we are all someone's monster

Guidelines ● Character List 

Most active canon muses: Bruce Wayne, Felicia Hardy, Helena Bertinelli, Mary Jane Watson.

Most active original muses: Alix Tabris, Katheryn Hawke, Mercy Winnick.

You can also find me at —

          just wanted to let you all know that the new multi is almost ready, so that’s where my energy is going. i will be following everyone i’m mutuals with here over there, once the bios for my ocs are posted, and that should be in the next few days. i will be keeping all threads unless it’s been two or more months since the last reply — in that case, i’m happy to keep them if you’re interested, just let me know !! i’m also keeping all mains. however, unless we’ve discussed it recently, i’ll be moving exclusives to mains. we can always make the change back if you’d like !! just let me know c:

          and i love? the idea? of mj as a reporter. i wasn’t sure how i’d like it but frankly i’m a little obsessed. so i think that mj’s career trajectory just does not go in the way she’d like — she wants to be an actress, it’s been her dream since she was a little girl, but because her dad insisted that she have a “reliable career” as a fallback in case the roles never came, she did a double major in theater and journalism. and the journalism, i’m convinced, is because she idolized lois lane as a little girl, bc you cannot convince me dc doesn’t exist in the marvel universe and you cannot convince me that mj looked at this dynamite menace to society who can’t spell and didn’t instantly think “i’m gonna be her someday.” 

          she figures she’ll work for cable news; she figures that’ll cover her for the time being while she goes on audition after audition. it doesn’t. and the auditions come but besides a few student films with shit pay, a few callbacks that don’t go anywhere, and a play or two she takes out of necessity, it just doesn’t happen. so she spends more time with reporting — shifting from freelancing to working a steady job at the bugle, after peter quits. and more and more, this becomes less of a job and more of a career for her. she’ll still tell anyone who acts that what she really wants is to act, and she likes to tell herself that she’d leave in a heartbeat if she got offered the right role.

          that’s alistair’s half-brother, who knew who he was and likely tried to keep him from the worst of the danger; that’s the man who raised alistair as a child; that’s the man who gave alistair meaning & purpose as an adult, and everyone else he’d considered family in those six months as a warden. it doesn’t matter that, in loghain’s eyes, this wasn’t about wiping out a family, or out of a run-of-the-mill thirst for power. it matters that the people alistair loves are dead, demeaned and lied about after their deaths, and used to further an agenda. loghain is a wonderfully complicated character, with a fascinating evolution between stolen throne and origins, and he’s a perfect example of one of the themes that origins especially emphasizes the most: not all monsters look like monsters. a lot of them look like heroes. it’s why we’re supposed to be disgusted by bhelen while knowing that he’s the only candidate for king who will do anything to help the violently oppressed and abused; it’s the entire point of the conflict between the dalish and the werewolves; it’s why duncan is, in almost all circumstances, fucking awful even as he’s saving the warden’s life. it’s why the moral dilemma between anora and alistair isn’t “one has royal blood and one doesn’t” — it’s that one has royal blood, good intentions, and no experience, and the other has experience, skill, and a track record of turning a blind eye to the suffering around her if it means achieving a goal, whatever that goal might be. it’s why eamon is so disturbing. the point is that monsters don’t always look like monsters, and that otherwise good people can do monstrous things, and that monstrous people can do good things. it’s why even someone as kindhearted and gentle as alistair becomes a killing machine, and why he’s perfectly comfortable taking loghain’s life in front of his daughter.

          and it’s a little bit frustrating to see alistair’s desire for loghain’s death dismissed as “childish” or an “overreaction” when that would never be said about cousland wanting howe’s death. howe is a monster who looks like a monster: he tortures his enemies, he has no remorse, he actively preys on the vulnerable, and he’s a convenient scapegoat for everyone to point to and say see? it’s not loghain’s or anora’s fault; they were being influenced. howe is easy to hate. loghain is easy to feel sympathy for, especially as we learn more about him. but it’s because he’s so sympathetic so often that it’s so deeply disturbing that he makes the choices he does. he leaves hundreds of his countrymen to die and incites civil war out of fear of orlais, and then swears that everything he does, he does for ferelden. he invites slavers into the capital city even though he rages against orlesian oppression against fereldens through an imperial project. he allows a purge on the alienage after the elves tried to save elven women from being raped, and uses that violent rebellion — an act of revolution — as an excuse, when he stands in the landsmeet and asks where the other lords were when the orlesians were raping fereldan women. he allows his daughter to be held captive in howe’s estate, to the point where even she’s afraid that he’ll allow her to die, despite the kindness and warmth in his voice when he speaks to anora at the landsmeet. loghain’s monstrosity isn’t lessened because he can be a good man; it’s made all the more horrifying as a result.

   Peter knew this was quickly becoming a bad idea. He had taken to visiting MJ against his better judgment, swinging by her apartment from time to time. Despite the careful attempt to distance himself from his past, he could not ignore the draw he feels toward her. It was one of the most difficult things to try & live without. He had not yet entirely processed everything that had transpired, but a handful of things were very clear. The first thing was that no one knew who he was. The second thing was that no one needed to. He had stumbled back into his world & had to bury his Aunt May nearl immediately. With her, he buried any connections from his old life, no matter how much it may hurt. The risk was too great. If Norman Osborn could figure out who Spider-Man was, it was only a matter of time before someone else followed in his path. Until then, he would have to steal moments like this, hoping they wouldn’t come to haunt MJ.

The butterflies that beat in his chest when he sees her are… excessive. Spider-Man crawls towards her from above, hanging upside down for a moment while he takes in the scene. He knows it’s not the same as it was, nor will it ever be. Still, she’s wrapped up in what had once been one of his favorite hoodies. It made him think of shared kisses on cold winter nights, how tight they had held on to keep one another warm. It makes him want to tear off his mask & drag her into the sort of embrace they used to share… But that was no longer an option. The only mark he had on her life was his jacket. It was oddly satisfying that there was something left of him for her to carry. He had left it endlessly at her apartment, always claiming that he would bring it home next time… There was always supposed to be a next time. He swallows the thought with her greeting, soaking in the familiarity despite his better judgment. 

     “ Smooth. I like flattery, flattery works for me. “ Though there is a bright sort of sarcasm to the words, there is reality to them as well. Still, he can’t help but notice how tired she looks. He wonders if she knows something is wrong, if she knows her life is missing a Peter Parker sized chunk. He can’t afford to think of it or he’s sure he’ll falter. Still, his eyes light up at the mention of coffee. It was the sort of stupid, silly thing he missed. MJ had a way of making coffee that felt like home. He didn’t often partake in decaf but it was worth it for a cup with her. When Peter tried to make it on his own coffee it was always too strong or too weak, often tasting like he had fished it out of the garbage behind his apartment building. It’s funny how such a sweet memory had shifted into an odd sort of nightmare, self-imposed loneliness. He kept the truth so close to his chest that he thought his lungs might burst. MJ was a soulmate who was never meant to be. Peter was a stranger. He ignores how his thoughts threaten to drift in a thousand directions, dropping to his feet & standing upright. When he finds his voice, he speaks truthfully, “ I don’t think I could say no if I wanted to. “

Now, he could not help but feel he had wasted the safety he had found in her embrace. His perspective had changed, filling him with a bittersweet nostalgia surrounding his memories of what they had been. Of what she had felt like in his arms. There had been a time when he had thought they would be forever, despite the risks. Now he had to steal moments like this, even if looking at her made it all the harder. His mouth starts to feel dry while he dares to walk an invisible line he’s drawn for himself, “ Your hoodie — It’s cool. I like it.         

Everything about him feels right. His voice should be echoing in her bathroom and his feed should be padding across the hardwood and in her mind’s eye she’s reaching over to touch his shoulder so he can turn around and face her and she swears, she swears she knows the face that she’ll see —

          — “well, then, come on in.” Nothing. It’s nothing like in the movies, where she’d try to remember and just then, at the perfect moment, it would all come flooding back, and she’d understand why she keeps thinking that there should be somebody else here. Instead, it leaves her feeling a little, well, insane. There’s something missing, she insists, even though nothing has changed. There’s something wrong with me, she swears, even though she’s the same as she was yesterday. Mary Jane hoists herself up with a little huff of effort as she tries to keep her coffee balanced; the window into her living room is still open, and there is something not unlike instinct that prompts her to take his hand, covered in the fabric of his suit though it is, to tug him after her.

          Is this the first time he’s been in her apartment? No, she doesn’t think so, but she can’t be sure. Still, she can, for some reason, picture him sprawled out on her couch, mask up just enough for him to practically inhale a sandwich. She shakes her head a little, as if to try and dislodge the image, before she climbs in, and she pulls him after her. He doesn’t need the support, or the help balancing, but that’s not enough for her to release his hand until they’re inside, and it would be actively weird to keep holding it.

          As for the hoodie — “Thanks.” It’s been nearly a minute since he said it, but she answers anyway, tripping over herself to catch up to him. It’s a cold. Or she’s just not sleeping enough. That would explain all of it. “I, uh. Don’t know where I got it. But I like it, too.” There’s still some coffee, freshly made twenty minutes before, in the pot, and she takes a moment to try and select a cup she thinks he’d like before she pours him one. “Spoons in this drawer,” she says, nudging a half-open one with her hip, “and sugar on the counter. Milk and creamer in the fridge. I feel like after all this time, I should know how you take your coffee.”

          She feels like she should know a lot of things. It’s got to be that she’s not sleeping enough. Nothing else really makes sense.

          Her eyes follow him as he moves around her kitchen; it’s a modest apartment, overpriced like everything in New York always is, but it’s homey. She can cook exactly six dishes, and three of them are breakfast foods, so the kitchen is always dubiously stocked around those handful of recipes. There are three near-identical blankets, different only in color, draped across the couch in what Mary Jane would call artful disarray but that her friends would call messiness. There is a cheap and trashy romance novel, spine cracked from multiple reads and open across the arm of the couch. Two and a half pairs of shoes are sitting by the door — the remaining lone shoe is under the coffee table. There’s an unfinished yogurt in the refrigerator. This place is wholly, entirely ordinary, just like the woman who lives here, but god, something about it feels right, now that she’s got company.

          Maybe she’s just lonely. Maybe she’s having trouble sleeping because she’s alone in her bed. Which, then, begs the question of why she’s so lonely now, but... one thing at a time, she supposes. Mary Jane watches him for a moment, then speaks before she can stop herself.