#I did in fact answer your questions

[marykedoesart]

How were you introduced to Danmei? Do you have any current favorites?

Hello! Sorry I didn’t see this for a bit, still getting used to tumblr again 😬

I was first introduced to danmei after the first season of MDZS’s donghua came out and I watched it, probably 2019! It was mentioned in passing to be a BL and I was like 🤨 that cover and title doesn’t sound like it… but the animation, sound design, and story were incredible and I soon read the fan translation of the book and was totally hooked. Afterwards I read SVSSS, and then a bunch others I found on Novel Updates. The TGCF translation wasn’t finished yet so I stayed in it for a while, but eventually I went back more to anime until just a few months ago when I remembered I never watched the last season of the MDZS donghua! 100x replays of wangxian later- I’m so back and reading new and old stories I loved.

Currently I’m in the middle of rereading TGCF and I’m also almost finished reading Golden Terrace (or Stage) for the first time! I love Golden Terrace so much, although the politics slow me down a bit, the main couple is so (literally and figuratively) married ahhh. After I finish it I’ll read Guardian and the second volume of QJJ! There are a lot of popular series I haven’t read yet like 2ha, yuwu, sha po lang, and Thousand Autumns, but I’m absolutely loving I have so many things to read right now!

Tbh I *had* been making sure to buy the special editions of books as they came out, and a rl friend(CDartistic) getting into danmei helped a lot, including reminding me of the MDZS donghua… so I wasn’t totally out of the loop. I even finished reading Little Mushroom during that period after it was published in English, and watched the TGCF donghua as it aired. I’m just more focused on it now you know? Sorry Yugioh GX my love, don’t worry I’ll return to you again.

Ffffff- I got sidetracked uhhhhh for my current favorites I gotta say TGCF for sure, although you’ll see me doing more with SVSSS tbh. Hualian invented love, what can I say? (also I’m in the middle of rereading and just finished the Blackwater arc so I am IN IT) But SVSSS has so many things to work with from a fan perspective tbh, like the parody of tropes invites so many fun things to do you know?

Thank you for the questions!! Sorry I rambled 🤡

[fantastic-nonsense]

I love your thoughtful SoC meta! I would love to know your thoughts on Kaz and Jesper’s relationship. Specifically, I adore Kaz but one thing in particular that always seemed so dark to me was that he enabled Jesper’s gambling addiction even though he obviously does care about him. Kaz is obviously willing to do a lot of fucked up things in service of his goals, but this one in particular, toward his own brother figure, I find sad. It’s kind of addressed during their fight at the end of CK but still feels a little unfinished.

I love Kaz and Jesper's relationship. There's sooooo much to dig into there (way too much for a single meta); it's super juicy and complicated, and one of the best complexities of it is that they often enable and feed off of each other's trauma. The pre-canon status quo is a situation where Kaz and Jesper are, in many ways, using and abusing each other as a way of avoiding dealing with their own trauma. It's a fascinating push-and-pull dynamic because neither of them are pushovers and yet neither one is particularly interested in facing their Issues™ head-on, and they both seemingly recognize that in each other and give each other an uncharacteristic amount of grace in helping the other avoid dealing with it.

In Kaz's case, that most often looks like enabling Jesper's gambling addiction and then repeatedly bailing him out of trouble under the justification of "he's loyal and competent, it would be wasteful to let the other gangs kill him." In Jesper's case, this looks like ignoring Kaz's countless and extremely obvious issues in favor of playing the loyal second. Basically, it's not just Kaz enabling Jesper's gambling addiction; it's also Jesper enabling Kaz's unhinged ruthlessness with little pushback other than a few snarky comments.

They also project a lot of their own issues onto each other! Kaz pushes Jesper away in part because he's projecting the grief and blame he feels over Jordie's death onto Jesper, but Jesper is using Kaz's ruthless pragmatism to escape the crippling disappointment of returning home to face his father's judgement for being a college drop-out, gambling addict, and gang member. And Kaz withholds praise and verbal declarations of trust from Jesper because he hates acknowledging that he cares about people, but Jesper uses Kaz's emotional detachment as a crutch to avoid dealing with his own commitment issues by pining after a boy he knows will never reciprocate his advances. This status quo is, of course, insanely unhealthy for both boys long-term, but where would we be if any of the Crows actually dealt with their issues in a healthy way?

That dynamic, imo, is also only possible because Kaz and Jesper have known each other for longer than anyone else in the main crew; Kaz may have let Inej in further, but he let Jesper in first. As far as we know, Jesper is the first person Kaz genuinely lets past his mile-high walls since Jordie died...but he very deliberately holds him at arms' length in a way that he does not with Inej (something that Jesper notices and is jealous about!). Being "the first" in this case unfortunately comes with a lot of baggage, and Kaz and Jesper would both lowkey rather die than talk about how much they care what the other thinks of them.

Kaz clearly didn't recruit Jesper looking for a friend or someone who reminded him of his dead older brother; he recruited him because he saw someone with a useful skillset who he preferred to be at his side rather than in a rival gang or dead in the canals. It's to Jesper's credit that he managed to break through those walls anyway, but there's only so much he can do in the face of Kaz's armor. And like Inej, Kaz's closed-off personality and actions hurt Jesper repeatedly. But he stays anyway, because he (like Inej) sees the boy underneath the mask that Kaz wears and cares a little too much to let him go:

“He wouldn’t—” Jesper stopped short, and then he laughed. “Of course he would.” Jesper flexed his knuckles, concentrated on the lines of his palms. “Kaz is…I don’t know, he’s like nobody else I’ve ever known. He surprises me.” “Yes. Like a hive of bees in your dresser drawer.” Jesper barked a laugh. “Just like that.” “So what are we doing here?” Jesper turned back to the sea, feeling his cheeks heat. “Hoping for honey, I guess. And praying not to get stung.” Inej bumped her shoulder against his. “Then at least we’re both the same kind of stupid.” “I don’t know what your excuse is, Wraith. I’m the one who can never walk away from a bad hand.” She looped her arm in his. “That makes you a rotten gambler, Jesper. But an excellent friend.” “You’re too good for him, you know.” “I know. So are you." -Ch. 17, Six of Crows

Kaz is unused to verbalizing the trust he places in others and actively in denial about how much he cares about them until Crooked Kingdom; he spends his time deliberately being cruel and pushing people away even as he proves over and over again that he doesn't actually want them to leave him. This casual assholery hits those closest to him (Inej and Jesper) the hardest because they are clearly trusted with his life but not with his heart, and that hurts them both.

For Inej, resolving that behavior looks like giving him an ultimatum ("I will have you without armor or I will not have you at all") and telling herself to walk away unless he meets her challenge. For Jesper? That looks like duking it out on top of the Geldrenner when they're both at rock bottom, because of course that's the only way either one of those boys is ever going to verbalize the tension that underlies their relationship. There's just a lot of baggage and mutual toxicity and unsaid words that neither of them are very interested in dealing with until everything comes to a head during the Clocktower fight.

I think we also forget that the Kaz-Jesper dynamic we see in the majority of the duology is not their normal dynamic: it's how they interact when Kaz is mad at Jesper. And a mad Kaz is, within the scope of canon, a pretty cruel Kaz, which is something that I think a good portion of the fandom likes to handwave away in favor of pointing towards Kaz's active attempts to be better in the back half of the duology.

Ultimately we only see the "normal" Kaz-Jesper dynamic for the first 12 or so chapters of Six of Crows (when the Dock Fight/Eyeball Incident happens) and the last few chapters of Crooked Kingdom. Those chapters are a really interesting look into what that relationship looks like when they're on good terms. It's clear that they're good friends, trust each other a hell of a lot, and joke around with each other quite a bit (the "saves ammo" joke in the parley chapter, their interactions during the Hellgate breakout, the "man with a knife!" "man with a gun!" exchange immediately after Kaz throws Oomen overboard, etc), but we also see the stress points: Jesper getting mad at Kaz for not telling him about Big Bolliger's betrayal, Kaz sending Wylan with Jesper during the prep chapters to keep an eye on him, and Jesper's bee and honey conversation with Inej on the Ferolind, for example.

These stress points are what fracture and crack in the aftermath of Jesper accidentally alerting the other gangs that they were headed out on the Ice Court Job and nearly causing Inej's death, and further buckle under the stress and pressure that Kaz and Jesper deal with during the following month and a half: the Ice Court job, Van Eck kidnapping Inej on Vellgeluk, Colm showing up in Ketterdam, and the Sugar Silo/Auction scheme.

In this way, I think Kaz enabling Jesper's gambling addiction is less about Kaz being actively cruel towards someone he sees the ghost of his brother in and punishing Jesper for the sins he percieves Jordie to have made (which is also true, and a meta for a different time!) and more about the weird balance of toxic mutual leniency Kaz and Jesper have allowed the other to provide for them for over two years...and how that leniency breaks down once it's not just Kaz's life or time on the line when Jesper fucks up.

Put more succinctly: for a long time, Kaz and Jesper existed in a toxic balance of enabling each others' worst impulses and behaviors, which was only able to be verbally addressed when they were both at rock bottom, desperate, and seemingly had very little left to lose. This conflict is somewhat addressed and resolved in the conversation where Kaz refuses to give Jesper the last of the parem and offers up a tiny bit of information about Jordie—showcasing his own growth and how he's finally trying to break the cycle by refusing to enable Jesper's self-destructive tendencies—but that level of tension is unable to be properly resolved in one single blowout argument. And I think it's deliberately left a bit unfinished because neither of them are really in a place where they're ready to address everything they've left unsaid for so long, even in the epilogue chapters.

However, we do see the beginnings of that reconcilitaion (Kaz asking Inej to tell Jesper that he's "missed around the Slat") and the story ends on a hopeful note regarding Kaz's commitment to removing his armor, which implies a lot about the resolution of that dangling thread. And of course, we know that by Rule of Wolves they're back to being thick as thieves and fucking around as usual, so clearly they hashed it out at some point in the in-between (and personally? I don't think it took either of them very long after the CK epilogue chapters to do that hashing out).

tl;dr: I love it when two traumatized and emotionally constipated teenage boys use each other to avoid facing their own personal problems and then get into a fistfight to avoid talking about how much they care about each other. Top-tier dynamic. Chef's kiss. I could talk about them for hours.

[ratwithhands]

I'm curious. I've seen your art and something that's come to my mind is what actually got you attached with the Subway brothers. Your narrative on their different AU forms is so unique which is what brought me to that question

Alright, rat history time.

So basically back in 2021-2022, I was working on an old OC storyline (about 3 years old by then) and I was in grade 9 so I was like “A new Pokémon game? Pfft, like I care” and just didn’t watch any of the stuff related to PLA when it dropped. I still got recommended Twitter posts about it on Instagram and I ended up seeing this one.

I tried looking up Ingo cause I was like "oh, funky design, looks like a captain or something" but I didn't end up finding anything so I didn't press further. Anyways in March break of 2022, I got bored and decided to put some game streams on in the background while I drew. I saw Alpharad's PLA video and decided to watch it for a bit when I saw Ingo.

I was like "Hey you're the guy from Twitter!" and since I knew his name now, I looked him up and found his Bulbapedia article. I found him much more interesting than the rest of the PLA cast since he had history outside PLA, and I ended up reading up whatever I could find on him. I also by extension discovered Emmet this way, which only served to suck me deeper down the rabbit hole. By the end of March break I had a fan OC and 2 AUs made with more on the way, as well as a YouTube recommended page with nothing but theory videos on Ingo and decade old Submas content.

Around May I decided to decommission my OC storyline for personal reasons, and by this point Submas was starting to occupy more of my creative work anyways. Since I didn't have my storyline to put my energy into, I started funnelling literally any story ideas into Submas. This led to nonstop content for a shockingly long time, and ofc I'm still coming up with stuff now.

Long story short, I got attached to them by accident! It was a "right place, right time" sort of thing since they came in as I was starting to get sluggish with my original content and I ended up being more interested in writing for them.

As for narratives, I am effectively playing dolls with these guys. Usually the kind of stuff that I write for them is meant for OCs, but I dumped the 60+ person cast so I put that energy into them instead.

Most AUs will either have a core theme, an out of pocket idea, or both to make things interesting. Usually I just come up with a dumbass idea like "what if we brought ReBURST back for a rerun" or "what if Emmet signed a contract with an eldritch space spider" or "what if Submas could see into the future" and stuff like that, then it picks up themes as I keep writing. For some silly examples:

Burst is based on Pokémon ReBURST and the idea of human-Pokémon fusion, but there's focus on skill, how characters misperceive it, and resentment as a result. There's also a spotlight on inferiority complexes, bottled up guilt, and blind confidence depending on which main character you look at

Journal is about a diary that helps Ingo to regain his memories, and it focuses on remembrance and regret as a result of him reading it. Spotlight on lacking awareness vs hyper awareness and the monotony of living as people around you leave

Oracle is exactly what it sounds like, with the twins being able to see into the future. It focuses on cooperation and the importance of working together, but also learning how to work alone. The spotlight's on jealousy and gratitude for this one, though the latter greatly outweighs the former in this case

I also just have AUs I made to try deranged shit for funsies, like Sapioflora, Cybernetic/Z-Λ, Team Supernova, and Idol. Those are mostly for exploring goofy ideas that may or may not go anywhere.

Right anyways basically I just saw Submas after watching PLA gameplay and found the twins more interesting to write about than the project I'd exhausted by then. The narratives are like that because the AU ideas I make are actually OC concepts that I modify to fit Pokémon specifically for these two or ideas about the two that I'd like to explore. Hope that answers the question ^^*

[aeolianblues]

it is literally not about legality, if you’re in your late 30s literally what are you hitting up 21 y/os for. Don’t you have investments to make.

[mad-hunts]

roleplay idea: barton's trying to say this BS that he's 'good at processing grief' when your muse was a witness to the absolute rage-filled and deranged rampage that barton went on after julien was killed by the joker in which he brutally hurt all but one of his henchmen (he killed the last one because he told him he was 'crazy' and that he 'better kill him, or he was going to tell his boss that barton had been there' and he literally just snapped, went 'you know what, i think i will kill you AND also let the joker know i killed you so he knows to never come near my family again' then killed him. like HUHHH?) at the time with your muse being like this

[roobylavender]

im really sorry if this question ends up being repetitive: but, if not for bruce’s over reliance on dick to regulate his thoughts and emotions, why would dick grow up into feeling like he needs to repress his emotions so much and his eagerness to act as people’s support? i know youve spoken about wolfman and his altering of their relationship but if ntt is generally an accurate portrayal of an adult dick, to me this nevertheless sounds like the consequences a parent-child relationship where the responsibilities are titled too much towards the child

i suppose this could also segue into asking for recs that would help me better understand your interpretation of their relationship 👀

not repetitive at all! to me the irony of wolfman's depiction of dick lies in that it is simultaneously something you can logically ascertain from prior canon but not for the reasons actually presented by wolfman. if that makes sense. he does extra work that isn't actually necessary to help explain why dick would act the way that he does because there's plenty of reasons for it without rewriting his history with bruce to have always been suppressed and edgy and dark. to me it makes far more sense to capitalize on the inevitable disconnect between bruce and dick as an adult and a child. batman: full circle is a good example of that dichotomy (and although it was published in the early 90s it built on mike w. barr's prior understanding of the relationship between dick and bruce that he wrote into the early 80s). bruce's primary concern for the people he works with is never standards or finesse but safety. he worries constantly about others coming to harm under his watch and with a child in particular those worries were exacerbated. he ran a tight ship not because he believed dick had anything to prove but because the only way dick could keep being robin was if he went about it safely. that was obv easy for an adult to understand. but not so much for a child

to bruce these worries were practical and par for the course (as well as an expression of his love and protectiveness) but for dick their consequences formed the crux of his entire world. as a child he idolized everything about bruce. his heroism. his work ethic. his skill. his resolve. his preparedness. if dick couldn't live up to the standard he set for himself in idolizing bruce then what could he ever hope to amount to? that was the thought constantly going through his head. and it's why the bulk of his childhood and primary tenure as bruce's partner was so precariously protected by the fact that nothing bad ever really happened during it (and admittedly this framing is convenient because even chronologically speaking nothing very significant happened in their history with each other until dick left for university in 1969) (i know dixon opted to write that whole shtick with dent in his version of events but personally i never found it necessary to do so). there is enough there in the idea of dick working hard for the course of a decade to embody who he believed bruce to be that lends itself to it eventually being difficult for him to healthily express himself once the rift between them actually began to emerge

because what about bruce was there to actually see that was broken and dark before dick became an adult? i know a lot of dick fans hate batman #408 because they don't like that it enforced "retirement" upon dick (which i personally believe is a conclusion they come to because of the way batman #416 re-framed the same scene) but to me that's an inaccurate reading of the text. batman #408 was about bruce (admittedly far too belatedly) recognizing that he could not in good conscience continue to ask dick to go out and be a vigilante on what he considered to be his own "orders". he viewed dick's close call with death at the hands of the joker as something directly of his own making. although their tenure with each other had been wonderful if dick wanted to continue to be a vigilante it had to be on his own terms and of his own volition. obv that was logical to bruce and it was something dick managed to accept in the moment. but it's still hard to go from always having a purpose alongside someone you idolized to finally being entrusted entirely to forge your own

in general i like the idea of dick the adult becoming privy to all of the personal problems and conflicts that come with being a vigilante. he was conveniently shielded from a lot of those problems as a child because all he had to do was be bruce's partner and hope to live up to the title. bruce had no reason to trauma dump on him or talk about his worries and concerns at length with him because it was never supposed to be dick's job to field those worries and concerns in the first place. he was a child. the only thing bruce wanted to do was to help channel his emotions through an outlet and provide him with a home to grow up in. but when you become an adult often that dynamic shifts. you're still not responsible for fielding those worries and concerns but you can perhaps be trusted with them. that's why i like the framing in batman #408 of dick now being a man. it's a subtle way to frame the double-edged sword of adulthood. the world is in your hands now but so will be the horrors that come with it. coming to terms with the real world that bruce lives in should be hard for dick. coming to terms with who bruce is when he's not perfect should be hard. coming to terms with how quietly bruce kept his grief because he did not see fit to overwhelm a child with it should be hard. that dichotomy of dick both wanting to be bruce's brother and his son should form the crux of their conflict with each other because you can't hope to be someone's equal and someone's protected at the same time in that kind of relationship. for dick to transition into the position of equal he has to expose himself to the fact that bruce is not in fact an idol but someone irrevocably human. and that should interfere significantly with his head and his own standards for himself

[here-there-were-dragons]

i have to wonder what super hardcore militant vegans think should be done about obligate carnivore animals, because in all my painfully-rapidly-approaching-30-years i've literally never actually seen anyone give a clear consistent much less halfway feasible answer on that

[silvreflames]

Rio! I have a random question about nesta as a girl who grew up overly pushed and forced into "feminine perfection" by her mom, how did she experience the realization that she couldnt fulfill those toxic expectations that her mom forced on her because of her own trauma and the what the cauldron did to her? Not me asking bc of my own mommy issues lmao sorry if you already talked abt this here! Also idk if i made any sense wiith this question in my head i did

euge my darling i could kiss you on the mouth. i've been sitting on this ask for like 2 weeks now because it's just so juicy and i've been wanting to do it (and nesta) justice in how i answer it with regards to my portrayal.

honestly? i don't think nesta HAS come to this realization. and i say this because i don’t think she is in a space mentally or emotionally to understand that those expectations ARE toxic. certainly not in a canon world LMAO but not really in my interpretation either. i think that the rotten roots that her mother dug into her at such a young age are so deep that it will likely take decades for nesta to really even understand just how badly she's been harmed. and the canon treatment she receives at the hands of the IC absolutely does not go far in mending the mindset she's been brainwashed into either.

i mean. people can talk about how prythian doesn't uphold the patriarchal ideals that the human world does because it's an entirely different culture and species but the fact of the matter is that that's just complete bogus. men rule prythian. and you can argue that amarantha was in charge and blah blah blah the human queens blah blah blah but the fact of the matter is, tamlin wasn't putting feyre down when he told her there weren't high ladies among the fae. he was simply stating a fact. viviane of winter court (arguably an incredible leader considering the winter court did not sway under amarantha's rule while kallias was under the mountain) was clearly slighted when rhysand made feyre the first high lady.

and don't even get me started on the treatment of illyrian women. the abuse that those young girls and women are subjected to by illyrian men (rhysand's people!) is very close to the treatment that nesta expects as someone who grew up knowing that her only fate, the only role she would fit into, was that of a submissive wife to ensure her family's care. that those women are being violated so horribly because it's "tradition" just further proves to her that safety is not an option. that freedom is not an option.

all that to say, nesta can't break out of those expectations because she doesn't have the tools or the knowledge to be able to do it. not even when she goes to live in the supposedly amazing world of the fae that her baby sister so dearly loves. she is forced into “fae ideals” which are not far off from what she’s already familiar with. she is “promised” (mated) to a man for the “good of her family” (the IC/rhys/feyre) whether she wants to be or not and “society” (the IC) expects her to stay quiet and accept it and do it beautifully and to stop being in pain so loudly. because that’s feminine perfection of course!

i think that. even if she DID realize this. she would be in deep denial. lune and i are giving nessian the story that they deserve, but trauma is trauma. and like i said it’s going to take a long time for nesta to uncover how badly she’s been hurt for so long. but even just uncovering it won’t “fix” or help her. there are so many layers to the way her mother’s expectations cut away at her (and continue and will continue to do so!).

i believe nesta knows her mother was cruel, but she wouldn’t believe she’s been harmed without reason. which is why, even realizing that the expectations foisted on her were terrible and she couldn’t meet them if she really tried, she would simply be devastated that she could fail so badly. because that’s all she does in her own eyes, you know? she failed her mother, she failed her sisters, she failed her father, she fails cassian, she fails herself. she wouldn't think, "gee i shouldn't have been treated like shit like that", she'd think, "wow i can't believe i became high fae and i still can't manage to take care of my fucking family". i think it would be a setback in her healing and she’d have to climb those stairs too.

[witchwhaat]

i'm SO happy for the future generations at my university that my supervisor will not teach anymore after my year but also. it should have happened to me. IT SHOULD HAVE HAPPENED TO ME!

[tieflinglich]

i do think its fucked up to see actual arguments on here about how AI is good, actually, and if you think calling someone out for using AI and then blaming some sort of disability on it then you are an inherently horrible person. like yeah.

AI generated content is based on theft from tons of artists across the world due to scraping from the internet. it is bad. even ignoring any of the environmental effects, it is a horrible fucking thing to just rip apart the efforts of your peers in order to spare yourself a bit of time because you want to make a product but don't want to put in the effort. and trying to spin it as 'oh poor artist has a disability, they cannot create art, how dare you expect them to hurt themselves for your petty moral argument' ignores the tons of actually disabled artists who actively work with their bodies in order to create content that they are proud of.

it feels like instead of actually listening to anyone you're just willing to throw disabled artists under the bus because you want to make the most amount of money with the least amount of effort.

[f1-stuff]

how does carlos resist the urge to kiss charles right there and then when he's being his cute silly self

It’s the image of Carlos Sr that pops into his head, wagging his finger at him…

[zevsarainai]

man dw really did not stick the landing huh

[hekateinhell]

First, I had to search online to find out what oviposition means. My innocence has been destroyed by the fish fucking fic.

Second, Lestat fertilized Armand. Does that mean armand will carry the eggs or Armand will put them into Lestat??

Anon, I'm crying ��

I am so sorry for destroying your innocence (although I'm surprised you still had one after reading TVC because that did irreversible damage to me)

It took me a weirdly long time to settle on the lore I wanted with this! Originally I was going to have the creature (Mermand, if you will) lay its eggs by some rocks and bully Lestat into it letting jerk him off over them (amphibians and some kinds of fish do this, like the fertilization happens after the eggs are laid).

But then that would've defeated the point of them having sex at all and that's kind of the story lmao. (Yes, I know, I needed my fishfucking fic to make sense).

But I also remembered sharks — some give birth to live young and others lay fertilized eggs (sharkfucking). So in my head, I decided on: they fuck -> Armand lays the fertilized eggs in a shallow area and watches over them until they hatch. Lestat will be more or less useless here.

Fun fact: some oviparous sharks lay eggs that are called mermaid's purses! And others can look like this.

Imagine Lestat seeing that come out of Armand like- 😨😵‍💫🫣🥺🥵🫠

[magnusmodig]

rough childhood headcanon qs / @clxscdeyes / no longer accepting !

╰┈➤ 7 . how old was your muse when they realized they had childhood trauma?

||. one whole "today years old" post!ragnarok and hela's reveal. Except, even then, according to the movie, not really because Thor is still in heavy denial about all of it where Odin is concerned. I've spoken a bit (here) about how Thor adores his family; he idolizes them and views them through blinding rose-colored glasses, (especially when they're deceased) and that is especially true of his circumstances.

So, very often times when the truth clashes with the rose-colored view of them (namely: his father), Thor does one of two things: find a way to justify the words or action with the surrounding context of the time to make it make sense (e.g., well he scolded me harshly because i was talking back), or avoid it altogether. (this is his go-to. no talking about it; thor would rather not right now, so he does not.)

Key example being: he would rather focus on how his father changed his ways, and the Odin that he knew and grew up with was a man who had turned away from pursuing war for war's sake, and was instead one who valued peace and life. He would rather focus on that aspect of Odin, and take in the broader picture of Odin's life. REGARDLESS of the fact that what Thor is deeply, personally affected - not with the realization that Odin changed his ways once upon a time - but by the fact that he lied to him, manipulated him, and controlled and shaped every aspect of his being, for Thor's whole life, JUST to avoid another Hela. Someone who Thor is not, could not be farther from, and never knew about, because Odin (apparently) kept the matter of his true first-born a closely-guarded secret and seemingly would have continued to were it not for Odin's death, Hela's escape, and Ragnarok all coinciding at the same moment in time. And this, all because Thor rationalizes it as "well, I wouldn't want to be remembered and judged based on the person that I used to be. I should extend that same kindness to my father, because he too, changed." (x10 because now Odin is dead. And it's in poor-taste to speak ill of a dead man.)

The problem namely being: Thor only talks about things when Thor decides it's time to talk about things ; when he is ready. ...but as this is a topic that ripple effects down to Thor's core, good luck getting him to open up about it, even just with himself.

[sidesteppostinghours]

Rolling in 10 hrs late but— 27, 28 Caine, 17, 34 for Cecilia? And B for all ur Steps, if you don’t mind :)

morning! thank you for the ask :D 

27. What causes them to feel dread? 

the fun thing about caine is that hes got really good instincts. its only heightened with hark (over 30 precog im p sure?) since hark encouraged him to listen to their gut. so if somethings about to go wrong, yeah, the dread is kicking in and theyre nope-ing the fuck out of there (the only exception to this is the casino scene). but there can also be false alarms if he disassociates hard enough, which is becoming more frequent lately. their paranoia+growing insomnia just adds to all of it. basically they just feel dread half the time,,, but also a more tangible thing that causes them to feel dread would probably be ortegas mind. if theyre in the wrong headspace, ortega brings back too many bad memories for them to feel safe.

28. Would they prefer a lie over an unpleasant truth? 

hmmm,,,, im not sure! it really depends on why the other person is lying about it ig, and how severe/urgent the unpleasant truth is. by default he tends to prefer the truth, but its mostly for informations sake. for example, with argent, they Really wouldve preferred not knowing what she was capable of. now that the cats out of the bag hes even more paranoid, especially since they have no information on her to use to protect himself. meanwhile, with the autopsy pics, they appreciated chen telling them what happened because it gave them a better idea of what happened while they were gone, and in their eyes chen had no obligation to tell them (plus they got some free bonus info about the kind of contacts chen has which is really useful too). basically, if he thinks he needs it to do things better or more efficiently, hell be ticked off about somebody withholding the truth from him, and vice versca if he thinks the lie would be more beneficial to him instead. either way though, theyre good at keeping their emotions in check, so hed be fine getting the unpleasant truth either way.

17. Are they easily embarrassed?

nope! not at all. i mean, if she hyped herself up and managed to fail spectacularly, then yeah, i could see her getting majorly embarrassed. but thats p much one of the few situations i could imagine her feeling like that. ceci isnt known for shame– shes extremely blunt, to the point of being insensitive, and shes willing to do a lot for a quick kick. except,,,,,hmmmm,, argent making a comment or stealing a quick kiss when she didnt expect it and managing to fluster her,,,,,, please hold while i experience the visionsTM.

34. How hard is it for them to shake a sense of guilt? 

oof. i think prehb the guilt of what she left behind was definitely there, but it got buried under the satisfaction of being free and having fun for once. nowadays, she still lives by those principles, that no matter what happened at least shes here now, but this time around theres an added layer of her actively trying to forget. if she does something she genuinely regrets, its still getting buried, but itll just claw right back to her in inopportune moments. most of the time though, guilt is getting tossed right back out the window so it doesnt disturb her happy fun loving times. no, ortega, no, finch, she is NOT repressing, she is simply being #goofysilly and will not stand for regret ruining her vibe.

B) What inspired you to create them?

speaking for my general process with all my steps: im rather predictable when creating characters. lots of them follow the same molds, they just tackle different storylines, and the differing plots are what makes them all different characters. so when making my steps, i ended up using those same character archetypes and taking them to their logical conclusions based on what choices the game offered. it makes it easier for me to imagine how they react, and its fun to tack on a slightly different trait to the mold and see what happens. ultimately, they all fall somewhere on the extreme ends of the "good/evil" spectrum, but with an added bit of ✨spice✨ from the other end to get them going into fully fledged characters. these are my inspiration/archetype for each individual step:

Caine- being an imported character for the exile if, i already had his character in mind when making him! in exile, they were very much meant to be the stoic leader character that was just beginning to doubt what he fought for. the problem when i tried to put them in fhr was. chen. chen i love you but holy shit it was so hard to make him unique and interesting when you were literally RIGHT THERE covering all the bases they were supposed to cover. and chen has a dog which made him obviously superior. it was annoying, but my frustration with their similarities pushed me to put a lot of love into them and well. look at where my son is now lmfao.

Cyrus- @ that one person who made that post about herald subverting the cinnamon role stereotype: thank you. i owe you my and my bastard sons life. cyrus was just meant to be a step i used to explore heralds ro route, so i didnt mean to take him too seriously. because of that, and because this was directly after caine and i was getting frustrated figuring them out, i kinda just went with the flow– he was originally a character closer to the "flirty and funny but actually competent and surprisingly apathetic" type. he used to have like. 50% ruthlessness lmfaoooo. a lot of his major character beats were caused by me making mistakes and figuring things out by clicking random choices out of curiosity. after i played him once, the higher ruthlessness route i went intrigued me, and i started tweaking him further, which is how we got here.

Cecilia- i! wanted! to! have! someone! fun! i wanted to have someone fun. i just wanted to have a step who would dick around and do stupid shit because they wanted to. she was my third step, both caine and cyrus were so serious, i needed somebody to juxtapose that. she was very much the "fuck around and find out" character. i created her to explore the lupin route, which seemed appropriate for the sort of character i wanted her to be. i also wanted to romance argent. it all just sort of culminated in a whirlwind of the most out there, daring step i had. it was only later i considered adding some more serious edges to her story, she was a bit like stress relief lol.

Cynthia- i created her with ortegas ro route in mind! even though caine was technically an ortega ro step, he was secretcrush so they couldnt really do much lmfao, so i was itching to play somebody whod actually pursue her. i chose the "calm, kind, do not burn down the house please and thank you" character for her since it seemed like fun to try with ortegas more out-there energy. i also had her as an anarchist, which i thought would be interesting to see play out since she was definitely on the more heroic end of the spectrum and i wanted to see how she would tackle one of the more destructive job choices. unfortunately, the kinder characters are almost always the hardest for me to work with, so it did take cynthia a while to find her footing. now, though, i think shes come together nicely! very much a balance of the nicer character i wanted for her originally while having that small kernel of "i can fuck things up if i wanted to" that i find more fun.

questions from here!

[nostalgia-tblr]

If I could do Fics With A Plot I'd probably attempt An AU Where Lauffey Dies And Odin Goes "Oh Hey, Frost Dudes, I Had Your Heir All Along :D He's Urs Now :D" Except Because This Is A Shit Plan It Does Not Go At All Well. Because it does bother me. Because I worry too much about fictional monarchies having the 'wrong' rules. D: