#Honestly I didn't expect to be writing pieces in all three major universes I have lol

[pinescrow]

Day three of #30dhs: 833/100

You wouldn't think my first three image post would have been such a struggle but it took me ages to get this idea anywhere near decent… and by then apparently I found I had a lot more to say lol.

Interested in doing the challenge with me? Check out this post here!

[local-lamppost]

Act 3 Thoughts

Watched Wicked, came home, waited 20 minutes, binged Act 3. I do not recommend this lifestyle. Anyway...

I was so satisfied with where we ended up, but I would have also appreciated about 20 minutes to an hour more. It felt like some beats were skipped over, they wanted to get to specific endings and didn't have the time to wrap them up as neatly as I would've liked.

Maddie is a good example. She's a plant for Ambessa, okay but when and why did she become one? She couldn't have been one before Cait being named commander and when we next see her she's pushing for Cait to take power back from Ambessa. Did Ambessa just message her right after Cait and Vi started working together again as like a "the woman you love's actual love is back in the picture, you can either wallow or get revenge with me", but also made a smarmy remark about Cait 'at least being warm' or something. We didn't need to absolve Cait or villainize Maddie for their 'relationship' because they didn't even have a relationship-just a coping mechanism for Cait, similar to Vi's drinking. At best it was all unnecessary and at worst a waste of time.

Away from that, I want to focus on some good.

I am officially a JayVik shipper now. Them disappearing into a void together, encircled with each other, after Viktor spend however long within timelines/multiverses in hopes of finding a Jayce able to bring him back to his humanity? Come on, they needed to kiss. Especially after Jayce and Mel's low key break up. Honestly we were denied the three of them working together, because they would have been unstoppable.

Speaking of Mel, I love her. I love her design, her powers, her matricide, her taking command of Ambessa's armies, etc. I wish we could have seen more of her adapting to her new powers, finding peace with what she now is. There could have been a cool interaction with Viktor over how Arcane power has changed them both for better and worse.

I don't think Mel's story is done. With other characters, I can see them coming in for future story arcs as like, cameos or background details, but if the next LoL story is in Noxus I fully expect Mel to be a major player again.

Back to Jayce. I like Jayce, that could be my Arcane hot take, and I definitely want to write something more in depth on him. On all the characters really. For now, I'll just say that his determination to destroy everything he has built, because the only creation worth saving is his relationship with Viktor is just... glorious.

Viktor was amazing. I love Viktor in the lore, and they took his traits from the lore and amped them up to eleven. His body being destroyed and rebuilt, the process of which has chipped away his humanity and mutilated his dreams. He lives up to his own quote: "In the pursuit of great, we failed to do good. We have to make it right."

Ekko is a character I never realize I miss. That sounds mean, it probably is, but I am never the less so happy to see him every time. It's like finding the missing piece you didn't even know was lost: that is Ekko to me. His mini adventure in the parallel universe was adorable. Us getting to see what could've been alongside learning what matters most to Ekko, him getting a taste of a near perfect life and still choosing to return to his own time. That's why Ekko is the true hero of this story.

In terms of Jinx, I'll just say I'm not a hundred percent sure she's dead. The airship leaving at the end followed by her scribbled sign off, plus not getting a dead body shot. It was definitely left open ended. Her looking to do something good, to not mess up, alongside her fear of not wanting to try again because she is just tired of failure, of being a Jinx, was too real in many ways. I will go in depth on her at a later date.

Caitlyn's arc is going to be argued about, no question. It needed more time (see the start of this long post) to make her point of her anger burning away, of it not being sustainable, hit harder. I would have made her realize what her anger was doing to Vi, have Jinx point out that they really are acting the same in their treatment of Vi, and use the whole Ambessa was literally stoking the fires of her hatred to help fit what time they had left. Honestly just have Cait learn Ambessa was the one behind the memorial attack, that would be a much better way to explain her anger diminishing enough to look beyond her own hurt to realize and take account of her mistakes.

Vi, as usual, needed more screen time. Not necessarily because her story would've been helped by it like in act two, but just because I wanted her to have more time to enjoy her life. I went into act three with the sole hope that Vi would have a nice day, only for her to loose everything again. The only people she has left are Cait and Ekko, and god help anyone who tries something against those too now. Her ending being the chance to finally rest, to lean on someone else, was beautiful. She is my favorite character and please let her have only good things in the future, she was traumatized in almost every scene this season please-

Nobody tell Vi that in a universe where she died young everyone else ended up living. It would destroy her.

Vi and Cait relationship was great. I wouldn't say it was rushed in act three, because it felt like it was where it should be for a final batch of episodes, if that makes sense. It felt like the set up was Cait being genuinely remorseful and Vi just wanting someone in her life who wanted her in return. It helps that they have great chemistry and that when given the chance they fit so neatly together. I think Jinx encouraging Vi to be with Cait is what sold it to me. Jinx realizing how much Vi has given/sacrificed and giving her blessing for her sister to be happy with someone she disapproves of; not to mention Cait pulling the guards from their posts to give Vi the chance to actually meet Jinx in order to have that conversation. All in all, it comes down to Vi's "I don't care" because that's really all there is too it for them. Vi is done being miserable and Cait makes her happy, vice versa. Cait is someone Vi can rely on, Vi is someone Cait can find strength in.

Spitfire round:

Sevika being made a councilor

Every single one of Mel, Cait, and Jayce's designs were 10/10s

Vi not being given an actual uniform, just armor and the gloves

Jinx cutting her hair further to match Vi

Ekko getting his crystal sword/bats

Heimerdinger dying after living a life where he could make his city something to be proud of

I was fully expecting Vander and Silco to kiss in that one shot

Everything with Benzo

Loris' name being said

Vi humming the song and the song being their mother's lullaby

Viktor being held within the Herald

Sky leaving so Viktor was free to bring Jayce to his space mind palace

Caitlyn's rifle never surviving

Fishman McBlue being the only one of Cait's soldiers to stick to his guns and stay loyal

Sevika and Shoola side eyeing each other

Vander and little Vi and Powder with the bunny

The bunny being a passenger on Jinx's balloon

Singed's messed up family getting a happy ending

[ziskandra]

2024: Fic in Review

The lovely @hazelestelle tagged me in this fic in review meme, and even though I didn't write much last year and am slightly late, I thought it might be nice to reflect nonetheless!

Total Number of Fics: 6

Total Wordcount: 7,260 🙈 my quietest year since 2019!

Fandoms: 3 (Ace Attorney, Baldur's Gate 3 and Dragon Age)

Smut scenes: 0, in a surprisingly sedate year for me. If my Meresino fic Hand in Glove had gone on for much longer, it probably would have gotten there, though!

Most Popular Fic (by bookmarks): Brilliant Things, my Johanna Hezenkoss-POV Emmrook fic that I posted all of three days ago.

Most Popular Fic (by kudos): Also Brilliant Things

New things I tried: Writing something that wasn't for a fandom event or exchange for the first time in seven years and actually working on it over multiple days despite it being a one-shot and not giving up, haha.

Fic I spent the most time on: Brilliant Things, again, because it was by far the longest and the one I was most nervous about getting right.

Fic I spent the least time on: Proof, a Franmiles ficlet I wrote for the Battleship exchange which basically flowed out of my fingers with limited input from my actual brain. They're one of those pairings I have spent so many years thinking about (a decade? plus?) that I could probably write about them in my sleep.

Favourite thing I wrote: Definite toss-up between Brilliant Things and Proof, although I feel like Brilliant Things might be affected by recency bias.

Looking Back, Did You Write More Fic Than You Thought You Would This Year, Less, Or About What You’d Expected? More, honestly! I actively planned to severely reduce my fandom participation at the start of 2024 on account of returning to uni, and I only started writing again when life blew up in my face last June.

Story Of Mine Most Under-Appreciated By The Universe, In My Opinion: tbh, I think my fics more or less got the appreciation they deserved, but if I must answer, I think it would've been neat if more people had read Ordinary Days in Baldur's Gate, even if it is a very short piece of Half-Orc Tav/Lae'zel fluff. It's probably the only BG3 fic I'll write because apparently I cannot spend hundreds of hours in a game AND also be fannish about it, I must choose or the other. lol

Most Unintentionally Telling Story: Not to like, psychoanalyse myself through fiction, but part of why I was struggling to write despite having so much free time in the latter half of last year was because I'd grown out of the themes that used to permeate my works when I was younger (there was a LOT of exploration of generational trauma going on, even before I knew the words to describe it). But the process of writing Brilliant Things made me realise what story beats and themes I'm interested in exploring going ahead, and my return to academia has empowered me in feeling like I might actually be doing it on purpose this time.

Biggest Disappointment: I don't think there were really any major ones. I was a bit disappointed I couldn't write more when I was unemployed, but in hindsight I think I was fully unprepared for how much brainspace job hunting takes up, even when one is actively taking a break from it.

Biggest Surprise: Dragon Age: The Veilguard not only existing, but coming out AND restoring my writing drive. Honestly, it's only in the past couple of weeks that I've been seized by this surge of energy (unsurprisingly co-inciding with my return to the workforce).

My Favourite Part Of Fandom This Year: A few things! Firstly, bonding with fellow Emmrich-mancers. I am just starting to be more active in DA fandom again, and given my previous experiences in wider Bioware fandom I am always a bit wary but Emmrich-spaces are overwhelmingly positive compared to the community at large because everyone is focused on the shared goal of sexualising that old man, and I just think that's neat-- But also, talking to and befriending @freddy-eynsford-hills-cuck-chair who has also helped me returned to the world of reading fanfic with unbridled enthusiasm of My Fair Lady and Henry/Eliza AND having written so many amazing fanfics for me to catch up on. I am still working my way through them. How do they do it? I honestly do not know <3 Also, shout out to my buddies in (what is nominally) the Meresino server; it may be small but we just celebrated our two-year anniversary and our conversations continue to sustain me 💖 There's definitely a common theme running here, and I dare say it is ENTHUSIASM!! 🗣️

Writing goals for next year: I would like to finish at least two of the one-shots I have outlined that take place in the same continuity as Brilliant Things. As a stretch goal, I'm even considering working on a chaptered long fic again for the first time in YEARS. We'll see how I go.

Did you meet last years goal?: Given it was roughly "write less" and I wrote like, 40k more words in 2023, I GUESS Not tagging anyone because I think most people have already done various 2024 fic reflections, but if you would like to do this one, please go ahead and tag me because I'd love to read it!!