#BUT absolutely you’re cool!!

[poisoned-pearls]

hey, ive seen some stuff from your high fantasy au and i just wanted to say its super cool!!! i hope this isn't weird of me but i edit and can also tween - i saw you posted art for your au and your art and art style is absolutely beautiful. if you ever wanted to colab, i could possibly make you a trailer or do something cool for you 🫶! you are free to ignore this but my ig is aquxticc, i have some edits posted if you are interested in seeing some stuff ive made. (i did use one of your drawings in my jamiazu edit, i hope you dont mind (you are credited ofc!!!!) but if you do mind, i can take it down!^_^) you are free to ignore this dw!

id totally be down! Unfortunately I don’t have too much art of my fantasy au- BUT I do have this!

Naga form Jamil!!

also I absolutely adore that edit- what-

[whoblewboobear]

Imagine being a sorcerery student showing up to class early for once and riiiiiight when you’re about to open the door you hear the weirdo barbarian teacher calling your teacher pet names Like 👀

Jace will be getting shit from his little chaos gremlins about it until the day they graduate 🫢

[mandalora]

Stolen from amidonexor, no one asked me either

[sunflowersolace]

the dungeon meshi english dub is good you guys just never got over the weird sub elitism thing weebs have

[whatsfourteenupto]

Okay okay okay this is 100% my fav episode of the season so far that was so much fun oh my god I’m bouncing off the walls rn what a BOP

[compacflt]

Would you ever consider writing about a different path Ice and Mav could take, one where they choose to leave the Navy and pursue a more open relationship and civilian life? Thinking it would be easier but maybe the sacrifice to their careers brings its own challenges?

(hi, jan 2024 me here, this was an ask that I answered when it was sent in in May 2023 & didn't post because I felt I actually answered it fictionally in the "icedad" one-shot the week after [and you can obviously see how these thoughts affected the writing of other pieces like "tremors & aftershocks"], but I still mostly agree with this take [though it's a little overgeneralizing] & I think it sums up a lot of my final "meta" modern-military-theory thoughts on ice & mav & their relationship, so im posting it now before I post the compacflt masterpoast)

see,… the thing is, i just… can’t see that happening!! i have no idea how to write that!!! Maybe i really do have a lack of imagination. But i can’t see that happening for a number of reasons. So short answer, no.

Long answer (and it’s long):

1. lame reason to start out, but it, uh, it’s canon that ice ends up at O-10 and mav ends up at O-6. not saying that im beholden to canon obviously (my mav ends up at O-7 and my ice ends up alive) but I do base my characterizations of them on the implications of the political struggles of both their careers so… taking away ice’s fourth star is basically starting from square one wrt my characterization of him. which is a lot of work. i could start from the beginning with a top gun 1986 ice who knows he’s gay—that would be a fun AU (i think other people than me have definitely done that better, though—I’m a one-trick pony). So if that’s what you mean then disregard the rest of this post. but if what you mean is a divergence from my existing work (i.e. homophobic/rank-climbing ice&mav) then… yeah, can’t see that happening, for further reasons below.

2. wrt my characterization of him: it’s based on a broad historical overview of armed service officers and the expectations of their careers. in my view, high-ranking officers aren’t after power—or maybe they started their careers wanting power, but somewhere down the line, it just becomes an expectation. if you do everything right and follow all the rules, you are expected by the institution to lead, whether you want to or not. That’s just the pipeline. at some point you start losing agency. which is what I mean when I keep saying ice doesn’t have a choice in advancing his career (besides the meta fact that this is fanfiction and canon demands that he have 4 stars lol)—high ranking military officers are continually and continually groomed for bigger and better positions; and the longer they spend in the military, the harder it is to leave that lifestyle for something else. And with ice’s canonical (and characteristically INTEGRAL, as I mentioned a week or so ago) refusal to rebel against the wishes of the navy as an institution, plus this historical expectation to lead placed upon the shoulders of excelling officers, I really do think ice is destined for four stars & nothing less, even if it gives him chronic depression. It’s his highest priority not because he wants it to be, but because…it just is. that’s how the institutionalized system of advancement in the military works. it just is. it has to be.

3. I mentioned in this post that I can’t ever see a foot in the door with them talking about their relationship unless maverick dies and is resurrected, and I feel the exact same way about them & their retirement plans. There’s a lot that ice and mav don’t talk about: the biggest one is obviously Goose’s death, the foundation of their relationship; but also their love for each other obv, what they did to rooster, AND their careers, which have to end at some point. Them talking about everything is totally inevitable, it was gonna have to happen eventually before they died, and I think one foot in the door MIGHT have been them eventually talking about retirement (someone sent in a prompt asking for this exactly & i am brainstorming it furiously) but before the Navy FORCES them to retire… i think they would studiously avoid talking about it. For a couple reasons: a) what does retiring with each other mean? living in the same house until they die together? hard to do if you’re just good friends. talking about retirement is tantamount to talking about Them. and b) what are they gonna do outside the navy? Ice has a lot of options, as I mentioned in the slider one-shot—general/flag officers are SUPER sought after in leadership/intelligentsia/management positions post service, so maybe if he were offered a crazy cool civilian position somewhere in San Diego in like the 2000s he would quit the navy for it… but what about maverick? I have no idea what a non-navy mav would do. Civilian airline pilot? Hoo boy. I think he’d hate that. I could maybe see emergency helicopter pilot, lol, or race car driver (i just watched days of thunder can you tell?) but none of the above offers the institutionalized honor the navy does (that, as a reminder, he *killed people* to obtain in the first place). I suggested his test piloting expertise would make him an attractive technical advising candidate to A&D companies like Boeing, LockMart, GD, etc. so that might be one option. But it might have been kind of a touchy subject for him before he racked up the expertise he’d need for those high-level civilian positions… the navy was kinda his only option. So they wouldn’t talk about it because it might hurt his feelings.

4. The biggest reason: again… open rebellion like rocking the boat by quitting the navy to be in an open long-term gay relationship, in upper mil brass ranks, and even retired upper mil brass ranks, just… isn’t done. And REALLY wasn’t done in the 2000s, when i think the scenario in this ask is positioned. And it’s not like “oh but whatever who cares about the navy, ice and mav are in love, they deserve to be happy no matter what, they should do what they want, fuck the navy…” no. Ice and Mav care about the navy. Clearly. Canonically. By necessity. The military requires cohesion and on some level repression of individuality & personal expression to FUNCTION, even when you’re retired. Yes, maverick certainly strains against that repression (which is why you Could spin top gun as an anti-military franchise if you were desperate enough), but he rebels through his ACTIONS (stupid plane maneuvers) not through his personal IDENTITY. his personal identity (headstrong overtly masculine white male pilot, whether gay or straight who cares) is NEVER challenged throughout the franchise (i.e. no one really challenges his masculinity specifically) & his personal identity does not POSE a challenge to the navy. Both he and ice in their outward-facing personal identities really fit in quite neatly to the navy’s overarching identity & contribute to the navy’s cohesion in a way that is favorable to both their careers and the establishment. Lack of imagination or not… i can’t see a universe in which Ice and mav would actively WANT to rock the boat and wreck the navy’s cohesion and their reputations for an open relationship and definitively rebellious personal identities, with the obvious caveat being Maverick’s death recontextualizing both their priorities (yes we’re in love AND we’ve finally proven ourselves to be ultra-capable officers regardless of our sexuality so no one has a license to judge us anymore etc.).

And also, they’re not enlisted seamen. Nor are they mediocre officers who have the luxury of fading into obscurity. Things are different when you’re that high in the ranks, and when your job publicly matters more. sorry, but even post DADT (probably until about biden’s election), an open relationship would end their careers. They might not be fired, but they’d never be promoted again. Too much of a liability getting subordinates to still respect them, from the higher-ups’ perspective, especially if there are other qualified candidates who fit the navy’s core identity better. Like—sorry. This is such a jaded oversimplification. But if you rock the boat like that (i.e. break the service’s united front to be individualistic in a way that does not match the service’s overarching identity), from the perspective of your officer peers, you simply are a bad officer. Being an open individual in a job where you are required to fit in and represent your service is not your job. You are not doing your job well. Straight-up. Even if you’re retired. I met US Army 4-star gen. David Petraeus (retired obv) in February—he led the successful-ish surge in iraq and Afghanistan in the mid-2000s—and he’s STILL a laughingstock for his disastrous affair with his biographer a decade ago, even after he retired from AD service. That’s what people remember him for, not the fact that he was one of our only successful commanders in any of our Middle East campaigns.

Something like that might be one of ice and mav’s worst fears—being known for their affair/scandal instead of the institutionalized honor they’ve fought and killed for. That kind of thing just Isn’t Done. It's bad taste. You have to keep it quiet. If you’re an officer representing the service, you have to represent it well & according to the service’s preconceived identity, even in retirement. (see, for another shitty example of "not fitting in" even in retirement, Lt. gen. Mike Flynn [his whole scandal is actually kinda geopolitically relevant to my fic if you squint lol] whom everyone fucking hates)

To summarize: i hope I’m not mischaracterizing your ask when i reframe it like this—would you ever write ice and mav without the institutionalized pressure to advance in rank and conform to institutional norms?

and yes, I would (and will if you ask—it looks like this: ice & mav meet & fall in love & it’s boring and fine. end of story), but I guarantee you someone else already has. I’m all about interrogation of institutional norms here. And i think until maverick dies & comes back from the dead, there is absolutely no *REALISTIC* incentive for ice & mav to leave the navy and/or have an open relationship. Like it’s just not possible. Idk how else to say it.

[wormlette]

hey op. thanks for being an inspo for the chilaios nation im writing a post canon oneshot where they invent dungeons and dragons. i loved him to the point of invention and also picking up a new hobby exclusively so i could carve small figurines of monsters to make him happy or however it goes

Wait holy fuck hold on a second when I first read this I thought you were saying you were writing an AU where they’re playing dungeons and dragons and I was already pogged up about it but WAIT A MINUTE. IN UNIVERSE. DUNGEON MESHI. POST CANON. THE GANG INVENTS DND. Holy shit please post that when you’re done I really want to read it. Happy to inform you you’re also doing inspiring work as a member of

ARE YOU MAKING FIGS TOO? Holy shit you loved him to the point of invention… Dungeon Meshi literally is out here healing us all and our relationships with desire and living fulfilling lives. We do it for him (depressed dad and his dog boy) 😌💞

[fucknugg3t]

very calm about people being nice to me

holyfuck

[platypusisnotonfire]

Someday I want to be the Travis Willingham to someone’s Laura Bailey.

[goldensunset]

there are games that i enjoy playing more and there are games i enjoy thinking about more. sometimes the overall story and themes and blorbos are delightful but actually playing it is a little annoying so i just rotate it in my mind instead. sometimes i get absolutely sucked into the gameplay and the world and the experience for dozens or hundreds of hours and i enjoy listening to the soundtrack but it has little to no lasting impact on me as a person bc something in the story just failed to hit and that’s ok. both are good both are beloved. obviously the ideal piece of media is one i both enjoy actively consuming and thinking about but my mindset is that if a piece of media has any single good thing in it it’s a good piece of media. give me literally anything to work with and i’ll extract joy out of it. i’ve literally never played a game i didn’t like btw

[cuteniaarts]

Small drawing collection of my latest creation Emran as a teenager/freshly minted Air Acolyte, for my dear partner in unhinged OC shenanigans @katkastrofa, as promised <3

[colonoscopys]

also absolutely obsessed with chimney meeting maddie in the dream world and saying “she’s kinda awesome”. he heard buck say they’re married in real life and talked to her ONCE and was like yeah that sums up let’s do what we gotta do

[flowercrowngods]

i had to do the dishes tonight and as i was doing i was thinking “this is self care” and then i didn’t feel dead inside anymore :D

truly a great tip 🥰

this makes me so happy like you have no idea 🥹 i’m also very proud of you omg look at you gooo!!!

i’m really glad and happy that these ramblings helped you, though, i felt like i got lost in there for a little bit 😂🥰🤍 i believe in you so so much, and you deserve to rest now 🫶

[largemandrill]

Giving my tarnished a cape just because I think he should be allowed to have it 👍

[crossbackpoke-check]

You have excellent tag thoughts, especially about Key & Laf!!!!

thank you!!!! i wish i had a better description than just 🥹🦋😭💕🥰 to explain my reaction to you saying nice things about my tags but please trust that this ask just made my day!!!

[therealslimscreamer]

What is the relationship between Briar (Broken vessel I think) and Tiso?

yeah, briar is my name for broken vessel! (but if you just ask about broken vessel/lost kin i’ll know who it is, haha). as for their relationship- tiso sees briar as like, a little brother or a little cousin that he would die for while briar is like “this is my cool sibling :] he’s sick all the time but he’s still cool :] isn’t that neat :]” while if you ask tiso the same question he’d be like “i’d do anything for them. i’d die for them. does that answer your question.”