Red Woods by Robin Tran
c!wilbur in inconsolable differences justifying being cruel with Doing It For Tommy vs c!wilbur in the elections literally taking mellohi his own damn self to force c!tommy to do what he wants
c!Dream always told himself he was objective, but he wasn't. He couldn't be. Perfect objectivity doesn't exist; there will always be biases and preconceived ideas about others, and these ideas threw Dream off more than I think he'd like to admit. He was wrong about Sam following their rules (he was wrong about Sam caring). But he was also wrong about Tommy, when he was so sure that Tommy only ever wanted to cause him harm.
like i know i talk about the c!wilbur of it all when it comes to discduo like a lot but. listen. exile might’ve been the point of no return for them that sort of made friendship no longer an option, but the exact moment they become enemies isn’t exile or the disc war or spirit speech or the duel. it’s quite fucking literally the exact moment tommy raises that crossbow at wilbur and dream steps between them.
“wilbur, hand me that tnt” “tommy, I’ll— I’ll have to step in” is the exact moment that takes discduo and defines their entire fucking story. that exact moment is why boundless sands has to exist for the discduo finale to even happen.
I am obsessed with Sauron projecting his toxic and bumpy relationship with Melkor onto that dark web of manipulation he weaves with Celebrimbor. He expects Tyelpë to be as unstable, unreliable, chaotic, cold and heartless as Melkor could be, and is fairly certain that deep down Tyelpë is as ready to betray him as he does Tyelpë. And when Tyelpë shows him genuine love, kindness and, unwittingly, empathy, there is an urge within Sauron to give into this warmth and to reach out for a real 'human' connection. This makes him very confused and angry, at it forces all that bottled-down anger towards Melkor to surface. But then Tyelpë would unknowingly repeat Sauron's lies he has already told him, call him Annatar, and that would bring Sauron back on track.
Later, in Sauron's pits of torture, Tyelpë would laugh hysterically and tell Sauron, If he was anything like you are, then he had already left you before you even met.