Part 4 And End Of Alastor's Bad Day Alastor Survived His Fake Date And Will Probably (not) Think Twice

Are there AUs as good as Darth Vader inexplicably showing up during TCW and immediately hunting down Palpatine for Murder Purposes without explaining a goddamn thing to anyone about who he is or where he came from or why he's doing this? Yes. But this particular subgenre of a subgenre owns my heart on a regular basis. He's a nightmare and he's here to make it Sheev's problem and none of you are going to stop him because he somehow got close enough to force Sidious to fight back before you could get in the way and now there are two (two) Sith having a bitchfight in the middle of the Senate. Rule of Two who? There's three and two-thirds Sith running around right now and the most competently Sith-ish ones hate each other beyond reason despite Palpatine apparently not know what the fuck this guy's deal is???

Sometimes you gotta pick a cat up just to set them back down somewhere nearby. Remind them who calls the shots in your house. Oh you thought you were lying on the floor? Dead wrong fool you're standing on the couch cushion now staring up at me waiting for an explanation. You'll never get it. I'm gone. I'm walking away. I'm already in the next room before you can so much as mutter a confused "meow." later son. you're reexamining your place in the universe all by yourself. Consider my power in a empty living room

here's the thing, I fully believe that Alastor is aroace, but I also believe that he would commit to dating someone if he thought that doing so would be really entertaining. like absolutely Al hates Vox, but if he discovered that calling Vox "babe" made him consistently short-circuit and fry any other nearby VoxTek, I think he would seriously consider starting to call Vox "babe" just to get to see him bluescreen and wreck his own tech

I made another thing.

With apologies to Neil Gaiman.

During the most poor and homeless period of my life, I had a lot of people get angry with me because I spent $25 on Bath and Body Works candles during a sale. They couldn’t comprehend why the hell I would do that when I had been fighting for months to try and get us on our feet, afford food, and have an apartment to live in.

Those candles were placed beside wherever I slept that night. In the morning, I would move them and set them wherever I’d have to hang out. At one point I carried one around in my purse - one of those big honking 3-wick candles. I never lit them, but I’d open them and smell them a lot.

I credit that purchase with a lot of my drive that got me to where I am today. I had been working tirelessly, 15+ hour days with barely any reward, constantly on the phone or trying to deal with organizations and associations to “get help at”. It’d gone on for almost a year by the end of it, and I was so burnt out, to the point that I would shake 24/7. But I could get a bit of relief from my 3-wick “upper middle class lifestyle” candles. They represented my future goals, my home I wanted to decorate, and how I would one day not be in this mess anymore.

When we moved into the apartment, and our financial status improved, I burned those candles every single day. When they were empty, I cleaned them out, stuck labels on them, and they became the starting point of my really cute organization system I had ALWAYS planned to have.

So whenever I hear about someone very poor getting themselves a treat - maybe it’s Starbucks, maybe it’s a home deco item, maybe it’s a video game… I don’t judge them. I get it. I get that you can’t go without anything for that long without it making you go crazy. You need to pull some joy, inspiration, and motivation from somewhere.

But I’ve heard people questioning if Snape was really traumatized by SWM. At first I had no idea what they were on about. How could Snape not be traumatized? Why are you even questioning this? But I figured what they meant was: why doesn’t Snape act the way I know traumatized characters to act? Why isn’t he having flashbacks or breaking down when being exposed to his triggers? 

Snape’s trauma is the angry aggressive kind. Snape’s trauma can be mistaken for a “grudge”. Because it’s not what people understand trauma to be.

In HBP, Harry was trying to crucio Snape and do all this other stuff, and Snape was so unbothered by it. But the moment Snape noticed Harry was about to cast levicorpus on him, Snape completely lost his shit. Below was Snape’s response to Harry trying to cast levicorpus on him.

“No, Potter!” screamed Snape. There was a loud BANG and Harry was soaring backward, hitting the ground hard again, and this time his wand flew out of his hand.

This is Snape’s response to Harry trying to crucio him. Literally torture him.

But Snape parried the curse,

Like a casual “whatever”. Yeah Harry got knocked off his feet, but he didn’t go soaring backwards like he did when Snape responded to Harry’s levicorpus.

During occlumency lessons Snape manhandled Harry and threw him out of the room, after seeing Harry watching James Potter humiliate him.

I shouldn’t have to add disclaimers to my post, disclaimers should be givens. But unfortunately we haven’t reached that point yet.

Disclaimer: I don’t approve of Snape hurting Harry more than what he had to (Snape still had to defend himself in HBP) and I don’t approve of Snape physically hurting Harry in Snape’s Worst Memory chapter. 

I’m not saying that Snape’s way of expressing his trauma is okay. He needed therapy to help him learn to deal with and express his trauma in a less problematic way. The point is that Snape’s trauma is overlooked and lessened. Snape’s PTSD is called a “grudge.” 

Snape had a grudge against James Potter vs Snape was still traumatized by James Potter.

James’ change.

I will always maintain that James changed for the better. I won’t argue my point, because I’m not here to convince you that James changed.

There seems to be this “unspoken” “implied” message that because James changed, the damage he did to Snape doesn’t count anymore. Okay yeah James hurt Snape, but James changed, why can’t Snape just get over it?

I have zero problem with the idea of James changing. He grew as a character, happens to be morally grey, and actually has the capacity for good? Not a problem with me. He changed? Great.

If people spoke about James’ change like he fits in with one of the themes in HP, that people can change for the better.

But unfortunately James’ change isn’t spoken about like that. James’ change is treated like some sort of band aid to slap on Snape’s trauma. 

I am okay with James changing if we’re speaking about James’ overall character, as well as his character development. But, if a post is specifically about Snape’s trauma, then I don’t care how much James changed, and I don’t think “but James changed” should be slapped on any original post talking about the very real post traumatic stress disorder that Snape has because of James and Sirius’ bullying him for years. 

I was wondering for the longest time why some Snape fans were so salty over the idea of James changing. So the fuck what if he did change? Why is the very idea of James changing a bad thing? Why is it so hurtful? My response to James’ changing was “meh cool.” Like I’m not jumping up and down in joy over it, but I don’t find the idea of James changing personally offensive. 

But now I get why even the POSSIBILITY of James having changed is personally offensive for people. When we hear the statement James changed, it’s hardly ever on an original post. It’s nearly always some Snape anti James stan coming onto a post (that is appropriately tagged) talking about Snape’s PTSD and they come onto that post and say “but James changed.” As in yeah but whatever about the emotional pain Snape had to suffer from years later, yeah but whatever about his triggers because James changed.

“James changed” has become a symbol for dismissing Snape’s PTSD.

I now understand why people take “James changed” so personally, as if someone went up to them and slapped them across the face. 

I started watching Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency and honestly I'm not super into it but Ken Adams fucking kills me.

Like. You meet this crazy woman who kills your employer and hasn't showered in weeks. Her hair is a nightmare. She's kidnapping you. She's talking about the path of the universe and her fate and how she's supposed to kill everyone she meets, she's fucking nuts. You're gonna die.

And then you don't. And the further you go with her, the more you start to realize that she's not bluffing, she legitimately kills everyone she meets. She won't die, the universe won't let it happen. She is completely unconcerned that you didn't die, because apparently this is just the way things work around her.

What if you met the god of death and she didn't kill you is already an insane starting point. What if the god of death took you on a roadtrip where she kills everyone she meets and you don't fucking die, despite all signs to the contrary? That's so insane, I love it.

I started reading for the Ozai goes back in time idea and STAYED for the Zuko also goes back in time trope.

But I gotta say I'm disappointed in y'all. I read through this ENTIRE post and not ONE of you mentioned my girl Yue.

If we're making a time travel fix-it then there are SO MANY characters we could bring into the Gaang. The more toddlers the better.

dumb atla fanfic idea: ozai is thrown back in time—to the time when firelord azulon still sat on the throne. when ursa had not disappeared into the arms of her lover, ikem. when he still had his bending. when the avatar had not reappeared.

when all was right with the world.

ozai’s ready to conquer the world—nine years earlier than planned, nine years before sozin’s comet was set to arrive.

…

what he did not expect was that the one thing standing in his way of success was his eldest son—in the body of a five-year old.

((where ozai and zuko travel back in time and try to thwart each other in every way possible while everyone’s confused by second prince ozai’s great amount of disdain for his only son and said son’s pettiness towards his father))