Everyone hates potholes. They pop up out of nowhere, they wreck your suspension, and your local municipality spends a ton of money on them. Sure, that money probably wouldn't have gone to efficient public transit or high-quality public services anyway, but it's a little annoying that a bunch of gunk with rocks in it is getting treated better than the bandshell at Cocaine Park. It would be nice if someone could do something about potholes.
Me, I'm the kind of can-do sort of person that is needed for this. Not only am I barely capable of many tasks, but I am overly confident in myself. That superpower allows me to ignore perfectly good reasons not to do something. In this case, "the law." Yep, that's right. Those greedheads in government procurement can't keep the potholes filled, but they're also going to keep you from helping out your neighbour.
Now, I can't afford the several-million-dollar pothole-scraping-and-filling machines that fancy city people use. Nope. Nor can I really afford gravel (it's expensive!) or hot tar (it's hot! And stinky!) Because of those constraints, I decided that they simply didn't apply. That's the confidence speaking again: I determined that it would be possible, through sheer force of mental effort alone, to figure out how to fill up a pothole from first principles.
I started, as you would, on a pothole down the block from me. It has threatened my threadbare tires many times. By simply kicking some rocks from the roadside into the hole, I was able to fill it up enough that I wasn't constantly deflating my passenger-side front tire. Problem solved! Or it was, until I took my brilliant innovation to the big open sores on the highway. Turns out cars going over it really fast knocks all the rocks out of the hole, beats the shit out of the hole with the rocks, and makes things way worse. It's a phenomenon scientists are calling "basic fucking physics."
By this point, I was feeling pretty tired, and I decided that the life of an innovator also required me to rest my immense mind. I drove home, occasionally weaving into oncoming traffic to avoid the multiple car-sized holes I had produced on the highway, and ruminated on my progress at home. Today, I had been unsuccessful at solving a problem that has vexed humanity since the dawn of cars. Tomorrow, I would try again, and perhaps I'd be successful. Another theory was emerging. McDonalds lets you take ketchup packets for free, and you can get a whole lot of them if you distract the people who work behind the counter. They're a lot softer than rocks; it'll be like driving over pillows. I'm gonna use those all over the holes in the playground zone.
Okay so on the topic of Leon and meds. What conditions/disorders do you think hes actually ended up with over the years?
Spoilers: This is gonna be highly clinical but I did my best to explain things in layman's educational terms too, but if anyone needs clarification on certain things, please feel free to ask!
TW// discussion of alcoholism, depression, suicide, and other aspects of mental health and trauma
This is somewhat difficult to fully nail down because I can't talk to Leon or ask questions in the manner I'd use when diagnosing a patient (granted, I can't do that anyway 'cause I'm not licensed yet, but I've practiced with fictional scenarios so I guess that's sorta what I'm doing here anyway lol). We also aren't privy to most of his personal life and we don't get to see him outside of the field, which is where I'd probably get the most information for this, but this is what I've got relative to psychology since that's what one of my degrees is in:
C-PTSD --> Pretty much everyone has at least some idea of PTSD due to pop culture depictions and it's prevalence in media and society, specifically as it relates to combat veterans, but in Leon's case I think C-PTSD would be the proper diagnosis. While PTSD is often caused by a singular or acute trauma (car accident, witnessing a death, getting shot, etc.) the C in C-PTSD stands for complex which is another type of trauma categorized by repeated or prolonged exposure to trauma. So in Leon's case, the initial trauma would've been Raccoon City, but since he is continuously put in situations like that over and over again for over a decade, it would be a complex trauma rather than an acute one. Now technically speaking, C-PTSD isn't listed in the DSM-5, but it's still pretty widely recognized since any therapist or future-therapist worth a shit understands that while the DSM is the diagnostic guide, it's not without issues. Due to the process, it tends to be sorta "outdated", and there are problem with some of the diagnostic criteria, especially for things like ADHD since it's typically based on how the condition presents in white men (or young, white boys for ADHD specifically). Very long story short, the APA and WHO are at war over if C-PTSD is a separate condition or if it's a subsection of PTSD but as I've been taught, things in the field of psych and especially if they're related to trauma often exist on a spectrum so treating the patient in a manner that works for them is more important than semantics.
C-PTSD and PTSD are both generally categorized by re-experiencing the traumatic event (rumination, flashbacks), anxiety related to the event (which usually takes the form of avoidance behaviors), hypervigilance, negative sense of self pertaining to the event (survivor's guilt), difficulty maintaining relationships, and sometimes even things like anger. And given not only what Leon experienced but the things he does throughout the series, I think C-PTSD is pretty much a given.
2. Alcohol Use Disorder (AUD) [Alcoholism] --> In the medical/psych realm, alcoholism is referred to as AUD technically. Alcoholism is the colloquial term and from what I've personally experienced, it's sometimes used in lecture or things of that manner to get everyone on the same page, but in studies and in the DSM it's AUD. Now AUD as it relates to Leon is somewhat contested in the fandom, usually using anecdotal information (which is highly problematic in this situation), but let it be known that the way Leon drinks is not healthy. AUD specifically (and it's a spectrum, so it ranges in severity) is marked by the following:
He displayed at least 3 of these on screen-- the qualifier is 2, mind you-- and given his behavior I'd argue it's probably a bit more than just these 3 highlighted in yellow but that would be more speculative. The three yellows, however, are covered by Damnation and Vendetta specifically. Drinking on the job, drinking specifically because he feels he fucked up at work, he's obviously binge drinking, etc. And I'd argue 10a and 11b are covered as well considering he drank an entire. bottle. in VD and was STILL going (10a) and it's specifically stated in the novel that he was drinking to help his hangover from his previous day of binge-drinking, so there's 11b too. Those 5 alone are enough to qualify him for moderate AUD by psych standards and that's without my personal speculation so, he's definitely got it. It also doesn't help that AUD and C/PTSD are highly co-morbid (meaning they tend to present together and having one significantly increases your risk of having the other, usually directionally).
3. Depression and Suicidal Ideation --> I'm grouping these 2 together since they're heavily associated with one another and both are also highly co-morbid with C-PTSD but Leon shows signs of both. The depression is usually picked up on pretty immediately, so I won't go into much detail on that, but for Leon, I'd mark it as active suicidal ideation. Generally speaking, there are 2 types of ideation: active and passive. Passive is pretty much exactly what it sounds like, passively contemplating suicide but lacking any real plan or motivation to actively do it. Active is an emergency, that's when someone needs immediate professional help because they have a plan and they intend on carrying it out. Leon seems to flow between passive and active depending on the situation, which is common for people who struggle with this long term. The active situation would've been post-RE2 specifically when he mentioned specifically that he wanted to shoot himself but didn't end up going through with it because he couldn't leave Sherry alone. I'd also argue the scene of him in Damnation where he's drinking from the flask would count as active since in the novel, he talks specifically about "ending it all here" and while it's not directly stated that he's thinking about shooting himself, it very much feels implied. Passive would be pretty much the entire Damnation novelization and parts of Vendetta too where he talks about how much he wants to die and wants to kill himself, but he (seemingly) doesn't have a plan for accomplishing that. I think the prime example would be when he almost falls off the roof in VD and in the novel, it's made clear through the fight that he wouldn't be upset if it killed him. He was still fighting back, he was trying to survive, but he did it all with the understanding that "today is a good day to die anyway" (that's literally a quote, no joke), so I feel like that toes the line between active and passive.
I’ll be honest I did not expect the Yandere Neajunko to hit that hard but it is really good
out of curiosity do you think theirs ever like a moment of Junko realizing she’s starting to fall in love with makoto, and if she does how does she react to it because based on how she acts in danganronpa 2 finale trial to makoto, I can see her going fully into romantic codependency especially considering how much power makoto has over her and him being the only different thing each day
I just realized while typing this that makoto is doing to Junko what Junko did to the remnants of despair, hes manipulating her to see him in a similar light to how Junko was seen by the remnants of despair which is really ironic
previous posts: 1, 2
(Lol, I'm glad you've enjoyed that.)
I'd say she definitely notices herself falling in love with him.
She fantasizes about gaining the upper hand over him enough to lock them both in a room with weapons and just kind of see if he survives it. She wants to know if, after this much time to break her down, he'll prevail over her on that kind of equal footing.
Would she kill him? Would she leverage his feelings for her by threatening herself? Or would he speak a few words and melt her convictions? Normally, she would be certain that she would ruin him, but now she's not so sure. She's been aware of every moment of her own despair-atrophy. Locked up with only her own malice, it lost its edge. Would she even find it interesting to try hurting him again?
The sound of the heavy cell door immediately brings her out of her ruminations (which is part of the problem!!), as Makoto himself shows up on the visiting side of her cell. "Hey! You ate your lunch," he says brightly.
"Where the fvck were you yesterday?" she demands, very aware of the lack of guile in the question. Straight to the point and vulnerable, just like him. She's adopted his dumb@ss way of communicating, for lack of anyone else to talk to.
"Yeah," he says sheepishly. "Sorry about that. I hoped you wouldn't notice, since you don't have any clocks."
One of her eyes twitches. The fact that she's pretty sure he doesn't even know that what he's doing is torture creates such a weird cocktail of annoyance and arousal, in her.
"But, I guess the meals probably help you mark the passage of time," he continues.
(They don't, actually. Surprise surprise, no one else at Future Foundation actually cares about her wellbeing. The mealtimes are as sporadic as they feel they can get away with, without His Hopeness making a fuss. But of course Junko is a good judge of how much time has passed, even sleeping.)
(And speaking of sleep, she hasn't dreamed about anything but him in months.)
She puts on a pathetic, warbling voice. "Tell me where the fvck you were, or I s-swear, I'm gonna start f-fvcking crying!" (This persona is kind of a new one. The theatrically miserable one. Key traits include extreme possessiveness and emphatic vulgarity.)
"I will, I will," he assures her calmly. "I even brought a movie we can watch. Do you mind if I come in?"
Ridiculously, she has to make the active choice not to smile. This "asking permission" thing he insists on doing made her want (and try) to rip her hair out, in the early days, but now she can't help but treasure the ritual of it. Unscripted, but inevitable. "I don't care," she says moodily.
"If you don't want me to come in, then I won't," he says, and he's doing nothing to suppress the smile.
She dips her head, staring up at him eerily and adopting a creepy, drawling tone. (This persona is also relatively new. She's labeled it 'Chained-Up Evil in the Basement', which is both an Ibuki title if ever there was one and a truly Gundham-*ss thing to do.) "I welcome you in, but I can't be responsible for what may happen to you once you've crossed the bars."
"Do you want me to come in?" he probes. "Yes, or no?"
Adopting a more saccharine persona, she shrieks, "Yes, yes! Get in here already!"
He smiles and lets himself in.
She watches, reflecting that she used to bother trying to take advantage of a moment like this. Not even necessarily to escape, just to attack while his hands were busy and his guard was down.
Experimentally, she ponders whether she feels like attacking. And whether she feels more partiality toward her daydream of a locked room with just the two of them and a lot of weapons, or the prospect of a movie date and an explanation for his absence yesterday. The two things have such different flavors, and in truth, she can't find the utility in treating them as an either-or thing when one is a dream and another is a reality. She can have both. The beautiful visions in her head and the rare treat of company.
The matter of which dreams she wants to make real...
She would like to see his blood again. To bruise him. Doable. She can save such desires for a day when she's already in trouble anyway, instead of a day when she's getting conciliatory entertainment.
She watches Makoto lock the bars behind himself, wonders whether she'll kill him one day, and feels a confusing, ambivalent neutrality about it.
MDNTIWLYIO (minors do not touch i will launch you into orbit)
Chapter 7: Luci in Wonderland
Lu has thoughts
a/n: so this is the last chapter i have completed, so from here on out you will be subjected to my erratic posting schedule, just like ao3 lol. anyway tw for depressive spirals and unreality
ao3 here
“Goodnight.” Lucifer’s voice is brittle as he replies. Quickly closing the portal, he stares at where you were just standing for a few long moments before sighing and sinking to the floor, his back resting against the kitchen’s island, tiredly closing his eyes.
He's managed to do it again. He ruined something potentially good before it had even started. Albeit on a much smaller scale, but still. Despite your good nature, he seriously doubts he would be able to gain your forgiveness if he did end up giving you skin cancer due to his thoughtlessness. If he was able to get cancer and someone carelessly caused him to contract it, he wouldn't forgive them either. He thinks, anyway. He can't really be certain since he can't get cancer and thus he has no way of knowing how he truly would react. But probably not good.
Opening his eyes, he notices the duck he made you, currently on the floor. Reaching over, he picks it up, then slides further down the floor, now wholly laying down. He examines it, turning it over in his hands; it's just like any other regular duck he's made, only slight details adjusted to resemble you, most notably your hair. Holding the duck up face to face with him, he asks, “I’ve really done it now, haven't I, Duck-Human?” The duck seems to nod in agreement—whether it's him subconsciously moving his arm to make it nod, or the duck is actually agreeing with him, he cannot be certain. Either way things aren't looking too good—especially now, considering he is talking to inanimate objects and they seem to be responding.
Sighing once again, Lucifer teleports himself from the kitchen floor to his bedroom floor, on one of the few duckless spots. Clambering up, he shuffles his way over to his bed in the dimly lit room and places your duck on his bedside table, kicks off his boots then climbs into bed. He doesn't have the energy to complete any of his nighttime rituals—he can survive one night without brushing.
Despite feeling quite drained, he tosses and turns—his thoughts far too busy to simply drift off. How can someone think too much, but also not nearly enough? Though, that's not entirely true—he is always thinking, his mind always racing; always ruminating, always daydreaming, thinking about what he could have done differently—done better. No, what he lacks is forethought. He doesn't think about the consequences of his actions. At least, not until after said actions have already happened. And then once those actions cause problems, he can't ever admit that maybe he shouldn't have done that. Sure, he can acknowledge it in his head, but saying it out loud makes it real. Saying it out loud means admitting to his faults. His hubris. His arrogance. His pride.
You can't ask the Sin of Pride to acknowledge that he was in the wrong! He thinks that, frankly, it's ridiculous that you would expect any different from him; you can't touch fire and not expect to be burned. Not to say he is always gonna cause you harm (though, with his track record, it's very possible he will accidentally hurt you)—just that you can't ask fire to act against its nature. And his nature is to be prideful.
And his pride is why everyone leaves him too.
He can feel the tears start to come before they actually arrive; his breathing becomes shallower. Fuck he needs to take his bowtie off now. It's too tight. Too constricting. His hands shoot up to his shirt collar and start fumbling with the bowtie in an attempt to take it off. His fingers are shaky and his eyes are cloudy with tears and he can't think straight and—
He tears the bowtie off. In his panic he simply grasped the bow and pulled. Along with the now tatters of a bowtie, the top button on his shirt flies off into the darkness, caught under one of his claws in his frenzy. Taking deep, gasping breaths—practically swallowing the air—he closes his eyes and tries to collect himself. He's not even sure why he got so frantic—Angels don't need to breathe. He doesn't need to breathe. It's a habit he picked up from Lilith many, many millennia ago. Sure, Angels can inhale to smell things, but their bodies don't run on oxygen—just pure, divine energy. The way God intended. He is simply inhaling air and then releasing that exact same air back out. And despite this, he doesn't remember what it was like to not breathe. Back in Heaven. Back when he was still wanted by his kind. Back before everything.
His hand finds its way back to his wedding band. Before he met the love of his immortal life. He can remember those days vividly. Anything before is hazy, but the moment he met Lilith—it's etched into his memory forever. He made sure of that. She had found it so odd that he didn't breathe. She had never known anyone that didn't need to breathe before she met him—though that's not saying much, considering it was just her and that asshole. Though she had interacted with a few angels before him, they just never got as close as he did for her to notice.
After a while he had started both consciously and unconsciously replicating things she would do—humans would do; eating, drinking, breathing, the list goes on. He even managed to pick up hiccups. He has no need for any of that, but he has done them for so long to relate to his wife and later his daughter, that it feels weird when he doesn't do them. He doesn't always do them; he doesn't eat much anymore, at least most days. He would primarily do that just to spend time with his family. With the exception of sweets, though. He eats those to feel better. He still drinks all the time—not alcohol, mind you, that does nothing for him, it just tastes gross. The same goes for coffee; no need for it and he doesn't like how it tastes. No, he's a hot chocolate kind of man. Nice and sweet and cozy and he makes special little duck marshmallows to put in it! He's also quite fond of herbal tea; not so much Tea tea. That was more Lilith’s style—she preferred actual tea made with tea leaves. She would always have some type of black tea in the morning with breakfast, then in the afternoon she would have something lighter, like green or oolong. He can picture her now—cup in one hand and saucer in the other, sitting at the little table in the garden, watching the wildlife.
Fuck, he misses her. He shifts towards his bedside table, peering at the family photo he kept there, gently illuminated by his ducky nightlight. Shut up, it's cute and he wanted it. When all three of them were happy, or at least close to happy in his case. What happened? What went wrong? … Were they as happy as he thought they were?
His eyes drift downward, to you—well, to your duck, anyway—sitting a few inches away from the picture frame. How did your relationship go from budding friendship to… whatever it is now in under a day. You certainly could have been nicer; he really was just trying to help, but he… he should probably try to think things through before doing them. Especially now that you're here. He had forgotten just how fragile regular, living humans could be. So… breakable. Though it doesn't help that—other than Hellborn—he's not used to interacting with non-Sinners. He doesn't interact with Sinners much at all and he prefers it that way, but for every… maybe 10,000 Sinners he interacts with, he meets one regular, living human. And the number of Sinners would be significantly higher if he didn't avoid them like the plague.
He just doesn't really come across humans much at all. And the ones he does usually end up meeting he wouldn't mind if they break because they've absolutely done something terrible to summon him. It's quite honestly disgusting the amount of times he gets summoned to Earth and directly in front of his summoning circle is some poor sap with a bunch of carvings on their skin and a knife through their heart. And he hates it. He hates that they died so some piece of shit could get the chance to talk to him, probably to request something idiotic. He hates that the sacrificed souls are now bound to him and they are destined for Hell no matter what they may have done in life. He hates that even though he always releases these souls they will still be stuck in Hell no matter what. He hates that once they become a Sinner they become a lost cause and end up just as bad as the rest of them. He hates that some freak out there a couple millennia ago figured out how to summon him and has since spread that knowledge. And he hates that he has no way of stopping it. If it were possible he would never answer any summons, but he has no choice in the matter. If they've done the ritual correctly, he will be brought to Earth whether he likes it or not.
And he can do nothing about it. He is magically tethered to the summoning ritual, in a similar way one is with a soul contract—except he didn't sign anything. Though, in a way, it is kind of a soul contract. Someone signs another person's soul away to him and he is ripped from whatever he was doing prior to answer the summoner’s call.
Of course—that doesn't mean he has to give them what they want/do what they want, thankfully. His usual M.O. is to scare them shitless, then leave. Though, there have been a few instances when he was having an exceptionally bad day and they were exceptionally bad people and he did things that he would rather not think about. It's not that they didn't deserve his wrath—they deserved it twice over—but rather, he's just not that kind of guy. Okay, sometimes he's that kind of guy, but not usually. It also didn't help that Lilith would get mad at him if he took his anger out on those future sinners. He didn't quite understand why, but he also didn't understand a lot of things that she did understand, so he would usually defer to her on those things.
At the very least, he has been summoned less and less recently. Fewer people believe as the years go by—though not entirely gone. Every once in a while he’ll find himself dragged to Earth by some loser thinking they can just demand whatever they want out of the fucking Devil.
…
He needs to Stop. Thinking. About. This. He's getting himself pissed off and he’ll never fall asleep at this rate. Think happy thoughts! Think about Lili—no, wait, don't think about Lilith, that'll just make him sad. Same goes for Charlie. Think about ducks! His relationship with ducks has always been good! Lucifer closes his eyes, a faint smile on his lips as he daydreams about watching ducks in a pond. Soon, he finds himself leaving the world of the waking, sleep finally claiming him.
He quacks in distress, his little webbed feet frantically paddling in the water—he's getting left behind! They—they're leaving him! He's screaming in his head for everyone else to wait up! Wait for him, please! He doesn't want to be alone! He’ll do better! He promises!
It's no use. They don't hear his pleas. They don't even stop to turn back. No glances. Nothing. He watches as the other ducks—his family—paddle away. Even his own duckling swims off without him, no need for her father now that her flight feathers have grown in. He could cry—well, technically he can't because ducks don't have tear ducts, but if he did have tear ducts… he would be crying right now. But because he doesn't, he just watches on, sadly. The usual amount of glassiness in his eyes from being a duck.
“ᏇᏂᏗᏖ’ᏒᏋ ᎩᎧᏬ ᎴᎧᎥᏁᎶ ᏗᏝᏝ ᏗᏝᎧᏁᏋ, ᏝᎥ’Ꮭ ᎶᏬᎩ?” The duck's head snaps over to look at the source of the noise. Some… odd… thing… With weird looking feathers sprouting from its head and absolutely useless wings. How is it supposed to fly without feathers on its wings? In fact, it looks like the only feathers this thing has are on its head—what is this thing?
Bravely, he swims closer to the big thing to better investigate. It looks kind of familiar, in some weird way. He's definitely seen it somewhere, but where? “ᏗᏒᏋ ᎩᎧᏬ ᏝᎧᏕᏖ?” And that call it's making… He's not sure what it means, but he knows he's heard it before. “ፈ'ᎷᏋᏒᏋ.” It pats the ground with its wing. What does that mean? Despite not knowing, he feels compelled to get closer. Reaching the edge of his pond, he waddles his way onto land and sits down next to it—right where it had patted the ground.
“աɦǟȶ'ƈɦǟ ʊք ȶօ, Lucifer?” You're looking at him fondly and he returns it with a shy smile—knees pulled against his chest as he starts tapping his claws against his boots in a somewhat uncoordinated rhythm. Looking back out, over the sprawling garden of his home, he considers his response.
“Just… Enjoying things… for once in my life.” He chuckles softly and looks back towards you. He admires your beauty for a moment, your impressively long, blond hair, your lavender eyes, your perfectly shaped lips painted with a shade of plum that almost looks black. Closing his eyes, he musters up the courage to ask a question that has been burning on his mind for some time, “Lilith…?” You hum in acknowledgment, “Do you think this will last…? That… we will last?” Opening his eyes again to look at you as you answer, you are nowhere to be found.
Snapping his head back and forth in search of you, he begins to call out, “Lilli…?! Sweetheart, where did you go?! …Lilith?” Pushing himself up off the ground, he begins his search for you through the garden, sprawling and wild. “A-are you there? Honey?” He wanders deeper into the maze of foliage, checking behind trees and bushes. “Lilli, are we playing hide and seek? I—uh—I would’ve appreciated a heads up…”
Making a sharp turn off his path, he finds the street in front of him entirely empty. What is going on…? Heaven is never this empty… He carefully flies down the street, eyes scanning for anything unusual when he spots a quick flash of a deep violet fabric as it turns a corner. Following the fabric leads him to another empty street and another clue—the bottom of a bright red pant leg disappears into an alleyway.
Were they trying to lead him somewhere? Why can't they just say… unless… Unless they're throwing him a surprise party!! He grins, his pearly feathers fluff in excitement at the prospect of a party—he's not sure what the occasion is, but if everyone is gonna be there then it must be something good! He speeds down the street, trying to catch up with whoever is luring him to the party as fast as he can, but no matter how quickly he makes it to their previous location, they're already ahead of him, turning down another corner. Pouting, Lucifer makes a frustrated little noise and continues pursuing the unknown figure.
Bobbing and weaving the different streets and alleyways, trying to see who it is that’s teasing him with the possibility of an invitation to a party, he comes to an abrupt halt in front of the Heavenly Courtroom. Are… are they holding the party in the courtroom? An odd venue, but a party is a party!
Lucifer pushes the broad doors open to a pitch black interior—so they are throwing a surprise party! He steps past the doors and lets out an exaggerated gasp, “Oh my goodness! What could possibly be going on here?” The angel is nearly vibrating with excitement when, in a blinding flash, every light in the room turns on simultaneously. Around the room are all of his family and friends, but his smile begins to strain when he notices that no one else is smiling. “H-hey, guys…!”
“Fuck up.”
“What?” Lucifer's head snaps to the direction the voice came from, “What’s that suppo–”
“Worthless.” “Disappointment.” “Mistake.”
There are too many voices in the chorus of Lucifer's insecurities to be able to distinguish who is saying what. His eyes frantically search the room for someone, anyone that hasn't joined in. For someone safe.
Lilith and Charlie make their way to the front of the crowd and Lucifer sighs in relief, “Thank goodness you're here! I–”
“Pathetic.” Lilith cuts him off, staring him in the eyes, lips curled in disgust.
“W-what…?” His voice cracks as he stares at his wife with wide, disbelieving eyes.
“Failure.” His gaze jumps to his daughter, glaring down at him with contempt.
“Char-Charlie… Wha–?” Lucifer cuts himself off when he sees you cut your way through the mass of angels and demons. “Human…?”
Both Lilith and Charlie step to the side, making room as you come to a stop standing directly in front of the trembling man. A soft, reassuring smile spreads across your face as you reach a hand up to cradle Lucifer's cheek. He leans further into your palm, your gentle touch beginning to calm his nerves. Slowly, your hand slides further down, past his jaw, then his neck, his collarbone, then finally settling on his chest, where your opposite hand now also rests.
Lucifer watches you intently through it all, his eyes pleading for something, though he cannot name what. The two of you gaze into the other's eyes, the room having fallen silent as soon as you touched.
His heart slows—he hadn't even noticed it had been racing. He opens his mouth to thank you when–
You shove him.
And he is falling.
Falling through the floor.
Through Heaven.
Back down to where he belongs.
Back down to–
Lucifer bolts upright in his bed, his pulse thundering in his ears. It… it was just a dream…
… Just a dream…
He tosses the comforter and sheets aside and rests his elbows on his thighs, face in his hands and eyes shut tightly. Taking a deep breath, he slides his hands down his face and cracks his lids open, eyes zeroing in on his crotch.
Anon wrote: Hi, anon from this post: https://mbti-notes.tumblr.com/post/800229097824567296. You asked me to provide my type, and from what I've seen of myself so far I'm probably an INFP.
So yeah your perspective helped, at the same time I've spent quite a while ruminating on this relationship and whether I should stick around in it. I don't think I'll ever have the place and importance in this guy's heart that his former crush did - he was absolutely devastated over her for half a year. I'm merely one of his friends, completely different personality and habits from her.
I fear that I'm being used as an emotional crutch and a refuge from his heartbreak and that he doesn't truly like me. I have a strong pride and think I should be self - respecting enough to check out if that's the case - one of my friends was bewildered when I told her about this, said that the guy is still not over his crush so wtf are you doing ?
I communicated my doubts to him a bunch of times. He has expressed that he has no bar or standards as such, he just wants the pleasant company of a person he knows well enough and that in relationships people grow to be together. Said that after getting with me he feels less bad whenever he sees her. He did say quite honestly that she was his first love so he'll never get over that void though. On the first day he said he feels bad that he won't be able to love me as intensely and fully and with as much trust as he did her. He said he gave up on her due to issues with her negative personality traits but I know that he still wishes it weren't so, he has said as much that he's really attached to the idealized image he had of her before she changed. Probably he still wishes that it's just a temporary change in her personality and that she'll go back to how she was, and then of course I'll be discarded at least in his mind lol.
That's why I feel like this relationship is bad for me. I want to be with someone who genuinely likes me, not someone who sees me as a crutch , a good person. I feel like I had clarity of purpose since I started dating him due to genuinely being into him, for me he was THE guy I liked for over a year. But I feel he has wronged me by dating me as a placeholder or a substitute. Even when he started hitting on me, I feel like there was this kind of boldness and audacity to it that one can't afford with someone one truly loves and respects.
I'm not gonna lie, I'm ready to leave since I can't torture myself or tolerate the hurt to my self respect any further. I don't know if I'll ever find someone who truly genuinely loves me, but I'd rather try than be stuck in these relationships where the only thing keeping us together is comfort, refuge, fun and efforts at kindness. It feels inauthentic and a waste of my emotions to me. Perhaps I'm just pissed at being genuinely into someone who most probably isn't genuinely into me, perhaps I'm pissed at not being seen as adoringly as his ex was ?
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"Probably" INFP is not good enough. I do not offer type development information until a proper type assessment is done and the result certain, so you will miss out on this aspect again. I don't tell people what decisions to make. But what I can do once again is point out potential problems in your thinking.
No two relationships are the same. It is unreasonable to expect that two different partners, in relationships that are occurring in different times and contexts and circumstances in life, should elicit the same response in a person. What this unreasonable expectation potentially reveals is that your thinking about love is naive or overly simplistic.
First of all, yes, first love can indeed be very different in quality than a person's subsequent relationships in life. Compared to other relationships, first love is often idealized (in an unhealthy way) and tainted by factors like emotional immaturity and nostalgic mythologizing.
For the sake of argument, even if I were to grant your claim that he's not over his first love, it is still unrealistic and unreasonable of you to expect that he should feel exactly the same way about you as a first love. You are not his first love and you never will be. It is a fact, and facts are to be accepted. Fighting against facts is a waste of energy and a great way to cause oneself unnecessary grief.
Second, while it is not a crime to be naive about love when you lack relationship experience, the question is: Do you want to overcome your naivete? If you don't, you are likely to suffer recurring relationship problems in the future. The remedy to oversimplified thinking is to learn in more depth, in order to discover that the world is much more complex than you originally thought.
Naivete is partly down to immaturity, but it can also be related to language and vocabulary. For example, in English there is only one word "love" to cover all manner of human relationship. Even if you want to drill down further and focus only on romantic kinds of love, most people only have the one word "romantic" at their disposal.
Objectively speaking, many different kinds of love and romantic love exist in this world. But when you don't possess the language and vocabulary to label and describe them, you cannot conceptualize them, so they basically don't exist for you, subjectively speaking. The result is that your thinking about love remains exceedingly small and narrow. Language limitation is a macro factor that affects an entire culture at large. All you have to do is turn on the TV and watch a trashy reality dating show to see how limited people are in their conception of love.
One way that researchers get around this language limitation is to borrow vocabulary from other languages that recognize the concept better. For example, John Alan Lee wrote a seminal work on psychology of love that borrowed some Greek words to come up with a theory of multiple love styles and attitudes. His theory is very useful for helping people develop a more nuanced view of love, in terms of understanding what is possible in love, what one's own love preferences are, as well as how to examine relationship compatibility in greater detail.
Once you understand that there is great diversity in the way that human beings love each other, you would be better able to recognize love in its many different forms, and then less likely to overlook or dismiss opportunities for love. Research has repeatedly shown that loving relationships have an enormous impact on long-term psychological well-being and they are a crucial component of living a meaningful and fulfilling life. In an age when people feel more isolated and lonely than ever, can one afford to take love for granted?
Another advantage in understanding diversity of love is that it encourages you to be less judgmental. Judgmentalness is one of the most common obstacles to forming meaningful relationships, and it is a symptom of ego development issues. In my previous response, I briefly brought up points about childish and adolescent thinking. Young people are often superficial in their judgments because their world is very small and they don't have much life experience, so they don't know what they don't know.
As ego development progresses from adolescence into adulthood, one should realize that there's really no need to always be comparing/ranking people against each other. Without this important realization, you'll always be prone to suffering self-esteem and self-worth problems, because you'll always be "measuring" yourself and others very unfairly, essentially living in your own dystopian version of reality rather than reality itself.
For example, you believe just because he doesn't feel the same way about you as his first love, that the love he gives you is "inferior" in some way? Is there really a need for such judgmentalness? Is it not enough to say that the love he shows you is different? A different kind of love can potentially be just as valid, can it not? One thing we learn from studying personality types is that some differences are legitimate and valid. You shouldn't just dismiss people because you don't understand them or because they don't resemble you or because they don't meet your personal standards.
If you keep thinking of his love in crude terms like superior/inferior or better/worse, then aren't you being unfair in dismissing the genuine feelings he actually has for you? Your language about him is very blame-y. The tendency to blame comes out of judgmentalness and is very destructive to relationships in general, so this is a problem that could follow you into every relationship. Aside from his feelings, there is also a YOU problem that needs to be addressed here. It takes two people to make a relationship and two people to break a relationship, so you must take responsibility for your part as well.
The proper way to think about this situation is to understand that there are different kinds of love and each kind of love has its own quality and validity. His love for you isn't superior/inferior or better/worse, etc. His love for you is what it is. Can you look purely at the facts without casting judgment upon him and attributing ill-intent to him where there might be none? Presuming to read people's minds is also a very destructive relationship habit because it creates pointless misunderstanding. It sounds to me like he's been honest in addressing your questions and insecurities, which is a sign of respect. You claim he's using you, but a "user" is by definition a selfish person and would only tell you what you want to hear.
The key question is NOT about him and whether his love is true. It is not his obligation to change for you or love you in the way you want. The key question is about YOU and whether the kind of love he's capable of offering you is what you prefer, need, or desire. If not, then the onus is on you to take ownership of your preferences/needs/desires and walk away and seek out a relationship that is better aligned with your way of loving or the kind of loving you want. Of course, staying in a relationship that isn't well-suited to you isn't a good idea, mainly because of the opportunity cost. Your time and energy could be better spent elsewhere.
In this day and age, it's not unusual for people to go through multiple partners before they find the right fit, so if you two do break up, it's very likely that you'll both go on to have more relationships before settling down. Do you want to leave a trail of negativity behind you? Do you want to carry baggage from every old relationship into a new one? If not, you have to learn to part with people/the past cleanly and amicably. One good way to do that is to work on your own judgmentalness so that you don't break up relationships for the wrong reasons. Many relationships will come and go throughout life, it's in everyone's best interests that you learn to avoid demonizing people whenever things don't work out.
major cw for venting abt rumination, unreality and paranoia...
questioning stpd + bpd culture is freaking out alot and never being able to keep an account for long and getting immediately suspicious as well as hella inferior to ("they're gonna find out something about me idk what but i know")/anxious of anyone who is too enthusiastic about you (and conversely trying to talk to people who are not as available at all), not being able to use youtube much anymore because u think all the videos could be talking about you even tho its just a tactic to address the viewer to watch but u feel so fucking called out by every little thing, getting angry at the screen and always typing mean shit in the search bar in case somethings watching (but still being addicted to the internet), feeling intrusive at every family function for no reason, feeling like an idiot trying to speak more than one or two words on most days bc it gets jumbled or u literally cannot remember even names or what u did 2 days ago, having the weirdest blend of disgruntled/confused/concerned stare with little response at all whenever u try to describe ur problems and mind, having breakdowns when u try to make friends irl, and really needing help but too scared of being invalidated/mistreated/laughed at and also its a big process i dont fully understand or have much help with and being watched/monitored by family is my nightmare. then ruminating for hours feeling guilty bc the other part of u knows its not all about u, negative grinch!! but u cant escape the feeling or the possibility. then u get scared somethings watching ur brain judging and u spend more hours arguing with yourself or the entity and freaking out which the stress and sleep deprivation turns into hallucinating ghosts (then u think... OMG she cursed me! im haunted! its this house! my vibes are so bad ghosts want me out of here.) and having nobody to tell abt it. so u write about it in a document cuz u literally cant verbalise delusions hoping whatever medical professional will see it wont disregard it because you are somewhat self aware/introspective (to the point that you're just obsessing over your own thoughts not really anything like ooh enlightenment. oh and then u ruminate that maybe youre not sick enough... then get angry at imaginary people who would dare think that... wait im an asshole! people can think what they want! whats my problem! im so mean! que rumination about that), post online then get paranoid about it again and tbh u dont know why u post it but it has to go somewhere, to someone. itll probably drive everyone away but i don't know where else to go. maybe ill be honest and show my true face. but do people even do that? am i something to be hidden? im so tired and cant even cope with people walking outside my window and i look creepy when i figure out what theyre doing by standing at the window then i panic thinking they think im a creep going to do bad things.
Love is for suckers and fools and all those who don't know what blood tastes like. To have to climb your way to the top and step on a few people, or worse.
Ever since he was little his father had drilled into him that love wasn't in the cards for him. Not if he wanted to be the next boss. Not if he wanted to lead the Barnes family.
He'd get married, sure. Maybe he'd even like his partner. But it wouldn't be love. It couldn't be love. This business wouldn't allow it.
So why the hell does he feel what he feels right now? His heart is hammering against his chest, probably gonna shoot right out of his ribcage. There's those stupid jitters he feels in his fingertips, like he's begging to hold onto something. Not something.
You.
He remembers the last time he felt like this. The day you broke up with him. He thought everything was going well. Shit he thought the two of you were headed for marriage.
He's taking in the sight of you in front of him. You're not wearing white, you're not even dressed up. But damn seeing you across from him about to legally become his partner is just doing all of the things to him.
He thinks back to the times he's spent in your first apartment. How you'd wear anything in front of him. A pair of sweats and a hoodie. Oddly themed pajamas.
You're standing here taking his hand in marriage. As casual as it can be.
And it's not even real.
None of it is real. You have a problem that he's fixing. That's all this is. Nothing more. He has to remind himself of that over and over as Sam speaks. Then as you speak and you say "I do." and then as he says "I do."
Love is for suckers. And he knows he was a sucker for you. Still is. But he can't go there again. He can't go down that path if there is no hope.
If you would even give him a sign, a sign that you still loved him, a sign that you wanted to try again, Bucky knows that he wouldn't hesitate. He would give it all up for you if you asked.
"You may kiss your spouse." Sam says.
It stops all the ruminating thoughts in Bucky's head completely. He looks at you now. You look like you're waiting, expecting something from him. But there's also a sadness in your eyes.
A sadness that wasn't there when he first talked to you in that dinner. Or when he got down on one knee and popped the question.
When he takes you in, in this moment, he knows. He knows Steve Rogers couldn't keep his big mouth shut. He knows Steve told you about what happened after the break up. Maybe not all of it but some of it, enough of it to make you seem remorseful.
That's not how he wanted you to feel towards him.
Because even though his father is being proven right with every second that goes on, he doesn't want this marriage to be loveless. Or wrapped in guilt and transactions.
HI I'LL ASK ABT UR WIPS I'LL VOLUNTEER. HELLO. CAN I KNOW OF THEM. DO ANY OF THEM INVOLVE CAIT OR IRIS RN :oo ???
THANK YOUUUUUU
It’s funny YOU should ask about those two cause you recently inspired me to make Caitlin’s backstory in my Star Wars AU Even Worse❤️ I originally had it that she fear The Bad Thing™️ happening but got away before it did……. But after all why not? Why shouldn’t I have The Bad Thing™️ actually happen :)
It’s all the whumplust you’ve posted about her. You’ve gotten in my head hfhsjfjjshf (thank you :> <3)
Ngl the SW au is kinda becoming my sandbox au where I play around with characters a bunch. Trophy’s ofc still my main and favorite wip, but there’s not much I can do with it regarding other characters cause ALL THE OTHER CHARACTERS I LIKE ARE DEAD OVER THERE🥲🥲🥲 ergo— Star Wars au❤️❤️❤️ “where main characters are only dead if they were by early seasons canon🙂↕️” I’m gonna stop talking about the sw au though cause BEFORE I CAN TALK ABOUT IT I NEED TO FINISH THE FIRST FIC CAUSE IT ESTABLISHES A BUNCH OF THINGS🥲
ANYWAYS— nothing concrete yet cause tbh my fic ideas never are, but I’ve had a few misc ideas involving Iris and Caitlin lately.
Considering (and I mean *considering*— none of these are guarantees)
A hurt/comfort nightmare fic for Iris (maybe taking place or a day or two after Tony Woodward kidnapped her; cause that wasn’t addressed enough in canon at all🙃).
I’ve had a Flash!Iris au on the miiiiiind… And it’d be pretty much exclusively used to whump her and Caitlin (cause I mean; what else would I write?). Again, nothing concrete but I kinda like the thought of Flash!Iris and Killer Frost!Caitlin being enemies, and having that flirty banter during fights. But whump comes in whenever one of them goes too far and accidentally hurts the other >:D ….or ofc if one of them gets kidnapped or smth. That would also be whumpy : ) (and smth I would probably end up doing cause again— this is me XD. Can’t resist a good kidnapping/capture fic…)
I’ve also been twirling an ‘Amunet captures Barry’ fic in my head lately where Caitlin goes to confront Amunet because she suspects she either has him, or knows who does— only to find Barry right fucking there with Amunet, acting as her personal guard dog :) cause spoiler alert— she found a metahuman that could create a mental link between them so she can mind control him :) . And if I write this fic I Will be having Amunet make Barry hurt Caitlin dw (also the fic would be Caitlin’s pov)
This is the oldest idea of this grouping and it’s likely I’ll only write it if I don’t the write one above becauseeeee I have A Thing about writing things that are too similar to each other (🫠). But— actually where’s the post, I’ve rb-ed it so many times and said the same thing with different ideas for this lmao (EDIT: TUMBLR ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS. ITS EATEN EVERYTHING UNDER THE LINK TWICE NOW. WHAT THE FUCK. EDIT: THREE TIMES NOW. Figured out the problem FINALLY— and luckily I copied everything i typed last time. Here we fucking go.)
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My tags on that reblog? Yeah, that :) . Would be Caitlin's pov, so she gets that fun little reveal of her new co-captive when Zoom takes her upstairs :} . And ofc most of the physical whump would go to Barry, but I did find my notes about this idea (can’t use the screenshot. That was the problem that deleted this multiple times🙃) and well...
MANHANDLE HER. GRAB HER HAIR. GRAB HER CHIN. GRAB HER WRIST. INJURE HER YAYYYYYYYYY
So make of that what you will XD. Def need to ruminate more on this idea, but I have a few thoughts about Zoom’s motive for this cause he wouldn’t be torturing Barry specifically in front of Caitlin without a reason… (ohhh outside of my plan for this fic but… The ‘are you with me or are you against me’ scene with Barry all bloody and tortured off to the side; a perfect example for Caitlin of exactly what he can do to the people against him… (also means if she chose to leave she’d be leaving Barry behinddddd… Yay!)
Anddd I think that’s it? My serial killer au has Iris if I ever pick it up again, and I want to put both Caitlin and Cisco in there too, but I can’t figure out how they’d fit… Iris is an investigative journalist so she’s perfect for it (and Barry’s a CSI which also fits perfectly into the plot), but for Caitlin and Cisco… idk.
Hope that was coherent! And thanks again for asking!!!
