#skalja

[thebiscuiteternal]

For the old paladins meets new AU -- Zarkon wants in on the "bonding with the new kids" thing that all his teammates are doing?

“You’re being absurd.”

Black rumbled back at him. 

“I don’t know how to ‘just talk to him’. The boy practically flees the room every time I enter,” he replied crossly. “No one will tell me why. Even you insist on keeping secrets.”

She had the grace to at least feel ashamed across their bond, and he sighed, leaning forward from his sitting position to rest his forehead against the steel between her eyes. “I apologize; that was rude. I am... tense. Being treated like a gravity mine primed to explode does little for the nerves.”

Black purred softly, soothingly, and he straightened up. “You have a point. A mediator would do wonders for keeping things civil. Would you...?”

She lightly tossed her head, nearly throwing him off, and he laughed.

---

“You’re seriously gonna talk to him?” Keith asked, expression sour, and Shiro sighed.

“Black asked nicely and promised to stay between us. Besides... we can’t just avoid him forever.”

“Don’t see why not. It’s worked so far.”

“And it’s made them all suspicious, as if us almost blowing the secret outright at the first dinner wasn’t bad enough. There’s no telling how they’ll react if they find out. And if them not finding out means making nice with him, then I’ll do it. Besides... this is the old one. The one they trusted. Maybe it won’t be so bad.”

“Yeah. Sure. I’ll just be keeping my bayard on hand in case.”

---

Shiro stopped at the hanger door, then took a deep breath before tapping the command control.

Whatever he was expecting, the sight of Zarkon dangling from one of the construction harnesses, meticulously cleaning Black’s ear wasn’t it. “Hello?” he called up hesitantly.

Black rumbled a pleased greeting, and the future Immortal Emperor looked down, lifting his focus goggles, a motion and position Shiro had seen Coran in so many times before while looking after the Lions. “Oh.You... You came. Be right down.”

Well...

Here went everything.

[spider-xan]

@skalja replied to your post:                    That said, for all of my issues with JKR, I’m on...               

It’s so weird to me how she gets Draco so right and yet romanticizes Snape in DH/the epilogue.

Yeah, same. (I say that now, though who knows if JKR will end up ret-conning how she handled Draco one day in the future, with the way she keeps going with that kind of thing.) I know fandom tends to hate how she wrote him in the end because they wanted a true redemption arc where he joins the DA/Order and fights against the Death Eaters because he is truly good at heart~ (gag), but honestly, I’m glad she went with a more realistic arc for him, especially in a fantasy series where I’d expect otherwise. Like, I like that he had this idealised vision of what being a Death Eater was like, and then changed his mind somewhat with the reality of it, but it didn’t completely change his nature or beliefs in terms of blood supremacy either. Yeah, sometimes it does happen IRL, but not always. You see plenty of bullies and bigots IRL who may not like violent hate groups and wouldn’t join them, but they’re still assholes.

Likewise, honestly, I’m more than okay with the fact that Lucius and Narcissa were still bigots after the war. I know fandom loves to romanticise the Malfoys because they’re beautiful (white people) and Narcissa saved the day (albeit for somewhat selfish reasons, which tbh was a plot thing I liked a lot), but the fact that they turned on the Death Eaters, but were still racist afterwards is perfectly realistic to me. Like, they’ve been that way for decades, one bad experience with an organisation that didn’t quite go their way isn’t going to suddenly make them realise that it’s necessarily wrong. I think people seriously underestimate how difficult it can be to change the thinking of racists.

But yeah, then there’s her weird opinions about Snape, and I don’t get it. Like, for all that I dislike fandom’s love for redeeming Draco and dismissing of things like being an unrepentant bully, Draco’s still more sympathetic in that he’s at least a child and didn’t actually end up murdering anyone. Snape is an adult and didn’t turn against the Death Eaters until years later when the girl he wanted to bone was up for murder. He’s interesting because he’s a complex character who does heroic things for the wrong reasons. A fact that JKR seemed to acknowledge strongly at first, but now we get crap like Cursed Child (which she still approved of, even if she didn’t directly write it) being a whole play of Snape apologism, and while I can kind of see it being somewhat in-character, Harry naming his child after him and calling him the ‘bravest man he knows’ is, gag me, please.

[thebiscuiteternal]

For the writing jam, hope I'm doing this right -- how about post-s2 Shiro getting thrown back into the time of the original paladins?

‘Waking up from unconsciousness was getting very old,’ Shiro thought groggily as he first attempted to open one eye, then the other.

The good news was that something was blocking the sunlight above him.

The bad news was what was blocking the sunlight above him, his brain registered once he wasn’t seeing double. 

Both fight and flight instincts kicking in, he kicked the Galran Leader solidly in the face before vaulting away and activating his arm, ready for another showdown-

-and then slowly registered that the sound around him was laughter.

“I told you if you didn’t start smiling more, that ugly mug of yours was gonna start scaring people off!” wheezed a raspy female voice behind him as Zarkon swore vividly, holding his undoubtedly broken nose. 

Extremely confused, Shiro turned to find a huge black and gold cat...horse...thing doubled over as she heaved for air and cackled, tail nearly standing on end. Before he could get away, she got herself under control and clapped him on the back, and wow, those claws and teeth looked sharp. “Good reflexes, cub, I ain’t seen anyone besides Alfor get the boss off guard in years. What’s your name?”

Boss? Alfor? Shiro stared at her, mouth open but words refusing to come out, then slowly, it dawned on him.

He did know her face.

He’d seen it in the video records Pidge had dug out of the Castle’s subsystems.

The First Green Paladin... Mirje.

He looked back over at Zarkon, who seemed to have healed from getting his face smashed remarkably fast, and was giving him a distinctly unamused look. Then he was still...

Oh, flaming hell.

[thebiscuiteternal]

skalja

  I passed out at some point, so at least I slept a...

Anything we can do to help you recalibrate?

Unfortunately this seems to be primarily emotions driven rather than physical body driven, so recalibrating is sort of... not... happening? Like, I dunno if it makes any sense, but logically, I know what’s seething in my brain right now is utter bullshit, but if anything, knowing there’s no justification for it is just making it... worse. So I’m just kinda... going fuck it, and letting everything run its course. It’ll fade. Eventually. Might take awhile, but it always does at some point or another.

[thebiscuiteternal]

Serious ask: which of the old paladins would get along best, or worst, with their modern counterpart? Troll ask: what if after Shiro disappears Slav becomes the Black Paladin

Serious Ask: Dracha would get along best because he just rolls with everything. Once Lance got past the species weirdness, they would just be the chillest buddies. Worst would easily be Joitree and Keith. They both have similarly bad tempers, he has no scientific inclinations and would just tune her out (which pisses her off like nothing else), and they would probably have to be held back from beating the high holy shit out of each other on a regular basis.

Troll ask: I WOULD LAUGH UNTIL ETERNITY.  Though actually, they might be a good match? I can see Black actually being patient with his OCD, using her connection to the universe’s Force to show him the best possible outcomes and letting him navigate the paths to them.

[thebiscuiteternal]

skalja

  I see you in my #star wars tag, @skalja ;p <3

Look I’ve been away and I wanted your TLJ thoughts, okay

BOY DO I HAVE THOUGHTS though I’ve been trying to be good and hold out until more people have seen it. I already broke down and ranted about that scene fucking up Luke’s character tho.

[thebiscuiteternal]

skalja

  I forget, has Shiro ever used Allura’s name yet?...

He definitely has! Most notably during the s2 finale after the castle was hit, but several times before then, too

Drat, that ruins the joke. Ah, well, it was a nice thought while it lasted.

[spider-xan]

@skalja replied to your post:                    @skalja replied to your post:                  ...               

Also, when woc get more frustrated with white women than men it’s because of the hypocrisy. Bigots are gonna bigot, but when one sub-group of bigots claims to be on your side, if only you do things her way instead of yours…

Yeah, exactly. Like, of course I criticise racist white men all the time, I’m not giving them a pass at all or anything, but at this point, I also expect white men to be garbage and they’re at least not pretending they care about me. WOC come out strongly against white women because, like you said, they pretend to be on the same side until it’s no longer convenient for them, and a lot of white women love to pretend that white women aren’t racist and it’s only white men who are like that. Like, idk how many times even white women claiming to be white allies will act like only white men are racist, it’s ridiculous.

And yeah, like, that ONTD post was so frustrating, because in addition to trying to twist KMT’s casting over Brunette White Woman #8 as sexism because Rian got his way over KK, there were all these people saying shit like, ‘I understand that WOC are frustrated and under-represented, but we have to realise that all women have it hard and it’s revolutionary even for a white woman to lead a film, so WOC just need to wait their turn to come eventually later’, that baby steps shit is so patronising, stop telling WOC they just need to put up with more white female leads and wait~ for WOC to magically be cast in shit.