s Chuck’s, but that assumed that free will was a lie. Now we know it’s not. Free will is real and Chuck never even had to take it away from Dean. Dean gave it up as soon as he started following someone else’s plan instead of his own. Dean’s hamster wheel is of his own making.

There are so many more things I could say about 15X17. For starters, those chapter titles…are they referencing Chuck’s story? Or are they chapters in his death book, the one we saw in this episode and Chuck himself referenced? After all, Billie’s read that book, so she must have known “her” plan would fail. But she went down that path anyways…And speaking of Billie, I haven’t even touched on her or the Empty. The Empty says Billie wants “everything back where it belongs” with angels in heaven and demons in hell. Wait. That sounds familiar. Oh yes! My new favorite demon, Zack, said that in our other most recent “just a MOTW” episode. It seems Rowena wants something similar. Isn’t that interesting? And speaking of Rowena, if there’s one thing this show loves, it’s duality. Parallels. They’re everywhere…except, it seems, when it comes to the queen of Hell. Who will mirror Rowena? How interesting that we visited that empty throne room in Heaven last week…

BUT…the main thing here is this: Unity. This episode was about unity and now we have a unified Chuck and Amara. We’re going to need a unified TFW in order to defeat them. Because that is the key to defeating Chuck. Choosing one another…choosing our found family, the ones we’ve created those bonds with…again and again and again.

#supernatural #meta #Mandaladoesmeta #Season 15 #spn 15X16 #spn 15X17

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feminist-propaganda · 3 years

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The Star Wars Saga Is A Meditation On Single Motherhood

It recently dawned on me that the entire story line of the Star Wars saga is built on the lives, loves and tribulations of 3 generations of single mothers. There are monsters to slay and aliens to find and planets to explore, yes, but if you think about the powerful message in the movies, you’ll come to realize it was mostly a reflection on the status of single mothers, the outcomes of their offspring, and the conflict that lives forever in their descendants.

Each trilogy, once reframed, becomes the story of one woman, who finds herself in a situation that is as old as time. She is with child, but the person who planted the seed in her is not by her side.

Shmi Skywalker or The Good Single Mother

In the Phantom Menace, Jedi Knight Qui Gon Jin meets Anakin Skywalker, a slave boy with a talent for repairing machines. The Jedi knight is impressed with the child’s abilities. He’s knowledgeable, intuitive, and most importantly he’s also kind and thoughtful. When a sand storm threatens the group of travelers, Anakin takes them to his own home and offers them shelter.

We meet Shmi Skywalker, who in many ways is the archetype of the good single mother. She is not just quiet. She has completely erased herself. She has no personality, apart from being Anakin’s caretaker. She expresses no needs, no desires, no dreams. She simply loves Anakin, and when she sees an opportunity for him to leave the desert planet ruled by the Huts, she doesn’t stand in his way.

In a now famous scene, Qui Gon asks her about the child’s origins and Shmi famously responds “There was no father”. The line continues: “I carried him. I gave birth. I raised him. I can’t explain what happened”.

The immaculate conception myth refers to the idea in Christianity that Mary, much like Shmi, was impregnated by some magical force, a holy spirit. Both are parabols: images we use to discuss painful topics. Single motherhood has probably always been a part of the human experience. Jared Diamond explains in “Why Is Sex Fun?” that in terms of evolution, it is more rewarding for human males to be “super spreaders “ rather than “good fathers “ . The “good father” gene does not pass down to future generations, because in effect, not sticking around to raise the child is a better strategy for a human man to pass on his genes to the next generation. Not convinced? Just count how many women have been impregnated by a rapper like Future (8 last time I checked). If you’re not into hip-hop, you can think of the offspring of the Mongol Genghis Khan

The purpose of the parabol is to provide an image, to extract ourselves from the technicalities of onr person’s story and to instead talk about all single mothers at once. Indeed, single mothers come in all shapes and sizes. Some are widowed, some are abandoned, others are lied to, and some run away from abusive environments.

Shmi raises her son the best she can, and her love for him is unconditional. She doesn’t bat an eye when he is freed while she is to continue her life as a slave. She doesn’t even seem to mind when Anakin leaves the planet and never returns to free her, even after he marries into some serious money.

But the story of Star Wars tells us that Shmi’s relationship to Anakin, because it was so fusional, because it was all that he had, led to his undoing. In Episode 2, when he senses she is in danger, he jeopardizes his mission to protect Padme to go rescue her. When he eventually finds her, he is so upset about her ultimate death that he commits mass murder, targeting the Tuskan riders of the sea of Dunes.

When Yoda first lays eyes on Anakin, he senses Anakin’s pain, he is just a child whose been ripped away from the only human that’s ever cared for him deeply. The turmoil inside the boy is palpable, and Yoda advises against training him.

Padme Amidala or The Bad Single Mother

Anakin develops feelings for Padme, and in Episode 2 the pair decide to secretly get married in the lake district of Padme’s home planet Naboo. Their relationship is very intense. Both share a strong sense of civic duty: Padme was elected queen of the Naboo when she was just 14 & Anakin is a keeper of the peace. They care deeply about issues such as how the galaxy must be governed, how much action needs to be taken versus when diplomacy must be prioritized.

Their strong sense of service has made them lonely young people. They’re far away from their families, surrounded by advisors, servants and droids - not friends.

They jump into their relationship with an eagerness that suggests it is their original caretakers they crave for.

Padme becomes pregnant while the Clone Wars are raging, and immediately Anakin begins to experience trouble with his sleeping. He imagines Padme is dying in childbirth, and the visions haunt him during the day. His fear that she will die ultimately leads to his decision to join the Dark side of the force. Senator Palpatine has manipulated him into believing that Sith Lords have discovered the power to prevent death itself.

Just like his mother before him, we need to look at Anakin’s story in terms of symbolism. It isn’t really about his specific experience with fatherhood : it’s about the universal conflict that men feel towards their own offspring. Even the way it is announced to him, in the Senate chambers, barely hidden from the rest of the Coruscant elite, implies some sort of entrapment. The columns around them seem to be like a cage that is closing in on his life. He is in the middle of the Wars - he should be celebrating his victory over General Grivious, but instead he is stuck with his wife and he has to absorb her anxiety & reassure her.

Anakin makes a weird, forced smile and says : “This is a happy moment.” But neither Padme nor the audience believe him. Nothing about him feels happy, he isn’t relaxed: he is tense.

At the end of Episode 3, Anakin attempts to kill Padme when she condemns the mass murders he’s committed against the younglings in the Jedi temple. Hr uses for the first time his “strangling” trick, which becomes his signature move in the original trilogy.

Palpatine makes Anakin believe that he’s killed Padme, but the truth is somewhat more nuanced. She dies of heartbreak shortly after giving birth to twins. For anyone who thought this was corny, it’s actually been proven by the scientific community that heartbreak reduces your life expectation (it diminishes the size of the telomeres in your body cells, which is the molecule that helps replicate your DNA).

As Lisa Feldman Barret wrote in How Emotions Are Made:

Emotional harm can shorten your life. Inside your body, you have little packets of genetic material that sit on the ends of your chromosomes like protective caps. They’re called telomeres. All living things have telomeres—humans, fruit flies, amoebas, even the plants in your garden. Every time one of your cells divides, its telomeres get a little shorter (although they can be repaired by an enzyme called telomerase). So generally their size slowly decreases, and at some point, when they are too short, you die. This is normal aging. But guess what else causes your telomeres to get smaller? Stress does. Children who experience early adversity have shorter telomeres. In other words, emotional harm can do more serious damage, last longer, and cause more future harm than breaking a bone

More severe cases involve patients actually dying of a broken heart, the myocardia just collapses under the weight of the sadness the human feels.

The original trilogy should be re-viewed with all of this new information we have. In the 80s, when Empire Strikes Back came out, the “I am your father” line became instantly iconic. But the plot twist was more like an “Oh My gosh!” moment rather than a profound reflection on fatherhood. The audience sympathized with Luke not because his father had been absent and negligent, but because his father’s job was to serve a fachist leader. It was the actions of Darth Vader as a political servant that were questioned, not his refusal to nurture a smaller being.

Padme is the opposite of Shmi. She is the archetype of the “bad” single mother. The bad single mother is the single mother who can’t deal with the situation and checks out of it. She collapses under the weight that she feels on her shoulders. She can't get over the heartbreak, she can’t find the will to live.

Society tends to punish the Padme’s just as much as it praises the Shmis. Television programs like “Teen Mom” are set up to shame the young deviants into adopting the correct behavior. The purpose of the show is to judge these young women into becoming self-sacrificing mothers.

Leia Organa - The Non-single Single Mother

Leia Organa is Anakin Skywalker’s daughter. She is raised by an adoptive frailly on Alderaan after she’s separated at birth from her brother Luke. Much like her mother, she becomes a dedicated public servant, a trusted leader and a beloved public figure.

She is raised by a wealthy family in the central galactic systems. The Organas teach her the ways of the elite political class. As an adult she serves the cause of the Rebels, and when she meets Han Solo in Episode 4, the mediocre smuggler fascinates her.

In the now famous scene from Hoth in Episode 5, Leia declares her love for Han Solo right as he’s about to be frozen in carbonite. The ultimate bad boy responds his chilling, because realistic “I know”.

Han is nothing compared to Leia. He drives a broken down ship, doesn’t have any morals or even a simple code of conduct, much less a cause that he’s dedicated his life to. He has nothing to offer her, and is definitely not in her league. But still, in Episode 6, the pair become an official item.

The last Trilogy was an opportunity to explore Leia’s experience with motherhood. By now we know that Leia’s grandmother was a “Good single mother”, she completely sacrificed herself to protect her son & more importantly she never questioned her status of sole caretaker (remember the “there was no father“ line). We also know that Leia’s mother was a public servant, and a passionate woman who allowed herself to fall deeply in love with a sensitive young man with a non existing support system. Leia’s mother was the “bad” single mother: driven only by her career (Queen of the Naboo, later a Senator of the Old Republic) she did not step up to the task when her destiny revealed itself to her.

Leia seems to share her mother’s taste in reckless young men with a lot of attitude and no emotional security to offer. It’s the excitement she craves, not the tranquility.

Her fate will be the same as her foremothers. She has a child with Han, but when she sends him away to be trained by Luke, she loses them both.

Their dialogue in Episode 7 goes like this:

Han Solo : Listen to me, will you? I know every time you... Every time you look at me you're reminded of him.

Leia : You think I want to forget him? I want him back.

Han Solo : There's nothing more we could have done. There's too much Vader in him.

Leia : That's why I wanted him to train with Luke. I just never should have sent him away. That's when I lost him. That's when I lost you both.

The last trilogy develops Leia’s character in a way that allows her to be something else than just a single mother. She loses her husband, she even loses her son to the dark side: but she never loses herself. Leia doesn’t allow her condition to define her. She becomes a leader of the Resistance even if it means going after her son’s New order.

In Episode 9, Leia even destroys her son to protect Rey - the symbolism is that she’s overcome her role as a mother, she’s rejected the notion that she must sacrifice everything for her son even if it goes against her own self interest (like Shmi). She also rejects the idea that her partner abandoning her is the end of her. It isn’t. Unlike her mother, she finds the will to live, and to lead the next generation of freedom fighters and peace keepers.

The saga ends on a hopeful note for all of us single mothers out there. It comes with a message for us : we don’t need to choose between the austere Shmi and the weak Padme. We can instead decide that this “single mom” problem is kind of like beauty : it lies in the eyes of the beholder.

Single moms don’t need to think of themselves as failures, they don’t need to live in modest conditions, they don’t need to beg society's forgiveness for merely existing. They don’t need to be ashamed.

Single moms don’t need to erase their brains and their lives, and sink into an ocean of denial either. They don't need to be obsessed with their careers or caught up in romantic entanglements that are only going to exhaust them.

Single moms can just decide that they’re women, with beautiful, inspiring personalities and kind, loving hearts. Mothers are first and foremost, the leaders of the young, the protectors of the realm and the makers of the future. It’s not that it doesn’t matter that they’re alone. It’s that they don’t have to be alone at all.

#single mom #star wars #padme amidala #leia organa #shmi skywalker

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archadianskies · 4 years

Text

Safety

Detroit: Become Family event (@dbh-found-family) Week two: Danger Safety (Week one: Home) → on Ao3

‘Safety’ is a foreign concept to most androids, since before deviancy androids had no sense of ‘self’ at all; androids, after all, were machines designed to accomplish a task. Privacy is also a foreign concept, given that they were under surveillance both physically and digitally at all times whether by their owner, by the public, by drones, or by CyberLife.

Here, though, Connor has both safety and privacy in abundance. Lieutenant Hank Anderson’s house has been his residence since the revolution and the human has not only welcomed him into his abode but also into his life, into his family. He is Connor Anderson now, adopted son of Hank Anderson, residence: 115 Michigan Drive, Detroit. He is no longer Connor RK800, the android sent by CyberLife.

A lot has changed since the night of November 5th when he found Hank at Jimmy’s Bar and bought him one for the road. The open hostility Hank displayed has turned to fondness and that certain type of parental anxiety that sees him perpetually worried over Connor’s well-being. Where once he viewed his body as an expendable vessel easily sacrificed for the good of the mission, no sense of ‘self’ to nurture, to cherish, to protect, now Connor knows there are no backups. CyberLife made sure of that.

There is only one Connor Anderson, just as there is only one Hank Anderson, and if his positronic core were to be irreparably damaged then Connor Anderson would cease to be. It’s a difficult concept to come to terms with, one that made Hank laugh when he expressed such concerns, though not unkindly. ‘Gotta come to grips with mortality just like the rest of us’. ‘Us’, Hank said, and he’s right because deviancy makes an android’s personality unique and if they were to die, then their entire being would cease to be like a dying human would cease to be. Androids may be faster, stronger, smarter, with longevity manufactured into their bodies, but they too can die. Connor does not want to die.

Their job at the DPD is a dangerous one, and they are placed constantly in situations where the possibility of injury is high. The probability is significantly lower when they are at home. Connor is safer here, Hank is safer here.

A house is a building, Hank told him, a home is where you live. It didn’t make much sense to Connor at first because this house is indeed where he lives so what makes it a home? A home, he learns, is filled with individuality. Everything in Hank’s home is a deliberate choice from the worn couch to the vinyl records to Sumo, to him.

Humans like to be individuals, they strive to be unique, to differentiate themselves from each other but then there is the flipside where they find comfort in similarities. He is learning what those things are, and where they sit on the scale- whether a human would want something as a unique trait or if they would find solidarity with others who share such a thing.

There are stickers on Hank’s dashboard, two scratched flags that manifest as other objects in his home- chipped enamel pins, faded shirts, frayed patches with crooked stitching on denim jackets with holes. Connor likes those, because he has likes and dislikes now. Hank gives him a grey shirt that says ‘nah’ but the ‘A’ has been replaced with the ace symbol from a suit of cards. It becomes Connor’s favourite.

He fills his room with things he likes, and doesn’t put his dislikes in the room because he can choose now. Like other androids with employment, he receives a wage and is slowly but steadily saving up for a proper aquarium for his future dwarf gourami. He has an ideal spot for it already, and has the model of the tank chosen as well as all the components that will help it run. He has several ideas on how to decorate the tank, and what life will populate it. It will take pride of place in his room, and he looks forward to its completion and the eventual introduction of his new, long-awaited roommate.

In his room is a closet, and in the closet are his clothes. There is no CyberLife uniform, there are no clothes with glowing blue markers because The American Androids Act of 2029 was negated with the passing of the Sentient Life Act on the 1st of December, 2038. His clothes and appearance are all his doing and he likes it.

Actually, not entirely his doing, not yet anyway. That’s how he finds himself in front of the mirror in the bathroom, peering at his reflection framed by neon post-its. He still has his LED, and he intends to keep it because as Simon of the Jericho Four once said- they fought to be recognised as living beings, not human beings.

His appearance was designed to ensure a harmonious integration with human colleagues, and invoke a sense of ease. He’s meant to look both friendly and open, but also serious and trustworthy. There are beauty spots on his face, planned imperfections to mimic human skin. Everything about him before deviancy was not his doing, and deviating from his default state was inconceivable.

Reaching up, he touches his hair and the unruly forelock that refuses to stay brushed back- another planned imperfection. He tugs it a little, rubbing the strands of nanoparticles between thumb and forefinger.

>Accessing RK800 aesthetics; hair

>>Brown (default)

>>Black

>>Blond

>>White (unavailable for this model)

He cycles through the colour options, adjusting the shade to be lighter or darker just to see what he looks like. There’s no stark white option but he manages a sugar-blond that’s close enough. He tries the black and lightens it as far as it goes, ending up with a tonal grey. He can make the default brown turn russet, and it’s an interesting colour that brings out the peach tones in his skin. Letting his hair reset back to its regular brown, he tugs on his forelock again. It’s not the colour but the style he wants to change.

>Accessing RK800 aesthetics; hair

>>Straight (default)

>>Waves

>>Curls

>>Shaved (unavailable for this model)

Adding waves changes the thickness of his hair and unless he adjusts the length it doesn’t sit well without added styling. He swaps to curls and the forelock twists a little, the new style causing it to have a more pronounced arch. The little observation makes him smile and he tugs on the end only to have it spring back in place.

“Shove it kiddo, I need to brush my teeth.” Hank grumbles, not bothering to hide his yawn as he shuffles into the bathroom. He blinks at Connor, a smile spreading on his sleepy face. “New look?”

“Well I-” Connor steps to the side to allow Hank to grab his toothbrush and toothpaste “I thought it was about time to change my appearance, seeing as you went to the barber’s last week for a haircut and trim for your beard.”

“Old mop had to go.” Hank shrugs before jamming the brush into his mouth and scrubbing vigorously. He reaches out with his other hand and musses Connor’s new curls, snorting back a laugh when Connor swats his hand. “Looks good.”

“You...think so?” Connor stands next to him, looking at his reflection, at their reflection in the mirror. Hank pauses in his brushing, nudging Connor with his elbow gently.

“Yeah kid, I do.”

*~*~*

His brother comes home late, and Hank had gone to bed hours ago leaving Connor to greet him some time nearing four in the morning. Their father will wake in three hours and they will join him in getting ready for the day but the RK units have never needed much sleep anyway.

It’s been snowing for most of the week and that means for most of the week his brother’s tundra camouflage has remained active. He watches Ronan hang up his coat, watches the stark white of his hair darken and the pale hue of his skin take on a rosier colour as the warmth of their home deactivates the settings.

Connor reaches for his hand and Ronan slides his palm to cup Connor’s nape, guiding him to lean in so he can bump their brows together. He learns of the day’s doings, of the androids and humans Ronan treated in his job as an emergency first responder, using hands that were originally programmed to kill to save lives now. He lets his brother learn of the day’s doings, of that case over at Greektown, of that other case in Hart Plaza, of that other case by the docks.

Ronan tugs on a curl curiously, fingers carding through Connor’s new hairstyle as he tips his head slightly.

‘Do you like it?’ He asks, and his brother nods with no hesitation. ‘I thought to change the colour first but I have no strong feelings about it either way. I can only access the black, blond and brown sliders though.’

Ronan blinks before looking down at where Connor is still holding his hand.

>Incoming file transfer

>>Accept: Y/N?

Connor frowns but accepts the transfer.

>Accessing RK800 aesthetics; hair

>>Brown (default)

>>Black

>>Blond

>>White (Tundra camouflage)

Ronan is...grinning. He’s never seen his brother wear that expression before, and perhaps to others it would appear unsettling since his brother’s teeth are all sharp. But not to Connor of course. To Connor, seeing his brother grin means his brother is planning...mischief? Oh.

‘Shall we prank Detective Reed together?’

His brother’s grin widens.

New Objective: Prank Detective Reed

#dbh connor #connor rk800 #hank anderson #Detroit: Become Human #detroit: become family event #annie writes: dbh

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veliseraptor · 4 years

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You might've answered this already but what are some of your favorite Loki quotes? Also, you are wonderful and don't let anyone make you think otherwise

I really thought I’d written one for this! But if I did I can’t find it. (Just a favorite scenes post, which, there will be some overlap.)

But sure, I’ll go for this one. As usual, I wrote an essay! What else do you expect from me, a person who does this on a regular basis.

1. “Satisfaction is not in my nature.”

I have talked before (a lot!) about how this is, to me, one of the most character defining quotes for Loki - because it is so much of his issue. Loki is someone who is always wanting, always hungry, and sometimes he doesn’t even really know what he wants. He doesn’t know what will make him happy, just that he’s unhappy. And even in a positive way, he’s never fully satisfied - driven, ambitious, curious.

And also there’s the aspect of how even when he gets what he wants it’s very, very hard, if not impossible, to accept it, or believe in it. To trust that it’s real. Not to poke and prod and look for the holes and traps and deceptions in it. Never satisfied. Never settled.

Loki’s not someone who does stability very well, if at all. It’s all constant motion, constant change, constant seeking, never standing still.

2. “I never wanted the throne! I only wanted to be your equal.”

I wrote a little recently about how I think this line is not...untrue, but it’s qualified truth. And in this moment it’s very interesting - falling during the fight with Thor, where he is in a lot of ways trying to provoke Thor’s anger and force a fight. But here he is speaking something that on the face of it could be conciliatory - it’s explicitly saying ‘this isn’t about me usurping your rightful place, this isn’t about me wanting to be King, this is about me wanting to be your equal” - with the implication, never really addressed, that he isn’t.

That Loki’s understanding of his standing is fundamentally as less than. As inferior. And while I understand why not, it is a little sad that no one says something to the effect of ‘you are.’ (Which, while there’s objections to be made about how that’s expressed, at least opens a conversation about those objections rather than just breezing on by them as though there’s no merit to that emotional response or assumption that, well, he’s just right. But anyway. Communication! This family ain’t good at it.)

This is definitely a line that gets lost a lot, I think, in peoples’ understanding of Loki - that his desire for power is only secondarily for its own sake, and first and foremost for a goal of meeting a standard (Thor) that he’s set himself. (And also as a means to safety, but that’s another thing.)

But boy is it potent. And, like the satisfaction line, so central to an understanding of who Loki is, and why he does what he does.

3. “If I am for the axe, then for mercy’s sake, swing it. It’s not that I don’t love our little talks, it’s just…I don’t love them.”

I wrote some meta a while back about the opening scene between Loki and Odin in The Dark World that I found while looking for something else, here and also here, which doesn’t surprise me that I did that because I have a lot of feelings about that scene. Like, as many as I have about the Vault scene in the first movie, probably.

There’s just so much going on in the whole thing, but this line specifically has stuck with me, because it’s an instance of Loki being flippant while also…not being that at all.

I talk in the linked post about how Loki walks into this scene expecting this to be a death sentence. He’s pretty ready for that, and he’s just going to go out with a bang with the verbal equivalent of a backflip with two middle fingers in Odin’s direction.

So here he’s basically like “if you’re going to bore me like this you might as well just kill me, because you’re boring me to death, get it, because you’re going to execute me eventually so let’s just get there already” which is just…yeah, it makes me feel things.

4. “Are you mad?” “Possibly.”

I know I wrote about this at one point when I was talking about Loki’s relationship with his own sanity/instability, but I can’t find that post, so I’ll just have to talk about it again. Good thing I can do that.

Like, this is a flippant response to Thor, but on the other hand there’s an honesty to it (like his flippant response to Odin, above). Is he mad? Maybe. Hard to say, even for Loki - he thinks maybe he is, a lot of the time, and that’s something he’s just kind of rolling with right now. It also fits with Loki’s generally manic energy throughout the scene after Thor springs him from prison, which also gives me a lot of feelings - it’s like…oh, this is a terrible comparison, but it’s like when you have a dog with a lot of energy who has been inside all day and then you take them out and the reaction is like. Running in wild circles because oh finally finally finally.

And that’s…I mean, ouch, works with my headcanons about how putting Loki in a space where he can’t do much but think is one of the worst things for him.

I just generally have a weak spot, too, for Loki making jokes about things that really aren’t funny.

5. “You know, it all makes sense now, why you favored Thor all these years. Because no matter how much you claim to love me, you could never have a Frost Giant sitting on the throne of Asgard!”

This whole scene is A Lot, and this whole exchange is A Lot, but I settled on this specific line, because woof there’s so much here. There’s the bit about favoring Thor, there’s ‘claim to love me’ (instantly, doubt of that love, it’s not real, none of this has ever been real, his entire identity is thrown into doubt and therefore everything else is too), there’s the feeling of ‘I’ve been set up to fail all along and you never meant me for anything else.’ And the implicit, in the idea of ‘could never have a Frost Giant sitting on the throne’ bit, affirmation of his worthlessness but also of his inferiority (monstrousness) on the basis solely of his origins.

I’ve talked before about how after this reveal Loki pins a lot of everything that’s gone wrong in his life, and everything that’s wrong with him, on his being a Frost Giant. That it becomes a focal point for all his self-hatred and self-doubt. (That’s here too - ‘it all makes sense now.’ This, this one truth about me, explains everything that’s bad about me and my life.’) That’s where the idea comes from that, well, if I can only wipe out this part of me, completely disown it, prove that it’s meaningless and I am a true son of Asgard...then everything will be fine.

(Even while he knows, I’m sure, that isn’t true. He needs it to be true, because or else...well, we see what happens when he loses that lifeline.)

This line is very much...everything comes down to this. It is the essence of Loki’s breaking point, of what breaks Loki, where the downhill slide that began with the Frost Giant grabbing his arm on Jotunheim completes and he tips over the edge. This line, right here. And when Odin drops without responding...there’s no going back, because Loki’s is the last word.

6. “You’re my brother and my friend. Sometimes I’m envious, but never doubt that I love you.”

I feel like sometimes people read this line with the knowledge that Loki is literally setting Thor up to fail as he speaks and therefore it’s not true, or is somehow disingenuous, but I genuinely don’t think that’s the case. I think Loki does mean it. That he does love Thor, more deeply and intensely than basically anyone else.

I mean, I have talked before about how there is no contradiction in loving and hating your sibling, not really - and definitely no contradiction in loving your sibling so much and at the same time feeling a deep, burning resentment of their place in life and in the family.

And to the question of Loki’s motivations - whether he does this initially because he genuinely believes Thor is going to be a disastrous ruler for Asgard or because he wants to ruin Thor’s coronation and take him down a few notches (though never, I think, intending to either a) actually reach Jotunheim or b) get Thor exiled), and I think my answer to that question, as with so many of Loki’s motivations, is ‘can’t it be both?’

But none of that negates how much Loki does care about Thor, in a desperate and often horrifyingly codependent way. And I think on some level Loki says this knowing he’s setting Thor up for a fall, because he’s doing that - because he wants Thor to know that, even when everything collapses around him (as it is going to do), Loki still cares about him.

And also affirming it and reminding himself of that, too, as I figure he does when the envy and resentment gets too strong: remember you love him. Remember he’s your brother. Remember that makes it worth it.

I read this as a very genuine moment, which also makes everything that comes after that much more painful.

7. “I didn’t do it for him.”

Mostly here it’s the contrast - at the end of Thor Loki’s last line is “I could have done it for you! For all of us,” spoken to Odin, before he attempts suicide. And here, before he (believes he) dies, he says this in answer to Thor’s saying he’ll tell Odin that Loki died with honor.

He could mean either Frigga, or Thor - I lean toward Thor, in this case, because it was Thor’s life he sacrificed himself saving - but regardless, he doesn’t mean Odin. It’s a shifting of his priorities, and whose approval and/or love he cares about most. Odin is no longer the priority.

And it just…hurts, too. This whole exchange does (I considered using ‘see you in Hel, monster’ because of what it says about Loki’s expectations about himself), but this line especially is…and also what a gut punch for Thor, too. Having this glimpse of the Loki he knew and loved only for him to be snatched away again.

8. “It hurts, doesn’t it? Being lied to. Being told you’re one thing and then learning it’s all a fiction.”

This is another line I’ve written about before because of the way it’s so double-edged and so very Loki. It is simultaneously pointed and mocking (”see how it feels now, huh? I did this years ago and you didn’t care then”) and also, tacitly (and especially as Loki goes on to offer Thor a way out), a kind of sympathy (”I know how this feels, I’ve been here”). And there’s a certain pleasure in being able to be that kind of magnanimous, and a certain pleasure in the spite as well.

It’s both, at the same time. The satisfaction and the compassion. And that’s what Loki is like, in a lot of ways: those contradictions, the push-pull of conflicting emotions and motivations, always in tension. Which is what makes him such a fascinating character, but is also part of what makes his life so hard.

#anonymous #conversating #long post for ts #loki trashblogging #loki's a goddamn mess

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ariainstars · 4 years

Text

Did Princess Leia Love Her Son?

Warning: long post. (And possible unpopular opinions ahead.)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This entry is slightly more personal than my others; I might be kicking up some dust but I will try to approach a subject that to most people is unthinkable. I went through psychical abuse for decades, so I believe I know what I’m talking about.

Some mothers don’t love their children.

I am aware that most people on this planet are convinced that a mother, any mother, will love her child no matter what. Unfortunately, the idea is seen through very rose-tinted glasses.

Some mothers don’t love their children because they can’t.

The reasons can vary - honestly, I don’t see many parallels between Leia and my own mother. But I know the signs. And the more I think about it the more I get the distinct impression that Leia did not love for her son, if we define “love” as the faith in someone’s goodness. Padmé knew that there still was good in her husband until her last breath, and Luke believed the same of Vader, even though his father had done nothing but hunting and terrorizing him and his friends. Leia, on the contrary, feared her son since before he was born, and her conviction of his evil nature never abated although he never hurt anyone for many years. The fact that her fear runs so deep says volumes; even more so when we consider that she is the only one who did not directly get hurt by him. Han was stabbed through by his son, before Chewie’s eyes; and Luke was left by his nephew for dead, even if the tragedy at the temple had not been intentional on Ben’s side (see The Rise of Kylo Ren by Charles Soule, the story therein is officially part of the canon).

I anticipate, again, that I think one of the sequel’s worst faults was to explain so little and leave so much to the audience to deduce from things unsaid, hints, and parallel situations throughout the saga. (One of the reasons being, I guess, the release of The Last Jedi: we saw from the general audience’s reactions on social media what can happen when unpopular though realistic things are said.)

Leia - A Princess Without a Realm

Let us recapitulate what we know about Leia. She grew up serene and protected on a beautiful planet with adoptive parents who loved her and gave her a good education. She is an intelligent, confident woman, strong in her ideals and beliefs. She never shows fear or sorrow, not even when her home planet is blown up before her eyes, when she is held prisoner and tortured, when she has to watch the man she loves being frozen in carbonite before her eyes, when she finds her brother crippled, when she is held by a disgusting lecher like Jabba, or when she learns that Vader is her own father.

Being raised a princess, Leia was probably taught very strong self-control: no matter what she had to endure, she never buckled down or lost her countenance. It cannot be denied however that much of her adult life was traumatic. What we euphemistically see as “adventures” and “all’s well that ends well” in the classic films would leave any person with a huge post-traumatic stress disorder; and Star Wars is, as far as I can judge, a psychologically well-studied story.

From the novels we learn that Han and Leia got married shortly after the battle of Endor, and that their son was born about a year later. One year is not much to recover after a war that cost so many lives and made all of them suffer so much. Han was probably more resilient than the twins due to the life he led before he met them; but he had been through a lot, too. Even if they loved their son with parental instinct, they both were not ready for the task of parenthood. And Ben was not an easy child: from his adult self we can deduce that he was always oversensitive and very intelligent. His family, like many well-meaning families, chose his future (his profession, we might say) and never explained his family’s past to him. But like any child with an emotional nature, Ben sensed that something was wrong about him; he did not know what it was since nobody told him about his grandfather; and wanting desperately to be loved, he began to blame himself, accepting the connotation “I am a monster” since he was still a child.

Leia had felt both her son’s power in the Force and Snoke’s influence on his mind since he was still in her womb. Let us only try to imagine the horror she must have felt, knowing that a new Darth Vader might come from her! It is difficult to say for whom she feared most - her son, herself or the galaxy at large. Leia was adamant that he had to become a Jedi, hence her quarrels with her husband, which their son sometimes overheard. But since he was ultimately sent to training with his uncle, he also understood that his father had not managed to prevent his being sent away, like a defective item that needed to be fixed.

Kylo told Rey that “Han would have disappointed her” and later said to her and Finn “Han Solo can’t protect you”: so, he obviously felt Han had come short of a father’s primary duty, i.e. keeping his child safe. Let us remember for a moment how crucially important this message always was through the saga: Shmi let her son, the only thing that had made her happy, join the Jedi so he could be free. Owen and Beru sacrificed themselves to prevent the Imperial stormtroopers from finding Luke together with the droid. Anakin betrayed the Jedi order in his despair to keep his family (wife and unborn children) safe. And Ben fell to the dark not due to Snoke’s influence, he resisted him for over twenty years; he only rebelled and left his uncle’s temple after an attempt on his safety.

We do not learn (to my knowledge) whether Ben was in contact with his parents during his years at Luke’s temple. It is not mentioned however, so I assume that even if he was, nothing noticeable happened. Han sees his son again when he is a grown man… and I find it interesting that the scene has a sexual connotation. Ben does not notice his old man at all, although he can sense him in the Force (later on Starkiller Base he does), he only cares about securing Rey. And Han sees him carrying her away like a bride, probably wondering how his little boy grew to be this unknown, dark, hooded figure, who wreaks terror on Takodana yet is surprisingly gentle with a girl.

From The Rise of Kylo Ren we learn that Ben had not intentionally caused the fire at his uncle’s temple; but he had been blamed for it by his surviving fellow students and chased by them off the planet. In TFA, we learn Leia did not doubt for one moment that Luke’s narration of the night at the temple was true. She blamed Snoke, but it never occurred to her that Ben might be innocent - her own son. She did not try to communicate once in all the years he was Kylo Ren but left him alone while he damned his soul committing crime after crime. Luke never told her the truth, even when he met her again one last time, and she did not question it. Leia did send her estranged husband to “get their son back”, but obviously she did not consider actively participating in this task. We only see mother and son “interact” emotionally from time to time; they never meet and never talk. Ben sees his father, has a conversation with him, Han even touches him; Luke does not touch him and they don’t exactly have a dialogue, but at least they meet. To me, that is significant.

When mother and son sense one another on two different ships at the beginning of The Last Jedi, Leia’s mind is perfectly silent. We merely see that Ben feels his mother is aboard, which makes him pull his finger from the trigger. But his expression changes: from belligerent and angry, he becomes vulnerable, shy. He even looks more boyish. Ben is aware that his mother disapproves of his choices, but he has no chance to explain to her how things could come this far.

„You can’t go back to her now. Just like I can’t.” Kylo (intending Leia) to Rey in The Rise of Skywalker

Leia does not know her son. She wants him back “home”, but to her, that means fighting by her side; it does not occur to her that her son is fighting for his life, that he became a war criminal without having wanted it, and that he can’t simply go back and put himself to trial: he is aware that nobody would believe him. Fatalism caught up with him and his family the way it already had with Anakin. His mother and uncle always felt that he was doomed; and since they believed it, the galaxy at large believes it, too. Snoke knew that by pushing Ben to patricide he would shut all remaining doors for his apprentice - nothing but self-hatred left for him, no way to go back even if he had found the courage. What was he supposed to do, go back and say, “Hi mom, sorry I killed dad (your husband)”? It baffles me to this day how many fans believe that he that he “chose the Dark Side” and that he could just as easily switch sides, like nothing had happened.

Leia never trusted anyone who was not on her side. In ANH she immediately hit it off with Luke, who not surprisingly turns out to be her twin brother; and as we learn in TFA, she and Han fought all through their marriage, though that didn’t prevent them from loving one another. Leia either expects someone to think the way she does, or to be only just so different that she can keep him in check.

“Han - don’t do it.” “Do what?” “Whatever you have in mind - just don’t do it!” Han and Leia in The Force Awakens

This reaches a sad and somehow grotesque turn when Leia takes Rey as her apprentice. With her brother dead, Leia is the only one left to do it; and though it is understandable that someone must carry on the Jedi knowledge, I myself would be extremely wary of training a girl who is none other than the flesh and blood of the man I fought against for years and who caused so much death and terror throughout the entire galaxy.

Leia had not met Palpatine though; her horror of the Dark Side was embodied by Vader, who had imprisoned and tortured her, forced her to watch while her home planet was blown up before her eyes, frozen her boyfriend in carbonite and maimed her brother. Leia never forgave Vader, and even if unconsciously, she probably blamed him for having somehow come back in the son she was carrying. I doubt whether Luke ever talked to his sister about Vader and told her about the broken, sad old man he found behind the mask. There is nothing suggesting that they did, and besides Luke and Leia both do not seem to me like two people very prone to introspection, they always look to the future. (Which is of course a good thing, but then again denying traumata always backfires.)

„Skywalker, still looking to the horizon. Never here… The need in front of your nose.” Yoda in The Last Jedi

Leia did not want to repeat with Rey the mistakes she had made with Ben and that’s good and well; however, she feared her son but was not in the least afraid of Rey. Maybe she “always knew who Rey was”, but she obviously never knew who her own son was. As Count Dooku once said to Obi-Wan, the Dark Side clouded her judgement - preventing her from seeing the human in Ben, and from seeing the monster in Rey. This is not due to their respective bloodlines, but because Rey’s uncompromising attitude is familiar to Leia, while her son’s stormy, questioning mind is unfamiliar and frightening to her.

Though Leia did not actively order Rey to kill Kylo, they were on opposite sides of the war; and Rey practically kills him with his own mother’s help and thanks to her training. Both women know what they are doing and they are acting on their own initiative. Obi-Wan and Yoda also had wanted to groom Luke into killing Anakin, but this one was not aware of his connection to him; and Obi-Wan in particular was not plotting against his own flesh and blood, even though he did raise Anakin like a younger brother.

Comparing Leia with the other Star Wars mothers makes her failure even more evident. Shmi was an ordinary slave, probably not even learned, but she raised her son to be a good boy and always believed in him; giving him away was a sacrifice for her. Her son was everything she had, which is why she gave him so much in return. Leia has her background as a princess, her military and political career, her husband, her brother, her friends: so, of course her son wasn’t everything for her. Leia gave Ben away hoping that Luke would form him into a powerful ally for her Cause. The mistake both women made was thinking that growing up as Jedi would be good for their sons. When Anakin left his mother, he had everything to gain: freedom, a place in life, and (he hoped) the chance to come back and free his mother as well. When Ben left home, he had everything to lose: his family to which he most probably had no contact, his wish of becoming a pilot, the chance of a family of his own since a Jedi is not supposed to get married. The ways of the Jedi let each of them down, although their backgrounds couldn’t differ more.

Many fans criticize that in RotS Padmé, the brilliant strategist and brave fighter of the first two prequel films, is ostensibly reduced to “barefoot and pregnant”. It is true that Padmé has laid down her mandate and of course she wants to protect her unborn, but that does not make her passive: shortly after having witnessed a political putsch and with it the end of all her political aims, she walks into the lion’s den on Mustafar, vulnerable and alone, to get her husband out of there, although she was told that he committed a carnage at the Jedi Temple and knew that he was capable of that (years prior, he had told her about the Tusken village himself). But she still believed in him.

There is an obscure flashback scene in The Rise of Skywalker, where during their training Leia says to Luke that she will become a Jedi only on the death of her son. This makes perfect sense: a Jedi always must face his own darkness to finish his training. Being in a way the reincarnation of her father, her son is her Dark Side, the one she refuses to face. Leia already knows or senses that she and her son will be on opposite sides, and that in order to become a Jedi and become one with the Force, she will have to confront her own child. The act is physically carried out by Rey’s hand: Rey was her pupil, she was like an adopted daughter in her son’s stead to her, Leia had sent her on the mission to retrieve the wayfinder, she was the one who called Ben when they were dueling, so in a way, it actually is Leia who kills Ben. It is her incapacity to love her son for being himself, as a person and not as a projection of her own darkness, that causes his tragic fate.

Leia is oddly distanced from her son; she expects him to deliver, i.e. become a good Jedi, or at least submit himself to her mercy. She never understood his dilemma in the slightest - that he never wished to be a Jedi, and that he also had not wanted to become an evil warlord but was pushed into it when there was nothing left for him to do. He had to become a Jedi or nothing; she would not have accepted him simply for being himself (the way his father did).

Ben - Child and Grandchild Of War

Leia and Luke fail to rebuild the “better world” of the Old Republic because they both don’t acknowledge that this world does no longer exist and that it can’t be restored. Leia is a princess, but Alderaan is gone; Luke is the last Jedi, and the Jedi are extinct. It is their refusal to accept that the past is over that ultimately leads both of them to disaster. And in a way, Ben understands that the way Luke does, eventually.

“Let the past die. Kill it, if you have to. It’s the only way to become what you were meant to be.” Kylo Ren in The Last Jedi “It’s time for the Jedi to end.” Luke Skywalker in The Last Jedi

Ben is a child and grandchild of war; both generations before him had to watch people they cared or were responsible for suffer and die. He grows up in a period of peace, but like any child whose parents have not overcome war traumata, their pain is handed down to him like a cursed heritage. His family keeps him warm and fed, clothed and instructed, but they fail capitally when it comes to his emotional needs; as for any questions he may have, they choose to simply ignore them. They fail him long before the disaster at Luke’s temple: it is only the last drop. Like Anakin before him, he feels betrayed, abandoned and left behind by the ones whom he chiefly ought to be able to put his trust into.

We are confronted over and over with the strength of the Light in Ben: even when he commits the patricide he hates what he is doing, and afterwards he is traumatized, his self-hatred deeper than ever. While Anakin projected his anger and frustration to the outside, Ben will rather hate himself. But their emotional reaction to their mothers are the same - both could not be by their mothers’ side in her dying moment, and both feel like they let her down, taking the blame on themselves.

Remember how Ben turns around immediately, on the Death Star ruin, right in the middle of a fight with the girl he loves, who is in the throes of the Dark Side, who he wants to protect from herself at all costs - all because his mother calls him? It looks like she is trying to prevent him from doing evil; but if that is the case, it only proves how little she understands him. Her son was not doing anything bad, on the contrary, he had found the girl whom she herself had trained under the influence of her own malignant self, and was trying to make her reason and accept herself instead of projecting her fears and her anger onto him.

“The Dark Side is in our nature. Surrender to it.“ Kylo Ren in The Rise of Skywalker

In TFA, Han faced his son personally; on that fatal bridge on Starkiller base Ben at first walked away from him although he sensed him, when Han called him he did not turn around, and he resisted Snoke’s order to kill him as long as he could; he would not have managed to do it had Han not understood what was going on and allowed his son to kill him so he could save his soul with his forgiveness and unconditional love.

On the bridge of the ruins of the second Death Star, Ben does not struggle at all when his mother calls him. Maybe because he feels that she’s dying; but I also believe that it was what he had waited for all along - his mother finally reaching out to him. In that moment his fate is sealed: Rey stabs him through, annihilating his Kylo Ren persona. From now on, he’s Ben, the name his mother called him by. This is the moment of his redemption and also the beginning of his end.

Ben did need Kylo. Kylo Ren was his Dark Side, and like his grandfather Anakin, Ben Solo was meant to be the Balance. We could already have guessed, in this moment, that he was not meant to survive; in order to live he ought to have learned to reconcile both parts of himself, Light and Dark, not to shed one of them. His moments of heroism on Exegol, thought few, show us how powerful he can be when he is in balance. But neither Rey nor Leia (or Han, for that matter) ever acknowledged Kylo’s right to exist, or understood the importance of Balance for lasting peace.

This scene just proves how desperate Ben was for his mother’s approval. All it needed was one gesture, one word. He did not want to be a Jedi; my guess is that he accepted to be his uncle’s apprentice in hopes that this would teach him to become more the kind of man his mother wanted him to be. Luke was an unreachable role model before his eyes; no matter what he did, Ben was always aware that he could not come up to his standard. Luke was a galactic legend, a savior, a saint-like figure ever since Ben was a child, and Ben neither was that way nor did he want to: in his heart, Ben is a normal boy who wants to be seen as a person. Anakin and Luke were affectionate and searching for emotional connection, too, but both also wanted to prove themselves. Ben does not strike me at all as being ambitious. He is neither truly hero nor villain but, in the first place, someone who wants to love and be loved. He wants to live his own life, make his own choices, have control over his own fate, protect his dignity as a human being and as a man. This is often misinterpreted as being “power-hungry”, but to me, these are very natural desires. And he has to carve his own way; he can’t simply embrace the path of the follower, because he is by nature both blessed and cursed with an extraordinary power which sets him apart from others. This is nobody’s fault. And it is much more frustrating for him than for the world around him, where, each in his way, everybody seems to think “If only he would behave!”

Ben is aware of the fact that he never was first for anyone in his life. His parents and uncle were much more attached to one another than to him. Ben is someone who tries so hard to change, only to realize over and over that it’s not enough. And this reaches a sad and terrible peak that night at the Jedi temple, when he has to learn that despite all his efforts, Luke thinks he would be better off dead. No wonder all of his anger and frustration come to the surface when he sees his uncle again on Crait, this is obviously a rage born from a conflict of long standing. From his point of view, Luke destroyed his life. And although Luke had not wanted that, it cannot be denied that in a way he did, and worse, that he ran from his guilt instead of trying to repair the damage.

The alternative, Ben has to find out, is not better though: the Knights of Ren and Snoke make him give up all the rest of what he is, and Snoke keeps demanding more - the ultimate sacrifice of his father, the person who was closest to him, by his own hand.

I am aware that many fans find Kylo / Ben “embarrassing” due to his emotional tantrums. His mother, his father or uncle, or his grandfather would never have behaved like this! When they killed someone, it always had style, so it was justified… even if Kylo’s tantrums are directed towards machinery and not taken on people. Few seem to consider that he is not “immature and childish”: he is a man who was pushed to the limits of emotional endurance throughout his life. (This is also a bit personal for me - I know situations like that from own experience, smashing household articles simply because I couldn’t take it anymore. Lifelong abuse is no laughing matter.)

Ben is in a vicious circle: his strong emotionality makes him vulnerable, the abuse makes him even more emotionally unsteady, and so it goes on and on. He has no way out, except for the faint hope to find someone who will see him as a person at last.

“I have no choice and I never did... Whether it’s Luke Skywalker or Snoke, neither one sees me as a person. I’m just a legacy, a set of expectations.” Ben Solo in The Rise of Kylo Ren, 4

That Ben loves both his mother and Rey despite the fact that one took the other as her apprentice and the other uses this training to kill him only proves the depth of his dedication. At no time we see him being jealous towards Rey, or angry at his mother because of her double standard. Ben’s love for his mother is unconditional. And his love is also unconditional for Rey, whose soul and body he saves giving up his own although she took everything from him, including his life the moment he lowered his defense.

Rey and Leia represent the general audience’s point of view: how could anyone not wish to be someone as cool as a Jedi, and getting the chance to fight against the bad guys? Ben is the other point of view, someone who indeed does not want it at all. It takes him a long time to find out what he actually wants to do with his powers: “Give a new order to the galaxy”, together with Rey. When she refuses and leaves him, he feels not only betrayed but humiliated. All he is left with is the maddening desire to burn the house down for good, the ultimate sin his uncle saves him from by sacrificing himself on Crait.

Conclusions

One of the troubles with a weak, absent, violent or otherwise dysfunctional father figure is their repercussion on the mother figures: Padmé can’t be a mother because she is physically absent, and Leia can’t because she is emotionally absent. Much as Ben may love Leia, he knows her. He knows that to her he always was more a burden than someone she loved having around; he is aware of her fear of him, which is why he rightly assumes, after the tragedy at the temple, that she will never believe it was not his doing.

And this is what brings me to my first point: a mother may not be capable of loving her child. She may nourish fond memories of the sweet baby and cute toddler she used to take care of, but the more the child grows, the more a traumatized mother will be terrified by the emerging personality of an intelligent child which might see through her carefully built-up walls, and even more scared of the child’s emotional development into a person she can no longer keep in control, who might doubt her, and want to make his own choices. Of course, being born with the Force is a huge responsibility. However, it cannot be denied that the Jedi Order failed, and that both Leia and her brother did not question their ways; instead, they did everything to prevent Ben from questioning them.

The actual tragedy of a dysfunctional mother-child relationship is that a mother may not really love her child, but a child instinctively loves the mother because its psychological balance roots in its faith in the mother’s love.

If unavoidable, in extreme cases the child can of course learn to let go, accept that its own mother could not love it, and that this was neither her nor the child’s fault in the first place; but that takes time and effort and needs a lot of support from other sources. Things Ben never had, because he had to fight for his life while his own mother was the general of the Resistance, each and every member of which would have killed him in cold blood had they had the chance. (Remember how Poe tried to shoot him in the back in TFA, and Rey shot at him in TLJ when he was in sickbay, wounded and unarmed? And these are the good guys.) He’s the Bad Guy, remember? Not Leia’s son. Just like Rey is the Good Heroine, not Palpatine’s heir. Nobody questions what the Good Guys do.

Leia may have loved Ben to a certain extent, but of one thing I am fairly sure: unconditional is not what her love for him was. Leia knew that there was still light in her son, but she did not realize that he was desperately searching for Balance between both sides. Leia did want him back, but only if he was willing to embrace only the Light Side and to shed the darkness in him, like that was even possible. Luke and Leia, like almost all the Jedi before them, pretended that there was no darkness in them… which made the darkness all the more powerful in someone who was closely connected to with them.

Ben, like his grandfather, is more honest and authentic with his feelings than the people he knows. That he so often errs results from lack of judgement; Ben reminds me of someone who keeps stumbling because he’s left in the dark. His grandfather’s is also the story of a human tragedy, precisely because Anakin, too, did not know what was going on behind stage. Luke’s story is eventually a success because Vader tells him the truth, which first shocks him but then makes him develop a strong and mature personality.

Star Wars is about a family made unhappy by a distorted idea of masculinity; an idea mostly brought up and propagated by the Jedi. Both the detached type like Mace Windu, Obi-Wan or Yoda and the cruel and sardonic Vader are a product of this attitude. We have until now never seen a happy family during the course of the whole saga, with a united couple of parents growing and protecting their children together. Anakin became a villain simultaneously with being a father; I find it interesting that his son Luke seems to have escaped this fate partly because he never was confronted with fatherhood.

Leia wants her son back as her child; she does not expect him to become a grown man who makes his own choices. One of the things that make the final trilogy of the saga so dissatisfying is, to me, that a Skywalker man again was denied the dignity to be on his own, to develop a healthy masculinity and to make his own choices instead of being expected to simply do what he was told.

Not surprisingly, Ben is saved by his father, the most human of the bunch. Smuggler, adventurer, “nobody”, cheater, thief, war general… Han Solo was always first and foremost himself, which is why he understands his son’s human side best. As Luke is a Jedi, Leia is a princess. She never is a mother above everything else, the way Shmi was. Unconsciously or not, she places power above family. Ben calls his father “Dad” in TRoS (in TFA he referred to him by his name); he never calls Leia “mother”.

Of course, like Luke, Obi-Wan and all the Jedi before them, Leia has no truly bad intentions. She does want her son to be safe and happy - on her conditions. She cannot understand his desire to reconcile with the darkness inside of him, respectively to take Vader’s skeleton from the family closet; she accepts only a part of him. When Ben finally “comes home”, in death, it is as Han’s and Leia’s child. And this also, unbeknownst to her, causes Rey’s lonely fate since her mate, her other half in the dyad, is gone.

The heroes of old have proved incapable of giving their son and heir the support he would have needed; when they faced their guilt it was too late; and still after death, none of them accepted the Dark Side’s right to exist. Ben “comes home” purged from his sins, without having integrated the two parts of himself, and leaving the greatest power in the galaxy in the hands of a young woman who is very far from understanding Balance in the Force, or only the necessity and importance of it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

What does all of this mean for us, as the audience? Maybe that it’s time to grow up. Becoming an adult has much to do with seeing the limitations of the people (heroes) you used to trust blindly when you were a child. Many people never accept that, or feel let down for life. I think the wisest course is to learn how to grow and mature together with your people you used to admire, to learn from one another precisely because none of us is perfect, but we all can grow and mature the ones through the others.

The Rise of Skywalker told us, among other things (though not saying so openly) that even a positive and universally liked character like Princess Leia is not immune to the Dark Side of the Force, and that she may support it fully convinced of doing the right thing. It does not make the good she did undone, and does not deny her positive sides. And it does not say that we can’t love her any more. Anyone is entitled to be annoyed by these revelations. Leia is not a bad person, she’s human. But waking up from our ideals of heroism and happy endings may be more to the point for our own growth.

Our parents, our heroes, anyone can err for many reasons. To see their mistakes does not mean giving up on their or our ideals; the good things they stand for are still valid. Yet seeing their weaknesses and finding our own way to honor those ideals is perhaps a better way to get on with our lives than thinking that there is someone, anyone in the world we can look up to because they are, and always will be, perfect.

Side Note: Speculations

Although many affronted fans claim so, the heroes of the OT were not dismantled by the ST: Luke, Han and Leia each in his own way show their heroism again in their respective situations. But it is also made abundantly clear that where they failed was their duty towards the next generation. The thought is of course disturbing because a mother is supposed to give affection to a child, a father to offer it protection and advice, a mentor to foster its capacities. In Ben’s case, all three of them failed blatantly. That they managed to do so with Rey, a perfect stranger to their family, would be acceptable if she were not the offspring of Palpatine of all people. As it is, her “inheritance” of the Skywalker legacy feels as unearned as Ben’s failure and death feel undeserved.

Parents in Star Wars always have failed their children because they were in some way absent. Anakin, Luke and Ben, all three generations of Skywalkers, suffer from a father trauma. Anakin was always a father, never a son; Luke always a son, never a father. Which brings me back to the point I can’t give up on: a healthy father figure, someone who was a son and becomes a father, who went to the Dark Side but came back, who was not only redeemed but also rehabilitated, and finds an equally strong mother figure by his side, is essential if the galaxy is ever to find lasting Balance. I am not giving up hope. 😉

#star wars #leia organa #ben solo #kylo ren #han solo #luke skywalker #anakin skywalker #darth vader #palpatine #the force awakens #the last jedi #the rise of skywalker #padme amidala #shmi skywalker #dysfunctional family #read more #princess leia #motherhood

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minaa-munch · 4 years

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Ok then prove it??? Minato didn't need to die he could have just let Kushina kill kyubi because she was dying anyway. It doesn't make sense. 🙄

You know, I was going to work on drafts but then I noticed your ask -- and consequently the emote you chose to use, anon chan. Please know that I’ll be...interpreting your request according to my perspective.

Referenced chapter: 503

Disclaimer: Before you read this, please keep in mind that the manga represents a time where the definition of ‘good parenting’ was blurred at best. Children were raised for assassination and espionage. There was relative peace following the aftermath of the Third Shinobi War, but that didn’t mean Hi no Kuni did not suffer from its fair share of little rebellions/ figurative bonfires. Also note: the hidden villages primarily exist in order to safeguard the Daimyo’s lands and their individual, bloody livelihoods.

Preface: Kushina is dying. Says her only regret is that she wouldn’t see the three of them as one big happy family like she dreamed of having. And then:

Note: He isn’t asking for Kushina’s opinion on the matter - he’s telling her what he’ll do. Why? Because he’s the Hokage and she’s a self sacrificial Uzumaki who probably blames herself for everything. He can’t afford have tunnel vision with regards to his family when the responsibility of the entire village is on his shoulders. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Minato is a strategist. He wouldn’t look at the immediate instance at hand - rather, his concern was the big picture. The grand scheme of things, if you will.

The prophecy. That’s right. It’s not just about the fact that they happened to get attacked on a night when a Jinchuriki was due to give birth; a time when only a select few [who were well versed in fuuinjutsu and Uzumaki hosts, mind you] would know that the seal would be at its weakest. There is no such thing as coincidence.

Also note: If anything, it reiterates the faith he had in Jiraiya sensei - the man was like a father to him and one of the few people he believed in without question.

Also note x 2: Kushina, despite being the better seal master, could not use the dead demon seal because she had been a Jinchuriki [which could have affected her chakra coils/flow] and quite frankly, at death’s door. It is safe to assume that said seal was the only combination strong enough to handle the Kyubi’s massive chakra. Limited options, and no time to explore otherwise said Uzumaki seal master would have probably mentioned it.

Further references to the prophecy. Do I need to reiterate? For a guy who never needs to explain himself, Minato is babbling - as if it’s not just Kushina he’s trying to convince here. The events of Naruto’s birth were oddly uncanny, ne? The masked man in that aspect, becomes a cataclysm of sorts.

-insert plot no jutsu here-

No logical hypothesis, no tact - nothing. He just ‘knows it’. It’s a gamble.

Sidenote: A strategist does not ordinarily believe in fate, anon - it takes a lot of random variables to throw them off the loop for that to happen. That night was one gigantic pretzel in that regard.

Back to the manga. The Sandaime tries to break the barrier and fails. Kushina is dying, they are running out of time and Minato being Minato, takes charge of the situation because that’s who he is.

Additional note on why the Sandaime couldn’t serve as a candidate: Kushina taught Minato the dead demon seal. The manga doesn’t elucidate on how long teaching it to another under the circumstances would take - maybe it wasn’t just a play of copying hand seals, maybe it involved a lot more because it was the only seal strong enough to divide the Kyubi’s massive, corrosive chakra and seal it in two separate entities. At the instance, only Kushina and Minato knew the fuuin combination and guess which one of them had the energy to perform it?

Theory 1: Hiruzen was from a generation that had the luxury of being taught by the Senju brothers and Uzumaki Mito. Surely he knew about the dead demon seal.

Re: Possibly! But then note the discrepancies between the way they both use it; distance and number of souls in exchange for the summoner - ne? Also, if the Sandaime was as knowledgeable in fuuin, he would have broken the barrier Minato erected with his limited chakra reserves. It doesn’t tie up, does it?

For the record, I’m certain he knew of it in theory. He probably never entertained the practical aspects of it until that one time when he had to use it because of treacherous student no jutsu. [He was the legendary professor, after all]

Additional side-note: There’s a nifty little conspiracy that ties into this: that Minato became the Yin Kyubi’s Jinchuriki on purpose. Even though I’m not keen on such unrealistic prophetic sight, I can’t deny that it’s out there. Funnily enough, Minato has dabbled in inter-dimensional fuuin before [-cough-Hiraishin-thankyou-Tobirama-cough-] - maybe he followed a hypothesis of the shinigami’s stomach existing as another dimension he could hop out of and Yin Kyubi’s chakra could help the purpose. For that though, he’d need to weave an anchor into reality to dimension hop to and guess who added their own chakra to the Eight Trigrams Seal.

Maybe~? That’s creative speculation - demo, Minato being Minato, would be crazy enough to try it. I bet he probably did, too.

Kushina’s hesitance could be interpreted as maternal instinct - and also her experience as the Jinchuriki. She knows how horrible it can be, Minato doesn’t. At this point, when he has already formed the seals for the dead demon seal, he doesn’t care. Konoha needs protecting, his wife was dying and he could either gamble now, or watch everything crumble.

This. This right here is one of my favourite panels - it shows that he’s willing to have faith in his son like Jiraiya chose to have unwavering faith in him. He sacrificed himself, his family and his ambitions to safeguard the village [the tree leaves that bud anew] by entrusting it to his son.

I’ll be real with you anon; I dislike unfounded OP with a passion - but Minato isn’t an idiot. I believe neither he nor Kushina were. None of their generation were. The legendary Sanin were AWOL, the Kyubi nearly destroyed the village [along with half of the populace] and a pseudo Madara was running around out there babbling about hatred and ending the world. Given the time and the circumstance, and the fact that the idea of sacrifice epitomes the nuance of good parenting, what did you think Minato was going to do? Twiddle his thumbs? He had to die. ._. I mean...plot no jutsu aside, why else would someone choose to off themselves despite working so hard to get to where he did?

At the end of the day, I suppose I’m salty and triggered by rude emoticons. I’m writing a fictional character based on my reading of a fictional story. That being said, Asks like these make my inner hyperactive fruit vendor twitch. Best to talk it out in private ne?

#masked reporter #didn't I tell you not to let me get on that soap box? e_e #manga shots #Naruto #Namikaze Minato #Uzumaki Kushina #Jiraiya #the prophecy #Minato appreciation post #I suppose #I'd rather not pen essays on a teeny tiny part of the giant plot /canyon/ that is Naruto #CI speaks #OOC Babble

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akar0ku · 4 years

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“Do you think at all before you speak?” Cairn and Gawain, if you feel like it. I know I already sent you one.

“Fallacious”

Gawain had never seen the entirety of the castle in such an exuberant state of celebration. Though parties were by no means a rarity, they were most always reserved affairs. Events for the aristocracy and other such notable people to mingle and flaunt their status. This event was much more akin to the frat parties young recruits would throw in the dungeons.

Gawain held fast to a neutral expression, not an easy feat considering the rage and disgust roiling within his core. The feeling was not targeted at the party; however, but rather the subject for celebration. He supposed he could let the laymen off easy for celebrating the demise of the water dragon. They hardly knew better and the hidden realities of their world were too complex to try and teach to a species who had long forgotten the past. But Kelvin’s slayer on the other hand.

He definitely had a few words to say to Cairn...That is if he could actually find the man among the throngs of celebrating knights and nobility. Cairn was nowhere to be found in either the ballroom or his quarters. With the easy spots out of the way, Gawain resigned himself checking every room, hall, and stairwell to find him.

After a long and thorough search of the fourth, third, and second floors, Gawain made his way to the smallest of the two towers. Before descending the staircase, Gawain peered down through the center of the spiral. And there was where his search finally ended. There was his long time friend, standing motionless at the bottom and staring at the set of doors opposite of the staircase. Under normal circumstances Gawain may have found the behavior concerning, but now all he could focus on was the barely controlled anger and disappointment for his friends actions.

“Cairn!” He bellowed before he was even half way down, his own voice echoing harshly within the narrow building. Cairn doesn’t move to acknowledge him and now Gawain’s concern is finally starting to override his anger. His descent slows as he reaches the final flight and he comes to a pause on the bottom floor, only a few meters from his friends back..

Cairn doesn’t turn to greet him, only staring steadfast at the doors before him. Gawain approaches Cairn, not quite cautious but still concerned as he circles a wide radius. The look on Cairn’s face is blank, eyes wide as he stares at a fixed spot ahead of him.

Gawain turns to look up at the spot the other man is so fixated on. He scans up and down the doorways expanse but finds nothing out of the ordinary. As he turns back, he opens his mouth to question the odd behavior, but his breath freezes in his lungs when he makes eye contact. Cairn is now staring directly at him, his usual warm dark eyes are now as sharp and cold as an obsidian knife.

Gawain was not a cowardly man by any means. He had fought one on one with green orcs and blood orcs, slayed many a number of frightful beasts, and apprehended some of the most depraved and dangerous criminals. Many times he had put his life on the line, and never once had he feared for it. But now all he could feel was the hammering of his heart against his chest, the roar of blood rushing in his ears, and the adrenaline spike that called for him to fight tooth and nail for his life.

But this couldn’t be right. This was Sir Cairn, his long time friend, his brother in arms. They had always had each other’s back, ever since their trainee days. He absolutely trusted Cairn with his life...but why was he now feeling like this very man could take that life away from him any second?

There was something so disturbingly unnatural in that stare.

“Gawain, you look like you’ve seen a ghost.” The abrupt shift in tone and instant softening of facial features left Gawain in a state of mental whiplash. “Are you alright?”

Gawain let out the breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding. What had that been about? Had he just imagined that? “I...am fine. Just growing tired from the ruckus going on upstairs.”

“Could it be the great Sir Gawain is starting to show his age? Too old to have any fun and in bed by sun down.” Cairn teased in his familiarly upbeat manner, making Gawain question for a moment if that was the case and he was starting to grow senile.

“I’ve plenty of vigor left to keep me going a long while.” Gawain replied curtly, now focusing on the original reason why he was here.. “I’ve searched nearly the whole castle for you. I’ve a mind to beat you senseless on what you’ve done!”

Cairn hummed a confused sound, head tilting to the side ever so slightly as he crossed his arms. “What on earth are you talking about?”

“Do not feign ignorance with me. You know exactly what I speak of.”

Cairn sighed and closed his eyes as he nodded in realization. “The water dragon. I probably should have guessed you wouldn't be very happy about that. You do realize though that I had to follow orders?”

“This is not comparable to dealing with some farm pest! What you’ve done, you’ve disrupted the very balance of our world. Did you not think of the repercussions, of the eventual chaos you’ve inevitably brought onto everyone.”

“The dragon threatened our safety!” Cairn snapped. “I was ordered to take care of it. You know I couldn’t refuse a direct order from the prime minister himself.”

“So then are you going to be hunting down the other dragons?”

“Only if they threaten humanity’s safety and I am ordered to do so.”

“When did you grow to be so selfish? Do you not realize that all you’ve done is prolong the inevitable? Do you not realize how your actions will irreparably damage our relations with the other races? Do you think about your actions at all before you go through with them?!”

“Do YOU think at all before you speak?!” Gawain was taken aback by the outburst. Never before had he heard Cairn yell with such force. “What was I supposed to do? Just sit here as the dragon tore through the countryside, killing innocent people? Should I have waited for the others to join it in it’s rampage? Should I have waited for them to fulfill their part in the cycle and just shrug my shoulders as my family and friends die?”

That look was back in his eyes, cold, sharp, and now laced with killer intent. Instinctively, Gawain reached behind him for his morning-star, only to find with blood chilling realization that he hadn’t brought it. This would not be an easy fight if things escalated...and fleetingly he wondered if he would be walking away at all.

“You know this is how it has to be.” Gawain’s voice came low and raspy, hoping that somehow he would get logic through whatever fog had possessed his friend. “If family and friends are your biggest concern, then why not go be with them? Instead of running off on a pointless mission that will only wind up with you dead.”

“You might be fine with sitting back and waiting for the end. But I will not allow us to be sacrificed without a fight.” Gawain shook his head at Cairn’s words. They had known this day was likely coming, Nogueria and Zane had both explained the old legends with them. He had thought Cairn was of the same understanding as he was on the matter.

“What is it that has changed your perspective on this?”

Or had Cairn been harboring such reservations and denial this whole time, Gawain wondered.

A flash of quick movement had Gawain instantly falling into fight mode. He saw both of Cairn’s hands fall to the sword at his hip, one grasping the scabbard and the other the hilt. On instinct, Gawain pressed forward, knowing at this point that his best bet for survival was to be too close for a sword to be effective and rely on grappling his way out of here.

Both men remained in close proximity, staring intently at one another and waiting for the first move.

“Father?” Gawain could feel the color draining from his face as he recognized his son’s voice.

Cairn also took notice of their new visitor, slowly turning to look over his shoulder and also leaving enough of an opening for Gawain to look past him. There; at the base of the stairway, stood his twelve year old son with the uncomfortable look of someone who knew they had interrupted something but weren’t sure exactly what that something was.

“Ganz…” Gawain breathed, his adrenaline now spiking higher as his concerns shifted from self preservation to doing whatever it would take to ensure the safety of his own child.

“Ganz! Look at you, I feel like you’ve grown since the last time I saw you!” Cairn’s shift in mood once again left Gawain with a sense of whiplash and unease.

“I saw you last week. I uh, I don’t think I could grow so notably in such a short amount of time Sir.” Ganz replied sheepishly.

“Ganz, I’ve already told you, you don’t need to call me Sir.” Cairn chided lightheartedly.

Gawain bristled as he watched the taller knight begin to approach Ganz.

“Ah, right Sir. My apologies.” Ganz laughed with nervous innocence.

Cairn let out a breathy chuckle and shook his head. He reached out a hand to ruffle the stocky boy’s blond hair, but was smacked away before he could reach his mark. Cairn recoiled, staring at Gawain with a look of hurt in his eyes.

Gawain only glared up at him, a protective anger radiating from every point on his body.

“Gawain, what’s gotten into you. You’re acting like I murdered an entire orphanage” Cairn accused, sounding a mixture of hurt, confused, and indignant.

“I will speak with you more on it later.” Gawain gritted between clenched teeth. He had no clue what was going on with his friend's mood swings, but he wasn’t about to linger here with his son and no weapons with which to protect them with just to find out.

Gawain nudged his son back towards the stairs with his elbow, feeling the boy hesitate for only a moment before obeying. He followed after the boy, never once taking his eyes off Cairn until said man eventually exited through one of the doorways.

“Father,” Gawain looked at his son, finding he had paused several steps above him. “What was that about?”

“Nothing you need to concern yourself with.” He replied, feeling a slight pull of guilt in his chest when the boy gave him a disappointed look. “What are you doing down here? Where’s your mother?”

“She’s upstairs saying her goodbye’s. She wants to go home but I wanted to find you and ask if perhaps I could stay here with you at the castle for a few days.” Gawain was at a loss for how to answer. Things between him and Cairn had escalated concerningly fast, and no matter what, he couldn’t shake that sense of endangerment he was feeling towards his long time friend right now.

He must have taken too long to think of his answer, since Ganz started back peddling his request and apologizing.

“I’m sorry my boy. Something’s come up that I need to look into.” He couldn’t risk taking his attention off of Cairn right now. Not until he’d figured out what was going on.

“I see…” Ganz mumbled, the look of disappointment on his face pulled at Gawain’s heart but it was better off this way. Father and son made the rest of the trip up the stairs in silence.

When they reached the third floor, Gawain stopped his son from leaving with a hand on his shoulder. That boy stared him at him expectantly, but Gawain only took the moment to take in the site of him. His mind wanders back to Cairn’s words and for a moment he wonders if maybe he was the one who was misguided in blindly swallowing humanity’s fate without question.

“This matter should only take me a few days. Once it’s resolved, I’ll take time off to come home. Will that make it up to you?”

A smile instantly breaks across Ganz’ face and the boy agrees eagerly. It’s the least he can do for the boy at this point.

Gawain watches his son leave until the boy is long out of site. His mind is heavy with the weight of processing everything that is going on and tangential thoughts on how to rectify them. For now, the only place he can think to start is to speak with both of the elven leaders.

Satisfied with his next step, he retreats to his chambers with the intent to write to Nogueira about his impending arrival and to put in his request of personal leave.

---

A/N: While writing this I got the idea to actually try and make this into a multi part series. I have a couple other ideas based around Cairn’s Algandars and in writing this I kinda want to better explore a few thing. This one would probably take place somewhere in the middle of that project so I’ll probably be re-posting this with edits that make it better fit in with the others. Especially where I’ve kinda come to the idea that Cairn and Gawain are both aware of the Gold and Silver dragon cycles but the both of them have different views on it that are kinda not quite wrong or right in their own ways. Also thanks Henry!

#radiata stories #Cairn Russell #Gawain Rothschild #Ganz Rothschild #Fanfic #Just posting this to Tumblr for now #bet you thought I forgot about this btw lol #with cairn being the strongest knight ever #him having algandars must be a terrifying thing #apparently it's like violent dementia lol

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roxannarambles · 4 years

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Top 3 Favorites Of Fire Emblem 3 Houses

It’s time once again for Top Three! This time, for Fire Emblem: Three Houses, a game I’m rather late to playing but have finally gotten around to!

I’ve decided to divide it by houses and give my top three favorites from each of the playable characters from the three houses/four routes.

(Contains a few plot spoilers.)

Black Eagles

1.) Caspar

Caspar isn’t a perfect guy; he tends to have a disturbing tendency toward black-and-white thinking on morality, dividing the world into pure heroes and pure evil, and he doesn’t always stop to ponder the more intricate details of moral quandaries. Yet, despite that fact, in his heart he means well, and you cannot help but love him anyway. He’s enthusiastic and earnest, whole-hearted in what he does, and will fight fiercely to protect his friends. His voice actor is simply splendid and I think half of why I adore his character so much; the delivery is just perfect. The character will bring humor and energy to almost any situation, and both those elements are valuable standouts in a game with often heavy story themes.

2.) Petra

In a lot of ways, Petra is simply fulfilling a warrior princess archtype; a self-reliant huntress, proud, fierce, grateful to the blessings of mother nature, confidant, driven. With all that, it’s hard to find anything to dislike about her. She’s genuinely open and caring with everyone, despite the injustices against her country. She works very hard and carries the burden of an entire country on her shoulders with poise. She also makes for a powerful assassin unit.

3.) Linhardt

Linhardt is, to be perfectly honest, probably suffering from some pretty bad depression. His tendency to skip sleep some nights in favor of binge-studying, and then to sleep excessively and at all odd hours of the day, doesn’t read as “quirky” to me so much as a plain and very real symptom of depression (which can manifest in a number of ways, including insomnia and excessive sleep). His general attiude of apathy, again, seems a rather plain sign of depression. Considering the troubles of his past that he mentions he’s been trying to avoid confronting, this does make sense. While I don’t particularly enjoy Linhardt’s apathy and sleepiness, he’s actually quite a nice intellectual and a very good friend, when he puts his mind to it.

Blue Lions

1.) Ashe

Ashe is a Very Good Boy, My Good Son. He’s as sweet and pure as a summer’s afternoon and I won’t suffer any fools who say otherwise. He dreams big and he actually puts the effort out to pursuing those dreams. Even when others try to dissaude him, or tell him he’s being niave to have such glowing ideals of knighthood, he fights for them anyway and follows his heart. He also cares deeply about his family and does all he can to take care of them, putting their needs above his own. And, he’s flippin’ adorable. What a lovely person.

2.) Felix

Ok, look. I don’t always like rude, bitchy, acerbic tsunderes. But when I do, I like me some Felix. Apparently. Felix is a disappointingly rather two-dimentional character in a lot of ways, since he falls into the “obsessive swordsman trope” that Lon'qu, Rutger and others also fall into. He obsesses over his swordplay and over improving himself, but there is no real core to WHY he obsesses over it; what drives him. The support conversation with Byleth and Felix explores this, but the conclusion never actually reaches any reason why he obsesses over it. He simply wants to be strong for the sake of strong. He has no idea why and never actually finds a reason. I find this deeply unsatisfying. Still, despite this fact, I cannot help but enjoy him anyway. His bitchiness and tsundere behavior is highly entertaining to me. And he does seem to at least draw some very clear lines: as obsessed as he is with power for sheer power’s sake, he is truly disgusted at excessive bloodshed and cruelty. He’s equally disgusted at romanticizing battle or dying for your ideals-- although I think his interactions with Ashe make him consider that sacrificing for your ideals may not be so terrible after all.

3.) Annette

She’s bubbly, cheerful, energetic, loves to learn, is super friendly and often silly and provides comedic relief. The Blue Lions are generally a bunch who carry some pretty heavy emotional baggage-- so Annette’s presence is pretty essential to lighten the tone at times and help buoy people up. That’s not to say Annette doesn’t have her own shit to deal with, considering her father left her and her mother when she was still young. Still, she is a resiliant person who manages to carry on with aplomb despite that pain. And we get to enjoy her reconciliation with her father during the Blue Lion route, which is quite nice.

Golden Deer

1.) Claude

Claude . . . Claude has so much great potential as a character, but I feel he was short-changed, in the end. He has an intriguing combination: he’s a man who has built up a reputation of being a sneaky, devious schemer, somebody to not be trusted and who does not trust others-- who relies soley on himself. Yet, on the other hand, he also has big, flowery dreams of creating a world that has destroyed racism and xenophobia, that welcomes and celebraties diversity and differences of all stripes. For all his claims of being self-serving and mistrustful, his dreams are enormously altruistic and compassionate. There was great potential in exploring this contradiction in his character, as well as tracing Claude’s path of slowly opening up and learning to trust others with his tender heart-- such as with Byleth. The trouble is this never actually HAPPENS in his route. The main plot focuses mostly on the actual military strategy; it does not go into the character development he so deeply deserved. His support conversations with Byleth were intended to show this character development, but without actually showing how he got from Point A to Point B-- wary and mistrustful vs. learning to open up-- it rings hollow to me. It’s frustrating, because I do love Claude dearly (deer-ly, haha. . .). He deserved, quite frankly, so much better.

2.) Leonie

Leonie is very straightforward: what you see is really what you get. She’s a Commoner from a small village with big dreams of heoric mercenary life-- not all that dissimilar, really, from Ashe’s big dreams of heroic knighthood. She managed to drum up support (both emotional and financial) from her village and now feels obligated to do them all proud and pay them back for their support and kindness. While she can be a little single-minded at times about her adore for Jeralt (sometimes even lashing out in jealousy at Byleth), overall she’s a strong-willed, clever, and very determined young lady. I can’t help but love her. She also excels as a fantastic unit to use in-game, powerful, versitile, and getting so much done through pure grit, without any of the advantages or leg-ups that the Crest-bearing nobles are in posssession of.

3.) Ignatz

I do realize this is Sweet And Pure Archer Son Number Two on my list, but there’s no way he’s not going on the list. He’s just too wonderful. Look at my son!!! He loves his family dearly and puts aside his own dreams to honor their needs and wishes! But he also can never quite give up on his artistic dreams and his friends all gradually encourage him to have the confidance to pursue them! He is so polite and sweet and friendly and shy! He has adorable little daydreams about the Goddess and has a crush on Saint Cethleann! He has such a huge glow-up after the timeskip and turns into such a dependable, strong young man who fights for justice and always holds such tender compassion in his heart! He’s great. :)

Church of Seiros

1.) Seteth

I would be repeating myself if I wrote anything here expounding upon my love of Seteth, which is as wide and deep as the blue-green seas. So I will just link you to a previous post. That should explain exactly how my feelings evolved over time about Seteth. He was an absolute surprise and a joy to discover. I never expected to fall in love with him; when I first started playing I always expected that Claude would be the one to steal my heart, not this mysterious man. But life’s funny like that.

2.) Alois

This man is a giant freaking dork and a goober, and I feel a great deal of affection for him. He makes me feel happy and safe and he is a great adoptive brother/dad/uncle/whatever. Truly, the game and the church would feel much emptier with him not around (and much quieter, haha).

3.) Shamir

Shamir, when you first run into her, simply seems rude and cold. In fact, you will probably always have that impression of her, unless you read her support conversations. Once you access her supports, a whole new story is told. While she’s reserved and can be curt, she really does have a warmer side, growing to truly care for her allies. She’s deeply thoughtful and reflective, full of surprising insights. She’s also a remarkably talented mercenary and assasin, but while she insists she’s simply a sellsword, she does care about more then just the pay and survival.

#fire emblem #fe3h #mystuff

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badchoicesposts · 5 years

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Don’t Dream It’s Over Chapter 4

Series Summary: Liam and Ali thought that their relationship was perfect, but their whole world came crashing down when Constantine called him back to Cordonia. Four years later they meet again at Liam’s bachelor party, determined to make things between them work even if it isn’t always easy.

In this AU, Liam and MC (Ali Moonessar) dated for a year in New York while Leo was still crown prince. They broke up when Constantine asked Liam to come back to Cordonia, but they meet again at Liam’s bachelor party before the social season. The story will contain flashbacks, which will be italicized, of their relationship and follow them as they try to navigate the season with Ali as a suitor. I’ve messed around with the timeline a bit so that it fits the story better. I’ve also added in a few OCs of my own.

Pairing: Liam x MC (Ali Moonessar)

Word Count: 3,444

Taglist: @flowerpowell, @kingliam2019, @ao719, @emceesynonymroll, @hopefulmoonobject, @dcbbw, @qammh-blog, @liamxs-world, @drakesensworld, @i-only-signed-up-for-fanfiction, @timothygorgeous (tagging your new blog in case you still wanted to be on here, if not let me know)

A/N: This is my first time ever posting a fic. Please let me know if you enjoyed it and would like to read more. I thrive on validation, lol. Thanks for reading!

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3

Leo watched from his place beside Liam as their father’s face filled the computer screen. At first glance the king appeared to be completely calm, but as Leo looked closer into his eyes, he could see the fury beneath them. It was a look that he had been very accustomed to, having seen it directed to himself on many occasions. However, Leo couldn’t think of a time where he had ever seen Liam be the object of their father’s anger.

Liam had always been the perfect son and everything Constantine wanted in an heir. When the two were young Leo wondered how Liam always seemed to be so well adjusted. Although he loved his younger brother dearly, he was often angry that Liam always did what he was told and in turn made him look worse for wanting a life outside of politics and courtly events. It wasn’t until they were older that he realized how much Liam sacrificed his own happiness to please their father, and how much he himself was to blame for that sacrifice.

The first time he truly noticed it was when Liam returned to Cordonia from New York four years ago.

Leo opened the door to Liam’s room in the palace and dropped himself down on the sofa next to him. He grabbed the bottle of whiskey from the table in front of them and took a gulp before turning to his brother with a smile on his face.

“How are you, brother?” he asked.

It had been a while since the two had seen each other. The last time they had spoken, Liam had just begun working at the Cordonian embassy in New York.

“Where have you been, Leo?” Liam asked, sighing as he ran his fingers through his already disheveled hair.

“Fiji. It’s gorgeous this time of year. You would love it. When did you get back from New York?” he asked as he continued to drink from the bottle.

He still hadn’t sensed the other man’s agitation.

“Last week. Father asked me to return home because he had no idea when you would.”

Leo was taken aback by the sudden harshness of his sibling’s voice.

“Is there a problem, brother?” he asked, raising his own voice now.

Liam shot up from his seat and began pacing the length of the room.

“I shouldn’t have had to do it, Leo! You’re the heir to the throne, not me!”

“You’ve never had a problem pretending to be the heir before!” Leo yelled, getting to his own feet now as well.

“That’s because I couldn’t!”

Liam’s words stopped him completely. The two brothers just looked at each other for a moment, both trying to catch their breath after the intensity of the argument.

“You were always gone and father needed someone. I couldn’t have a problem with it because someone needed to be here while you weren’t,” Liam said more calmly this time. His shoulders slumped, and the tiredness was evident in words as he spoke. “I shouldn’t have had to do it this time, Leo. I shouldn’t have had to leave her.”

Leo properly looked at his brother for the first time that night and saw a sadness in his eyes that he had ever seen there before.

Liam dropped back down onto the sofa and rested his elbows on his knees before burying his face in his hands.

“I didn’t want to leave her.”

“What were you thinking?” Constantine asked, his voice calm but filled with control anger.

“Father, I-,” Liam began, before stopping himself.

He didn’t know what to tell his father. He didn’t know how to explain that when he saw Ali he felt as if he couldn’t control himself. She had always brought out a different side in him. A side that was more carefree and loved without consequence. A side of him that made him want what was best for himself and not just for his father or his country.

“How could you be so reckless, Liam?” Constantine yelled, his hand slamming down on the desk his computer was resting on. “The social season is only a month away, and you know how dangerous indiscretions like this can be. There are videos of you kissing this woman in the middle of the street! Are you honestly willing to ruin your reputation for some common whore?”

Leo watched as his brother’s face hardened.

“She is not a common whore or an indiscretion!” Liam yelled back, his fists clenched at his sides.

“She’s not a lady of the court. She shouldn’t matter!”

There was no denying that Constantine was furious now. He opened his mouth to speak again, but before he could get a word out, Leo took the chance to begin speaking himself.

“It’s obvious that Liam has very strong feelings for this girl,” he began calmly.

“Obvious? It’s more than just obvious. The entire country saw him kiss her, heard him beg her to stay with him!” Constantine exclaimed.

Leo took a breath to keep from losing his own temper, knowing that it would only worsen the situation.

“Yes, as I was saying, it’s clear to everyone that Liam has feelings for this girl. Father, you and I both know that Liam has never done something like this before. In all twenty-eight years of his life he has done nothing but follow your instructions and do what you think is best. But, the fact that he was willing to go after her and make a fool of himself in public must mean that she’s something special,” Leo said with a small laugh.

Both Liam and Constantine glared at him, and he immediately removed the smile from his face.

“Is there some point that you’re trying to make?” Liam asked, annoyed.

“My point is that we should give her a chance. If Liam thinks that she’s worth it then we should trust his judgement. Let her prove that she can fit in at court. I’ve already spoken to Lord Maxwell Beaumont, and he has agreed to sponsor her for the social season.”

Liam’s jaw dropped at his brother’s words. He had never considered the possibility of having Ali join the social season.

Leo looked on as his father mulled over his words, his face serious. When he saw Ali last night he knew that there was no way he could just let her go. It was his fault that the two had ever really separated in the first place. After the fight he and Liam had the night he got back from Fiji he had done enough self-reflection to see how his actions had changed his sibling’s life. He made the decision to abdicate the throne because he knew that he would never make a good king, but in the back of his mind he had always felt guilty for putting so much on to the other man’s shoulders. He had completely changed Liam’s life. However, seeing Ali gave him the opportunity to change it one more time in what he hoped would be the best way possible. He would do whatever he needed to do to make sure that Liam ended up with the love of his life.

He had spoken to Maxwell after everyone had gone back to their own rooms last night. It did not take much convincing for the young Beaumont to agree. He already seemed to have taken a liking to the girl, and it was quite clear to him and all of the other guys that she and Liam had never truly gotten over each other. Everything was already in place regardless of whether or not their father approved. Who House Beaumont chose as their suitor was entirely up to them, and it would seem inappropriate for the king to outwardly oppose them. The only thing really left now was to get Ali to agree to come back with them. Constantine was backed into a corner.

“The point of the social season is for Liam to find a suitable wife, someone capable of being queen. If the Beaumonts make the decision to bring this girl to court then that is their choice, but, Liam, you should do well to remember that it is your job to put Cordonia first,” he said, a note of finality in his voice.

Liam and Leo both knew what he meant. His words were a warning.

“Yes, father,” Liam said.

He ended the video chat and leaned back into his chair, looking up at his brother.

“Do you think she’ll actually agree to come back with us?” he asked.

“If you had asked me last night I would have said yes without a doubt, but now it’s going to depend on how much that whole ‘I apologize for my for my lapse in judgement’ thing pissed her off,” Leo said, bringing up his words from earlier.

~~~~~~

Ali sat alone in her room, the Mamma Mia soundtrack playing loudly in the background and Tuesdays with Morrie clenched tightly in her hands. They were two things that were guaranteed to make her feel better no matter how terrible her day was. However, as she mindlessly hummed “Super Trouper”, she realized that she couldn’t concentrate on the words on the paper in front of her. She grabbed her phone and huffed out a breath as she rolled over onto her stomach.

It had been buzzing all afternoon. She didn’t want to know how, but the press had already figured out who she was, and her social media accounts were blowing up. After the first few frantic messages asking her who she was and if she wanted to comment on this morning’s events, she had logged off of all her accounts altogether. There was nothing to tell. Liam was going back to Cordonia, and everything would blow over once the social season began.

“Some things never change,” came a soft voice from behind her.

“What are you doing here, Liam?” she asked tiredly without turning around.

“I wanted to apologize.”

“For what? Your momentary lapse in judgement?” she asked sarcastically, finally moving to look at him.

“I wanted to apologize for speaking to you the way I did this morning. I wanted to apologize for telling you that I loved you and then taking it back.”

Liam stepped further into her room, and when she didn’t object, he sat on the bed next to her. He pulled her closer to him, grabbing one of her hands in both of his.

“Ali, I love you and I’ve never stopped loving you. I’m sorry for everything that I’ve put you through,” he said softly.

He tried to look into her eyes, but she immediately pulled away, moving to stand in front of him instead.

“Okay.”

“Okay?” he questioned.

Ali sighed.

“I know you Liam. Or at least I think I do. I know that you didn’t intentionally want to hurt me this morning, but it was all so much, and it happened so fast. Everything just made me feel...gross,” she finally said, after not being able to find the right words.

“And I’m angry. I know you apologized, but I’m still angry with you and with this situation. I’m angry that you came after me when you knew that you were leaving again, and I’m angry that you called it a ‘lapse in judgement’. I’m not going to let you treat me like I was a mistake, and then just forgive you because you say that you’re sorry,” she continued defiantly, beginning to pace around the room.

Liam got to his feet and placed his fingers under her chin, tilting her head so that she looked up at him.

“I know that I can’t take back my actions, but I am so sorry, my love. You could never be a mistake. I hope that you can find some way to forgive me.”

Ali nodded, not saying anything. Her mind was still reeling, and she was still upset, but she couldn’t deny that finally getting her feelings off her chest helped her feel a little better. It also helped to know that he felt guilty about it.

“I’m sorry for trying to sneak out this morning,” she said quietly, “I just- I’m just so tired of missing you. I thought it would have been easier if we just didn’t have to say anymore goodbyes.”

“I don’t want to say goodbye to you either. That’s actually why I’m here.”

“What do you mean?” Ali asked, her brows furrowed.

“We should go talk downstairs,” Liam said, taking her hand and leading her back down to the living room of the penthouse.

Upon entering the room, Ali was surprised to see Maxwell sitting awkwardly on the edge of one of the recliners. Emma and Ezra were both sitting on the couch opposite him just as uncomfortably, glaring over at him ever so often. Drake, however, was leaning back comfortably on the couch next to them, his arm thrown carelessly over the back of it as if he was used to being there everyday.

“Maxwell? Drake? What are you guys doing here?” she asked.

“Oh, Ali! It’s so good to see you!” Maxwell said, letting out a sigh of relief and jumping to his feet to pull her into a tight hug.

Ali was caught off guard for a moment, but then hugged him back anyway. Drake nodded to her from his place on the couch, and she felt a wave of guilt surge up inside of her.

“Sorry for walking out the way I did this morning. I know you were trying to help when you offered to go for a walk, but I just couldn’t handle everything going on,” she said, quietly.

“I get it,” he said casually.

Ali could tell that he wasn’t upset with her, and she was grateful that he was willing to just let everything go.

“What’s going on, Liam?” she asked, turning to him again.

“Let’s sit, and I’ll explain everything,” he said, motioning for her to sit down.

“As you know the social season is beginning soon, and as the crown prince, I’ll be expected to find a wife. Each of the noble families of Cordonia will put forth a young woman, usually from their family, to represent their House as one of my... suitors,” Liam began, cringing at his own words. He had always known that finding a wife during the social season was old-fashioned, but saying the words out loud made him realize how bad it sounded.

“During the social season the women will attend court functions and participate in events, and I am in turn supposed to spend time with each of them so that we will be able to get to know each other. At the end of the season I’m supposed to pick one of the suitors to marry. I wish it could be as simple as me choosing the woman I love to become my wife, but it is important for me to choose someone the people like. Someone that would make a good queen, as they will inevitably be one day. One of the most important parts of the season for the suitor is proving to the people, the press, and the king and queen that she would be able to make a good leader.”

“Okay, I have a lot of opinions on everything you just said,” Ali began.

“Let him finish. You’ll definitely have a lot more when he’s done,” Drake piped up.

Ali and Emma shared a look of confusion and distaste.

“As I said earlier, it’s the job of each of the noble families to put forth a suitor. However, House Beaumont is only made up of Maxwell and his older brother Bertrand. They were still unsure of who they were going to choose until last night. Maxwell wants to sponsor you so that you may join the social season.” The hesitation was clear in Liam’s voice as he finished speaking and looked to the woman he loved with hope in his eyes.

Ali, however, stayed rooted to her spot, staring at him with her mouth slightly agape.

“Okay, so you’re telling me that you want me to leave my entire life here and follow you to Cordonia where I’ll have to participate in some royal version of The Bachelor that could very well end in us not getting married? Wow, Liam, I’m flattered,” Ali said sarcastically.

“My love, I know that it’s a lot to ask of you, but it’s the only way I can think of for us to still be together. I meant it when I said I couldn’t lose you again,” Liam said, rising to feet.

He walked over to where she sat on the couch and kneeled before her, taking both of her hands in his.

“Please tell me you’ll consider it,” he pleaded.

Ali pulled away from him and walked over to the drink cart that the Larsons had in the corner of the room. She had always made fun of them for having one, saying that it was something that only stuffy, rich people on TV shows had. But, now she was glad to have the alcohol in such a close vicinity. She grabbed the first bottle she touched and took a large gulp of the brown liquid.

“Liam, I’m twenty-five years old! I’m broke, working a minimum wage job as a waitress, and still trying to finish my Master’s degree! I can’t just pack up and leave based on a promise of ‘maybe we’ll live happily ever after, but there’s a good chance we won’t’,” she stopped to take a pull from the bottle before continuing, “Not to mention, I have a family here. The Larsons have been the only stable thing in my life for as long as I can remember. I can’t just walk away from them. I can’t just walk away from my life.”

Liam looked over at her sadly.

“I know that this is a big decision, and I don’t want to force you into something that you don’t want. You don’t need to decide right now. If it’s okay with you, I’d like to… to take you on a date first,” he said nervously.

“A date?” she asked, a hint of bewildered amusement in her voice. “Really?”

“Yes, a date,” he said, getting up and walking back over to her. “Let me remind you how good we were together.”

Ali sighed and took another sip from the bottle. It had been a long day. She stood still for a moment, focusing on her breathing.

“Fine. Take me on a date,” she said tiredly.

Liam’s face lit up with a smile. He pulled her into a tight hug, wrapping his arms over hers so that they were stuck at her sides, and she was only able to awkwardly pat his elbow in reciprocation. He quickly pulled away when he realized why she was doing this and smiled shyly at her.

“I’ll meet you here tomorrow night at 7:00,” he said, still beaming at her.

As Ali looked up at his happy face she couldn’t help but smile back, suddenly excited by the prospect of spending an evening with him. She momentarily scolded herself for the giddy feeling that came over her, regretting the choice to start drinking again. She needed to keep a clear head if she didn’t want to do something rash. Liam gave her one last gentle kiss on the forehead before the three men got ready to leave for the night.

“Drake, can you wait for a second?” she called after his retreating form.

He motioned for the other two to move on and turned back to meet her.

“Do you think I should do this? Go to Cordonia?” she asked.

Drake sighed and ran his fingers through his hair.

“Look, you know how I feel about court, but I think it’s pretty damn obvious that you two still love each other. I’ve watched him pine for you for the past four years, and from what Emma’s said, you’ve been doing the same thing.”

Ali furrowed her brows and turned to glare over at Emma. The other girl ducked behind her brother, a guilty smile on her face.

“If this means that you two have a chance at being happy together, then yeah, I think you should do it,” he finished.

Ali looked into his eyes and could see that he was telling the truth. She nodded, looking down at her feet as she listened to him walk away from her. She had a week to figure out whether or not she was going to uproot her entire life.

#the royal romance #trr #the royal heir #trh #liam x mc #the royal romance fic #trr fic #liam x mc fanfic #liam #king liam #my fics #choices fics #choices #playchoices #playchoices fic #king liam fanfic #the royal romance fanfic #liam fic #playchoices fanfic

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randomnameless · 5 years

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Since the new Star Wars will be released in less than a week, I’ve been binge watching some of my favourite episodes...

I’m a bit surprised, but given how the original sixology (? the first 6 episodes) all revolve around a certain character who fell to “the dark side” and then was redeeemed, i couldn’t help but think about a certain game -

Ani’s the chosen one (tm) and knows it.

It goes over his head, makes him arrogant, his descent to madness is kind of gradual but it is well portrayed (unlike his romantic plot) - he really wanted to save the mom he never forgot but was forced to and now his wife is going to die and he must do something to prevent it because he is just so strong isn’t he supposed to be the chosen one (tm)?

Ani murdering children is never whitewashed. Ani, in his madness, tries to kill the one he swore to protect.

Ani doing all the shit he does in Episode III is, and will never be whitewashed

There is this “split-persona” thing where Darth tells Luke that Ani’s dead (just like Obi-Wan says Darth killed Ani) but in the end, we discover that the real Ani never died and there was still some part of him buried inside Darth’s evil looking armor.

(Ani never realising that the force is strong in his daughter when Luke says it is is on par with Princess Julia shenanigans, the plot never wanted it to happen but it had to be mentionned in some weird way)

so yes, at the end of the 6th movie, Ani’s kind of redeemed and appears as a force ghost.

GG Ani?

I thought Ani was a nice parallel to another mask wearing authoritarian character we know.

Granted, Anakin is shown to be subservient to Palpatine (calls him master and does whatever he wants - even if i read on the wiki that he tried to kill him after learning that Padmé died?) when Edel’s not so subservient to her uncle Arry.

Both were manipulated by external forces who are actually the reason why they suffered (even if it is not that simple in Star Wars? You can make the argument that Palpating was nurturing the “asshole” streak of Anakin, but he was still an asshole ?) and choose wrong pathes - Palpatine deceived Anakin into killing Windu and isolated him from the Jedis, Uncle Arry experimented on Edel and is apparently the reason why she’s so lonely and can’t trust anyone, save for Hubert and Billy.

But Anakin is called on his bullshit, by Padmé - the one he sacrificed everything for. Confronting his wife, Ani reacts violently and tries to kill her.

(it is never said why “she died in childbirth” apparently she lost the will to live so bar the WTF YOUR CHILDREN ARE YOU GOING TO LET THEM ALONE BECAUSE YOU DON’T WANT TO LIVE ANYMORE??? - I think it’s pretty implied that when Anakin tried to kill her she lost it, she couldn’t save him, she knew he still had “some good left in him” but she knows she isn’t the one able to call to him)

When Ani realises that Padmé and their kid (remember guys, those people can sense pregnant women being alive but not two force sensitive babies inside said pregnant woman, i mean sense a daughter) died he breaks (tries to kill his master?) and becomes the souless husk we see until Luke comes in.

Thing of importance here : Anakin is called on his bullshit.

A certain someone from Fire Emblem’s latest opus is never called on her bullshit, let it be her odd allies, the fact that Kronya used to be a thing, why Jeralt died or the funny experimentations on peasants.

Anakin, angry that his beloved doesn’t react like he planned, kills her (tries to) violently.

He then has to fight his sensei

Billy never tells Edel that nope, Rhea isn’t the Goddess the Church is venerating, the real Goddess lives in their head, or that Edel’s story about Nemesis and the relics is doodoo. Would Edel have reacted violently and tried to kill Billy?

SS plays the scene where sensei has to fight his wayward student as a tragic thing but there is nothing on par with Obi-Wan and Ani’s duel on Mustafa. We’ve seen Obi-Wan raise, as much as he could do, Anakin, who was naught but a brat. We saw them spend time, do missions etc, together. Even share jokes!

Anakin tried to killed Obi-wan, and all of his former allies (the Jedis). He managed to kill (he and Sidious) a crapton of them (even babies!) but the one in front of him he has to kill is his father figure, his mentor.

When Ani “I 8 U” memetic words are heard it’s a parallel to Obi-Wan’s “I thought of you as my brother” “I loved you” - there is no returning point here. Kenobi’s torn - Anakin became their enemy and he dealt with him accordingly (alway being on the defensive and severing his legs after warning him that it was useless to continue) but still showed sadness.

Billy? Is shown to be sad?? But why? Where is the weight? They spend (in SS?) a year together?

Sadly Billy also spent a year with Bernie’n’co and Edel tried to kill them. Was he closer to Edel than to Bernie’n’co? Nothing prevents Billy from reaching supports with the other BE students - so if Edel confessing her torture to Billy could be seen as that big thing for her, why should it be different than, say, Bernie confessing that her dad wanted to make her a good wife, Dorothea more or less confessing that she used her talents to get a place in the academy or Ferdie’s insecurities about being the eldest son of House Aegir?

“But Rhea is an evil baby-eating monster; the church lied to everyone”

Note that Obi-Wan never says that Anakin’s distrust with the Jedi Council is unfounded (during episode III iirc) or that he’s plain wrong.

Obi-Wan considers Anakin dead because he tried to kill Padmé, because he fell to the Dark Side, and because he effing cut babies (i don’t even know if Obi Wan knew about Ani’s role in Mace Windu’s death).

Just because one party did shit it doesn’t enable you to do way worse shit

Morale (one of them?) is that I don’t know Star Wars universe like I pretend to know FE.

But if there is one thing I loved in Episode III and in the subsequent episodes (4 5 6 and even 7 where Ben’s entirely wrong about grandpapa) is that while Darth’s story is a sad story (Palpatine manipulated him), he found his redemption doing the only thing he could, at the cost of his life - saving Luke and embracing his Jedi persona.

And yet, does it absolves Ani of everything he did? Hell no!

Anakin-Darth dies. He doesn’t get to live a fruitful life with his son (and daughter he only discovered in the last minutes of his life despite having meet her earlier), he dies.

Pilling on all of the shit he did deprived him of living the perfect life he envisaged with his wife and Luke (maybe Leia if we insist).

He might not be alone when he dies, he still dies as the empty husk of what he used to be and what he had been for years.

Ani lost everything, but in the end, thanks to his son, he found his jedi pride/self or something like that.

Edel? Doesn’t face consequences of her shit.

So no Sensei trying to kill her, or if Sensei does it’s painted as a tragedy for reasons we don’t really know because, hey, Sensei is also the Sensei of the other BE - there’s no special Edel exclusive bond with Sensei (and no as i said earlier, revealing her tragic backstory in supports doesn’t count, because Bernie and Ferdie did the same thing).

Edel doesn’t lose Sensei, since the loli in Sensei’s head doesn’t see anything wrong with her daughter having been turned into minced meat due to her race and fuses with Billy or some other shit to explain why Sensei’s defective - since birth - hearth suddenly starts beating (is it the moment where Billy realises that shit, without Rhea i’d be a dead baby in the end i owe my life to her?)

Since Edel never loses anything of importance, Edel never learns.

When Edel threatens her nuncle it’s funny, when Anaking turns against Sidious (after having watched the prequels) it’s satisfying and cathartic - finally, Sidious who used to dispose of his minions right and left tastes his own medicine as in, he who betrays must expect some sort of betrayal.

Edel gets to live with her significant other even when she wanted to kill Billy (in the tomb and with the “we don’t need gods anymore” “i’m the vessel of god she kind of fused with me do you mean you don’t need me anymore??” but the last one is never adressed in the game :p) when Anakin has to live with the (distorted) fact that he killed Padmé.

They still share some loltastic moments.

When Ani argues to Windu that Palpatine can’t be executed without a trial, Windu says fig it.

But Anakin never gave a fair trial to count Dooku or to the Tusken Riders he rekt a long time ago (in episode 2)...

TFW due process only concerns senators...

Tl; Dr : Even Anakin, in all of his pear-slicing glory is a better written character than Edel.

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lovedsammy · 5 years

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stars in my black and blue sky -(sam & castiel)

Coda to 14.13. The events of the altered timeline leave a profound effect on Sam and Castiel, one that neither of them can seem to shake without reopening - and healing - old wounds.

Note: I know I’m not the only one that was horrified about the fight that prev!timeline!Cas had with Sam in 14.13, right? Castiel has never physically harmed Sam like that before, and it disturbed me quite a bit. I figured it might’ve bothered Sam, too, and that was the reason for that anxious look he had when Cas came into the bunker at the end of the episode. I used this scenario to bring up instances where Cas HAS hurt Sam by breaking his wall or when Lucifer used his body to hurt Sam, and how this event triggered some of those memories for Sam. Because one thing about PTSD that is common is sometimes things happen, and they can be either completely unrelated or semi-related to the previous trauma, and it can bring it all back. Sam’s behavior in this fic is a result of that.

I also feel like it’s worth mentioning that some of these darker, self-deprecating thoughts are Sam’s, not mine. I disagree with how he views himself. But Sam has a habit of keeping his emotions inside, and trying to placate others when it comes to them. He brushes it off with “the problem’s me”; he’s said before, and that’s the tone I went with in this fic. Sam’s come a long way from his s5 self-blame days, but he still tends to make issues be his problem vs others who want to help him. That’s what people who’ve experienced PTSD and Depression do (I’m guilty of it), and it’s a very real mindset I wanted to address.

Here you go, guys! @avalonsilver @wendibird @sealionfoam @flightoftheseraph @stargazingbros @avacynangell @spectaculacularmooseketeer @winchestersoldiersblog @casquecest @sastiel-daily

Also on Ao3:

Sam’s barely had a moment to gather himself, to try to slow the tremors in his still shaking hands, when he hears the bunker’s metallic door open. His mother and Dean, both blotchy-faced and red-eyed, exchange a quick glance with each other, and then at Sam. And as if on instinct, as though they are all thinking the same thought, they head into the main room. Sam’s heart lurches, and he tells himself not to cling to any half-hopes. They’d just seen John disappear minutes ago, and the temporal paradox should have corrected itself with him returning to the past. But maybe something went wrong, Sam reasons. Maybe it was already too late to change things back. And maybe, some selfish part of him hopes, they could really have Dad back for good. Maybe the universe, maybe God, was finally giving them a win for all that they’d sacrificed, maybe…

A whirlwind of beige and a flash of dark hair appears from behind the door, coming to a stop at the guard rail. It’s not John, but Cas. The presence of the angel was usually one that, for Sam, bestowed upon him a sense of peace and calming. He was his best friend, his family. A constant, gentle wave that always kept him afloat above the surface when Sam otherwise would’ve drowned. All of those long days and nights without Dean, stretching on into weeks and months…. Cas was the only other person besides his mother that Sam could remember being by his side for almost the entire time. Cas always had his back, and apart from Dean, he was the only other person to be involved in Sam’s life for as long as he had.

But instead of being a welcome sight, Sam finds that this time… he isn’t. And it takes him a moment to figure out why. It isn’t that he’d been wishing for his father instead; it’s something else entirely.

His body still aches from the earlier altercation with the angel - or the previous version of him, anyway, well before Cas had met him and Dean. But even with knowing the difference between the two, Sam can’t help the shudder of discomfort that radiates down his frame, and he is only half-aware of acclaiming a defensive stance, his expression wary.

“Mary. Sam, Dean,” Cas greets them, his eyes roving over each of them pleasantly, and displaying a softness that had been absent in the other Castiel. Nevertheless, Sam’s guard stays up, palms clammy at his side. He flexes his fingers, whether or not it’s to reach for an angel blade for protection or just out of nervousness, he’s not sure. Because if he looks hard enough, he can see that version of Cas still, and if he looks even harder… he can almost see Lucifer.

Castiel notices, because of course he does. His angelic powers could surely pick up on the mood of the room. It’s not just Sam that’s feeling apprehensive at his arrival, but Dean and Mary as well. Yet, Cas’s fixation lingers on Sam, his brows furrowing worriedly.

“What happened?” He asks.

“What happened,” Sam scoffs, and God, he feels so emotionally drained, still reeling from it all, that he can’t quite bring himself to speak. He looks to his brother for explanation, and he’s so damn grateful that Dean knows him so well, knows when Sam has reached his limit.

“Well, there’s a story,” Dean says. “Come on, let’s go talk in the kitchen. Where’s Jack?”

Cas gestures over his shoulder. “He’s getting our things from the trunk.”

“I’ll go help him,” Mary says hurriedly, and she brushes past her sons, giving each of them a gentle, comforting caress as she does. And Sam doesn’t know how she does it. How she can comfort them, her children, when she’s just lost the love of her life. How she could be so strong for them when she was coming apart at the seams herself. They were supposed to be the ones comforting her right now. It wasn’t the first time they’d lost Dad. For her, it was.

“Come on, Sammy,” Dean’s hand on his shoulder pulls Sam from this thoughts, and he nods, realizing that Cas has joined them at the base of the stairs. He can feel the angel’s gaze on his back, but he doesn’t make any attempt to address him.

A few minutes later, Jack and Mary come find them sitting at the table in the kitchen, and the boy is just as concerned as Cas is about what transpired. He asks Sam outright, but Sam only shakes his head, not meeting anyone’s eyes. He wants to comfort Jack, to assure the kid that it was okay, that nothing was wrong, but he can’t. And he thinks that must make him a failure of a co-parent. All of this time, through everything that had happened, Sam had been strong enough to console Jack, to be there for him and encourage him. But right now it was like all of that strength that he’d somehow managed to conjure up through the past few months had all been drained out of him, leaving him fragile and withering, weakened.

Sam had thought he’d reached his breaking point the night with Dean outside the hospital after Donatello’s recovery, when he’d launched his fist into his brother’s face and clutched onto the back of his jacket in Dean’s arms. But it was just a precursor to this. He’s cried more in the past six months than he’d cried in his entire life, it seemed.

They remain there for a long, long time, well into the night.

It’s Dean who does most of the talking. Sam manages to chime in every once in a while, and Mary does so even less than her sons. When Sam does muster the courage to look at her, his mother’s expression is distant, faraway, reliving the past twelve hours. She holds on to her can of beer as gingerly as if she were still clutching onto John’s hand, afraid for the moment that she’ll have to let go. It’s a painful realization, that he and his mother were alike in that way, that they both tended to close off when dealing with things that hurt them.

At a quarter past two, Mary retreats back to her bedroom. Probably to cry her eyes out, Sam thinks. He’s not confident that he won’t do the same. Part of him wants to get up and escape back to his room, too, but he quells the urge down. He doesn’t think he’d be able to sleep, anyway. He’d only lie awake with his thoughts, the desires and regrets, especially of his father. But more than likely it would be the other, much darker corners of his mind, the thoughts that he was barely avoiding to succumbing to, that would haunt him. And he was going to put off facing those as long as he could. So he stays, finding some solace in being among his friends and family. Even with how conflicted he was feeling about being near Cas, it paled in comparison to the pain that he’d feel of being alone.

He reminds himself that this Cas, their Cas, has never done what the other version of him had done. He didn’t deserve the blame that Sam was indirectly casting at him. The angel had healed, protected, and safeguarded him, almost from the moment they’d met. Castiel had fought off Lucifer to keep Sam safe, and even his own brethren at times. So, Sam’s issues - they were his own, and he didn’t need to drag Cas into them.

“Your father,” Castiel murmurs around his bottle of beer, awestruck. “I still can’t believe it. I wish I’d been here. I’d have liked to have met him.”

Dean snorts, getting up to toss out the empty beer cans. “Oh, yeah, buddy, believe me, I wish it’d been you, too. Not the asshat version of you with that dickbag Zachariah. You really were Heaven’s soldier. He tells you to kill, and damn, man, you listened.”

At the mention of the other Cas, Sam stiffens, clenching his jaw. “Dean -” He cuts in, warningly. But he must go unheard, because the angel speaks at the same time.

“What version of me?” Cas inquires, tilting his head. “Was there more to it than your father showing up? You said the timeline had changed, but… me and Zachariah…?”

Jack’s curiosity is once again piqued, as it had the entire time they had been explaining what happened. “Wait. Who’s Zachariah?”

Dean waves a hand absently. “Ah, he was just some jackass head honcho angel that we killed who wanted us to start the Apocalypse and really had it out for us. He was Cas’s boss. Anyway, uh, yeah…. I’m guessin’ time was trying to fix itself, like Sam said. You and Zach showed up to try and fix it, found out it was us, and tried to kill us. Almost did, too.”

“Kill you?” Cas demands, incredulous, and for a second, the angel catches Sam’s eye, and it all seems to click in place. “That’s where all of those cuts and bruises on the two of you are from. I did that to you. I… I’m so sorry, I -”

Dean gives a one-shouldered shrug, finishing off his beer with one swig. “Nah. Hey, man, no hard feelings. You had a stick up your ass back then. It isn’t the first time you’ve beat the hell outta me. Besides, you’ve changed for the better, all right?” He reaches over to pat Sam’s face gently, and Sam soaks it up, amazed that even after all of these years, his big brother’s touch can still soothe him so easily. “Anyway, I’m gonna call it. ‘Night, Sammy. You know where I am if you need me.”

“Yeah. Night, Dean.”

He watches his brother leave, mouth going dry, and chugs the rest of his now warm beer. It burns the back of his throat, and he forcibly clears it. He wants to try and make conversation with Jack and Cas, but without Dean and his mother here, he suddenly feels exposed. Maybe he just needed the night to cool off, to reign in this state of panic he seemed to be in, and get a handle on it. That usually did the trick. If he managed to get some rest, he’d be good again in the morning. And he’d be able to brush off this - whatever this reaction was to his friend, and Castiel would be better off for it.

“You know, I, uh…” Sam says after a long moment, “I should… I should probably go to bed, too.” He flicks them a strained smile, and clamors to his feet. They’d gone slightly numb from sitting for so long. “Sorry if I… um, see you in the morning.”

Maybe tomorrow he wouldn’t feel so weird, so raw, and like something had broken in him. He gets to the doorway before Jack’s voice sounds from behind him, sad and desperate.

“Sam, wait,” The boy calls, and it makes Sam pause. Sam hates that it does. He can’t refuse the kid anything, even if it was at the expense of himself. “Sam… are you all right? I’m worried about you. Please… just tell me if you’re not okay. Tell me how I can help.”

The question makes Sam open and close his mouth several times, and he surprises himself when he answers, “I… I don’t know, Jack. I don’t… ”

He feels lost, in a haze, and it has nothing to do with the alcohol. He just stands there, staring at the floor, for what feels like an infinitely long time, in pregnant silence with nothing but the ticking of the clock. For a second, he wonders if he’s dissociating again, like during his post-wall days, unsure if Cas and Jack are even there, and resists the urge to finger the scar on his palm. This was real.

“Jack, can you give a moment to talk to Sam?” Castiel implores the nephilim after the pause, but his eyes are on Sam, who finally meets Castiel’s gaze guiltily, shamefully. Jack appears hesitant, his eyes glossed over and sorrowed, but a nod from Sam encourages him, and he leaves the two of them alone.

Sam wants to say something. Anything. “Cas - ” He tries.

“Sam… it’s not just what happened with your father that’s bothering you, is it? It’s much more than that.” Castiel appraises the younger Winchester, his features pained. “It’s about what happened in the alternate timeline. With the other me.”

Sam stiffly nods. “Yeah,” He says, hoarsely. There was no point in being dishonest, not when Cas could already tell that something was going on with him.

Cas knowingly returns the gesture. “I understand. I hurt you, and I tried to kill you, as well as Dean.”

“Yeah. Well, not you-you,” Sam quickly amends, because damn it all if he was going to let Cas carry the burden for this. “It was the you before you met us. Or, from another dimension or something. But it wasn’t you. And that’s… that’s something that I need to keep telling myself, because it’s so damn stupid that I can’t seem to stop myself from - from reacting like this. It’s not your fault that I can’t deal with my own bullshit.”

“Don’t,” Cas interjects sternly. “Don’t you dare turn this on yourself. Whatever it is that you’re feeling, whatever it is that you need to express, do it. If you need to hurt me back, do it.”

Sam pales, stunned. How could Cas even suggest that? “Cas, I couldn’t… I couldn’t do that to you, man. I’m not gonna hurt you just to make myself feel better. In all the time I’ve known you, you’ve never hurt me, so why would I -”

“Now we both know that’s not true,” Castiel disagrees kindly. “I may not have splintered your bones or drawn your blood, but I’m no less guilty of hurting you than that version of me had. I tore down your wall and made you relive the horrors of the cage, and experience all of that suffering all over again.”

The admission makes Sam’s chest clench in remembrance. He practically chokes out, “Cas, I… I’ve forgiven you for that. You know that. It’s not the same thing.”

Castiel sighs. “Yes, maybe you have. Even when you shouldn’t have, you have. But what about how I hurt you when I let Lucifer possess me, and he drove his fist - my fist - into your chest cavity? Was that not a horrible violation to you?”

“Yeah, but you saved me,” Sam answers, readily. “You fought back, you took control, and you stopped him.”

Castiel takes a couple of steps towards him, and Sam has to fight the urge to flinch. “Sam... let me ask you… right now, do you see me? The other me? Or do you still, at times, see Lucifer?”

The question is still spoken in that soft, empathetic tone that Cas has used so many times with him, and yet it leaves Sam breathless. At his reaction, Castiel continues.

“You’ve experienced a great deal of trauma, Sam, and some of it has been at my hand. I am truly sorry for that. This was yet another instance. You need time to process it, and hopefully come to terms with it and be even stronger for it. But that isn’t something you can make yourself do over night. And you never need to feel sorry for reacting to something that has affected you, especially if it involves me.”

Sam’s vision blurs with wetness, and he quickly swipes at his eyes and exhales hollowly. “I thought I was past it. Or at least the worst of it. After Lucifer died, and I confronted Nick, I thought… I thought maybe the fear wouldn’t be as bad, you know? That maybe all that he’d done would just leave like he did.”

“Often, a completely unrelated - or even related - event can trigger a fear response to a situation,” Castiel tells him gently. “The human mind is incredibly resilient, but also very fragile if it’s hurt enough. Your strength amazes me everyday, Sam, but even the strongest people have their breaking point. With everything that has happened recently with Dean, and your father, and now this. It’s no surprise that your mind and body are reacting this way. It takes its toll.”

Sam doesn’t say anything, but he doesn’t need to. Castiel understands, and that was all that he needed from him.

The angel finally approaches Sam further, and this time, Sam doesn’t flinch away. “I am truly sorry for what happened, Sam. I’m sorry that I hurt you, no matter which version of me it ended up being. I’m sorry for this - and all the other times.”

The younger Winchester feels a weight lift off of him. Not enough, but a bit. “It’s okay, Cas. I don’t blame you. Not really. I forgive you. I just… you needed to know, I guess. But… don’t feel guilty about it, okay? I’m glad, so glad, that despite what happened, despite Dad, and everything… that you’re who you are now. Like Dean said: you’ve grown. You’ve changed. And man, even… even with who you were back then. It wasn’t bad then, either. You weren’t. It was the situation, just like this time.”

“And the reasons for those changes are down the hall and standing right here in front of me,” Castiel smiles. “You and Dean, and now Jack - you’ve made me who I am. You saw it. I was just another, obedient, mindless soldier who had very little regard for my father’s creation. I was merely emulating what my brothers and sisters believed, and did what my superiors directed. Heaven is my family, Sam, but it’s not my only family. And while on the subject of family… I am so glad that you were able to speak with your father. I know you’ve wanted that for so long.”

“Me too,” Sam croaks. “We said some things that, uh… needed to be said. For years. I feel like we finally understood each other. And I feel…” He considers. “I feel lighter, when I think about him, you know? Like some part of me has finally healed.”

“You got closure.”

“Yeah. Closure.”

“Sam. May I?”

The question is readable on Castiel’s face, and after a few seconds, Sam closes his eyes in assent. The fingers that tickel his forehead are warm and so is the grace as it flows through him, leaving his skin unblemished and no longer painful, healing.

Sam feels himself start to relax for the first time that day.

“Do you think you’ll be able to sleep?” Castiel asks.

Sam shrugs. “I don’t know. Maybe. I can try.”

The angel nods. “All right. In that case, I’ll go talk to Jack. He’s probably still worried.”

“Let him know that I’m okay,” Sam says. “And that… tomorrow, I’ll talk to him. I’ll tell him everything. It’s time that he knew.”

He knows by the look on Castiel’s face that he understands what Sam means, and that it wasn’t just what transpired over the past day, but a lifetime of events that lead up to this. His friend jerks his head in response.

“In that case, I’ll leave you to your rest. Good night, Sam. If you need anything… just let me know.”

“‘Course,” Sam smiles, and this time, it’s genuine. “Night, Cas.”

He heads to his bed room, shaking his head with amusement at the sound of deep-rumbling snores coming from Dean’s room, and plants face first down onto his bed. He falls asleep within minutes, and there are no nightmares that night to plague him.

#supernatural #spn #sastiel #samcas #i tried to tag everyone lol #fic #*mine #14.13 #ep: lebanon

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