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magioftheseas · 6 months ago

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Shades Of A Perfect Blue

Written for the @sayakazine Please check out the fundraiser!!! Summary: Sayaka just wanted to shine as an idol alongside her friends. She didn't want to be singled out. She definitely didn't want to be targeted. Warnings: Violence, Stalking, Murder, the dark side of idol culture Notes: This is one of my two fics posted for the Sayaka Zine! It's definitely more psychological thriller and horror-focused. As you can tell from the title, it's based off Perfect Blue! Fantastic movie. The fic's not quite as dark, but I hope it's still a suitably chilling read. There's focus on the Sayaka/Ayaka relationship and some minor references to Naezono too. But this is one of my favorite pieces written for a zine! Currently, the Sayaka Zine is running a fundraiser, so please show them support! Special thanks also to @softausterity for the illustrations, which are included in both the zine and the Ao3 version. Go check them out, too! Their illustration of the crane is soooooo good! ***Alternative Ao3 Link*** Commission? Donate?

It’s well into the night and once again, the only company she has are the gaggle of girls on the screen. But Sayaka wasn’t lonely at all.

Not when the girls sang so sweetly and in such perfect unison like a picturesque family. The kind that Sayaka always wanted to have. They followed one another’s lead, their smiles even brighter when regarding each other.

In that small, dark room, those girls were twinkling stars in Sayaka’s eyes.

Guiding stars down a path she very much wanted to follow.

Not even the otherwise encompassing darkness would deter her, not when she had that light to reach for and steal away between her fingers.

As long as she had that light, nothing else would drag her down.

–

The stage lights were much more blinding when you were under them, much to her delight.

From the cheering crowd to the manic grins on the other girls’ faces, that first performance was no doubt a roaring success.

“CHARM! CHARM!”

“Thank you, thank you!” Sayaka shouted. “Thank you so much, everyone! Give all your heart to CHARM!”

Just her waving her arms eagerly had the crowd shrieking in delight. Cries of her name, confessions of love and adulation, the promises of support—nothing at all like her father’s miserable drunken nights.

“CHARM! WE LOVE YOU SO MUCH, CHARM!”

Her heart swelled, and for once, it wasn’t with guilt.

She was still so giddy once they retreated backstage. She traded high fives and fist-bumps with the other girl and happily accepted a hug from Satomi. They were all bursting with energy and excitement, fingers so entwined and interlocked to the point of happily ignored pain.

“That went so great!”

“We killed it!”

“Everyone loves CHARM! They love us!”

Just like the crowd, there were squeals of delight from CHARM! All except for one member. A lone girl downing a bottle of water where the light strained to reach. Sayaka slipped away with surprising ease, and she practically skidded into the loner’s back.

Ayaka doesn’t even stumble, just chuckling lowly as she does. Without missing a beat, she took another water bottle and handed it over like a baton at the sports festival.

“We did good,” she said, and the light danced in her eyes even if her wry smile remained firm. “But it’s going to be much rougher down the road.”

“It’s fine,” Sayaka said, and the cap scraped against her palm as she cracked the bottle open. “We can do anything.”

Ayaka’s smile didn’t even twitch. Her head cocked to the side, casting part of her warm expression in shadow.

“Just don’t lose sight of yourself, Saya.” Ayaka took another sip. “That’s really easy to do in this line of business.” She finished off the rest. “Idols are expected to give all of themselves–but only the parts that people like. As for the rest…”

She tossed the bottle without looking, and it landed perfectly in the trash.

“Hold onto yourself like a lifeline,” she said with such seriousness. “No matter what happens, never lose yourself.”

Sayaka could only frown.

“What do you mean?”

Before Ayaka could answer, their manager’s booming voice cut through like lightning splitting the earth. Ayaka had quickly composed herself and dragged Sayaka to that booming voice, to that overbearing presence that Sayaka still somewhat feared.

Even though the manager was smiling, Sayaka still felt that way. It took everything to not flinch when those fingers branded themselves on each of the girls’ shoulders.

But Ayaka had held her hand like a lifeline, and that alone was enough to keep them afloat.

–

“Hey, everyone! How’s your heartbeat? Is it going crazy~?”

“Ayaka-chan! You should know better than to tease!”

Ayaka stuck out her tongue, making sure that it came with a cute sound so that the audience was aware. Even with the stuffiness of the sound booth, she acted natural and sweet.

(Seriously, it was almost suffocating.)

“Anyway!” Satomi exclaimed. “It’s that wonderful, heart-throbbing time! Kyaaa! You get what I mean, right?!”

“My heart won’t stop racing,” Sayaka murmured, and the other girls cheered.

“It’s time for Love Letters to CHARM!”

It was supposed to improve morale. The producers said that nothing touched a young idol’s heart more than the pure, earnest love of her fans.

(She knew a pure and earnest boy once. She wonders if he sent anything in. And she shouldn’t. She shouldn’t wonder about anything. To pick one out would be a betrayal to everyone else.)

Still, she wonders what types of letters she’ll receive. They’re already sorting the letters between the girls, and the girls are trading smirks and nods to signify who goes first.

“Satomi-chan, your smiling face gives me strength.” Satomi was beaming brighter than the sun. “Thank you so much!”

“Aya-chan, your strong eyes get me through the day.” Ayaka just laughed at that. “Oh, so just my eyes and not the rest of my face, hmm?”

“Ayaka-chan, you know what they mean! Don’t tease, haha!”

“Nyeh!”

The others were having fun. Ayaka especially was in a good mood. It all seemed light-hearted. Sincere, even.

But Sayaka still felt a twinge of…uncertainty.

Will everything really be okay?

Will we be fine?

How do the fans even see me? What do they see when they look at me?

“Saya,” Ayaka sing-songs, elbowing her. “Come on! Your turn! Don’t keep us in suspense!”

The audience thankfully is unable to see the slight tremor in Sayaka’s hands as she tears open the first letter. Her groupmates are quiet to drill up anticipation.

(And as a show of understanding. Ayaka is even comfortingly squeezing her thigh under the table.)

“Sayaka-san,” she finally reads. “Looking at you makes me feel like I have an older sister. You’re my guiding star and I never feel like I’m alone. I will support you always.”

She releases her breath. Joy bubbles in her heart. Just like that.

“Thank you so much! I won’t let you down!”

Everything will be fine.

(What a foolish thought that had been.)

–

“Sayaka-chan, you’re truly like a star. Shining and out of reach, and yet that makes it all the more special that you grace us with your light. You truly are the heart of CHARM!”

“Oh, but!” Sayaka hurriedly exclaims. “I wouldn’t be anything without anyone else!”

“Flatterer!” Ayaka exclaims right back. But when the show’s finally over, Sayaka crumbles the letter.

“I really don’t like it when they demean the others to compliment me.”

“Some fans are like that,” Satomi sighed. “I’m not taking it seriously and you shouldn’t either, Sayaka-chan.”

The others were already nodding along firmly as Ayaka nuzzled her cheek.

“We still appreciate it, and we know you care about us. In fact, we know you best, right?”

Ayaka really was warm and comforting.

“R-Right.”

“So, don’t worry!”

“I won’t.”

She had meant it. At the time.

(But things can never be so simple, can they?)

–

She first heard about the fan blog from a fan’s shouting as passed by after another successful concert.

“I’ll always follow Sayaka’s Room!”

The producers had explained it to her.

Just think of it like an online shrine, they said.

How flattering, Satomi said.

Don’t look at it, Ayaka said.

She found herself googling it in the dead of night. The latest entry, of course, is about the recent concert. Paragraphs gush about the stage, the music, Sayaka herself, and the words…

Like a guiding star, I can’t help but look away! I’ll never stop being a Sayaker!

It’s harmless, her producers said. It’s a symbol of love, they said.

There were countless other entries. Each and every event from meet-ups to even guest appearances were oh-so lovingly documented. Every stitch and crease in her outfits was remarked upon. Even the smallest twitch did not go unnoticed.

“Sayaka’s crooked smile chips away my heart! Is she sleeping well?”

That was from an event where she nearly collapsed backstage. Ayaka had given her such an earful.

“Oh, Sayaka! How I wish I could chase away the darkness that threatens your light!”

“It’s harmless,” she repeats to herself as she scrolls. “It’s a symbol of love.”

–

A couple of days later, a picture of her is posted.

It’s not of any event.

It’s her in her school uniform.

She’s laughing with her classmates. There are a couple of male classmates close by.

The comments are livid.

“It might be best,” her producers said with apologetic smiles. “If you were homeschooled from now on, Sayaka-chan.”

There are pictures posted of her heading to the station she takes home.

“As expected of Sayaka-chan! She always so dutifully gets on the train with her left foot!”

She can’t imagine what her father might think. She doesn’t tell him anything.

“It’s just love,” the producers had said. “It’s just an intense, different kind of love.”

“How about you room with me for a bit?” Ayaka asked after a long day. It’s a casual question. Ayaka doesn’t even bat an eyelash differently and Sayaka finds herself trembling as she forces out an answer.

She can’t imagine what her father might think, but she also isn’t sure he would even notice if she just…didn’t return home for a while.

–

“It’s time for Love Letters to CHARM!”

Another cheerful session. Joking and laughing. And then Sayaka goes to open up her letter and slices her fingers from the blade taped inside. Everyone goes silent. They stare at her with wide eyes, all save for one.

“Gawd, Sayaka,” Ayaka just laughs, but her stare is hard and cold. “Don’t you get enough letters?”

Without missing a beat, she snatches up one and tears it open without a preamble.

“You’re my guiding light!” she gushes in a fake, high-pitched voice. “So pure and shining! Don’t let anyone overshadow you! Oi, oi, what are the rest of us, chopped liver?”

“A… Ayaka!” Satomi gasped. “It’s rude to look at other people’s letters!”

Sayaka joins in the laughter as her blood stains the envelope red, red, red. Someone outside the recording booth is already screaming to get the first aid team.

“I’m sure they didn’t mean it like that! I certainly don’t feel that way!”

Someone is rushing with the first aid kit.

“After all, you girls are everything to me!”

One of them just bursts into tears. Ayaka teases her for being soft. Satomi’s gaze flickers nervously. And Sayaka is pulled into a tight embrace.

“I’m sorry,” is whispered oh so pitifully into her ear, away from the microphone. “I’m so, so, sorry.”

Sayaka’s fingers are bandaged up but they finish the session. The staff is the one that opens the letters now, all of them tentative and with utensils to make sure none of the others are dangerous. When done, they set the opened letters in front of each girl that the letter is for.

“I’m glad you don’t go to public school anymore,” one letter says. “Those pigs would’ve dirtied you.”

“You’re too pure for us normies,” another says.

“I’ll always forgive you, Sayaka-chan,” is written in a crude scrawl.

Are these letters really for her?

–

Sayaka’s Room is going strong. And now she can feel the blogger’s eyes where she goes. She’s painfully aware of someone following her as she’s shopping for groceries to prepare dinner with Ayaka. They’re unremarkable in every way and always on their phone. They would slip under the radar of any other person.

Sayaka glances at them. They flinch. She smiles. They look so dazzled.

They’re not even shy about snapping her picture.

It doesn’t show up on the blog. They must’ve thought that smile was for them alone.

In a way, it was. Treat someone like they’re special and they’re all the more likely to follow you even if it’s to the ends of the earth.

–

The Crane Wife was one of her favorite stories growing up if only because it was one of the precious few that her father read to her at night.

There really had been something sweet and melancholy about it, namely about the woman who plucked her own feathers for her lover’s sake.

Plucking herself thin so that she could support him. Essentially destroying herself for his financial gain. It was a romantic sacrifice and how she justified her father’s absence as time went on.

But sometimes, her mind wandered within the story.

If the crane wife had never fled, what would happen?

Surely, her lover would make her promise not to hurt herself anymore, right? Surely, he’d work harder to support them without needing to sacrifice her, right?

Except… Life could be hard, sometimes. Money still needed to be made if you were to survive.

What were another few feathers when you’re looking to preserve your livelihood?

If that man never let the crane wife escape, then what would’ve happened? Would she be plucked until all that remained was a naked corpse to cook and consume?

Or would she have snapped and stabbed her once lover through the heart with her sharp beak?

The human chest was surprisingly durable despite the heart being such a fragile thing, but if the crane wife could slip her beak between those ribs like so…

(Sayaka twisted the knife, digging it in deep. The red bloomed under her gloved hand like a rose.)

The heart really was such a fragile thing, she thought.

–

She returned to her place with Ayaka soon after that to strip away the blood-soaked clothes and gloves. It was Ayaka who ran the bath afterward at just the temperature she liked.

“It’s no problem, Saya,” Ayaka said like it was nothing. “I have a couple of favors I needed to pull anyway. No one will ever know.”

Ayaka squeezed her shoulder, and Sayaka very nearly sank deeper into the water. It took everything in her to not curl up and scream.

“So,” Ayaka began, speaking slowly like she was approaching a cornered animal. “How are you feeling?”

Sayaka breathed in. She breathed out.

“The funny thing is that once I decided to kill them… It wasn’t as difficult as I thought it’d be to actually…do it. I think that swimsuit photoshoot was harder.”

“I can believe that,” Ayaka sighed. “Well, I already called some guys to get rid of the body. And the detective said that the guy was just some loser shut-in, so no one’s gonna be looking for them. Not even their family. They were disowned years ago.”

Sayaka clenched her hand into a fist against her thigh.

“That makes things way easier.” Ayaka patted her head like she was a child. “Next time, don’t worry about getting your hands dirty. I’m always here to help, Saya. I promise.”

Sayaka leaned into her embrace, not saying another word as she soaked.

–

There was a boy she liked in middle school. She started liking him after she saw him carry a crane across the campus no matter how much the crane protested and flapped. He held onto that crane securely even as he struggled.

What a pure and earnest boy.

She wondered what he would think of someone like her if he knew the truth.

Would he still…?

#sayaka maizono #maizono sayaka #ayaka haneyama #satomi aoba #danganronpa #dgrp #dr1 #Magi fics #Naezono #makoto naegi #hanezono

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ragecndybars · 10 months ago

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AO3 tag game :3

thanks so much for the tag @mvshortcut !!!!! much appreciated, this was a blast to fill out :D

How many works do you have on AO3?

86! Damn, that's more than I remember 🙀 I have been writing pretty fervently since I was pretty young, though, and I transferred all my old fics from fanfiction dot net to AO3, so it's a long stretch of time. All my old wattpad fics are still rotting somewhere though lmaooo I can't even access them anymore bc I forgot my password and I can't reset it bc I used a school email 😔

What's your total AO3 word count?

443,734! When I get to half a million I'm gonna have to throw myself a party. With boba and everything

How many fandoms have you written for, and what are they?

Oof, okay, here we go. A lot of the fandoms I have tagged on AO3 don't really "count" because they're just aggregate tags for the same fandom, so even though AO3 says the number is 48, I'm gonna count the TRUE number as 17. (It got cut down so much because of how many video game series have different games with different fandom tags on AO3, lmao)

Here's the breakdown of the list:

Persona (Mostly Persona 3)

Fire Emblem (Mostly Shadow Dragon and Blazing Sword)

Legend of Zelda

Pokemon

Professor Layton

RWBY

Kid Icarus: Uprising

Earthbound/MOTHER

Red vs. Blue

Voltron Legendary Defender

Naruto

Final Fantasy XV

Harvest Moon

The Mysterious Benedict Society

The Avengers

Animal Crossing

Care Bears (despite having never actually consumed any Care Bears media to my knowledge)

The worst part is that this stupid list would be much, much, MUCH longer if I finished even a quarter of my WIPs 😭 Hell, even just my "Video Games" subfolder in my "Fanfiction" subfolder has more than 17 subfolders in it...

Y'all don't understand how many random fics my ADHD spares you from ever seeing I have no focus

Top five fics by kudos:

Ash and Emotion (Zelda) - Not surprising, I knew this was my most popular fic. It was for a ZeLink zine full of beautiful work :)

Resemblance (Naruto) - bro I always forget people really liked this one. Literally an unedited drabble I did in an hour for a "pride month drabble challenge" which I immediately abandoned. Trans rights I guess

Always Wanna Play (But You Never Wanna Lose) (Persona 3) - This one isn't surprising either, and I'm very proud of this fic so I'm quite chuffed to see it get so much attention... thanks everyone :')

The Beat of Your Heart (Zelda) - Now this one surprised me a lot. This was just a little piece for ZeLink week... Another unedited one, I literally was writing it on the toilet in church so I could get it out in time 😭

Comfort (Zelda) - Another ZeLink week piece, but I knew this one was popular. Also unedited, lmao. I was writing it on the day of my AP Calc finals and I rushed through the exam so I could have more time to work on the fic 😭 I made some Choices that year

Do you respond to comments?

I try to! But I get very anxious about it and tend to work myself into a tizzy, so I often put it off for later and then forget, haha. Then I'll go and respond to all my comments from the last few months and feel even weirder about it... T_T

What's the fic with the angstiest ending you've ever written?

Oof. That's... a hard one, haha. I've written a couple of fics without happy endings, though I typically don't. At least three fics which end on a canonical character death, for instance. But I'd say the ending which made me the most emo writing was Butter, a Mother 3 fic. It ends with Lucas, who's like 9, recently lost his mother, then lost his twin brother (and thinks it's his fault), and is now being neglected by his father, crawling into bed and crying. So yeah, pretty bleak, lmao... but at least he doesn't die I guess?

Do you write crossovers?

I do, but I haven't posted many yet. I'm not always huge on writing them, but I do think about them a lot. I was working on this one Persona 3 x Fire Emblem Awakening crossover but I lost steam on it, and now there's a really lovely crossover on AO3 with a similar premise that I was SO delighted to come across!!! Hope y'all don't mind me taking a break from linking my own work to shill for this one, hehe

Have you ever gotten hate on a fic?

Unfortunately, yes, about six times, I'd say. Even more unfortunately, most of those times happened earlier on in my fanfic writing career, and I was pretty sensitive to hate back then, so I deleted many of the relevant fics, and some of them I don't even have access to myself anymore.

Not gonna talk about the ones that are still upsetting, but I will talk about the funny examples: on a (since deleted) RWBY fic, I said in the author's note that I "wrote them as platonic, but the fic can be read as WhiteRose", and then I got a glowing comment gushing about how good the story was which ended with "but then you had to ruin it by shitting all over WhiteRose, how about you [long suicide bait]". Third most baffling comment I've ever received.

The two most baffling were on different fics, but both were making the same weird accusation??? One was on a ZeLink fic (actually, on Comfort, my fifth most kudos'ed fic of all time now), and y'know I think I'm just gonna show you the comment in question:

The other one was on a long-since deleted fic which focused on both a romantic ship, as well as a fatherly relationship between one member of the ship and the other member's father. I guess having a fatherly relationship with your father-in-law makes your boyfriend actually your brother (and therefore you can't date him anymore). IDK man people are crazy. (tbf the commenter in question thought I was setting it up so that he'd get adopted by his boyfriend's parents, which would give them more of a case, but like... that didn't happen in the fic and wasn't going to. they just guessed at a future plot development and got angry about their guess)

Do you write smut?

I do, but I've never posted any. I've posted one fic that was very suggestive, I'd even call it "NSFW" in a sense, but never anything explicit. Maybe I will in the future? We'll see if I can ever finish anything smutty, lmao.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yep, I had Ultimatum, my longest chapter-fic (and by far my most popular fic in the ff.n days) stolen and posted on another site by somebody. I reported it but never checked back up to see if it got taken down.

I also feel that I've had my work plagiarized pretty damn blatantly in another fandom (I was browsing a certain AU tag and read one which contained all the exact events and sometimes word-for-word dialogue from a fic of mine, just very very slightly rewritten) but the poster had no other works and their writing was definitely extremely juvenile, so... I figured they were a dumb kid and just decided not to raise a fuss. Checked back later and they deleted it, hopefully because they realized they shouldn't do that, so I figure there's no need to start shit over it. Honestly, if that person used that experience as a jumping-off point to write their own fics, then I'm glad it happened, imitation being the highest form of flattery and all.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

No, though I had someone reach out to me on fanfiction dot net a long time ago and ask permission to translate An Unheard Goodbye, which was super exciting! I agreed, but I don't believe they ever got around to it, or if they did, they never posted it. Still very flattering, and I think about that a lot, hehe.

What’s your all-time favorite ship?

HOW COULD I POSSIBLY ANSWER THIS. UM. UM UH. UHHH UM UH I. UM.

I'm.... gonna say Zelda/Link? I haven't written it in FOREVER but it was such a huge part of me coming into my own as a fanfic author, so I have to give it credit for that.

What’s a WIP that you want to finish, but don’t think you ever will?

.......all of them 😭 god I have so many of these damn things. But for the prime example, I'd point to Ultimatum, an old Pokemon fic that I started in middle school. I got all the way to the climax and I feel bad leaving my readers hanging, but... at this point, if I did continue it, I would honestly have to rewrite the whole fic first just to be in line with my current understanding of the characters.

What are your writing strengths?

Y'know, I think I get character voices down extremely well in a way which elevates my dialogue and narration. That's probably the thing I'm most proud of in my own writing, at least.

What are your writing weaknesses?

BREVITY. Or the utter, glaring lack of it. I have also been known to muddy up my writing with an overabundance of A) adverbs, B) unneeded clauses tacked onto perfectly good sentences, and C) em-dashes 😭

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fics?

I think it's dope as fuck, but I currently can't really accomplish it because I'm monolingual (NOT FOR LONG IF I HAVE ANYTHING TO SAY ABOUT IT, I'M COMING FOR YOU, JAPANESE FLUENCY!!!!). I will also say that I don't like when authors will write characters having a story-important conversation in another language, then put the translations in the end notes or something, requiring you to either read the chapter confused or else keep scrolling back down and back up.... I think even that's totally fine to do if what's being said isn't plot-relevant, though.

What was the first fandom you ever wrote for?

Naruto. I hadn't read or watched Naruto btw, I had only read other Naruto fanfics. I have spoken on this topic many times, but it remains hilarious to me. Also, so many of my old Naruto fics are lost to the Wattpad times, but I will take this opportunity to once again share a quote which I recently managed to unearth from my long-lost unsung magnum opus:

Never ever will I intentionally attain the level of comedy gold that I managed while writing completely dead serious Naruto fanfiction on Wattpad in 2012.

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written so far?

See above. How could I ever top that fic.

In all seriousness, this question always makes me sweat, but I think I'm gonna say Oil, a slightly older fic from my EliHec days which I absolutely obsessed over for months before finally managing to finish. And, unlike most of the fics that I obsess over, I think the obsession actually made it come out better rather than worse, haha.

thanks again for the tag!!!! as for me, I'll tag uhh, hm, @wizard-finix @dreamedge @misty-wisp @flyfish1999 and any other AO3 writers who see this!!! (idk how many of you use AO3 and most of the MBS authors I know have probably already been tagged hehe but anybody who wants to should absolutely feel free!!!!!!!)

#Lee Speaks #tag game #god this is long. i love ranting about my writing thank you again for the tag

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kamenriderliveblog · 1 year ago

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Guess what's ready for digital order! It's @ultra-zine!!!

Okay look I know that my very first post said that I wasn't a figure person. That has obviously changed and I have officially fallen into the SH Figuarts rabbit hole. I preordered Blazar plus I want to get Zero and all of Z's forms. Send help, lmao

Full disclosure: I did contribute something to this zine, which is one reason why I haven't done many liveblogs lately. (I'm still a little emotional about seeing something I've written in print.) I wrote Chill Out, It's Snow Problem, though that was before I saw the dub for Z. Watching that notably changed how I write Z's verbal tics.

I had a hard time with this story because my first draft was like 4500 words. I had to cut out a lot and that was a painful experience! Granted, for me editing is always a painful process, but I'm of the opinion that if it doesn't hurt in one way or another, I'm not editing enough. I'll probably toss up the longer version on AO3 eventually though. It actually really, really hurt to cut as much as I did and I want those parts to see the light of day in one way or another.

There were some scenes that I wanted to write but didn't even make it into the first draft. There was originally going to be a scene with Z taking control of Haruki's body with his permission and skating at an ice rink because my headcanon is that Z would be really good at it. Yes, that scene from episode 7 has been living rent-free in my head for way too long. I also thought Z skating in Haruki's body would be a fun scene for the artist (in this case the amazing @chacerider, though I didn't know that at the time) to use for the illustration if they wanted. Beliarok was going to appear too, but I couldn't think of a way to get him in there in a way that I was happy with.

Originally the story started in Haruki's apartment before going to STORAGE, which actually did make it into the first draft. I had to choose between scrapping that whole intro or paring down the emotional beats that came later. The choice was obvious. Oh yeah and I had Haruki nearly get hit by a truck in the first draft. Fun! Still had to cut it, though.

Haruki and Z being able to tell how the other is feeling or emotions bleeding from one to the other isn't exactly something that happens in canon, I know. It's pretty much me taking the idea of Haruki's emotional state having a big effect on Z in episode 12 and then dialing it up to 11. I like the idea of there being side effects (for lack of a better word) to merging, and I wanted to explore how the friendship between Z and Haruki might develop if there was a lot more unintentional emotional openness. I'll also fully admit that I stole some things from Geed. Leito and Zero's conversations when they're out and around regular people was the big one, and while Z does take control of Haruki's body in episode 7 for a second, I was really more thinking of Geed's early episodes and how Zero would take control of Leito's body basically whenever he felt he needed to.

If you made it to the end, thanks! The link to read my story on AO3 is below. If you didn't manage to grab a physical edition of the zine, you can get a digital version of it and the previous volumes here!

#not a liveblog #ultraman z #ultra zine

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olderthannetfic · 2 years ago

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Wait I’m genuinely curious about the mechanisms of this - so I know about ao3 and copyright law, but what about zines? I think the earliest are from the 1970s but how have they, as a media form, survived for so long if they’re also technically breaking the law by profiting off an IP? I get a lot are for charity and companies would be reluctant to sue projects for charity but I’ve seen some being sold that aren’t?

And also what about authors who post early updates on patreon or have patreon exclusive fics? That surely has to break copyright law?

Possibly answering my own question but maybe it’s because companies don’t care about this but I also did live through Nintendo viciously taking down let’s plays because they thought it breached their copyright by disincentivising people from playing the games?

Companies can be really strict about their IPs, so I’m really curious as to how this is happening and how people are protecting their works.

Getting away with shit and shit being legal are two very different things. ;)

And, to be fair, shit being illegal and companies threatening you with legal action are also very different things.

The oldschool ones were not for charity. You could make a fair use argument, but most zines survive simply because rights holders don't bother to go after them. Small print runs of physical objects are often not seen as significant enough to bother with. Zine makers often argue that they're only charging because they need to cover the printer's bill. Some prices on old zines bear this out; others don't.

Plenty of zines did get shut down by rights holders, however, from big-for-sff-publishing names like Chelsea Quinn Yarbro to Hollywood types like George Lucas. The reasons ranged from "My historical figure vampire is super original and your random-ass zine is endangering my copyright" (Fuck you, CQY. I'm never reading a page of your crap!) to "I just don't like Luke/Leia for some reason but won't tell you why" (LOL). I hear Lucas went after horny zines in general too. I wasn't around for any of this, obviously, but there are writeups online, including on Fanlore.

I presume modern zines benefit from the greater awareness around fair use and around bad press from suppressing fanworks, but they could still be in danger from big rights holders. Being legal or illegal is less important than who has the money for lawyers. Sometimes, a fan can get a big corp to back off by brazening it out, but you have to tell them your legal name and go "Come at me, bro!" Who wants to do that?

Fic Patreons are not only on shaky legal ground, but Patreon does not allow that use of the site. It's a private company, not a public service, and it can pretty much do as it pleases. Here are the guidelines in part:

Restrictions We don’t allow creations and benefits that violate our terms or policies. You can learn more by visiting our Community Guidelines and Benefit Guidelines. A high level summary of those rules is that we don’t allow:

illegal creations or benefits;

creations or benefits that are abusive towards other people;

creations or benefits that use others’ intellectual property, unless you have written permission to use it, or your use is protected as fair use;

or creations or benefits with real people engaging in sexual acts.

If your fans include people under the age of 18, then please remind them that they need their parent’s or legal guardian’s permission to purchase an offering or membership subscription on Patreon, and that those under the age of 13 cannot use Patreon. We are not required to allow any particular person or group of persons to be a patron or otherwise access Patreon services.

Now, yes, they do make an exception for fair use, but I doubt they'll side with the majority of fanworks creators on their particular Patreon works counting as fair use. (Actually, they might be more lenient on RPF. That "real people" rule is about porn starring live actors, not about RPF.) They might rule in favor of the person selling their fic on there, but they very well might not, and even if you were willing to fight it out in court, you probably couldn't since Patreon would be denying you service on their site, not suing you. They can deny service to whomever they want any time they want.

I don't advocate tattling to Patreon simply because I don't think there's any social contract around respecting Patreon's wishes, nor are Patreons I don't back super visible and in my face. Patreon is built by people who get paid to do that; the extra ethical issues present on AO3 are not present here. I don't really approve, but I'm also not going to go out of my way to rat on people. However, I'm sure that fandom enemies of BNFs with Patreons do tattle. I'd advise anyone monetizing this way to have other contact info for their patrons in case they suddenly get kicked off.

Basically, people are flying under the radar, and then periodically, there's a big drama where a rights holder or hosting site destroys everything.

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mentalblabbermouth · 5 months ago

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May the 4th hit me like a truck and i'm still stuck like a fly to a windshield 3 months later

(just posting notes from my ramble doc, i should just get the app at this point)

Man it’s lonely not having people outside of online spaces being just as obsessed with the same media. My sib and I have kind of drifted apart in terms of tastes in shows/fandoms and my folks aren’t interested at all. I don’t really have any friends in my hometown that I could just go on impromptu hangouts to the mall or park with, and the ones I do have their own long established clique and they’re into different stuff. It’s not like in college with living on campus, and all those friends are miles away. These days it’s hard to even find a free day. I think it really comes down to I wish I had someone to turn to and be like “this character connects to this and foreshadows this and did you know etc. etc.” basically infodumping but actually being listened to with the same amount of enthusiasm.

I want to talk about Star Wars, casual mainstream stuff I guess, like I’m late in the game but just started the Bad Batch and I got so excited hearing the narrator again. I used to watch the Clone Wars when I was little so it was a huge hit of nostalgia. Funnily enough I’ve basically gotten the highlights of the whole series through reaction posts, fanart, clips, and finally decided ok I’ll check it out after reading a fic (it was "Success Rate" on Ao3 btw). I wasn’t initially interested when the Bad Batch first came out until their personalities really started to show and of course sibling family moments. And I’ll admit the fandom space from what I could see on insta genuinely looked like fun from the sidelines.

The Dad Batch is so real, watching the very first episode knowing what happens later on and how much they grow it’s bittersweet and touching. Literally the moment Hunter sees Omega it’s like the remnants of the paternal Mandalorian instincts kicked in. This man was already set on becoming a father figure even if he hadn’t realized it. I just thought it was the fans doing their thing but no I witnessed it with my own eyes they’re all girldads and now I wish I got into the series sooner.

Also because I’m an animator at heart I love catching the little side glances between the brothers and the little quirks. For being voiced by the same guy, each of the Bad Batch have their own distinct personalities and mannerisms and I’m having such a good time.

Omega is such a sweetheart, I don’t get how people could not like her! She’s literally baby and I know she grows up at the end of the series, so seeing how she started out she’s so small! She’s just a kid! She’s their little girl! They love her immediately and wholeheartedly! I didn’t know that in the first episode Order 66 just hits them like that, everything is confusing and chaos, the world they’ve known their whole lives is crumbling down. But they risk their lives and their freedom and return to Kamino for her!

The food fight scene was great, absolutely love how they’re ready to throw hands.

Nothing is more euphoric than finding a piece of fanart you remembered liking years ago but not remembering the artist so you go on a long search detective style and then find it! Yes it was Bad Batch content—I liked the occasional art even though I had never seen a single episode until now and I’m living rn absolutely delighted to find the piece was part of TBB Zine! Catching up on quality content now with context is healing rn (just in case the piece is by clone.enthusiast aka Bird on insta, forever treasuring this I’m smiling)-update: i think with the whole Meta AI thing the artist left Instagram and I'm so sad i can't find them.

Anyhoo, wanted to get that part out of my system. Been busy with a new job that's been so draining that I haven't finished Season 1 yet. Burnout has made picking up a pencil feel like holding a hot iron that it just hurts idk. Thinking of making a Tumblr blog just for professional art portfolio things since Instagram is now a hot garbage fire and lots of people are moving to Cara. I don't think i'll leave Insta myself since I've got mutuals there and there's still awesome art around. But yeah that's what's life been lately, if you've read this far, thanks!

#rambles #ramblings #star wars #the bad batch #tbb

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danggirlronpa · 1 year ago

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That Sonia/Hiyoko art you reblogged got me thinking. I've always had a soft spot for this ship, but it's not that popular at all, and even the content that talks about it seems to miss what I think is a really big part of the ship: Hiyoko mentioning Sonia in her FTEs. In her FTEs, she is literally so pressed by Sonia's existence, Sonia just... gets under her skin. I think this is in part because she's jealous of her, and also because Sonia makes her feel things she doesn't want to feel. I think the only reason she mentions her dislike of Sonia in her FTEs is and not outside of them because she knows Sonia is well liked and bashing her wouldn't be as well recieved as say, bashing Mikan or Kazuichi or Nagito (rip to them, but mostly Mikan, I'm sorry girl you did nothing to deserve Hiyoko bashing you so much), so she only does so in her final(? If I remember right) FTE after building up rapport with/trust in Hajime. (Which is also sweet—Hajime makes her feel safe. They are like siblings 2 me. 2 Me.)

All this to say, imo, the ideal Hiyoko/Sonia dynamic is Hiyoko anonymously sending a note to Sonia that says "get out of my school" because she can't deal with her Feelings about her.

(Tbh, I also thing this is a good alternative to Mikan/Hiyoko for people who want a "get out of my school" dynamic since it has a lot of the broad appeal points with the added bonus that Hiyoko never actually bullied Sonia—or at least not as viciously as she bullied Mikan. Not to say I don't like Hiyoko/Mikan, the two definitely have their appeal, but I'm just saying that people who may want a similar dynamic of "one sided enemies to lovers" but don't necessarily want the baggage that comes with Hiyoko's targeting of Mikan may find Sonia/Hiyoko to have appeal to them as an alternative.)

But yeah, honestly I'm not sure why the ship isn't more popular. It could partially be because they don't interact much outside of bonus scenes, but we DO get that scene with Sonia suggesting the mirror to Hiyoko which is very sweet of her, even if the suggestion did... turn out badly. And we also get Hiyoko talking about Sonia in her FTEs, something that is sort of rare for FTEs. It doesn't even necessarily have to be a romantic exploration of the two, I'd just like more content exploring their dynamic.

This is a GREAT look at the appeal of Soniyoko!! In general, Hiyoko kind of suffers in shipping material, both because of the semi-popular belief that she is Actually Genuinely Younger Than The Rest Of The SDR2 Cast And It's Problematic To Ship Them (I obviously don't subscribe to this) and because people just don't like her. But there's so many great ones.

Not to be on my bullshit but I'm actually going to take this chance to promo the DR WLW Zine again, because there's a specific piece by Magi (starrylitme on AO3) that completely sold me on Soniyoko in a way that almost no fic ever has.

I don't want to post too much, but I think this excerpt really gets into the fundamental appeal of the ship in general! It's full of the exact kind of "I hate you. Go away. NOT LIKE THAT" that I think this ship can really dig into. And it nails Sonia like nothing I've ever seen. Everybody go support the DR WLW Zine when they have leftover sales. And then go support Magi like right now.

EDIT: I can't believe I forgot to post images of the FTE that anon's talking about. Here's the important bits!

#this is not to distract from your meta its just SO good that i dont have much to add!!#asks #soniyoko #talk to the mod #anon #meta #sonia nevermind #hiyoko saionji #sdr2

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contentment-of-cats · 1 year ago

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Part II: Growing Pains

When we ended Part I of our overview of Fandom, we saw fic evolving from Zines and independent publishing to fic specific platforms such as Fanfic.net, LiveJournal, Ao3, and Dreamwidth. The hand-off from one platform to the next was not always a process of evolution, nor a smooth transition, rather often necessity demanding invention. With the transition from paper to online exposure came the opportunity to develop community and an opportunity for problems.

We’re back at the Asker’s Studio™️, so grab a cat, move a cat, kick the toys out of the way and get comfortable.

Today, I would like to discuss what I like to generally define as Growing Pains. These are the issues that arose on all fronts which ranged from the highly personal, to technical assaults that threatened the mere existence of fic, online.

I have chosen a few topics that reflect on the evolution, creation and demise of Fandom platforms/archives/host sites. Let’s begin with the big one: Censorship. Over the months, I have heard fragments about a wave of censorship that hit both FF.net & LiveJournal. I understand that the results caused rifts/fragmentation in the fandoms. Since those platforms existed before my time, could you briefly describe what they were, how they served your needs, and what ultimately led to their demise?

Out of the ashes grows a rose: AO3. I understand that Ao3 was borne as the answer to the failings of the aforementioned FF.net & LiveJournal. However, it is not without its own attacks/problems - as recent as the last two weeks, hackers with content issues successfully took down the site for a solid day. Could you add any insights to these purity attacks & whether they are a continuation of the long war on creativity? Even less spoken of are issues of internal strife, regarding fic content/underage content. Having participated in several Fandom platforms/host sites, was the creation of Ao3 the answer that Fandom participants were looking for, or do problems evolve along with solutions? (I invite @olderthannetfic to feel invited offer any historical perspectives on the creation of AO3 at this time)

Finally, I would like to throw out what I call The Next Frontier: the introduction of AI. Many of us have locked our accounts and designated them Registered Users Only, as the AI beast lands like a pack of Death Eaters. We see the entertainment industry walking the picket lines with AI being one of the contract issues. Can you offer some insight on this topic?

This is a hackneyed list of issues - both human & technological - that has confronted Fandom/fic over its long and short history. Please feel free to add, abridge, omit or expand on anything I have brought up. As always, thank you very much for your time..

*settles in*

I wanted to answer this sooner, but really needed to think about some of my answers. This has been through a few drafts, so hold steady.

Censorship:

In the beginning (Usenet), there was always censorship. The fandoms would start off with 'all are welcome' but that was never actually the truth. Popular ships always eclipsed rarepairs, and people got downright nasty about it and there was also a lot of anti-smut action. Then there was the slash vs. het vs. noromo (no romance - now called 'gen) disputes. The fragmentation came with e-groups and members only listservs where people could write their stories without the censorship of the majority or characterization cops. There was still more fragmentation over other subjects, the purity police existed to make more wedges. The first time I ever saw a fight over 'queer' being a slur was on a Skinner/Mulder e-group so that was around 1996ish. E-groups purged a lot of slash and smut lists before it was bought by Yahoo, and Yahoo did the same.

Archives were curated sites on accessible hosting sites like Geocities, Angelfire, and so on. either dedicated to a specific fandom, pairing, or genre. Posting power rested in the hands of an archivist or a board of archivists. There was a lot of favoritism, and some authors posted their own work on a private website and often joined a ring of likeminded sites.

Fanfiction came out of the woodwork of the internet in 1998 when fanfiction.net came to be. FF.net was the equivalent of a publisher's 'slush pile.' A knocked-over fire-hydrant geyser of fic and fandoms as opposed to the neatly bottled and displayed stuff. It took a while, but the tweaks started in the early 2000's (dammit I am so fucking old) with banning works from a specific source (Anne Rice, Archie, Terry Goodkind etc.), then moving on to banning reader insert, filk and songfic, RPF, NC-17 and sexually explicit material (purging existing content also). They banned CYOA, Self-Insert, Character/Reader (You) fic. A lot of this was for two reasons.

The leadership of ff.net wanted to make the site attractive to advertisers.

They wanted to play nice with publishers, studios, media, real people depicted in fic, and intellectual property attorneys.

The migration to LJ placed fic in the hands of the author. They could post whatever they wanted and screw the mods.

If fanfiction came out of the woodwork on ff.net, it came out of the closet on LJ.

LJ came along in 2000ish, it originally was a place for fans to interact with other fans - like a forum where you could also post fic. The ban and excision of NC-17 and explicit fic from FF.net made LJ into a fandom hub, and for a short while kept the fan-run archives from dying out. However, even the hosting services did not want smut, slash, or other possibly-prosecutable fic on their servers, and were shutting down those sites. It was haphazard, but not random, as fandom grudges and the purity police would rat archives out.

LJ also saw the rise of the BNF, and also the phenomenon of Dark Fandom and Fandom Wank (FW originated on LJ and was driven off several platforms). LJ was sold to 6 Apart in 2005, and the Russian company SUP in 2007, with the founders mostly bolting after Strikethrough and Boldthrough - instigated by Warriors for Innocence (actual identity unknown, speculation attributes to Ms.Scribe). However, 6 Apart and SUP also wanted to - you guessed it - make LJ profitable. WFI was arguably the first successful, large format purity troll. I was already moving away from LJ and FF.net at the time, that just hammered the nail in.

Archive of Our Own:

That leads us to Ao3 (called AoOO and cue the 'Werewolves of Fandom' jokes), began with a 2007 LJ post by @astolat. The genesis of Ao3 was widely mocked, but fifteen years later it is still standing. I remember hearing about it and wondering if it had any relation to the essay 'A Room of One's Own' by Virginia Woolf.

"But, you may say, we asked you to speak about women and fiction—what, has that got to do with a room of one's own? I will try to explain."

I view the attacks on Ao3 as an attack on marginalized groups using nontraditional media. There are still vast numbers of people who do not want women or other marginalized groups to have a room of one's own, much less an archive, much less an archive that can't be held by the balls via their wallet, or threatened with a squad of foot soldiers with Esquire and Juris Doctor next to their name. Ao3 is now a part of fandom culture - good, bad, and ugly - and is a target for purity trolls using straw man, gaslighting, and red herrings to pull Ao3 apart for their own purposes.

Ao3 does have the problems that any institution has - and those unique to those dependent on user-generated content. It has its own internal struggles with the content that users generate as it pertains to underage/noncon and other squicks. To censor or not to censor? Is it enough to ask grown ass people to tag their work or to ask other presumably grown ass people to use tags when to eliminate content they do not want to see? are they doing enough to attract a diverse staff? How is that staff being treated? It is non-profit, staffed with volunteers, and lives on funding drives like US public television and NPR. It has a big enough base that understands the mission and is active enough to parse board candidates. In much the same way as NPR/Public Television, the content is a draw for trolls. Legacy media was the means to control the message, but when you can shoot content on your phone, write and publish from your connected device, the media can't control the message. It scares the piss out of people who have every reason to want to control the message.

When people attack Ao3, their reasons are spurious troll food for the most part. There's another, deeper, more nefarious agenda at work.

AI and the War On Creativity:

AI art, music, and writing is the idea of someone who views media as something to be consumed. You buy a book, you watch a show, and that is monetized.

Nobody has ever successfully monetized fandom.

The war between creators and media controllers heated up when technology handed creators the tools to make their own content and the platforms to distribute it whether it's video, writing, art, or music. AI is an attempt to wrest that control back.

To the Powers That Be, fandom is a resource that needs to be squeezed for money. People consuming fanworks for free are people not giving their money to Disney, Sony, Warner Bros, and so on. The PTB have taken over the cons, despite the inclusion of artists alleys, so that they can once again control the media and control the message. The PTB like to deem themselves creators and disruptors. However, creative human beings are an unruly lot. The PTB want creatives and what they produce, but under their control. No unions, no contracts, no pesky IP issues.

An AI has no rights, no needs, no true consciousness and thus can only copy or derive when it 'creates' content. Their 'disruption' is for everyone but themselves. So when we bar them from scraping our content, they see it as our refusing to give them something that they are entitled to use.

AI scraping from Ao3 and venues like DeviantArt are attempts to make unpaid use of creators' content. Creators write and create art that is uncompensated, which is then shared. Some writers and artists have 'tip jars' or take commissions, but the vast majority get nothing but comments and likes. Since this work is uncompensated, the PTB deem it 'free' and therefore they can do what they want with it. When they scrape a work to train their AI, they are working to replace creatives. Full stop.

For that matter, a scraper doesn't need to be from Google or MicroSoft. You can download scrapers for Wattpad like this one:

There are also tools available on sites like GitHub that can be used to scrape Ao3 and FF.net. Moreover, there are a fuckton of AI specifically marketed for fanfiction writing to fanfiction writers - all of which have been trained on fan-generated content. There are AIs for art and for music. It could be argued that these AI will help people unleash their own creativity, improve stories, and unearth creative potential. The thing is that none of these tech companies does anything for free in the long term.

Finally, the US Copyright office has ruled that you can't copyright anything - image, writing, music, video - that you create with an AI. anyone can use it for any purpose, without you having any legal recourse. There must be a minimal 'human involvement' - in this particular case, the art generated by a human entering text prompts into an AI was deemed insufficient to meet the standard. The ruling is the first of its kind, and more will follow, but keep in mind that you are one ruling from the AI creators assuming a stake in your work.

#askers studio #ask reply

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amazing-spiderling · 11 months ago

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for the fandom ask game: 5 6 11 16 23 24

something you see in fics a lot and love

I really love seeing Foggy sort of leap-frogging over his panic and anger and confusion in moments of crisis to get right to the part where he works on being helpful. That, "We are going to fight about this later, but right now I need to stop that bleeding" sort of thing. Foggy is absolutely allowed to have emotions and fall apart in a crisis, but he has a good head on his shoulders and certainly after a certain point he's had to learn to compartmentalize just to survive being in Matt's life. I think it's comforting to imagine having a friend or partner like that- I guess it speaks to the idea of there always being an undercurrent of love. No matter what else is going on in the moment, no matter how furious or scared or worried the events taking place right now make them, they do not supplant the love that is at the basis of the relationship. I just think that's neat.

something you see in art a lot and love

When artists really have fun with the clothing, paying attention to details and making things really specific. When someone really pays attention to drawing a certain kind of shoe- I'm just... yeah, that's the good stuff. :)

if you’re a writer or artist, what fic or piece of art are you proud of making?

Well, I'm a little bit of both- but I guess a fic sprang to mind first so I'll answer for that. (tw for fictional CSA mention btw) So, as I've not-so-casually mentioned, one of my first big/long term fandoms was Metal Gear Solid. And I know that some of the memes from that series have escaped containment, and to the outsiders it might look like "Call of Duty but with the occasional zany moment" but it does have a lot of story (too much, some might say XD) and intricate character relationships and lore and, ugh it's just SUCH fertile ground for art and fic and all the things that make fandom great. But, it *does* also very much appeal to gamer dudes of the usual type. And normally this is fine, the transformative fans and the archival fans largely keep to their own fandom spaces- but sometimes there is crossover that rubs one group or the other the wrong way.

One such case is that there is a character who has an "affair" with his step-mother, but I put that in quotes because when the dust settles, it turns out this happened when the character in question was 16. There is TERRIBLE fallout from the event (family trauma, suicide, estrangement) and the game plays it all straight- this is something that broke the already fragile family to pieces. BUT for a long time, the joke was "haha character banged his stepmom". Which. Ew.

Anyways, I always really wanted to write a story that sort of expanded on those events, not the actual relationship/abuse/fallout, but more the events that precluded it, mostly what made the character an easy target. (Isolation, otherness, a lack of confidence in who they were as an individual). Basically, I wanted to really tell a story that treated the matter with the needed level of seriousness, if only to say, "hey, this isn't a punchline, this is a traumatic experience".

I ended up watching, "The Graduate" a few times as sort of... research? Partially for tone, partially because the themes and characterization in that movie matched the vibe I was trying to go for in my own story. (I can't help but think that Kojima, known for referencing movies in his games- might have had it in mind due to some shared imagery.) This was maybe the first time I did something like that, watching a movie to pick it apart for nuance in tone, as opposed to looking at it for canon events, timelines etc.

So that story ended up being, "Surface Tension", which first appeared in the "Metal Gear Solid: Lost Years" zine, and then eventually got posted to AO3. It's not my best reviewed fic by a long shot (understandably, it's a difficult subject material and not shippy or anything), but it's one that I can say I am proud of.

a tiny detail in canon that you want more people to appreciate

Wow, this one is tricky for me- I feel like a lot of fans are way more detail oriented than I am when it comes to canon. I'm always the one in awe when people are like, "Oh in episode seven, this one song is playing in a car as it drives by, and that's significant because it came out in 2013 and that was the year that..." and i'm just like "you guys know the names of songs?"

I guess to that end- I always liked the line in, I think it's season 1 where Matt says it's a "90's Top 40" kind of guy. I think it's really funny because people characterize him as having... well, let's just say "better" musical taste, but like, no. That dude would bop his head if you played the Spin Doctors.

the fandom you’re curious about because of a mutual

I have no idea what's going on in the Trolls fandom, and at this point I'm afraid to ask. But they all look like they're having a great time.

how has fandom positively impacted your life?

I've made so many friends, and as someone who doesn't get out as much as I'd like (especially as an immunocompromised person in the middle of a pandemic), my fandom friends are so, so important to me. I love the feeling of having a group of people who love the thing I love and being able to waltz into a space and say, "Hey, who wants to do this crazy thing with me?" and have even a few people say "Yeah, let's fucking GOOOO". ^^

I also think I wouldn't write nearly as much if it wasn't for fandom, and writing has certainly gone a long way towards helping me become better at unraveling the balls of yarn in my brain and making them into sweaters and scarves, as it were. I think a lot of the time when you write, you're practicing empathy- because you're forcing yourself to see the world from someone else's perspective. Maybe the character you're writing about had something in common with you, maybe that's what drew you to them in the first place, but identifying that also helps you understand more about yourself *and* how you relate to others. So I like to think that writing has helped me relate better to other people, even the ones I disagree with, and made me more able to slow down and ask, "well, why does this person feel/think that way?" Storytelling is so important for a lot of reasons, but that's a big one for me.

#thank you for the ask #i got wordy oops

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avaantares · 6 months ago

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Fic authors self rec! When you get this, reply with your favorite five fics that you've written, then pass on to at least five other writers (except me because I've already done it). Spread the self-love 💙 (also sorry if you've gotten this already!!)

Top 5 fics? Isn't that like choosing a favorite child?

Well, here goes:

Fic: Children of the Future Age Fandom: Devil May Cry Probably Definitely my most popular fan work, this 330K monolith was meant to be around a tenth of that length when I started writing it during the final week of 2019... but during COVID lockdown, it became something of a coping mechanism, and I escalated from a simple one-problem plot to a convoluted braid of several interlinked conflicts, with a whole lot of character work on the side. Ultimately, I spent over a year writing and editing the thing. It gets the top slot by virtue of its length and complexity, its characterization, and because it was just fun and therapeutic to write. And it has the dubious honor of having been stolen and sold by plagiarists! (Okay, that part is less fun.) It's also been translated by fans into both Russian and Chinese, which... wow, that's a lot of words to translate, and I'm honored that anyone would volunteer to spend that much time with it. .

Fic: Splinter Fandom: Torchwood & Sarah Jane Adventures This is my earliest novel-length Torchwood work, and arguably not the best-written, but still a favorite because of all I put into it. I did SO MUCH RESEARCH for this one, to the point that after reading it, several other authors asked me to tech-read their stories because they thought I was either some kind of biologist or a medical professional (sorry, I'm just a nerd!). Also there's timeline fracturing and causality paradoxes and, oh, yeah, a boatload of angst. Very on-brand for me. :D .

Fic: What Dreams May Come Fandom: Torchwood & Doctor Who Another long and plot-twisty fic, this one plays with time travel and some other elements that I really enjoy writing. I included a number of my favorite characters from both series, and it was fun to get my teeth into their personalities. It also features an original character whom (to my surprise) most readers seemed to really like. This story was later republished in the Doctor Who zine Tales From the Matrix. .

Fic: The Night of the Fractured Mask Fandom: The Wild Wild West I've written so many Torchwood fics that I could probably populate a whole faves list just with those, but in the interest of variety, I'll pull out a story from the second most obscure fandom I've written for. Ever since I was a kid watching reruns of this 1960s spy/Western/proto-steampunk adventure series after school, I have been in awe of Artemus Gordon (and Ross Martin, the absolute genius who played him, who is largely responsible for the existence of one of my sideblogs). This is just a quick little character study, but I think I succeeded in capturing Artie's voice a bit, which felt like a pretty big accomplishment. .

Fic: The Light Within Fandom: Guardian (Zhen Hun) I'm being a bit self-serving with this last one. 😅 I do really like this story, especially the sibling dynamics in it, but for some reason it has garnered the least attention of any finished work I've posted on AO3 (only 121 views in the nine months it's been up). Admittedly, it started out as a joke, but it quickly took on a life of its own and became a charming little far-future sequel to the TV drama. I'm including it here in the hopes that someone in the tiny Guardian fandom who missed it the first time around might check it out.

I will be sending out some Asks privately, as that's how I received this one, but for anyone who has NOT done this yet and would like to participate, send me a message or Ask (off Anon) and I will drop it in your inbox! Everyone deserves a chance to self-promote once in a while. :)

#fanfiction #ask game #ao3 #my writing #fanfic rec list

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sineala · 4 years ago

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How would you say fandom culture has changed over the years? What are some differences you notice between older and younger fandom folks?

I’ve been thinking for a while about how to answer this, and I’m not sure I have a really good answer, but I’m going to try.

I’ve been in fandom since approximately 1995. Maybe 1994. At that point, the world wide web was a relatively new part of the internet, and the fandoms I was in had most of their activity on privately-hosted mailing lists (predating eGroups/OneList/Yahoo Groups) and on Usenet newsgroups, with fiction beginning to be available on websites as part of either fandom-specific or pairing-specific archives as well as authors’ individual pages. Fanfiction.net did not yet exist. LiveJournal did not exist. AO3 definitely did not exist. If you wanted real-time chat, there was IRC. I was coming in basically at the tail end of zine fandom; zines were no longer the only way of distributing fanfiction, as fandom started to move online. So I have a selection of zines from 90s-era Western media fandoms but even by then zines weren’t where I was doing most of my reading.

I think in terms of generally “what it was like to be in fandom,” the big-picture stuff hasn’t changed. Fandom still produces creative fanwork and likes to, y’know, get together and talk about fandom. Also, almost every fight or complaint that fandom has about something is a thing that has been going on for actual years. People complain that, say, the kudos button is ruining comment culture because back in the LJ days the only way you could comment on a story was, well, by leaving an actual comment, or sending an email on a mailing list, and this might mean that people who would have otherwise commented have left a kudos instead. But back in the LJ and mailing list days, people were complaining that commenting was going downhill since the days of zines, when in order to comment on a story you had to write a real paper letter and mail it and because you had to do that, the quality of feedback was so much better than you got nowadays because people could just dash off a quick email or comment. You get the idea. Top/bottom wars are not new either. Pairing wars are not new. If you’ve been in fandom a while, you will pretty much have seen all the fights already. I think one thing that is new, though, is the fandom awareness of things like privilege and intersectionality and various -isms, as well as things like “providing warnings might be nice” (do you know how much unwarned deathfic I have read? a lot!) and I sure won’t say we’re perfect at any of this now, but I think fandom is trying way way more about all that stuff than it used to.

There are some fights we actually don’t have anymore, as far as I can tell. I feel like it’s been years since I’ve seen the “real person fiction is wrong” battle, but also I don’t hang out in a whole lot of RPF fandoms, so it’s possible that’s still going and I just don’t see it.

There also used to be a recurring debate about whether gay relationships that were canonical were slash or not. When slash started, obviously this wasn’t a question because there weren’t canonical gay relationships in fandoms, period. But as gay characters began to appear in media, people started to wonder “does slash mean all same-sex relationships, or does slash mean only non-canonical same-sex relationships?” Now, you may be reading this and think that sounds like an incredibly weird thing to get hung up on, but that’s because what appears to have happened is that the term “ship” (originally from X-Files Mulder/Scully fandom) has, as far as I can tell, come up and eaten most of the rest of the terminology. Now people will just say, “oh, I ship that.” For any pairing, gay or not, canonical or not. Fandom seems to have decided that for the most part it no longer actually needs a term specific to same-sex relationships as a genre.

Similarly, there are a few genres of fic that we used to have also pretty much don’t exist anymore. There are also plenty of genres that are well-entrenched now that are also extremely recent -- A/B/O comes to mind. But there are some kinds of fic we don’t write a lot of now. Like, I haven’t seen smarm in years! I also haven’t seen We’re Not Gay We Just Love Each Other in a while. There was also a particular style of slash writing where you’d basically have to explain, in detail, what made you think that these particular characters could be anything other than straight. You’d have to motivate this decision. You’d have to look at their canonical heterosexual relationships and come up with a way to explain why all those had happened in order to reconcile how this one guy could have romantic feelings for another guy. When had he figured out he wasn’t straight? Who might he have been with before? How does he interact with people in ways that make you think he’s not straight? That kind of thing. You had to, essentially, show your work. And these days a lot of fanfic is just like, “Okay, Captain America is bisexual, let’s go!” It’s... different.

Fandom also used to skew older, is my sense. A lot older. I don’t know, actually, if it really was older, but I get the sense now that there are some younger people who are surprised that adults are still in fandom. I have seen people saying these days that they think they’re too old for fanfiction because they are not in middle school anymore. And I think a lot of this has to do with the fact that the barriers to access fandom are a lot lower than they used to be. You used to basically have to be an adult with disposable income (or know an adult with disposable income who was willing to help you out; but even then if you were reading explicit fiction you also had to swear you were 18+, usually by sending in an age statement to whoever you were buying the zine from or to the mods of the list you wanted to join, so a lot of fandom was very much age-gated). Internet access was not widely available. Even if you had internet access, you maybe didn’t have your own email address, so you couldn’t sign up for mailing lists; free email providers didn’t exist. If you wanted to buy zines, you had to have money to buy them. If you wanted to go to cons, you had to be able to afford the cost of the con, travel to the con, et cetera. If you wanted to have a website you had to know HTML. Social media did not exist. You want to draw art? Guess what, you’re probably drawing it on paper! You might be able to upload a picture to your website if you have a digital camera or a scanner, but both of those things are expensive, and also a lot of people don’t have the capability or the money to download pictures from the internet (some people have data caps with overage charges, and some people have text-only connections!), so they won’t get to see it. Maybe you can sell your piece at a con! You want to make a fanvid? We called them songvids, but, anyway, you know how you’re doing that? You’re going to hook two VCRs together and smash the play and record buttons very fast! If you want anyone else to watch them, you are either making them a tape personally and mailing it to them or bringing your vids to a convention. Maybe you can digitize them and upload them, but it’s going to take people hours to download them!

(Every three hours my ISP would kick me off the internet and I’d have to dial in again. If it was a busy time of day, it might take me 20 or 30 minutes to get a connection again. And that was assuming no one else in the house needed to use the phone line. Imagine if your modem went out every three hours now.)

And now, for the cost of my internet connection, I can read pretty much whatever fanfiction I want, whenever I want it. I can see all the fanart I want! I can watch vids! Podfic exists now! Fanmixes exist! Gifsets and moodboards exist! If I want to write fic I can write it with programs that are completely free, and as soon as I post it everyone in the entire world can read it. If I want to draw or make vids that may require some additional investment, but I may also be able to do it with things I already have. Do you have any idea how good we all have it?

There are a couple of kinds of fan activity that don’t seem to exist anymore, though, and I miss them. I know that roleplaying still goes on, but I feel like these days most people who do real-time text roleplay have switched to things like Discord. I know that in the LJ days, RP communities were popular. But I really miss MU*s (MUDs, MUSHes, MOOs, MUXes..), which were servers for real-time text-based RP with a bunch of... hmm... features to aid RP. There were virtual rooms with text descriptions, and objects in virtual rooms with descriptions, and your character had a description, and they could interact with the objects as well as with other characters, and you could program things to change descriptions or emit various kinds of text or take you to different rooms, and so on. Just to, y’know, enhance the atmosphere. It was fun and it was where I learned to RP and I’m sad they’re pretty much gone now.

I also don’t think I see a lot of fanfiction awards in fandoms. Wonder where they went.

Going back to the previous point, the barriers to actually consuming the canon you are fannish about are way, way, way lower now. You can pretty much take it for granted that if right now someone tells you about a shiny new fandom, there will be a way to read that book or watch that show or movie right now. Possibly for free! Of course you can watch it! Why wouldn’t you be able to?

This was absolutely, absolutely not the case before. I’m currently in Marvel Comics fandom. If there is a comic I want to read, I can read it right now on the internet. I have subscribed to Marvel Unlimited and I can read pretty much every comic that is older than three months old; the newer ones cost extra money. But I can do it all from the comfort of my own home right now. I was also, actually, in Marvel Comics fandom in the nineties. If I wanted to read a comic, I had to go to a comic book store and hope they had it in stock; if they didn’t, I had to try another store. Not a lot of comics were available in trade paperback and they definitely weren’t readable on the internet. I used to read a lot of Gambit h/c fic set after Uncanny X-Men #350. I never found a copy of UXM #350. I still haven’t! But I did eventually read it on Unlimited.

Being in TV show fandoms also had similar challenges. Was the show you were watching still on the air? No? Then you’d better hope you could find it in reruns, or know someone who had tapes of it that they could copy for you, otherwise you weren’t watching that show. It was, I think, pretty common for people to be in fandoms for shows they hadn’t seen, because they had no way to see the show, but they loved all the fanfic. The Sentinel had a whole lot of fans like that, both because I think it took a while for it to end up in reruns and because overseas distribution was probably poor. So you’d get people who read the fic and wrote fic based on the other fic they’d read, which meant that you got massive, massive amounts of fanon appearing that people just assumed was in the show because it was a weirdly specific detail that appeared in someone’s fic once. Like “Jim and Blair’s apartment has a small water heater” (not actually canonical) or “Blair is a vegetarian” (there’s an episode where his mother visits and IIRC cooks him one of his favorite meals, which is beef tongue).

Like, I was in The Professionals fandom for years. I read all the fic. I hadn’t seen the show. As far as I know, it never aired in the US, and it certainly never had any kind of US VHS or DVD release. I’d seen a couple songvids. I eventually saw a couple episodes in maybe 2003, and that was because my dad special-ordered a commercial VHS tape from the UK and paid someone to convert it from PAL to NTSC. I didn’t get to see the whole show until several years later when I got a region-free DVD player someone in fandom sent me burned copies of the UK DVD releases and then I special-ordered the commercial release of the DVDs from the UK myself. But if I were a new fan and wanted to watch Pros right now? It is on YouTube! For free!

I think also one of the things about fandom that’s not immediately evident to new fans is the way in which it is permanent and/or impermanent. There are probably people whose first fannish experience is on Tumblr or who only read fanfic on FFN and who have no idea what they would do if either site, say, just shut down. But if you’ve been in fandom a while, you’ve been through, say, Discord, Tumblr, Twitter, Pillowfort, Imzy, DW, JournalFen, LJ, GeoCities, IRC, mailing lists. And sure, if Tumblr closed, it would be inconvenient. But fandom would pack up and move somewhere else. You would find it again. It would, eventually, be okay. Similarly, if you’ve been in a lot of fandoms, if you’ve made a lot of friends, drifting through fandoms is like that. You’ll make a friend in 1998 because you were in the same fandom, and then you might go your own ways, and ten years later you might be in another fandom with them again! It happens.

But the flip side of that is that I think a lot of older fans have learned not to trust in the permanence of any particular site. If you like a story, you save it as soon as you read it. If you like a piece of art, you save it. If you like a vid, you save it. Because you don’t know when the site it’s on will be gone for good. I have, like, twenty years of lovingly-curated fanfic. And I feel like people who have only been in fandom since AO3 existed might not understand how much AO3 is a game-changer compared to what we had before. It’s a site where you can put your fic up and you don’t have to worry that the webhost is going out of business, or that the site might delete your work because they don’t allow gay fiction or explicit fiction or fiction written in second person or fiction for fandoms where the creator doesn’t like fanfiction, or whatever. Because all of those things have absolutely happened. But, I mean, I still save pretty much everything I like, even on AO3, just in case.

So, basically, yeah, fandom is a whole lot more accessible than it used to be. I think fandom is pretty much still fandom, but it’s a lot easier to get into, and that has made it way more open to people who wouldn’t have been able to be in fandom before. There is so, so much more now than there ever was before, and I think that’s great.

#Anonymous #replies

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elmelloill · 2 years ago

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i put this on twitter but what if i put it here too! my favorite lines (more like...sections) from the fics I wrote in 2022 :)

(with slightly more commentary than on twitter, perhaps) (edit: a lot more commentary than on twitter)

I included my aa4 zine piece on twitter but I don't think I will here, since I didn't actually write it this year and just happened to post it on ao3 in January after the zine released. So the rest of these are all Waver fics, because in 2022 I finally unlocked the ability to write about him.

i'm the one you can't ignore [rated M, excerpt is some implied nsfw]

So first, I'm so pleased with the concept of this fic. I didn't really take the idea seriously at first but the more I thought about it the more I realized that it's really the premise with the best of both worlds when it comes to the question of whether Iskandar remembers Waver in Chaldea or not. All of Waver's heartbreak and inner conflict AND the actual reunion all in one fic! One of the comments called it a "delicious little misunderstanding" and I love that. I know this is very much tooting my own horn but it's also my most popular fic of them by a Lot so it feels a teeny bit justified. And my goal this year was to write the things i really wanted to read so! I love everything I wrote this year a lot!

Anyway. Excerpt.

He had thought that, in this situation, it wouldn’t make a difference if Iskandar remembered him or not. It was purely physical self-indulgence, after all—what did it matter if Iskandar only thought of him as some attractive stranger to share his bed for a night?

But something in Iskandar’s touch was different now—they had never done this before, not remotely, but it was as though Iskandar had figured him out nonetheless, like he knew even better than Waver did what would make him unravel.

Actually half my reasons for this section being my favorite is because when I thought of it I felt like I unlocked the path to the end of the fic. It was simultaneously like "yes! this is it! this is the whole point!" while also giving me something to talk about through my sex scene that wasn't like, the actual sex, so i was able to get through it without my usual ordeal. But it's also my favorite because I'm just a sucker for the concept of Iskandar seeing straight through Waver, in any context. Being around Iskandar means being subjected to the mortifying ordeal of being known, for Waver, or at least I like to see it that way.

His Rightful Place [rated G]

But despite everything, when he raises his head to meet Iskandar’s gaze, an unassailable sense of reassurance overtakes him, and even though his heart is still pounding hard enough to echo in his ears, he feels as though something has slotted into place in his chest.

Waver Velvet, second-rate mage and stand-in Lord of the Clock Tower, should not be here in this alien place, trying to save the world, but at the same time, looking into his King’s eyes, he knows that he is exactly where he is meant to be.

I actually don't have much more commentary than the title itself. His rightful place! (Shameless use of the CE name because it makes me emotional and I'll never actually have it unless they rerun accel zero order just for me.) This one was fun though, and also sort of started from an idea I didn't take seriously right away. I definitely watched the entire Solomon movie hoping Waver would show up, but if my disappointment led to me writing something about it, then maybe that's fine.

Warmth [rated T, maybe it should be M?? i really couldn't decide.]

I really really wanted to write a kiss and (mostly) just a kiss. Making out is so often just a prelude to smut (in doujins especially. maybe I was flipping through too many doujins at this time lol) so I just really wanted to focus in on the kiss and that's probably why it kind of got out of hand. That and Waver's just so fun to write when he's a repressed gay 19-year-old.

All that said, my favorite part is just about Waver being Seen, again:

Waver hadn’t meant to look at him, but now he couldn’t look away. According to legend, Alexander’s eyes should have been different colors, one dark and one light, but it was hard for Waver to imagine anything more striking than the dark burning crimson that he was so used to. Had anyone ever looked at him the way Rider did? It was frustrating sometimes, how he seemed to see through Waver so easily, but that meant he was actually looking, when so many other people just dismissed Waver at a glance.

Waver couldn’t feign indifference to that gaze. Everything he wanted was laid excruciatingly bare, from his petty ambitions and his desperation for recognition, to the desire he had told himself had no place in the heart of a mage—Waver could hardly stand it, but at the same time…Rider was still looking, wasn’t he? Not with disgust, not with scorn…despite their disastrous first encounter, Alexander the Great was still looking at Waver Velvet with undeniable interest, as though he saw something of value where nobody else had, value that even Waver sometimes doubted was there.

And because I can't get enough of this whole concept, I wrote about it from Iskandar's perspective, next.

Bloom [rated G]

I loved writing this one. Giving myself an excuse to write about Waver's character development in Zero by making it into a fic! Iskandar POV was really fun and I hope to use it a little more in the future. While it isn't the excerpt I chose as my favorite, I really liked thinking about him getting excited about talking to Waver about the Iliad. I love when Fate points out (accurately) that he's basically a huge fanboy when it comes to Homer.

But I basically centered the fic around this metaphor so, it should be the chosen excerpt:

He’s changed.

He had the feeling of watching a desert flower burst into bloom after the briefest deluge. It was always a delight to witness the prickliest, most forbidding plants unfurl the sweetest blossoms after a rare rain, and Iskandar felt the same satisfaction now. His first impressions had not been wrong—Waver was weak and cowardly, overconcerned with frivolous matters, impatient, self-centered—but the spines and the flowers were of the same plant, after all, and it was just a matter of the proper conditions to bring out one or the other.

While this fic was largely just inspired by the thought of Waver wrapped up in Iskandar's mantle (shout out to the 4th hgw for taking place in February) I think I was also influenced by the scene right before Iskandar fights Saber (which I happened to be rewatching) because I hadn't noticed before how Waver stands next to him and just sort of...holds on to the mantle while he thinks about Iskandar's history and ideals. Prior to the scene on the bridge, it really felt like a point where Waver's attitude towards Iskandar is shown in it's final form, more or less, so I sort of wanted to place this fic directly before that scene and show Iskandar's feelings reaching that point, too.

Okay that's it! I had a lot of fun writing this year even if I didn't write a lot. My goal was just to create the things that I really wanted to see and I think I accomplished it, even if I still have things I'm working on that I haven't finished yet. If you read and enjoyed any of my fics this year, thank you!!!

#very sorry if this shows up in tags but hopefully the read more works #i'm only able to talk abt my thoughts on my favs in fanfic form and i was really happy to be able to do that w waver this year <3 #i don't know if i really made much progress with writing this year but i AM happy with what i created in the end #levblogging

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mprosperossprite · 3 years ago

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I just finished my first novel length fanfic!! How did that happen? I'm still a little bit in awe of myself and very very proud. I've been thinking about how I got to this point and I want to share what I learned while writing it, because writing can be a solitary, independent activity, but it doesn't have to be. So, in case this is useful to any other fic writers out there...

Three Things I Learned While Writing My First Novel Length Fanfic:

1. “Write for yourself” is bullshit advice in an ecosystem driven by sharing

I started writing my novel-length fic, Bring the World Back Into Tune, in November 2020. Four or five chapters into posting it, I almost abandoned the project all together. Why? Because I felt “nobody” was reading it. The Old Guard fandom is dominated by Joe/Nicky content. There are so many reasons to love Joe and Nicky and their relationship, but compared to my Joe/Nicky fic, Bring the World Back Into Tune (btwbit, hereafter) was getting a miniscule number of hits and comments and kudos. And I thought it was a better crafted story than anything else I’d shared at that point! I wanted to tell this story, but I also wanted to share this story, and those are related but distinct.

Fandom is an ecosystem built on sharing. These days, Archive of Our Own has given fandoms a safe place to host creations. Tumblr is a platform designed to promote engagement by sharing and re-sharing content. Discord is a platform designed for discussion. I am not a fandom old, so I can’t speak to this personally, but the folks who were creating and mailing physical zines? That was also an ecosystem of sharing, the internet has just expedites the time frame. Fandom is about sharing, not about creating.

I didn’t quit writing btwbit because there were people who told me they were enjoying reading it, because I had a handful of people who were commenting on each chapter. I realized that “write for yourself” was bullshit because I was already writing for an audience. Maybe it wasn’t the audience that I’d dreamed of, or as big an audience as I’d hoped, but I realized that internet fandom had given me an audience and so I started writing for them. Each chapter was a gift to the folks who were reading the story. Framing why I was working on this huge, sprawling fic in this way helped keep me motivated to finish it.

I also realized that audience and community are related. The more people I got to know by being present in fandom spaces -- in AO3 comments, in tumblr group chats, in discord servers -- the more people I got invested in the fic because they liked me, not necessarily the ship or the premise. Part of finding my audience ended up being building it, and that too contributed to my enjoyment of writing the story.

2. Beta readers are the best thing you can do for a fic

I think I may have said this in every single author’s note, but btwbit would be a very different and much worse fic if it weren’t for marbletopempire’s beta work.

I didn’t start out with a beta because I’ve a degree in English literature, damnnit, and I’ve got confidence in my ability to craft a story. I am also a damn good beta reader myself and I know that beta reading is a relationship built upon trust. When I started writing btwbit, there wasn’t anyone I trusted with it.

Marble became my beta because I began beta-ing for her. And I began betaing for marble because I was commenting on every chapter of her fic. I found her because I was engaging with the fandom. I was willing to let her into the writing process for btwbit because I had gotten to know her as a writer and a friend.

There were a couple of pivotal moments when marble gave me notes that came down to “would your characters really do that?” and every single time the answer was “no, they wouldn’t.” Sometimes this made the story longer. Sometimes this was a reminder that btwbit was not every Book of Nile story, it was my Book of Nile story, and, ultimately, a romance.

Also, find people to help you get the details right. Sometimes research is enough, but sometimes a conversation with a person who has experiences different than your own that might help you bring realism and nuance to your characters is transformative. @nevermindirah helped me out a couple of times and their insights helped shape and define a couple of pivotal moments of the fic (and I learned stuff that didn’t make it directly into the fic, too).

3. The hardest things to write are often the most rewarding

Mostly I’m talking about writing smut.

But, yeah, sometimes writing is hard, but with a community and audience by your side, it is very very worth it.

#writing #fanfiction #writing advice #fanfic #the old guard #the old guard fanfic #tog #tog fanfic #long fic #writing motivation #fandom friends #fandom community

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kckenobi · 3 years ago

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2021 fic review

tagged by @katierosefun @the-last-kenobi @adaliak and @stolen-pen-name23 <333

total number of completed works: 26 this year i think, between tumblr and ao3!! Not including the orchestra au, which i’ve yet to finish and start posting :)))

total word count: i wrote 165k words this year! And i did include the orchestra au in that one, bc its consumed so much of the time i’ve spent writing during the second half of 2021

looking back did you write more, less, or the expected amount of fic this year?: more, i think!! Because looking back this year has just been,,,so crazy? And i totally expected it to be crazy–i graduated college, moved, started my career, i’m applying to grad school, like i did not expect to have time to write as much as i did during 2020, which was primarily a year of quarantine and isolation lol. Last year my word count was 104k i think. So i definitely topped it!!

your own favorite story of this year?: it might be On Gravity and Broken Things, my stargazing fic, which i wrote for the Untold Zine so that was pretty cool. Also, maybe Reflections?

did you take any writing risks this year?: writing multichapter fics!! I’d never done it before Bloodlines, bc honestly I was afraid of the commitment lol and couldn’t justify it to myself. But this year, I finished Bloodlines, my fic where Dooku, Anakin, and Obi-Wan get stranded on Tatooine. And I also started a modern au where Anakin, Obi-Wan & company are professional musicians in an orchestra. And that fic is honestly like,,,so special to me. I know none of you have read it yet lol but it’s kept me company during what might be one of the loneliest times of my life (i’m good tho!! just being very independent lol) and that’s just,,,neat

do you have any fanfic goals for the new year?: start posting my next multichapter!! After i finish and edit, of course. But i also want to write wayyyyy more oneshots. I have this annoying mindset that everything i write has to be like, my magnum opus lol, and i think that held me back this year from doing work that wasn’t necessary “moving” so much as just plain fun.

most popular story of the year? Bloodlines, which is no surprise!

story most under-appreciated? hmm…probably The Thing About Falling, which is understandable lol. I know obitine isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, and also this one was high-key me projecting my relationship problems onto fictional characters lol, but it is quite special to me, and i was proud of it

most fun story to write?: probably What I Want lol, where Obi-Wan buttdials Cody when he’s sleep deprived.

most unintentionally telling story: yikes!! ummmm part of me wants to say the one i posted today bc i technically wrote it on new years eve…..that one was…something. But one that i posted in 2021, would probably be What Dreams May Come. I think i mentioned when i posted it that it was,,,basically something that happened to me in real life and i just needed to fic-ify it lol. Both of those are codywan, which is interesting…do i smell projection?

biggest disappointment: hmm i’m not sure if i have any? Except for maybe, idk–you know how as writers we all go through the whole “what if i’ve peaked what if i never write anything good again” nonsense? Yeah lol

biggest surprise: getting to write for 2 zines! (one won’t come out till later this year tho!) That’s just a really cool opportunity to collab with some awesome people.

my favorite part of fandom this year: just getting to strengthen these awesome friendships i have, and make some new ones too. Like its so awesome–how some of these people i’ve now known for almost 2 years, and like?? We genuinely care about and check in on each other the way i do with real-life friends. Which is just awesome, and i love you all dearly.

But also there’s some people here on tumblr who i haven’t even talked extensively with, but who have popped into my inbox to offer me support when needed and that’s just really special too. Like–i mentioned, this year was a lot!! It was dramatic for me!! And every time i’d even mention i was feeling less than stellar i’d have someone–or multiple someones–offering to listen or just giving a virtual hug. And i’m really grateful for that too :) i’ve been so, so fortunate in my dealings online, and i’m looking forward to another wonderful year w/ yall :’)))))

tagging some other lovely individuals, sorry if you’ve been tagged already! @pandora15 @giggles-and-freckles @tessiete @ewanmcgregorismyhomeboy12 @meantforinfinitesadness

#GUYS I LOVE YOU OKAY #tag game #fic related asks

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tenspontaneite · 4 years ago

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Pigment

Callum discovers the wonders of elven pigments.

(The first of two pieces written for @falling-for-you-a-rayllum-zine, which is now having leftover sales!) ('Future' chapter; takes place post-s3, naturally not canon to TTM. Oneshot. 4k. Ao3 link)

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The first time Callum was introduced to the concept of elvish pigment was, ostensibly, by Rayla’s skin. He’d noted the marks under her eyes in the same hurried, panicked glance that picked out the horns, the ears, the alarming points of the weapons in her hands…

He wondered about them, of course, but in the first frantic two weeks of their acquaintance, there really wasn’t a lot of time to ask about it. Not until the Storm Spire, when he sat mulling over the flight-runes on Ibis’ wings, and how they might have come to be there.

“…So, I’ve been wondering,” he said to Rayla, apropos of nothing, while she was tending to her equipment. She looked up as he began to speak, the armour momentarily forgotten. “Those…markings you have, the ones on your face—and the ones a lot of other elves seem to have—what are they?”

She blinked, and for a moment, her fingers rose to her face, as though only just remembering the marks were there. “They’re pigment?” She offered, squinting at him a little. “…Is that a trick question, or…?”

“No, really, I have no idea what they are.” He assured her. “I was never sure if they were tattoos, or…weird elf birthmarks, or something. But—pigment? Does that mean it’s like…ink? How do you get them on?” Tattoos, as he understood them, involved needles. He hoped elven pigment didn’t involve needles.

For a moment, Rayla stared at him, looking decidedly nonplussed. “You…paint them on?” She offered, still thrown. “With a brush? And then they stay there for a while. Half a year, maybe. Depends on how good your pigment is.”

“Huh.” Callum mused. For a moment, he was tempted to press further, to ask about the intricacies of various pigments and the application thereof…but he’d been asking for a reason, after all, and his attention remained there.

If they were painted on...then that boded well. That meant that it was something that he could do, if only for the presence of the pigment and a brush.

It wasn’t much later that, after a guilty rummage through Ibis’ things, Callum stood at the pinnacle of the Storm Spire and painted flight-runes onto his skin. That was his first true introduction to the pigments of elves. As an artist, he couldn’t help but marvel at it. The pigment was white, yet it entirely obscured the darker colour of his skin with only a single, easy stroke. Only one layer, and it was solidly opaque. It glowed a little—then settled utterly dry, clean, and steadfast upon his arms.

For a moment, he spared a thought to wish that his paints could be like that. He’d dabbled in every form of art medium he could get his hands on over the years, and he’d never worked with any pigment like this one. It would be gorgeous to paint with.

But then he was too distracted trying to fly to think about art any longer, and that was the last mind he paid to pigment for a while.

After the battle of the Storm Spire, he prevailed upon the use of a finer, neater brush, and filled in the edges of his flight-runes until the shape of each was perfect and immaculate. Ibis watched him with a critical eye, and nodded.

“The spell will come easier if the runes are tidy.” He said, approvingly. “You’ll need to re-apply the pigment every three months. Any longer than that and it will begin to fade—which isn’t so great an issue when the marks are merely aesthetic, but with runes…”

“I can see how you wouldn’t want these fading, no.” Callum said ruefully, and accepted the little bottle of white pigment with a murmur of gratitude. He tucked it into his things for the next time he and Rayla went travelling, and she smiled at him.

“Packing your pigment for the journey, Callum?” She remarked, a little teasing. “Think we’ll be gone that long, do you?”

He laughed, and shrugged, glancing down at one of his arms. “I guess it’s just in case, really. I shouldn’t need to touch them up again for months, but…you never know. Wouldn’t want to end up flightless for some reason.”

“I suppose you are a tad obsessed with flying, now.” She agreed, as if she wasn’t always finding excuses for him to sweep her up into the sky for another flight. She reached out, absentminded, and trailed a fingertip around the curve of one rune with the trace of a smile on her lips. “Still, if it came down to it, you could always borrow mine.”

He glanced up at her, startled. “Your pigment?” He checked, eyes settling on the marks beneath her eyes. “I didn’t know you had any with you.”

“I don’t. Need to pick some up from Ethari, when we visit.” She said, succinctly, and he supposed that was another reason for their stopping at Silvergrove on the way to Katolis. How long had it been, since she last refreshed her pigment? Did she need to do it again soon, or was she just planning for the future?

He stared at her for a moment, contemplating her, feeling his heart flutter with a familiar warmth. If her markings had faded at all since he met her, it wasn’t immediately obvious to him. They looked as clear and lovely as ever; a natural part of her face. It was strange to think of what she might look like without them.

Rayla eyed him, when he’d stared a little too long and smiled a little too softly, and huffed at him. Her cheeks pinked a little, the colour darkening her markings. “What are you looking at?” She muttered to him, a touch self-conscious. Rather than look away, he smiled at her all the wider, and captured the hand she had on his arm to plant a kiss on its fingers.

“You.” He said, very contentedly, and watched with pleasure as her face coloured and her fingers twitched beneath his touch.

“Dumb prince.” She sighed, a smile spreading unbidden and affectionate across her lips. It was beautiful, so of course he kissed that too. He felt the widening of that smile against his mouth, and lingered there for as long as she’d let him before she prodded him away to finish packing.

She gave his arms a strange look, though, when he next bared them. Appraising, almost, with a narrow-eyed sort of consideration. “…What?” He asked, when she’d been staring long enough to warrant the question.

“Your runes are…neat.” She said, tone as considering as her eyes. “Tidy.” She shook her head then. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised, with all the art you do. Of course you’d be good at painting skin-pigment.” He eyed her, because there was clearly more to this observation than just surprise that he’d managed some tidy brushwork, but all she said when he asked was “It’s nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

He didn’t believe her, obviously. Not with the way she kept shooting half-considering looks at him when she thought he wasn’t looking. But he didn’t press her, and she didn’t mention whatever was on her mind. In time, he forgot about it.

Until they were back in the Silvergrove.

Rayla asked Ethari, and within the minute he was pressing a small dark bottle and a fine brush into her hands. “I did wonder if you needed any.” He said, as she turned the glass over and the indigo liquid swirled around within. “It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”

“Yeah,” She agreed, pocketing the vial and the brush both. “It’ll start fading soon. So…thanks.”

He nodded at her, all warmth and familial affection. “Not a problem. Did you want me to help with that while you’re here?”

She hesitated, then, and for a moment…for a moment, her eyes slid to Callum, who’d been watching them idly over the top of his sketchbook. “…I’m good.” She settled on, eventually, and if there was anything particularly knowing about Ethari’s smile then, Callum didn’t notice it.

He kept drawing, content in that she was content, and happy to be in her home under happier circumstances than the first.

But then, later: “I wanted to ask you something.” Rayla said, abruptly, when it was just the two of them in what was ostensibly her childhood room. It had been adapted over the years for a growing teenager, but still maintained hints of the past lingering within its walls. He spotted a child’s doodle of a shadowpaw etched into the grain of the dresser, and suppressed a smile.

He turned to her, eyes crinkling a little at the thought of a tiny rambunctious Rayla who scrawled over the walls and furniture. “Yeah?” He responded, a little distracted, as he wondered if there were perhaps any baby or childhood portraits in residence somewhere. He should ask Ethari. If there were any to be found, surely he’d know.

That distraction fled the instant she spoke. “Will you paint my pigment for me?” She asked, directly, and his eyes shot to her at once. At his expression, she added, “You don’t have to. But it needs doing soon, or it’ll start fading faster.” She paused, looking a little more tentative as she said, “If you don’t want to, Ethari can—”

“No,” he blurted, clumsy, then scrambled to say “I mean, yes, I mean—I mean I’d like that. To help. To, er. Paint your pigment on.” He felt his face heat, in part from how he’d stumbled over the words, and in part because…well. He might not know a lot about elven pigment and elven markings, but he was fairly sure that they were…personal. That painting someone’s markings for them was personal.

His reply settled her, and she huffed, lips twitching with familiar fondness. “…Good.” She said, in the end, and surprised him by leaving the room without further word. He blinked after her, uncertain whether he was supposed to follow, but then she returned a bare few moments later with a towel and a wet cloth that she was already wiping her face with.

“Er,” he offered, perplexed, as she dried her face off and set the towel and cloth both down. He didn’t understand until she plucked the bottle of pigment from her dresser and pressed it into his fingers. “Now?” His voice was something of a squeak, and she rolled her eyes.

“When else?” She asked, procuring a brush and giving him that too. “We’re setting off tomorrow. Now’s best.” She paused. “…That okay?”

Her voice had gone tentative again, and his chin jerked up, fingers tightening around brush and bottle as if worried she’d take them away. “No, yeah, it’s okay,” he assured her, and then laughed, a little nervously. “I just…wasn’t expecting it.” He cleared his throat, and took a closer look at the brush. It was like the one he’d filled his own runes in with, fine and delicate and short enough that it didn’t seem liable to flick off in weird directions. “…So I just…paint this onto your face?” He asked, after a moment, feeling his cheeks heat for reasons he couldn’t quite put to words. It felt special, in a way that was hard to describe.

“That is how it works.” Rayla answered, dryly, and then tugged him by the rune-adorned arm until they were both sitting on the floor, towel and cloth at close remove. He supposed those were there in case of spillages, though considering how quickly elvish pigment took hold, he wasn’t sure how much good a towel would do. He wondered if there was some sort of solvent, magical or otherwise, that was up to the task of dissolving pigment like this.

“What happens if I make a mistake when I’m putting your pigment on?” He wondered aloud, only half directing it at her. “Do you just have to walk around with it on your face for months?”

She snorted, and shook her head. “Nah. There’s pigment-remover for that.”

A little tension eased from his shoulders. “Oh, good,” he sighed, relieved. “That’s much less pressure, then.”

She rolled her eyes again. “Just paint my face, Callum.”

He chuckled at her, a little nervously, and uncapped the bottle. The liquid inside was so much darker than the pigment he used, and bizarrely true in its colour. Usually, inks tended to look much darker than their actual colour when they were in the bottle. It was only when you painted them onto a page that you could see how light and bright they were. This, though…it was just solid, liquid indigo, as if someone had distilled the concept of the colour of Rayla’s markings and spilled it into a bottle. “This would be amazing to paint with.” He murmured, somewhat distractedly, watching the pigment shimmer in the low light.

Rayla didn’t answer that, which was unusual enough that his eyes darted to hers, and found her looking strangely thoughtful. She shook her head, though, as if to dispel some thought, and started giving the pigment bottle and the brush some very meaningful looks. He laughed, softly, and obeyed the unspoken command; he dipped the brush in, drained off the excess, and then lifted it. It was dyed the same solid, true indigo—a colour that he was about to put onto her skin.

It hit him then, or at least started to; he looked between the brush and her face and felt his breath catch at—at something. It felt a little like panic, a little like wonder, a little like the breathless infatuation she always managed to inspire in him. For a moment, he didn’t know what to do with it, and just…stared at her, heart beating wildly at—at the trust, and the honour, that he couldn’t help but feel she’d given him.

She was looking impatient by the time he finally moved, and likely would have spoken if not for how he shuffled closer, until their knees were touching. Her mouth closed, watching him, eyes settling on his own as he reached towards her. His fingers brushed the edge of her jaw, feather-light, as tentative as he always was when he remembered that someone as amazing as her had deigned to be with someone like him. His breath caught in his throat as he lifted his hand, thumb tracing tenderly along a cheek that warmed beneath his touch.

He cupped her face in his hand, then, unable to resist the impulse, and she leaned into it without even thinking. Her eyes fell half-lidded for a moment, the smallest smile twitching at the edges of her lips, and he wanted to kiss her. That wasn’t what he was supposed to be doing, but—but he wanted to, and she was smiling at him, and her eyes were soft and warm in the quiet and low light of the room—

So, he kissed her, and she huffed an amused breath against his lips, lifting a hand to trail affectionate fingers along the side of his neck. “This doesn’t feel like face-painting to me.” She murmured to him, fond and teasing at once, and he wouldn’t have been surprised for a moment if his heart stopped beating for the strength of how much he loved her. “Weren’t you supposed to be doing something?”

He laughed, a little breathless, and the warmth of it spilled between them. “Yeah.” He agreed, helplessly, drawing back with her fingers still warm on his neck and his hand still cupped to her cheek, and paused for a moment to treasure the sight of her looking at him like that. He couldn’t believe how lucky he was that she loved him. He didn’t think he’d ever believe it. “I’ll just…get on that.”

She withdrew her hand, and watched him. Waiting.

His fingers shifted on Rayla’s face, moving to press his thumb gently to the side of the marking under her left eye. Pulling at the skin, ever-so-slightly, to allow for painting it more evenly. Another urge struck him, but this time he suppressed it. He could kiss her cheek-markings later. For now, he was supposed to be painting them. And so…

With an almost reverent care, he lifted the tip of the brush to her face, hovering just above her skin with a heady mixture of breathless wonder and breathless trepidation. He exhaled, softly, and felt her eyes upon him. Watching, warm and fond and expectant.

Finally, with the utmost care, he touched the brush to her skin.

She flinched a little at the touch so close beneath her eye, but he’d expected that. He held the brush steady and traced a slow, perfect line down her cheek, along the edge of the extant marking, like a dark border to the fading colour. And it was fading; he could see that now. It wasn’t noticeable on its own, but with the contrast of the fresh pigment beside it, it was fully obvious that the old colour had begun waning.

With the brush to her skin, Callum’s hushed awe fell in step with the breadth of his skill and practice. He’d never put brush to someone else’s skin before, but that did nothing to diminish his skill. He knew brushwork, and he knew the delicacy needed for fine detail, and…and, in the end, this was easy. Just tracing around an existing marking, and filling it in. There could be nothing easier.

He drew the pigment across her skin in smooth, effortless lines. He traced the borders of her marking and then filled it in, up until when the brush began to run empty, and he had to go for the bottle again. The colour settled fast, immediate, and perfect upon her face, with that gorgeous fidelity he’d never seen in any other pigment or paint or ink in all his life. It was a pleasure to use it, and all the more that he was using it for this.

Callum fell half into an artist’s trance for the remaining minutes it took to finish. He filled the left marking in, stark and perfect, then shifted his fingers tenderly to her other cheek, and repeated the process. When he was done, there was nothing but perfect lines and perfect colour upon a face that he loved.

He smiled, small and satisfied, and set the brush aside. “Done.” He murmured, and leaned forward to press his forehead to hers, cradling her face in both hands. It felt strange, to risk touching her skin when he’d only just painted it. But that was the wonder of elvish pigment; it dried the moment it was applied, and permitted no possibility of smearing whatsoever. He stroked his thumbs beneath her eyes and felt more happy, more tender, more loving than he’d ever known. “Perfect.” He murmured, reverential, the words meant for more than the pigment.

Her eyes blinked across from his own, and he loved them. Loved her. She brought her arms up and drew him closer, one hand splayed on the back of his neck. “Maybe I’ll have you do me some new markings, someday.” She murmured to him, in the end, a small and secret smile at the edges of her lips. He stared at her, spellbound, for the three beats of his heart that lingered between her smile and her movement. She leaned in and closed the meagre distance between them, the kiss soft and sweet and all the more perfect for how dearly he adored her.

He imagined, for a second, drawing that ink-brush again along her skin. Imagined it between her fingers, along her arms, casting indigo whorls about her shoulders. He thought of new pigment, new markings, and the sheer delight of being the one who got to put them there. His heart fluttered. “I’d like that.” He said, against her lips, and she kissed him again.

“Good.” When she drew back, the markings were still stark and beautiful beneath her eyes, where he’d painted them. The sight of them left him a little breathless, even now, unable to shake the sense that he’d been afforded an enormous privilege, a gift of worth beyond measure.

Someday, he hoped, she’d afford him that gift again.

Callum saw the fruits of Rayla’s thoughtful consideration and furtive glances a while later, when July came around and he was startled from thinking about her birthday by the arrival of his own. She cornered him with palpable satisfaction, and gave him a parcel that she very clearly expected him to be delighted with.

She wasn’t wrong.

He unveiled an array of small bottles; thirty-six hues of true and perfect elvish pigment, distilled for the purpose of painting. He beheld them all with a nearly breathless joy, finding the little parcel of pigment-brushes, the bottle of solvent, the masking-fluid….

“You like it?” Rayla asked, with a broad and decidedly smug smile on her face. She clearly already knew the answer.

“I love it.” He pronounced, and set at once to trying them out.

The very first thing he painted was her. She watched him, and huffed as she saw the familiar lines of her own face taking form on the page, pleased and exasperated all at once. She never did seem to understand why he drew her so often, but that was okay. And, with these pigments…

The colours were spectacular, brighter and more intensely pigmented than anything he’d ever seen. He found himself utterly swept away in the delight of using them, and hours later, emerged from his artist’s trance to the completed work: Rayla in the early evening of the Silvergrove, her hair and eyes gleaming softly with the gentle illumination of the lights and moon-moths around her. It was one of the finest works he’d ever produced, and at the sight of it, he concluded the process of falling helplessly in love with Elvish pigment.

Rayla, for all her embarrassment at being painted, seemed to approve of it too. “You picked that up quickly.” She noted, handling the edges of the thick paper with the delicate care it deserved.

“These pigments are my new favourite thing.” He declared, arranging the bottles a little more tidily beside him. His eyes rested, a little consideringly, over another wide sheet of paper. He stared at it for a long while, growing quiet and solemn, and eventually reached out to take it.

He had his birthday traditions to observe, after all.

The second thing he painted with the elven pigments was his family portrait, atrophied and truncated by tragedy. There was no Sarai there, and hadn’t been for years. No Harrow, and that was a new pain. He felt the ghosts of their absence in the lines he didn’t draw, in the colours that never fell upon the page, in the voids of grief that they left in his life.

But there were new faces now, too.

With quiet, exquisite care, he drew himself. He drew Ezran, older now, wearing a mantle that had come for him too soon. He drew Bait in his brother’s arms. He drew Aunt Amaya. And, tenderly: he drew Azymondias and Rayla. The outlines took form, and as the hours passed, elvish pigment filled them in.

In the end, he had his family portrait again. Changed, and echoing with its empty spaces, but…

Quiet, from her place beside him, Rayla slipped her hand into his own.

“Come on,” She said, with the small but tender smile that he loved. “Zym has a present for you too. He’ll be disappointed if he can’t give it to you today.”

Callum exhaled, and let her fingers tighten around his, pulling him up to his feet beside her. His own smile slipped onto his lips. “Then we’d better go find him.” He said, casting a last glance at the portrait on the table. He didn’t resist it when she tugged on his fingers, pulling him away.

With a strange, quiet serenity, he followed her out into the light.

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end.

This is word-for-word what was published in the Rayllum zine 'Falling For You'; I have made no changes. It’s the shorter and less impressive of my two pieces, but I hope you liked it anyway.

I’ll potentially be making some minor edits to the second piece before posting, given I intend to continue it - in fact, I’ve already got like three extra chapters of it written, though small ones. I’m considerably more excited about that one, so stay tuned!

#rayllum #rayllumzine #tdp fic #tdp callum #tdp rayla #seriously though the soulmate au piece is good times #looking forward to everyone being able to read it #had to do word count negotiations to get a piece that long into the zine lol #the mods kindly granted me a couple extra ks #and then I decided to reduce my word limit for this first piece by 1k so I could shift that to the more exciting piece too #it deserved every word I could give it #this one is nice don't get me wrong #i'm just not made for short decisive pieces #and the soulmate AU's ending is VERY MUCH open-ended #and inviting follow-up #which I then wrote and shared with my closest cohorts #awaiting the day it could be published #looking forward to seeing the comments on my baby

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