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foxes-that-run · 1 month ago

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Taylor Swift: There is no happy ever after

BARRY EGAN MEETS TAYLOR SWIFT Sunday Independent (Ireland) -26 Oct 2014

“I think that the only way that I know how to process difficult and complex emotions that I can’t figure out how to navigate through in my own mind is to write a song about them and then they become simplified to me. It’s almost like ‘You and I are going to be best friends. We are just going to hang out! We are just going to go to Ireland and hang out in a pub’ I then know how to process them, when I write a verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/ chorus/out”, she explains.

To interview her is to pay a state visit. You know you’re dealing with a star of astronomical proportions when the record company sends a car to pick you up at the airport. And there is someone from her management team to bring you to a waiting room on the 10th floor of a grand hotel with a courtyard filled with flashy cars straight out of a James Bond movie.

What follows is almost ritualistic. You sign a confidentiality agreement form. Then, after a while, someone comes to take you to a suite where you are given an iPod. Then another person hands you earphones and presses play so that, amid much secrecy, you get to hear three songs from the star’s new album, called 1989, after the year of her birth.

Once that is finished you are brought to another, much bigger, much grander suite, where the star awaits your questions on those three songs and anything else that you might care to ask her. The correspondent from a Japanese magazine is leaving just as I am going in. “She is very talkative,” he says, as an English journalist sits down to his turn after me at the iPod. It is quite an operation.

“‘Star’ used to be reserved for a small number of people,” playwright Tom Stoppard once said, “and when the star category became so vast, they came up with ‘superstar,’ and then they came up with ‘megastar.’”

Taylor Swift — for it is she — is a megastar with bells on. Last year, the cover of New York magazine spelled out her contribution to popular culture’s zeitgeist: “Not Katy. Not Miley. Not Gaga. Why Taylor Swift is the Biggest Pop Star in the World.”

In person, Taylor Swift looks like a 1930s flapper siren, reimagined for a new age of pop ultra-stardom with a touch of the girl-next-door thrown in. She is extremely polite and almost impossibly normal and, above all, fun. Her girl-next-door, down-to-earth demeanour belies the vast scale of her jaw-dropping success.

The Guardian described Ms Swift’s supersonic rise from “ringletted country artist, teenage sweetheart of the American heartland, to feminist role model and the world’s most charming pop star” to become “the kind of culturally titanic figure adored as much by gnarly rock critics as teenage girls, feminist intellectuals and, well, pretty much all of emotionally sentient humankind.”

Pretty much all of emotionally sentient humankind appears to have bought at least one of Taylor Swift’s albums. She’s sold over 30m copies of them. And when you factor in world tours that sell out in the blink of an eye, and endorsements and what-have-you, it is not particularly difficult to see why Forbes magazine estimated that the 24-year-old woman sitting in front of me made something in the region of $64m last year.

“It’s not the hardest job to have in the world,” she says with disarming charm of this day of international media interviews, as I take a seat opposite her. “I try to remind myself of that. I’m sitting in a chair, talking about music. It’s not that big of a deal.”

Taylor Swift, however, is very much a big deal. Her every utterance and action is world news or at least trending on Twitter. Her lyrics are dissected by culture vultures as though they are the Dead Sea Scrolls of post-teen angst. Her 2010 song Dear John had the famous lines, “Don’t you think I was too young to be messed with?/The girl in the dress cried the whole way home/ I should’ve known”. It is about singer John Mayer, who was 32 when he and Taylor broke up in February, 2010.

The ballad All Too Well included the even more famous line: “You call me up again just to break me like a promise/ So casually cruel in the name of being honest”. The song’s reputed target is the actor Jake Gyllenhaal, whom she dated in mid 2010, and broke up with a year later. Scurrilous reports even had it that Jake took then 20-year-old Taylor’s virginity and then dropped her, abominably, on her 21st birthday.

Then there was the 2012 song, I Knew You Were Trouble, about One Direction’s Harry Styles, whom she was dating for a time in 2012.

Most memorably, perhaps, was when singer Joe Jonas broke it off with Taylor in 2008, and then began dating actress Camilla Belle: the song Taylor wrote, Better Than Revenge was nigh venomous: “She’s an actress/She’s better known for the things that she does on the mattress”.

Swift’s lyrics are not so much autobiographical as heart-rending, and sometimes pure vicious lines ripped from her private diary — or what critic Robert Christgau described as her “diaristic realism.” Her new album does not disappoint in the heart-on-bloody-sleeve department either. I ask Taylor what goes through her mind when she wrote lyrics such as, “You look like my next mistake”. This is one of the three songs I got to hear from the new album seconds before our interview. “Actually, that song was a joke,” she smiles. “I wrote that as a joke. And I think people think I’m serious when they listen to it.”

I nod to the effect that I thought, too, she was serious.

“But the idea of that song is that I was sitting around, thinking about the media’s fictionalised, cartoon version of me,” she says, “where I’m like this jet-setting serial dater/man eater. I was thinking about that perception. And I was thinking about how interesting it might be to write from that perspective, if I was that way.

“Like, if I was that girl, exactly as they write about me, what would be my mission statement? What would be my life story, my life’s motto. So I just wrote that song,” says the singer, who was born on December 13, 1989, raised in Wyomissing, Pennsylvania, and released her self-titled debut album when she was a mere 16 years old.

What emotions come up for the public when they hear the words Taylor Swift? I ask her. How do you think the world sees that person?

“That is such an interesting question, because I think about that all the time,” she says, adding that being her is sometimes akin to an out-of-body experience.

“I think we all wonder what the perception is of us to strangers,” she explains. “But I think there is no real right answer to that, because everyone has their own opinion based on how much of you they’ve been exposed to. Like, if someone has listened to all my albums then they’d have a different opinion of me than someone who has only heard one song.”

And if you could have an out-of-body experience and listen and watch yourself, what would you think of Taylor Swift?

“Ohhh. I don’t know! I think I would be,” she says sweetly, pausing, “I think I would like my lyrics.”

I say that for such a big star, the lyrics on the new album are almost novelistic — “I’ll end up in flames or I’ll end up in paradise”; “Boys only want love if it is torture.”

Asked what kind of books she reads, Taylor says, “Oh my gosh, I like to read historical things. I like to read biographies. I really like things that actually happen. I just read this book by Peter Evans called

The Secret Conversations, the Ava Gardner biography. It is not necessarily biography; it is a book he wrote about the process of interviewing her for her biography that she then decided she didn’t want to do. Did you read the book?” she asks.

Frank Sinatra threatened to kill himself if she didn’t come back to him, I reply. “You totally read the excerpts in Vanity Fair,” she gushes. Would your relationships be as, er, ... feisty as Ava’s? I ask.

“No — she and I are very different. We have very different personalities. But I love Ava Gardner,” she says of the American legend who had a tumultuous marriage to Sinatra from 1951 to 1957.

She seemed to revel in driving Frank literally mad, I suggest.

“Uh-huh,” Taylor Swift says, looking at me, wondering where this is going.

And you have the potential with your music and your lyrics to drive exes mad. She laughs. “I think that the only way that I know how to process difficult and complex emotions that I can’t figure out how to navigate through in my own mind is to write a song about them and then they become simplified to me. It’s almost like ‘You and I are going to be best friends. We are just going to hang out! We are just going to go to Ireland and hang out in a pub’ I then know how to process them, when I write a verse/chorus/verse/chorus/bridge/ chorus/out”, she explains.

I felt like I had looked in your diary with some of these very raw lyrics, I say to her as the bottled water sits unsipped to her left.

“I feel like my diary has been public since I’ve been 16,” Taylor replies, “because that is true. And I mean, it is very interesting living your life that way because as things have progressed and as you get more known and more, I guess, recognised and all that, there are higher stakes to being vulnerable. Like, opening up your diary to the world; you know you are going to have some people go, ‘Hey, yeah, I relate to that. I felt that too’, and then some people are going to be, like, ‘She’s so annoying,’ You know?” she says.

“You have people who have really, really, incredibly, intensely positive feelings about you,” she laughs, “and then you have people who are giving you intense senseless criticism. I can always handle constructive criticism.”

Aren’t you worse for listening to the intense senseless criticism? I wonder.

“I do try to limit the amount of senseless criticism that I listen to, but I do read journalists’ take on my music, because I think that helps me grow. And, honestly, if someone whose job it is to study music has an opinion, then I think that’s valid. There have been times when I have read a review and thought, ‘ You know what, I could work on that for the next record.’”

But you’re the one who sells millions upon millions of records. You can do it; they can’t. They are the eunuchs in the harem.

“Yeah,” she laughs. “But it’s a fine line, because I love to watch other people’s careers. I love to study other people’s career arcs and things like that. And one thing that I do notice a lot is a lot of celebrities cannot handle constructive criticism. So they only listen to the positive feedback and then they exist only in this world where they surround themselves with sycophantic people who tell them everything they want to hear all the time. And that’s the opposite end of that pendulum swing.”

And then you’d be on medication, I say, by being in that world.

“I have a really high priority on staying sane. It’s a huge deal,” she says. How do you stay sane? “Well — I over-think a lot about everything”

You’re 24. If you didn’t over-think you wouldn’t be sane.

“Yeah! Exactly! And especially as a songwriter you have to stay open. You have to stay open to feeling things — like rejection and, you know, loss and disappointment; and reminiscing about things. It is just the same as you have to still feel joy and enthusiasm and excitement. As a songwriter, I can’t put up barricades and emotional barriers to protect myself.” Were you always so honest? You wrote

Revenge when you were 18. To be that young and write the lyrics, “She’s an actress/She’s better known for the things that she does on the mattress . . .” “I just always wanted to be able to say what I actually felt, and put it into a song and put it out into the world,” Taylor answers. “What is interesting is that it is about my life when I write it and then I put it out into the world and it is about someone else’s life when they’re listening to it.”

You said something fascinating in an interview about that song Revenge: “I used to think people could steal your boyfriend . . .”

Taylor finishes the quote, “But no one can steal your boyfriend from you if he doesn’t want to leave.”

“Exactly,” she says, suddenly all girl power. “An interesting part about having grown up with all of my inner thoughts and lessons and doubts and fears and anger issues being put into these songs and these lyrics is, sometimes, you change your mind. Like, sometimes you handle things differently.”

“Like, two albums ago I had a song that I put out called Mean that was about this critic who would not get off of my back and wanted to end my career with his reviews alone. I felt very victimised by it. So I

wrote this song that was, ‘ Why have you got to be so mean?’ It came from a place of such hurt. Then fast-forward and the way that I now handle criticism is reflected in

Shake It Off,” she says referring to her new single, which is old-school pop in the mould of Gwen Stefani’s Hollaback Girl, with Taylor, tongue-in-cheekily telling the haters to jump in the Hudson River:

“I stay up too late, got nothing in my brain/That’s what people say mmm, that’s what people say/I go on too many dates, but I can’t make ‘em stay/At least that’s what people say mmm, that’s what people say/. . . And the haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate.”

“Shake It Off is a much different way of dealing with it,” she explains. “Which is kind of like, ‘OK, you don’t like me for being myself? I’m just going to be myself more!’” And who are you? “Me? Wow! You are really . . . ” I’m Irish. We’re obsessed with death and sex and God.

“I am too! So this is like talking to myself. I think what’s interesting — and I have been thinking about this a lot — is the idea of celebrity and fame and all those strange concepts is that it affects people differently in every situation. I see a lot of people where it overtakes them and it becomes them. Then I think I’ve seen other people — I hope I’m in this group — where they remain in somewhat of a normal mind-frame and have sort of a self-awareness about the fact that their life is being . . . that there are all these completely weird and abnormal circumstances swirling around their life. And they are just trying to stay in a normal mind-space about all of it. So, I think, that’s the group I’m in.”

Isn’t it a slight dichotomy? In the sense that you have written a lot of songs about failed relationships and break-ups. If you meet Mr Right and the relationship is fantastic, will your creativity crumble? Does that worry you?

“Yeah! I think about that all the time,” she says.

Why don’t you just lie about your relationships then? You could be in a happy relationship and pretend not to be.

“I wish!” she exclaims. “God, if I didn’t have 40 paparazzi outside my door every day, then that would be a lot easier, but I do think about that a lot, because songwriting is the only reason I do this. Like, if I didn’t write my own songs I wouldn’t be a singer; I wouldn’t be on stage.”

Are you saying you have to be miserable in order to write songs?

“No. I am saying I have to write songs in order to be onstage. So if my inspiration ever dried up,” Taylor says. “It’s kind of like, you wonder if that can really happen. I think after a certain period of time, you have learned a skill; you know how to be open to inspiration at all times; you know how to catch ideas when they kind of land in front of you.”

As Taylor tries to suture her wounds, some of her critics are sharpening their long, bloody knives. They don’t know what to make of Taylor’s brand of l’amour. “Retrograde, a prude infatuated with white-knight romance,” went one criticism in the Noughties.

Dodai Stewart, in a post on the website Jezebel entitled, ‘Taylor Swift is a Feminist’s Nightmare,’ wrote: “For Taylor, 15 means falling for a boy and dreaming of marrying him. My 15 was more like: Flirt with this one, make out with that one, try a cigarette, get drunk, lie to your parents, read some Anais Nin; [Swift’s] image of being good and pure plays right into how much the patriarchy fetishises virginity, loves purity, and celebrates women who know their place as delicate flowers.”

Maybe a more important point that these critics are missing is that if Anais Nin was around today she’d probably be writing lyrics like those in Revenge or

All Too Well and putting them to music so we could tune in to MTV to hear about her tortured love life.

The question of Taylor’s tortured love life has become almost an international obsession. Last month, she was asked by Rolling Stone if she had ever been in love. The answer from the girl who has been romantically entwined to various degrees with Joe Jonas, Taylor Lautner, John Mayer, Jake Gyllenhaal, Harry Styles and Conor Kennedy, was typically Taylor in its Jane Austen melodrama: “Not real love. Not the kind that lasts.” Boo hoo.

I ask Taylor if she will ever run out of break-ups to write about.

“I would probably run out of break-ups to write about if I stopped having breakups,” she laughs, “because my music is very autobiographical. But, on this new album, one theme that you will see that has kind of faded is the idea of the guy, the boy, has faded into the background. It is not as much about writing about a boy or a guy or losing a guy. It is more reflective on relationships and the lessons I’ve learned and taken away from those relationships.” What lessons are those? “There are a lot of them,” answers the young woman who once called one of her songs We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together. “You heard a song called Out Of The Woods [on the new album] which is kind of about me realising that there is no happily ever after. It is a constant struggle. Every day is, ‘ Are we going to make it till tomorrow?’ What kind of guys are you drawn to? “Right now?” she asks “I haven’t been looking. I haven’t dated in a really long time.”

But, generally, some people when they are in a bad space will be drawn to partners who accentuate or reinforce their low self-esteem. Or if they are in a good space, they will be drawn to someone who brings them up.

“I don’t know,” she says, “I have always had that — you dream about the ideal situation, if you ever were to meet someone and it were to be right. I think if it were to be right, it would be someone who is very sunny and bright. I think that would be the ideal match. But then again, I have no idea. I don’t know. I don’t know anything! I haven’t been dating in a really long time. I haven’t been looking for a very long time. I’ve just been focusing on music and my friends. I think it is really important for twentysomethings to take some time to themselves and figure out who they are on their own terms.”

I say to Taylor that if all her lyrics — with the exception of this new album — are autobiographical, then she seems to be meeting the wrong guys on a regular basis?

“I think, I have thought about this a lot, I may have been mistaking my idea of always challenging myself in my career for always looking for someone who is a constant challenge in my personal life. If I was to put some sort of psychological spin on it, it would be that,” she says. “I had ambition in my career and, you know, you’re looking for someone who always seems like an obstacle, a challenge, and that is not necessarily what will end up making you happy.” Why not just fall in love, Taylor? “You’re full of these questions that have no answers! Would you be able to answer that question?”

Give me a glass of whiskey and I’ll have a go, I say. She laughs.

Did you really call Ed Sheeran a substitute boyfriend? “No! Who said that?” She roars with laughter again. “I never called him that. I called him my best friend. He is one of my best friends. But it has never occurred to either of us to date. We would never do it.” I ask her about All Too Well. “That was a song I wrote that was very brutally honest and kind of,” she pauses, “kind of hard to release because putting that out into the world is kind of exposing people to the fact that you’ve got your heart sort of ripped out when you were 19, 20. But telling the story of it from beginning to end was kind of like a way of saying goodbye to it for me.” And healing yourself as well. “Oh yeah! Ab-so-lutely.” I say that I used to love Jake Gyllenhaal’s movies but when I listen to the words of

All Too Well (all together now: “You call me up again just to break me like a promise”) I will never, ever, ever, watch Donnie Darko — the 2001 supernatural classic starring Mr Gyllenhaal, his sister Maggie and Drew Barrymore — again.

Although she has never publicly admitted that Mr Gyllenhaal was the subject of the song — until now, effectively, to LIFE — Taylor cracks up laughing for the trillionth time in the evening.

“Oh my god! You and I are going to be best friends. We are just going to hang out! We are just going to go to Ireland and hang out in a pub.” I’m 47. You’re 24. I’m married. “Bring the family We’ll talk about life.” Taylor Swift’s new album ‘1989’ is out tomorrow on Big Machine Records

#Haylor Media #Taylor Swift #1989 #Print Interviews

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tigris-types · 10 months ago

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Okay! Finally getting around to posting this! Here is my Monster High character Tabitha Tanari, daughter of the balor librarian Ben Lore Tanari and the werecat professor Delilah Devon-Rex!

G1 is on the left, and G3 is on the right.

For G1, her outfit is a witchy dress, boots, leggings, and a belt made out of skulls. Since demons are summoned by witches and have cats as their familiars, I thought a witchy vibe would work for her "killer style". The more specific parts of her scaritage come out with the tanari/balor side being represented by the lightning on the sleeves, the fire on the leggings, and the belt made out of skulls. The skirt being torn and ripped alludes to the werecat scaritage as werebeasts often have a rip and tear motif somewhere in their outfit.

For G3, since any character can be a witch, the witchy vibes became more of a character trait than an outfit choice. The outfits for G3 are more of those of actual teens than of fashion models, so she has a much more casual look. Designs get simplified a lot more in G3 too. So the purple dress becomes a long shirt and purple hoodie, the skull belt has only one skull, the boots are more practical, and finally generic ripped jeans. A flame design is on the shoes and a storm cloud is added to the shirt to convey the demon side of her scaritage. The werecat side comes through with the ripped on the jeans, and the tiger stripes on the jacket sleeves. Her longer striped fingerless gloves in G1 have been simplified to plain gloves that just cover the hands. The colors have also been brightened and the markings have been simplified compared to G1.

Alright, I have more chores to do, so I think I'll leaves friends and personality for another post. Basically this design came from not having any shame about copying various styles from existing MH characters. When I was younger I would have been too scared to try a character like this for fear of just copying my favorite characters, but by combining the elements that I liked and recoloring them? She does look like her own character.

But here's a question, what 3 characters inspired this look? More for G1 than G3, G3 is all original.

#monster high #drawn on my 3ds #tigris types art #tigris-types art #tabitha tanari #monster high oc

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purple-goo-writes · 4 years ago

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Congrats, It’s a Girl

Summary: There was many things the Justice League expected- A new villain every other week, an old villain raising hell every other week, another alien invasion and at least one apocalypse a year. They were not expecting for their Watchtower to be hacked by a twelve year old girl in order to speak with her genetic donor.

Part 1

Marinette Luthor may be only five years old, but she was far from stupid. After all her Father claimed she had a high IQ level and that it would only grow as she got older. And after having meet other children her own age, Marinette was inclined to agree that her IQ was higher then those children even if her vocal skills were limited at the moment. Though from the mutterings of her ‘Nanny’ Mercy, Marinette was not a normal child to begin with even if she looked and grew like a normal child.

But back to her original point, Marinette Jai Li Luthor was not stupid. She knew something was strange about the boy her Father had brought back to the manor. She would estimate that his age would be that off possibly 12 judging by his height, though his attitude made her think of someone older. It was rather hard to tell unless she got closer. Though was she also noticed is that her and the boy shared alarming characteristics. While they weren’t exact copies of the other due to Marinette inheriting her facial features from her Chinese mother- the two of them shared many of the same looks- such as electric blue eyes, golden tan skin, black hair (though hers had an odd blue tint) and similar facial bone structure from what she could tell. This was suspicious and Marinette could smell something was fishy. Her Father looked rather nervous as he talked to the boy unaware of his five year old daughter creeping closer.

Perhaps the boy would be worth getting to know as he had spotted her and was looking rather amused behind her Father at her without giving Marinette away. Yes, perhaps she would keep this playmate around he seemed fun. She tilted her head to the side for max cuteness making sure the ringlets of her pigtails fell just right after making sure her dress was free of any dirt. Clutching her ugly monster plushie close, Marinette tugged on her father’s pants leg, making sure to give him her best puppy eyes, as she spoke pouting slightly at the lisp in her voice, “Father, who dis?” This was why she rarely spoke, no matter how well her sentences were formulated within her mind, it was as if they lost a majority of their words and meaning when exiting her mouth.

It was annoying.

Lex chuckled softly as he looked down at his young daughter, before leaning down in order to pick her up. Easily settling Marinette against his hip in a practiced move, before turning back to the clone, Superboy, “This is Superboy, Marinette. He will be staying with us for a while.”

Both children studied each other with intense gazes, heads tilting from side to side before finally Superboy spoke, “She looks like me.”

“Merely a coincidence, Superboy,” Lex grimaced before trying to change the subject only to be interrupted by Marinette, “We alike...Is he bwother?”

“No, he is the genetic clone of Superman,” the billionaire sighed already having a feeling where this was going.

Two pairs of sharp blue eyes turned to him and Marinette’s narrowed showing just how fast her frightening intelligence was. “Am I clone?” The five year old asked, while squinting at her father and Superboy, “And why name Supewboy?” “...” Lex let out a long sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose, sometimes raising a genius child was hard. Though it did help that he didn’t have to simplify his explanations, “You are not a clone, Marinette. You were, however, genetically modified in utero in order for a third of your DNA to be that of Superman’s. Meaning technically he is your father in a way, though more of a genetic donor. Unfortunately, so far, the only traits you share are his looks.”

Marinette was silent as she took all this in, head tilted to the side as she looked at her brother (or would it be Father given he is a Clone of her genetic Donor she wondered...No that would get too confusing. Brother would do for now). Yes her brother. Before nodding gravely, “Vewy well, bwother needs a name.”

She wiggled out of Lex’s hold before grabbing a stunned Superboy’s hand and dragging him away to her room once she was back on the ground, “Come we find name.”

After all it was not every day that your father brought home a new big brother. And Luthors only have the best, which included names.

#biodad lex luthor #genetic donor clark kent #maribat #Fixed it

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mystic-monkey-express · 3 years ago

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Veselko Pyrokinetic Ability:

Amber Veselko, a second-class fire soldier, and scientist for Company 8, has a 2nd-gen ability; an ability that allows her to copy and mimic another pyrokinetics ability once hit with it.

The form and style of the power get simplified but the attack damage is still the same.

Veselko can absorb and mimic almost any kind of flame as long as it's not too hot and not too strong that it would shatter her body. Another limitation she has is the fact that she can't absorb plasma. Plasma being too hot and partially electricity-based for her body to handle. However, she can absorb and could potentially even mimic Kurono's smoke. Which that in itself comes with pros and cons that will be discussed later in this.

There's no set amount of fire and power Veselko can store within her body. As long as she doesn't fall unconscious she can store and maintain it. A downside to this is the fact that she has to let out and use the ability after every mission. If she doesn't do that before she either goes unconscious or falls asleep the flames and ability she absorbs will immediately all fire at once. Causing extreme stress on her body as well as setting everything around her on fire.

With Kurono's smoke ability Veselko has the easiest time absorbing it and it's one of the only abilities (until after the 3 month time-skip) that Veselko can absorb passively. Due to the smoke being more airier than flames if Veselko activates her ability while in the middle of it the smoke will automatically start getting sucked into her body. Making a lot of Kurono's attacks unusable.

However, the major con of this is the fact that the smoke will start to suffocate her faster than anybody else. So once she's exposed to this there's only a limited amount of time before she passes out due to the lack of oxygen. The effects of this can last a couple of days until Veselko is back in working order.

To help utilize her ability more, Veselko frequently forgoes any form of armor; leaving her frequently to be slightly more under-dressed than a typical fire soldier. Funnily enough not as under-dressed as Tamaki Kotatsu but she does forgo the neck coverage, gloves and frequently takes off her bunker coat.

Due to her ability and how it works Veselko is more in charge of making sure the non-powers (I.E. Licht, Vulcan, and Sister Iris) are safe from harm.

Well, primarily Head Scientist Viktor Licht since he has a habit of getting into near-death situations.

Spoilers for Anime Only Watchers:

UPDATE AS OF DAY ** OF THE MONTH **** YEAR 198 OF THE SOLAR ERA:

Due to Adolla merging more and more with our world every pyrokinetic who is a third-gen or second-gen has their pyrokinetic ability getting stronger. Amber Veselko included.

Due to the oncoming merger, Veselko can now absorb and mimic a pyrokinetic user just by skin-on-skin contact. Basically nulling the ability.

The same restrictions still apply, however.

#si: amber veselko #fire force self insert #slowly but surely I will post more Veselko things #Veselko good #self insert community #exhibit car

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pi-cat000 · 4 years ago

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Girl who made the night sky: p5

NOTE: so I started writing this again this year but didn’t get very far. Here’s what I wrote if anyone was interested. I might post it on ao3 as well, not sure.

Summery: To return home Shikako splits herself infinitely across dimensions. A fault in one of the splits results in a discorporated Shikako stranded in the Naruto canon-verse.

Part 3, Part 4

Her alarm goes off just as the sun begins to peak between the buildings opposite her apartment block. Sakura roles over to glare at the thin beam of light filtering through her window, catching in floating dust particles. Somewhere in the dark of her mind Kako shifts with amusement, prodding at her sluggish thoughts, pushing them into a state of awareness.

/Morning./ The word is said slowly, echoing with a lazy laughter. Sakura scowls, flopping over to hit the snooze on her alarm, yawning. She is still getting used to waking up at dawn and is thus completely reliant on her alarm to shake her from her sleep. A real shinobi would have enough control to wake up whenever they desired.

/Practise makes perfect,/ Kako says as if guessing the direction of her thoughts.

“Easy for you to say,” Sakura mutters, dragging herself up and yawning again. There is more idle amusement from Kako.

/Have a good day./

Slowly, the impression of Kako fades into the neutral baseline of just-Sakura, signalling that the other was asleep.

“I will,” Sakura comments in her renewed alone-ness.

Kako now slept during the day, leaving Sakura to her own devices. Whatever that not-dream had been, it had disturbed Kako enough that she now spent most of her ‘awake’ time watching over Sakura while she slept. This left only a few scant hours in the evening for discussion, conversation and hanging out together. Despite only having Kako around for a few months, Sakura already misses the other’s presence. Though their interactions had always been limited, reduced to scattered sentences and the occasional emotion, just having Kako listen to her ramblings or watch as she walked to and from the academy, studied or completed whatever other task she had set herself. Funny how much of a difference just having someone around and interested made even the most mundane parts of life.

Discouraged by her own solitary thoughts, Sakura contemplates returning to bed and sleeping an extra hour. Not like Kako would know if she did. The notion passes quickly. Kako would be disappointed and the thought of disappointing Kako make her sad. Also, she was pretty sure it was dangerous for her and Kako to sleep at the same time. Sakura’s not an idiot. Even if Kako had yet to outright say it, she could put two and two together. Something bad had happened during the nightmare other than just giving them a fright.

...

The rest of the morning progresses according to her new schedule. She dresses and packs her bag. With her collection of notebooks steadily increasing, it was starting bulge in the middle. The sooner she figured out how to properly make storage scrolls the better.

Next, she shuffles down to the kitchen, pulling together a meal with the correct amount of nutrients. Now Sakura is waking up before her mom, she has been forced to plan her own meals. Kako had been very helpful in that department, pushing her towards the type of diet she would need to help with muscle growth and keep her energy levels high throughout the day. It didn’t taste particularly nice, but it was functional, and she couldn’t help but wonder if the other non-clan kids knew about this sort of stuff. Meal planning was something they’d touched on in class but not something Sakura had bothered applying to her day-to-day life. Sure, she’d always tried to eat healthy but, like most things ninja related, there was a lot more to physical conditioning than just that being healthy. It had only been a week but she has already noticed a marked improvement in her daily energy levels.

...

Sakura closes the door her apartment just as she begins to hear her parents start to shuffle around, preparing for their own workday. She takes a second to breath in the cool morning air before heading towards the old academy training grounds.

When she arrives the training area is empty like it usually is. Not a lot of academy students bothered coming out so early, especially not to this training spot which was in an awkward location. She hadn’t even known it existed till Kako pointed it out.

Another yawn.

A long sigh.

Sakura begins her warmup stretches, trying not to let the silence of her own mind bother her too much.

She is maybe halfway through the revised exorcize routine that Kako put together for her, when movement at the edge of the training field catches her attention.

It startles her enough that she almost trips through the final set. If Kako were awake Sakura might have had some warning as Kako was usually the one to sense and alert her to people approaching unexpectedly. Maybe she should work on her spatial awareness or lack thereof. She’ll add it to the list.

As it is, she thankfully doesn’t trip and embarrass herself because the person approaching is very familiar.

“Sasuke-kun!” She can’t help but call an enthusiastic greeting, waving. Sasuke freezes on approach, staring his usual blank stare. He blinks, expression shifting ever so slightly to surprise. Well, as surprised as someone as cool as Sasuke can be.

“Hello!” What were the chances of running into Sasuke outside of school hours? Practically zero. Ino would have a fit.

Saskue about-faces and walks in the opposite direction.

“Wait!” She starts to follow as the other quickly disappears into the trees encircling the training grounds.

“Do you want to train…” She hesitates, slowing, “with me…?”

Does she want Sasuke to see her huffing and puffing as she tries to make it past her tenth lap of the field? Her stamina is less than impressive and Sasuke always placed in her class’s top three when it came to combat and physical ability. She stops following. No way was she letting Sasuke see her like this.

If Kako was right, and she usually was, she would start seeing a physical improvement in another weeks time.

She pouts, trying not to feel too unmotivated. Maybe…hopefully, she’ll see Sasuke out here again and ask to train then? Then she wouldn’t be a total embarrassment. Yes, a prefect plan. She resumes her exercises. Before Kako had come along, catching up to Sasuke would have seemed like an insurmountable task. Now Sakura’s seen what a real shinobi is capable of and said shinobi believes she is capable of the same things, it doesn’t seem as impossible. Goal reaffirmed, she tackles the rest of the morning with renewed energy.

...

Her day progresses as per usual. Sakura sits in class, takes notes, and revises on past topics when Iruka deviates between teaching and crowd control. When lunch break starts, she takes it as an opportunity to sit around the side of the building and examine her sealing notes. Away from her noisy peers, she has a chance to sort through all the stuff she’s been learning and figure out what questions she wants to ask Kako in those few hours they have together in the afternoon.

“Why do these seals use a bunch of descriptive kanji while this one is just a collection of stylistic lines?”

She mutters to herself, scanning the copies of Kako’s seal and her copies of Iruka’s notes on storage scrolls. The storage scrolls are easy enough to understand. The symbols and lines follow a logical progression, building on the basics she’d learnt while studying explosive tags. Kako’s seal is different…very different. Instead of easy to follow connections between the function and kanji, Kako’s seal is a simple circle, spiral and tomoki. Nothing else…No hint at what the lines might mean.

….

...

/Seal is collapsed…simplified. Needs expanding./

Is Kako’s somewhat confusing answer. After spending most of her lunch, then the following lesson mulling the question over, this is less than satisfying.

“What do you mean by needs expanding?” There is a long pause and Sakura waits for Kako to find the right words and energy to talk. Kako could almost communicate in full sentences now but it was still somewhat stilted.

/Not the full seal…simplified…smaller./

Sakura frowns, staring at her desk. Strewn across it are piles of notes, several bottles of ink she’s been infusing with charkha, and blank sealing paper. She had been half asleep at the time but she vaguely recalls how, on the night of Kako’s arrival, the seal had been a lot bigger, stretching across almost all her visible skin.

“You mean this is only a small part of the seal and there’s more that I can’t see.” A wave of warm encouragement has Sakura continuing, “No, it’s more than that…all the seal is here it’s just…. just smaller…symbolic of the larger seal.”

/Compressed./ There’s a warm swell of pride like she’s just understood some tricky concept Kako’s been trying to impart

“Well …then how do I study it? How do I un-compress it?”

/An expansion seal./

She groans, “So…I need another seal to look at this seal.”

/Hmmm./

“Let me guess: That’s complicated as well.”

/Basics first./

Sakura rests her head on the desk, sighing.

#DOS #dreaming of sunshine #Shikako Nara #Alternate Universe - Gardens #wafflelate's gardens verse #sharing a mind #sakura #naruto #fanfiction of fanfiction of fanfiction #end of year WIPs

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howaminotinthestrokesyet · 4 years ago

Text

Behind The Album: Load/Reload

Metallica’s sixth and seventh studio albums were released in June 1996 and November 1997 respectively. The two albums can be taken into consideration as almost a double album as most of the songs on each album were all written around the same time. The records would see the band venture completely away from thrash metal into the realm of hard rock, blues, southern rock, and even country. A majority of Metallica’s loyal fan base would be completely alienated by the album and the new Metallica image brought out during its promotion. James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich once again acted as the primary song writers for the record, which began at Ulrich’s house in California in 1994. They would bring in almost 30 demos to Plant Studios when recording began in 1995, so the decision was made to split it into two separate albums. The artist that influenced the songs on Load included Kyuss, Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Primus, ZZ Top, Pantera, Corrosion of Conformity, Ted Nugent, Aerosmith, Oasis, Alanis Morissette, and Garth Brooks. Lars would have this to say about the criticism towards their new musical direction. “This album and what we're doing with it – that, to me, is what Metallica are all about: exploring different things. The minute you stop exploring, then just sit down and fucking die.” For this album, Hetfield and Kirk Hammett began to experiment with blues style riffs and guitar styles, while Ulrich began to simplify his drumming style getting rid of the double bass drumming he had utilized on every album to date. Hetfield’s lyrics abandoned any consideration of politics or society at large, but instead became very personal about his depression and sadness regarding his late mother and Cliff Burton. Other tracks focus on his own depression in dealing with these issues. Metallica was trying to gain a looser vibe with the music on this record, so Hammett for the first time on an album played rhythm guitar. For this record itself, the run time comes in at almost 80 minutes making it the longest LP the band ever produced. They needed to cut out one minute of the “Outlaw Torn” in order for the cd to play correctly without skipping. The back cover of this album had this explanation on it: “When we were doing the final sequencing of the 'LOAD' album, the record company told us that we couldn't go a second past 78:59, or your CD's wouldn't play without potentially skipping. With our 14 songs, we were running about 30 seconds over, and something had to give, so the cool-ass jam at the end of 'Outlaw' got chopped.”

The cover of the album was a photograph created by Andres Serrano that combines bovine blood and his own semen in between two sheets of plexiglass called Semen and blood III. The album does not specifically name the photograph, but instead only refers to the photographer's name. James Hetfield hated the use of this picture as the cover. He would say, “Lars and Kirk were very into abstract art, pretending they were gay. I think they knew it bugged me. It was a statement around all that. I love art, but not for the sake of shocking others. I think the cover of Load was just a piss-take around all that. I just went along with the make-up and all of this crazy, stupid crap that they felt they needed to do.” The album also saw Metallica remake its logo, an alternative symbol the ninja star, cut their long hair short, dress in designer clothes, and wear eyeliner. Once again, Hetfield absolutely despised these changes to their brand and image. “Lars and Kirk drove on those records. The whole 'We need to reinvent ourselves' topic was up. Image is not an evil thing for me, but if the image is not you, then it doesn't make much sense. I think they were really after a U2 kind of vibe, Bono doing his alter ego. I couldn't get into it. The whole, 'Okay, now in this photoshoot we're going to be '70s glam rockers.' Like, what? I would say half – at least half – the pictures that were to be in the booklet, I yanked out. The whole cover thing, it went against what I was feeling.” The backlash from their fans was significant as they felt completely betrayed by the band's new image. Years would pass before they would gain the trust of the diehard fans once again.

Load would represent a commercial success for the band as it stayed number one on the Billboard 200 chart for four weeks. And in its first week, the band moved 680,000 copies, making for the most successful week in the band's history. The record would go on to be certified as five times platinum selling 5 million copies. The critics were mixed on the album noting the change to hard rock. Rolling Stone liked the record. "The foursome dams the bombast and chugs half-speed ahead, settling into a wholly magnetizing groove that bridges old-school biker rock and the doomier side of post-grunge '90s rock.” Melody Maker was not as enthusiastic about the record saying that there were moments on the album where you needed to ask the question, has Metallica gone soft? AllMusic found the record to be boring, the same song over and over, and poorly played. Lars Ulrich would say this about the mixed reviews towards the album. "With Load, it was disappointing that some people's reaction to the music was biased by how they dealt with the pictures – the hair and all that crap. People have come up to me years afterwards and said, 'I never gave the record a fair chance because I couldn't get beyond Jason Newsted wearing eyeliner.' But 'The Outlaw Torn', some of that shit is pretty fucking awesome."

The follow up album Reload would be released in November 1997 with similar commercial success as it debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 chart selling 436,000 copies in its first week. This would be the last album that Jason Newsted would play on with the band. As noted previously, the original intention was to release the songs as a double album, but then it was decided that doing so many songs might have issues. Kirk Hammett would say this about the recording sessions with producer Bob Rock. “We were gonna do them both as a double album, but we didn't want to spend that long in the studio. Also, if we did a double album, it would have been a lot more material for people to digest, and some of it might have gotten lost in the shuffle." Reload became the first album that the band featured another singer as Marianne Faithfull lended her vocals to “The Memory Remains.” Once again, the band used a photograph from Andres Serrano mixing bovine blood and his semen. Critics for the most part liked the album, but they did note that the music seemed to be heavily influenced by southern rock. One of the big takeaways for some critics was the fact that Reload felt like the leftovers from the Load sessions. This also showed in the fact that the record was only certified platinum three times.

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diyunho · 5 years ago

Text

The Joker x Reader - “Trapped” Part 3

Almost one year ago, someone tried to kill The Joker in a speeding car and Y/N pushed him out of the way, getting hit instead. With a fractured skull and broken bones, she was out of business for 6 months; when she finally recovered, The Queen of Gotham wasn’t the same anymore. Trapped inside her own mind and exhibiting severe cognitive impairment, Y/N’s life switched upside down without any hope of ever returning to normal.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 4 Part 5

Same day, later in the evening

“What are you doing, Pumpkin?” The Joker crawls next to you although he has an idea about why you look upset.

You’re on your tummy scribbling on a piece of paper and he can tell you are concentrating hard while working on the current project: writing down your name. Only got the first three letters then the rest went blank.

“I….I can’t think…” you intensely stare at the blue pen in between your fingers.

“Of course you can!” J reaches over so he can guide your arm since it’s clear you need help. “There you go… done. Now try to copy it bellow, alright?”

“Hm?”

“Try again Princess,” he taps on the sheet and watches Y/N struggling to imitate the word. “Well done!” The King of Gotham praises. “Wanna give it a shot with a few more simple words?”

“Mmmm…” you debate. “OK?...”

You analyze The Joker’s movements as he depicts four letter words, one of them getting your attention in particular.

“Love?” you smile, happy you deciphered the meaning.

“Yes, a basic…”

“Love?” you scoot over, more and more excited and it clicks for your boyfriend.

“It’s just an example for you to exercise and relearn how to write, understand? It doesn’t mean anything!”

You giggle and touch his nose with yours.

“Love!”

“No Pumpkin! I don’t love you, how did you get such atrocity from my note??!! It has no hidden meaning! I barely, from very afar, remotely, not even similar to love, sort of like you and that’s it!”

You snicker and quickly slide to grab the yellow teddy bear, whispering in its ear:

“Love.”

“Aren’t you listening Princess?? Don’t start fake rumors!!”

Still…Y/N lives on her own little planet and her damaged brain grasped a wonderful concept despite The Clown vehemently dismissing his actions.

“Serves me right for being supportive,” he grumbles and resorts to diversion, the best weapon against your new found logic.

“Wanna read to me?” he points at the pile of children’s books resting on the nightstand: they are the best to use in your present circumstance.

“… … Read?... ” you ask, confused.

“Here,” J picks a random publication and gives it to you.

Might as well fully take advantage.

“Spoil me!” he buries his cheeks in your cleavage, guiding your free hand towards his green locks.

You never figured out how he doesn’t suffocate with his face glued to your skin; sometimes he sleeps like that for hours. Must be a special talent.

“The … ummm… the…. The duck…” you read the first page and massage his scalp, frowning at the words you can’t make sense of. “Cross… … crossed?...”

“Yeah,” The Joker’s mumbled voice agrees.

“… the… g-glass…” you stutter at the sentence.

“Grass,” J corrects you.

“Hm?...”

“Grass Pumpkin, not glass.”

“Ummm… grass…” you continue to read the best way you can and he rectifies your errors until no more sounds emerge: The King is softly purring, a clear indication he’s dreaming.

You toss the book on the floor, fed up with the difficult task of organizing your thoughts; pampering him is better. You slowly tilt his head backwards so you can kiss him: The Joker frowns in his daze and you pinch his butt, chuckling.

“What is it?” he opens one eye and you pull down on his boxers. “Princess, we had sex an hour ago. Do you think I run on batteries?” the complaint is fast to follow.

... … … Batteries?... …

You jump from the bed and stump to the closet, fumbling around for a couple of minutes before returning to a puzzled Clown.

You stretch the elastic of his underwear, dropping two batteries you snatched from the flashlight inside.

“How… how long do we w-wait?” you innocently ask.

The Joker bites his lip, attempting to contain himself yet he can’t: he bursts out laughing at your quirky solution while dragging you on top of him.

“You’re the funniest and smartest person I know, Pumpkin!” he cracks up, actually convinced he’s telling the truth. “Who’s my clever girl, huh?”

He’s talking about a girl again…What girl?...

Y/N peeks behind her and J reminds his baffled half:

“For God’s sake, Princess! I’m talking about you; you’re my girl! Can you get my phone?” he gestures at his mobile ringing by your pillow.

You give the cell to J, ignoring his conversation with Frost: you keep kissing him with the sole purpose of getting undivided affection.

“I guess Adam is here to pick up the cars you damaged,” he finally ends his chat. “Let’s go supervise the process. Don’t be disappointed, Pumpkin, we’ll have fun later. It’s your fault for destroying my collection!”

****************

The Joker watches his crew sweeping the concrete in the garage: broken glass, pieces of metal and debris scattered on the pavement after his vehicles were hauled inside huge trucks in order to be transported to Adam’s workshop for repairs.

“Thanks a lot, Y/N!” he growls, frustrated.

“Y-you’re welcome,” you serenely reply without a care in the universe.

“You’re the worst thing that ever happened to me, Princess!” he huffs at your indifference.

“Love,” you confess to the fluffy toy squished in your embrace.

“I heard that and it’s an aberration! Why do you keep persisting with this nonsense?! I’m literally stating the opposite!” J admonishes but who’s listening to him?

Not Y/N.

“Nolan is texting me,” he changes subject. “He wants me to meet him at his warehouse to inspect the boxes of ammo for the deal. Will you accompany me?”

“Hm?”

“Car ride?” The King of Gotham simplifies his request.

“U-hum!” you nod, preparing to enter the purple Lamborghini which luckily wasn’t in the garage when you smashed J’s cars.

“Frost, if you see me parked up the street in the driving alley, don’t come investigate, got it? This woman’s been pestering me for extracurricular activities, might not make it inside the mansion.”

“Of course, sir!” Jonny finds it wise to consent to his boss’s rambling.

“Tell everyone: if the Lamborghini’s rockin’, don’t come knockin’!”

**************

You’re sitting on J’s lap, completely blocking the arrangements happening at the table: you’re more preoccupied with your game than whatever it is they are negotiating about.

“What are you playing, Y/N?” Nolan curiously inquires because your thumbs are surely moving at a crazy speed on your cell’s screen.

“Hm?” you stop and gaze his way.

“What are you playing?” the man repeats.

“Mmmmm… Tetrixx Bricks.”

“What level are you on?” Nolan leans over, his eyes getting big at the revelation. “Holy shit, Y/N! How did you make it this far??! I’ve been striving to pass level 98 for a month!”

“She’s smart, that’s how!” your boyfriend sassily underlines.

“Do you think that you can help me?” the guy slides his phone in front of you.

“I’m sorry, is this a gaming party or a business matter?!” The Joker scoffs.

“Well, we’re pretty much done: we accepted the terms, we just have to move the merchandise in the morning.”

You are already matching the colorful blocks on Nolan’s game, his face ecstatic when the obnoxious song announces with great fanfare: “Level Up!”

“Holy cow!!!!” he shouts and you return his phone. “Thank you!”

“Hey Y/N,” one of the mobster’s henchmen dares to voice his demand. “Would you help me too? I’m stuck on level 76.”

“I’m dead on 105,” another goon mumbles under his breath, stepping in the line forming to your left.

J would normally cut off this useless waste of his precious time yet he can’t deny the gratification building up in his heart: heavens knows how it feels to be trapped inside your own mind and his girl has definitely battled unimaginable odds to be where she’s at right now.

Living with cognitive impairment is not easy, but she’s still here and it beats the alternative.

“Good job, Pumpkin!” The Clown boasts at the long string of cell phones parading through your fingers while you aid Nolan’s team leveling up on Tetrixx Bricks.

And somehow his hands are holding you tighter, not even bored with the random outcome of his meeting.

**************

You escaped on the terrace for a break and J is discussing the last details with your host: tomorrow you have a routine checkup, thus he has to wrap it up soon.

“Out of my way, half-wit!” Derek aka Nolan’s oldest son pushes you. Would he have done it if you were the same individual from almost a year ago? Nope. Apparently he believes he’s entitled to take advantage of Y/N since she’s alone outside.

“Why did Mister Joker bring you anyway?” he lights up a cigarette, annoyed. “Stupid monosyllabic bitch!” he ogles your summer dress, swiftly lifting it. “Are you wearing diapers?” he chuckles as you walk backwards, trying to process what he’s throwing at you. “Come on, show me!” he approaches and carefully scouts the premises to ensure you two don’t have company.

Perhaps the neurons in your brain are overcharged for the moment; nevertheless, they warn of imminent altercation: the dude’s a total douchebag.

“Are you shy?” Derek grins. “C’mon, lemme see!! Oooohh…fuuuuck…” he bends over in pain when your knee unexpectedly kicks him in the crotch: you used all your strength and he drops down, curling up in a ball. “God…dammit!” Derek shrieks at the defense he didn’t anticipate.

“I…I’m not wearing diapers!” you stammer and because he landed on the edge of the pool you roll him in the water also.

The loud splash makes The Joker wave at you, glad he eventually found you: he’s been searching around the warehouse for the last 5 minutes.

“There you are! Quit playing around, Pumpkin; we have a swimming pool at home!”

You rush by his side eager to bail before the asshole pops up from the bottom of the pond.

“Sushi for dinner?” J suggests and Y/N is not the type of individual to reject one of her favorite dishes.

“I…I love sushi,” you smile elbowing him. “Love.”

“Don’t start with me again!” The King barks at your obvious hint.

*************

“Are you eating the last piece?” he glares at your salmon roll.

“No,” you offer the treat to him. “You…you need it more,” Y/N verbalizes her concern regarding his well-being.

“Can’t disagree, Pumpkin. You exhausted me you naughty girl,” J pretends to be super tired. “What can I do? Princess wants, Princess gets,” he inhales, resigned.

You’re not focusing on his whining: frankly, your intellect has been challenged enough for today. You cuddle in his arms while he chews on his food and watch TV without paying attention to the movie.

“Don’t forget tomorrow morning you have your doctor’s appointment,” J mentions. “I have to stay and wait for the guns I purchased from Nolan; you’ll have to manage without me. I’ll send an escort, deal?”

“U-hum.”

“Don’t yawn, Pumpkin. I’m the one that should yawn,” The Joker scratches his thigh. “This move sucks,” he pouts and turns off the TV. “I have a better idea,” he chooses a kid’s book from the stack. “Read to me.”

You open the textbook and although your brain is overwhelmed, you still make an effort for his sake.

“Mmm… Rainy… sky… Skies?...”

“Yup,” he turns on his side and nuzzles in your hair.

“Float over…hmm… t-town…”, your voice echoes in the room, soothing a worn out Joker.

Strange he can’t properly rest unless you read to him: after all J barely, from very afar, remotely, not even similar to love, sort of likes you.

Also read: MASTERLIST

You can follow me on Ao3 and Wattpad under the same blog name: DiYunho.

#the joker x reader #the joker imagine #the joker fanfiction #the joker jared leto #the joker suicide squad #jokerleto #joker #joker fanfiction #joker imagine #joker suicide squad #dc #dcu #mister joker #mister j #Mistah J

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finleyjayne · 5 years ago

Text

Break A Leg

{Chapter 1: Auditions}

Summary: After your accident, everything in your life changed. Your shared dream of being on Broadway with your best friend, Amanda, was over. But just because YOU don’t think you want the same things in life doesn’t mean that your friend won’t see through you. Taking matters into her own hands, you end up at an audition you’re sure that you’ll fail since SHIELD Theater Company is known the world over for typecasting. And you don’t fit any of your typical actress types. Little do you know that the company’s new writer - nihilistic, pessimistic, and resident drunk; Bucky Barnes- is looking for someone out of their normal choices.

Characters: Female Reader, OFC Best Friend, Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, Bucky Barnes, and all your other favorite Marvel Characters, hopefully in the long run it will end with a Bucky Barnes/Reader ship.

Series Warnings: Guys, this is based on my own experiences within the Acting community after gaining weight and height after an accident. There will be fat-shaming, mentions of eating disorders, unhealthy expectations, unhealthy coping mechanisms, also like bias based on looks.

A/N:this originally was inspired by @star-spangled-man-with-a-plan s follower celebration challenge. I was given the opportunity to use the text prompt “No fucks given, Next please.” Thank you Star! Thank you Thank you. Also a big thanks to the lovely @cavillanche for giving me a gentle nudge to write for myself and for being an amazing sounding board.

"Come oooooon, Y/N. I don't care if you don't want to go out. I haven't seen you in what feels like literal months. That's saying something since you know we LIVE together. I won't take no as an answer." Your best friend, Amanda, said as she flopped on top of you.

Amanda burst into your bedroom this morning at way-to-fucking-early o'clock in the morning, on a warpath to get you to come out with her. It didn't matter to her that you were finally getting some sleep after working all-nighters for the last week. There was no way to ignore her either, her sunny personality and eager persistence would cause you to roll over in your grave if she wanted you to.

With a groan, you smothered your complaints behind a gasping wheeze. "Kay, Manda, where are we going?"

She rolled off of you with a high-pitched squeal and used the momentum to pull you out of bed. "Yay! I have so much planned. I was talking to my manager about how well we used to work as a pair on stage. I may have mentioned how much I would kill to be the Penny to your Tracy. Or the Meg to your Christine. The Judy to your Betty. The Glinda to your Elphaba." Her words started to fade into background noise as she milled on about the parts you had once wanted to play together.

The dream used to be that you both would move here, to New York, and play in all of the big theaters on Broadway together. Sadly, your broadway dreams were not as much of a reality as Amanda's were. And you were okay with that. You were thrilled for Amanda. Living vicariously through your best friend, helping her prepare for her shows while working as a Math tutor and Accountant for a local firm.

It didn't help that you weren't necessarily what people consider the typical standard of beauty. Standing just under six feet tall, a little plushy about the middle, and some nasty scar tissue leaving one of your legs in a constant state of ghostly paleness. Not that people notice since you tend to find yourself just as pale as the damaged tissue. After so many failed auditions, you figured your best life was lived outside of the theater. You were happy, and honestly, you are kinda glad that you are where you are.

"....So hurry up, I'll pick your outfit, we have an appointment with Rijah in half an hour." Amanda finished pushing you into the little cubical shower. When did she turn it on? Where are we going? Needless to say, you did what she asked and stuffed down your confusion, focusing on waking up more before you accompanied her to yet another one of her 'private' lessons with your pianist friend.

Thirty minutes later, you were dressed, primped, polished, and not all that much more awake. Amanda stuffed a binder of music into your hand as Elijah spread his copy over the lip of his pristinely kept upright. "You know this song, I think it will be perfect. A little overplayed, but with a fresh interpretation, they'll overlook it. All you have to do is sing. They are bound to cast you. I've worked with them before, and Director Rogers values skill over appearances. So we'll show them your ability, and he'll love you."

Looking at your rambling best friend, Your confusion amplifies. Your jaw cracks as you don't even try to stifle another yawn. You rub your eyes, not questioning her pushiness. "Uuuuhhhhh, okay?" You scan through the score, making note of the cut before looking to the triangular-shaped man sitting on the piano bench. Since you had already been taken through the typical vocal warm-ups by Amanda while she played dress up this morning. You smile at your expectant friend/accompanist. "Will you give me a playthrough with the melody line in it as a refresher, please, Rijah, Repeat, and I'll join you?"

"Of course," He said sweetly with a nod, turning to the keys and playing. Quietly you hummed along, mentally noting which registers each phrase should be sung in. Where the notes would be stretched, what you would use to your advantage. The accompaniment was simple, repeated strummed chords like most modern musical use. It gives freedom rhythmically when it comes to melodies. You could have fun with the piece. Smiling to yourself, you open your mouth and join the simplified accompaniment on the repeat.

When the second run-through finishes with a very extravagant arpeggiation. There is a moment of complete stillness as the resonance leaves the space. You are high on the feelings of intense emotion and absolute peace, yet somehow buzzing with unlocked energy. You miss this feeling, of connection with everything and nothing, The feeling of knowing that you did something right, it's heady, and it drives you to ask yourself why you ever stopped performing for a brief second. Amanda was always saying that she would drag you to an audition one of these days if you didn't get over yourself.

You are knocked out of your musical high by Amanda's enthusiastic clapping. Elijah looks at you with a smirk, opens his mouth, and is swiftly cut off by your friend. "God, Y/N. They won't be able to stop themselves as soon as you open your mouth!" You smile at her very biased opinions. Before she can get any crazy ideas like dragging me along to more than just her sessions with Elijah, you place the binder the music into her hands, "Why don't we go over Take me or leave me? After all, this is your rehearsal time, I'm just here to help you."

Amanda gives you a devious smirk as she nods. "Sure. You heard the woman, 'Rijah." She sends him a sly wink that you are too tired to really read much into. He just nods with a conspiratory smile and spreads the music for the RENT song over the previous.

"Whenever you are ready, ladies," He says when he's ready. Sighing internally, you place yourself back into your 'supportive friend' role, playing out the simplified blocking of Amanda's latest show.

Before you even fully realize it, your hour with 'Rijah was over, and Amanda was pulling you into a nearby taxi to your next destination. "If you don't let me at least have a coffee, I will not be held accountable for my actions, Woman." You warn your best friend as you eye her. You were starting to worry that you would need to be more awake for whatever plans she had for the rest of the day, You were now to the point where you could see her scheming something, but were still too out of it to figure out what it was.

She looked at you, trying to hide behind her mask of sickeningly-sweet innocence. I knew this look and all that it implied, and it worked to shake me into a slight panic of what she was walking me into. "I don't know what you mean, Y/N. I told you where we were going this morning, I promise this is the last stop before we can go home and you can sleep the rest of the night away. But if things go as I hope, we may have a repeat of this occasion sooner rather than later." The taxi pulls up at a building with a line heading out the door and around the corner.

That's when it hits you; That promise that Amanda had made to you all those months ago about dragging you to an audition wasn't just one of those 'get moving your ass, or I'll move it for you' speeches to get you out of bed, she was going to do it. No, she wasn't going to do anything. Amanda had already done it. She had gotten you into an audition.

You were suddenly wide awake. The knowledge that you were at an NYC Broadway audition, with your best friend hitting you like Celie's babies being alive in The Color Purple. It is unexpected but brought with it such excitement and fear all at once. You grasped onto Amanda's arm. "Amanda Jenivive Brendon, if this is some kind of joke, I don't know if I can forgive you. Please say this is not some kind of joke." The words are a desperate snarl. The hope pressing against your chest mixed with the fear that you jumped to incorrect conclusions was absolutely unbearable.

Amanda lets out a loving laugh before playfully scowling at you. "You really haven't been listening to a single thing I've said to you all day, have you?" The accusation was slightly bitter, but you knew she was laughing on the inside.

You squeeze her arm as your panic escalates. What am I going to do? How am I going to do this? What if they don't accept me just because of how I look? Shit, what am I going to do about a resume? Your vision blurs as you watch your best friend take your hand, leading you into the building past the line of girls and down a hallway to a dance studio styled room.

She leads you to a table set before the long wall of mirrors where a cute little redhead sits. Taking out a binder and handing her two sets of papers, "Hey Wanda, It's good to see you. Is it standard issue today?"

With a bright smile, Wanda accepts the papers. "Sure is Amanda, Do you need a copy of the company notes, or do you still know them by heart?"

Amanda chuckles before shaking her head, "I don't need a set, but you probably should give one to Y/N here, She could use the distraction of going through all the legal jargon while we wait."

Wanda's eyes grew wide as she turned to face you. "Y/N? As in 'shower singer Y/N'? Oh my Atlanta, Buck is going to lose his shit!" She jumps up and claps her hands. "I gotta go tell them!"

Amanda's hand snaps out to stop the woman from leaving. "Hey, none of that. I want to see their surprise when they hear her, especially after Tony's last casting rant."

Wanda immediately calms, her face splitting into a devious smirk. "OOOOooo, you are evil. I love it. Want me to film it for you?"

"It's like you read my mind," Amanda says, turning to see your expression of confusion. "Y/N, hey, Y/N/N? You in there?" She snaps her fingers lightly in your face. "Come on, girl. Wanda here is the Stage Manager for the SHIELD Theater Company."

"Wait, what?" Your voice cracks as your heart hammers even harder into your ribs. SHIELD Theater Company was one of the prominent troupes in New York. They were world-famous, they were the equivalent to The Royal Shakespeare Company in America. Were you at an audition for them? I thought you had to be part of a Union to even be considered for an audition with them!

"Really, Y/N? Still not paying attention? Come on, let's take a seat, stretch a bit. before they put us through our paces." Her eyes are bright with amusement as she sticks your number on the left side of your dress.

"I'm sorry? In my defense, I have had a total of 8 hours of sleep in the last week. So not the point, though!" You follow her to a set of chairs in the room. At her reproachful glare, when your voice breaches into a louder panicked screech, you take a few breaths before continuing in a harried whisper. " I mean, how am I even here? I am not Unionized, I haven't paid my dues for months! I don't have-" Your internal concerns continue to pour out of your mouth as Amanda slams her palm over your mouth.

"Hey, take a deep breath for me, Y/N. I need you to stay conscious... maybe I should have gotten you a coffee before we came, but you always complain that it makes your vocals all gummy." You rip her hand off of your mouth, eyes flashing with annoyance.

"Hey, you're the one who woke me from my first decent sleep this week, you can't really blame me for being a little lack-of-sleep drunk. And Coffee does make me phlegmy, but, again, that is not the point. The point is now that I know what you've set up, how can it be possible?" You whisper scream at the aggravatingly calm Amanda.

She rolled her eyes, "Well, I told you I was going to make our dreams come true, and I have had enough of your lame excuses about how you don't want to get back on the horse. But I saw you today. You WANT to be here. I've seen your secret tears when you go over our old cast photos. I hear you belting in the shower, so I've taken it upon myself to continue paying your dues to the AEA, and cashed in a favor with my agent to sign both of us up for this particular call."

Before you could make a rebuttal, seven people walked into the room that had slowly filled with fifty or so women while you were distracted. A short brunette plants himself in the center of the mirrored wall as the others take seats next to Wanda behind the white foldable table.

"Welcome, ladies, It is inspiring to see all of your beautiful faces. Before we start, I wanted to say a few words. First, thank you for taking the time to come and audition with us today.

"As you know, we only hold one set of auditions for the full season and look at that, all of you have made the initial cut for this season. Now it's time for the fine-tuning. Just know that even if you don't make it into our troupe this year, it's nothing personal. We have a specific set of personalities and abilities that we are looking for. If you don't make it this year with us, don't be afraid to come back next season.

"Now, to kick off this lovely party, let's have you line up, no particular order." The man smirks, and you gasp as you realize who the cocky man is: Tony Stark. You were being lined up for your first NYC cattle call by the eccentric, theatrical genius Tony Stark. You didn't know whether to be honored or terrified. He had a notorious reputation as a type-caster, and the only type he favored was the short, petite woman. FUCK.

Amanda dragged you into the line as she plastered a knowing smile on her face, "Just remember, sing. if you open your mouth, let that beautiful song sing from your heart."

"Sure, whatever you say," you reply to her whispered reassurances, holding your head up high as the legendary man started down the line."No, No, Yes, Yes, Yes, Sorry, Sure, Yes. Not this time, sweets. No, Sorry, Yes, Yes, Yes... " And so on until he reached Amanda. "Miss Brandon, nice to see you again. I look forward to hearing your choices today."

"Same to you, Mr. Stark, and I look forward to showing you my progress from last year."

"Good, good" His eyes crinkled as he smiled at her for another few seconds before skipping over you entirely, "yes, yes, yes, No…"

Well, it looks like you made it through the first cut, Amanda drags you back to where you left your purse and Amanda's backpack. She shares a conspiratory glance with Wanda, who just rolls her eyes. "Take a deep breath, then they'll start pulling us up in small groups to rotate through our song choices."

"Amanda, I'm pretty sure you voodooed Stark into overlooking me." Amanda just laughs.

"Sure, whatever you wanna tell yourself. I think it was just you being here, it's fate." Now it's your turn to roll your eyes at your friend's everlasting optimism.

Once Stark finishes going down the line, he takes his place back front and center. "Okay, ladies, now it's time for the fun bit. I'm sure you were all smart cookies and gave Wanda your music cuts along with your resumes, so now it's time to put those voices to work. We'll call you up in trios. Wanda will read out your name and call number, Thor will wait for you to count out a tempo before playing for you. Wanda?" Stark calls out the woman before taking his seat behind the table.

Wanda smiles brightly, calling out the first three people as the Hulking blond man stands from the table and makes his way to the piano. Wow, I hope I don't mess this up. It's not just my ass on the line anymore. You are brought back out of your thoughts by a gentle tug on your arm.

"Stop overthinking things, you'll do fine, Your resume is prime, your song choice is brilliant, and like they couldn't choose someone more theatre conscious if they had hired Idina Menzel."

You shudder at the actress's name, "I would hope so, she's terrible."

"Yet she had been a mainstay in theater for years."

"So what, just goes to show people don't necessarily want talent. They want beautiful mutants who can screech out songs without killing their vocal cords."

"Y/N, Shut the fuck up. You can do the same things, you may not sing in a scream like she can, but you know how to sing, you can dance- don't give me that look I caught you practicing your fouettes last week- and more importantly, you can connect. You connect in everything, you have so much to offer, and I know that once these people hear you, they will hire you. I know it."

You sigh, you weren't sure that everything she was saying was true, but you knew that she believed the words with all of her heart and didn't want to be the reason her hope died. So you just sighed in resignation before turning to the group that was in the midst of their auditions. They were outstanding, and the longer you went on, the more self-conscious of your own lack of preparation. Subconsciously you reached out to grab Amanda's hand and ended up clutching onto her dress front.

"Amanda, Amanda, I don't deserve to be here." Your hushed whisper, dragging harsh against your throat. Your chest tightening, your panic acting as a hangman's noose. "Amanda, I don't know what I'm singing. Amanda, what is it from? What is the song's name? How will I slate if I don't even know the name of the song? Wait, what is MY name? " Your breath started to tear through your lungs, your sinuses stung with oncoming tears.

"Y/N, take a breath, let go before you give everyone an unexpected flash." Amanda's whispered reply was almost biting in its directness. Even if you consciously didn't hear the words, her tone cut the noose from your neck. Your lungs immediately expanded with much-needed air, your fingers loosening their grip to let her replace the fabric with her own firm grip. "Good girl, now, Y/N, what is your name?"

"Uhhhhhh…" Even if you were calming down, your brain was still coming back to grips.

"The next three are as follows: Y/N Y/L/N, Amanda Brendon, and Savannah Moffat." Wanda's lyric call cut through the silence that had filled the studio while you were trying to remember your name.

You stood automatically, all your years of auditioning kicked you into performance autopilot. Your shoulders take their place slightly back, head high, chest on display, the skirt of your dress flowing around your thighs as if they were the mist rolling over the valley at dawn. Your face hid the horror that was filling your mind, it didn't matter that you didn't remember the name of your song, you were Y/N Y/L/N. You could fake it till you make it to perfection. Amanda was right, all you have to do is sing, and they will see you. It doesn't matter if you don't look like you used to, you are still capable, and even if you don't make it, you can't say that you didn't try. Just remember what Doctor Ellis said, 'every audition is a performance, even if they don't choose you, you were able to perform.' You can do this. After all, you sang it this morning, you could see the sheet music just behind your eyelids when you close your eyes. Just keep breathing.

Amanda gave your hand a final squeeze as she recognized the look of horrified determination in your eyes. Smiling to herself as she saw the bored looks on the panelists' faces. She met eyes with Wanda, who gave her a smirk nudging the blond man sandwiched between her and Tony. Turning his attention to your regal appearance before Tony also decided to look up from whatever was so important on his phone.

You opened your mouth to introduce yourself, and Tony's voice filled the space clearly, saying the words that had shattered your own will to find your auditions.

"I'm sorry I must have missed you before. There is no need for you to sing today, collect your things."

Your face fell into an imitation of a polite smile as your brain processed the rejection. Guess Amanda really did save me from being culled. Before you can say or do anything, though, the blond man sitting next to Tony spoke.

"Tony, you had your chance. Now it's my turn to decide whether or not she is cast. Now sit down."

"No, it isn't too late, Steve. I bankroll this group I get to have a say. And I won't have someone who looks like her representing my Acting Company."

"You already had your say. Now sit down and let the girl sing."

"No," Stark turns from the blond man and back to you. "No fucks given, Next, please."

CHAPTER TWO

#Marvel #reader insert #star's celebration challenge #Theater Company AU #Slow burn Fanfiction #stole my boyfriend's computer to write this.#he wasn't happy #It died twice #what even #also like leave me an ask or something #ofc fic #fins reads #fins' fic recs #fins' recs #fins recs fics #fanfiction #fic reblog

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skzhrs · 6 years ago

Text

Bad Boy - Chan x Reader Smut AU

Switch!Chan, Fem!Reader, Degradation, Drinking, One Night Stand, 3.6k

Chan, AKA Chris Bang, is the playboy of the school. What happens when his goody two shoes desk partner, Y/N, manages to undo him?

You stare at the whiteboard, watching as your teacher makes dainty strokes of icy blue with her pen. The Expo marker leaves slick trails of color, the beryl hues weaving themselves into a mess of quadratic functions and systematic equations.

"So," she tsks, writing a simplified set of variables, "we get 3x after subtracting 7x from 10x, and then we have a slope we can use to-"

Everyone's heads gradually turn as the classroom door opens, and a broad shouldered boy with platinum blonde hair steps inside. His narrow eyes possess a mischievous glint, the edges of his paper thin lips tilted upwards in a snarky smirk. Stomping the muddy snow from his sneakers, Chris Bang lets the door swing shut behind him as he hands the teacher a tardy note.

"Hi, Chris," she says, less than pleased. "We're discussing functions and equations with three variables. Take out your notes, please."

"Alright," he bites his lip as he paces towards his seat in the back of the classroom.

"Actually," our teacher pipes up, "how about you sit up here? I want to make sure you take extra good notes to make up for what you missed."

Heat rushes to your cheeks as you see the only empty spot in the front is the chair adjacent to yours. Your large desk that normally seats two is just half full. Chris glances at the teacher, then at you, and walks towards your space, placing his sagging black backpack on the desk.

"Much better," she smiles. "So, after eliminating 7x from the equation, we can see that we have a fairly easy equation left over: 3x equals 12x. After dividing both sides by 3, we can conclude that x is equal to 4."

Chris pulls out a tattered notebook, the cardboard cover ripped in places, and grabs a mechanical pencil from the spiral wires that barely keep the paper sheets together. He flips to a blank page while you scoot a bit closer to him. Although you have never had a serious infatuation with Chris Bang, his edgy sense of humor and stunning looks have always made you swoon. Just a little bit. You've never considered what it'd be like to really date him and you're pretty sure you wouldn't want that, but the idea of him just slamming you against the wall and melding your lips together, running his coarse fingertips over your bare skin, gave you chills.

"Okay," you murmur under your breath, pushing your notebook towards his. "You can copy my notes if you want."

"Thanks," he replies softly, his raspy voice still hoarse from a good night's sleep. Squeezing your legs together, you smile and try to contain the knot in your stomach. He's ethereal.

He's crazy. He's a rebel. He makes the worst jokes at the worst times and he's all about partying and living life to the fullest. He's a bad student and overall a bad example.

And yet, he still fascinates you.

"Sure," you say, cheeks red. "If you need help, just ask me."

"Okay," he smiles in return. The way his eyes crinkle and the shape of his lips as they stretch across his teeth and how his skin folds mesmerizes you, and you find it hard to pull away from his enchanting gaze. But you do, focusing on your teacher.

"I'm going to pass out a page of problems for you and your partner to work on," she announces, pacing to her desk. Her heels click on the linoleum as she retrieves a stack of papers and hands one to each student. "You have the rest of the class period to do these. Anything that isn't completed by the end of class is homework."

You write your name on your assignment, and glance over at Chris, who has idly pulled out his phone. He scrolls through Instagram without a care in the world.

"Why were you late?" you ask daringly, and he looks at you. His eyes glimmer in the fluorescent lighting.

"Slept through my alarm," he shrugs, setting his phone down. "I stayed up pretty late last night."

"Doing what? Playing Fortnite?" You laugh through that last question.

"No," he rolls his eyes through a sarcastic smirk. "I was at a party."

"On a Thursday night?"

"It's never too early to party," he assures you. "I'm going to another one tonight, at Felix's house. You should come with."

"Maybe I will," you shoot back, a smile on your face.

"You should," he repeats, edging closer. Your legs touch, and you can smell the faint aroma of mint and possibly alcohol on his breath. "It'll be fun."

"Wait," you shake your head, "are you hungover?"

"What? No, I hardly drank last night. Now that's reserved for Friday nights." You can barely tell if he's joking or not, but through your ecstasy and his intoxicating charm, you don't really care.

"Where's Felix's house?" you inquire, leaning against the desk.

"Oh shit, are you really gonna come?" His eyes widen at that.

"I might," you shrug, using your seemingly nonchalant attitude to hopefully convince him that, despite being the good kid who regularly gets good grades and has a good family and a good reputation, you can be daring when you need to be. You aren't 100% pure. For some reason, you want to prove that to Chris. You want to show Chris who you can be.

"Sweet, okay," he turns on his phone again and scrolls through a selection of apps before opening something. "It's at 328 Huckleberry Drive. Big beige house. White pillars on the porch."

"So, it's a mansion," you jeer.

"Pretty much," Chris shrugs. As his arms move, the sleeve of his jacket catches your pencil and pushes it onto the floor. "Oh, shit, sorry."

"It's fine," you assure him, bending down to grab the utensil. You pass uncomfortably close to his crotch, and as you grasp the pencil and return to a normal sitting position, your eyes skirt over his lower half.

And you definitely notice the tight bulge that threatens to poke through his denim jeans.

A wave of embarrassment cloaks your face in a bright shade of burgundy and you purse your lips, hurriedly looking away and staring at your paper.

Should you tell him? Does he even know?

"Uh," you murmur, awkward tension suffocating your lungs. "You've got a, uh, situation." You nod towards his groin. Chris glances down, and immediately crosses his legs.

"Hmm," he scoffs, poking the inside of his cheek with his tongue. "Would you look at that?"

"Trust me, I already saw it," you say, somewhat enjoying his embarrassment. Even if he tries to hide it, you can see he's flustered.

It's oddly cute.

"You wanna help me out?" Chris shoots a suggestive wink at you, wiggling his eyebrows. You shake your head with a lighthearted smile, nudging his shoulder.

"Very funny."

However, his expression doesn't falter. It takes you a moment before you realize he isn't joking. At least, he isn't fully joking.

"Wait," you close your eyes. Is this real? "Chris, we're in class, for God's sake."

"So you're not saying you don't want to-"

"Oh my God," you smirk. "Shut up. Maybe some other time." Like him, you are only half kidding.

Something is pulling you towards Chris Bang. A spark goes off when you're in his presence. And you love it.

The bell rings, and you stand, slinging your backpack over your shoulder. But before you leave the class, you feel Chris's veiny hand on your wrist and all of a sudden, his lips are brushing your ear.

"I really want you to come to the party tonight."

You pull away gently, staring at the lustful boy. A sly grin manifests itself on your face.

"We'll see."

***

Because Huckleberry Drive is just a few blocks away from your home, you choose to walk to the party. Wearing a silky, scarlet dress that brushes your knees, adorned with gemstones, you make your way to the address Chris gave you. Your silver heels clink on the sidewalk, as you follow the loud music wafting through the night sky. Even while putting on your makeup, you could faintly hear the sound of music blaring in the distance.

You knew that the party was probably going to lead to...other things. And you weren't against it, by any means. While sitting with Chris in class, you felt something you hadn't felt in a long time. You wanted him. And his behavior suggested that he wanted you too.

So, you dolled yourself up. You wore the most elegant yet sexy shade of lipstick you owned. You wore luscious mascara and donned a layer of eyeliner and smoky eye shadow. You put on perfume, the tantalizing scent of rose filling the room.

And as you make your way to Felix's house, you feel a sudden burst of confidence overwhelm you. You're ready to slay at that party. You're ready to drop jaws. You're ready to show everyone who you can be.

And as you step into the mansion, feeling the music shake you to your core, and as you feel several pairs of eyes on you, drinking in your appearance, you smile to your self.

You're ecstatic.

"Hey," Felix beams, holding a red cup. "Didn't expect to see you here. And you look great!"

"Thanks," you smile. "I didn't expect to be here either. But a friend of mine convinced me to come."

"Ah, was it Chris? He's been talking about you nonstop." Felix takes a sip from his drink, sighing as he swallows the beverage.

"Has he?" You raise an eyebrow, amused.

"Yeah," he replies, a smirk growing on his face. "All good things. Trust me."

"Good to know," you say. "What are you drinking? Beer?"

"A bit," he shrugs. "Not drunk yet. I doubt I'll get drunk. Maybe buzzed, but not drunk. You want some?" Felix hands the frothy drink to you.

"Sure." You take it from his tiny hand and sip from the cup. By no means is it good. But it's invigorating. And so, you drink some more.

"Easy, easy," Felix grins. "This your first time drinking?"

"No," you reply truthfully. "I hold my alcohol pretty well."

"An admirable trait," he smiles. "I'll go get another drink. Feel free to keep that one."

"Thank you," you say as he smiles in return, disappearing into the raging crowd. You pace to the wall, standing near the hall as you drink. Soon enough, your cup is empty. And you can feel the alcohol pulsing in your veins. You're not drunk. But you aren't sober either.

"My God," you hear a familiar voice rasp. You turn, and see Chris gaping at your outfit, lips parted in awe. Smiling, you lean against the cream colored walls,

"Nice party," you beam, knowing that you're driving him crazy.

"Mm," he murmurs, stepping closer to you. His hands wrap around your hips, his touch tender. "Fuck, you're gorgeous."

"Thanks, you too," you wink, prideful. He gazes into your eyes, occasionally glancing at your ruby lips.

"You know," he says quietly, gently guiding you to a sofa by the hallway door frame, "I could barely control myself during Algebra today."

"Oh yeah?" He sits down, never releasing his grip on your waist. You situate yourself on his thigh, feeling his jeans on your bare skin.

"Yep," he breathes out, breath shaky. He lowers his head, massaging your skin through your dress. "God. You're driving me crazy."

You smile to yourself. "Good." Readjusting your position, you slowly move on his leg, and watch as he bites his lip to suppress sound. You let your fingers dance across his shirt, moving up his neck until you grasp his jaw. "You like that?"

He exhales loudly, staring at the ceiling. "Keep doing that," he mutters, finally mustering the courage to face you. His eyes are glazed over with pleasure. "You look so pretty when you do that." His hand moves to your back and all of a sudden, you can feel Chris squeezing your ass. You yelp as he smiles, bringing your head to his collarbone. "So fucking pretty."

Your heart pounds as things heat up. Your dominating attitude has begun to fade as you grind onto his thigh, holding onto his arms and burying your face into his neck. Your need for more contact strengthens with every second.

"I-I," you falter, already losing your power of speech.

"Hmm?" Chris chuckles, tilting your head up with his fingers. "Use your words, babygirl."

"I need you," you finally gasp. He smiles, lifting you off of his lap and standing.

"Let's get out of here."

***

The second the car door closes, his lips are pressed to yours.

You haven't even left Felix's mansion, and yet you're already attached to Chris in a fiery embrace. Your mouth moves against his as you feel his hands slide up your thighs, cupping your ass before traveling around your hips.

Your kiss becomes more heated, and gradually gets deeper as you tug on the collar of his shirt. But as you do so, his hand slaps at your ass.

"Not yet," he growls, finally pulling away. You're breathless, lips numb from the sheer force of the kiss. "Wait until we get to my place."

You nod, panting. You buckle your seat belt while fixing your tousled hair, smoothing town your ruffled dress as Chris begins to drive.

Aching, you cross your legs. Desperate to find some pleasure. You can feel yourself growing hotter and more needy. You can feel your heart rate rising with excitement.

"Don't even think about touching yourself," Chris says without looking over at you. You glance at the boy and see his clenched knuckles on the steering wheel, and how desperate he is as well. A sense of pride washes over you.

You're undoing the biggest player in the school. Just with a kiss and a sexy dress.

After what feels like an eternity of controlling your urges to reach down and seek some pleasure, Chris pulls into a modest and thankfully empty driveway. You get out of the car with him, and both of you pace to the front door. He unlocks it deftly and the second you two are inside, he slams you against the door and begins to kiss you again.

His lips are rough and ruthless, and you moan lightly as you feel him grind against your sensitive area. As your lips part, you feel his tongue enter your mouth.

"F-Fuck," you gasp as Chris fixes his hands on your waist again and guides you towards the hallway. You step into a room, still enveloped in his embrace, that resembles a bedroom.

Pushing you onto a bed but keeping you in an upright position, Chris's hands teasingly play with your dress and the zipper on the back. You breathe against his lips as he pulls on the zipper. You shrug out of the dress, smiling to yourself when you remember that you didn't even wear a bra.

Chris stops as you pull your hair to the side, staring at him with a smirk. His eyes are wide, lips parted in awe, as he examines your chest.

"Fuck," he blinks, his fingers tracing your soft skin. He squeezes the left side of your chest and you inhale, closing the gap between your thighs in an attempt to ease the growing fire burning there.

"You're impatient," Chris raises an eyebrow. Damn you. He knows he's driving you crazy.

"Says the guy who wanted me to jack him off in- fuck!" You throw your head back as his tongue swirls around the buds of your breasts, sucking on your nipples. At this point, you're sick of him teasing you.

You grab his shirt and throw it over his head, pulling him closer to you. You grind on him as he moves up your chest, leaving bite marks trailing from your breasts to your chin. His lips suck on your neck feverishly as you shove your hand under his belt, palming his twitching member. He groans, pulling away and letting you remove his jeans.

"So," you murmur, thumbing his head through his thin boxers, "how long have you wanted to get in my pants?"

You enjoy how he squirms under your touch, how fucking desperate he gets when you're barely even touching him. Hypocritical bastard.

"A bit," he chokes out as you take off his boxers, letting his length extend fully. Idly wrapping your fingers around him, you feign an innocent look. Staring into his hooded eyes while you finally give him what he wanted in class.

"C'mon, Chris. Give me a number. Days? Weeks?"

"Weeks," he cries out as you squeeze his member. You hum in response as you lower your head, taking him in your mouth.

Swirling your tongue around him, feeling his spasms of pleasure, you remove your lips from him with a loud pop. "And you have the nerve to call me needy? Fuck, Chris. You're such a little bitch."

"Shut-shut the fu-fuck up-fuck!" You increase your speed, pumping your fist up and down while bobbing your head around him. You let him slam into the back of your throat, and you slap your tongue against his member.

Finally, as you begin to use one hand to reach for your lace underwear, Chris grabs your face and rips you away from him. With your cheeks in his palms, you stare up at him with wide eyes and swollen lips, droplets of precum and spit dribbling down your chin.

"Little slut," he tsks. Without warning, he jams a hand into your underwear, and before you know it, his finger is twirling around inside of you.

"Ah," you cry out, clenching around him. He smiles, beginning to kiss your neck while inserting a second finger.

"You're already moaning with just one finger," he murmurs while leaving love bites on your skin. "Your voice is gonna be gone by tomorrow."

Fine, you grit your teeth, feeling his thumb move around your slit. His third and final finger begins to stretch you out and you groan with a mixed feeling of pleasure and some pain.

Chris takes his fingers out of you, but before you can even catch your breath, he's moved from your neck to your core. His wet lips suck on your pulsating clit, sending bolts of frantic electricity through your body. He fucks you with his tongue, feeling up your walls, and you scream, hopelessly grinding on him. You've lost all of your pride at this point. You've given in to him. And you're ready for him to take you.

"Come on, baby girl," Chris teases, squeezing your thighs. "We haven't even gotten to the best part."

"Then take me there," you snap, breaths ragged. He smirks, reaching for his jeans strewn on the floor.

"As you wish."

Chris fumbles in his pocket and grabs a condom. He tears open the packaging and you help him put it on, brimming with nervous energy. You need him. Now.

Spreading out your legs, you feel his hands grip your hips, and his tip prods at your entrance.

"Just fucking do- ah!" Chris slams into you without warning, and you feel your walls tighten around his length. Even though you had gotten a good view of him, you hadn't realized how big he truly was until he was inside of you.

And with that, he goes at a relentless pace, the sound of skin clapping against skin filling the room. Your throat chokes up with wild moans, making you sound almost like a puppy.

Chris's moans are breathy and long. Through hooded eyes, you can see the sheen of sweat on his naked body. His eyes are closed, his jaw is set. He's trying to hold it together, just like you.

"Wanna," he growls, pushing deeper into you with every word, "fuck you so hard, you can't even fucking walk."

"Yes," you shriek, your breasts bouncing with every thrust he makes.

"My little babygirl," he groans, leaning closer to you without slowing down. He kisses your chest again and you latch onto his back, your nails gouging into his skin.

"Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me," you whisper frantically, humping his torso. Chris smiles against your skin and he places his hands parallel to your shoulders, staring into your eyes as he slams his entire length into you. Stars dot your vision as you scream into his ear.

"I'm gonna come," you squeal, closing your eyes as Chris passionately kisses you again, his fingers caressing your cheekbones.

"Me-me too," he grunts, his forehead pressed to yours. "Ah, shit!"

With one final and grand thrust, you feel him come undone in his condom. You hit your climax a few seconds later, your body convulsing with waves of pleasure.

Panting, you let Chris lay on top of you for a bit before he finally rolls into his back, stepping off of the bed. You notice his legs shaking as he disposes of the condom.

"You can stay the night here," he says softly, crawling back into bed and wrapping his arms around your waist.

"Thank you," you reply, still catching your breath. "We should do this more often."

"Yeah," Chris smirks, pressing a kiss to the nape of your neck. "We should." With a light laugh, he moves his mouth to your ear and raises the pitch of his voice. "Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me!"

"Shut up," you laugh, turning to face Chris. He pulls you in for a long, mellow kiss.

"Sleep tight, babygirl."

***

i hope you guys enjoyed this!! 😩😉

#stray kids dark hours #stray kids smut #smut #skz smut #kpop smut #chan smut #chan scenarios #chris smut #kpop rude

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ask-de-writer · 5 years ago

Text

DARING DO and THE GRYPHON’S QUEST! : MLP Fan Fiction : Part 17 of 19

Return to the Master Story Index

Return to MLP Fan Fiction

DARING DO

and

THE GRYPHON’S QUEST!

De Writer (Glen Ten-Eyck)

and

Carmen Pondiego

Cover art by Aranel the Cyborg, now Wind the Mama Cat

29584 words

Writing begun 03/29/16

This is a Fan Fiction based on My Little Pony. Canterlot, Princess Luna and the name Daring Do are owned by Hasboro Inc.

//////////////

Users of Tumblr.com are specifically granted the following rights. They may reblog the story. They may use the characters or original characters in my settings for fan fiction, fan art works, cosplay, or fan musical compositions, provided that such things are done without charge. I will allow those who do commission art works to charge for their images.

All sorts of fan art, cosplay, music or fictions is actively encouraged.

///////////////////////

Chapter 17. The Coward’s Weapon!

Daring Do was pleasantly surprised at just how good her half brother Blendin was at specimen preparation. There was another surprise for her too.

Friend spent much of her time crooning to her Eagle eggs. She did frequently leave her nest and lend her green magic to the task, usually greatly simplifying the work. It was the greatest assistance at particularly difficult or delicate times in the preparation of the failed nymphs that she had loved so dearly and watched over for so many centuries.

Almost any time that they took a break from the arduous task before them, Friend would leave the eggs and nest protected by a nearly invisible glow of green magic. She would take a place beside Daring Do and purr/croon softly. Daring Do found real rest and comfort in the love that Friend shared with her. She often rested her head against the changeling’s horn and shared thought and memory.

It was from that sharing that she learned something surprising about Friend. When her hive was attacked by war equipped and battle ready unicorns, Friend defended the hive’s precious eggs.

She slaughtered ten of the enemy, literally tearing them to pieces in the defense of those eggs. When her shared hive mind felt the Queen die, she went briefly berserk. Four of the ten attacking unicorns that she killed fell in those few moments.

It was duty and love for the eggs that she tended that brought her back to something resembling sanity. Taking all of the eggs that she could carry, she fled into the night.

The world outside of the hive was a strange and confusing place at first. By luck alone, she found a long disused road that led to the mountains. She did the best that she could but it was not enough. One by one, she felt the spark of returned love die out of each of the eggs. Her heart was torn asunder by the loss.

Daring Do knew the rest of the story. What she did not know was the sheer depth of feeling that Friend had developed for her. She meant it when she said that Daring Do was Matunen, Hive Queen, in the ancient tongue of Early Middle Equestrian.

Friend was totally contented for the first time in ages. That in no way interfered with any whit of her egg tending.

Blendin saw his half sister’s serene relaxation around Friend and was glad. The Apprentice Librarian of the Great Library in him was glad too. He was learning things about conservation of irreplaceable delicate artifacts and relics that would apply to his work in the Great Library.

Once everything was ready, he stared at the results of their work in wonder. He had not only helped to prepare the whole foundation for the creation of an entire intelligent species, he had it and all of his half sister’s notes cataloged for the Great Library!

Together, they sent a note of their progress to the Empress.

The door, upon opening, showed the Empress, Grata, and Hisst, the Right Wing of the Imperial Throne. The hallway was blocked by heavily armed Imperial Guards in full battle armor.

Daring Do was about to ask if such precautions were necessary when a loud, harsh voice from up the hallway demanded, “This is all Blasphemous! Even if it were the truth and showed our ancient roots, it would still be blasphemy! The Holy Legends declare that Faith alone is sufficient and seeking truth beyond its holy pages undermines Faith!

“Whatever is here must be destroyed!”

The Empress responded, “What is about to be destroyed is YOU, Krapper! You have fifteen seconds to be around the curve and out of OUR sight before I order my troops to open fire!”

“You would not dare!”

“Nine seconds left, Krapper.”

There was a clatter of claws on stone as the speaker retreated!

The Empress drew a deep breath, her crest showing disgust. “The entire lot of First Creation Idiots want to destroy the only real history that our kind has.”

Friend spoke up, “Your Majesty, they are wrong. This I/we know. Before I/we loved the eggs that became the nymphs of your kind, I/we saw changelings. I/we saw unicorns. I/we saw Eagles. I/we saw pegassi.

“I/we helped matunen Daring Do and brother Blendin to be sure that these failed nymphs truly show how I/we loved the eggs that became the nymphs that are your kind.”

The Empress, crest showing deep thought, began tracing the development of her kind. She was reading the placards set by each step of the way. Looking over to the true mother of her whole species, she asked, “Why did you go from pony to big cat for our hindquarters?”

Friend crowded over to point as she spoke. “Not all big cat. See how these bones go? That is from the pegassus. The head was carnivore, Eagle. The hindquarters had to eat meat too or fail. I/we did see a lion in mountains once, close enough to feel its insides by loving it. I/we used what I/we knew.”

Grata, crest rippling in laughter, exclaimed, “We are so lucky that she didn’t see a bear!”

After the fit of laughter passed around the room, the Empress asked, “How will this all be presented, Doctor Do?”

Daring Do sketched rapidly. “The case, to be portable must be of stout woodwork. The front viewing window should be made of glass that has been spell strengthened like a Magic Net mirror.”

The Empress nodded, crest showing some concern. “You mentioned not risking the real relics and that is a good idea.

“We have General Iron Hooves here with some of his munitions experts. The team that they are consulting with is known to you, though we know that you do not like them much.

“V.I.L.E. Is here. They have sent Carmen Pondiego, Baron Von Nighthoof, Marehem Skadefryd, and Kiros Asbhy. I understand that they have also got a number of Agents here too.”

Crest smiling, the Empress went on, “I was warned to be sure that I still have both mandibles of my beak after dealing with them. However, they will be absolutely honest with family.

“They have several missions. One is being worked on now with General Ironhooves and his aides. Another is to be the agency for creating your cases and making the copies for display. I will be ordering twenty sets.”

Daring Do, looking doubtful, did agree, “I have to admit that when it comes to museum quality duplication, Mom’s company is unexcelled.”

An all too familiar voice caroled from the doorway, “So sweet to hear you actually say something nice about my company! Of course we are honest! V.I.L.E. has never been caught or proved to be guilty of ANY crime at all!

“Suspicions? Poof! Suspicion and a cup of tea will get you anything from a nice Bergamont to bag of Lupton’s Worst!

Carmen Pondiego strutted into the room in her trademark porkpie hat and fire engine red dress. She called over her shoulder, “General, Dear, would you please come in and see for yourself what my daughter found that is causing all this mess?”

General Ironhooves entered the door. He was in his simple field uniform.

He tipped his Campaign Hat to the Empress and her Wings. He approached the study tables, examining the relics with care. He picked up Daring Do’s voluminous field notes and sketches, seeming to leaf through them, except that once in a while he stopped long enough to separate pages that stuck together.

He put down the books and turned to the Empress. “Ma'am, you have chosen your battlefield perfectly. Better, you have the enemy in the sights of your artillery.

“I hope that it does not come to armed conflict, but if it does, after consulting with Carmen here, I think that you will have a LOT of surprises for them!”

Daring Do managed to look skeptical. “Only them?”

Before Carmen could snark back, Marehem wandered in, right past the security detail. He grinned. “Helps to be a misfortune changel …”

His eyes bugged out. It was the first time that Daring Do could remember that her uncle Marehem was caught totally off guard!

“An Egg-tender, HERE? How did that happen? How can she live without a hive?”

Friend looked up from serenely turning the eggs in the nest. She smiled as she said, “Matunen Daring Do.”

Uncle M stopped like he’d hit a brick wall headfirst. “Adora, Matunen? A queen?”

The Empress nodded, crest rippling amusement. “It hit us like that too, when we realized that Friend is OVER two thousand years old. She was the sole survivor of a destroyed hive.

“Tending eggs kept her sane. She is the Mother who loved an unstable and fatal hybridization into becoming our strong race. I gather that for her, loving means something other than a simple feeling.”

Marehem got it together to say, “It sure does. The eggs a queen lays are sort of neutral. They will develop as random kinds of changelings. Give them to an Egg-tender and tell her how many of which sort, worker, other egg-tenders, drones, even a queen, and that is what you will get. Their love is a very complex magic that no other kind can do.”

Daring Do, eyes twinkling, suggested, “Make the order for V.I.L.E. twenty one copies. We will donate one to the Nightmare Wars Collection of the Royal Museum!”

General Ironhooves grinned hugely. “You really want to shaft those First Creationists, don’t you?”

Daring Do simply said, “Yes. They defile and deny the history that I have devoted my life to.”

Carmen pointed to the work tables and said, “Will you take a real compliment from your mother, Adora? This, notes, restorations, preparation and all is a fantastic piece of work.

V.I.L.E. will duplicate it with the greatest of care. With your permission, we will keep a copy for our own private museum.”

Mutely, Daring Do nodded.

She saw Uncle M talking to a Magic Net mirror and turning it to show everything.

Carmen pointed to an especially fragile relic and said, “Be especially careful of this one, Baron.”

One by one, the laboriously prepared relics, notes and all quietly vanished. General Ironhooves simply noted, “Handy trick, that!”

Daring Do, Friend, with her nest, and Blendin were brought to a large suite with an open airy feeling. One Gryphon port was open enough for the Eagles to get in and out but not Gryphons. The rooms were swarmed with Eagles.

Friend immediately shared that soft green magic of hers to include all of the waiting Eagles. The way that they crowded close about the nest, it was clear that they had been waiting for Friend’s loving magic. Several shuffled aside and one reached out a beak and snagged Daring Do’s tunic, making her join or get a torn tunic. She joined the Eagles in luxuriating in the literal glow of Friend’s shared love.

After a few days of resting up, Rahak came by. Crest at attention, he requested, “Doctor Do, master Blendin, would you come please? The display copies are ready for examination.”

They followed the Wing Commander back down to the workroom. There were twenty one large cases of fine solid woodwork, each faced by stout glass armored by a spell to the toughness of steel. The contents were beautifully displayed to make the whole progression from hippogriff to Gryphon utterly clear. Each item of the display had its explanatory placard.

Neatly done on each placard was an exact copy of a reference to the actual original Legend Document, with translation. After that part was a clear, simple note explaining the item.

Central to the whole display was Daring Do’s detailed sketch of the remains of the failed nymphs in place, as they were found.

The whole thing had such an impact that Daring Do’s breath drew in, in a way that she had heard so many times as a child riding her mother’s back in a knapsack, when her mother saw some beautiful thing that she was about to steal.

Turning to an equally awestruck Blendin, Daring Do said, “Tell Carmen that this is the best display preparation that I have ever seen.”

“Thank you, dear,” said a familiar voice. A khaki colored unicorn mare in a form fitting fire engine red dress stepped out of the shadows. Daring Do was shocked to see bags under her eyes.

Carmen Pondiego told her, “The General is sleeping now. I have been working along with every agent that I have available. I cannot tell you what we have been doing. Imperial Security is involved. I only hope that it has been enough to prevent the war.”

Rahak suggested, “Let us all prepare for this evening’s banquet. That is when you will make your presentation, Doctor Do.”

Daring Do was looking around the Imperial Banquet Hall, at the many war banners that fluttered in the light breeze. There were also the banners of the provinces of the Empire. The wood and stonework was outstanding for its solidity and rich carving.

Perched on every place that they could find claw room were hundreds of Eagles, looking expectantly at Friend. Her nest had been placed conveniently close to Daring Do’s place.

The dining tables were all set so that every diner could see the big glass fronted case with its display. There were two small books by each place.

One was a copy of the original document of the Legends, written some time shortly before 54 Post Nightmare Wars. It had an exact copy of the document itself, a line by line literal translation and a third line in modern Gryphon with notes to explain the meaning of idioms used when the original was written. No commentaries. No editing. Only a foreword explaining that this was a true copy of the Legends that they all revered and tried to follow. Commentaries were dispensed with in the hope that the reader could understand what the words said and form their own opinions based on solid fact.

It was signed and sealed by the Empress herself.

The other small book contained copies of Daring Do’s expedition notes and sketches that were relevant to the display showing the origin of their species.

The First Created believers started to scream, “Blasphemy!”

The Empress herself cut them off. “Silence, Krapper! These are the Legends that you CLAIM to revere!”

“You have left out the rich and ancient commentaries!”

Her crest rippling with laughter, the Empress exclaimed, “Ancient? Krapper, the FIRST commentary was inserted into a small book like this only thirty five years ago! It had a note that it WAS NOT HOLY WRIT, only opinion. That note was removed and further commentaries added. More than half of the mass of your book has been added in just the last five years!

“It must be wonderful to be able to write up whatever you please, insert it into the next edition of your book and have it called HOLY WRIT!”

“Our Book is the true Law! Holy Word is higher than mere secular law!”

“NO, Krapper! That is direct sedition! Guards! Stand behind Krapper! If he utters one more word of sedition, cut his wing tendons at once. He will be given the LONG DROP at sunrise for the crime.”

The Empress paused for effect and added, “Now, we have a banquet laid before us. Let not Krapper’s ill manners spoil your appetite. After we have eaten, we will hear from Doctor Daring Do, whose actual facts, well documented and proven may provide you with much food for thought.”

The server placed a plate in front of Daring Do, commenting, “I hope that we got it to your taste. It is a sauced alfalfa steak. We don’t eat such fare, so we are not much used to cooking it.”

Daring Do replied with a smile, “I am sure that it will be fine. You have been doing well the last few days.”

She cut a bite and began to chew. Numbness spread from her mouth. She gasped and could draw no air. Her vision was fading slowly.

She heard, “The Blasphemer has been struck down! Any means to strike at blasphemy is honorable, the Holy Writ is clear!”

The voice of the Empress cried, “Poison is the Coward’s Weapon! Seize them! Do not wait for the Long Drop! Kill them now!”

The voice of Friend cut across the fading din, “No! Matunen still has love. I/we need them! They will wish for your long drop! I/we promise …”

Then no sight. No sound. No touch. No taste. Nothing …

<==PREVIOUS NEXT==>

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#DARING DO AND THE GRYPHON'S QUEST!#Part 17 of 19 #MLP Fan Fiction #Written by De Writer and Carmen Pondiego

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daily-rayless · 5 years ago

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20 Years of Art

2000

(OC / Celes from Final Fantasy 6 / OC / OC)

The influence of Final Fantasy 6, off of the Anthology collection, and Yoshitaka Amano caused a significant shift in my art, leading my human figures to be very slender, graceful, and frequently pale. Most of it was of women, some of it was of horses, and by then I was very self-consciously starting to draw men. I mostly worked in pencils and colored pencils. Faces were oval with high hairlines and long, sharp, narrow noses. Also note my evident fear of mouth-seams and lower eyelids. I was pretty terrible at coloring, often feeling that coloring one of my sketches ruined all the nice linework.

2001

(Quistis from Final Fantasy 8 / Rosa from Final Fantasy 4? / Schala from Chrono Trigger / Dark Knight OC from Final Fantasy 4)

This is where more anime influences came in, and I consciously took on a semi-anime, semi-realistic (in my own mind) style. My ideal of beauty was overbig eyes, overlong nose, and oversmall mouth, and I stuck to it pretty relentlessly. Trying to figure out shadows and face structure. Still bad at coloring. I was incredibly proud of that charcoal picture. Was also going through my mandatory Dark 'n Edgy phase, with a big helping of Phantom of the Opera, Sarah Brightman, and my attempts at designing supercool clothes, many of which I wouldn't have actually worn, even given the opportunity.

2002

(Me trying to recreate “Flaming June” / OC, who incidentally looks almost exactly like Sarah Brightman and whose diadem was bodily lifted from a Jodi Lee painting / angsty symbolic wet chain lady / OC)

Deep in the Dark 'n Edgy. Faces are still very heavily made-up, with big lashes, defined upper eyelids, and dark lips. Trying very hard to be a good artist though, have high expectations for the future. I was so proud of that final pose and worked so hard on it. Lined paper? So not a problem. Besides, how else am I supposed to draw during class? A sketchbook would've been even more obvious than the incredibly obvious I already was. I'm able to listen while drawing pretty reliably, and I did manage to take detailed notes while doodling, so at least I had that going for me.

2003

(Celes / OC / OC / Hermes-inspired wing lady)

I was focusing (at least some of the time) on backgrounds and trying to make my work detailed and polished. Coloring is still hopeless. Often when I colored, I would go super light, even when I was using dark or intense colors. It would give my pictures a sort of faint, half-assed hazy look. I remember an art teacher urging me to use more color, but I probably resisted because I knew that way lay total destruction. I'm sorry, well-meaning art teacher. You are unversed in the ways of my pencils. I have killed too many sketches to take those kinds of risks.

2004

(Rosa? / Meliara from Crown Duel / willow-dress lady / Geddoe and Queen from Suikoden 3)

See the Meliara picture? That's supposed to be a night scene in a forest. Front-lit by blazing firelight. I was too afraid to make the colors darker. This is dark enough, okay? Anyway, this year, along with being utterly obsessed with Suikoden 3 and Crown Duel, I was letting my art head in a more realistic direction...

2005

(OC / Queen / Queen / part of Zetta and Salome from Makai Kingdom; I remember deliberately copying those swoopy Ss from one of my friends’ handwriting. Wishes ended up being the first longform fanfic I posted online.)

...that really flourished this year. It's not actually realism, but I made a point to give my characters, especially the women, more realistic bodies. Faces are very round in this period, often with soft features. Noses are prominent. I'm also, finally, using more vibrant colors. I probably got my first Prismacolor pencils around this time. I also got some really cheap markers, but had no idea how to use them so mostly stuck to pencils.

2006

(All OCs)

I look back on this as a good year. I was learning better coloring techniques. (Bold colors! Press that pencil down! Okay, I still had much to learn.) I got an Elfwood gallery while the site was doing its slow mosey into oblivion. But that was an important step, not just looking at other people's art online, but putting my own up as well. There were downsides though. I began to feel more insecure – or maybe more realistic? – about my art, on this site with so many highly talented artists. Still, 2006 is a good year. It was a lot of fun, and I learned a lot.

2007

(vampire and hunter / Fleur from Harry Potter / OC / Avril from Wild Arms 5)

The year of Fleur Delacour. This is when I was writing Kindred. I think it was because I was trying to depict Fleur as distinctly non-human that my art shifted away from that more realistic style. Fleur, and my other figures, became very tall and slender. The anime DNA is still there though. For a long time, I felt the lying-down picture of Fleur was my best work.

2008

(Revya and Gig from Soul Nomad / my attempts at being “abstract” / OC / OC)

This was the year of Soul Nomad and, towards the end, Tales of the Abyss. Unsurprisingly, the anime influences start moving back to the fore. The eyes are becoming larger again, the features a bit more angular and stylized, mouths are shrinking. I'm still desperately trying to figure out markers and wondering why it's so darn hard (I don't try to educate myself, I just flail), but I was proud of that blue OC picture. It made me feel like I was getting somewhere. 2008 is when I started my deviantART gallery, right when everyone else was moving on to Tumblr.

2009

(teacup lady / Persona 4 noir-style comic / Revya / OC)

Then Persona 4 hit. Shigenori Soejima was a huge influence in this period, especially in eyes and faces. Pupils, chins, and jawlines shrink, eyelashes are sparse and stylized, noses are simplified. 2008 and 2009 are about as pure anime as I've ever gotten. Meanwhile, I'm really exited about my dA gallery and trying lots of different combinations of media. I'm super active on dA and FFN at this point, writing Elysion and then a slew of shorter Persona fics.

2010

(Minako from Persona 3: Portable / concept-art-version Minako / lady with dragon ferret thing / other lady with dragon ferret thing)

I'm still drawing with a lot of Soejima influences. Additionally, bodies are becoming even longer, taller, thinner, and bendier. Some of them look absurd to me now. On the other hand, a lot of pictures from this period have a nice elegance to them. I was still using colored pencils a fair bit, but more clumsy markers are showing up. Persona 3: Portable came out, and this is when I was writing Death and Ker.

2011

(mask lady / hat lady / Archaya, Duphaston, and Iryth from Eternal Poison / symbolic autumn lady and her winter baby)

Midway through this year, I hit a breakthrough when I got my first set of Copics – and skin tones, no less. Even though I was still flailing, I was so thrilled with my results. That Eternal Poison picture left me enormously proud, as did the mother and child one. My style hasn't changed all that much, but it's starting to feel less extreme. The focus on big eyes and tiny little mouths remains.

2012

(Elza from Suikoden 2 / Daryl and Setzer from Final Fantasy 6 / Killey and Lorelai from Suikoden 2 / Lyssa, Greek goddess of madness)

This is the year of Elza. Lots of delicate sketches of this lovely scarred lady, and lots of colored pictures too. I've definitely shifted away from pencils towards markers. The Daryl and Setzer one was an attempt to use both, and I was very happy with it. These pictures show their age, but there's still a lot here I like. Mouths are larger too. However, my online activity was starting to lag.

2013

(Rydia from Final Fantasy 4 / Nia from Infinite Space / the prophet and Schala / Argos and Io from Greek mythology)

The mid-2010s weren't entirely great for me, marked with a lot of frustration and discontent. And that definitely carried over to my art, making me feel very disappointed with myself. There was lots of marker work this year. Probably the standout picture is Argos and Io. This is also when I played through all three routes of Fate/Extra, and my art was suddenly full of Hakuno and Emiya.

2014

(Minako / butterfly lady / Marta and Tenebrae from Tales of Symphonia 2 / Elza)

Looking at it now, this was a good year. Lots of nice marker art. The butterfly one was a big step up for me in terms of coloring. The Marta and Tenebrae has a really cool stylized look to it. But I was becoming less enthusiastic about sharing my art with others. I started to post less and less.

2015

(evil Hakuno and Emiya from the Fate series / Mitsuru from Persona 3 / half moon cookie lady / Hakuno)

I barely posted anything this year, though I was still drawing a ton. As far as making strides, this is one of my better years. Coloring will never be my strong suit, but it's a lot more fun, and it looks a lot better. It's almost entirely marker-work at this point. Despite my, er, angst, a lot of people are smiling this year.

2016

(OC / doodle lady / Luna from Roman mythology / hair bow lady)

At this point, it's feeling too recent for me to really see what's changed. I did a fair bit of eraserless work. One problem I still have – and, yes, it involves coloring my pictures – is losing some of the image's personality after I've inked it and erased the initial pencil work. The picture's still there, but not as nuanced as it originally was. The results often feel stiff to me. Doing the first linework in ink, or not inking at all, allows me to keep that sensitive, spontaneous quality. Luna and the bow and doodle ladies were done without erasers. Another thing I did a lot this year was fill backgrounds with busy shapes and colors, which is a trend I’m still following today.

2017

(flapper and dog / Alcyone and Ceyx from Greek mythology / flower hair lady / Kida from Atlantis)

Not a good year. Not that the art is bad, there just isn't a lot of it, and what there is often isn't very finished. I was still mostly dark online, wondering if I should take down my dA gallery. Drawing and knowing I wasn't going to post something took off some of the pressure of my own expectations, but I was still unhappy.

2018

(Altera from the Fate series / Elizabeth Bathory from the Fate series / OC / Aranea from Final Fantasy 15)

This was a really important year for me. I wrote a novel I'm really proud of, and it's done a lot to give me confidence and a sense of creative direction. I also decided that after New Years, I was going to start a Tumblr gallery...just as everyone who was still on the site was jumping off of it. Much of my 2018 work is still sketchy and unfinished, but I also think it's loosening up some. It feels less stiff than the stuff from the middle of the decade.

2019

(Aloy from Horizon Zero Dawn / medievaly lady / Red from Transistor / Red)

The year of Supergiant Games, which led me to focus more on bright saturated colors. It's really hard for me to analyze these objectively. Coloring is better? I worked more on details? I used my metallic gel pens a ton and did shape-cluttered backgrounds? These aren't new things, but I think they paid off okay. I'm more at peace with my level of ability, I've finished more complicated works, and I crawled out of my den and started posting regularly online again. So that's all good. Curious to see what the art looks like in twenty more years.

#art progression #20 years of art #2000-2019 #i'm not tagging all the characters #this is a terribly long post #and shouldn't clutter up too many search results #thank you if you read the whole thing #i apologize for typos #art meme #art summary

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mel-is-sanonymous1994 · 6 years ago

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Exploit Found

Part 1 Part 2

A/N once again I am not an expert in anything. I did my best.

PART 2

NOVA’S POV

The Next Morning

Alarms suck. I groaned, stretched, and then walked into the bathroom. Turning on the speaker, I pressed play on my shower playlist, back to back queen. Once I had gone through my routine I got out dried off and got dressed. At Safety Net Cybersecurity there is a pretty strict dress code. I put on a button up baby blue blouse, a pair of khaki skinny jeans and a dark blue blazer. To finish off the outfit I curled my hair, put some light makeup on my face and a pair of heeled short boots. I took one last look in my full-length mirror. I looked ridiculous. I took some deep breaths and walked out of my apartment locking the door behind me. Driving in New York is basically impossible so I waited outside for a cab, which terrified me. As I waited I saw Elliot walk out of our building.

“Hey, Elliot!” I called waving. He glanced at me before walking towards me.

“Where you headed?” I asked trying to make small talk with my less than talkative neighbor.

“Work.” He said, hands still in his hoodie pockets and his eyes looking anywhere but at me.

“Cool me too, where do you work?” I questioned further.

“Safety Net Cybersecurity, I’m a tech.” He said.

“Woah, that’s crazy, I start there today, however, I'm not smart enough to be a tech, I'm basically a secretary kinda.” I babbled.

“That is crazy, well I gotta go.” He said politely attempting to leave the situation. I got an idea.

“Hey! Wait! Would you wanna take a cab with me? I know it sounds ridiculous but I've watched too many crime shows. I’ll pay.” I offered. He looked like he was gonna say no.

“Pretty please Elliot, I promise I won’t say anything to you the entire cab ride, plus it’s a free ride to work,” I begged. He caved.

“Fine,” he said as I hailed a cab. I opened the door for him to slide in. Once I got in I told him the address with a shaky voice. I kept my eyes on the driver as I tried to control my anxiety. I couldn’t bite my fingernails or play with my hair so I resorted to listing all of my family members in order over and over again in my head.

ELLIOT’S POV

We’ve only been in this cab for 5 minutes but I can tell Nova is on edge, she kept tapping her leg in some sort of rhythmic pattern, her eyes are firmly planted on the drivers back which I can tell is making him uncomfortable. Another two minutes had gone by and the driver had had enough.

“Miss if you don’t stop staring at me I’m kicking you out of my cab.” He yelled. She jumped.

“Hey, Nova, uh what made you decide to move to New York?” I asked attempting to distract her. It worked, now she was looking at me. I once again looked anywhere but her eyes.

“Um, personal reasons.” She said looking back at the driver. Crap. Think Elliot.

“Tell me about your family,” I said. She gave me a surprised look.

“I promised I wouldn’t talk.” She smirks slightly.

“If it will keep you distracted and keep us in this cab then go ahead.” I offered.

“I just met you yesterday, how do I know I can trust you with my family information.” She countered. The stalker, it’s made her more cautious and untrusting. I needed to think of a non-personal question. We drove past a bus with some sort of musical advertised on the side of it.

“What’s your favorite musical?” I asked.

“You know for someone who isn’t very comfortable with talking you sure do talk a lot.” She pointed out. I leaned closer to her to whisper in her ear.

“Listen, I know you are super anxious right now, the driver won’t kill us, unless you keep staring at him,” I said trying to help her. Krista (Elliot’s therapist) would have a field day with her.

“Fine.” She said making direct eye contact with me, I looked away.

“Then tell me, Elliot, tell me about your life.” She countered. I froze. I didn’t expect her to turn my questions on me.

“Nothing to it really,” I said shrugging, she was right, we just met.

“Wicked.” She blurted out now staring in her lap at her hands fidgeting.

“What?” I questioned thinking I missed something.

“My favorite musical, Wicked.” She said smiling at me.

“As for the family, and the reason I moved here questions, we are gonna have to wait until we’ve ridden the cab together for at least a month before I answer those questions.” She said nudging me. I flinched slightly at the touch but brushed it off pretty quickly.

“Sorry.” She said noticing my flinch.

“It’s fine. So are you saying that there will be more cab rides?” I asked. I found it slightly easy to talk to her, it felt like talking to Angela (best friend) or Darlene (sister).

“I mean, I have to get to work somehow and I don’t completely trust the subway just yet, if you don’t wanna ride the cab with me for free then I guess I can ride alone.” She said as she began scratching her palm with her opposite hand. I looked at her palm and noticed it was red and rough, must be a coping mechanism, something she does to keep her anxiety at bay. I sighed.

“I’ll ride with you,” I said.

“Thank you.” She said smiling and blushing. She now rubbed her palm with her thumb. I made a mental note to ask Krista about anxiety mechanisms.

“On one condition,” I said with a smirk of my own. She nodded.

“You promise to talk, it seems to distract you and I’m 90% sure our cab driver here almost kicked us out at the last red light,” I said in a whisper once again. We pulled up in front of the building. She pulled out her wallet. I stopped her and paid for the cab ride.

“But whatever will I talk about?” She asked with a smirk.

“Anything, I once had a friend who talked about TV shows, nonstop for months,” I said shrugging. She nodded as she apologized to the driver and thanked him for giving him an additional tip to the one I gave him. Once we got out he drove off.

“Ok, I promise, but be prepared I don’t shut up.” She said laughing nervously at herself. I shrugged once again.

“I’m a good listener,” I said.

“Hi welcome.” A receptionist greeted us at the door. Elliot showed his badge and then walked to the elevators. I gave a slight wave and he gave a polite smile. I took a deep breath and approached the front desk.

“Hello Ma’am, what can I do for you today?” She asked with a megawatt smile.

“Hi, I am here to see Mr. or Mrs. Brown of Safety Net, it’s my first day,” I said nervously.

“Perfect, ride the elevator to the 4th floor, walk into the main room off of the hall and all the way at the back is their offices, whichever one is in right now will get you started. I nodded and followed her instructions. I walked to the offices and saw only one occupied, Mr. Brown’s. I knocked and waited for the wave to enter.

“Yes?” he asked once I opened the door.

“I’m November Peterson, your new employee,” I said as clearly as I could.

“Ah yes, come sit.” He said pointing to the chair across from his desk. He stood to shake my hand and sat back down once I did.

“Welcome to Safety Net, I'll spare you the full backstory but my wife and I started this company only a couple months ago, after the E corp hack, the wife and I were left with nothing, no jobs, no home, and just when we were trying to start a family.” He said drifting off in thought. I cleared my throat.

“Anyway, once E corp had got back their system and the economy was restored my wife and I went to investors with the promise of opening up a company that is pretty hard to hack, we’ve employed the top tech’s in New York, we handle some of the biggest companies in New York's data, we may be just starting out but we already have over 50 companies in our care.” He proudly stated. I noticed the way his face lit up when he talked about his wife. He reminded me of a younger version of my Dad.

“I’m happy to be a part of that sir,” I said smiling. He smiled in return.

“My wife is currently at a doctors appointment otherwise I would take you over to introduce you, finally starting that family, anyway, if you follow me, I'll show you to your desk.” He said standing and opening the door for me.

“I’m sorry it isn’t more glamorous but this is the best we can do for you right now, you can personalize your desk however you’d like, feel free to help yourself to coffee or water in the break room just down the hall, your phone at your desk is set up with it’s own number and line, if reception receives a call for me or the wife and it’s not an urgent matter it will be directed to your phone, answer it, if we are in our office and it seems important or they will not take no for an answer you can transfer it to us by pressing line 3 or 4, if we are out of the office, take a message, or have them call back, use your own judgement, if they seem like assholes and won’t take no for an answer hang up, they will eventually call back anyway. Any questions so far?” he began my instructions as I looked over my desk. It was a half circle set directly in between the Brown’s offices. It was a clear glass top with a nice desktop and a phone. I shook my head and he continued.

“Ok so your main gig while here will be answering phones, but other than phone calls you will be in charge of inputting the simplified reports, the companies we protect each have a number of tech’s on their accounts, every day the companies demand reports, at 4:45 P.M the techs will send a simplified status of all of the accounts they monitored that day, all you have to do is copy and paste them into the program, just click on the company’s name and that will open a page where you will paste the tech lead’s simplified report press send and then do that for every company, it shouldn’t take you very long. Still following?” He asked. I nodded but was still worried I would forget something.

“For today I’ve asked Mr. Alderson to help you at the end of the day, he is our best tech, he oversees most of the tech leads, he doesn’t like the attention but the simplified reports go through him first, other than that you’ll just be sitting here and being an assistant for my wife and I, until the end of the day when you are inputting data. Sound good?” He asked with a smile.

“Yes, sir,” I said sitting in my desk chair. The desk and desk chair were higher than the other desks in the room so I could just about see the entire office. I saw rows of cubicles and heads buried in computers.

“You will have a company log in, your username is your last then first name, the password will automatically generate once you type in your username, we’ve set up the computer so the first time you turn it on it will only ask for your username, then it will send your cellphone a message containing your password that will self delete in 30 seconds to write it down or if you have a good memory then you are good, but the next time you log into your computer you will need that password, if you ever forget your password or for some reason it isn’t working then you can call Mr. Alderson, like I said he is our head tech, best employee.” I nodded.

“Oh and the last thing before I leave you to it, make sure you turn your computer off or log out before you leave your desk if you forget you won’t be in trouble but it’s how we make sure people stick to their desktops.” He said patting my back. I smiled and nodded.

“I’m just gonna stand here for a second while you log in so that I know you get your password.” He said. I turned the computer on and a screen popped up with the heading, Welcome to Safety Net. I clicked in the textbox that said username and typed it in.

Username: PetersonNovember

Once I had typed in the username another screen appeared asking for the password. I felt my phone vibrate and I saw the password. Mr. Brown looked away as I wrote down and typed in my password.

Password: 6683623771987NP

“Thank you for joining Safety Net.” The computer said in an automated voice.

“Perfect, ok well, I’ll leave you to it, if you have any questions or need me feel free to come ask otherwise there is a list of phone numbers next to your phone including mine and the wife’s office phone so feel free to call. You are gonna do great.” He said with one more encouraging pat on the back. I felt my phone vibrate once more. Once he walked away I looked at who it was.

Mommy: Hey honey, how is the first day going, we miss you, Mason and Max say hi, they miss their big sister.

Me: It’s going great, just started, it’s a lot but I got this, tell them I say hi, and I miss them more, also tell them that they can text me themselves lol

Mommy: You know the twins, they don’t wanna bother their sister, they think because you are 28 and living in New York you don’t have time for your 16-year-old siblings anymore.

Me: well that is just not true, I always have time for the little miracles, please tell them to text me whenever and for whatever reason, even if it’s just Mason telling me about her most recent attempt at a boyfriend or Max’s incessant need to try every single sport.

Mommy: will do, oh lord Max has moved on to hockey, poor boy.

Me: What happened to soccer?

Mommy: that’s a summer sport dear, and at the end of this year, Mason will be performing at Walleye, she is only going to be on a small stage but her little girl band has attracted quite a bit of attention here in town.

Me: OH MY GOSH, I will have to fly down to see my little sister kill it, but listen I gotta go I'll call you later when I get home to talk to all of you.

Mommy: Oh before I forget, your old house was broken into, James knows you moved, there is no way in hell he would know where since you are so far away but I just thought I'd let you know.

Me: Thank you. I’ll keep it in mind.

I locked my phone and set it down on my desk and took a deep breath, James is continuing to be the biggest mistake I’ve ever made in my life. I glanced at my computer and saw messages popping up in a company group chat, every single tech in the room had welcomed me to the company. I blushed and took another breath as my phone rang. So it begins.

“Hello, Safety Net,” I answered as cheerfully as I could. This job could either go really good or really horrible, being an assistant might seem easy at the moment but the data inputting, that doesn’t seem easy at all.

#elliot alderson x oc #elliot alderson #elliot alderson imagines #mr robot #rami malek

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mybeautifuldecay · 7 years ago

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Private Tutor. Part Nine; It Was There With Every Breath.

Previous parts can be found: HERE.

This chapter definitely got out of hand. But @suhailauniverse was on hand to offer her wise opinion. Thanks bud! <3

And @gotham-ruaidh is, as always, my fandom big sister, the kind everyone needs in their lives. Mwah.

I hope you enjoy.

Walking aimlessly around the bustling Glasgow streets, Claire’s vision blurred as people continued to pass by her on the high street. The mizzle covered her face leaving a faint coating of moisture on her skin as she turned off the main street and wandered down a side road until she came to a stop opposite an interesting piece of graffiti.

“Ye should come to this lecture we have at the end of the week, Claire.” Jamie said on their weekly study meet. Neither of them had brought up the kiss but they seemed easier in the presence of one another, the weight of their confessions alleviating some of the previous tension that had begun to grow silently between the pair.

“Oh, what’s it about?” Claire asked, twizzling the pencil between her fingertips as she looked up from her book.

“It’s by a world renowned doctor called Joe Abernathy, have ye ever heard of him?”

Claire shook her head though something niggled her, leaving her questioning whether she did, in fact, know who he was.

“He’s doing a seminar wi’ us and a couple of other doctoral programmes in central Scotland on necrotising fasciitis so there will be loads of students there. Nobody will ken who’s who so ye willna stick out. It’s on Friday afternoon, will ye consider it?”

“An afternoon listening to a professional surgeon discuss flesh eating bacteria? Hmm, Mr. Fraser, were you always this smooth with the ladies?” She joked feeling rather chuffed. With the medical programme being so elite and small, it was almost impossible for Jamie to take Claire along to any of his lectures without someone noting an unfamiliar face but this would allow her to sneak in unnoticed.

The rucksack felt heavy on her shoulders as the straps dug into her flesh but even the sores that were forming couldn’t bring her vision back into focus as she finally sat down in the empty outside patio of a generic coffee shop and laid her head on her arms.

“Can I get you something to drink?” A friendly barista asked, braving the rain in an attempt to drum up some interest in Claire.

“Earl Grey,” Claire said, her words surprisingly clearly, “take away, please.”

When the waitress had brought her the hot drink and Claire had placed the cash, she simply sat letting the thin paper cup warm her frigid fingers.

She’d gone to the lecture as Jamie had asked and it had been amazing to hear. Afterwards she’d even managed to speak to Dr. Abernathy and discuss, whimsically, the humour behind the simplified nickname for a disease that didn’t -in fact- ‘eat’ anything…

“Ah, well, yes, Miss Beauchamp,” Joe quipped, using Claire’s maiden name - which she had given to him on a whim rather than using her married name, “I guess toxin-releasing bacteria didn’t have the same ring to it - nor the active image the term ‘flesh-eating’ gives to the disease. But I like your point.”

“That’s all down to Jamie, really,” Claire replied, smiling as she pulled Jamie gently forwards, “he’s the one who’s given me all of these wonderful insights into modern medicine - him being a third year student and all.”

“So you’re only in your first year then, bravo, Claire, the questions you posed on the increase of sepsis and antibiotic resistance were well informed and clearly presented. If you ever get the option to write your thesis on it I do hope you’ll email me a copy, I’d love to read it.”

Passing his card over to her, Claire placed the small piece of paper into her pocket and moved to let some of the *real* students through to ask their own questions.

The business card felt heavy in her fingers as she let droplets of rain splash onto the top of it. Luckily it was mixed plastic material and the text didn’t blur with the moisture.

Dr. J. Abernathy: Surgeon: Harley Street - it read clearly, the stark font screaming medical professional. It made Claire feel positive.

For a moment -just a second in her life- she’d been interesting and *smart*, her points and opinions had mattered and then only an hour later (after a quick coffee and chat with Jamie and his course mates) she’d walked in on something life-altering.

—

“I have a meeting with my course mentor in a few minutes, lass.” Jamie whispered in Claire’s ear as they’d left the rowdy group sharing anecdotes about their various experiences with famous and *infamous* doctors over the last couple of years. “Are ye alright by yerself? You can wait if you like - we can pop over to The Mitchell for an hour or two after. Unless ye have other plans?”

“I’d love that.” She answered honestly. “But I think I’m going to find Frank’s office. We need to have an earnest conversation about some things. Maybe he’ll be more open to listening to me whilst his colleagues are within earshot.”

“Ach,” Jamie chuckled, “I like yer style. Have ye no’ spoken at home since…?” he said, leaving his sentence hanging in the air instead of talking openly about their previous encounter.

Claire sighed loudly. “When I got home he’d already left for the day. After that we’ve been in the same room as one another. It’s been polite, no more arguments, but he’s just been reserved and quiet and I haven’t had the energy to bring up the subject of my *illicit* studying.” She rolled her eyes as she spoke frustrated that she even had to consider her possible continued education as something to be hidden.

“But now?”

“Yes, well, that lecture opened my eyes.” “I bet Dr. Abernathy would gi’ you a glowing reference...if you asked?”

Smiling, Claire pushed her thick curls behind her ears and shook her head. “He thinks I’m already enrolled on a course somewhere. If I were to email him asking for support with an application, don’t you think he might be a little reticent to do so?”

“Nah.” Jamie replied. “I dinna think he’s the sort to hold that against ye. He offers support to the cutters on our course as well as passing on all sorts of literature to the professors. He’s a really nice guy. He’ll understand why ye couldna be honest at the time - I bet ye a good bottle of whisky.”

“You’re on, lad.” She returned, winking as they turned the corner and headed towards the history block. “But for now, I have to talk to Frank, and you need to get to your meeting.”

Thunder rattled overhead and Claire jumped, her curls frizzing madly around her head as she shook the rain from her hair.

“I’m sorry, miss,” the waitress said, pointing to her watch with a small smile on her face, “but we’re closing now. Is there anything else I can get for you before I start cashing up?”

“Nah, no...thank you, though. I’m fine.” She mumbled, collecting her bag, shaking herself off and pushing the chair under the damp table as she made her way back onto the now desolate streets.

The low slung clouds threatened to dump a fresh shower on her but the roll of thunder kept the heat in the air up as she meandered down to the Clyde. Standing overlooking the water she could see a tall ship mast in the distance, a reminder of the first nice lunch her and Jamie had shared with one another.

“Fuck you, Frank,” she cursed to herself, “that’s how it should be.” Tears threatened to spill down her cheeks as huge, black clouds replaced the lighter ones, making the scenery look menacing in the growing darkness.

Images from the afternoon flooded her mind now, replacing anything good and pleasant with a thick, dank ooze that made her stomach roll.

She could’ve just gone straight to Jamie’s, sat in the bottom bar with a drink her hand and waited for him to return home from university but with her mind all over the place she felt it would be unfair to dump another load of her emotional baggage onto him without knowing what exactly she was going to do next.

“It should be simple.” She sighed under her breath. “Why is it not simple?”

Knocking tentatively on the door that read: ‘Prof. F. Randall’, Claire waited patiently until it was clear his secretary wasn’t going to call her in. Wrapping her hand around the brass door handle, she pushed her way in to find Frank’s receptionist’s office empty. A brief squeak caught her attention and she glanced over at the closed door to the internal room that lay beyond the abandoned desk.

Voices filtered under the door but Claire couldn’t work out what was being said. One was distinctly feminine and without knocking again she made her way over to the second door, her heart pounding in her chest, her head screaming that something was not quite right.

“Frank?” She half questioned, half gasped as she pushed through and into his half furnished office to find a petite blonde woman half dressed and half draped over his spartan desk.

She felt sick. The wind swirled around her as she recalled the calm look that had passed across Frank’s face.

He didn’t care that she’d caught him, she could tell by the bored look in his eyes as he’d straightened his tie up and re-buttoned his fly.

“Just wait outside for a moment, Sandy.” He said, nodding at the woman as she righted her shirt and pulled her skirt from around her ankles. “Read through the dissertations the third years have submitted so far and I’ll be out as soon as I’ve spoken to my wife.”

“Of course, Frank.” She replied, a smug smile plastered across her face as she went, closing the door behind her.

“There was no history expedition the other week, was there?” Claire said as soon as she was certain they were alone. “You were away with her.” Her words were emotionless and clear even though her mind was running at a mile a minute as she tried to process what she’d just walked in on.

“There was a trip, Claire.”

“Really?” She asked, crossing her arms over her chest as she tried to keep her feet still.

“Of course. But yes, it was with Sandy. She’s a PHd student and needed a more accurate research sample for her research doctorate. It was only logical that I accompanied her as her speciality is one of mine.”

“How long have you been fucking her?” Claire whispered, her voice becoming dangerously low as she spoke with forced politeness.

“That sort of language doesn’t become you, Claire.” Frank said, his eyes trained solely on her as he shuffled some fallen papers and placed them back in the centre of his desk. “It doesn’t matter, truly. You’re my wife, I’m not leaving you for her.”

“So you expect us to continue like nothing is wrong?” She choked, the air appearing to thin in the space around her. “Does it mean I can just go out and find myself someone to hook up with, come home and tell you - oh, it doesn’t matter, Frank, I’m not leaving you for him!”

Frank scoffed and the thin veil of nicety that Claire was clinging to freyed as she struggled not to throw the wedding ring on her left hand right at his face.

“It just happened. It’ll fizzle out, they always do.”

“No, Frank. I don’t accept that.” Claire spat, her anger spiking. “I’ve suffered for years, isolated and alone, ditching all of my dreams because of you and your bloody mother and her archaic ideas of marriage. You slept with someone else. After I...I waited, I put my life on hold. You don’t get to brush this off as nothing. Not now.”

She’d stormed out then, but not before she’d told him about her plans to apply for medical school and whispered; ‘he’s all yours, you’re welcome to him’, to the still smiling Sandy who was sat, spine straight, on the chair in Frank’s miniature reception room.

Suddenly Jamie’s words the previous evening made more sense.

He’d had an idea of Frank’s infidelity but no actual proof of the affair. Claire smiled sadly as she thought about it.

Fugitives from the laws of averages, indeed.

But now, standing in the midst of a powerful storm, it wasn’t the excitement of applying (finally) to university or the horror of discovering Frank’s infidelity, that had her heart racing. Instead it was Jamie. By finding himself inflagranti with his own student, Frank had inadvertently lessened any guilt Claire might have felt about her growing ardour for Jamie.

Before she could think too much about it, her feet were moving quickly in the direction of the West End. It was late enough that if he had gone across to The Mitchell after his meeting, he would certainly be warm and dry at home by now.

As the rain started to pour, fat drops of water pummeling the pavement around her as she jogged through the empty streets until the familiar lights of the pub appeared in front of her.

It had been there with every breath, she realised, her love and affection for Jamie and now there wasn’t anything standing in her way. Once she hired herself a lawyer, she’d begin proceedings to divorce Frank and move on with her life.

Pounding on the door as well as ringing the bell, she shuffled from one foot to the other, ignoring how wet she was getting from the unstoppable downpour.

“Christ, Claire!” Jamie exclaimed as he pulled the door to his flat open and took in the sight of the very drenched lass standing nervously on his stoop. “Ye’ll catch yer death out in this, come in.”

Needing no more encouragement, Claire took one step inside and pushed Jamie against the wall before pressing her lips to his. She tried to keep her sopping clothes away from him, but lost to the passion of the kiss, he wrapped his arms around her waist and pulled her flush against him, causing his own shirt to stick to his chest as his hands roamed up and along her back.

Their tongues danced together for a short while, their mouths only parting briefly to drag in gasps of air before Claire tilted her head to the left and slowed her movements.

“I think I’m falling for you, Jamie Fraser.” She sighed her stomach flip-flopping at the breathless admission. “It started the moment I met you and now I can’t get you out of my head.”

“And Frank?” He asked assuming something must have changed for her to be here with him pressed delicately against him.

“Fuck Frank.” She said emotionlessly. “That was over a long time ago and it’s definitely over now.”

“What happened?” He asked, wanting to know exactly what had given her the courage to seek him out like this, in this sort of furor.

“It doesn’t matter now.” She returned, shutting out any image of Frank and focusing completely on Jamie.

“It was there with every breath.” He confessed lowly, choosing to drop his previous question and eerily echoing the words Claire had said to herself not long before making her decision to come. “My love for ye. From the moment I met you I kent what we had was special. Different. But we can talk about that later, aye? Now,” he continued, leaning his forehead against hers, “I think ye need a shower to warm ye.”

#gotham's writing workshop #Private Tutor AU #Jamie X Claire #Outlander #fanfiction

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yangingaround · 7 years ago

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Is Qrow Ruby’s ‘real father’? No, of course he isn’t

the notion that Qrow might be Ruby’s ‘real’, biological father has been around since he first showed up in volume 3, and in this discussion (which i’ll be sticking under a read more as common courtesy because posts like this inevitably get really long when you have to tackle a lot of factors) i’ll be going over why it’s not the case - based on Word of God and evidence in the show itself, as well as deconstructing the supposed ‘proof’ that gets cited to support the idea (read: taken out of context and twisted around to support the idea)

1. Word of God says ‘no’

Monty confirmed in 2014 that Ruby and Yang are half-sisters to different mothers (in response to a theory that Summer Rose is a time travelling Yang – the early RWBY fandom got weird) https://twitter.com/montyoum/status/492070189731565568

Barbara later echoed the statement in the RWBY Volume 3 livestreams, talking about how she loves reading all the zany theories fans come up with, and bringing ‘Qrow is Ruby’s father’ as one specifically that she doesn’t think is right.

It’s clear that the intent is that Qrow and Ruby are unrelated by blood.

“But they could be lying/misleading us”

They have never outright lied about RWBY before – if there is a question they don’t want to answer, it’ll either be ignored or joked about (for example, in a Facebook Q&A in 2015, people asked if Ironwood was half robot due to his glove covering his - what we now know to be robotic - hand. They said he was a big Michael Jackson fan, making a joke out of it and not answering the question directly). Monty answered this question directly – Ruby and Yang are half-sisters. Not cousins. So that’s Word of God, canon. They’re half-sisters.

2. Ruby’s connection to Qrow

"Ruby looks like Qrow”

No, she doesn’t. The only things they have in common are dark hair and a pale complexion (but Ruby is far paler than Qrow, and about as pale as Yang). Ruby doesn’t look like Taiyang because she is a dead ringer for Summer Rose in terms of facial appearance and hair colour (which is different from Qrow’s – Qrow has dark grey hair, while Summer and Ruby have very very dark red hair).

Similar, her dress sense is more than likely inspired by Qrow’s fashion sense, she hasn’t inherited a genetic preference for capes (especially as she’s clearly wearing the cape in reference to Summer, not Qrow), don’t be ridiculous.

"Qrow has the same colour scheme as Ruby”

Ignoring that colour schemes don’t mean anything because that’s just up to personal preference (like dress sense, it’s not genetic), this is also just plain untrue. In the volume Qrow was introduced (and when this argument first popped up), Ruby’s colour scheme was red and black. Qrow’s, meanwhile, is essentially black and white (with red as an auxiliary).

Under this logic, this of course means that Raven is actually Ruby’s other biological parent - which makes perfect sense because her hair is also black and red, like Ruby’s, and she’s far more pale than Qrow.

Ruby had the same colour scheme as Raven, Qrow’s sister, back in the first three volumes, while Qrow had the same colour scheme as Blake (but with a different auxiliary colour - red instead of purple) – in addition, Weiss had Summer’s colour scheme (primarily white) and Yang had Taiyang’s, making her the only one to line up with someone she’s actually related to.

“Ruby wields a scythe just like Qrow, and he trained her”

Weapon preferences aren’t an inherited thing (under that logic, Qrow is Blake’s father too, as her weapon is specifically classed as a Variant Chain Ballistic Scythe), nowhere in the show do we see characters having inherited weapon preferences from their parents. So Ruby choosing to wield a weapon similar to someone who has been an active part of her life since she was small, and active in the field of work she hopes to pursue, doesn’t mean anything other than that she looks up to Qrow – and he trained her because he’s close to the family (having been on the same team).

A scythe wielder training someone he knows to wield a scythe doesn’t mean they’re related.

"Ruby and Qrow have the same Aura colour – they HAVE to be related”

First off, no they don’t

Ruby’s aura is bright red (image from 3x06), Qrow’s is shown to be two different colours in separate shots (images from 3x07), but still darker than Ruby’s. It’s unclear which is the mistake – but the colour in the first seems to match his cape, which is darker than the red Ruby uses.

Second – Aura colour doesn’t mean anything; Pyrrha had a bright red Aura

but she’s not related to Ruby. Aura is the manifestation of the soul; so it’s more than likely going to match a character’s colour preference, it’s a reflection of themselves. And souls aren’t genetic (unless you’re a Schnee with their freaky hereditary semblance). So even if Qrow does have a similar Aura colour, that does not mean anything.

“Raven and Summer both have dark hair, but Yang has light hair like Taiyang. If Tai was Ruby’s father, she’d be blonde too. Genetically, it makes more sense for Qrow to be Ruby’s father.”

We’ll ignore that, in fiction, genetic probability is often ignored for the sake of symbolism or just what looks cool (see every anime protagonist with bright neon hair colours when their entire family look like normal human beings) – in fact it’s pretty common in this show already for a character to look far more like one parent than the other (Ruby’s a dead ringer for Summer, Ren looks a lot like his dad with his mother’s colour scheme, Weiss and Winter both take after their mother, Blake looks a lot like Kali but has more of her dad’s colour scheme, Yang is actually nearly identical to Raven in her youth but has Tai’s colour scheme for the most part) and go straight into the (really really simplified) science lesson:

To begin with – Alleles. An allele, to put it simply, is a name for a gene variant. Every gene has multiple variants, most are benign and don’t make a difference beyond changing the phenotype (physical appearance, though that’s really boiling it down) if at all. Sometimes harmful variants (often called ‘mutations’ but that’s really simplifying it as they’re not always ‘new’ mutations and can simply be carried down a family line until manifesting) will be in the genome and can cause permanent conditions such as Cystic Fibrosis or Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome.

We inherit two sets of chromosomes from our birth parents. So we get one copy of every gene (more or less, again, keeping things simple) from each parent. And this is where you will probably have heard of ‘Dominant’ and ‘Recessive’ genes. The correct terminology, as you might have guessed, is Dominant and Recessive alleles.

A Dominant allele will always be expressed over a Recessive allele, unless there are no Dominant alleles, in which case the Recessive allele (and the phenotype it encodes) will be expressed.

So bringing things back to RWBY – Yang has blonde hair like her father, while Raven has dark hair.

I’m going to use a diagram called a Punnett Square to demonstrate how this works. A Punnett Square is a simplified diagram showing inheritance probability – the chance of the offspring of any two individuals inheriting a particular arrangement of alleles.

In reality, blondness is a recessive trait; meaning Taiyang has two copies of a recessive gene encoding hair colour – signified in this diagram with the lower case b.

So any children Taiyang has will definitely inherit one of these recessive alleles.

Yang’s birth mother, Raven Branwen, must also have one of these recessive alleles for Yang to be blonde. As Raven herself is not blonde (and is therefore a carrier of the recessive trait), she must also have a dominant allele, signified in the diagram with an upper case B.

So filling in the square

we see that two of the four combinations have both recessive alleles – meaning there is a 50% chance that any child that Raven and Tai could have had could be blond (homozygous –two of the same allele), and a 50% chance that they would instead have Raven’s dark hair (heterozygous –two different alleles).

So from this, because we know Taiyang’s alleles for hair colour are recessive, we can assume that Summer carries at least one dominant allele encoding for her dark red hair, which Ruby inherited (similarly, blue eyes are another typically recessive trait. That Yang has purple eyes suggests that red eyes are another recessive trait in-universe, meaning Raven has two recessive alleles there – seen in this second Punnett Square depicting inheritance of those alleles

showing a 100% chance that every child of theirs would have purple eyes, as the traits would be co-recessive - neither more dominant than the other).

We don’t know what Yang’s maternal grandparents looked like, but we can assume one at the very least carried a recessive blond allele like Raven does. This means there is a minimum 50% chance that Qrow, Raven’s twin brother, inherited that same recessive allele from that parent (as non-identical twins, like most full-blooded siblings, have a 50% chance of inheriting the same allele from a particular parent).

We don’t know Summer’s genotype, so we don’t know if she was homozygous or heterozygous for dark red hair and silver eye alleles, as the whole thing is a 50% chance rate, but Ruby is identical to Summer and possesses those traits, meaning those alleles are Dominant.

So then we get into the potential fathers – now Taiyang’s hair and eye colour alleles are both recessive, so Summer passing on her dominant alleles means a 50% (if heterozygous) minimum chance that those children would look like Summer. Qrow on the other hand, while possessing a recessive trait when it comes to eye colour (so same chance of passing on Silver Eyes as with Tai), does not when it comes to hair colour. Qrow has at least one allele for expressing dark (gray) hair, and that is presumably dominant as it would be in reality; however Ruby definitely has Summer’s dark red hair allele, meaning if Qrow is her biological father, he did not pass that gene on or it’s not as dominant as the dark red hair allele (as there is no sign of co-dominance where both traits are expressed to a degree).

What this means is that, based on hair and eye colour (the traits normally cited when it comes to this subject), there would be no genetic basis for arguing one way or the other, because Summer’s traits are dominant, and Tai and Qrow both carry recessive traits. So this argument is moot.

Now, if I were to joke around, I could say that because Ruby, following the time skip, has grown to have a figure more like Yang does, they must have gotten those traits from the same side of the family. However, we can see that Raven is quite slight, she’s not as developed as Yang is (and we haven’t seen Summer to know either way), so it’s more reasonable to assume that those physical attributes come from Taiyang’s side of the family. So while I personally wouldn’t say there’s any argument that could be made using genetics (simply because we don’t know enough about Qrow or Summer’s genotypes), that could be used to suggest Tai would be more likely. Especially as, with Occam’s Razor meaning the solution with the least number of assumptions is the most likely to be correct, Taiyang has no dominant traits that could interfere with the expression of Summer’s alleles, while Qrow potentially could, but we have to assume on that score.

And just to close this little journey into science out, I’m going back to earlier in saying that genetics shouldn’t really be taken into consideration, it’s highly unlikely the writers were thinking that in-depth about it, and the show’s relationship with genetics in general is shaky at best. Just look at the Faunus – from what we’re told, we can actually put together that humans and Faunus are the exact same species at a genetic level (though considered separate societally), with the only difference being a single allele (and for Faunus-human offspring to have a higher chance of being Faunus, the allele expressing Faunus traits is dominant), and that they have essentially the entire animal kingdom in their genes (for two Faunus with different animal traits to be able to produce offspring with an utterly different animal trait than the parents), all on a single genetic pathway activated by a single gene, for a trait that can be manifested anywhere on the body. That’s not possible unless magic is involved (which to be fair is likely but I doubt this is the reasoning).

Science lesson over.

"Qrow acts more like a father to Ruby than Taiyang does”

Well first off, this is an unfair claim to make, as Ruby and Taiyang have only shared one scene together (where he had fallen asleep at her bedside waiting for her to wake up, I might add, and after she wakes up he’s concerned, doting, goes to get her tea - that’s pretty damn parental), so we don’t really get an idea of how close they are. While Qrow and Ruby have had multiple scenes together simply because that’s the way narrative has gone.

Tai leaving the room and looking angry at Qrow for asking for alone time is often used as ‘proof’ of this argument, that Tai is angry at Qrow for being an irresponsible parent who only comes in when it suits him. When all it really is, is a concerned father whose daughter has just woken up from a coma and he’s understandably worried about her (and we know he’s overprotective of Ruby; as per her conversation with Penny in volume 2) and so not telling her what precisely she did on the tower because it’s something to do with Summer (who is, y’know, dead, for reasons almost certainly tied to her Silver Eyes, so Tai wanting to avoid the subject for fear of history repeating is understandable), and so his anger at Qrow is a) because he wants to be by Ruby’s side as she’s still recovering and b) because he knows that Qrow is going to tell Ruby what she did (and so encourage her to run off and potentially get hurt again) and is kicking him out of the room so he can’t stop it (and Taiyang admits to stopping Qrow from giving Yang information, so we know it’s something he’d do).

Qrow, while having more scenes with Ruby, doesn’t act like a father. He’s a barely functional alcoholic, he’s rarely around, only hangs out with his nieces for a brief period of time (and he wasn’t at Beacon to see them in the first place) and then leaves to do more work – he’s more a fun uncle (because, surprise-surprise, he is an uncle!). And his behaviour in volume 4, following Ruby at a distance and not letting her know he’s there isn’t a particularly fatherly thing to do even when Ruby isn’t well outside her comfort zone. This trend continues in volume 5 as we see he leaves the kids alone to go out drinking and generally spends little time with them.

Now, Qrow has without a doubt been a big part of Ruby’s life since she was young, but that doesn’t mean he’s her father. I mean, in volume 4, episode 4, we see Yang implicitly saying that she sees Qrow as a ‘father-figure’ (as her discussion with Taiyang was echoing points Qrow made in volume 3 episode 4), but we’ve got no idea if Ruby does, but if she does, then it’s still nothing special, because it’s both Ruby and Yang seeing Qrow as a father-figure.

Finally, if Qrow is Ruby’s father, then his comments disparaging Raven’s poor parenting would be incredibly hypocritical of him, as he’d pushed Ruby to leave Yang behind and cross two continents to track down an opponent she has no hope of actually beating in a straight fight. And additionally, Raven does not call him on that, which you’d think she would, instead of trying to defend her actions.

"Ruby acts like Qrow”

Only so far as being reckless when she fights, rushing into danger, and that can be chalked up to him training her.

However, Ruby also reflects Taiyang’s more… eccentric traits. He mailed Zwei to the girls at Beacon, Ruby later suggested the team mail themselves to Mountain Glenn.

And this is a nature vs nurture thing; determining how much of someone’s personality comes from their blood relatives and how much of it comes from the environment they’re raised in (and specifically the people they were raised by). As Ruby was raised around both Taiyang and Qrow, her having personality traits reflective of both is understandable, this isn’t proof one way or another.

”The only reason Qrow would care about Ruby is if he was related to her”

This isn’t an argument I’ve actually seen put explicitly like this, but it is very often an Implication when this subject is brought up. The situation is treated like there is no possible way a man could possibly care about a kid he isn’t related to, so he has to be their father. Which is just such nonsense, people can care about other people without being related to them

Found Family is a very popular trope (and given how Qrow talks about the people who raised him, very much in play with Qrow, who was obviously happier with the family he found at Beacon than the bandits he grew up with).

”But he went specifically to look out for Ruby after volume 3, but he’s blood related to Yang. Why would he leave Yang if Ruby wasn’t related to him?”

As harsh as this is gonna sound – Yang wasn’t going anywhere. She was safe at home, while Ruby was heading into the wilds of the world and Qrow had good reason to assume Salem’s agents would be after her.

And as I already went into, you don’t have to be blood to care about people – Ruby is family, regardless of who she’s related to, and Qrow was her teacher.

On top of that, Ruby is a Silver Eyed Warrior – she has this special magic power that can affect Grimm and apparently Cinder too; Qrow is still following Ozpin’s plans after his disappearance/death, so keeping tabs on someone Ozpin had taken an interest in is more than enough to explain that even without the personal connection.

3. Story Elements

Now a big part of the reason this idea of Qrow being Ruby’s father seems to be so popular is that a lot of people seem to be stuck on this idea that it would “be a good twist” or that “it makes sense”. But, I hate to say (not really), it really wouldn’t be and no, it doesn’t.

Another thing, that came up with volume 4, is that people seem to think ‘Bad Luck Charm’, Qrow’s image song, supports the idea, and I’ll get into why that’s not true in this section. So let’s get into this:

"It would be a good twist”

The reason Qrow being Ruby’s father would not be a ‘good twist’ is because there’s no narrative stake on Ruby’s parentage. The most that comes into play with Ruby’s heritage is Summer, which is understandable because of her Silver Eyes. Adding “who’s your daddy” drama would unnecessarily complicate Ruby’s current arc.

One reason I see on occasion on why people wanted this idea to be the case is “so Ruby can inherit Qrow’s shapeshifting magical ability” (this was before we learned such powers came from Ozpin). And that’s really confusing because… Ruby’s already got bloodline magic powers, with her Silver Eyes. She doesn’t need more. Besides, Ruby has wolf imagery (Monty originally designed her to be more ‘wolf-like’, she’s based on Little Red Riding Hood, a story which famously features a wolf, introduced fighting Beowolves, has a pet dog and has ‘circling doggos’ when dazed – 1x08), not bird imagery like the Branwens have.

Honestly, it’s like Yang is being forgotten about. Yang is Qrow’s niece by blood; she’s the Branwen on team RWBY, if anyone would inherit magical bloodline powers related to the Branwens it should be her (though, again, as that was Ozpin magic, it may not be inheritable - and if by some strange twist it is, we haven’t seen it yet, or we have an it’s just manifested differently than ‘turns into a bird’ - her fire abilities are strangely inconsistent to what we consider her ‘semblance’.)

So, narratively, it’s already poor because it’s creating unnecessary family drama and ignoring that RWBY already has a Branwen on the team, so it’s redundant as well.

But it’s also a bad twist because, what changes? In a story with a ‘surprise heritage’ twist, the reason the protagonist doesn’t know this other person is their parent is because that person is often either not around or is kept away. But Qrow has been around for Ruby’s whole life, he’s a welcome part of it, he doesn’t go out of his way to avoid Ruby or Yang. He taught her how to fight, he was a teacher at her school (which means his semblance isn’t so bad that he can’t be around people for long stretches of time, because I know people love to jump on that, ‘oh he can’t let Ruby know because of his semblance, it’s bad luck’ – it obviously can’t be, because otherwise how would he have managed to be a teacher? How would he have managed when he was at school? At most his semblance, in relaxed settings, just means someone occasionally walks into a doorframe or trips over their feet, log falls out of a fire. He’s not that dangerous to be around despite how emo he gets over it and likely takes necessary precautions). So there’s no narrative tension to him telling her, because then what changes? Does she start calling Qrow ‘dad’ and Taiyang ‘uncle Tai’? Does she start calling Yang ‘cousin’? No, of course she doesn’t, because her relationships with them wouldn’t change in the slightest (beyond maybe anger and confusion at being lied to, and that’d pass with time). Or does it make tensions between Taiyang and Qrow worse, and so make it about them instead of Ruby, the main character?

Ultimately, this would just be a cheap, soap opera twist for shock, and ultimately change nothing, it wouldn’t add to Ruby’s narrative. And soap opera drama isn’t necessary, when narrative drama is already happening for Ruby, and all this would do is complicate things for something that ultimately amounts to nothing.

"But it makes more sense for Qrow to be Ruby’s father”

Nope, no, it doesn’t. Because think about it; I mentioned before that this idea would be redundant because Yang’s already the team’s Branwen – and that redundancy is definitely the case here too.

For Qrow to be Ruby’s father, but Ruby unaware, that means that both Yang and Ruby have birth parents they weren’t raised by or initially informed of. We’ve already had the ‘surprise heritage’ twist with Yang’s backstory, and it really stretches disbelief to do near the exact same thing twice in the same story, in the same family.

The blow-up from Yang finding out about Raven nearly got Yang and Ruby killed. And yet even after that, apparently Ruby and Yang were still lied to about Qrow being Ruby’s father. That is a horrific violation of common sense; because what’s stopping the same thing happening a second time if Qrow’s away, Tai dies and then Ruby gets the revelation that Taiyang wasn’t her father and she has to go searching for him? Why not just tell her, to avoid the possibility of that happening? Isn’t that safer than keeping it secret ‘because he’s bad luck’?

Ultimately, it’s redundant, and takes away from Yang’s story by doing the same thing with Ruby (with even less reason to do so). And so then a big part of Yang’s story is made less special.

Now let’s look at some of the reasons this idea is said to make ‘more sense’:

"Taiyang moved on too quickly – for Taiyang to have realistically gotten with Summer within two years, Summer would have to already be pregnant with Qrow’s child and they were only together to take care of their kids”

This is nonsense, which seems to be based in assuming that Taiyang reacted to Raven leaving similarly to how he did with Summer’s death, by shutting down.

But there’s a vast difference between the two – someone leaving is a very different impact to someone being taken away. It still hurts, but there’s less to grieve. So it’s totally realistic for someone to have a bad break up (which is essentially what happened) and then a new relationship sparks with someone else within a year or so (especially as Taiyang and Summer already knew each other from being on the same team; and it’s possible she was around more helping him take care of Yang before it really started – fact of the matter is, we really don’t know much about team STRQ from that time period and what their relationships with each other were like, but we do know that Yang thought of Summer as ‘mom’, meaning she was there pretty early on).

On top of that, Yang explicitly states that the reason for Taiyang’s shutdown/not being around much afterwards is because Summer was the second love he’d lost – indicating that it was the combined impact of Summer’s death and the not-yet-healed wounds of Raven’s departure that caused that. So they very plainly were not just together ‘for the kids’, because Taiyang clearly loved her enough that losing her led to such a devastating response. And in addition, we don’t hear how Summer’s death affected Qrow’s behaviour, if it did at all, so it’s very strange that Taiyang’s devastated reaction is paid attention to if he was only with Summer for the kids, and it was Qrow that Summer loved.

We have absolutely no indication in canon that Qrow and Summer ever saw each other as more than friends. This is just plainly heteronormativity (and specifically the idea that men and women can’t just be friends) and the Pair the Spares trope in action (because Tai and Raven were together, so Qrow and Summer obviously got together too. They couldn’t have just stayed single or anything).

“Summer must have cheated on Taiyang with Qrow, because Ruby looks like Qrow”

While I already debunked Ruby looking like Qrow earlier, I’m exploring this point because this is flagrant character defamation.

We know very little about Summer Rose, but what we do hear is all positive.

So this notion that Summer was an adulterer, that she would and did cheat on someone - cheating being an utterly horrible thing to do to a person - is absurd when there’s nothing about her that we’ve heard that suggests she would do that. And all to satisfy… what exactly? That’s the biggest part of this idea that makes no sense to me, what’s the reason? Why do people like it? Is it because they ship Qrow and Summer (which is… interesting because Qrow has an established character while we know very little about Summer’s character and also she’s dead) and want to push it into canon? Or is it one of the reasons I went into and deconstructed earlier, ‘Ruby getting more magic powers’, ‘Because people can’t love people they’re not related to’, ‘they look alike and so must be related’? Ultimately, there’s really nothing that supports the idea, and a whole lot that goes against it.

"Bad Luck Charm”

Coming back to Qrow’s volume 4 image song. One thing that now gets cited a lot as ‘proof’ is the lines “You and I are not the same/You don’t want the burden of my name”, and taking that to mean “you’re my daughter but it’s better that you don’t know”.

But that line is taken wholly out of context from the rest of the song, and even the rest of the verse it’s in:

“You should trust one thing take my advice If you linger close It’s a hefty price You and I are not the same You don’t want the burden of my name”

This verse is a warning – because the line about his name? That’s a reference to Qrow talking about his name in A Much Needed Talk (Volume 4 Episode 8). That he was named after CROWS because they’re a symbol of bad luck. That’s the point of the song in general, it’s a warning to the listener (the song never makes any specific reference to the audience it’s directed at either, so it’s a general warning to anybody, not someone in particular) that he’s bad luck. It’s not some “ooo i’m secretly your father ooo” line in a song that is otherwise constantly about how he’s bad luck.

What that is, taking the line out of context to use as proof, is cherry-picking. Using out of context details that supports your point while ignoring all the rest of the information that contradicts it to push for it.

I can do the same thing with the same song, look:

“I'm a cursed black cat” – Well, I guess this means that Qrow is Blake’s father because she’s a cat Faunus and has a primarily black colour scheme.

“I'm an albatross” – Oh god, Qrow’s is Yang’s father too – she has flight imagery so it must be true.

"I'm a mirror broken” – And Weiss’s father too, because Weiss has mirror imagery which means he’s definitely her father because it’s not like ‘broken mirrors’ are bad luck and that’s what the song is about

Do you see what I mean? If you have to take specific lines and scenes out of context to prove your point, then your point doesn’t exist.

4. “It’s just a theory, stop freaking out about it”

This is something I see in response to pieces attempting to debunk this idea of Qrow being Ruby’s father – that people annoyed at it should stop complaining because “it’s just a theory.”

Now to begin with on this point; the reason people are so annoyed by it is because, despite the Word of God information, nothing in canon supporting it and the only supporting information being either made up or taken out of context, a lot of people are so insistent on it being canon, and refuse to listen when people point out the holes in it.

Secondly, it’s not a theory. A theory is, typically, a logical, intuitive leap based on existing information. Qrow being Ruby’s real father, as I just said, is the exact opposite of that, because it’s based on nothing but misconstrued moments taken out of context, contradicting the existing information and statements from the creators of the show. At that point it’s not even a headcanon – which would be a small idea that isn’t directly contradicted by canon but isn’t necessarily supported by it either. “Qrow is Ruby’s real father” is an AU concept. It’s not a theory, can we please stop pretending that it is.

And ultimately, Qrow can still love Ruby like family even if he’s not related to her by blood (I mean, Summer is Yang’s mom, she raised her, she wanted to be part of Yang’s life, unlike Raven, who is Yang’s mother by blood only), so I don’t see why people are so insistent on Qrow being Ruby’s father in canon, because he doesn’t have to be.

Anyway, that’s that, thanks for reading

#RWBY #Qrow Branwen #Ruby Rose

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