#this absolutely did happen and she's been obsessing over how vindicated it made her feel enough to WRITE AN ARTICLE ABOUT IT | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

bozawarriorsposting · 4 days

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Following up from my last post about this AU, this is some info about the four damned souls on 'probation' and their Overseer

Mudclaw

The ““““Leader”””” of the group

Spent his entire life with the ambition of becoming leader, grew up with stories of his great ancestors and what a Warrior should be

Devoted himself to his clan and lived every second of every day as the ideal Warrior cat, revered the Stars and it seemed it payed of as he was made deputy

Stolen from him and given to some sniveling coward making googly eyes at a Thunderclan kittypet

VERY bitter

Tries to take charge in every situation, the other three tend to fight him on this depending on how dire it is

Gruff, blunt, cold, and easily irritable

“Ends Justify the means” as a lifelong motto, and they are doing Starclans will, so the Ends MUST be good

Despises the other three, but this goes for all of them

Does find some enjoyment in these missions, it's something to do, a chance to prove himself,

makes it feel less like his life is over

Can manipulate mud and physical matter as a spirit, very good for dropping trees on cats, Starclan has a sense of humor

Ashfur

Felt fully vindicated by Starclan’s decision to let him in, and was happy to watch as Squirrelflight and her wretched family suffered

Yet… they did cope with it, and while everyone back in the real world recovered, Ashfur was still dead, still alone

His obsession emerged again as Ashfur found that his death was as empty as his life

He HAD to do something…

Yeah, Starclan decided to nip that one in the bud

PISSED at them for shunting him here

He thought he was proven right with his entry into Starclan, then they let his murderer in too

WILL try and take revenge on the stars… at some point

Dubious honor of being the most amoral out of the four

I mean, its neck and neck all the way down

Tends to keep his unhinged nature in check

Pretty good liar, capable of disguising his true self

Still gives everyone else the creeps so they still don’t trust him

Pretty short tempered as a warrior, spiteful as all hell

Ability to possess living cats, that and also limited emotional manipulation for more discrete methods

Needletail

Out of the four, the one that most recognizes she messed up

Which isn’t saying much, she still sees her rebellion as justified, and Rowanstar as being more culpable just because of how weak he was

Rebellious teenager turns into a very rebellious ghost

She isn’t doing this for Starclan’s approval, she wants to be in Starclan when Violet dies so she can apologize for everything

Has something resembling a moral backbone

Still self serving in the end, and it’s not hard to have moral standard higher then zero

She tends to go along with the plans, but makes her displeasure abundantly clear

Is very caustic, snapping at everyone more than the others usually do

Sometimes plays contrarian just for the sake of it

She is surrounded by stuck up fanatics that will do whatever Starclan tells them to, so why not screw with them a little?

Power is either luck control or something that similarly is unpredictable and upends everything

Appledusk

Is having the worst time

Was looked down upon in Starclan, he was an average warrior, and is now solely remembered as a consequence in what is the equivalent of an old wives tail

He wasn’t particularly ambitious or anything, but it does sting to be known as nothing more than what happens when you have a cross Clan relationship

Then suddenly THIS happens

Out of the four, he is the most afraid of ending up in the dark forest, for obvious reasons

Would have the thing most resembling a moral compass, but has absolutely zero spine

Is essentially resigned to doing whatever Starclan tells him so he can get back up there

Has also been dead the longest out of the four, so there is some disconnect between him and actually living, more like a loose memory at this point

In life was a smooth talker, real womanizing charmer, a real sleazy asshole

And he still acts like that occasionally

But under the surface he is just exhausted, wants to go back up to starclan and rest until he fades

But nope, he is going back down to the mortal plain, risk getting murdered by his ex, and have to work with a bunch of War Criminals

His power is warding of some kind, while the other three affect the physical world, he makes sure they don’t get attacked by the things lurking in the forest, or for other starclan spirits to find them and ask exactly what they are doing

Clear Sky

Very much enjoying getting to lord over other cats again

This was more or less his idea with what to do with at-risk Starclan cats, is trying to keep it on the down low in terms of activities

Not a secret, he did get the thumbs up from the rest of Starclan, but he does keep their operations vague in terms of what exactly happens

Starclan gets what it wants, prophecies come true, who is paying attention to the details

What does it matter if some mortal lives get ruined

Been dead for so long that the idea of a mortal life is almost unimaginable to him

Is proof of why Fading exists

Represents Starclan at both its most self righteous and amoral

He is morally right because he is the stars

You know the Vast from TMA? that's essentially what he can do

If you piss him off, you will be getting the worst case of vertigo of your life at best

Falling forever in a pocket dimension at worst

Falling from the very real sky and into the very real ground as a sort of midpoint between experiences

On the mortal plain, a clear sky means that he can observe almost everything from above

The Four learn to fear a bright sunny day and a cloudless blue sky, for it means that their “Benefactor” is watching

#warrior cats #warrior cats au #appledusk #mudclaw #needletail #clear sky #ashfur #wc

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penguinwithitsarseonfire · 3 years

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Baby Just Say Yes

Relationship: 12th Doctor x Reader

Warnings: brief mention of drowning - but not graphically described, and some spoilers for War and Peace (the book, although I suppose it would apply to the TV show as well, since they're the same story)

Word Count: 2,704

Summary: When you, Bill, and the Doctor debate the merits of how many doughnuts are too many, it accidentally leads to a revelation on an event you hadn't actually known had happened.

Request: Bill finds out that the reader is "married" to Doc and at some point Bill jokes calling the two her grandparents

A/N: I took the route of reader knowing the Doctor for years and years, just so it was easier to justify the nature of the Doctor and readers relationship. As a result, it's got some implied past 11 x Reader. Hope that’s okay!

Your finger trailed along the spines of the collection of books on one the shelves in the second level of the console room. You paused when your eyes landed on a familiar novel, one you had yet to crack open, but really wanted to. If so you could boast to the Doctor that you'd read it.

War and Peace.

1,225 pages. The Doctor had never had the patience for it. You took the novel out from the shelf, only for a plume of dust to pool into the air. It tickled your nose, making it itch.

Then you sneezed.

You rubbed your finger along the base of your nose in a vain attempt to scratch it, and narrowed your eyes at the dusty bookshelf. The Doctor had said he was going to dust it.

A muffled voice spoke from below, it took you a moment to place what was said, but you were pretty sure it was ‘bless you’.

You were on a planet the Doctor and you had discovered in his last face, back when he had been younger, had a longer chin, and was far more obsessed with sweets. It was famous for its doughnuts, the best in the galaxy, the Doctor had decided.

And that decision had stuck, since, when the Doctor had told Bill about the planet, she had decided that they absolutely must go.

You poked your head over the bannister and locked eyes with Bill. She was holding a doughnut in her mouth, and her hands were full balancing two trays. You realised it must have been Bill who spoke, because the Doctor was only now coming in, holding a near empty tray of doughnuts in one hand.

“Hey,” you said, and you placed your book on one of the chairs before hopping down the stairs. “You two get enough?”

Bill snorted, dropping her boxes onto the console and taking a bite out of her doughnut. “Not even. He,” she nodded towards the Doctor. “Has already eaten nearly every single one out of that box.”

Your eyebrows flew into your hairline, and you snatched the box out of the Doctor’s hands. You waved the Doctor away when he protested, and instead eyed the boxes contents. There was a single doughnut left. Out of nine doughnuts, and only one was left. It was round, with no hole in the middle, and a good layer of icing sugar sprinkled on top.

You raised an eyebrow at him. “Feeling sick yet?”

The Doctor raised his own eyebrow at you, and you knew, instinctually, that it was more effective than yours. “You do not get to lecture me on health.”

It was a weak rebuttal.

“You’ve had eight of them Doctor,” you took the final doughnut out of the box. “Eight.”

He snatched it out of your hand, and your face fell. “Timelord,” he replied, and then took a large bite out of the final doughnut. The Doctor immediately winced, then hissed. He pulled the doughnut away with a frown, and you saw the remnants of hot jam on his lips.

A swell of vindication ran through you, and, under the guise of wiping some of the jam off, you took the doughnut off of him. You let the air cool the jam slightly, not wanting to burn yourself too. “Eight,” you said again. “Is more than enough.”

“The very basics of my physiology are different,” he gestured to both his hearts for good measure, then tried to reach for the doughnut, you were ready though, and you held it out of reach. “I’ll be fine.”

“Just because you've got two hearts,” you said. “Doesn't mean you've got two stomachs. At the very least you'll get indigestion.”

And with that you took a hungry bite out of the very doughnut he had just stolen from you. It was good, they’d made it with raspberry jam, and the stark taste of the sharp raspberry against the sweet sugar warmed you. You gave him a satisfied smirk, and turned to Bill. “What about you, what’s yours?”

Bill had been watching you both, her head swinging between you like she was watching a tennis match. She had just bitten into her doughnut, and she looked slightly stunned that you had spoken to her.

“It’s really good,” she said, but her mouth was full so it sounded more like ‘ts r’lly gud. She swallowed, then continued talking. “Can’t remember what they said this one was,” and she turned to the Doctor, holding the doughnut up so both you and the Doctor could see its contents. It was filled with a rich purple paste. “What’s supposed to be in it?”

“Ube,” the Doctor said coolly, and he shuffled over to your side. You sidestepped him, taking another bite of the doughnut. He wasn’t getting it that easily. “It’s from the Philippines, traditionally.”

“We should’ve gotten more,” Bill said. “I think these are my favourite so far.”

This was the beauty of this planet, they were obsessed with Earth doughnuts, so they’d preserved every culturally significant recipe that Earth had, 1,893 – the Doctor had counted. They even had cronut’s, of all things, though you’d yet to try them.

The Doctor scowled at the other two boxes, and you stepped carefully in front of them.

“I chose a new book,” you said, which was a blatant redirection of conversation, but you powered through. “One I’m sure you haven’t finished.”

From the corner of your eyes, you noticed Bill was watching the pair of you again, as if a spectator of a sport.

The Doctor studied you carefully, and you knew he was humouring this new conversation. “That’s an unlikely assumption.

“War and Peace,” you said, with only a small hint of pride.

The Doctor cocked his head to the side, considering it. “You’re right, actually. I got bored once the Anatole and Natasha affair got going. Couldn’t visit the opera for a couple decades either.”

Your face fell.

Bill spluttered. “Did you just spoil it?”

The Doctor waved a hand. “The book's over 150 years old. If Y/N doesn't know about the ending by now then that's not really my fault.”

You vaguely heard Bill breathe out an Oh my God.

“That's one of the most arrogant things you've ever said,” you said, still processing the shock of how he had so simply said what he had. “And I once listened to you drone on for an hour on how you choreographed the macarena.”

“I did that in a different face though, younger, more nimble. I’ll have to tell you about how I taught Claude Debussy how to shred.”

“Like, on the guitar, or in the ocean?” Bill asked.

“Yes,” the Doctor said, and then he went to grab for the rest of the doughnut in your hand.

“Oh no,” you said, side-stepping him. “No more, especially not after you spoiled the book for me.”

“That’s ridiculous,” he said. “It’s not like I told you how Andrei dies in a gruesome battle against the French, and Natasha coincidently finds herself by his side as he dies on his deathbed, even though they’d long parted. Honestly.”

Your eyes bugged out of your skull, you could feel it, as though they were ready to up and roll away.

“Is Andrei an important character?” Bill asked slowly, and then, she meekly added. “I haven’t seen the show.”

You spoke very slowly, your voice low. You narrowed your eyes to the Doctor. The death of a major character was a pretty big spoiler. “I cannot believe you.”

The Doctor winced slightly. “I just rambled like I was 900 years old again, didn’t I?”

“At least,” you breathed. You swallowed your exasperation, and then, suddenly, you sneezed. It was loud, like it had to announce itself to the world, and you rocked backwards slightly. You sniffled.

“Bless you,” Bill said again, but her mouth was full, so it sounded like ‘bleshooo’.

You gave her your thanks, then turned to the Doctor, your mind going to the reason why you were sneezing in the first place. “Dusting,” you said. “You haven’t dusted yet. You said you would.”

The Doctor waved a hand. “I will, I’ll get round to it.”

“You offered, Doctor,” you continued, and in the back of your mind, you wondered if it sounded like you were nagging him . “No one asked you to do it, Nardole didn’t even ask. You offered.”

“You’re in a mood,” The Doctor said suddenly, and he leaned forward, so his big nose was almost against yours.. “Are you sick?

“I – what, no, I’m not sick,” you said, and you stumbled back suddenly. His eyes were so large, so close, and it was momentarily disarming. “You can be so infuriating sometimes, you know that?”

“You tell me constantly.”

Bill’s face grew into a large, delighted grin. “Oh my God,” she said. “You're like an old married couple.”

You turned to her, stunned. Or course, you were with the Doctor, but the idea of being married to him… well, he had done it, you knew he had, you’d been there, several years ago now when he’d had a different face with a long chin and an affinity for custard.

It certainly hadn’t been to you, though.

Of course, time had been broken and you’d been wearing an itchy eyepatch, but schematics.

You’d also seen the Doctor, a much younger face, one you had never travelled with, marry Queen Elizabeth the first. You’d been a ring bearer. It had been too fun teasing all three of faces of the Doctor that day for it.

But no. You had certainly never married him.

It wasn’t as if you didn’t want to, quite honestly, the thought had never crossed your mind. You had been so content in your relationship with him, how sure it felt, how right it was, that you’d never thought about anything more.

The Doctor, too, gawked, but for an entirely different reason. "You called me old.”

Bill glanced up and down the doctor's frame, which was enough to make her point.

“Fine,” the Doctor grumbled. “I'm old.”

“How are we like an old married couple?” You pressed, because the Doctor was not getting the key part of Bill’s statement.

“The bickering,” she said. “It's totally what couples do.”

You gaped and turned to the Doctor for some sort of guidance. You waited for him to shut it down. To laugh and just say it was because you were comfortable around one another. Instead, the Doctor only shrugged. "I mean,” he said. “Technically we are married'

You did a double take. Married. You were, apparently, already married to the Doctor.

What?

Bill gasped. “What - no, since when? Why didn't you tell me?”

“Yeah,” you said, finding your voice. “I'd quite like to know too.”

Bill turned to you. “Wait what do you mean?”

“This is news to me,” you continued. “We're married? Where was my something old and something blue?”

The Doctor gestured to himself, then around the console room - the TARDIS. So those were, apparently, the something old and something blue. A bit on the nose.

He raised an eyebrow, and you wondered if your expression was as confused as you felt. “On the foreshore of Tralite,” he prompted. “With the Arhkor embassy.”

That... that hadn't been a wedding. Had it?

You mind went back to that evening, so many years ago now, back when you had been travelling with Clara, back when the doctor knew who Clara was. Your heart clenched for a moment, you didn't think about those times often. You felt alone in those memories, like you were the only one who held them, could cherish them.

But you remembered, quite clearly.

Here's what had happened:

Every decade, the Arhkor would sacrifice a person with renowned intelligence to the foreshore of Tralite, a beach that was more pebble than sand. The sacrifice would sit in the water until they drowned, and their memories would be recorded into the water. Living memory, the Doctor had said.

But the sacrifice that year, a young girl named Ardiel, whose bright purple hair had matched her purple scales, had been so young, and she hadn’t wanted to die.

So the Doctor, in all his foolish martyring glory, had marched out into the sea himself.

And of course, you couldn’t let him do that, so you followed.

“That wasn’t a wedding,” you said. “You were trying to sacrifice yourself to an ocean.”

You remembered it, your hand clasped in his, and the water settling over you both. You hadn’t been scared, which, in hindsight, terrified you. You should have been scared, but you weren’t. You had felt calm, at ease, safe even.

You couldn’t remember exactly why you had both been spared, but the water washed away, leaving you both wet and cold – but alive. And the water had never asked for another sacrifice since.

“It was a marrying of the minds,” The Doctor said, enunciating the words like he was trying to drill the meaning into your brain. “The water had been the officiant.”

“This is so weird,” Bill said, and she took another bite out of her doughnut.

You found yourself agreeing with Bill. “Doctor, that makes exactly zero sense.”

“The water had found something worth more than intelligence,” the Doctor continued. “It had found love. So when it copied and pasted our minds, that’s all it found. It unified us. It was a wedding.”

You rubbed your forehead with your fingers, trying to process this.

“I gotta say,” Bill commented, and she’d finished the doughnut she had been eating and was now fishing another out of a box. She pulled out a brown doughnut that was an oval shape with a silt down the middle. “I dunno how many people can say their grandparents got married by an ocean.”

“Ox-tongue,” the Doctor said, and he nodded to the pastry in Bill’s hand. Then, he considered her statement. “And that’s true, you should use that. It’s a good pick up line, should impress a girl or two.”

Bill scrunched up her face. “Okay, one; Ox tongue? Seriously? That can’t be right.”

The Doctor shrugged. “It’s Cantonese. A friend once told me about it. Apparently it references the shape of the dough. That being said, it might also be horse ears.”

“Okay,” Bill raised a sceptical eyebrow. “I’ll maybe half trust it, because it doesn’t sound right, but I don’t know enough to prove you wrong,” she paused before speaking again. “Also, two; I don’t think those two can get mixed up. Three, I’m never, ever using that as a pick up line. Not ever. It’s terrible.”

Thankfully, the Doctor was so focused on Bill’s last point, that he disregarded what she had said earlier. “It’s an excellent line! You’ll get to teach the girls something new!”

“Sorry, circle back,” you said, because your brain wasn’t computing. You weren’t even sure what you needed to address first. The marriage comments? The grandparents comment? The ox tongue?

Both Bill and the Doctor looked to you expectantly.

You pointed to the Doctor. “First of all, still wasn’t a wedding,” you then pointed to Bill. “Second of all, grandparents? I know he’s old but I’m certainly not.”

“Yeah but you’re with him,” she said, after swallowing part of her doughnut. She took another eager bite.

“He is sitting right here,” the Doctor grumbled. “But alright, if it wasn’t a wedding up to your standards, we can always do something different,” he stood up. “We can arrange it.”

Your brain short circuited, and you had to reprocess what the Doctor had said.

We can always do something different. We can arrange it.

Had the Doctor just proposed to you?

You were so stunned you didn’t even protest as he plucked the remaining doughnut from out of your fingers, wandering out of the console room. “Let me know,” he called out. “And we’ll get to reading that Tolstoy.”

You sat there, bug eyed, and turned to Bill. She was wearing a similar expression, she’d dropped her own doughnut, which sat dejected on top of one of the doughnut boxes.

“Did what I think just happened, happen?” You asked, your voice only slightly shrill.

Bill nodded. “I – uh, yeah. I think so.”

You stood up, and sprinted after him.

A/N^2: I gotta give huge thanks to the ever-sweet @phxntxmx, who pointed out there was a bit of confusion in how I described one of the doughnuts here. I’ve tried to clear it up and make it a bit more consistent, since it’s not something I know about for sure.

#the doctor x reader #twelfth doctor imagine #12th doctor x reader #twelfth doctor x reader #12th doctor #Doctor Who #DW #Elle: Speaks #opening Elle's vault #vault fic

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marrys-dream-world · 3 years

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lovers alone wear sunlight (chapter 1)

Summary: Adrien is drowning in loneliness, losing two friends in a matter of weeks and feeling like his lady is getting farther away from his reach each day. Ladybug is drowning in responsibilities, crumbling under the duties of a guardian and Shadow Moth’s relentless attacks. Maybe, they can offer a safe place to each other. Post-Queen Banana.

Notes: It’s my first time participating in a fandom event like this, I’m excited to fulfil these prompts. Since I don’t have a lot of time, I picked ten prompts to write a ten-chaptered fic and I’ll post the chapters on the day of each prompt. Happy Ladrien June for us! Today’s prompt is Day 1: Private Island. @ladrienjune

Read on AO3

When Adrien was young, he dreamed of going to a private island.

It started when he was around six and watched Lilo and Stich for the first time on family movie night. He remembered relating to Lilo a lot even then, because he also didn't have many people to play with and that the red-headed girl reminded him of Chloé, his best friend, when she was in one of her worst moods. He remembered pestering his parents for months to get him a dog that he could name Stitch, so much that his mother hushed him away when his father’s mouth drew a thin line and how he made Chloé cry when he said her “badness level was unusually high for someone her size” after she threw a tantrum because of a grass-stained dress. But most of all, he remembered begging to go to the beach.

“Please, mom, please.” Adrien had insisted to his mother for, perhaps, the thousandth time that day. “Why can’t we go to the beach?”

“Sweetheart, don't whine.” His mother had admonished softly, lips quirking into a smile and placing her warm hand on top of his head. “Your father and I just think you’re too young to travel.”

“But I just wanna go to the beach with you!”

“And you will. After our trip to Tibet, I’ll talk to your father, okay? We won’t even go to just any beach. My family has a private island we can go to on vacation,I’ll even invite your aunt Amelie and you cousin Félix to come!”

“Promise?”

She had laughed then, a sound that was fading more and more from his memory. “I promise.”

He had spent the whole time parents were way planning as much of the trip as he could, with Nathalie. They had been in a good mood when they came back, but said they would be too busy to travel soon. But his father was content to promise him the trip once enough time passed and his mother started to help him plan too, even scheduling a date that was sooner than Adrien thought it would be. This would be good for her, he had thought, the sun would help her look less pale than she was lately. It wasn’t meant to be, though, as a week before it his mother simply collapsed, coughing and wheezing and gasping for air so desperately that Nathalie had to drag him to his room, face red and wet, as his father went to the hospital with her.

And now she was gone and he didn’t even know how.

It doesn’t matter right now. Adrien shook away those thoughts, focusing on the task at hand and setting down the drink on the picnic blanket.

“So, Plagg, what do you think?” He asked his kwami, spreading his arms out to the decorations.

“I think it’s dumb.” Plagg said, floating lazily by his side. “Not even a cheese platter? If I was your girlfriend, I would just leave.”

“Good thing you’re not her, then. And she’s not my girlfriend.”

“If you say so, kid.” He didn't need to look to know that the kwami was rolling his eyes. “I’ll be in my sanctuary if you need me.”

With that, Plagg fell into his cheese-filled trash can.

“Good night for you then.” Adrien called out, chuckling a little.

“Well, good night to you too, handsome.” He hears a good-naturedly voice say from behind him, turning around quickly.

There stood the love of his life, his lady in red and black. Thankfully, it didn’t seem like she noticed Plagg, too busy taking in his room. He had dimmed the light in the room, but only enough so it made the place look cozier, and spread out a blanket on the ground with bowls of fruit and two cups filled with clear liquid and topped with colorful little umbrellas on it. The sound of crashing waves was coming from the computer, mirroring what happened in his heart whenever he saw her.

“My hero.” He breathed in awe, loving the way her cheeks pinked as he did. Then, a small smirk grew on his face. “Like what I did to the place?”

“What is all this for?”

“Well, you said Shadow Moth’s attacks were stressing you out.” Adrien said as he motioned for her to sit down on the blanket. “So I, your emotional support civilian, improvised a private island here for you. Just drop your worries and enjoy a nice Agreste-sponsored fruit bowl.”

She giggled and he wished he could file it away in his mind and repeat it over and over again.

“Isn’t it a bit much, Adrien?” She said, picking up her cup and fiddling with the little umbrella. It was something she did a lot, he found out from spending time with her somewhere she could let her guard down, occupying her fingers with anything. Her brilliant mind didn’t rest.

“Too much? I didn't even bring out the sand yet.” He said as he sat near her, relishing her chuckle. He relished joking around with her. His sense of humor was, of course, her favorite thing about him. “But really, nothing is ever too much for you, Ladybug.”

Her eyes softened. “Well, we can’t let all this go to waste, can we?”

Ladybug picked up her cup and raised it in his direction, so he mimicked her and they toasted before sipping their drinks. She made a surprised sound.

“It’s coconut water!” She said, taking another sip. “It’s really good.”

“I thought it would fit the theme better.” Adrien said, grabbing a piece of mango and chewing carefully. It wasn’t everyday he could eat something out of his diet plan. “I’m happy you like it.”

“Honestly, this makes me nostalgic. Not that I have actually been to a private island or even somewhere we can just eat tropical fruit, but I haven’t gone to the beach in years. If I ever want to swim, if I even have time, I just go to the pool.”

He remembered the last time he saw her swimming, doing nervous laps in her aquatic form around the pool they went to after their disastrous movie session, trying to pretend everything was fine. It was hard to picture that stressed out Ladybug with the one stuffing her cheeks with fresh pineapple on a blanket in his room.

“I have never been to one, too.” Adrien confessed. “I don’t have a lot of time for swimming, imagine going to an actual beach. Last time I even went to a pool was because of a commercial shoot and the producer tried to pretend the pigeons he got were doves.”

“Ah, Mr. Ramier’s last akumatization. I didn’t know you were shooting something there.”

“Yeah, it wasn’t going anywhere, though. But at least I got to see Marinette, my friend from school, so that was nice.”

“Ah- yeas, I mean, yes, nice.” Ladybug said, wiggling like she did every time he mentioned Marinette. Trying to not give away that they know each other, maybe. “So, what made you think of ‘private island’ when trying to get a relaxing idea?”

“Well, when I was young, I got completely obsessed with Lilo and Stitch, it drove my parents absolutely insane. I wanted to got to the beach so badly that my mother promised that we would go to her family’s private island for our vacation. But she got sick, so we never went.”

Ladybug didn’t say anything, just offered her hand to him, which he took and squeezed. They spent a few minutes in silence, just listening to the sound of crashing waves.

“Maybe we could go after, you know, everything.” Adrien said.

“Go to the private island?”

“Yeah, after you and Chat Noir defeat Shadow Moth. We can go and live off fruit for a month.”

“I don’t know if I can live off fruit for that long.”

“We can think of something else.”

“I could use lucky charm and get us a fishing rod.”

“I’ll learn to cook fish then.”

“Deal.” They laughed quietly after this.

“We can get a hamster too.” Adrien said, eyes shining as he looked at her. He knew it was probably never going to happen, but was glad that she was humoring him.

“Do you think a tropical island is a place for a hamster?”

“Anywhere is a place for a hamster if we give it enough love.”

“Fair enough. Name ideas?” His mind flashed back to brunch at the Dupain-Chengs and a wailing Marinette shouting about a hamster named Loneliness.

“No abstract concepts?”

“It would be hard to call it that, can I shorten it to Nac?” He bumped her shoulder and she failed to contain her cheeky grin. “Okay, so Melancholy and Vindication are out.”

“Were you really considering these names?”

“Sometimes. Do you have any suggestions?”

“Hummm… Let’s name it Chat Noir.” She choked on air at this before letting out a few huffs that could be laughter.

“Okay, why would we name it after my partner?”

“So you won’t miss him when you’re there, my- er hero.”

“I might just take him with me then, just so I don’t miss him.” Adrien wondered if he should be happy that she wanted to take Chat Noir or sad that she didn’t want to be alone with Adrien anymore.

He chose happy.

“It would be purrfectly fine with me, my lady.” He teased.

“Nooooo, you sound just like him when you do that.” Ladybug said, dropping her face in her hands. She missed how Adrien froze in place. “Honestly, you would get along a little too well. I don’t know if I want to be your third wheel.”

“You could never be anyone’s third wheel, Ladybug.” He said so earnestly that she stared at him, flushing so much her cheeks matched her suit.

They laid down after that, gazing at the ceiling and listening to the sound coming from the computer. They haven’t let go of each other's hands since that moment, he noticed absentmindedly, but she wasn’t saying anything, so he would enjoy it while he could. It startled him, sometimes, how he felt during these quiet moments. From the beginning, he loved her with the intensity of a thousand suns, like he would burst from how much affection he felt and the only way he wouldn’t explode was by telling her all the time.

He still loved her like that, of course, and some days it overwhelmed him. But what he learned from the last weeks of her coming to his room and just spending time with him: reading while he does his homework, listening to him playing the piano, watching a movie and just resting her head on his shoulder… In those moments, he felt something different, comforting. It was a bit like putting his hand in the sunbeams that Plagg likes to sleep in mid-afternoon, not hot, but a soft-warm that made you feel at ease.

It was funny. Nino teased him at times that he was too nice, so he and Alya started to call him a sunshine boy. Marinette didn't seem to agree much (“What? No, I don’t think you’re like a sunshine, you’re not like the sun at all, I don’t orbit around you all day- I mean, you’re more like a star- wait, no, that’s not what I meant-) and he thought she was right. How could he be anything like sunshine when he was holding a ray of sunlight in the palm of his hand?

“Hey, Ladybug?” Adrien said and only noticed that she had her eyes closed when she opened them. Soon she would have to go home to drop her transformation and let her kwami rest and get back to her mysterious civilian life. But it didn't matter, because right she was here, her hand in his.

“Hum?”

“I thought of a name for our hamster.”

“Not Chat Noir anymore?”

“No. Not Chat Noir anymore.” He said, squeezing her hand. “How about Sunspot?”

She blinked at him sleepy before her face broke into a warm smile.

“I love it, Adrien.”

#ladrienjune #ladrienjune2021 #ladrien #ladybug #adrien agreste #my stuff #lovers alone wear sunlight

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kybervisions · 3 years

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slight obsessions [bucky]

summary: after months of obsessing over a senator, bucky is given the opportunity to save her. he then visits her in the hospital

author’s note: warning, warning, this will feature aspects of the u.s government,,, \\ lil bit of fluff and mentions of torture ,, just a kidnapped senator and bucky pining ,, requests are open :)

The security footage of your kidnapping at the fundraiser was leaked to the media. Millions watched as a prominent U.S senator was ambushed and drugged before being dragged into an unmarked vehicle. Bucky’s heart ached. “We’ll find her,” Sam, well-aware of Bucky’s infatuation with you, promised his friend.

Bucky was unprepared to find you in the state that you were, bloody and bruised. There was a cut above your eyebrow and blood dripped down your face. Your skin was riddled with red and purple. The metal cuffs around your wrists and ankles dug into your skin and caused you to bleed. There was track marks on your arms and your knee didn’t look too good either.

You looked nearly unrecognizable — almost nothing like the senator that so adamantly advocated for his pardon.

“Captain?” You mutterly weakly, barely recognizing the two figures near the doorway. The drugs they pumped into you fucked with your vision and made you feel absolutely sick. You could barely keep your eyes open. Everything hurt and you shivering from the lack of warmth.

Sam quickly ran past Bucky and his fingers searched for a pulse on your neck. Weak, but it was something. Once up close, Sam could see the multitude of track marks on your skin and his fingers gently touched them, causing you to cry, something that completely shocked you. Zemo had stopped giving you water a few days ago.

“We’re going to get you out of here, senator,” Sam pulled out a Widow’s Bite, which he had secretly stolen from Natasha, and used the electricity within the bite to override the power source of the cuffs.

When the cuffs opens, you were released from the vertical interrogation chair. Before you fell on the concrete floor, Bucky quickly reached out to catch you.

“Fuck!” You shouted and startled Bucky. You bit your lip in an attempt to silence your pain. After weeks of absolute hell, you were sensitive to touch. Tears filled your eyes and you weren’t strong enough to hold them back. “It hurts,” You whimpered. You felt sick. Cold and weak and wanting to puke but having nothing in your stomach to regurgitate.

A protectiveness he had not felt since before the war consumed Bucky. Seeing you so weak and in pain filled him with both anger and the need to make you feel better. Your big, soft, and tear-filled eyes awakened his primal instinct to defend and protect.

He acknowledged there was still something wrong with him, because even in the state that you were in, Bucky wanted nothing more than to press his lips against yours and hold you against him.

For a short second, while looking down into your eyes, the world was quiet.

“C’mon, man,” Sam urged them. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to be in here when the timer goes off,”

“Alright, alright,” Bucky agreed. “Um, can you run?” He looked down at you again. You were smaller in person. The television must make everyone look like titans. On the screen, you had such a larger than life presence. Whether it was asking questions during committee hearings or speaking out against a bill, you were imposing.

“She can barely stand,” Sam answered before you. With all the drugs in your system, you were nearly unresponsive. “Pick her up and let's go!”

Once they reached the C.I.A medical facility, Sharon told a room full of reporters that the senator had been found and was being examined by professionals. She did not give too much information, which was typical for intelligence agencies.

By “being examined by professionals”, Sharon meant you were undergoing surgery because whatever was injected into your body caused you to go under septic shock. She omitted that part, not wanting to give the public further cause to worry.

After the surgery, only family was allowed to enter your hospital room. Some of your staff was able to bypass that rule. You were still recovering, but your top aide, Winnie, had begun planning your first public appearance.

“You’re a certified badass now,” Winnie informed you, and it made you chuckle. Winnie had been by your side since you were a congressional freshman and you loved them to death. “The corpses will have to show you actual respect now,” They smiled, referring to your coworkers as corpses gives them a bit of joy.

“I’m sure Stern will find a reason to call me a traitor to the country,” You replied. Your strong opposition of the intelligence agencies earned you a lot of enemies.

“Yeah, well, he’ll — ”

The door had opened and there stood a “Hi, sorry. I, uh, I didn’t mean to interrupt,” Bucky stopped at the doorway. He was holding a small bouquet of your favorite flowers and scratched the back of his head, avoiding eye contact.

“Sergeant Barnes,” You smiled. Bucky looked to you, and he’d never seen or heard anything as beautiful. He had heard you say his name a thousand time over, but hearing it in person was just swell.

“Bucky’s jus’ fine, senator,” Bucky returned a toothy grin. You swear you had died and gone to heaven. He was even more beautiful in person.

“Bucky,” There was a shine in your eyes when you said his name. His name sounded so pretty coming from your mouth.

“O-kay,” Winnie chuckled and their eyes bounced between yourself and the soldier, who was just a few feet away from them. “I’ll be back tomorrow to hash out the details,” They turned to look at you and gave you a small peck on your head. “Be careful,” It was a warning.

Bucky stepped into the room, allowing Winnie to easily slip out.

Now that the blood and dirt had been washed out, Bucky could truly admire how striking you were. You were glowing. There were still bruises and healing wounds but they didn’t diminish your beauty.

He set the flowers on the visitor’s chair.

“I wanted to properly thank you and Mr. Wilson for saving my life,” You told him. He took a few more steps towards you. “W-Winnie has a press conference planned once I’m discharged, and there might be a Medal of Freedom in your future, after the Congressional Gold Medal, of course,”

“What?”

“Yeah,” You smiled. “It took a little bit of convincing but the bastard caved eventually,”

Of course you had recommended him, and Sam, for such prestigious awards. It was further proof that he had been vindicated from the dark part of his history. You helped profoundly in his path to finally accepting himself, and for that, he would always love you.

When the nightmares returned, Bucky would rewatch your old speeches for the campaign to pardon him. He felt pathetic — having to listen to a woman he had never met before passionately advocate for his freedom in order to feel better. You saw him as human, worthy of forgiveness.

“I know they’re practically worthless in the age of superheroes, but I thought I would be nice,”

It would be nice. “Thank you,” His smile slowly faded as the conversation took a serious turn. “For everything, the campaign and the pardon and now these medals,” A breathy chuckle escaped. “I...you never attended the ceremony,” He commented on your absence during his pardon. It had plagued his mind for countless nights.

“I wasn’t invited,” You chuckled at the irony of it — having spent months working for his freedom only to not be present to watch it happen. “A picture leaked of me at a protest in college and they thought it would be too controversial for me to attend,” You shrugged it off.

Ensuring Bucky’s freedom was all that mattered. Your acknowledgement was not important to you in the greater scope of things.

“I’ll make sure you get invited this time,” Maybe you could give a speech before he’s awarded the medal. He could finally be present to hear you praise him.

Bucky’s eyes lingered on your lips. Your nervousness returned. There was a distinct look in his eyes that terrified and excited you all the same.

“Senator, time for your medication,” A nurse entered the room and pushed a cart with her. There was an IV set, some pills, and a cup of water on the cart and all that medicine made Bucky feel anxious.

He was well aware of the dangers of so much medicine and he was scared. He couldn’t afford to lose you now. Not when he finally has you within his grasp.

“The pills help with the pain and the IV gives me nutrients,” You noted the panicked look on Bucky’s face when he saw the cart. “Or so they claim,” You looked at the nurse, who was not entertained by your accusatory comment.

“I should head out,” Bucky nodded. “And allow your drugs to be administered in peace,” You laughed, and he was quite proud of that.

Feeling bolder, Bucky took a few final steps toward you. You offered your hand and he lightly held your wrist, stilled bruised, and bowed down to kiss your hand. It was a small and sweet gesture, but it left you an absolute mess. You held your breath and felt your heart in your throat.

Bucky admired you once more before leaving the room. He nearly memorized how you radiated in spite of the harsh cold white light that illuminated the hospital. In that moment, he was certain you’d be his.

#bucky barnes x reader #bucky x reader #bucky barnes x you #marvel imagine #winter solider x y/n #marvel one shot

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there-are-things-i-dont-forget · 3 years

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SPOILERS FOR CRITICAL ROLE CAMPAIGN 2 BELOW

I just wanted to talk about how much the Mighty Nein and Matt and Critical Role have meant to me over the past few months. I started Campaign 2 in January this year, when I moved out for university and was able to live on my own for the first time. They quite literally saved me, because I cared so much for the setting and the characters and the story that Matt wove and how the players interacted with them that I hung on just to see how it would end.

For me, it was amazing how I could relate the characters to aspects of myself, and how watching them all get their happy endings have made me be able to look forward with a bit more hope.

Let’s start with Beau. I’ll be honest, Marisha’s characters are always the most challenging for me, because of how real they are. Marisha is a stunning actor, incredibly skilled, and Beau was the character I responded to the most as if it was a real person. Everyone else I could enjoy and play into the metagame of watching the players be characters. With Beau and Marisha, it was so real. Moreover, I could see myself reflected in the character (which is probably why I found her so challenging to begin with). Trauma, hurt, being an asshole to other people before they could reject her first. Not the best at compliments, giving in to anger and sarcasm, struggling to connect. And I got to watch her grow, and be accepted, and learn from her mistakes, and be appreciated by who she was, and in the end get vindication on her abusers, and find love and acceptance. Beau’s story is incredibly special to me.

In that same vein is Yasha’s. Manipulated, taken advantage of, forced to do things against her will. Yasha’s story is the one that I can relate to the most, in terms of trauma, and to see her quite literally rip the wings off of her abuser was cathartic in a way that I did not expect, but should have foreseen. And in the end, she also got her happy ending. I’m gonna leave it at that, because any more will make me cry. But I hold her and her character arc so close to my heart.

Liam’s performances are the hardest for me to watch because he feels so much, and I love it. He really gives it all to the scene and it is incredible. Caleb was a character that I overlooked for a bit in the beginning (as Jester had quickly become my favorite), but he quickly climbed as we began to see more of his character and his backstory. Manipulated and groomed by someone he was supposed to be able to trust, forced again to do things against his will, falling in to flashbacks and panic attacks, struggling to rejoin society and interact with others, a love and a passion for learning to a nearly obsessive sense, both for the love of it and for the possibility of gaining the power and strength needed to take back control. Slowly learning to love, to grow, to find friends and see that there can be more to life, that you don’t have to be ruled by your trauma or let it define you, but also still acknowledging it and its effects. But also just how long it takes, and how it can affect you in ways you cannot imagine. He also got his vindication on his abuser, and again, I cried, tears of happiness for him and of grief and hope for me, that one day I might be able to do the same.

Caleb, Yasha, and Beau are the ones I relate to the most because their story is my story, and watching them grow and love means it can happen to me as well. I cannot stress how important and incredible it is for me to realize that. In the more material sense, they all got closure and catharsis against those who hurt them, and they all learned to love again, to open their hearts and let others in again. And that means I can too.

This brings me to the Shadowgast love story. I know this is really controversial for the fandom and I don’t care. For me, their arc was perfectly realistic, and their ending was exactly what I expected for the characters. Finding a kin spirit, learning together, hesitant but trusting in the other’s passion for study at the very least, slowly and naturally growing closer and learning more about each other, revealing more. The betrayal from Essek, the scene on the boat, the slight recoiling on either side, and then learning again, slowly trusting again and teaching each other to forgive themselves, that they were both victims in a sense and that they can take back control and do better, and choose to do better and be better. Slowly healing, and healing together, knowing the worst of each other and choosing to stay but still acknowledging those parts of each other. The scene where they return to the T-Dock and they talk about time travel, and Caleb disintegrates the whole thing? That’s growth, and that’s growing together. And they continue to grow for years, and heal for years, and eventually they end up together, but it takes time. Of course it does. And Essek’s character and this ending really helped me understand some of my own feelings in terms of friendship and romance. Everyone upset that there wasn’t any “on screen” romance or whatever, to me, fundamentally misunderstood the character, especially since his love language does not seem to be physical touch at all (if anything it’s gift giving/acts of service - teleporting the M9 around? Helping Caleb solve the spell? Giving up to dunamis gem to help the M9 get a long rest?). But yeah. Watching characters like that help validate my own experiences in friendship and romance and it was fantastic.

The others I have a bit less in common with, but there’s still stuff to talk about. Veth having her body changed by someone else, something out of her control, feeling alien in this body and struggling to find a sense of self, then finding friends willing to pour everything into helping her be herself again? Fjord learning he is valuable whether or not he has powers/can serve others, that he has worth just as himself, and that that is enough? Those were stories I needed to hear, to know that something like that is possible.

Caduceus growing out of his comfort zone, exploring, learning, but still being a rock for the others (and for the viewers), and "Pain doesn’t make people. It’s love that makes people. The pain is inconsequential. It’s love that saves them."? Molly’s loyalty and “leave every place better than you found it”? Even if I couldn’t relate directly to the characters didn’t mean they didn’t have an impact, and these are things that I will carry with me always.

Jester. I have just about nothing in common with Jester, and I loved it. Her optimism, her jokes, and her art (including the dicks), just the absolute light and joy that was her character was exactly what I needed to get through some of the toughest times of my life. Watching her grow from episode one to episode 141 was insane, to mature but not lose her creativity and her fun for life. She was my reminder that there is good and light and hope in the world, even if sometimes you have to create it for yourself, and that is what kept me going sometimes.

And finally, Matt. I cannot give enough thanks to you for choosing to share this amazing world and this story with us. Your storytelling is what prompted me to finally put my ideas into writing, and now I’m working on my own book. Along with Jester, Essek is one of my favorites, and his story arc and characterization was incredibly important to me. I truly have no words for how Critical Role and especially you, with the care and passion and obvious love for storytelling that you have, have changed my life. And I cannot thank you enough.

Am I sad that the campaign ended? Maybe a little. I will miss these characters. But I truly believe that Matt ended the campaign at the perfect point, and I loved the final episode, it made incredible sense for the end of the characters (maybe a teeny bit more Marion/Babenon? But I digress). I’m sure Campaign 3 will be just as astounding.

My love and thanks to the cast and crew of Critical Role. Rest well knowing you did a fantastic job, and I’ll see you in campaign 3.

PS: I know there’s a lot of tags, I want to make sure I cover all my bases so people don’t get spoiled if they have these tags blocked because I have been spoiled too many times by people who tag badly.

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reachexceedinggrasp · 4 years

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Fated to Love You here reaffirming my long held conviction that no pure romance drama should be 20+ episodes.

This show is... really something. It is, in the fullest possible sense, A Lot. It starts out as an all-out screwball comedy wrapped around a troperiffic romance fluff plot. Wall to wall clichés, but not in a bad way; in a meta, self-aware, peak performance, finest Velveeta way. And if you’re not familiar with screwball comedy, think ‘light-hearted crack fic with slapstick and farce’. There is nothing believable or grounded about any aspect of it, it starts at Bonkers Level: Platinum and it only climbs higher as it goes on.

(On a side note, this results in the leading man being possibly the most memorable love interest in romcom history. His introduction scene is nothing short of batshit insane and you can't reliably predict how he will respond to anything. I have never seen a main character like this, he is all over the shop and utterly singular. Your first reaction to him is ‘wtf?’, your second and third reactions are ‘really?! this guy??’, your fourth reaction is ‘okay he do be mad hot tho’, your fifth and final reaction is ‘I cannot believe this performance exists, I have no idea what he is doing, but it is amazing.’

Appropriately(?) the actor who plays him is an uncanny Korean doppelgänger of Johnny Depp and- between the resemblance, the mannerisms, and the fearless total commitment to a bold as fuck acting choice with the very serious chops to back it up- I’m not convinced they aren’t half brothers separated at birth.

They do sabotage my happiness several times by starting to randomly style his (long, beautiful) hair very weird, fixing it right when the plot is rapidly circling the drain so he looks his hottest just as the show becomes briefly unwatchable, and then ruining him for the entire second half of the series by shearing it all off. WHY, my anguished cry goes up. Why do you do this?! Why does he have like seven hairstyles over the course of the show? Much later they even briefly give him that ubiquitous Kdrama Second Lead haircut with weirdly forward combed fringe in a solid straight line across the brow all the way back from the crown. It looks terrible on everyone and I hate it so much. This version was less bad than most but it is still bad. Anyway.)

So it’s an incredibly fun time to start but there are some problems with the tone and plot even in the first 9 episodes, including when the lovers start getting along really well right away and they’re both thoroughly decent people so there’s nothing keeping them from having a lovely time together making the best of the circumstances (forced/fake marriage). And, instead of introducing new conflict or advancing one of the dozen conflicts previously established and actually moving forward, there is a painfully contrived rehash of something they already dealt with which is then just never resolved. They make the hero leap to a conclusion his wife is nefarious after he’d already decided once that she isn’t (though it was completely reasonable for him to think she was- the fact that he decided to trust her so quickly just speaks to what kind of person he is), never try to find out more or talk to anyone about it, start pushing her away because of it, and have all this come to absolutely nothing. It only exists so he’ll stop being so incredibly nice to her and they won’t fall in love too fast.

You’d think they would have to eventually clear the air before the romance advances right? No. It wasn’t a real plot point, it was just a reset button to get them estranged and hostile again after they connect over their kindred spirits and we’ve spent a bunch of time showing how profoundly supportive and honourable our hero is. He’s being beautifully mature and selfless because he’s a really good dude (unusual for a romcom drama, right? for the main guy to be nice and considerate? to accept responsibility even if he doesn’t have to? Gun’s weird but he’s wonderful), but the writers need him to be cold and standoffish, so they just make him act like an unreasonable idiot for a while. He’s been thus far hugely proactive and direct and honest about everything, it’s one of his most prominent character traits, but suddenly he’s going to avoid confrontation in favour of being super passive aggressive?? Then the writers never solve it. Never! It just goes away. He got over it, I guess? He decided he doesn’t care if she’s a gold digger who deliberately trapped him? God forbid we have motivations that make sense and organic character drama, right? It's not like he didn't have totally valid reasons to be suspicious that could have led to legitimate conflict our heroine would struggle to vindicate herself from.

But anyway, apart from that kind of lazy bullshit, it’s a fine romance plot with extremely endearing characters who have great chemistry. They are fun and well-rounded and incredibly human despite all the silliness and OTT antics. Their relationship is hugely, hugely engaging and the dynamic is perfect, they really complement each other as characters and organically drive each other's arcs. There's the genuine depth and warmth and quiet pathos so often lacking from this kind of show. Things progress at a semi-reasonable pace. They work up to confessing their mutual feelings and get into some cute shenanigans before making out. It happens soon enough that you are not frustrated, but there's still plenty of build-up. Then- uh oh! We’re only 9 eps in and we have another 11 hours to fill with this fluffy plot!

Time for a bunch of absolute fucking nonsense. Time for our show, which has been so goofy and removed from reality it occasionally resembles a Monty Python skit, which has been so light it asks you to ignore the frankly incredibly fucked up implications of its premise for the sake of comedy (they were both drugged and proxy raped resulting in a pregnancy- the FL was a virgin prior to this and Gun had a girlfriend he wanted to propose to- and it was the FL’s family who did this to them: SUPER FUCKED UP), so farcical that it makes Some Like it Hot look like a gritty crime drama, that show to cover a bunch of serious heavy shit.

First, the rankest of melodrama. The families and the world all turn on our couple, but their love is true and will conquer all- UNTIL, he randomly collapses and gets convenient Soap Opera Amnesia. He’s forgotten their entire relationship and a series of coincidental pieces of misconstrued evidence, the machinations of his scheming ex girlfriend, the Soap Opera Doctor’s advice, and his closest confidants all going along with this conspire to make him believe (AGAIN) that his wife just wants his money.

This whole terrible episode is mercifully brief, but it just gets worse after his memory returns. This is where we get into the Noble Idiocy. The ‘pretend you don’t love them to “save them” from getting hurt by hurting them and making their important life decisions for them as if they don’t have a basic fucking right to decide that themselves’ kind. Which goes on for three FUCK years in the show. He wastes three years of their lives they could have spent together because he’s worried he might die young (in a terrible way) and doesn’t want to put her through that. And, of course, they inevitably get together later, so all he did was make it infinitely worse for her either way. To say nothing of how he thus couldn’t be there for her through the loss of their child. Possibly my most hated fucking trope of all time when done this way.

And, yep, you read that right. This show that has the single most batshit bonkers over the top slapstick I have ever seen in a kdrama, this show has a storyline where the fluffy romcom trope accidental pregnancy ends in massive trauma. Because she was standing around in the street after realising he does remember her (he continued to pretend he had amnesia after his memories came back, it’s all part of the stupid noble idiocy so I glossed over it) and gets hit by a car in the middle of their angst staring.

It is nearly Meet Joe Black levels of hilariously abrupt and incongruous.

so, blah blah, they lose their baby (there’s a very stupid whole thing about her telling everyone to save the baby instead of her- the baby is not far enough along for this to have been remotely viable. She is like 3 months pregnant. They all act like there’s a choice to be made between them and she’s mad at her husband for choosing to save her, but there was NO CHOICE. Either she lives or they both die! ffs I’m so irritated about this) and then he dumps her ~for her own good~~ because he loves her too much to make her go through losing him? So she loses him sooner?? right after their baby died???

Why do people in these stories always think being betrayed and abandoned for no reason and being incredibly angry at someone you love while also not getting to be with them is somehow less painful than making the best of your life together and then losing them against their will? ‘I will make her hate me and then she won’t be sad we broke up/I died!!!!’ is such a fucking galaxy brain take and I despise it with the heat of ten thousand suns. Fuck you, Spider-Man. You aren’t protecting anyone, the villains still know you love MJ and will still use her against you, you clod. Emotionally torturing the person you love is not going to make them not a target because the villains are not as fucking stupid as you two. Anyway.

Amnesia was right where I started fast-forwarding and skipping around (because I couldn’t bear it), but it only goes downhill from there. Maybe I would have toughed out more of the wretched middle part plot twist if they hadn’t cut all the hot guy’s hair off. If I’m going to watch total nonsense tedious melodrama, I need it to at least be pretty. I understand it was a Symbolic Haircut but damnit! Let me have this!

And it ultimately does the thing that kdramas seem obsessed with and which makes me want to claw out my own eyeballs with frustration. There’s a giant time skip, the female lead gets a personality transplant, all narrative momentum is lost, and the characters who eventually (at ENORMOUS length) get together permanently are essentially completely different characters with a completely different dynamic than the couple you were shipping for 90% of the story. It is so FUCKING unsatisfying and it is EVERYWHERE.

Not so much with this one because this one still had a lot of very romantic scenes late in the game, but most that do this, it’s also like all the romance is sucked out of the post-time skip episodes and the ending is a consolation prize instead of a triumphant culmination. Inevitably, the heroine abruptly cools off and is suddenly wary of the hero and wants this Important New Career she never mentioned until the penultimate episode but is now her one true life’s dream. What the apparently irresistible appeal is of these contrived separations and demure conclusions is I CANNOT FATHOM. I’m here for the fucking romance guys, you have not made Citizen Kane, please just indulge me with a big schmoopy finale.

And if not that, it’s frequently that there’s been so many random mood swings and so much shitty behaviour by the end that the relationship doesn’t make sense and you don’t know why they even bother to get back together.

I’m not inherently against all misunderstandings (they are the bread and butter of low stakes romance let’s be real) or attempts at noble idiocy from misguided characters, but the duration and seriousness of the drama these generate needs to be in proportion to how ridiculous they are. If your entire plot can be solved by a thirty second conversation there is NO REASON not to have and the continuation of the misunderstanding is a result of someone just NOT SPEAKING UP when any functional human being would have spoken up seven times by now IT’S BAD.

Do little cliff-hangers, whatever, but don’t draaaaagg out silly misconceptions into Shakespearean tragedy, it’s just wearying. It makes me hate the characters for acting like emotionally constipated toddlers with terminal stupidity. If there is so little trust, so little understanding, and so little basic patience between these people, they probably shouldn’t be dating, so try fucking harder, writers. And noble idiocy that is more than an impulse they fairly quickly see the error of is just insulting. You are not helping the other person, you are being domineering and selfish. I have a whole complex about wasting time and seeing endless parades of characters flushing years down the toilet for literally no reason gives me hives. Especially when the whole issue is about time!

(And, btw, so much of the plot is about how desperately the family needs an heir and everyone still wanting them to have kids the second time they get together- while the ~dilemma used to keep them apart is a GENETIC DISEASE which could STRIKE AT ANY TIME. Do you SEE THE PROBLEM WITH THIS WRITERS????? NO, I KNOW YOU DON’T. ommmmmmmmggggg that’s awful! So they’re just dooming more kids to Soap Opera Brain Disease? And maybe growing up without a father just as Gun did? And no one even considers suggesting adoption??? He never considers that he shouldn’t have biological children despite thinking he shouldn’t have a wife?)

ANYWAY. Please do watch the first nine episodes and the last three, it’s bananas. They are cute as fuck, Gun is The Best, and the tropey romance scenes are top quality. You don't get those things executed so well, it doesn't happen, so you need this in your life. The acting is of a calibre you never usually see in modern romcoms; these are people at the top of their game committing utterly and taking these characters completely seriously. In that way it is pure wish fulfilment for me as someone who loves romance and is almost always disappointed by popular romance media, and thus the show is incalculably special. But skip the middle. Just skip it. It's not worth the suffering. I find the tone whiplash honestly just this side of crass.

I’ve been thinking about it for over a week and I truly love the main characters so it did plenty right, but I just cannot with wedding the two things this show is trying to be together, especially when it goes so hard in two mutually exclusive directions. but also the Meet Joe Black sudden car accident device is not redeemable under any circumstances. Can we never do that again, please.

#fated to love you #kdrama #jang hyuk #writing

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the-apples-were-monitored · 5 years

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it’s 1 am and i’m exhausted because i just got off my shift at the Retail Hell Job a few hours ago and have been writing because the only fucking time i have left in my day to write is at midnight because minimum wage existence steals my day...but anyway, that’s my excuse for this post then i’m gonna immediately pass out and forget i said anything. (i’ve said most of this before, but after the scene i was just working on, i wanted to put it all in one post)

@neil-gaiman, thank you so much for good omens. And thank Terry from beyond the grave (my word choice is suffering, I apologize, I got my good words out on my own writing over the past several hours). Not just because the book gave me so much comfort when I read it as a teenager (Crowley is so easy to project my trauma onto, you have no idea, I’ve talked about this often and at length), but because even today with the series being out it continues to give me something. You see, my girlfriend lives in England and I live in America. We’ve been friends for 6000 years almost 9 years but only just admitted our feelings to each other last year during a kind of apocalypse of my own. (It involves a fall from grace of my own, long story short...) Seeing as we’re both broke we’ve never gotten to meet in person, but that’s fine. I’m planning a visit next year and eventually I’ll move there. She relates more to Aziraphale, while I relate more to Crowley, so it’s a workable arrangement. (Did I mention Aziraphale is very easy to project our autistic traits onto?) Anyway, she hadn’t read the book previously, but we met because of Doctor Who when we were teenagers so of course she wanted to see it and now she’s reading it. And she’s absolutely obsessed. It’s given us something else to connect over, which is really hard to do with the time difference and the fact that we very often have such different tastes. (Hoping to get her at least onto Discworld next, I’ve been meaning to read more of those but finding the time is always a thing...)

Anyway, i wanted to say all of that before I got into the Other Stuff.

First, thanks for casting David Tennant. It was a special vindication because I said 8 years ago when I first read the book that he should play Crowley but at the time I was Big Obsessed so everyone was just sort of like that’ll never happen, but I’ve done community theatre casting so I have an eye for these things. I’ve been an actor since I was 9, but only on the community stage, and David’s filmography inspired me in a big way when I got into Doctor Who at 15. He made me realize I’m fascinated by long-form visual storytelling and actually want to work in TV. I’ve kept following his work and he keeps consistently picking projects that I find helpful in some way or at least inspire me as an actor. And of course he just had to go play Crowley. Not just because I predicted it like I’m a modern day Agnes Nutter, but because I always had a crush on Crowley so that’s fun just kill me now, Casanova, it’s easier.

I want to also thank Michael Sheen. Because I went through some really traumatic events when I was a teenager that took me away from the stage and took away my confidence and self-worth. Something about Michael’s (and David’s, of course) performance reminded me of what I loved about acting and how much I miss doing it. I still can’t really, right now, because gotta scrape by and earn a living and eventually move, and plus I am far too passionate about acting to allow my performance to suffer because I have to divide attention and give less of it to the show...but it reminded me of exactly what I love about storytelling. Got me looking for an acting coach so I can do this properly, maybe someone to help with accent work, perhaps a proper screenwriting course...This all really reminded me of what I love about storytelling, which I never really lost, even though I lost my confidence. So I’m working on that, getting back to who I always wanted to be before the trauma took that away from me. Thank you all.

Also send my best to Amanda. I read the Art of Asking last year and was blown away. But I always am by her work - big fan of her music even before I was a fan of yours, Neil, but not before I was a fan of David Tennant’s...the web of influence is ever expanding.

For Satan’s sake, I gotta go now. I’m gonna regret this in the morning. Getting a bit embarrassed. Hope this wasn’t too weird I just know that when anyone tells me they like what I’ve done in any aspect with one of my projects I enjoy it, so I wanted to, I guess, pass that along. Again, really sorry. Totally feel free to ignore me, I know this was long and a bit Much.

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1800areyouslapping · 6 years

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I really liked the idea of a yandere Genji having a voyeur blog dedicated completely to his little sister ❤ The best of all? Her loyal followers don't even know a thing about what's really going on, neither does she. They think is all an act or role play between the "couple"~ would you mind sharing a scenario about this with us?

If only you knew how lovely your followers think you are. All of the beautiful complements, all of the phrase, all of the heart-centric emojis that get left as comments on your photos. Maybe then you wouldn’t feel the need to fuss so much over your appearance, or perhaps you’d fuss more; who knows.

Genji watches you through a slit in your closet doors, sitting at your vanity with a small displeased frown on your face. Hair going up and then down. Braided and unbraided. Winged eyeliner wiped off of your eye multiple times to be replaced each time with a line that is cleaner and more sharper than the last.

Genji snaps a photo while you’ve got a bobby pin between your teeth and your hair in your hands. Brows furrowed in concentration, frustrated because a certain piece of hair refuses to cooperate. Not even dressed yet, still clad in your robe. Your shower ran five minutes too long today. You’re going to be late for your lessons at this rate.

Then he sinks back into your closet, leaning against the wall admiring the picture, thinking up a caption. It’s not long before he’s typing:

“My gorgeous girl’s feeling insecure today. Even with worry lines she’s perfect. Give her some love, yeah?”

And… posted.

Immediately the likes and comments start flooding in. Many of your followers who are demanding, albeit playfully, that he makes sure to lift you up, to give you assurances. It is his job, as a loving boyfriend, to make sure you don’t continue to feel insecure.

The comments inflate his ego and his lies. Fill his false sense of ownership over you. Yes, duh, of course, it’s his job to ensure you that you’re perfect, amazing. There’s no one else who would be able to say it with nearly as much sincerity as he can. No one else would go to such great lengths to capture your candid moments like him.

Some even joke, “Is the girl aware she’s got a whole blog dedicated to her smh”

No.

Genji practically feels giddy from all of the vindication. So giddy and enraptured in the false life he built for the two of you that he nearly misses you dropping your robe to the ground. Your bare bottom and back still a bit dewy from your morning shower. Genji goes from feeling giddy to feeling foggy and hot. Blood swelling in his cock, his breath becoming shallow.

Suddenly the closet feels too small. Like the walls are starting to pulsate around him as you pick out your matching underwear for the day. Nothing he would consider sultry, it’s a rather cute matching set. This fog, this dizziness, has been happening to him more and more often. The impulse to make himself known, to just throw open the doors, and bring his internet life with you into reality.

Surely you would be happy to know that so many people love you because of him… right? That so many people wait with baited breath for the next photo depicting his relationship with you to be posted. So they can gush, praise, and wish and wish that they had what you and Genji have.

Then you bend down to put on your underwear. Even for all of the static fuzz in his brain, the way the world bends when he’s this close to your naked form, he is still able to think quick enough. Snaps photo after photo, a couple of which come out just right. A side shot where your arm blocks out the view of your breasts, your butt only exposed so much. A little racy, but not so racy that it wouldn’t fit in nicely on the blog.

Genji quickly touches up the photo with a blur that makes the room around you go out of focus, the only thing clearly visible being you. He posts the photo with the caption:

“If only we did not have somewhere to be ❤︎“

There’s no time to let the comments feed the hungry, obsessed beast always sitting at the forefront of his brain. Genji’s going to have to duck out, as you’re coming to your closet to finish getting dressed.

Just as you are sliding open the doors, Genji is disappearing into a not-so-secret corridor in the wall, and closing the panel at the back. Silent, quick, you’ll never know he was there. Not that you aren’t aware the compartment is there, it used to be your favorite spot during hide-and-seek as kids.

Now he waits. Waits in the hall just outside of your room. Listens for the sound of your door opening and the pitter patter of your feet as you run to try and be a little less late for your tutoring. When he does hear it his heart rate quickens, he waits just a little bit longer and runs after you.

“Eh, ‘Sis! Wait up!”

You come to a halt. Spin around, ponytail swinging wildly with the momentum. A big grin on your face. Man, that would have made a great picture.

“Genji! Good morning!” You say cheerfully.

Genji feigns heavily breath as if he has been running from his room to this point. When really he’s breathing clearer, getting all the oxygen he needs now that he’s close to you, fully dressed, and has had the pleasure of hearing your voice.

“You late too?” He asks.

“Ugh, yeah– this is the third time this week. Mrs. Yumi’s gonna be so sour with me,” you say.

“She will get over it-” Genji leans in close, taking ‘notice’ of your eyeliner- “Your wings are killer today, ‘Sis.”

Your face turns into a shining beam of a smile. “Oh! Thanks!”

That’s the first time you’ve smiled today, he was the one who did that for you. Gave you a reason to be happy, to feel good. Genji can feel the dopamine flooding his brain, as it must be flooding yours. Then he gets a whiff of your perfume; soft floral blossoms and citrus, suddenly his head is spinning again.

Ignoring the lub-dubs in his ears he says, “They’re so sharp you could slit a man’s throat.” Warranting an even bigger grin, and an adorable blush.

“Exactly as they should be!” You say enthusiastically, jumping up to give him a quick hug. He resists the urge to hang onto you. To cling to your body and bury his face in your neck. Letting you go, you turn away from him and continue on your way. “I’m sorry, I really have to go!”

“Don’t let Mrs. Yumi guilt trip you too much!” He yells as you continue on your way.

Giggling you absentmindedly state that that is impossible. Then you pause your progress one more time, to grant him with a gift.

“Hey! You wanna have lunch with me later?”

Yes. Absolutely. As if he’d ever turn down an invitation from you. It’s all he can do to keep his eyes from bulging out of his head, to keep from sounding too eager.

“Yeah! Sounds great, I’ll text you!”

Genji doesn’t have anywhere he needs to be. So he makes himself some breakfast and takes a seat on his balcony. Hardly touching his food as he’s obsessively scrolling through comments, looking at the notifications on the latest picture. It’s a hit with your followers, as most of your pictures are.

An old, old follower of yours makes a suggestion:

“U love birds ever consider making a nsfw blog 👀 just a thot plz dont hate me”

Warmth floods in his belly; brings his erection back to his attention. Yes, he has considered it. Genji’s considered it a lot. These days it’s nearly all that he can think about. Taking yours and his internet relationship to the next level, sharing every aspect of the beloved couples life. Funny how one simple comment could break down the little self-control he had, gives him confidence to put a plan into motion to do just that.

Now that he thinks about it, the blogs one-year anniversary is coming up soon. What better way to celebrate it than to start a whole new blog. One with an explicit eighteen and over tag, and even more pictures, possibly some videos of you.

#genji x reader #drabble #sister!reader #implied incestuous feelings #yandere!genji #Anonymous #mystuff

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bipolarblatherings · 4 years

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Wound me once, shame on you. Wound me 30 times, shame on both of us.

This is all a giant mess.

I find myself amidst a saddening, tortured, infuriating, ridiculous dance of (semi)conflict with a very close friend of mine. She (let’s call her B) is ungodly intelligent and very well-versed in things of the psychiatric nature. I’m a fantastic match for her in almost every way. B has bipolar II. I have bipolar I. We have had many mind-blowing conversations. I haven’t met someone as intelligent and cunning since looking in the mirror. But oh, she sure qualifies.

She twists knives. I hold punches. Stupid, stupid me.

I should provide some background. I’m obsessing about it, so it’s absolutely been eating me for breakfast, lunch and dinner, but I can’t fault you all for ignorance if I don’t do diligence.

Ahem.

B and I have been friends for, well... over 5 years now. My friendship with her (hold your laughter) started in an outpatient DBT therapy group. We were instantly drawn to each other. I apparently had equated something I was sharing about in group to “rolling a nat 1.” I don’t remember saying this, but this is pretty on-brand for me. Nerd alert! She was sold.

I started playing in a DnD campaign with them in a fairly local gaming store. We would go out for cigarettes and dish about whatever - she and her husband and I, and occasionally others. We bonded. We joked. We shared intellectual nuggets about life, the universe and everything. We pondered serious mental health issues and tried to meet in the middle somewhere between bipolars I and II. Another joke we consistently went back to was me telling her “I don’t know how you do it! I’d get whiplash!” and her countering back, “I don’t know how YOU do it!”

It’s true. Cursed as I may be, I don’t think I’d opt for the other side of this coin.

Anywho.

Fast forward through my marriage (to some guy) and a separation which is not a yet a legal divorce because he feels badly for me in that I wouldn’t have health insurance, and we would lack the tax breaks of filing jointly, what with me in my 10th year of college...

B and her husband - let’s call him S - were with me through all of that and then some. Supportive, helpful, welcoming. When she suggested that maybe I should join them in a “thrupple” as their “unicorn,” pansexual, polyamorous, manic me was all in.

I’m sure it’s no surprise that this went fairly sideways quickly. B and I were, by far, farther along than S and I probably would ever be. There was awkwardness. There was unbalance. There was a solidly manic bipolar human (me) who incidentally fed her hypomania into excess (she). We are both very self-aware in general. I do not know that I trust her to be able to walk away from triggering on purpose. It’s the best worst superpower ever. It’s a drug. It’s tantalizing and dangerous. I should know. I’m high on it practically all the time...

Fast forward again.

B and I had a talk the other day after a fairly long and very uncomfortable near-silence. Our last exchange had been awful, and instead of lashing out, I’d gone home and injured myself. Crisis crisis crisisss! We had come to a better place of understanding and calm, and had sensibly addressed it - for about 4.5 straight hours. I’d felt so much better. Vindicated. Validated. I’d really broken through and I was able to show her vulnerability (stupid, stupid me). I told her about what had happened after I’d left the last time. B has seen me naked, in more ways than one.

Within this conversation, we admitted to each other that the idea of a “thrupple” was, although amazing, absolutely poorly executed in terms of timing and pacing. You take a husband - interested and with good intentions, but very much along for the ride, I expect - and his wife with bipolar II, and then throw in a very heavy pile of this bitch with bipolar I and ... PARTY. Except, duh. This poor guy now has his hands full with two crisis-happy, mostly-manic women.

OH. AND YOU ALSO HAVE TWO CRISIS-HAPPY, MOSTLY-MANIC WOMEN. And they are depending on each other, crying to each other and fucking each other.

After her admission and going over the Ps and Qs of everything, she’d confided that she and he had been looking online for a better fit for “unicorn.” Far from being upset, my free-loving self told her earnestly that I was happy for them: go get it, girl! B had also proffered a potential less-high-stakes hookup situation for she and he and I that would be “casual.” That word was thrown around a lot. FWB.

I’d also had a boy on my mind. (I say boy because I don’t want to invest too much in giving a fuck - more on that later - he is, in fact, a man.) I had honestly advised her that I didn’t know what to do about him. That he was tripping me up, as normally I can figure people out in a snap. I have a penchant for frustrating projects; they challenge me and hold my interest. She vibrantly encouraged me to pursue him.

When he asked me out on a date several days later - even amidst this COVID business - her words echoed in my head and I felt good about accepting. I was happy and I felt I had her support. I messaged her the news joyfully, and without hesitation.

[I regret nothing about that date night itself. That bit is really fucking complicated. It deserves its own post.]

Fast forward again. Some very good friends from out of state were flying in to visit. I, super duper manic, lost track of days. When B messaged me seemingly in a panic asking for me to immediately bring over our friend’s dog’s crate, I messaged back hastily that I wished someone had let me know (rather than spring it on me last-minute.) I was thrown off. Her message out of seemingly nowhere seemed direct and cold.

I messaged her back and let her know I would be over with the crate as soon as possible. I was tripping over myself. My INFP-A manic brain and my empathic nature were having a lot of trouble. She was not herself. She was really pissed. Or something.

I didn’t have to wonder long. After I’d asked her to text my phone directly, she threw out this (very nearly verbatim):

______________________________________________________________

Oh, I get it. You don’t hang out with anyone you aren’t dating or fucking, right?

______________________________________________________________

I was stunned. WHOA. I literally said, “Whoa,” with no real follow-up. I was flabbergasted. Cut deeply. Bleeding. Did our conversation a few days prior mean absolutely NOTHING???? And I’d just seen them! Just those few days had passed. What had I done that was so egregious, except follow her advice to me? I floundered. “Whoa... Not true. Ouch.”

Not an ounce of caring or apology. Hard-line held.

By the time I’d gotten over there with the dog crate, I’d been informed to text S directly to ask him to come out and get it from me. I did so, and made the exchange shaking and unable to look him in the eyes. I did a lot of mumbling but I remember saying, “I’m sorry. I don’t know why, but I’m real fucking sorry.”

To which he replied: “I don’t know. Me too.”

Effectively when I gave him the dog crate and he gave me my last box of shit from my time over there, there remained no ties. No reason for them to come here, and no reason for me to come there as all of the ephemera was in its correct place.

The days following have been fairly awful. Last night I was encouraged by a friend to feel okay to join the online DnD game that B plays in and S runs. I panicked for the entirety of the time that it took them to get started. We were an hour and a half past normal start. My friend - we’ll call him C - was EXCEPTIONALLY amazing, helpful and calming. It would be alright. He was there. It wasn’t just me and her. There were other people to balance everything out. It would likely be a safe place.

And it was. It had echoes of normalcy. It’s the only real interaction I’ve had with our out-of-state friends, as they were all four on the same mic, in S&B’s living room. I’d been there so many times, it echoed naturally in my mind. False sense of security?

I’d sent her a message stating my surface-level feels about the situation several days ago, to which I’d not gotten a response until after I left the DnD session a little early (as I was falling asleep). I tire of explaining so I’ll let our words - as already written - finish this out.

_____________________________________________________________

Me: I'm just going to leave this here, as I do not want to/am not ready to truly talk about it, and you've got company and other things going on. I feel it was unfair of you to come at me like that. I know you have feelings too, but I can only be sensitive to what I'm aware of. I only really took *the boy* up on it when he asked me out because although I wasn't sure I wanted to pursue anything at all, I felt that you were encouraging and supportive of it and I kind of felt like, "hey, who knows? I might just give it a try."

I'd absolutely be lying by omission if I just said nothing about it.

And I'd be pretending that I'm not deeply wounded. That is all.

B: I'm sorry for the late response to this, but I was not feeling that I was in a place where I could effectively communicate with you on this topic. I still do not feel I am ready to do so, but for the sake of E and J being in town, I would like for everyone to feel comfortable, and I know seeing E is very important to you. They would both like to see you very much as well, and for their sake I want to be concise in that I want them to feel like they can feel comfortable visiting with you, or even you coming here to visit with them however you feel most comfortable.

While I don't quite feel like discussing this issue yet, I bear no ill will at all so coming here would be just as relaxed as if we were to come with them to visit you. I've tried to keep everything as low-key as possible (basically just not mentioning anything :P) so that E would not feel uncomfortable or like she has to choose or something silly like that, and even moving forward no matter what happens I would never want her to feel that way at any point, and I definitely know that's not your style either, but I feel it is a huge priority for me to not alter any other relationships no matter what happens, because I think people only get hurt that way. (Although I don't think I even need to say this at all, but I wanted to include it for the sake of concise and effective communication which I know will be beneficial for all three of us moving forward)

For now I am enjoying our company and keeping myself focused and balanced. If you want to try to sort out the conflict here, feel free to let me know when you are in a place of caring and compassion and even-tempered mindset, and when Anthony and I are also in that place we can certainly approach the obstacle with problem-solving as a focus and repairing our communications.

Stay safe, and keep working towards being healthy, as I know you've been trying very hard to do so to good effect - Hope all is well xoxo

Me: Thank you. I'm not ready to talk about it either. I appreciate your honesty.

In regard to E&J: I've been very discouraged because neither they nor you reached out to me at all once they got here (with any indication of plans whatsoever to see me). Whether or not this is the case, it was my perception that I was being avoided and ignored. And that sucks when you (ubiquitous you - and awful English, but whatever) look around your apartment and see your friend's things everywhere, but feel like nobody wants to see you.

I apologize if this comes across as abrasive. That is absolutely not intended.

I need to communicate that it might be a fairly long time before I can discuss the issue at hand. Especially with all of these dysmorphic days and the fact that I am anywhere from almost done with my manic run to just beginning (dear god I hope not), I am not brave nor strong enough to work through it. I have to protect myself from hurt or I am actually in fear that it may tear me apart. It has absolutely the possibility to be fatal.

I appreciate that you responded honestly and I feel you also deserve honesty. The above seems possibly to reflect a flair for dramatics, but as they say in the city, I'm dead-ass.

I do, as always, also hope you are well. Xoxo

______________________________________________________________

(Fuck me, right in the feels.)

#interpersonal communication #mania #manic #dysmorphic mania

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mild-lunacy · 7 years

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My fannish feelings (let me show you them)

Man, fandom really alienates me in 28846851 ways, as I often say. And it's funny 'cause I really admire it. I admire the transformative nature of fandom... from afar. But comparing Johnlock to transformative ships like Harry/Draco or Sherlock/anyone else (hah!) or saying we're 'free to engage however we wish' misses the point. Personally, I know I'm free, but then I always felt free. Canon always feels like home, not a prison, no matter what happens. I just don't want to 'break free', unlike Moriarty. Like, I understand that people write these things because others or they themselves are really upset and/or looking for something to cling to or believe in in a cold, hard universe or what have you. You gotta find your comfort where you can. But that's why I said fandom frequently alienates me-- conspiracies, fake-out episode theories and even fanfiction in general has never been even close to 'enough'. It just... doesn't help. It doesn't work at all, haha. I understand why people react the way they do, but sometimes I think I have an innately different idea of what fanfiction is for.

It's true that Series 4 didn't fulfill all my hopes and wishes, and obviously I was wrong about the direction of the Authorial Intent, and I still think that's a crying shame even though I understand the limitations of thinking about that in the context of textual interpretation. But like I said in that meta yesterday, issues of intent have to do with the social aspects of fandom, not fanfiction (obviously). But of course, turning to fanworks to fix or somehow escape canon (whether it's speculative meta or fanfic) is part of the fundamental nature of fandom. I just... don't do that. At all. And I've never particularly enjoyed fanworks that willfully refused to follow canon in any obvious way instead of integrating (because that tends to read as OOC to me). Just for example, I may not be crazy excited about something like Sherlock/Mycroft, which is clearly acanonical, but normally it genuinely doesn't bother me. But if I see a ship like that combined with Johnlock so that it replaces it, where Sherlock chooses Mycroft over John, then I get pissed. And it's not because I'm a shipper (or not just) but because it's so blatantly not only OOC but transformative in a way that's anti-canon. Like, you really cannot sell that after the scene in TFP where Sherlock seriously considered shooting Mycroft, and in fact, it's clear that this writer didn't want to consider it. They were disregarding canon reality and substituting their own, and that sort of thing drives me batty with fic. You can always tell when the fic is going out of its way to misread the characters and/or rebelling against canon, and it never once worked for me in all my years of reading oodles of fanfic. I was never even tempted by 'Epilogue What Epilogue' fics in HP (needless to say, breaking up Harry's marriage held even less appeal). So yeah, I definitely can't look forward to years of doing that post-S4, haha. Not that... I think I'd have to, 'cause the door to Johnlock is wide open after TFP (and unfortunately, so is the door to other ships.... And hell yeah, that's pretty unfortunate, seeing as the very existence of straight!Sherlock seems like an abomination to me, honestly).

My reasoning for why explicitly canon Johnlock was definitely important and necessary goes like this: 1) it's the natural conclusion to Sherlock's arc and the emotional resolution to unresolved developments in Series 3, beginning in TRF; 2) representation and avoiding queerbaiting. But there's definitely also 3) cutting off straight-washing of Sherlock and John in the fandom and vindicating/establishing our understanding of his characterization as canon. I don't apologize for that. I still firmly stand for that. Straight or bisexual Sherlock is not something I calmly accept in the context of his BBC incarnation, not least because it's ridiculous and OOC, and you have to do some serious mental gymnastics to justify it canonically. But I also honestly simply find it harmful in the context of fandom as well as being queerbaiting in canon.

Obviously, I mean, fandom has but a fraction of the social power and cultural resonance that the hugely popular media property of BBC Sherlock does. But heteronormativity is always problematic and it's not more present in the media than in fandom in the sense that it's present everywhere equally, by its very nature. Obviously, we fight against it more here, so there's clearly less of it here in one sense, but heteronormativity always remains something to push back against with the intent to eradicate. And in the context of the canon characterization of BBC Sherlock, even reading Sherlock as bisexual (as in, displaying actual or potential attraction to women) is quite blatantly, extremely heteronormative, and so it's pretty distasteful to me. I do think it's that obvious that he's gay, yes. And so... a future of endless fanworks at this point is definitely a very mixed blessing.

No. Nope. Uh-uh. I didn't think that, and I didn't ignore or avoid willfully. I side-stepped and tried to build on canon while trying to integrate every bit of characterization possible. And further, I only started new Harry/Draco fanfic before Harry got together with Ginny permanently. He was together with Ginny at first in some of my fics, but I made up the characterization so it would fit; when I saw that he genuinely wanted her, I just wanted him to be happy (and I guess when I did take him away from her, it wasn't a happy story). Even before, I never wrote him as gay or tried to ignore his interest in Ginny (I just kind of wrote speculative Ginny characterization sometimes that took her down alternative paths... but I didn't think it was OOC at the time). The fact that people ignored or avoided canon and embraced OOCness to write an admittedly transformative slash ship used to drive me insane with constant, neverending frustration back when I was in HP fandom. It's also something that bothers me about the way people write Kavinsky in The Raven Cycle, too. People mess with characterization and the entirety of apparent canonical intent to write the stuff canon left unexplored on purpose, which is understandable... but not necessary.

I used to write lots of meta back in the day about how, you know, you can build on canon and do anything-- certainly, you can write redemption arcs and stuff-- if you're careful about starting where the characters really are. It's not like I was ever obsessed with JKR's intent regarding Draco Malfoy, but then neither did I ignore it, see. She said stuff to the effect of him being a 'little cockroach', as Hermione might say, and she warned about young women denying or ignoring that, but I didn't deny or ignore it! I thought that was important. He was a little prick in my fics, and I tried to work with that. I did my absolute best not to romanticize him and I constantly wrote metas imploring others not to, more or less; I wanted to let him grow up and develop, not deny he needs the development. This was not because JKR told me not to, of course. At the same time, I genuinely believe that if you read the text closely enough, you'll come pretty close to the perspective of the author anyway, given it's a good author and given you're not the sort of reader that has an agenda. And as for myself... I don't have an agenda, man.

I guess that could be hard to believe, if you thought of me only as a TJLCer (not that I'm aware of anyone doing that). I mean, people have certainly had a tendency of accusing us of projecting onto the text, though the aphorism about stones and glass houses definitely applies. But anyway, obviously I've never seen canon Johnlock as wish-fulfillment, and I get pretty incensed when I think people misunderstood that, not that it wasn't a wish to be fulfilled. Not only did I wish, I still fully and firmly believe it should have happened explicitly, even if I'm starting to understand where the misconceptions we had about Mofftiss were. Anyway, it's not that I don't see myself in the story or identify with characters. I just... don't really project. That's the source of my alienation, I think. I don't see a show or read a book I like, that's remotely internally consistent, and think, 'I know these characters better and I and/or fandom could have done better', the way so many people in fandom have done after Series 4 of Sherlock or the last book in The Raven Cycle. I mean, I get disappointed, but it's really been weird seeing people's issues with The Raven King. It's more understandable with Series 4 'cause they did drop an apparent arc, in the sense that they didn't actually fulfill it except by implication. That's not really what happened in TRK; all the arcs were completed, but many people complained about the stuff that was left out or not focused on that they wished would have been. That's really weird and unnatural to me, possibly 'cause I just really believe in the importance of reigning in self-indulgence.

Basically, the whole problem with TFP was essentially self-indulgence! Calling for more of it, or even critiquing Series 4 for essentially not having more of the right kind (and even accusing TJLCers of only wanting that and nothing else!) is hard for me to relate to. Alas, as usual.

#pointless rambles #me myself and i #sherlock feels #johnlock feels #oh fandom #fandom meta #hp feels #queerlock #tjlc

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aslibekroglu · 3 years

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Okay....I don't even know where to start from. That last scene from when Selim noticed Canan and telling the kids to get out to her death, just wow! The acting from all four of the was amazing. I'm still in sort of denial. There's a small part that thinks she's not dead but maybe be in a coma for s2 but then my logical side and the side that has a degree in biomedicine is like "nah, girl, she got shot in the carotid. Very difficult to survive" I feel like everything was too on the nose, too much foreshadowing Canan not being there in the future which is why I'm still a little suspicious. Whatever the case I'm excitex to see how this changes the Kara family, especially Yağmur, like her mom was her best friend.

My baby Akgün!! Cannot believe he became the one thing he didnt want to😭😭😭

You know when I heard they were going to Istanbul for s2, ngl I was a little sad but seeing what happened in the finale it'll make sense for the Kara family to move there. Like I can even see Emel and them moving there too, so they can be there for Selim and the kids. I'm gonna miss Ceşme but I feel like they'll go back there one day

My Akmur babies...i'm so scared and nervous for them. I honestly have no clue as to what will happen to them. But I trust the writers *shocking* they've done an amazing job with them throughout this whole season and I'm sure they will continue with that

Speaking of the writers, they were like "Y'all want Akmur soulmates, parallels??? Well here you go. They both get to watch the most important figure in their life die the exact same way forever changing them...and bonus they'll both be wearing the exact same color shirt" Damn these writers they know exactly how to mess with our feelings

Selçuk.....Honestly have no idea how I feel about him anymore. You know, in the earlier episodes when we found out Semiha turned him in, I was always surprised that Selçuk spoke respectfully about her and it felt like he had no resentment about what she did. But holy shit was I wrong! I cannot believe he did that. I've been loving his growing relationship with Akgün recently and shit this is gonna hit Akgün so hard. I feel really bad for Semiha tho, like one of your son kills you and the other gets to watch you die

I feel like Selim is going to be filled with so much rage and go even harder at getting Halil Sadi. I watched without subs but I think Selim told Canan that he was going to stop with all the chasings and dangerous stuff so I believe that once Selim gets Halil Sadi, he'll finally retire (and be that peaceful smiling guy from Yağmur's dream😭😭😭)

Anyways, so so excited for s2. Have no idea what to do for 3 months. Am watching Kardeşlerim atm but does not hit in the same way😩😩

I still believe there’s at least a 0.1% chance that she’s still alive and I’m holding on to that for all it’s worth, degree in biomedicine be damned (this is diziland after all logic tends not to prevail lmao). I agree there was so much foreshadowing in the episode that it made it almost tooooo obvious that she was going to die, so maybe they were trying to trick us or something.

Although, the writers went on a chat room on Twitter and they talked about some of their plans for s2. From what I understand, whether or not Canan is actually dead is a bit up in the air. I think it all depends on Funda and whether or not she wants to stay.

Either way, Canan’s (possible) death absolutely destroyed me. I cried for over an hour that night about it and I’m still so sad. She had the best relationship with everyone. She was a such a rock in that family. Everyone could rely on her, go to her for help, get advice, support, and understanding. She was so so strong willed, fierce and protective. Canan was just such a light for everyone in the show. If she really is dead, I just feel so sad that all of that will be missing from everyone’s life.

I worry about how Canan’s death is going to affect Selim. I just feel like he’s going to be completely obsessed with getting Halil Sadi and is going to start neglecting Yağmur and Altay (not on purpose of course), that he’s going to become the old workaholic that he used to be and that the kids are going to have to grieve on their own and kinda fend for themselves. I also feel like Yağmur is really going to try to take up that mother role and isn’t going to be able to grieve herself and will focus on helping everyone else in the family. I’m just so worried for this family 😞

What happened to Akgün hurt so much. Akgün kinda really prided himself on not being a killer, y’know? It kinda proved to him that his mother and Yağmur were right to see a light in him. And now…..I’m so worried about how that’s going to affect him, about how guilty he’s going to feel. I know he’s going to be so scared of disappointing Yağmur and Selim. I’m wondering how they’re going to react to everything. They mentioned multiple times in the episode that they were worried about how he’s going to react when he sees Gökhan. Tbh as long as they believe him, I’m okay. (This was another thing the writers commented on. I think they said they were thinking about doing a time jump and that Akgün might go to jail 😞😞)

I’m also so worried about Akmur. They’re both going to be so busy dealing with their own things, it’s going to be so difficult for them to comfort each other. All of those lighthearted moments from the earlier episodes are going to be so hard to come by 😞 Although if there is a time jump, their reunion is going to be EVERYTHINGGGG

Oh god and Selcuk. I was so in love with how Selcuk and Akgün’s relationship had developed. They had come so far and for this absolute bomb to drop, like goddddd even I felt betrayed. I can’t begin to imagine how Akgün is going to feel when he finds out the truth. Just thinking about it makes me want to cry. And for some reason, I still want to give Selcuk the benefit of the doubt. Like I mean, he loves Akgün, doesn’t he??! That wasn’t a lie, right?! And ordering Semiha’s death is pretty unforgivable, but maybe he regrets it?!!! Maybe he really loved her and there’s something else going on that Gökhan didn’t know about, RIGHT??!!?!! I’m just soooo 😩😩😩😩😩😩

And honestly I’m kinda surprised with the direction they went with Gökhan. When they first introduced him in ep16, I really thought he was going to be a straight villain, but they humanized him so much through his run on the show. Even after he kidnapped Yağmur and Selcuk, they still managed to vindicate him in the end. Between the revelation of Semiha’s death and then that part when he starting forgetting everything in front of Akgün, I ended up feeling so so bad for him. Especially the forgetting part, he looked like a lost little kid, it broke my heart. And even when he raised his gun at Akgün, I could understand him. I mean he was disoriented and lost and all he saw in front of him was someone pointing a gun at him. I get it. Oh and his last words about how he’s going to his mom now 😢

I’m telling you, just everything about this finale WRECKED me.

#sorry this took so long to answer #i was waiting a bit so that i wouldn’t spoil anything #and then i got busy but anywayyy #im going to miss son yaz so much #these 3 months are going to move so damn slowly i cant #sonyaz spoilers #sonyaz ask #xinging-unicorn

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shirlleycoyle · 4 years

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The Men Who Love Getting Their Balls Absolutely Destroyed

Welcome to Rule 34, a series in which Motherboard’s Samantha Cole lovingly explores the highly specific fetishes that can be found on the web. If you’ve thought of it, someone’s jerked off to it.

The links in this article may be considered NSFW.

Bitta VonSweet's foot slave loves when she stomps on his dick and balls. "He loves the pressure," she told me. "The feeling of my full weight on him is exhilarating. The meaner I am to him, the more he is willing to serve."

Once, when he was laying beside her bed while she stepped on his penis sticking out from a cockbox, she climbed onto her bed and jumped off—onto the box, full force.

"His eyes were as wide as saucers as he grabbed the sides of the box to brace for impact," she said. "I can only compare it to landing on concrete and smashing a water balloon, without it popping! He let out a gasp of air and replied, 'I love you, Mistress.' I thought, wow. That's loyalty and dedication. Not to mention I got the giggles and wanted to do it again. His reaction was priceless."

Much has been said, of late, on the topic of feet. Looking back, the last year has seen the triumphant rise and vindication of the foot fetishist. Quentin Tarantino's sole obsession was laid bare, the silicon foot-fucksleeve Vajankle debuted and continues to haunt me, the good fellas of Wikifeet helped me solve a mystery, and here at Motherboard we recently got to the bottom of our own footsie-wootsie enigma: the size of Jeff Bezos's feet. Everyone on my Twitter feed was toying with the idea of selling foot pics to pay off some debt.

While casual observers of foot fetishism might think being "into feet" means a gentle, longing to give someone a foot rub or pining after some piggie-pics, that's only part of the story. There's a whole subsection of people whose kink is someone planting that foot, as hard as they can, straight down onto their dick and balls.

The first time I saw cock-trampling in action, it was during a scroll through my Twitter feed. I stopped on a video of a woman jumping—jumping!—up and down on a board balanced on a lying man's torso. When I looked closer, I could see the man's penis sticking out through the board. With every landing of her bare feet, his whole body twitched in pain, and she lifted off again. I wasn't sure if I was witnessing a permanent maiming, or an incredible testament to the resilience of the human mind and body. I soon learned it was the latter.

This isn't your usual "send feet" amateur shit, or even a "foot job" video. This is cock trampling and ballbusting. And you might have some questions, as I did.

What are cock trampling and ball busting?

VonSweet, who lives a trample domme lifestyle with her current footslave and sells videos of their sessions online, tells me she's always been a "scrappy kind of gal." So years ago, when a man walked into her life who not only had a foot fetish but an affinity for cock trampling, it changed her world.

"I relished walking up and down on him, overpowering him with my full weight," she said. "It was my way of making him submit to me when he got too lippy."

As their relationship grew, so did their experimentation. The cockbox—a hard, square structure with a hole for the penis to poke through—was a revelation. "I was able to stomp, crush and grind till my heart's content. Even jumping up and down on it with bare feet, sometimes even wearing stilettos, just to be cruel."

According to a blog entry by the sex toy company Lovense, trampling, crush porn, and giantess fantasies (where a Godzilla-sized woman steps on a very tiny person) are not sub-genres of one another, but distinct kink categories that sometimes overlap. Trampling alone involves a lot of flavors: You can be into being literally walked all over, but not into your dick getting stomped. Or you might only want your penis pulverized. Or your balls. Or both, like VonSweet's foot-loving sub.

Cock and ball tourture, or CBT, is the name for the wider BDSM umbrella under which ballbusting and cock trampling falls. CBT might involve chastity cages, impact play with whips or paddles, or kicks in the nuts. For our purposes, we'll focus on when feet come in contact with the genitals. A simple form, no extra hardware necessary.

Why are people into cock and ball torture?

Nearly 10 years ago, BallBustedSub lost a bet.

"I’ve always had a thing for dominant women in heels," UK-based BallBustedSub, who requested to be cited using his Twitter handle, told me. Although he first got into ballbusting and tramping around the age of 16, his first in-person ballbusting experience came years later. "It all started with a throwaway comment I said, something like, 'I’d bet my left nut on it.' Can’t even remember what the bet was now but I actually lost," he said.

"I was shocked and delighted at this new point of weakness I had discovered."

"She was the one who said right, 'I’m going to claim my prize, I want to stand on your ball.'" That escalated to her putting books under his nuts and standing on them, in different shoes, and barefoot.

Nowadays, BallBustedSub visits a professional dominatrix. "My favourite things are being trampled in the cockbox or lead on my stomach with my balls out behind me so she has full access to crush them. I love the feeling of being led in the cock box and giving over full control and then watching as the domme tramples my manhood for her own pleasure and amusement."

The dominatrixes that do the busting are often very amused.

"Ballbusting always made sense to me. I am a sadist and it's an easy way to hurt someone with balls," Danielle Blunt, a NYC-based domme, told me. "One of my early memories is playing catch with my dad. I threw the ball to him, missed his glove and hit him in the balls instead. He doubled over in pain and shrieked in a high voice, 'I think we are done with catch now.' I was shocked and delighted at this new point of weakness I had discovered."

Blunt's had a lot of experience busting balls, metaphorical and literal, so I asked her why she thinks her clients get off on something so excruciating.

"It makes sense to me that a client who likes pain would like trampling," she said. "I think everyone processes pain differently. I've seen people cum from ballbusting. It's such a sensitive part of the body and so many people with balls have experiences hurting them, it makes sense that some people eroticize that pain."

Can it be done without causing damage?

Personally, my biggest question about ballbusting and cocktrampling wasn't why people enjoy it—people get off on all kinds of wild things—but how it's done without actually breaking someone's dick off or exploding theiryes nutsack like a split beanbag.

I contacted a dozen urologists to try to learn more about the limits of these highly stompable wieners. None responded to my questions.

But after some pointed internet searches, I have my answer anyway. Despite being so sensitive, the penis is incredibly durable and resilient. There are no bones in dicks, but there are three tubes: the urethra, and two corpora cavernosa, which fill with blood to make a boner.

According the Urology Care Foundation, it's possible to "break" your dick, or at least hurt those tubes and the nerves around them, if "during an erection, a man sustains a level of unnatural force to the penis, with much more energy than the normal force associated with sexual activity, a break or fracture may occur." Basically, stubbing your dick really hard, to the point that it breaks those vessels.

But what about slamming two sets of pedicured toes down on the thing, from a few feet high?

Men's health platform Roman has some inspiring information on that front: A penis can handle eight times more blood pressure than the blood vessels in your brain. If the pressure of blood that rushed to your dick when you're horny ran to your (other) head instead, it would explode your brain in your damn skull.

So, penises are spongy and stretchy, as long as you don't torque or bend them too hard. That might explain why stomping flat down on one, on a hard surface, can happen without being permanently damaging. Testicles are more tender—they can rupture, fracture, dislocate, and deglove, according to WebMD's horrifying list of ball injuries. A lot of this can happen from a strike or blunt force, such as being kicked in the jewels for fun.

But BallBustedSub swears it's not hurting him long-term. Like most BDSM play, it's about starting slow and constant communication.

"It’s really a case of building up, and as the domme sees what you can take, adding more each time until she gets to a level where it’s almost unbearable," he said. "Obviously safe words are used too… I can always stop things at any time."

Blunt said she's taken anatomy classes from kink-friendly doctors to ensure what's going on underfoot isn't causing real harm. "I always ask about people's previous experiences to assess what their limits might be," she said. "I've had to be creative while playing with someone who was into CBT and trampling who had a prosthetic testicle."

VonSweet echoed that the safest precaution is preparation and working up to more intense play: Ball stretching, rough stomping with soft soled shoes first for a couple weeks, gradually moving into square heeled shoes, stilettos with the heels sanded down to be dull, then, eventually, stilettos.

"The human body is pretty resilient," she said. "I push him as far as his mind will take him, and even more, if I know he can give it." Aftercare consists of an ice pack on his meat and "a lot of 'thata boy' encouragement, she said. "He really will lay down his entire body for me to do what I like to it. He feels it's his job, and I wholeheartedly agree."

The Men Who Love Getting Their Balls Absolutely Destroyed syndicated from https://triviaqaweb.wordpress.com/feed/

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thisdaynews · 5 years

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Trump’s road from wishing for impeachment to dreading it

New Post has been published on https://thebiafrastar.com/trumps-road-from-wishing-for-impeachment-to-dreading-it/

Trump’s road from wishing for impeachment to dreading it

The president’s optimistic, even nonchalant attitude melted away this week in a series of sudden developments as he crisscrossed meetings at the United Nations in New York. Trump and a coterie of aides were stunned by a swift progression of events that upended their longtime thinking about how an impeachment scenario would proceed. By the time they returned to the White House Thursday, they had tested and retested strategies on the fly as they began to recognize the perilous road ahead that would likely look far different from anything this president or any of his predecessors faced.

“It should never be allowed, what’s happened to this president,” Trump told reporters upon stepping off Air Force One.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s rapid move toward impeachment, after months of stalling, reflected her recognition of a new political reality: The contents of Trump’s call with the Ukrainian president, in which he used his sacred perch in the White House to ask a foreign leader to investigate a political rival, could push Trump into feisty and perilous territory — testing public opinion and congressional patience in a drama-filled election season. The swiftness of Pelosi’s action caught the White House by surprise.

White House aides and allies do not expect the president to calm down anytime soon. Many worry impeachment proceedings will sour the president’s mood and his ability to focus on legislation, any other substantive policy matters or even key elements of the 2020 campaign, much the way Mueller dominated his attention.

Interviews with more than a dozen White House aides, former administration officials, Republican operatives and close Trump allies showed little consensus on either the best course of action ahead or the consequences for Trump and his presidency.

The White House and Trumpworld are expected to test countless new strategies in the weeks and months ahead, just as they did in recent days.

The White House attempted to first bat down the controversy by stonewalling Congress on getting the whistleblower complaint. Then the administration veered toward transparency by releasing a summary memo of the call between Trump and the Ukrainian leader, and then the whistleblower complaint. Republican talking points tried to cast the rough call transcript as a vindication for the president, a “muddy” document as one former senior White House official put it.

Still, the president believed his sudden embrace of transparency would exonerate him, even if he and two Cabinet members worried about the precedent of releasing notes of calls with foreign leaders.

But by Thursday, the administration and allies moved into a new phase of attempting to discredit the whistleblower, whose complaint kicked off the events that brought Trump to this point. Republicans, privately and vaguely, tried to cast the whistleblower as a partisan figure without offering any evidence, while Trump reportedly referred to the whistleblower as a spy.

But some former aides also say Trump himself has made things much worse for himself with his changing story, a reflection of the president’s long-held approach to decision-making.

“You get one version of the story, and then you go, ‘Oh okay.’ But then you go, ‘Oh wait, there’s another version. We forgot to tell you these 10 other things,’” said one of the former senior White House officials. On calls with foreign leaders, the president “has a comfort level where he says whatever is on his mind.”

After days of differing messages offered between his U.N. meetings, the president spent part of Thursday taking Twitter jabs at both the whistleblower and Democrats. “Liddle’ Adam Schiff, who has worked unsuccessfully for 3 years to hurt the Republican Party and President, has just said that the Whistleblower, even though he or she only had secondhand information, ‘is credible.’ How can that be with zero info and a known bias. Democrat Scam!” Trump tweeted Thursday afternoon, shortly after he arrived back at the White House.

Campaign aides and advisers maintain the impeachment inquiry only helps motivate Trump’s extremely loyal base as well as his fundraising. The campaign and Republican National Committee raised an estimated $8 million this week from a dinner and breakfast in New York, which featured the president as a special guest.

“Pelosi sacrificed Biden’s presidential campaign to get Trump, and now Elizabeth Warren is going to be the nominee, which I think every Trump person with a brain would prefer,” said a person close to the campaign.

Republicans and White House advisers’ greatest comfort now comes from the wonky mechanics of impeachment, which will give the Senate the final say about the fate of Trump’s presidency. Few think Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will allow the Senate proceedings to drag on. Republicans’ confidence in Trump’s ability to survive this scandal appears to largely rest with McConnell and his grip on his caucus, not necessarily with the White House.

A White House official claimed there “is a very positive mood” in the building. “Everybody’s just absolutely thrilled.”

The White House press secretary and communications director, Stephanie Grisham, said the president and his aides’ view of impeachment has not changed in the last week. “Nothing has changed. The president did nothing wrong,” Grisham said.

“What these guys are doing — Democrats — are doing to this country is a disgrace and it shouldn’t be allowed,” Trump told reporters Thursday afternoon. “There should be a way of stopping it — maybe legally, through the courts. But they’re going to tie up our country. We can’t talk about gun regulation. We can’t talk about anything because, frankly, they’re so tied up. They’re so screwed up, nothing gets done — except for when I do it.”

Public opinion has rapidly shifted over the week, with the number of Americans who support impeachment on the rise.

Strategizing about the best way to handle the impeachment proceedings and the White House’s release of information happened on Monday night, when the Trump family gathered for dinner at Trump Tower.

Then as soon as White House aides returned to Washington on Thursday afternoon, the West Wing impeachment planning kicked off in earnest.

Acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney hopes to set up a war room, comprised of political, press and communications aides to help with the administration’s fight. The administration intends to model it after the Clinton White House’s impeachment strategy, which relied on both separate administration staffers and outside surrogates for the political battles.

Grisham said the White House does not need to make any new hires to deal with the impeachment inquiry.

Already, the White House counsel’s office is accustomed to the siege of investigations and Democratic oversight, so the top attorney, Pat Cipollone, and his team are more prepared than the rest of the White House staff, according to two former administration officials and one close White House adviser.

The administration will need to set itself up for a potentially long battle. The impeachment proceedings for President Richard Nixon stretched roughly eight months, ending with Nixon’s resignation. The Clinton proceedings ran for roughly five months, with Clinton acquitted by the Senate.

Several former administration aides and White House advisers worry the West Wing is not staffed robustly enough for this type of prolonged political fight, as filled as it is with family members, junior aides, newcomers or staffers who’ve stayed so long they feel exhausted.

Current and former aides also wonder if this impeachment fight will end up feeling different than the prolonged Mueller investigation. “Some of the White House scandals are awful, and you take the PR hit. Everyone knows it is just a matter of time and the news cycle changes. This is one of those instances where it is less clear,” said a former senior administration official.

Trump critics say the president’s habit of firing aides so habitually may hurt him as Congress looks for witnesses and the president tries to stay on message.

“The president’s HR practices are going to come back to haunt him here because he is uncomfortable apparently with truth-tellers in his inner circle,” said Timothy Naftali, a professor of public service at NYU and a co-author of “Impeachment: An American History.”

“He is likely to not get good advice from the acolytes who are left,” Naftali said. “He does not have Don McGahn anymore to tell him not to cross a trip cord.”

But Trump allies and current and former aides argue the White House has been anticipating the moment of Trump’s impeachment since he first took office.

“It’s like crack cocaine to the Democrats. They can’t not take the hit,” said Michael Caputo, a former Trump 2016 campaign official. “If the Republicans aren’t ready for impeachment after having two and a half years to prepare, then we shouldn’t be in politics,” adding that he believed the White House was “completely prepared” and the Senate, “bullet-proof.”

“This isn’t a strategy to survive. It’s a strategy to thrive through this. It’s a strategy to leverage the Democrats’ obsession with impeachment to defeat them at the polls in November 2020,” Caputo added. “The White House’s strategy should be predicated on public opinion that’s trending in their favor on impeachment.”

#dreading #Foreign #impeachment #Politics

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