#(i also think it would be INCREDIBLY funny if one of them was decade)

[egophiliac]

YEA RIDE KAMENS ART IM CRYING.. is there a rider you want to appear in the game? i'm personally praying for kiva 😭

YEAH! :D I'm having a lot of fun anticipating the reveals (and being extremely wrong about most of them) but I am also unironically extremely excited for this game! it is the kind of buckwild adaptation that we both need and deserve (and also I kind of adore all the characters already).

we're never getting a Fourze but. I desperately want a Fourze. 😭 Kiva would also be EXCELLENT, the vampire motif would work SO well with these designs! (not to mention the whole stained-glass theming in general...Kiva had some really beautiful designs going on, just LOOK at Saga --)

[wonder-worker]

"It is too easy to dismiss [Leonor of Navarre] as an overambitious schemer who would do anything to obtain a crown, shedding the blood of her own siblings and her subjects in order to attain the throne. However, a deeper investigation of her long lieutenancy and ephemeral reign shows a woman who fought tenaciously to preserve her place but also worked tirelessly to administer a realm which was crippled by internal conflict and the center of the political schemes of France, Aragon, and Castile. She tried to broker peace, fight off those who opposed her, repair the wounds caused by conflict, protect the sovereignty of the realm, and keep the wheels of governance turning. Leonor was not always successful in achieving all of these aims but given the background of conflict and the lack of cooperation she received from all of her family members, bar her loyal husband, it is a huge achievement that she survived to wear the crown at all. Many writers have argued that Leonor deserved the troubled lieutenancy, personal tragedies, an ephemeral reign, and a blackened reputation, basing their assumption that she committed a crime that cannot be [conclusively] proven. However, a more fitting description of her would be that of a resolute ruler who successfully overcame a multitude of challenges in order to survive in a difficult political landscape and gain a hard-fought throne.”

— Elena Woodacre, "Leonor of Navarre: The Price of Ambition", Queenship, Gender and Reputation in the Medieval and Early Modern West, 1060-1600 (Edited by Zita Eva Rohr and Lisa Benz)

[stxrvel]

absence (1)

series summary. the holy grail of the seven men who ruled the country's entertainment used to be your friends at school. now, ten years later and between successes and failures, what reason would they have to want to come back into your life? pairing. eventually ot7 x f!reader... or not? content. first of all, english is not my first language so sorry for any mistakes! curse words, fangirling a lot and some self-deprecation. no proofread. this is just silly writing, we're on the safe zone for now. a/n. hi guys! i was gonna wait a little bit but i'm really excited about this one so you're gonna have earlier! thank u all for the support and i really hope you enjoy this 🫶🏻

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You met them all at school. Each with their own ambitions, their different dreams, but so similar in the nature of their core. It was almost funny how everyone with their dissimilar personalities fit so strangely well into one school group. There were times when you could still remember how you used to tell them that all together they could rule the world.

Maybe that's why you didn't see them years ago.

Jeon Jungkook was an idol. There wasn't an hour in the day or a screen in the city where you weren't watching him. He was so popular around the world that you suspected that not even one person didn't know him. His voice was on every radio station, on every cell phone of the people you passed on the street and on the buses, his face on the TV sets with the last interview he had done, as if it were a national achievement. You even saw him in restaurants, chefs naming dishes after him, production companies releasing collaborations with his company. There wasn't an object in that city that didn't have Jungkook's face on its forehead. It was impossible to escape him.

He was closely followed by Kim Taehyung and Park Jimin, two of the most promising models of the last decade, a national pride hand in hand with Jungkook. You didn't see them as often as Jungkook, but they still swept the international public and there was hardly anyone who didn't talk about them. Invited to catwalks in Paris, choosing their contracts and collaborations, wearing the most expensive clothes that you wouldn't even think of buying, wearing beautiful matching jewelry, expensive enough that a single outfit from each of them could buy you five houses in the small town they all came from. Taehyung and Jimin were known as the Siamese twins of modeling. Wherever one went, the other always had to be. Their exclusivity was incomparable.

In levels of recognition, Min Yoongi followed them in line. A great rapper who was well received by the general populace. Yoongi had managed to captivate a large audience thanks to his incredible command of the production of his music and his ease and gift for writing his own lyrics. His growth was gradual, but when he touched the sky he never went down again. His popularity was not low even though his presentation to the public was not that high compared to the other three. Still, Yoongi had enough charisma and talent to stand out, especially when his fans were obsessed with highlighting the duality he had when he was on stage and when he did those seventy question interviews with Vogue or whatever… that had made him one of the best rappers of his generation and probably of the last century.

Kim Namjoon was the owner of the company that made Jungkook's debut and welcomed Yoongi with total creative freedom. If he were not solely focused on music, he would surely also be Taehyung and Jimin's agent. Namjoon had inherited a company from his parents, but the success he had turned it into over the past few years, into one of the most profitable businesses in the country, was entirely to his credit and effort. His popularity was also high, because everyone said he was too handsome to be a mere businessman; not knowing, of course, that everything involved in maintaining such a business required much more than a pretty face. Of Namjoon the public didn't know too much, not probably like the other guys and you, if he was still half the person he was before.

Hand in hand with Namjoon were Jung Hoseok and Kim Seokjin. Hoseok was and still is to this day a national pride as he passionately played tennis since school and turned professional, reaching to participate in major international tournaments representing his country and winning one of them. However, two years after that great feat, an accident involving one of his hands prevented him from continuing to play. No one knows exactly what happened during the more than a year and a half that he almost completely disappeared from the public eye, but when he returned with his huge smile he announced that he would dedicate himself to dance, opening his own academy throughout the center of the city. Although he was not a recurrent teacher, his academy was one of the best in the country, and of course, it was financed by Namjoon's company. At one time Hoseok became Namjoon's associate.

Seokjin, on the other hand, was the one who kept the lowest profile. He was a great doctor, cardiovascular if you were not mistaken. In addition to being an amazing surgeon, his research projects were the ones everyone looked forward to the most at the end of each year. You didn't know much about the subject, but he was almost like the guru of medicine in his field specifically. The only reason he was so much in the public eye being a doctor was because he was regularly seen in the company of Namjoon, Hoseok and Yoongi. The four of them made up the holy grail of dilfs.

They had all had incredibly successful careers and you were glad that they had been able to accomplish everything they once talked about on the rooftop of Namjoon's house, with sneaky steps so their parents wouldn't scold them when they sneaked out in the wee hours of the morning.

You didn't know exactly what it was - or you didn't want to acknowledge it - that succumbed inside you every time you saw or heard about any of them on the news or on social media. Because yeah, no matter how low media exposure any of them had, always the faces of all seven appeared on your TikTok every week.

It was amazing how they had all moved on and you… well, you-

“Weren't you supossed to leave?”

You lifted your head from your phone, trying to hide it with trembling hands as you let Taehyung's face next to Jungkook's plunge into the darkness of your apron pocket.

“Huh?”

You tried to look distracted, returning your gaze between your boss and the notes next to the cash register. She had a soft gaze, between amused and sisterly. Her brown eyes shifted from your eyes and hot cheeks to the notes you held upside down in your hands, pretending to work as if she herself hadn't seen you completely frozen and gawking at the pair of the country's great casanovas.

“I thought you were leaving earlier today,” your boss shifted, settling her trench coat and long brown strap bag over her shoulder. At that moment she was leaving to walk around to each of the locations she had in town, just to do follow-ups. “Don't tell me you forgot.”

You followed her index finger until it landed on the red circle you had drawn on the calendar placed in your little cubicle a couple of weeks ago, with hearts surrounding it and exclamation points. Yes you remembered, of course you remembered, but at the point where you were at the time no one was going to miss you if you didn't attend.

“I didn't forget…” your voice trailed off as you looked down, your fingers finding the tips of the pages more entertaining than your boss's worried expression.

“y/n, you asked me to leave earlier this day from four months ago,” her high-pitched voice echoed in your head, reminding you how excited you had been a while ago for this day to come. “You can't just give up like that. Come on. You still have time.”

You began to shake your head, releasing your grip on the woman who was looking at you with the same worried eyes of a mother. Your boss had been one of the most encouraging people you'd ever had in your life, besides the handful of friends you had stored in your phone's contacts.

“It was a bust last time. I don't plan on going through that again.”

“But hadn't you told me afterwards that you weren't going to let that stop you? You said… what was it? I can't drown in this glass of water.”

You grudgingly resisted the urge to roll your eyes. Really you of four months ago was a deluded fool.

“I had no idea about life at the time.”

Your boss clicked her tongue, dropping her hands on your shoulders, giving little squeezes whose familiarity stole your breath.

“I'll leave Patrick waiting for you in case you change your mind.”

You shook your head, evading the memories. The man outside the store shook his head in greeting as the two of you turned to look at him, as if he knew you were talking about him.

“Don't miss this opportunity because you're afraid. It may change your life.”

You watched her leave, the clacking of her low heels drawing the attention of everyone in the store, earning every possible stare as she did every time she entered any room. Her chauffeur, Patrick, greeted her with a similar nod of his head as before and stood leaning against the black car parked right where he could get a perfect view of your nervous face.

You, unlike the great and successful lives of your high school friends whose company you still used to miss like a fool, had not had such a great and successful life.

You were a writer. Well, an attempted writer and, worse, part-time. The other part-time was this job behind the cash register at the largest pastry chain in the country. Or sometimes as a waitress, it depended on the day. There was good pay, mind you, at least it allowed you to make up for the losses you took every time you tried to sell a book and then had to market it on your own, only to have five purchases once every seven months and three of them were from your parents and brother. The other two were from your friends.

Four months ago you had been invited to a sort of convention for readers, how they had found you and why? You had no idea, but the idea of being considered in that way drove you crazy at the time. You were so excited that you had more copies of your failed books printed and prepared your booth several days in advance to present them to the horde of people who, you were sure at the time, would come to meet you.

Only one person came by to ask you about the bathroom.

You never recovered from that.

Even with all that failure, that same day you were invited to another convention and, for a while, you were excited to attend. Everyone goes through those kinds of bumps at some point in their life, right? You have to work hard to earn that kind of fame, you kept telling yourself. But as time went on and your networks didn't grow and your videos didn't get more than ten views, or fifty views at most in a week, you began to lose that spark of excitement you held for your dream. Your parents had never turned your back on what you wanted to do, but it was too demotivating and discouraging to have spent so many years at it, so many headaches and tears invested for you to just keep losing and losing money.

That was why you were sure you wouldn't go to that convention if you had to go through that mockery again. You hadn't even bothered to go and fix your booth so surely they already knew you weren't going.

“Have you seen them yet??????”

The female voice coming from the wine cellar made you jump up on your chair.

“Jesus, Yuna, you almost killed me here.”

“I don't care! We could die right now for all we care!”

“Wow, speak for yourself.”

“Haven't you seen theeeem?”

Yuna held up her phone, the screen at full brightness blinding you for a moment. The blurry dots you saw from the proximity of the device told you nothing, as your friend jumped excitedly beside you.

“God, hold still.”

Grabbing her wrist, you leveled the phone to see her TikTok and a picture of three men.

Namjoon, Yoongi and Jungkook coming out of a building. From Namjoon's building.

“They look amazing, don't they? They just came out! That means their car will pass in front of us any minute!”

Yes, Namjoon's building was just a few blocks away from your boss's place. In fact, your boss knew him and many times they would prepare large orders for parties at his company. You had never seen him set foot in this place or any other in the country, but every time he went to celebrate something he had to dial your boss's personal number and you would work until your backs burned because everything had to be perfect for the big businessman.

“Are you going out to greet them or what?” you frowned, letting go of her wrist and returning your gaze to the notebook next to the cash register.

Yuna let out an excited exclamation.

“Ohhhh~, should I? Should I?”

You grabbed her by the collar of her uniform as she tried to pass behind you.

“We're still on business hours.”

“I'm sure Sol wouldn't mind,” her almost heart pupil eyes stared down the street, her hands moving in front of her like she was a zombie. She almost seemed possessed by her fanaticism. Though of course you didn't blame her, if you didn't know any of the seven knights of the underworld you would surely be as excited as she was.

“Don't put words in her mouth. You'd better tell me if the lady's batch of cakes is out yet-”

Commotion erupted throughout the room. You almost saw in slow motion how all the people in the premises got up and running in the direction of the glass doors when you heard the screams coming from far away.

“They're comiiiiiiiiiiiing!!!”

Sometimes you wondered how they dealt with this level of fanaticism.

The ground almost shook with the amount of people running after a black car, where the three men who were causing such a furor so early that day were most likely to be, and the commotion was not tiny inside the venue where the screams erupted.

Having to deal with that on a daily basis would easily turn someone into a hater. Not that you were one... strictly...

“God, for a moment we breathed the same air,” Yuna plopped down on the table, her body doubled over with her eyes lost. You resisted the urge to smack her forehead.

“Their car windows were up.”

“So you saw them, right?????”

“Argh.”

You had to drag her back to work as the excitement in the store dissipated. You attended to another batch of consumers while Yuna fixed the display case and, in a moment of lapse you could almost tell, her back suddenly straightened and she turned to look at you with her eyes a little too wide. You passed the change to the man in front of you, who barely sent you a confused glance before continuing to claim his order at the other corner of the store.

“What's wrong with you?”

“You shouldn't be here.”

“Don't say that with that face. You look creepy,” you pulled out the bill to tuck it under the cash register as Yuna approached, leaving the frightened face behind.

“Wasn't that convention today?”

You sighed. “Yes.”

“Then why aren't you there?”

“Do I look like I want to be there?”

“Y/n! It's a great opportunity. You should-”

“A great opportunity for what, to be a laughingstock again?”

Yuna pursed her lips, looking almost pained that you would remember in that way the experience that was supposed to change your life. She had been one of the ones who had accompanied you to set up the booth and she was sure she had never seen you smile so much during all the time the two of you had known each other. Yuna was aware of how over time you seemed to have lost interest in this new convention, but she didn't think you would finally decide not to go.

On the sly, she had prepared your booth with the help of your mother and Sol, your boss.

“You were never a laughingstock! Don't say that,” Yuna patted your forearm harder than necessary. “Besides, I recently logged some purchases on the site! How do you-?”

“I know it was you and mom,” you raised your voice to interrupt her, stepping archly away from her body.

“What the… Of course not, ha, ha!”

“You're the only fools who would write down celebrity names to register purchases. Besides, the addresses don't even exist.”

“Fuck, I told her that wouldn't work.”

Under your heavy gaze, Yuna had the decency to look embarrassed.

“Okay, I'm sorry! We wanted to motivate you to go to the convention.”

“Can't you just let me do my own thing? If I don't want to go, I won't go.”

“Even if you leave Patrick waiting there?”

You followed his gaze, watching the man pull an umbrella out of the trunk of the car as the slightest breeze brushed against his body and the water droplets were smaller than a dew that the two of you had to squint to see them on the glass of the entrance.

“Whatever it is, I'm not going.”

“y/n…” Yuna pleaded, coming closer with her puppy dog eyes.

“No.”

“y/n, please…”

“No and stop doing that. You look weird.”

“I don't,” Yuna pulled away to frown at you. “I once heard you agreed with Seoyeon about my puppy face being cute.”

“I never agreed with that!”

“Seojun told me so!”

“Your first mistake is believing Seojun.”

“Do you blame me if the reason is your demonstration of love for me?”

“That was your second mistake.”

“Y/n!”

_____________________

That day you arrived home a little later than usual. Since Patrick had been waiting for you all day in the sun and mini rain and refused to let you take a cab on direct instructions from Sol, you asked him to take a ride downtown so you could buy the teokkboki your mom loved and incidentally bought some for him, even though he didn't want to accept it at first.

“y/n, dear, how did it go?”

Your parents were in the living room when you arrived playing Go. Your father left the table when he saw you carrying the bag of food and came over to take it from you.

“What does our little writer bring here, a contract by any chance?”

You watched out of the corner of your eye as your mother tried to get your father's attention by wildly waving her fan, while the man rummaged through the bag to find something warm and delicious smelling.

“Oh, it's teokkboki.”

Your mother stopped waving her arm to stare at the bag with sparkling eyes.

“The ones from the center? From Mrs. Wang?”

You nodded in her direction, taking a seat in their midst on the floor. Your parents started a pitched battle to see who would break the bag first to try the first batch of teokkboki and you could only watch them with a smile on your face. The day may have been difficult, but being home at the end of the day always made you feel so much better.

Amidst laughter and anecdotes, trying to avoid the elephant in the room because you knew your mother's furtive glances weren't for nothing, the three of you ate teokkboki until you were bursting at the seams. You organized the kitchen with your father while your mother grumbled from the living room whatever he said about her. You watched the three of you favorite soap opera on the fixed schedule and finally got ready for bed.

With your body more relaxed and lighter, you let yourself sink into the softness of the sheets, completely ignoring the messages Yuna had sent earlier and the stupid questions your brother asked at the most inopportune moments.

How do I unclog a bath?

Do I add salt to the rice???

Where do I get the kimchi mom makes?????

His independence was probably one of the worst things that could happen. You being the older sister thought you would leave home first. Even according to your twelve year old diary, you should have been married by then or at least planning your amazing, mega giant wedding, complete with helicopters and puppy dogs carrying drinks through the reception. You didn't know what kind of crazy dreams you had when you were younger, but up to that point you hadn't been able to fulfill any of your inner child's desires except to study for a career you were passionate about.

Still, what good had that done in the end? Maybe you should've listened to your grandparents to study medicine. Maybe your parents should've been a little more conservative instead of libertarian, which your grandparents always complained about when they had the chance. If you were a disgrace to anyone in the family, it was to them.

Ah, what a long day.

You didn't know at what point you fell asleep, but the incessant sound of your phone vibrating next to your pillow woke you up. With a grunt, you moved your hands to put the device in front of one of your half-open eyes to find Yuna on caller ID. Your eyes moved upward.

It was one in the morning!

“What the fuck are you doing calling at this hour? It better be an emergency because-”

“WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU DOING THAT YOU DON'T CHECK YOUR MESSAGES?”

“WHAT KIND OF QUESTION IS THAT? IT'S ONE IN THE MORNING! WHY WOULD I BE DOING ANYTHING ELSE BUT SLEEPING?”

“I'VE BEEN TEXTING YOU FOR A WHILE NOW, Y/N!”

“YUNA HOW CAN I NOT FUCKING SLEEP-?”

“Well, whatever!”

You let out an exasperated snort, giving her time to say what she had to say.

“You're going to fall on your ass.”

“I'm lying down.”

“Your books have sold a thousand copies in the last hour!”

Silence. Absorbing silence…

“Yuna, if you really woke me up to play a fucking prank on me I'm going all the way to your house to pull out every single one of your hairs with a fucking tweezer.”

“First of all, gross. Second of all, I'm not kidding! Get on your fucking Instagram! What's worse is that's not the most shocking news. Well… depends on how you look at it.”

“Yuna, I don't think I'm following you.”

“Fucking Kim Taehyung was at the reader convention and he took a picture of your books and UPLOADED IT TO HIS INSTAGRAM STORIES!!!!! AN HOUR AGO! The damn shopping notifications woke me up and I think I took too much time trying to process what was going on because they already tripled!”

“What the fuck are you talking about, did you start smoking weed?”

“Ugh, why are you so insufferable? Just look at fucking Instagram!”

You didn't want to believe Yuna, but a part of you was vibrating in anticipation. You'd already seen her text messages, her exclamations and voice notes, you'd barely processed the images she'd sent you. You logged on to Instagram. The first thing you noticed was the exorbitant amount of notifications and direct messages.

You had to search for Taehyung's account because you weren't following him.

There was the colorful arc around his profile picture. The story.

You clicked on his picture on the screen.

Your books were all over his story, with his hand holding one of them.

It jumped out at you that there was a stand of your books that you had no idea where it had come from.

A description loomed between the image.

One of the best fantasy books I've read in recent years. And by one of the best writers I've ever met in my life.

Your user was next to the description. You had no idea how fucking Kim Taehyung had gotten your user when it wasn't even something related to your name. You hadn't even uploaded pictures of yourself once in all the time that account had been open.

“Did you see it?? Can you see I wasn't lying?”

With Yuna's malevolent laughter in the background, you felt your mind escape into an unknown mental space.

“You're going to be rich!!! And I'm going to meet Kim Taehyung!”

Your mind was racing a thousand miles an hour trying to make sense of what your eyes couldn't credit. His story was replaying on your screen. So many things you could say and just…

“What the fuck?”

--

tag: @rinkud @futuristicenemychaos @pastelpeachess @parapiop7

[ghoulfuckersincorporated]

You mentioned ghoul scent markings-- can you elaborate on that? Explain it and dump any other thoughts you have about it?

So, I feel like ghoulification would heighten all of the senses (*within the confines of what tissues can remain intact over long spans of time, like centuries; we see older ghouls, especially, with things like cataracts, etc. that would would obviously impact your perception), but the sense of smell especially. Smell is widely considered to be the "weakest" of the human senses, but if you were constantly regenerating the smell receptors that are physically closest to your brain, along with having basically one massive nostril, I'd think you'd at least smell SOMEWHAT more effectively.

I've seen people assume that, as ghouls eventually lose their noses to decay, they have no sense of smell, and (absolutely no disrespect or anything) I find that sort of funny. The olfactory sense ultimately originates in the brain, like any other sense, and the smell receptors that pick up on odors are not only found in the cartilaginous parts of the nose AKA the part that would rot off.

Scent memory is also one of the strongest kinds of memory, as the olfactory bulb that processes smells is located very close to the amygdala and the hippocampus, the memory centers of your brain. For this reason, I think that many ghouls, but particularly ferals, would be incredibly sensitive to smells, even if their particular "nose" is weak from decay. I'd imagine that ferals, as they slip further and further into the sort of aggressive, rotting dementia state we see them in, would still be able to connect with some human memories through smells. I think this may be one of the things that draws them to people so easily, even when you're trying to sneak past them.

Imagine moldering away for years and years, rational and conscious thought basically lost to you, and then, for just a breath, you smell a long-lost loved one's perfume, a favorite food you haven't tasted in decades, a fresh rain after a long, long dry spell. Just for a moment...you can remember.

All that to say that I think smell would be a very big deal for ghouls. Especially the smell of people they care about. One day, the memory of that smell may be quite literally all they have left.

I'm not sure most of them would be conscious of the fact that it's scent marking, but it wouldn't be uncommon to find ghoul lovers (ghouls who are lovers AND those who love ghouls) swapping clothing, reveling in their partner's smell enveloping them and vice versa. Taking their lover around other ghouls and knowing that the fact that the others can smell them all over you means they know you're theirs. Ghouls smelling another ghoul on you and knowing all your business without you even having to say anything.

(Plus...it's just a fun excuse to not have to pull out, you know?)

[keepthedelta]

Can I ask why you like Fernando? Is it the chaos?

you can't deny that the chaos is entertaining lol. some of it is that 2006 was the first year of f1 that i watched live, and fernando was both the reigning world champion and that year's champion, and it was through watching him that i really fell in love with the sport (i had watched some of the older seasons but there's something different about watching it live imo). i also met him that year and he was very nice to me so i can't deny that's a part of it. but mostly i find him fascinating.

fernando is such a contradiction. he is incredibly open about the fact that he is actually incredibly private. for as long as he's raced, he's been open about the fact that who he is on the track and in front of the camera, camp and evil and scheming etc., is not who he is in private. and everyone who's close to him, pedro de la rosa, carlos sainz (both of them), mark webber, they all say that outside of f1 fernando is completely different to the personality you see on track. he's quiet and a bit shy, nothing like the shakespearean villain he is for the cameras.

he keeps his two lives incredibly separate. his family rarely come to races (although that might be because he's superstitious and has said that they brought him bad luck) but he's incredibly close to them outside of work. for all the bridges he's burned and relationships he's damaged in his professional life, he's able to maintain good relationships in his personal life. some of his friends from when he was a child are still close friends with him now. he's on good terms with most of his exes, even his ex-wife (and he actually dates women his own age which is nice).

there's a clip of him from the last season of dts, where he says that in racing, in f1, there are good guys and bad guys, and he is on the dark side, and i think that's one of the things that makes fernando so interesting. he understands the genre. one of the fundamental facets of the theatre and acting in general is the suspension of belief. when you go to see a play or a musical or a film you accept the terms of that universe. in the theatre it's fine that people break into song to express themselves, even though it would be insane to do that in real life. you accept that those four people moving a puppet are a lion or a tiger or a dragon. that wicker basket that was a wardrobe? it's a carriage now, or a seat on a train. and you accept it because that's part of the genre.

fernando alonso is a piece of theatre and fernando is character, actor and director all at once. he understands that it is a performance, and that if you perform well enough, if you are engaging enough, funny enough, talented enough, you don't have to be the hero. you can be ruthless and cruel and manipulative, you can cheat and lie and then lie about cheating, but if you have the audience on side, you can get away with anything. everyone loves a good villain after all.

and i think that understanding is why fernando does what he does. he doesn't think anything of blackmailing and psychologically torturing his boss and then showing up at mclaren again less than a decade later because to him it's part of the show. and because he's as talented as he is people beg him to do just that.

he is a fiction and yet completely real. he lies all the time, but is so honest about the fact that he lies. there is no one else like him

[i-am-snowils-admiral]

So the dpxdc fandom has been trying to come up with more ways to get Danny into Gotham without relying on the old Bat-adoption trope (though it's a fun trope that I love), which typically either means aging him up or giving him a fake id and making him live alone in Gotham pretending to be aged up, but personally I think we can streamline the process a bit by borrowing liberally from Marsalias' fic Adoption (if you haven't read it, definitely do, it's a really good fic) and sticking Actual Master of Time Clockwork in Gotham as yet another weird rich cryptid.

For those who haven't read that fic, the basic premise is that Clockwork decides to adopt Danny completely legally through both ghost and human methods. He is required to establish a human persona for this, which I find hysterical. He and Danny end up living in an incredibly creepy manor that they both love. We can easily uproot that thing and plop it into Gotham. If we want to be particularly funny about it, we can sandwich Wayne Manor between Clockwork and the Drakes to make them all neighbors.

Now what you do from there is obviously subject to whatever story you're wanting to tell, but there's a couple fun things I want to suggest:

Clockwork doesn't try very hard on his human persona. He still dresses like a time god in a fantasy novel (I'm a little in love with 13thcat's designs so I like to imagine his human form looks a little like this). You have to live, what, 40-50 years in a city to be established? Sure. Why bother aging visibly in this time? That's not necessary! What does he do for work? Uhhhh he's a woodworker who makes clocks. That's why he has millions or even billions of dollars, obviously.

5-year-old Bruce Wayne is OBSESSED with Clockwork (aka Charles Worth). This is baby's first incredibly pure crush. This is your really cool kindergarten teacher that you remain a little in love with well into adulthood, except instead of being nice CW is just really weird and doesn't care about what 5-year-olds are able to discuss. Baby Bruce does that little kid "I'll marry you when I grow up" thing that everyone finds adorable but CW says "there are many timelines where you get married, though never to me. Some options are better than others, but I won't tell you about them" because what else would he say.

When Danny shows up in Gotham decades later as CW's adopted kid Bruce is zeroed in on all the gossip. His interest is based entirely on his childhood obsession though so he uses absolutely zero Batman skills to investigate the situation and therefore finds nothing weird about Danny's background. The batkids find this hilarious because there is Clearly something weird going on with that kid.

Clockwork could easily solve all of the Bats' problems and tell them the answers to all the investigations they're doing but why would he do that???? That's boring. He's vibing in his new house with his cool liminal son why would he be worried about *checks notes* the hundreds of people dying to rogue attacks nearby.

Despite never being genuinely helpful he DOES randomly drop in-universe lore that no one would've figured out otherwise. Usually he does this about six months after it would've been really nice to know.

He doesn't do this out of malice he just doesn't intervene in things normally and if he does, it's only by request. The Bats (besides Batman because he's still oblivious) are too worried about what he might ask for in exchange to make requests though they know he's powerful but they are totally wrong because he's just sitting there baking bread thinking "hm I wonder why Timothy never asked me to help him get Batman back from being lost in the time stream, I could've done that really easily without changing too much. Oh well, whatever makes him happy."

Danny also never makes requests but that's because CW went a bit too hard on teaching him messed up karmic lessons about interfering with time so Danny just assumes it's always a bad idea to ask.

[tossawary]

For a while, I kept periodically thinking about F/M Wangxian (Male Wei Wuxian and Female Lan Wangji) without being able to figure out why I kept being distracted by F/M Wangxian. I mean, I think different genderbending AU situations are fun to think about in fanfiction, especially in worlds where gender roles are a problem. M/M, F/M, M/F, and F/F Wangxian all change the story slightly and I think it's neat to explore why and how.

And obviously, F!LWJ would be a total babe, that's nice to think about, but why still M!WWX and not F!WWX? F!WWX would also be a total babe, though of a different type, especially as the Yiling Patriarch. But my brain kept insisting that M!WWX was still crucial somehow and I couldn't figure out why that setup.

I mean, it is funny to think about how M!WWX's unchanged flirty behavior in their teenage years would suddenly set off every single alarm bell in the Cloud Recesses due to people being able to SEE IT thanks to heteronormativity goggles. WWX with a degree of societal permission to be romantically interested in Lan Wangji? Intolerable levels of annoying. Unbearable to witness. Singing love songs under her balcony type bullshit like he wants her to start another fight under the moonlight. He's writing her poetry (clever "joke" poems bordering on innuendo and actual romantic poems) and has the gall to be good at it. Lan Qiren is barely resisting the urge to beat WWX off with a broomstick. Lan Xichen doesn't know whether to be horrified or delighted (LWJ is bluuuuushing).

I do also like the idea of WWX coming back from the dead and finding out that the common people have decided in the past decade (thanks to the heteronormativity goggles) that the noble female cultivator LWJ had a Tragic Romance with the Evil Yiling Patriarch. Poor woman! WWX: "Who had a what now?" (I do also like the idea of Wangxian actually having a Tragic Romance during and after the war. And mutually stated romantic interest and affection still didn't fix anything for them. But it's funny to think about WWX getting completely blindsided by this EPIC LOVE STORY if there was no actual relationship.)

(Sizhui is still adopted here! Noble and pure-hearted LWJ adopted a war orphan because she longed to be a mother but swore never to love again after the Yiling Patriarch broke her heart, obviously! WWX, listening to this gossip: "She what? I mean, Lan Zhan would make an amazing mom, good for her, lucky kid, and no one is good enough for her if she doesn't want to get married, but seriously, I cannot stress this enough, what the fuck. She didn't like me back! Aiyah, I bet she's still so mad at me for ruining her reputation like this.")

Eventually, I realized that the key piece of this AU that I was missing was that I wanted to write F/M Wangxian that turned into F/F Wangxian. Because I think Transfem Wei Wuxian would display (and I mean this affectionately) the most ridiculous trans egg behavior imaginable, especially because it would lean more towards one of those "I was mostly fine living as a guy, but I'm so much happier as a girl" situations. Absurd amounts of queer foreshadowing.

So, Wei Wuxian gets resurrected into a female MXY's body or something and obliviously goes, "Oh! This is nice! I've always wanted to try being a woman! Yes, I can roll with this." And eventually Wei Wuxian has to actually examine the fact that she really likes being a woman and doesn't want to "go back" to being a man in any way, but not before putting Lan Wangji through an incredible amount of new "joke" flirtation. And people who knew WWX before are like... "Hmm. Some things are making sense now."

Things like: 1) As a teenager, WWX insisted that LWJ was such a strong woman that, if they got married, LWJ could be "the husband" and "he" would happily be "the wife". There were lots and lots of "I want to live as Jiejie's spoiled wife" jokes. Consequently, at the Cloud Recesses, at least one outrageously inappropriate joke was made by WWX about LWJ knocking "him" up, because WWX's breeding kink is still very much a thing. WWX didn't know about her breeding kink when she made that joke; both she and LWJ learned something about themselves that day.

2) Wei Wuxian would frequently pull crossdressing-related pranks saying: "Wow, this is crazy. I can't believe you guys are forcing me to put on a dress and all this makeup for this prank! You guys are wild!" And Jiang Cheng would reply: "No one is forcing you to do this. No one dared you. You suddenly volunteered to crossdress for a prank that does not require crossdressing AGAIN. Also, give me that brush, I'll do your makeup because you suck ass at it."

3) WWX would frequently go on rants about how women are so much more beautiful than men, which flew under the radar as a "normal behavior for a lustful young man", but there was always something a little off about it. Like, WWX might say that women are so beautiful and perfect that everyone would choose to be one if allowed to pick before being born just to admire the gorgeous view, and JC might say, "I don't think that's quite right...?" But WWX would just say something like (like an obnoxious teenage sibling), "That's because you know that you'd make an ugly woman!" or, "Are you saying that women aren't perfect? Also, are you saying Shijie isn't the best person in the world?" And JC would have to be like, "I didn't say that! And I'd make a beautiful woman, fuck you! Also, how is that relevant to your point?"

By the end of this AU, there is at least one public love confession that is horribly embarrassing for everyone else to witness, in which Wei Wuxian has finally realized that LWJ used to be in love with "him" and that she loves LWJ back, but tearfully apologizes because she can't be the handsome man that LWJ loved anymore. Even if she could be a man again, she still doesn't want to stop being a woman, even if she's not very good at it yet. She can't perform the required husbandly duties like provide a good home for LWJ! She can't father LWJ's children anymore!

(Jiang Cheng: "Do you have to do this now?! Stop being indecent! There are children here. Also, we're all being held hostage.")

But it's all cool! Because shortly after realizing WWX was back and determined to live as a woman, LWJ speedran a sexuality crisis, flipped a mental switch, and essentially went, "I'm a lesbian now." (Or maybe LWJ was really confused about being attracted to WWX when they first met, because LWJ had only been physically attracted to her fellow female disciples up until then, so WWX seemed like the "exception", until WWX comes back from the dead as a woman and then it's like, "Ah. Not an exception after all.")

[cheriecoke]

Can you drop some long series recs (any fandom!)?! I haven't had any come across my dash >.< Would love to read some!

omg of course!! I HAVE SO SO MANY RECS! a lot of the ones i've seen recently are ongoing, but i hope you give them a go & keep watching for updates <3 i have read quite a variety, so hopefully there's something for you tehe. some of them i haven't read yet, but have been on my list bc i enjoy their other works :) so i recommend them to since i know the writers are amazing!!

to have and to hold by @fedyenkas (chuuya, ongoing) - i just started this one today & it's so so amazing so far !! chuuyas characterization in it is sooo yummy. i haven't read a hybrid series before, so it's super unique to see how that fits into the bsd universe.

noble blood by @forest-hashira (satoru & suguru, ongoing) - i haven't read this one yet, but both of fallon's entries for my collab were incredible, so i can only imagine this is too! plus, the premise is SO insane, it's about dragon riders, and there's an entire sheet with all lore that they've created !! i can see how much love and care was put into this one, so i can't wait to check it out !!

oh, baby! by @tetsuskei (kuroo, ongoing) - i have yet to read the first part (everyone throw tomatoes at me) but risu posted some parts on her old blog & i read it there! it's so so sweet!! i looove all her writing, and dad!kuroo is just the cutest thing EVER.

waterloo by @fyorina (dazai, ongoing) - i haven't read this one yet either but i am SO SO incredibly excited to get to it. this one is going to be long, so it might be what you're looking for !! the first two parts are out already, and there's a posting schedule if you want to know when they're coming out :)

bulletproof love by @staryukis (gojo, ongoing) - i've really enjoyed this one so far and logan's writing is so captivating <3 it feels just like missing scenes from in between the canon jjk storyline. logan also has a mini zombie apocalypse series i've been excited to read after reading the other series !! it's dying (for your love).

regrets by @/kingkonoha (levi, complete) is so good !! i still need to finish it, but the concept is super cool & the reader is the antagonist so it's a really interesting spin on levi's actions in the canon universe.

tidal temptations by @fyodorloveclub (fyodor, ongoing) - i have also yet to read this one (cries myself to sleep my tbr is never ending), but everything flora writes is incredible, so i have no doubt this one is too. it's a merman fyodor fic, which is such a cool concept i'm so excited to see where it goes !!!

hell within reach by @/ddarker-dreams (chrollo, complete) - omg. ok i read this one like 2 years ago LOL, but it's finished and its about 80k long, and it's so good <3 i used to be an insane chrollo girlie & this is one of my favorite fics about him.

lover's delight by @lovelyluc (diluc, ongoing) - i don't even play genshin or know anything about it HSHFSDFH but this one is so sweet <3 you can really see how much awea loves diluc in this series, which is my favorite thing about reading fics, and it has so many of my favorite tropes !!

geheinisse by @honeybleed (jean & reiner, ongoing) - only the first part of this is out but it's SO INCREDIBLE. there's so much drama already, and nara does such a great job of setting the scene while getting you hooked immediately. nara also has a two part reiner fic (the first part is decades) that's completed and over 10k words that i'll never forget! her characterization of reiner is so yummy.

if it wasn't for him (would you have me) by @gojoath (yuuta, ongoing) - cella's the ceo of yandere yuuta, so if you're into him, i can't think of anyone else to recommend !!! cella wrote another yuuta series that i think is completed, so there are lots of amazing things to read on her blog <3

@osaemu has a streamer!gojo series that are all in the same universe & connect! they're so funny & everything sabs writes is amazing, so i encourage you to check out her work if you haven't

the lakehouse by @tetzoro (kuroo, ongoing) - rahhh i'm the worst bc i still haven't read this but aims is one of my favorite writers on here, so trust me it's amazing. this was written for october, so if you're missing autumn rn def read this one! aims also has another kuroo series coming soon <3

i know i left some people out, so if you're ever in need of any other recs, pls lmk tehe. and if you're a mootie of mine but have a series i didn't include, send it my way <3 but hopefully all these amazing ones will get you started!

[cantgetworsethanthistbh]

Ford getting jealous of his younger counterparts part getting horny over Stan kills me. Like, wdy mean man, he’s YOU!!!!

GOD YEAH i have the conclusions that ALL fords are ridiculously possesive over their stans while also completely delusional enough to believe they deserve to have every single stan out there. you put one ford in a room full of stans (across all ages mind you) and he'll be all well clearly i have a duty to take care of every single one of you

OH AND A BIT OF A TANGENT BUT YOU KNOW WHAT I HAVENT SEEN YET BUT WOULD BE FUNNY AF? a 2Fords that takes place in the present day PRE weirdmageddon. due to some rift or bottomless pitt bullshit it spits out a young teen ford randomly right infront of the shack. a young teen ford BEFORE stan broke his machine and even got offered a spot in WCT. they take him in, and to prevent fucking up the timelines they have to keep details of how the mystery shack became the mystery shack shut and spin a lie about how stan just found his calling and ford works downstairs.

teen!ford latches onto older version of his brother IMMEDIATELY— with no decades of resentment and "you made a MOCKERY of my lifes work" angst attached, he would actually be SO proud of Stan for finding his niche, when everyone told him his brother would be a failure, here stan is a thriving business man! him and his brother get to work together! ford is probably kinda famous and praised around these parts too if he's allowing stan to use his discoveries like that! and sure theyre not sailing around, but in his perspective this is a really good life for the both of them, especially when he hears ford went to college and got a bunch of phds. its not like ford ever let himself dream of anything besides stanley (because this is before the wct offer).

with this life its almost like theyre married, and ford with his still huge and untainted feelings on his brother is kind of giddy about it.

old ford is ofc an asshole who wants to burst his bubble so bad but cant do that so is pushing him away instead by locking himself down at the basement to send a way to send his younger self back. this ends up being so great for teen!ford and for stan tho. teen!ford gets to hang out with stanley— and moses stanley grew up incredibly well. all chiseled and huge and looking INCREDIBLY good in and out of the suit. especially out when he realizes stanley turned out to be an incredibly hot bear when he sees his belly out and hes just. not normal about it. hed be on stans side like glue and is just ENAMOURED by him.

and stan LOVES this ford, he loves him. this ford is, while still a nerdy brainiac know it all, is the ford he knew and loved before everything turned bad. they have a fucking blast together, this ford makes him feel young again and looks at him like hes begging to be pounced on all the time. he wont because he cant taint the kid like that but! who knows! he thinks the best part is lowkey how much it pisses off HIS ford too. Ford would be glaring at the way stan has his arms around teen ford across the room while hes yapping and teen ford is looking at him all heart eyes, or how stan has him close all the time and how his younger self is such a clueless .selfish brother stealing bitch as if his hands are completely tied.

the eventual climax being that hes gonna catch them making out (initiated by ford ofc) and either doing the correct thing to do (telling teen ford the whole truth) or the smart thing (fuck stanley right infront of his teen self and claim that it doesnt matter what happens, stan you only belong to ONE ford at a fucking time and in THIS time itd me and istg i will travel back in time to fuck you in the past for revenge for this while teen ford is both mad cockblocked and super into it)

sorry again for the tangent but this 2fords au kinda grabbed my brmy the throat while i was answrring dhdbdhdb

[jbaileyfansite]

The Wall Street Journal Interview (2024)

The 36-year-old English actor Jonathan Bailey is one of Hollywood’s newest heartthrobs. From Shonda Rhimes's Regency-era courtship dramas of “Bridgerton” to the decades-long romantic-political saga of “Fellow Travelers” to the Met Gala red carpet, he has earned admirers with his goofy charm and deep looks of longing.“

Being acknowledged as a heartthrob is incredibly flattering,” Bailey said. “It’s a big compliment, not just to you as an actor but everything around you.”

It has been a life-changing few years for Bailey, a stage actor turned screen darling. After “Bridgerton” launched him to global fame, he wrote up a document with tips to help prepare his younger castmates for the attention their on-screen romances would earn. “I think it’s about how to approach the work in a way that allows you to feel yourself and grounded,” he said.

Bailey, who’s been acting since he was a child in the Royal Shakespeare Company, reprises the role of Anthony in the third season of “Bridgerton” this month. Later this year, he’ll appear as Fiyero in the film adaptation of “Wicked” with Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo. He lives outside of London. Here, he talks about his favorite tea, doing gymnastics and the advice he got from Sir Ian McKellen.

What time do you get up on Mondays, and what’s the first thing you do after waking up?

I try to get up between 7 and 8. Then I try to not look at my phone, which sometimes works and sometimes doesn’t. If it’s a good day, I drink loads of water, have a bath and then just get out because I need to get outside. I’ll go for a walk, always with my headphones. If I feel a bit excited or my brain’s sort of alive, I’ll listen to a podcast because that keeps me quite calm. If not, I’ll listen to some drums and bass. 

How do you like your coffee? 

I love tea. Earl Grey tea for me. I love coffee as well.

What do you do for exercise?

I’m currently training for a half marathon. Then I do gymnastics at a local gym with loads of lovely, brilliant people. I’m part of that community, which I’m very proud of. I do handstands.

How long can you hold a handstand for?

I’ve gotten up to a minute. 

Do you meditate or journal or otherwise practice mindfulness?

Walking outside is meditation to me. There was a Buddhist center I loved when I was living in London, and I’d go there regularly to learn the practice of meditation. I believe in taking bits and bobs that work for you. I do write stuff down in a book that I carry with me, lessen the load in the brain when I can. 

Do you have any hobbies or habits that might surprise your fans? 

Probably playing loud music and dancing around naked. 

“Fellow Travelers” follows your character, Tim, as he falls for Matt Bomer’s Hawk over the course of several decades, from 1950s McCarthyism to the AIDS crisis in the 1980s. How did you get into character? 

With Tim, I felt like there was so much understanding that was in my bones already just from being me. Understanding the character who you’re playing opposite is also really good. Me and Matt, we didn’t really talk about it but we had that understanding of the experience of what these queer, gay people were experiencing.

Beyond that, I think about my forefathers and what an incredible opportunity it was to an academic, hands-on research of gay life in America. As a Brit, there was so much to learn, so the preparation was kind of nerdy in that respect. In another, it was incredibly emotional and spiritual. 

You’ve become very famous for the looks of longing that you’ve perfected. Do you practice them in the mirror?

No, unfortunately, I probably practiced them in real life all the way through my childhood. It’s funny, isn’t it? I can totally understand why people say that, but I think maybe what fascinates me most about humans is there’s always a distance between what you want and what you have and who you are and who you want to be. I mean, if I’m still longing and 92 years old, then I’m going to be very happy. 

How did you prepare to model swimwear for Orlebar Brown? Was there any part of you that was nervous? 

I had been doing gymnastics, so the swimsuit-model aspect of it required a couple of weeks of doing more handstandy stuff. But no, I was excited. 

There were some cute photos of you and Ariana Grande released from the set of “Wicked.” Do you have any favorite memories from filming? 

I went to CinemaCon and it was the launch of all of us together. I watched the trailer for the first time, I’m so glad I waited to see it in the big cinema. I just watched Cynthia [Erivo] and I was, like, God, Cynthia’s just going to blow everyone’s mind. You care so much about her in it. And Ari redefines Glinda in a really fun way, it just expands. 

There’s so much love for the original material. It was really fun and silly and great. Jon M. Chu [the director] just mines the emotion and is quite sincere about the truth of what’s going on with the characters.

What’s your most prized possession?

My headphones. If I lose them, I feel crazy. But also in 2017—I saved up and it felt incredibly frivolous—I started collecting the Yves Saint Laurent love prints, the original prints of the years that my sisters were born because there are four of us. Annoying actually, one of my sisters was born in 1982, and I don’t think there is a print for that year, so I might have to do a stickman or something. 

What’s one piece of advice you’ve gotten that’s guided you? 

Always do theater. That was actually from Ian McKellen. It’s in my bones anyway.

Source

[waffowo]

I’m convinced that the Seventh Doctor is one of the most powerful characters in all of fiction. Not “The Doctor” but the “Seventh Doctor” very specifically.

He’s incredibly funny conceptually and I cannot get over it. I’m baffled by his existence. He is walking proof that The Doctor doesn’t need to be always just some guy in a box. He has 4 main enemies and none of them are iconic Doctor Who villains. His greatest foes are his own intellect, the literal embodiment of evil, an abstract bounty hunter that has reality warping powers and Thatcherism. Does he fear a God? One of his schemes against a great enemy involves weaponising RPF fanfiction and I’m being completely serious. Every Doctor references 4’s speech in Genesis Of The Daleks while pretending this little man doesn’t exist. I guarantee that if he was in Midnight, the episode ends in 10 minutes. He has either tricked the entity into combustion or has instructed Ace and Hex to batter it to death with baseball bats. The episode runs at full length only if he gets bored but instead ends with a full doxxing of its identity.

I’m not a powerscaler, but if I were, this man would not be on the fucking scale. Do you really think that most anime characters would clock him as the main threat? He’s playing the fucking spoons and tottering around, he has misdirected everyone so hard that people are just forgetting that he still hasn’t explained (I’m only at Death In The Family) why the fuck the TARDIS is in a different colour. Even if let’s say, he’s bisected by Sukuna or obliterated by Saitama, he will come back. Somehow, SOMEHOW, be it one hour or literal decades, he would have resurrected and would giggle and completely wipe your existence from History. Warping reality cannot save you, he has already won. Keep in mind that the only reason that he actually died and regenerated was because he got super unlucky, that even after getting pelted by bullets BY ACCIDENT that what took him out was a fucking defribrillator BY ACCIDENT and also somewhat BY MEDICAL NEGLIGENCE. Nobody is doing is doing it like him. As I type this, I literally cannot think of a way that my favourite characters could actually kill him permanently. Like what do you do if you see him? Why does he just…know things other Doctors don’t? What even is he?

[numberonetacostan]

I feel like, atleast within the first while, when Taco starts living in a proper place she'd be caught in a mess of over and underconsumption as well as falling into habits she had while homeless.

There's so much food just there that she could probably make herself sick from it all but at the same time she's had to ration her food for what is basically her whole life so she could end up skipping meals or keeping a bunch of it in her room (this gives me the image of Mic trying to explain her taste in women to Soap if she ever visits the room honestly, this may or may not be funnier in my head but oh well)

Making a little den out of all the covers, blankets, pillows all of that tying this into shipping again because I just into that rn I guess to but I imagine it would be very awkward to share a bed with her (I imagine them as Tacomic because I have favoritism but really it could be whichever Taco ship you want).

She'd also be on thin ice with some people mainly the s1 contestants not forever but atleast for a bit so she could end up leaving something even if she wanted it out of fear it'd mess up the progress she's trying.

Hi there!!!^^ Welcome, and thank you for submitting an ask!!! :]

She would have so much adjusting to do!!! Girl has never lived in a home before it's all new to her.

I've talked before about Taco's eating habits during and after her homelessness era, but I'll go over some of it here too. I think she'd actually avoid changing her very unhealthy eating habits from when she was homeless for quite some time. Changing your eating habits after having been on the verge of starving for a decade or so has to take some time. Her stomach is not used to that much food, it's quite small, and it will take her body time to get used to a regular amount of food again. She's also, to bring your last paragraph into the discussion here, on thin ice with quite a few people, and she knows it. Especially with their food supply being more limited after Melife gets cut off, she'd be very nervous about taking "too much" from the group supply and getting kicked out to go live alone in the woods again, so she could be taking even less of what she considers a normal amount of food. But when they get a more steady supply, she'd definitely start hoarding it. She's been suffering through food insecurity for a decade, if there's any sort of surplus she's already in the habit of stashing it away for when she doesn't have any. I can see her keeping a few little stockpiles in the woods in case she gets outcasted again. Long term starvation would have so many side effects actually maybe I should make a post about it I think. If someone wants it lmk.

Nah Mic desperately trying to explain her taste in women to Soap is incredibly funny, actually.

Yup yup yes!!! Little den!!!!! Sharing a bed with her would be quite difficult since she doesn't use an actual one for quite some time!!! And since Mic is so much bigger than her, I don't see her fitting inside a den comfy enough for Taco to sleep in. The enclosed space would make her feel safe, yeah?

And yeah!!! Taco is constantly alert and anxious about getting kicked out for quite a bit due to being on thin ice. Like her stockpiles of food kept outside in case of emergency, she'd probably have other things stashed around like blankets, maybe a cooking pot or two, etc., etc.

[crueltyserpent]

When she introduces us, she’s either my girlfriend or my mom. She’s neither of course, she killed my mom and my girlfriend so long ago at this point. Sometimes I think she chooses whichever she thinks will make me more uncomfortable; it’s not like whoever she introduces us to will live long enough for their thoughts on it to matter. If I were to choose a name for what I am, I would probably go with captive. Victim also comes to mind, but it’s hard to feel like I’m the most victimized person in the room when she’s cutting off the fingers of a naked woman one by one.  At least she’s not making me eat them this time. The “here comes the airplane” bit with raw human flesh isn’t nearly as funny as she thinks it is.

If I guess why she keeps me around, why I’m not dead in a ditch somewhere like every other poor bitch who get’s her attention, I’d guess it’s because simply torturing attractive women to death every other day doesn’t fully sate her appetite for cruelty. Sure, her ability to wring physical pain out of a stranger is staggering, but there’s a special type of satisfaction she gets from the form of psychological torture that is only possible to inflict on someone she keeps close for an extended period of time. I don’t know if she chose me because something about me was uniquely appealing to hurt or she just liked how my dick felt inside her, but at this point I’m fairly confident she’s sunk too much work into messing with my head to casually replace me.

The woman bleeding out on the floor is the owner of the Air BNB we’re staying at, a chipper blonde thirtysomething who was now karmically paying for the fact that nothing in her life had ever gone wrong before. I used to vomit seeing a girl taken apart like this. Now it’s boring enough that I can sit on the bed reading a romance novel while barley acknowledging the poor cunt’s slowly decreasing number of body parts. This is an easy one, relatively speaking. I don’t really have enough emotional energy left to feel bad for well to do women a decade older than me who’d never give me so much as a smile if I weren’t a customer.

I call myself a captive, but it’s not like I couldn’t walk out of the room if I wanted to, physically speaking. She wouldn’t stop me, she’d continue her ruthless execution and not even remark on me leaving. I was never bound (except for sex), never locked in a room, always free to go where I wanted. It had just been incredibly clear to me that if I ever made an attempt to do something she disapproved of, she could make my life so much worse than it already was as her unwilling partner in crime. One time she had left me alone for three months, letting me think I was free, only to return and kill every single person I had met and liked to any degree. I was trapped with her because she had created a situation where helping her murder people every few days was the decision I could make with the lowest innocent body count. And it meant that sometimes women like this died instead of the cute queer girls my age who used to blow me in alleys. Seeing someone I might have been friends with in a different life die was a whole different story to something like this.

I turn the page, working my way through a particularly arbitrary love triangle as I hear the death rattle. I don’t remark on it, but I’m not at all surprised when my bloodstained captor sits at the foot of the bed, looking at me with those hungry eyes. Don’t get me wrong, this woman is evil, the worst person I could even imagine who I would do anything to be free of.

She’s also probably the hottest person I’ve ever met. She was the first woman ever to be hot enough to make me cheat on my girlfriend, in what was either the greatest mistake of my life or the sole decision that kept me alive, depending on what would have happened if I turned her down. Her nude body sprayed with fresh blood is a powerful sight, and her toothed smile makes me shiver as blood rushes between my legs.

“Anything spicy happening in your book, honey?” She asked in a soft, motherly tone, her hands moving to undo my belt buckle. I hate how much her sexy mom routine works on me. It’s humiliatingly effective. I should be anywhere else right now, doing anything else, doing anyone else, but as she rides me, her other victims blood dripping off her chest over my face, I can’t do anything but whimper in enjoyment.

[chessboredom]

i’m curious about your take on lairy seeing that you actually have a brain and don’t woobify the shit out of it

Thank you, anon. U_U

And OMG. The woobifying part is too real, it's painful. I've seen a lot of people saying that "lairy is BAD and is PROSHIP because Airy is a kidnapper who ruined Liam's life," like Liam never tried to hunt down Airy and kill him? Yeah, that's your soft uwu boy victim incapable of defending himself from an sentient apathetic lantern.

And for the love of GOD, lairy is NOT PROSHIP, it's a CONCEPT. I am a Homestuck fan and I have seen worse. You are Not a horrible person for shipping Fictional Characters Of Any Kind. Educate yourself in fandom etiquette and remove yourself from purity culture(most importantly read the Commentary section).

Now back to the topic at hand;

Lairy (Liam x Airy)

I've seen a couple of people look at this pair and draw them as "platonic" or more stable than they are, which is fine, I like looking at them too, but they refuse to dive deeper into the potential of how unstable and codependent their relationship could be. It would fall more into codependency. It's my favorite.

As someone who loves toxic ships because of how horrible but also funny the dynamic could be, lairy is just a basic ass toxic yaoi. Nothing sexual happens. Pure instability. Toxic because they both flawed characters in their own special ways. Airy is extremely detached from not getting to be with anyone for more than a decade that he doesn't even care or show concern if other people get hurt/killed/die. Liam has lost all purpose in his life and was several axe swing away from becoming a murderer. lol

And for the part where the relationshipping happens with two things happening at once;

it starts with Airy having a one-sided infatuation, and then there's Liam taking that advantage, try to manipulate Airy and distract him away from the computer, and use that opportunity for him to figure out how the computer works. If it's for saving his friends, he'd do anything.

Airy gets these indescribable feelings by looking/thinking of Liam. He has no concept of personal space, so he'd just stand behind Liam and hold his backpack strap. Airy would insist on hugging Liam when they sleep. Just an incredibly touched-starved Airy.

Liam would be reluctant at this at first, but he should eventually realize that whatever he's trying to do is the last purpose he has. The world thinks he's dead. As long as he saves his friends in the end, it's worth it.

Oh? You want reciprocated? It is also possible for Liam to have feelings for Airy, but in a way that he never wanted to kill himself more in his life and never come back from limbo so he could never see his glassy face again. HAHAHA

I have more possible scenarios, but that would be for another post, hehehe.

[rosalesbeausderholle]

There are a lot of reasons for the backslash to feminism that's been occuring in the past decade after somewhat of a small resurgence in the early 2010s but it's funny just how much of it in progressive spaces comes from AFAB people who identify as trans and non-binary and believe in all these very outdated and damaging stereotypes about what the concept of womanhood is, therefore they cannot understand why anyone would want to focus on women or defend women or fight for women.

Very "I'm not a woman so this doesn't matter because it doesn't affect me" or "women as a group are inherently regressive and reactionary so anything that is meant to help them is bad in some unspecified way (because if gender is gender roles and you identify with the female ones what are you? Also, if gender roles are real and natural because I'm not a woman so I don't fit them but all other women identifying people must do so, so feminism is pointless and/or conservative because being a woman means liking the cage).

Yet, these are the same people that will call out white feminists for only focusing on their own problems, but then they'll do this?

It's incredible how many people have deluded themselves into thinking that they're the people who think about gender in The Most Radical And Subversive Way In The World and yet can't get past very basic, very simple, introductory feminist concepts about the nature of gender roles and the power relations between men and women.

[ipatrichor]

my thoughts on dead boy detectives after watching episode one

okay first of all i gotta say i love the vibe. two ghosty boys running around solving cases and helping trapped spirits move on? that's so fun i love them

tbh. i don't know whats going on btween these two if it's platonic romantic whatever and i don't think any distinction can be drawn that matters. maybe that's the aro in me but they are each other's most important person and who cares about the semantics!!!

charles trying to get edwin to learn self-defense is very sweet. however i will say girl how has this not happened sooner. you literally just got chased through london by a knife ghost and your next case involves fistfighting a possessed psychic Please learn to throw a punch minimum. i would say learning how to fall properly is more important but it's not like they can get more dead. so.

unless they go to the afterlife or something i guess? interesting stakes, especially with the lady from the end of the episode who's looking for them. also the scene hanging outside the window was very sweet, with edwin promising he won't let them get separated. at this point i think it could go either way whether that was to establish their dynamic or to foreshadow, so we'll have to wait and see if the promise holds, but either way very touching moment

crystal my girl crystal!!!! i love her so much holy shit she is so messy!!!! i love love love her getting angry about her shitty situation bc. yeah! that's scary as hell having amnesia bc ur literal demon ex stole your memories and she's got no one except the boys, one of whom very openly doesn't want her around. that's really rough and i Love that she blows up at them about it in a moment of extreme stress instead of being unnaturally chill about an objectively awful situation like many mystical characters (especially when they're women)

anyway i think crystal should get a knife and stabbing privileges. she'd for sure misuse them but i think it'd be funny

edwin is so real for the 70 years in hell thing. girl if i was in the torture dimension for SEVEN DECADES i'd be awful to everyone, it's actually impressive that he restrains himself to being a petty bitch. good for him tbh, i think he's earned the snark. don't get me wrong it's unhelpful and sometimes downright mean, but it's also funny so i'm letting it slide

the witch... esther i think? god what do i say about her. ok im first gonna start with this: she's fucking chilling, it's so scary watching her body the group with ease until charles basically hail-marys and possesses her AND EVEN THEN it's for less than a minute til she forces him out!! it feels like encountering the bbeg when your party is level five- you know you can't touch her and have to play the situation carefully so she doesn't just end you, and the win is getting away with a different objective (here saving the kid) while knowing she's gonna be actively hostile to you now. scary stuff!

idk if this is the popular opinion or not but i just don't find her hot 😭 like yeah she's serving incredible cunt, but her awful pta mom energy keeps that from being attractive. idk if it's the mommy issues but i would feel unsafe and constantly judged in her presence which is usually a dealbreaker for me finding people hot. sorry ma'am i deeply respect your vibe and the cunt you serve i would just avoid u like hell if u were real

the whole snake in a bone dimension in her cupboard is pretty cool though, and i love that her blowing smoke in people's faces isn't just a power play but a paralytic that's So clever

any other thoughts.... the girl with long hair is pretty, and that interaction with crystal has me wondering if the show got cancelled for lesbianism. i feel like maybe not? idk, if it was the start of a relationship that seems weirdly at odds with the tone of the rest of the show, so im leaning more towards crystal was picking up a weird psychic vibe from her that might be important later. who knows though!! i'll just have to find out haha

anyway i got sucked back into reading a novel but i should get caught up on that sometime today and then it's on to episode two, lol. very interested to find out what's up with the cat's vague ominous warning and what esther's gonna do when she finds out they rescued the kid she kidnapped