#I mean. It's specifically in my Don't s section.

[screwpinecaprice]

Coffee commissions? (CLOSED FOR DECEMBER 2024 AND JANUARY 2025!)

KOFI COMMISSIONS ARE CLOSED UNTIL 2025!

Wanna order a drawing from me but you're on a tighter budget? Perhaps you'd like to consider my Coffee commissions instead?

They are the cheaper options among my commission list! ^^ However, I will only be taking 2 or 3 slots per month.

Anatomy is simpler than Style B.

$3 is just busts but we can work around more body parts shown if I feel it’s needed to convey the message of the drawing.

For $5: I do best with half body/knees up so that’s my usual. But it can be in full body if the scene requires it or if the client wants it to be.

Environment/background will also be simpler than the Style B background.

There is no full character rendering option, but an environmental background may include slight rendering to the characters.

extra samples for Style A:

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Style B is more anatomically detailed than Style A, but is a simplified version of my regular commissions.

My default is half bodies and knees up, but it can be in full body if the client wants it to be.

15 USD is just 10 USD with a detailed design or added background. If, say, it's both a detailed character and with background, it may cost extra.

extra samples for Style B (last image is a sample of a full character rendering):

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Ready to order?

> Contact me via DM for the discussion of details and confirmation of the prices.

> Send in the payment at ko-fi.com/pandan009 or you can pay directly to Paypal. I will not start drawing anything until payment is made!

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Extra notes:

> Please don't send any photos of yourself in the DMs. Personally it's pretty uncomfortable not gonna lie. 😅 Maybe if there's at least a third person in the chat it's alright.

> I do not work with adultXminor ships. This is already in my Dont's section but I failed to explicitly mention that: If the older character is already an adult when they met/know the minor, it counts. Aging up the latter counts. Do not get cheeky and find a loophole. Rest assured, I'm not going to blow up at you for asking if you aren't sure. However any works of such content sent to me for reference is a high potential cause for being blacklisted.

Any questions or details you'd like to clarify, you can as via DM.

Interested in my Regular commission?

[dedalvs]

When will humankind learn the lesson of its hubris and begin to heal itself? Also can you recommend any undergraduate or graduate level resources (textbooks etc.) for learning about fiction? I already read Writing Fiction by Burroway. Thanks in advance

January 14, 3182. Make a note of the date and return to this post when it comes.

To your second question, I've never read anything on writing fiction, only writing in general. I've found something valuable in every book on writing, even if there were things in the book I found less valuable. For example, I read Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within by Natalie Goldberg, and while there was much of it I didn't care for, there are some passags that have stuck with me 22 years later. When it comes to writing guides, I think the best thing to do is read what interests you while understand that what you are really doing is building your own writing guide inside you. You're absorbing what you find personally meaningful and using it to create your own personal styleguide that, like it or not, you'll be following for the rest of your life. Rather than rejecting that, and trying to decide which text will be the text that tells you how to write, embrace it, realize that you are going to do what you're going to do, and then try to work within that framework. That is, if that's what's happening, how will you approach a styleguide? What will it mean to you to read a very didactic text (i.e. "All serious writers must do x; no serious writer every does y") vs. a loosey-goosey one (e.g. "Dance naked in the garden of your creativity and allow your flowers to bloom!")? What are you looking for in these texts and what will you do with information or strategies that you find valuable?

Returning to Writing Down the Bones, I have to say I found the book to be mostly woo. It was more a kind of self-help/empowerment book than a book on writing, in my opinion. But there is something in there that I'm sure I'd heard before but which finally resonated with me. Specifically, it was the way she articulated that it really, truly doesn't matter what you put on the page when you're drafting. Drafting is not the time to reject. Even some idea comes to you that you find absurd, illogical, thematically inappropriate—whatever. It's not the time to push it away. Indeed, it's wasted effort. Editing and revising is the time to question. If you're writing, you shouldn't let anything stop you—even your own brain.

Why it took till then for this idea to take root, I don't know. It could be how she worded it. It could be that it came at the right time. Perhaps I was more open to new ideas when I was reading this book. It may also have something to do with a transition that had taken place for me in writing. After all, when I started high school, I was not regularly using a computer (we'd only just gotten a computer that stayed at home). When I started writing, I wrote by hand—on paper. It's a much, much different thing to edit and revise when you're writing on paper than it is on when you're working on a computer! I mean, digital real estate is cheap. When you're writing by hand, it can literally hurt to write seven or eight pages—and then to discard them in editing! Right now I'm working on a novel draft where I've decided an entire section needs to come out. If I'd written that by hand?! I can't even imagine.

I guess the tl;dr of it is I don't have a specific text to recommend. Rather, I encourage you to look around and grab anything that interests you. In doing so, though, I encourage you to approach it differently, focusing on what in it you find valuable, without either wholly rejecting it or feeling you have to follow it to the letter like an Ikea manual. I even found something valuable in C. S. Lewis's The Abolition of Man, which I honestly can't believe I read.

If you'd like some fiction advice that may be generally useful no matter what you're writing, this is what I can offer:

A valuable skill to hone is being able to read your work as if you have no other knowledge of it. In other words, you need to be able to read your work like a reader. One of the most difficult things to do with fiction is to cut. You usually have a lot more characterization, a lot more plot points, a lot more detail, etc. than end up on the page. The important question is if you cut something, will the reader notice? Will it actually feel like something's miss it, or will a reader never notice? Mind, I'm not saying that as a writer you can't tell if something is superfluous, or that anything you cut will be superfluous. I'm saying sometimes even if you cut something important a reader will still get the impression that what they are reading is whole and unedited. That isn't a good thing or a bad thing: it's a neutral thing. The question you'll have to answer is what is this whole that the reader is getting, and is that whole something you're satisfied with?

Get multiple rounds of feedback from many different readers. I say this not because it's vital, because beta readers are important, because you have to have multiple perspectives on your work, etc. None of that. Getting feedback from many different readers is a form of self-care on the part of the writer. I was deathly afraid of feedback as a young writer. I welcomed praise, sure, but anything else felt too painful to bear. This changed when I took a short fiction class at Berkeley. Suddenly a short story of mine wasn't getting one round of feedback: it was getting fourteen. And not just from the professor, but from fellow students. This was a minor revolution for me in terms of accepting feedback. If I were to take, say, one round of feedback, certainly there would be some praise, but there would also be notes like "awkward phrasing", "why did x character do y?", "this is unclear", "too much description", etc. These things would burn me. I would seethe reading them, and it would hurt so deeply. But! Imagine that one of them circles a paragraph and writes "too much description" and then the other thirteen readers say absolutely nothing at all about that paragraph—maybe one even puts a smiley face next to it. THAT puts the criticism in its proper context. Maybe your writing isn't too bad! Maybe there isn't too much description. Maybe that particular reader just wasn't vibing with it, and maybe that's okay. And then let's look at it from the other perspective. Say thirteen out of fourteen papers have a sentence marked and all of them say things like "huh?", "what's this mean?", "confusing", etc. Guess what? The sentence is probably confusing. And for some reason if everyone's saying the same thing it hurts a lot less. It means, yeah, you probably made a little mistake, and that's okay. It's not one person singling you out, and it's not the case that they don't know what they're talking about. I can't emphasize enough how freeing it is to look at reviews of your work if you have a handful or more to draw from rather than just a single good friend.

It's okay to write the fun part first. You may have a plot device you're really excited about, but to get there, you have to introduce your characters, have them get together, have them go to a place, meet someone else, etc. And it may take time and energy to write all that. You may feel pressured to get through that before you get to the part you really want to write. You certainly can, but you do not have to. I don't know if younger writers can appreciate exactly what it means to have a computer. You can write a little bit now and literally copy and paste it into some other document later. Try doing that with a typewriter! You can write something like "Insert paragraphs later of characters traveling to x location". You can even drop a variable in there so it's easy to find with the search function later (e.g. "ZZZZZ insert scene description here"—now you just need to search for "ZZZZZ"). You can put it in a different color on the screen so it's easy to find when scrolling. You can paste a freaking photo into your document! It's extraordinary what you can do with a computer that you couldn't do in years past. You've got a ton of options. But most importanly, when your work is done, no one will know what order you wrote it in.

In fiction, nothing has to happen. Villains don't have to be punished; heroes don't have to win; characters don't have to have a specific arc that comes to some conclusion. Honestly, one of the tropes (if you can even call it a trope) that I find most frustrating in sequels for movie franchises is after the characters are introduced, they take a few character and assign to them the major story conflict, and then for the rest, they give them a mini arc. It's like, "Mondo 2: Exploding the Mondoverse sees our hero Larjo Biggins take on new villain the Krunge as the very core of the Mondoverse is threatened with destruction! Also, Siddles Nuli learns its okay to be left out sometimes and she shouldn't get her feelings hurt, and Old Mucko learns that even though technology is advancing, sometimes good old fashioned common sense is just what the doctor ordered!" If you get to the end of your story, and you feel it's done, you don't have to panic if you suddenly realize we don't know whether Hupsi ever made it to Bumbus 7. It's okay if Story A is resolved but Story B is not.

I don't care if you used Trope A in your new story even though you used Trope A in your past seven stories and neither should you. Seriously, you think anyone was complaining when Agatha Christie put out another mystery novel? "Oh. Mystery again, huh? Gee, we were all hoping you'd write a book about the struggles traditional fishing villages are facing in the wake of industrial modernization." No we fucking weren't!

I hope you find some of this useful. Whether you did or not, though, be sure you enjoy what you're doing. If you are, you're doing the right thing.

[neragufetta]

That is a code, your honor

I stayed away from Link Click in order to avoid any spoiler, to the point I only discovered today that episode 1 of the Yingdu chapter was released last friday.

There is a long frame by frame rewatch already waiting for me but, at this moment, I only want to focus on this frame in the opening:

I don't know if anyone has already done it but I've cracked the code and I wish to share it with you.

Yes, that is a proper code and is fully decipherable, if you want to solve it yourself I'll share some hints on how to do it, otherwise you can just skip to the actual message section down below.

Have fun!

HOW TO DECIPHER THE CODE, step by step

The message is in English, lucky for us non-Chinese viewers;

2. the code uses a substitution cipher, which means every symbol corresponds to a specific letter and that letter only.

With these two clues alone I think you can already approach the message, but if you wish for more hints, here they are:

3. I could think of two different ways to decipher the code, one takes longer but it requires only one cipher; the other one is easier but there is a twist to keep in mind.

4. The longer method consists of classical substitution cipher solving approach: symbols, or set of symbols, that occurs more often in the message can be correlated with letters (E, T, ...) or words (THE, AND, ...) that occurs more often in the english language.

5. The easier way is to recognise that the symbols belong to a well known cipher: the pigpin cipher! You can google it, see the pic below

or just check my solution:

-XLI LIEVX SJ XLI JSVIWX E WYHHIr- -MG WTVIEH EQSRK XLI ERMQEPW JSB- -VIGXMRK IPITLERX XS HSYWY XLI JPEQI- -MJXPC WTVIEHMRK QIWWEKIW SJ YVK- -SAIZIV SRPC GEVIH EFSYX JPIIMRK- -XLI JSVIWX WYGGYQFIH XS XLI JMVIW-

HIXIVQMRIH XS TVIZIRX WYGL XVEKIH- LMVIH E HIXIGXMZI XS YRGSZIV XLI- HMWGSZIVIH AEW FICSRH XLIMV AM- MQEKMREXMSRW

LI FIPMIZIH XLEX XLI OIC XS- XS IPMQMREXI EPP TSXIRXMEP- MKRMXI XVSYFPI

Wait what?! That is not a solution! True, and that is the twist: pigpen alone doesn't solve the code, you need one more step, another substitution cipher.

6. This is a Caesar Cipher with key 4!

from: E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z A B C D

to --: A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

THE ACTUAL MESSAGE

-(t)he heart of the forest a sudde(n)- -ic spread among the animals fox- -recting elephant to dousu the flame- -iftly spreading messages of urg- -(h)owever only cared about fleeing- -the forest succumbed to the fires

Determined to prevent such traged(y)- hired a detective to uncover the- discovered was beyond their wi- imaginations

He believed that the key to- to eliminate all potential- ignite trouble

THE BLABBERING

Already many interesting things everywhere!

This message implies the existence of 5+ people: the writer of the message; the target of the message; the hired detective; the "He" mentioned in the third paragraph; the "all potential" trouble igniters (at least 2, I'd say) that should be eliminated. The blond woman seems to be the target, since the message is under her cup of tea; Liu Xiao could be the detective but I bet he is the "He"; the trouble igniters are definitely Lu Guang, Cheng Xiaoshi and the whole gang. The other two characters are way less obvious, we can only assume their identity based on which one is missing; I can only speculate that Vein could be the detective, but he could also be your basic assassin; Finally, Xia Fei could be the writer of the message, if we accept the idea that he and the woman might be somehow blood related.

Then, we have the proper content of the message: a burning forest is mentioned and we know from S2 that a forest appears in Lu Guang's memory of CXS dying (and in the opening as well). Why so much emphasys is placed on the forest?

The next sentence "determined to prevent such traged(y)" might be the most revealing: what is the tragedy? The forest on fire or something else? If it's the former, how can the fire be prevented it it has already happened? Either, they dive back in the past and change it, which we know is no-go option, or the forest on fire was a vision from the future and there is someone (Liu Xiao?) with the ability to either foresee or actually dive in the future, completing the past, present and future pattern.

And this is all coming from just one frame. One Frame.

Welcome back to the delightfully hellish Link Click.

Edit: Guys, I'm so silly, a few second later the cup is removed and the code becomes visible almost entirely...a part 2 is required.

[bowsellie]

we have chemistry

warnings: college!ellie x college!reader, stoner!ellie, chronically ill reader (not specific, just mentions of fatigue and a medical accommodation for a single room for plot reasons lol), weed usage (Ellie and reader), mild language, briefly proofread, no use of y/n minors dni! smut in 3rd section! top!ellie, some degradation, praise (reader called a good girl, pretty girl, etc., ellie told she's doing a good job), SO MUCH CONSENT WE <3 CONSENT, fingering (r! receiving), oral (r! receiving), aftercare.

💗💗💗

You didn't want to be taking organic chemistry. Nobody in that class did--not even the chemistry majors. But as finals season rolled around, you found yourself spending extra time to make sure that it would at least be worth your while. Needless to say, not everybody shared the same drive.

As the clock hit 8:49am on the last class before the exam, everybody started shoving their laptops away despite the professor's continuing drone. To your right there was an extra loud snap! as the student beside you--an auburn-haired girl you'd never seen before--shut the screen with finality. You shot her a glare, gently closing your notebook as people began to trickle out.

"You're smart, right?"

You angled your face towards the sound, assuming somebody was having a side conversation close by. Instead, you found yourself face to face with striking green eyes leaning to reach your line of sight.

"Hi. Yeah, you. You're using an actual notebook and have all the fancy pens and shit, so...are you smart?"

Your eyebrows drew together slightly as you shrugged with one shoulder. "I try, I guess. Um...why?"

One corner of the girl's mouth picked up. "I don't know if you've noticed, but I've literally never been to this class before. My grade sucks. But I really don't want to retake this shit. Do you think you could help me?"

You stared at her incredulously, mentally calculating the equation of audacity and arrogance it must take to expect a complete stranger to help despite a clear lack of effort.

You opened your mouth slightly to say some variation of hell fucking no, who do you think you are anyways?, maybe you should have considered that before skipping literally every other class meeting when she stuck out her hand. "I'm Ellie, by the way. I'll pay you for helping me." When you hesitated to shake it, she added a "please".

You rolled your eyes, shaking the girl--Ellie's--hand with slightly too much force. "Fine. Whatever. Give me your number." You slid your phone across the table, already open to the contacts app, and watched as she typed.

"You're a lifesaver! Thank you..." she asked, pausing for your name. You gave it. "Thank you."

💗💗💗

Getting back to your dorm and settling into bed for a nap, you briefly texted the number now in your phone as "Ellie" with the last name "Wehavechemistry".

hey

Almost immediately, three dots popped up.

hey there. do you like my contact? lmao

i mean, we do have chemistry together. so like...sure?

no no no. i meant like...we have chemistry. wink wink nudge nudge. and my last name starts with a w so it's funny. do you get it?

...

it's funny.

yeah yeah sure. very funny. hahaha. anyways.

when did you want to come over? i'm free all weekend, and the final's monday. sooooo

oh shit

didn't realize the final was monday

ummmmmmmm how does tomorrow at 8pm work? do you have a roommate or something we need to accommodate for?

no, no roommate. tomorrow at 8pm works fine for me. see you then, ellie.

:)

Turns out, texting with Ellie wasn't all that insufferable. She was friendlier than you expected, and every time you put your phone down to try and fall asleep you found your heart beating too fast at every notification to actually put it down.

Instead, you kept the conversation going until 8pm the next day rolled around, when instead of a text you got three loud raps at the door.

Opening it up, you saw Ellie in the same hoodie as yesterday. This time, her hair was slightly damp and she smelled like...old spice and something pungent and earthy. Did she shower already?

"Hey," you said, suddenly feeling awkward and over dressed in your jean shorts and crop top, hair still done from that afternoon. "You can come in."

Ellie grinned at you as she slid in the door. "We have a semester of schoolwork to cover. Hope you're prepared for a long night," she said.

"Trust me, I am. Did you bring anything?" You asked, looking for a bag as she climbed on to your bed.

"Nope. Not school stuff, anyways." Curious, you tossed your notebook towards her and watched as she pulled a pre-rolled joint and lighter from her hoodie pocket. "I'm assuming you don't smoke since you're like, a nerd, but do you mind if I do?"

You shook your head, dropping your jaw in false offense. "How lame do you think I am? Just because I actually go to class doesn't mean I'm a nerd."

Ellie shot you a disbelieving look, but handed you the joint anyways as you joined her on the bed. "Here, have the first hit. As a thank you for helping me out."

She lit it for you as you inhaled, passing her the weed and opening your notebook. "If this keeps you from retaining information that's not my fault. Just saying."

"Trust me, I'm so alert right now it's crazy. All of tonight is gonna be stuck in my memory for a while."

💗💗💗

The room gradually grew darker, lit only by your adjusting lamp and the last smoldering ashes of the joint as you reached halfway through the notebook.

You breathed heavily through your nose, looking at Ellie seriously. "It's so late. We're not going to finish this tonight."

As she looked up at you, you suddenly noticed how much closer you two had moved over the course of the night. Had your thighs been touching the whole time? Has her breath always been so close it's hitting your cheek? Why did she have to smell so good?

Your own breath caught in your throat as she leaned even closer to you, placing a hand so close to your leg you could feel the fabric of her sweatshirt against her bare thigh. Almost imperceptibly, her gaze flickered down to your chest, now rapidly rising and falling.

"How set do you think I am for this stupid final?" Ellie asked seriously, a rasp in her voice either from smoke or the lowered pitch.

"You picked up on everything really well, so at least the first half I think you'll do fine."

She grabbed your left hand in both of hers, causing your breath to catch again. Her eyes flickered down again, this time lingering longer. Following her gaze, you noticed the top of your bra peeking out.

"Sorry," you said, quickly adjusting your shirt to cover it as heat spread through your body.

"No, no, you're fine. Sorry for looking," she said. You looked at her face, watching as her eyes seemed to trace the shape of your shoulders and the line of your throat.

The air thickened with tension, but you found yourself not wanting Ellie to leave yet. "So, why did you take this class anyways? If you didn't want to go?"

Finally, she met your eyes. "I need a chemistry for my major. Astronomy. I thought I would like this one, but didn't realize it was a fucking 8am when I signed up. By the time I realized I wasn't going to make it up that early it was too late to drop." She shrugged. "What about you? Big chemistry fan?"

You snorted. "Not really, but I also needed a chemistry for my major. I like the 8ams, it lets me have afternoons free to sleep. That's why I don't have a roommate--medical accommodations for fatigue or whatever." She nodded along, genuinely listening.

"Well, hopefully I don't have to retake this class. Next time there probably won't be a pretty girl willing to help me out."

You smiled at her, breathing sharply out of your nose in a laugh. "We'll see what we can do."

A beat of silence washed over you before Ellie pointed towards the pride flag on your wall with her chin. "So...are you..." She began, causing you to laugh full out this time.

"Yeah. Obviously, I'd hope, but if you're feminine people tend to assume otherwise I guess." You smiled and looked at her. "Are you?"

Ellie placed a hand on her chest. "I'm hurt you had to ask. I've been trying to flirt with you since I got your number, babe."

Oh.

"Oh."

She leaned back a little. "I can cut it out, if you want. I couldn't tell if you were into it or not."

Without giving her time to continue doubting, you sprung forward and attached your lips to hers. Threading your fingers in her hair and breathing in as you pulled back.

"So...you are into it?"

"I'm a little dense, Ellie. Don't let the color-coded notes fool you. But yes. Now that I know...I'm into it."

She smiled at you with one side of her mouth again, this time leaning forward to kiss you first. Lips opening slightly, you felt her body around yours as her hands found the bed and pushed you on to your back.

Ellie pushed her tongue gently into your mouth, settling between your legs as they fell open. As you felt her weight between your hips, you groaned a little.

Whining a little as she pulled away, your eyes fluttered shut as Ellie threaded her fingers through the hair by your ear. "Is this supposed to be my payment?" you asked, leaning into her touch.

"Shut up," she said playfully, leaning in to kiss you again. This time it was more forceful, teeth bumping against teeth as your tongues chased each other. Too focused on the overwhelming sensation of Ellie's mouth on your own, you broke the kiss to moan in surprise when you felt her knee push against your core.

Using the opportunity to trail her mouth down your cheek, to your jaw, to your neck, Ellie asked "is this okay, baby?" between kisses. You nodded before remembering she couldn't see you, instead responding with a slightly choked "yes."

In response, her lips attached right behind your ear as her teeth sunk into you and she began to suck. You groaned, bucking your hips against her knee. Kindly, she began to push it back into you, laughing into your neck as you continued whimpering.

"What?" you asked. "Why are you laughing?"

Ellie pulled away from the spot she had been working into your collarbone, meeting your eyes. "You're just so pretty. Can't believe I have you falling apart for me and I've barely touched you."

Your mouth fell open at her words, groaning. Ellie's mouth found yours again, her hands reaching for your tits over your shirt. "Can't blame me for looking at these," she said between kisses, "You look so good in this shirt."

"Take it off, then," you said. You sounded braver than you felt, your stomach doing absolute flips as the girl over you quickly complied to reveal your lacy nude bra.

"I like this," she said softly. "I want it off, though. Is that okay, pretty?" You nodded. The bra was nothing special--just comfy and the right color. If Ellie liked it, though, it was now one of your favorites.

Her mouth moved down your chin and neck to attach to your left nipple, bringing a hand to your opposite hip as she sucked and licked lightly. Your hips continued to buck against her knee, which was now stationary as you essentially rode her thigh.

Chuckling a little, Ellie looked up at you and began unbuttoning your shorts. "Knew you'd be needy. What kind of thoughts are you hiding from me?" she asked, pulling off your bottoms and panties in one go when you lifted your hips to help.

You smiled a little watching her eyes attach themselves to the spot between your legs. "What can I say?" you said. "Maybe I'm a little slutty if the right girl has me under her."

This seemed to light something in Ellie, who watched your face as she brought your face down to your pussy. Close enough to feel her breath, her eyes gleamed as she moved away from your hips chasing her.

"Please," you asked, voice breaking. "Please, Ellie."

"Guess you are a slut, huh? Begging for me already." Whatever response you had was cut off by a screaming moan as her mouth attached itself to you, immediately lapping at your clit before interspersing it with longer licks. Your legs shut around her face as your hands grabbed into her hair, pulling a little as you noticed the groan she made at the pressure.

"That feels so good, Ellie." Her motions sped up at this, and you hurriedly repeated the phrase as she focused more attention on your clit. Feeling everything tighten, you wrapped your ankles around her back as your hips lifted almost completely off the bed. Still attached to you, Ellie fully moaned as you pulled her hair and came over her face.

Whimpering softly as she pulled away, you audibly groaned when she looked up at you and wiped her chin with the back of her hand. "You did so good, baby. Do you have another one in you?"

You quickly nodded, feeling words escape you. All you wanted was for her to say you did good again.

Ellie leaned into you, placing her head into the crook of your neck as her fingers ghosted lightly over your hips, stomach, and thighs. Finally, you felt them dip into the pool of wet that had collected in your cunt. Spreading the mix of saliva, cum, and arousal up to your clit and around your hole, she slowly pushed a slender finger into you. Your back arched off the bed when she began pumping it in and out, chuckling against your neck.

"Such a pretty girl. You're doing so good," she whispered. Your moans grew louder at her words and she pushed another finger in. "Good girl," she breathed, kissing your neck and jaw as she worked into you.

"Ellie," you gasped. "Ellie, please."

"What, baby?"

"Please, Ellie, please. Wanna cum."

You felt her lips quirk up against your collarbone as she added a thumb to your clit and a curl to her fingers. Quicker than you'd ever been able to get there yourself, you felt the tightening of your gut. She swallowed your moans with a sloppy kiss, gently catching your bottom lip between her teeth before soothing it with her tongue. She used her other hand to hold on to your hair at the scalp as you writhed, second orgasm shuddering through your body.

"Good girl," she said as she worked you through it. Sitting up, she wiped her fingers on your thighs before moving up up to let you rest your head on her chest. "You did so good, baby. My smart, pretty, good girl."

You whimpered a little, not prepared to speak just yet. Ellie seemed to understand and didn't push you, holding you and playing with your hair until you leaned back to smile at her.

"That was good. Thank you," you told her, leaning in for a kiss that tasted of your sweat and pussy.

Ellie broke away, moving the hand wrapped around your waist to grab something out of your back pocket. She placed it on your bare chest, tucking it between your tits.

"What do I look like, a prostitute?" you asked. "Much love to them, but..."

Ellie raised her eyebrows. "I mean, you fuck like a professional, but this is for helping me study."

You grabbed the bill and pushed it back into her pocket. "Save it for next time. We need to finish that notebook if you want to actually pass this class."

Ellie kissed the top of your head. "How does tomorrow work?"

A/N this is basically a self insert...my bad. tried to make it as inclusive to different readers as possible. let me know if there's anything I can improve on!! <3

[stagefoureddiediaz]

Costume Meta 7x04

How we all doing?? have we managed to find some semblance of equilibrium in this new world where we have canon bi buck?? I’m not sure I’ll ever know how to exist in this world but that’s fine with me! I’m still here writing my silly costume metas and having a blast in this bright new world!

No Hen this week as we never see her out of uniform!

The rest is below the cut because you would all hate me if i clogged your feeds with this beast (shes 7k)- you have been warned!!

Actually going to start this week with a uniform out of work section!

Because three times in this episode, we had one of the firefam wearing an element of their uniform out of work and its actually pretty key!

We have Bobby in his LAFD polo when he informs Athena that Harry is wanted for assault and he fled the state.

Then we have Chim at the basketball game in his LAFD hoodie

And finally Buck at the airfield on his tour with Tommy.

All three are playing into the idea of protecting ones self by being in an official capacity in some way. Firefighters (like all first responders) are of course there to 'protect and serve' the community.

Bobby delivers the news to Athena about Harry - he's in uniform because he can inhabit a small aspect of his captain mentality - makes it easier to deliver the news and also gives him the distance to play the 'don't shoot the messenger' card if necessary.

Chimney has to step into paramedic mode at the end of the scene. The LAFD hoodie separates him from everyone else at the court and foreshadows that he will have to 'go to work' its also about chimney being there as the colleague not the almost brother in-law of Buck. An important distinction - it protects Chim from being seen to favour anyone (specifically from Buck. (Buck is angry and not being rational so Chimney has protection from Bucks potential anger for helping Eddie - Buck is already feeling awful by that point so the protection isn't needed but it provides cover if it were) and allows him to go into first responder mode. (this is so badly worded but I'm sure you get what I mean!!)

Buck is at the airfield under the guise of wanting to find out more about becoming an air support firefighter - its the cover under which he is operating to try and befriend Tommy. The jacket also provides him protection from Eddie when he shows up and finds out Buck is not coming to Vegas with him and Tommy.

Bobby

Just the one costume for Bobby this week - a maroon tee that her's wearing to sleep in. we see him in this colour a lot - its a bit of a staple colour for him and I've spoken a lot about maroon tees and shirts representing parental roles in relation to the various children of the 118. Its no different here -we can see from Bobbys face he isn't buying what Harry is saying and the parental concern we see evidenced here plays out with him calling Michael and finding out what is really going on.

Athena

Athena wears a lot of black this week, which is fairly typical from her, although we are in a much more overall muted palette than usual and its missing the jewel tones we're used to seeing her increasingly wear. its a bit of a signal of returning to normality now they're back from the cruise disaster.

She starts off in black and pink pyjamas but I'm going to talk about those at the end in the pink section so we're skipping ahead to this ruffle smocked cream blouse and her gorgons head necklace is back. the ruffling is an nod to her feathers being ruffled when Bobby tells her about Harry and his arrest warrant, and the white with the black trousers is about things being black and white - for Athena as a cop things do tend to be black and white when it comes to the law - of course Athena has always been one to work within the law to bend the rules but in this moment things are black and white.

Then we have her all in black with a red longline cardigan which has a open weave that give the appearance of mesh or a cage. The show has been using Red since day one which makes sense as it is a first responder show and you literally cannot escape it when the fire trucks are red! But they have always been pretty careful about when they use bright red in the costuming meaning its appearance with such regularity this season so far is pretty telling. Its an advance warning of incoming danger/trouble/strife, but it is rarely worn by the one who is directly in danger - they will be involved, but not the centre of it. The best example of this is Bucks bright red broadcloth shirt when Christopher calls him because Eddie is smashing up his bedroom.

Here we have it on Athena in the scene when things are about to properly kick into action with Harrys story. Athena is literally a red net about to ensnare Harry. its the one time in this episode we see Athena in a bold bright colour - something that generally is attached to her being happy or having fun, but not here.

The denim sleeveless shirt/jacket when Athena goes to the hospital to visit the lady who shot her son (does she have a name - I cant remember!) and later to talk to Harry about the reality of his altercation, is quite bulky and blocky. It's far less fitted, structured or flowy that we are used to seeing on Athena. To me this is about playing into her struggles to tread the line between mother and cop - that neither role fits right. That denim is also a fabric associated with labour, it suggests Athena is working hard to figure it out.

Then we get this all black outfit when she takes Harry to the station - it is such a simple yet effective bit of costuming, especially with the silver zips and buckles- it blends her in with the police officers in the station so she can hover the line between mom and cop - and makes it look like an arresting officer bringing in a suspect.

Harry

New Harry comes with a new style!!

I actually can't wait to see how they dress him over the rest of the season because there was a definite colour theme at play here this week with all the beiges, greens and redish browns which is very not how younger Harry dressed (he was much more bright colours).

Not going to lie - my hatred for the copaganda and the fact I've been in Bi Buck land since the episode aired has made it hard to focus on Harrys outfits in greater detail, but I do have a few thoughts!

This first shirt is a map print, maps denote journey's andHarry is on a literal and metophorical journey - the literal being the one he made form Florida to LA. The metaphorical one is all about his journey to become a man, and learning to take responsibility for his actions, so this shirt is essentially setting out his arc for the season - Makes me feel like the storylines with harry we're going to see are going to be about the community service he has to undertake and him figuring things out and growing up a bit in relation to that.

Then next up we have this cream hoodie with an brownish beige pocket. the thing I found interesting about this choice was the fact that Harry played himself off as innocent. lawyers usually instruct their clients to wear white shirts to court, and to avoid loud patterns. The white is because i suggests purity or innocence, and the loud patterns should be avoided because it suggests you're trying to employ subterfuge (that you're lying). So Harry wearing a block of cream is a play on this idea. We see him in the map shirt before - when he is employing subterfuge about his reasons for visiting, and now this cream is him trying to suggest his innocence to his mother - the use of cream rather than white is telling us that he isn't as innocent as he is making out!

Finally we have check theory (my most beloved) in play. harry returns to wearing patterns - this one check and in greens and browns. there is an element of military to the green shades, its a coloour we've seen used on Eddie to show his military background, but it is also a colour frequently worn by Athena - usually when she is fighting for her family in some way. Here it feels like a refelction of that, with the added aspect of green being a colour of growth. Harry shows contrition and is willing to take his punishement, showing his growth, but also showing his understanding of fighting for his family - and Athenas willingness to do the same. its showing us tht he is his mothers son. And of course the check is the pointer towards the fact he is in trouble - that his earlier protestations of innocence were false!

Then we move on the he Buckley-Hans

Chimney

Only the one for Chimney this week, it's a very short scene where he is completely oblivious to the tone of the conversation. He's dressed completely in greys and is by all accounts neutrally costumed. this is intentional - he's not the focus of this scene and when we think that so much of this episode is shown from Bucks pov, the use of neutral grey makes sense - Buck is projecting on to chimney in this scene. Buck himself is speaking his jealousy and fear, while what Chimney says is actually the little voice inside his head that isn't in fact jealous of Tommy, but is impressed by him

Maddie

Again only two costumes for Maddie this week and one of them is her dispatch outfit, but I'm including it because of its place with a mini colour theme for this episode, which both of her outfits play into.

I spoke about the use of red in Athenas section and its representing danger, and it is in play for both of Maddie's outfits, the wearer changes though. In the first scene, Maddie is in blue - dark blue. a tee with 'The Great School' and bobcat logo on the front. I love this, the bobcat is a symbol of inner strength and resilience in the face of adversity, while Maddie is a great source of learning for Buck - he essentially raised him and has been a sounding board for him since she returned to his life. Maddie is the next level wise older sister, her point of view is important to Buck and is grounding for him. She had got him to back down from his spiral over Eddie and Chris, until Chimney came in (and like I said above, that was Bucks inner voice, not really Chimney)

Then we have her dispatch uniform and its red. This is a clever play actually, it allows the costume team to put Maddie into red, a colour we don't really see on her outside of work (a deliberate choice as it helps distinguish work from non work to the audience). Just like Buck was the angry one in the other Buckley siblings scene, her Maddie is the one who is angry (with good reason) and we again get Buck recieving education at he hands of Maddie - in her place of work where she is a lifeline to people and where she holds authority. Buck needed her in a lifeline capacity in this moment and he got it, despite her anger. She gave him the advice and help he needed.

Eddie

Eddie my man looking suave and confident - this Eddie is Bucks version of Eddie so of course he looks cool, well dressed and in a green and black combo. In nearly every scene where Eddie nad Buck have a deep meaningful conversation - one that gets through to Buck on a higher level - that works on Bucks abandonment complex, Eddie is dressed in a black shirt and khaki green trousers (the only exception is the will reveal when he's in navy blue but that is to play in the yellow blue colour theming and its a close to black as they could have a blue!), this outfit is an inverse though, which is actually really clever. Eddie (Bucks version) here is playing into Bucks fear of abandonment - Bucks version of Eddie has spent so long building him up and chipping away at that fear that to invert that colour theme and have green on top and black trousers is a fun way of inverting that chipping away at Bucks fear - this is putting another brick in that abandonment wall

The black tank top!! Its back and everybody cheered! Ok so I wrote this meta about when the show puts Eddie into a black tank top and how it means he's in an emotionally vulnerable place and once more, the theory plays out. Obviously Eddie gets physically injured, but his face when he looks at Buck after he's gone down shows him emotionally vulnerable. Yes there is a little bit of anger and a lot of pain in the look he gives him, but there is also understanding and a little guilt too.

It's the moment Eddie realises that he has unintentionally sidelined his best friend, and the effect that has had on Buck and his abandonment issues. This is Eddie showing his truly deep understanding of Buck and how Buck ticks (and because this is also from Bucks pov, its also showing us Buck understanding that Eddie understands how Buck ticks) we get all of this proven when Tommy comes over to Bucks later and clearly states that Eddie is feeling bad about the whole situation.

It is also worth noting that When Buck has seen Eddie at the gym or being sporty in some way Eddie has either been in uniform or in a black singlet and that he always looks super competent (even if he is working through things when he is in the black singlet). From my perspective, this is an interesting choice to play into because it suggests Buck recognises Eddies emotional maturity over him, even when he's not in a great place (we can discount fight club Eddie becasue Buck didn't actually see him there), its clearly something Buck admires and places as central to how he sees Eddie.

Tommy

Tommys costuming is chefs kiss perfection to me. The wardrobe department have literally dressed him as Eddie and I am living for it.

Its a way to emphasise that Tommy and Eddie are super similar. this serves two purposes - it builds a visual connection for the audience - we don't need to be shown Tommy in the army or fighting/ training in Muay Thai etc, we can mentally make a connection to the ones we've seen of Eddies in the past and accept the information as fact. obviously not all people who join the army or undertake MMA are going to dress the same, but this is television where visual information is valuable real estate, so playing into tropes and stereotypes is a key piece of arsenal.

The other thing about it is the specific Eddies its calling back to - fight club Eddie and to a lesser extent, post breakdown Eddie when he's back in therapy and unrepressing himself.

Tommys basketball outfit is really about making him stand out from everyone else - it makes him seem to appear more because the blue shorts and the light coloured top will catch your eye, even if he's not the focus of the camera at that moment. This is all about the fact that this is Bucks perspective on things - he is seeing Tommy everywhere and feeling like he's taking over/ taking away Eddie and so we the audience feel that same thing in a visual way. The thing the blue shorts do is visually connect Tommy to buck in the next scene we see Buck in - when he is talking to Maddie at dispatch - the blues are similar enough for us to subconsciously connect back to that scene and link Buck and Tommy together rather than Buck to Eddie - who Buck is dressed more similarly too in the basketball scene.

It doesn't hurt that the blue shorts also play into yellow blue theory - especially against the sunsets yellow hues in a scene that is playing homage to a famously queer coded scene from Top gun.

Then there is this outfit from Bucks loft. again is very similar to an Eddie outfit - its the same style of shirt we often see Eddie wearing especially in seasons 4 and 5.

Tommys jeans have always been reminiscent of Eddies Jeans (I mean I know they are jeans, but I promise the significance will become clear when I get to Buck!)

Even Tommys watch is similar to Eddies Christopher watch (every other watch in the show worn by the men is all black - black strap black face and mount only the Christopher watch is different) in that it has a different coloured strap to the watch face and its mount.

The other thing I want to mention quick, is the progression of Tommys costumes in relation to them being similar to Eddies. By this I mean the first non uniform costume we see Tommy in is very stage 2 Eddie, while the one below is very much more stage 3 Eddie.

I also really like the use of a purple/red/black shot tee for this scene as well. If you watch the scene through, the way its lit changes its colour as different sections of the scene unfold. The red tones are there early on, during the apology and conversation around Eddie being allowed to have more than one friend and Christophers adoration of Buck. it gives it that air of danger lurking, because Tommy isn't sure how things are going to play out. and plays into the red/blue theme we saw with Buck and Maddie in this episode - just on a much lower level.

Then it turns this purplish shade as we move into the initial stages of flirting - from the moment Buck moves around the counter to put himself in the same space as Tommy. It gives things an air of mystery, but purple can also be a colour of enlightenment - both elements are in play here and I love they were able to do this with this shirt.

The shirt turns black at the moment Tommy says 'my attention' - the moment he essentially hold all the cards on making a move - he is the one with the power here (as the already queer person in the room) and black is a power colour, so its the perfect choice for the moment he makes his move.

Buck

Buck my beloved bi disaster. His costumes were doing some pretty impressive storytelling this episode!

We start off at the air field - I spoke at the start about this LAFD jacket and the theme of protection, but I also have other things to say about it and the rest of the costume. We don't generally see Buck out of work wearing uniform (we actually don't see many of the firefam in uniform out of work tbh) so when we do its going to have meaning. T

he thing with the bomber jacket being the choice (they could've made it a hoodie which we've seen him wear out of work more!) is that on one level plays into its name and the fact that its being worn at an airfield, while on another level it low key plays into the Buck cheating arc. which is actually fun - the idea that he's 'cheating' on the 118 by claiming he's thinking about his career options and also cheating on Eddie by trying to befriend Tommy (because at this point that is all it is its only once Eddie appears that things change).

The trousers are also important. I know I've said before about how trousers are less important than tops because they are less likely to get screen time. We not here - here they are really important, but only with the context of the rest of the episode.

These are the short in the leg dark trousers we've come to know and love on Buck - he's been solidly wearing them since season 2 and what we have seen him wearing so far in season 7 so no surprises to see them here. But this is the last time we see them and its super important and telling.

We also have Bucks white trainers - the ones that he wears when he moves forward on his journey - we see him in them the entire time this episode.

Buck and Maddie this episode have a red v blue thing going on in their scenes together. In this one Buck is in red and Maddie in blue. I spoke about the red for danger theme they seem to be using this season for the red clothes above in Athenas section and it applies here - Buck in red is foreshadowing the danger/strife that the basketball game presents as that is what he is talking about and what he is most upset about over Tommy and Eddies friendship.

It's a slightly burnt out red in comparison to Bobbys red shirt from the cruise, Athenas red cardigan, or even the red he wore when Eddie had his breakdown. Its not a full high alert colour, its a more muted and restrained colour - suggesting the danger is going to be less of a big thing, that it's just a part of it rather than the main big thing

We can also see that Buck is now wearing more traditional stonewash jeans - this is the first time we're seeing them on him since Eddies arrival at the fire house. I'll explain them in more detail in Bucks last outfit of the episode, but I needed to point their presence out here.

Basketball Buck in his white shirt and dark blue marl cut off tee - its very Buck posturing at the firehouse gym and its meant to be. Its a direct reference to the last time Buck showed any jealousy towards Eddie. The shorts are different this time in that they're white/light grey rather than black, but I think this is done for two reasons - it creates a pairing with Eddie - they are dressed similarly with dark tops and lighter grey shorts, but on opposite teams/sides.

It also makes him stand out from everyone else at the game - excepting Tommy (and a random guy in a red top with white shorts that I'm living for. When Red = foreshadowing as I've talked about above, this guys actions on the court are precursors of what is about to happen - we see him bump into Tommy - a couple of moments later and Buck does the same thing, then just before Eddie gets taken out by Buck, he gets breezed past by Eddie stumbles and starts limping. Its fun and clever and not something many people will pick up on - its a bit like the role of the bullet in Hamilton!)

Bucks bright blue chunky corduroy shirt with white tee underneath. I already spoke about the visual connection between Tommy from the basketball game and this shirt. It also fits into the red and blue theme I spoke about above - this time Buck is the one in blue and with the combination of Buck in his danger incoming white shirt and Maddie being in red it signals exactly what this scene is going to be about.

The danger, in my opinion, is Maddies wrath at Buck getting physical with Eddie. Its a perfectly valid and important response from her and plays into the growth we get from Buck in this episode that is not connected to his bi awakening - the recognition and acceptance of his bad behaviour in a far more mature way than we saw from s3 Buck.

The chunky corduroy give the shirt vertical stripes and we all know how I feel about Buck and vertical stripes at this point - I wrote about them a lot in my seasons 5 and 6 metas and the blue and white nature of bucks outfit plays into the theming that was at play in early season 6 - where Buck was free from Taylor and resisting buying a couch because he was looking for the right couch etc. (and playing house husband to Eddie nad feeding them!!!)

Here in this episode we kind of have Buck going through a similar process - free from the shackles of death and trying to figure things out - who he is and what he wants, he's still on that hamster wheel in many ways at this point in the episode but he is about to jump off it.

This is the key to happiness and Lev's advice and the year of yes scene 2.0 - the same shade of blue are at play here. Lev figuring it out ('I get it now') just as he's dying and Buck then trying to figure out what Lev had figured out and essentially failing before he died only to now get it and free himself is a blue thread we've been following through season 6 up to bucks death, then the use of this shade of blue in Bucks costumes tailed off - we saw it reappear a couple of times after the lightening strike - specifically around Natalia and his continues flirtation with death - almost like his hovering around death was him trying to grasp what Lev had figured out.

Then the blue had been gone again only for it to reappear here in this episode in a scene that precedes Bucks bi awakening and his comments about being free and 'yeah that works' with their double meanings that play in the same way as lev's 'I think i get it now' just without death coming immediately after. It's a scene when he starts to get an inkling on what his jealousy is actually about. (The fact we know he's going to be back in this bright blue in the next episode in a scene with Eddie - that is very likely a coming out scene also plays into this idea.)

And the stone wash jeans are once more there for all to see!

Then we get this dark navy blue shirt with silvery white dots and yet again those stone wash jeans.

Ok lets talk about the jeans! The fact that we haven't seen Buck wearing stone wash jeans, which if you watch the opening couple of seconds of the dispatch scene, you will see are proper normal length on him and not ankle swingers like we've got used to seeing him in for the last few seasons!

The thing with him suddenly wearing these stonewash jeans is all about imitation - imitation of Tommy (and by extension, imitation of Eddie even though we don't see Eddie in stonewash denim in this episode) because you know that old adage of dressing like the person you want to be , or the idea that you subconsciously start dressing like the person you have a crush one?? Well yeah - Buck has all these new feelings that he doesn't know what to do with, but Tommy is cool and Tommy dresses like Eddie and Eddie seems to like Tommy better than Buck now so maybe if Buck starts dressing a bit like Tommy he'lI get Eddies attention back. So he's pulled out the stone wash jeans so that he's dressed a bit more like Tommy, but he's also dressing a bit like his crush that he doesn't yet realise is a crush.

The other small thing that I think is a nice nod - So Like I said earlier, the last time we see the jeans is in 2x01 - Eddies introduction to the firehouse. This is the moment (on screen at least for us as viewers) that Buck ceases to be the probie - that baton is passed to Eddie, so its almost like a symbol of him graduating and maturing in some way. then we get the jeans back for Bucks bi awakening - we see them the entire time he's navigating all these new feelings he has - he's never been with a man, so he's like a probie again.

The thing is, that the jeans appear to be gone for his date with Tommy (makes sense - he's on a date so he's got to look good for his man!) , and from what I can tell from the (super dark even when brightened) stills from the Buck Eddie loft scene, it would appear they are gone for that scene too. We've had bts of Oliver in the jeans again, so I don't think they're gone completely, but that makes sense, he's still a baby queer after all, still navigating his way through things.

On to the shirt! I wrote a whole meta about this shirt (and the jeans actually!) when we first got this still - you can read it here and I'm still a little awestruck at how close to the mark I got!

What I want to add to what I said, now I have context is that the two previous times we've seen blue shirts with dots are played upon in this scene - the lawsuit is the obvious one and the parallel is showing Bucks growth - he got jealous and worried about being replaced and ended up lashing out and suing everyone, now he got jealous and thought he was being replaced, but as soon as he lashes out, he realises he is in the wrong and verbally acknowledges it.

The diner with Maddie scene is a bit more tricky to parse out, but for me, it ties to Doug - Maddie is quick to call Buck out when he confesses to Eddies injury not being an accident, because of her experiences at the hands of Doug. In the diner scene she is determined to go back to her apartment and her life in the aftermath of killing him - she wants life to go back to normal. In the loft scene Buck is trying to achieve that end too - he's in a new world where Tommy exists as part of his life now (as Eddies friend initially) and he wants to clear the air and move forward - so he's still a part of Eddies life.

I also want to talk about the contrast between this scene and the one where Taylor turns up at his door after the shooting and the difference between being chased and doing the chasing. Its spots v stripes!

Buck is in a similar shirt - short sleeved button up in a dark shade (black) - this one with vertical stripes for the Taylor scene and he thinks he's being chased for the first (ish) time (Abby sort of chased him but he is the one who pushed for it to be a relationship when I think she just wanted a bit of fun and a hook up! so I'm not sure if it actually counts or not). Thing is Taylor only chases him after they've already kissed and when he's then made it clear thats what needs to happen. (as an aside - Natalia does pursue Buck - not romantically, but because he has died - and she is the one wearing vertical stripes

While in this scene he doesn't have to say anything, yes he flirts, but he isn't explicit about what hewants - Tommy is the one who makes the decision to go for it, and so when he genuinely gets pursued, he is wearing dots

Chased verse's doing the chasing - dots v stripes

Then we have the Pink.

Pink is back in full force in 7x04 with it popping up regularly throughout the episode.

I didn't include Athenas pink dressing gown or Bucks pink shorts in their sections because I actually wanted to talk about them here. The context the scenes they were in gave me the information I needed to figure out what I think the purpose of all the pink we've been seeing is.

Lets start with a quick recap of all the pink from the 3 previous episodes then we'll look at the pink from this episode as well as the fact I've already spotted some for 7x05 from the trailer

7x01

Athena's pale pink top in therapy with Frank

Sue at dispatch in a pink cardigan

Christophers pencil is pink when he's sat at his desk - when he reads the letter from Shannon

Marisol in her bright pink strappy top

Lola's Manzanillo outfit is bright pink and white

Norman has pink flowers on his Hawaiian shirt and he later wears a bright pink polo shirt when he's pretending Lola is still with him.

7x02

the woman who is teaching her daughter to drive

the pink roses on Hen's jacket (which I know I said play into the theme of family bonds etc but the pink has a second meaning)

7x03

The cruise ship family nearly all wear pink at various points (grandma and mom are the exceptions)

and now 7x04

We have Ashley C in hot pink at the Bachelor mansion

Athena in her dusty pink ddressing gown (and pyjama pants

The woman who shot her son is in pink

And then there are Bucks pink shorts!

All of these scenes with the pink are scenes about either naivety and or innocence

The pink on Athena is about her being naive about her relationship with Bobby - not recognising that she is nothing to fear about them spending time together.

Sues pink cardigan. Sue's line is about the civilians at risk from the fighter jet - she is representing their innocence

Christophers pink pencil - in that scene his behaviour might be naive (he's a child so of course it is) but it comes from a place of complicated feelings as he does begin to mature - he was the innocent party in the loss of Shannon and he is the one left to suffer.

Lola is naive on the ship about having an affair and thinking she could get away with it and that it wouldn't hurt Norman. She’s also innocent in the plot regarding the bitcoin (or whatever it was)

Norman is also both naive and innocent - not recognising the fact his wife is cheating, for selling up their entire life and he is innocent in the bitcoin plot.

The mother and daughter were innocent in the car crash.

the pink flowers on Hens jacket hint at her being innocent of any wrong doing (from a departmental perspective) at the car accident.

The cruise family are innocent - just in the wrong place at rhetorical wrong time and they are a representation of all the innocent people on the boat who end up in danger on that ship.

I think the Marisol top is an interesting one - it plays into Chris being naïve thinking he can date multiple girls without them finding out. But I also think it’s foreshadowing her naivety in general - I think we might either see her immaturity in some way (perhaps on a date with Eddie) which will prove terminal for her relationship with Eddie. Now we know about this date scene coming up this is possible but it could also end up being about the fact that she is likely going to be an innocent party caught in the crossfire of Eddie unrepressing himself (much in the same way Ana was back in s4/5.

Ashely C's pink dress is a representation of the innocence of trying to find love.

Athena's pink dressing gown is about her innocently and blindly/ naively being excited about Harrys return home to her.

The lady who shot her son is innocent in that her actions were brought about by something out of her control and so she can't truly be held responsible for them.

Then Bucks pink shorts are about his queer innocence and naivety about his feelings the fact that we see them in a scene where Tommy isn’t present, a scene that is meant to inform the audience that his behaviours is all about Eddie and not Tommy - that he’s naively not grasping that part of this internal confusion that he's experiencing.

To add to all of this, we have Marisol carrying a pink bag in the teaser for next week, to me if pink theory is correct then this is playing into the idea that Marisol is naively dating Eddie and that she's going to be an innocent caught up in whatever goes down in that scene (part of this arc) the use of lighter pink here specifically on a handbag is giving me babyish vibes as well (its screaming little girl playing at dress up!). As a quick aside - I am very amused that shes been dressed in a basic black top - she looks like wait staff!

And of course there is Eddies pink ensemble that is connected to either Chims bachelor party or the Madney Wedding. I have no idea what is going to happen in this scene(s) but whatever does go down - place your bets on Eddie being innocent (and or naive!) in whatever goes on - itll be fun to see if I'm right! 🤓

Right 7k later and that is me done for this meta!!! I am handing out the tea, coffee, cake and biscuits (all dietary requirements catered for!)🫖☕️🧁🍩🍪- you've earnt them if you've made it to the end of this monster! Hope you enjoyed reading. i'm off to revel in Bi Buck some more - I can't believe its happened I'm overcome!!! 🩷💜💙

Tagged peeps as always are below!

@theladyyavilee @mistmarauder @xxfiction-is-my-realityxx @bewilderedbuckley @spotsandsocks @bewitchedbewilderedbisexual @rogerzsteven @wanderingwomanwondering @oneawkwardcookie @leothill @copyninjabuckley @shammers86 @crazyfangirlallert @missmagooglie @katyobsesses @radiation-run @gayandbifiremenofmine @bi-moonlight @crazyaboutotps @princesschez75 @alliaskisthepossibilityoflove @sherlocking-out-loud @tommykinarddd @satashiiwrites @lover-of-mine

(if the tags don't work its because people have changed their url (very valid of you!) and I didn't know, so let me know if you want tagging in future in the comments so I can catch the new urls!

[sneezypeasy]

Why I Deliberately Avoided the "Colonizer" Argument in my Zutara Thesis - and Why I'll Continue to Avoid it Forever

This is a question that occasionally comes up under my Zutara video essay, because somehow in 2 hours worth of content I still didn't manage to address everything (lol.) But this argument specifically is one I made a point of avoiding entirely, and there are some slightly complicated reasons behind that. I figure I'll write them all out here.

From a surface-level perspective, Zuko's whole arc, his raison d'etre, is to be a de-colonizer. Zuko's redemption arc is kinda all about being a de-colonizer, and his redemption arc is probably like the most talked about plot point of ATLA, so from a basic media literacy standpoint, the whole argument is unsound in the first place, and on that basis alone I find it childish to even entertain as an argument worth engaging with, to be honest.

(At least one person in my comments pointed out that if any ship's "political implications" are problematic in some way, it really ought to be Maiko, as Mai herself is never shown or suggested to be a strong candidate for being a de-colonizing co-ruler alongside Zuko. If anything her attitudes towards lording over servants/underlings would make her… a less than suitable choice for this role, but I digress.)

But the reason I avoided rebutting this particular argument in my video goes deeper than that. From what I've observed of fandom discourse, I find that the colonizer argument is usually an attempt to smear the ship as "problematic" - i.e., this ship is an immoral dynamic, which would make it problematic to depict as canon (and by extension, if you ship it regardless, you're probably problematic yourself.)

And here is where I end up taking a stand that differentiates me from the more authoritarian sectors of fandom.

I'm not here to be the fandom morality police. When it comes to lit crit, I'm really just here to talk about good vs. bad writing. (And when I say "good", I mean structurally sound, thematically cohesive, etc; works that are well-written - I don't mean works that are morally virtuous. More on this in a minute.) So the whole colonizer angle isn't something I'm interested in discussing, for the same reason that I actually avoided discussing Katara "mothering" Aang or the "problematic" aspects of the Kataang ship (such as how he kissed her twice without her consent). My whole entire sections on "Kataang bad" or "Maiko bad" in my 2 hour video was specifically, "how are they written in a way that did a disservice to the story", and "how making them false leads would have created valuable meaning". I deliberately avoided making an argument that consisted purely of, "here's how Kataang/Maiko toxic and Zutara wholesome, hence Zutara superiority, the end".

Why am I not willing to be the fandom morality police? Two reasons:

I don't really have a refined take on these subjects anyway. Unless a piece of literature or art happens to touch on a particular issue that resonates with me personally, the moral value of art is something that doesn't usually spark my interest, so I rarely have much to say on it to begin with. On the whole "colonizer ship" subject specifically, other people who have more passion and knowledge than me on the topic can (and have) put their arguments into words far better than I ever could. I'm more than happy to defer to their take(s), because honestly, they can do these subjects justice in a way I can't. Passing the mic over to someone else is the most responsible thing I can do here, lol. But more importantly:

I reject the conflation of literary merit with moral virtue. It is my opinion that a good story well-told is not always, and does not have to be, a story free from moral vices/questionable themes. In my opinion, there are good problematic stories and bad "pure" stories and literally everything in between. To go one step further, I believe that there are ways that a romance can come off "icky", and then there are ways that it might actually be bad for the story, and meming/shitposting aside, the fact that these two things don't always neatly align is not only a truth I recognise about art but also one of those truths that makes art incredibly interesting to me! So on the one hand, I don't think it is either fair or accurate to conflate literary "goodness" with moral "goodness". On a more serious note, I not only find this type of conflation unfair/inaccurate, I also find it potentially dangerous - and this is why I am really critical of this mindset beyond just disagreeing with it factually. What I see is that people who espouse this rhetoric tend to encourage (or even personally engage in) wilful blindness one way or the other, because ultimately, viewing art through these lens ends up boxing all art into either "morally permissible" or "morally impermissible" categories, and shames anyone enjoying art in the "morally impermissible" box. Unfortunately, I see a lot of people responding to this by A) making excuses for art that they guiltily love despite its problematic elements and/or B) denying the value of any art that they are unable to defend as free from moral wickedness.

Now, I'm not saying that media shouldn't be critiqued on its moral virtue. I actually think morally critiquing art has its place, and assuming it's being done in good faith, it absolutely should be done, and probably even more often than it is now.

Because here's the truth: Sometimes, a story can be really good. Sometimes, you can have a genuinely amazing story with well developed characters and powerful themes that resonate deeply with anyone who reads it. Sometimes, a story can be all of these things - and still be problematic.*

(Or, sometimes a story can be all of those things, and still be written by a problematic author.)

That's why I say, when people conflate moral art with good art, they become blind to the possibility that the art they like being potentially immoral (or vice versa). If only "bad art" is immoral, how can the art that tells the story hitting all the right beats and with perfect rhythm and emotional depth, be ever problematic?

(And how can the art I love, be ever problematic?)

This is why I reject the idea that literary merit = moral virtue (or vice versa) - because I do care about holding art accountable. Even the art that is "good art". Actually, especially the art that is "good art". Especially the art that is well loved and respected and appreciated. The failure to distinguish literary critique from moral critique bothers me on a personal level because I think that conflating the two results in the detriment of both - the latter being the most concerning to me, actually.

So while I respect the inherent value of moral criticism, I'm really not a fan of any argument that presents moral criticism as equivalent to literary criticism, and I will call that out when I see it. And from what I've observed, a lot of the "but Zutara is a colonizer ship" tries to do exactly that, which is why I find it a dishonest and frankly harmful media analysis framework to begin with.

But even when it is done in good faith, moral criticism of art is also just something I personally am neither interested nor good at talking about, and I prefer to talk about the things that I am interested and good at talking about.

(And some people are genuinely good at tackling the moral side of things! I mean, I for one really enjoyed Lindsay Ellis's take on Rent contextualising it within the broader political landscape at the time to show how it's not the progressive queer story it might otherwise appear to be. Moral critique has value, and has its place, and there are definitely circumstances where it can lead to societal progress. Just because I'm not personally interested in addressing it doesn't mean nobody else can do it let alone that nobody else should do it, but also, just because it can and should be done, doesn't mean that it's the only "one true way" to approach lit crit by anyone ever. You know, sometimes... two things… can be true… at once?)

Anyway, if anyone reading this far has recognised that this is basically a variant of the proship vs. antiship debate, you're right, it is. And on that note, I'm just going to leave some links here. I've said about as much as I'm willing/able to say on this subject, but in case anyone is interested in delving deeper into the philosophy behind my convictions, including why I believe leftist authoritarian rhetoric is harmful, and why the whole "but it would be problematic in real life" is an anti-ship argument that doesn't always hold up to scrutiny, I highly recommend these posts/threads:

In general this blog is pretty solid; I agree with almost all of their takes - though they focus more specifically on fanfic/fanart than mainstream media, and I think quite a lot of their arguments are at least somewhat appropriate to extrapolate to mainstream media as well.

I also strongly recommend Bob Altemeyer's book "The Authoritarians" which the author, a verified giga chad, actually made free to download as a pdf, here. His work focuses primarily on right-wing authoritarians, but a lot of his research and conclusions are, you guessed it, applicable to left-wing authoritarians also.

And if you're an anti yourself, welp, you won't find support from me here. This is not an anti-ship safe space, sorrynotsorry 👆

In conclusion, honestly any "but Zutara is problematic" argument is one I'm likely to consider unsound to begin with, let alone the "Zutara is a colonizer ship" argument - but even if it wasn't, it's not something I'm interested in discussing, even if I recognise there are contexts where these discussions have value. I resent the idea that just because I have refined opinions on one aspect of a discussion means I must have (and be willing to preach) refined opinions on all aspects of said discussion. (I don't mean to sound reproachful here - actually the vast majority of the comments I get on my video/tumblr are really sweet and respectful, but I do get a handful of silly comments here and there and I'm at the point where I do feel like this is something worth saying.) Anyway, I'm quite happy to defer to other analysts who have the passion and knowledge to give complicated topics the justice they deserve. All I request is that care is taken not to conflate literary criticism with moral criticism to the detriment of both - and I think it's important to acknowledge when that is indeed happening. And respectfully, don't expect me to give my own take on the matter when other people are already willing and able to put their thoughts into words so much better than me. Peace ✌

*P.S. This works for real life too, by the way. There are people out there who are genuinely not only charming and likeable, but also generous, charitable and warm to the vast majority of the people they know. They may also be amazing at their work, and if they have a job that involves saving lives like firefighting or surgery or w.e, they may even be the reason dozens of people are still alive today. They may honestly do a lot of things you'd have to concede are "good" deeds.

They may be all of these things, and still be someone's abuser. 🙃

Two things can be true at once. It's important never to forget that.

[aizenify]

[💌] AIZEN SŌSUKE RELATIONSHIP HEADCANNONS

[NOTE]: Aizen has a variety of character arcs, so this won't be limited to any specific one. I do plan to create a more detailed version covering the different Aizen arcs in the future, but you're welcome to request any specific one in the meantime.

[ ☕️ ] My ask box is open! If you have a specific prompt you'd like me to write about—whether it's relationships, everyday activities, or anything else—don't hesitate to ask! I encourage you to suggest whatever your heart desires.

TW: none!

This will be split into 2 sections

What does Aizen look for?

— If you were Aizen’s partner, you’d definitely be someone very special to him. Looks wouldn’t be as important; rather, it would be your personality and ideologies that matter most.

— For instance, Aizen values someone who enjoys challenges and is willing to take risks. He’s all for that, but, of course, you’d also need to be cautious at times.

— Aizen greatly appreciates a deep understanding of the world. I like to think that he and his partner would engage in philosophical conversations daily. He’d want someone to explore the world with, to venture into new places, and try new experiences. Aizen definitely strikes me as the type to enjoy travel.

— He would want someone who challenges him. Given who Aizen is, he wouldn’t be interested in a partner who is passive or follows the crowd. He wants someone who will challenge his ideas, his ethics, and his worldview. He seeks someone who is on the same intellectual level, someone equal to him, or perhaps even better. This is something he has always longed for.

— I believe Aizen is sapiosexual, meaning he is attracted to people with high intelligence, and also likely demisexual or somewhere on the aromantic/asexual spectrum. He deeply values intelligence and personal space. For him, the sexual aspects of a relationship would not be his focus; instead, he values the fundamentals. His understanding of "love" is more complex than that of most people.

— Building on what I mentioned about his view on love, you would also need to respect his needs and be patient. Trust is essential here. Aizen doesn’t easily trust anyone, so the idea of him loving someone would make him feel extremely vulnerable. While he views trust as a form of reliance, his approach to trust in relationships is different. His way of showing trust and love will likely be expressed through his actions. Perhaps after Muken, Aizen would become more open and free. Muken Aizen, after all, is much more carefree and relaxed.

I’ll keep this section as is since it’s getting long. I’ll leave the rest for another day!

What will Aizen be like with his S/O?

— Aizen would likely ask for your thoughts on his plans or if you have any alternative suggestions for execution. He enjoys the sound of his own voice, so don’t be surprised if he rambles on about his strategies or just shares his thoughts from time to time.

— He will shower his partner with gifts and words of affirmation. Aizen is incredibly attentive and will take note of even the smallest details about what you like, even if you haven’t explicitly told him.

— Quality time will be very important to him as well. Despite his preference for solitude, having someone by his side will be a refreshing change. After being alone for so long, it’s natural to crave companionship. Aizen will likely plan a variety of activities for you both to enjoy together, whether it’s shopping, cooking, or simply taking a walk. Every moment with you will be meaningful.

— Physical touch is something Aizen might find unfamiliar at first. He’s used to being cautious with those around him, especially with anyone who gets too close. However, I think he would offer hugs from time to time as a way to show that he’s there for you and cares for you. If he knows you enjoy physical affection, he’ll make an effort to meet that need, even if it takes him a while to become fully comfortable with it!

— Expect a lot of playful bantering. Aizen seems like He enjoys a bit of lighthearted back-and-forth.

— Aizen will take you out on extravagant dates or to fancy venues. He is undoubtedly classy and chivalrous, he will treat you with the utmost respect and make sure you always get the best of everything!

That’s all for now! Thank you for reading!!! This is my first published hc 🧡🤎☕️

[robogalaxies]

☎️ - The Unneeded But Happily Researched Crumbs Of Everything We Know About The Commissioner

“If anything happens… I’ll deny I ever knew you.”

The Commissioner is, as we all know, a mystery, and I hope it stays that way, but I put it upon myself to wrangle every little tidbit of information we have on him outside of giving cases! I do this solely because of three things:

I have nothing better to do

I find myself strangely endeared to his character (i.e. I do a gay little "favorite character" clap every time I hear him mentioned)

I want to share all my random knowledge with you all because I go digging for it in every S&M media there is

I'll be dividing this up into 4 sections for ease of access: comics lore, games lore (HtR, Telltale, TTIV), cartoon lore, and misc. lore. Some things MAY be assumptions based on other characters' reactions to what he MIGHT be saying or say about him, sure, but I will source all information on where to find it & provide images when they can be easily provided!~ If anything new comes up or I have forgotten something, I'll update. Until then... hope you love both hyperlinks and "at least I laughed at it" style commentary! ☎️

Comics Lore

The introduction of The Commissioner, as with everyone else! Small tidbits of his quite understated character outside of being The Phone are here, obviously, including:

the Commissioner's one and only speech bubble! (Bad Day on The Moon)

the beginnings of the implied "I love you" statements towards Sam & Max with an "XOXO" on a postcard (Bad Day on The Moon)

he shows SOME disdain towards Sam & Max's attitudes towards achieving their goals, being the one specifically to tell them to go on a road trip (On the Road #1, "Prisoners of The Casbah")

Games Lore

Hit the Road

The Commissioner is barely a character in this game (big surprise, right?) and you do not get much information on him minus the bare minimum of "he is Sam & Max's boss," so there's not much to be said here. In fact, I don't know why I mentioned it. Great game, though, go play it! Now! I'll wait until you get back :)

Save The World

Welcome back! There're only minor silly tidbits here, but they're needed for this comprehensive list. Everything is worth mentioning about a character with nothing to his name but "The Commissioner." I mean, you're reading this post, right?

wears bifocals! 👓 ("The Mole, The Mob, and The Meatball")

was once in contact with & worked with Harry Moleman, as he sent him to be the mole for the Toy Mafia. Crossover of the century... I wonder if he knows how far poor Harry has fallen ("The Mole, The Mob, and The Meatball")

Takes Sam & Max out for dinner sometimes, apparently, if they do well enough on their cases! Squirrel Garden sounds disgusting, but I'd be jazzed too if they also had the free breadsticks ("The Mole, The Mob, and The Meatball")

likely just a quick jab, so I don't really know why I'm putting it here other than humor, but Max apparently doesn't trust him! I hope that gets solved; Commissioner is sorta signing his meager paychecks ("Bright Side of The Moon")

Beyond Time and Space

The middle child of the Telltale trilogy, this game has barely anything in terms of tidbits given that he really only assigns the beginning cases in 1 out of 5 episodes, and even then, that doesn't give a single thing away. Despite this, there's gotta be one or two tidbits we should learn, right? Sure!

is aware of Sam's insistence on answering the phone & seemingly asks straight up why he didn't answer (What's Up, Beelzebub?)

Can confirm an "I love you" towards Max... d'aww! (What's Up, Beelzebub?)

The Devil's Playhouse

The Commissioner barely shows up or is referenced in this game, mainly due to the story existing outside of the common framing of "assigning cases," but we learn two small yet revealing tidbits:

British Columbian! 🇨🇦 (The City That Dares Not Sleep)

Has provided books on cultural and racial sensitivity for Sam & Max because they kept "reducing people to obvious stereotypes." (The City That Dares Not Sleep)

This Time, It's Virtual!

The phone exists yet again... but in your VR HEADSET! Some fairly funny Commissioner lore in this one even if you, like almost everyone I've seen in this fandom, dislike or even hate this game:

His family is in hiding, and I'm assuming Witness Protection?! Must come with the territory (phone call after completing first three Freelance Training segments in-game)

Can confirm an "I love you" of some sort said to Sam ... d'aww! (phone call after completing first three Freelance Training segments in-game)

Signs off even official, legal wanted posters with "The Commissioner," asking people to seek the help of Freelance Police & associates himself as PART of the Freelance Police!

signs your certificate at the end of the game, which mentions the Illuminati in conjunction with his name for some reason! What kind of policing are we running here....??

Cartoon Lore

Truly, the 90s cartoon is where most Commissioner lore lies if we take into consideration all of these happen within the same universe, which we likely shouldn't. This being said, the cartoon provides us with the only picture we have of the guy (see post photo above the cut). Alongside this, we also get a LOT more information than any other media:

before we even start the information in the ACTUAL cartoon, Sam & Max say within the show's initial Bible believe he's out to kill them, in some way, saying they're the "troubled, ungrateful sons he never had." That's so sweet ... in a way. As well, there's a very small section dedicated to the Commissioner as a character, though not much is said that we don't already know (Sam & Max Cartoon Series Bible)

has Geek's number, or at least a number to the Sub-Basment of Solitude, as he calls it more than once over the course of the series, which makes me wonder how well he may or may not know Geek! Like a grandniece or something (episodes 1, "The Thing That Wouldn't Stop It" & 3b, "They Came from Down There")

cried over the story of Sam & Max having to get rid of John, their beloved alligator son... must be a shared parental instinct (episode 6a, "That Darn Gator")

apparently sends sticker books in case briefings on a semi-regular basis, as Sam comments that he "loves when the Commissioner does that" as if it has happened before - how whimsical! (episode 6b, "We Drop at Dawn")

confirms the Commissioner as a legitimate police commissioner alongside being Sam & Max's boss (episode 6b, "We Drop at Dawn")

seemingly very fussy if not given his private bathroom and honor bar. Fancy stuff, Commissioner, & he apparently allows Sam and Max up there! Or not, they just sorta bust in. Whatever! Sharing is caring (episode 6b, "We Drop at Dawn")

the Commissioner has a DAUGHTER! and somehow, Sam & Max got invited to her WEDDING! I think she's beautiful and I hope she doesn't resent her special day getting ruined (episode 11a, "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang")

that iconic, signed, chest only photo given with the solemn, loving, promise of "If anything ever happens, I'll deny I ever knew you," followed by Max crying that it's "It's just... so him." - what a loving, tender and slightly bordering on oddly familial relationship he has with Sam and Max... stop, I'll start crying! (episode 13, "The Final Episode")

Misc. Lore

These are lore tidbits that are present in mediums either outside of the media itself, belong in a game that is not technically part of the larger S&M canon, or has to do with out of media context, but should be included anyway because why not!

gifts Sam & Max a new floaty pen from a different United State every Christmas ... but not really anything else! (Poker Night 2)

Sam & Max discuss the Commissioner's power in response to doubt about his existence, claiming "Don’t you know he’s everywhere? He knows we’re talking about him right now!" - which is sort of scary, but I'll let it slide because it implies that the Commissioner's surveillance is of a much higher caliber than we initially thought and that is BANGER (in-character interview for Telltale, found here on Steve Purcell's Sam & Max FB page)

He's affectionate yet surly & I'm sure all those "I love you" statements contribute to that! D'aww... (Skunkape Origin Video)

Voiced by a member of Bay Area Sound, Julian Kwasneski, in the Telltale trilogy! Talked about and even has a LINE recited in this specific developer commentary! We love a mysterious boss who sounds like an adult in Peanuts.

God bless the guy, he had a rash! Does this matter? No. Will it ever matter? Likely not, as it was from the sadly cancelled Sam & Max: Freelance Police trailer. Sighs. At this point, you can tell I'm just adding whatever mentions we get of the guy. Makes me giggle, though.

Conclusion...?

In the end, the Commissioner is a mystery, and always WILL be a mystery. Hell, I sort of never want to know as it will ruin every single thing I have worked so hard to archive, but it is fun to comb through the different canons! Of course, it is likely any of this can be tossed out or considered non-canon in the blink of an eye because Sam & Max always loves to give a middle finger to character details if they don't affect the main plot & likely a lot of these are mere gags. The Commissioner is phone, and always will be only phone. However, it's always in my best interest to try to find ANYTHING to push back the curtain even the tiniest inch, and I hope my efforts were worth it. Now, to sign off, just press that phone! You got it, you got it! ☎️

[slothcapsule]

a collection of things kaeya foreshadowed

(copy pasted directly from reddit) one of the main appeal points in Kaeya for me is just how much potential his character holds, and how that gets proven with every new main story-centric update. Everything Kaeya says holds a certain double meaning, and we only get to find them out when we know more, so I thought I'd compile all the things (that I know of) that Kaeya has foreshadowed or teased in one way or another because I feel like I never see anybody mention how many things he's said before started making more sense after we knew more things?

starting with his story quest (1.0) predicts a couple of things! the first one being the first three nations' plotlines. Dvalin being the 'wicked abyss dragon' and Osial being the 'hydra', then in Inazuma signora being the 'silver-haired banshee' (for those who don't know Signora's lore centres around her actions being motivated by grief over the loss of her husband I'm pretty sure, so she can vaguely check the banshee title off)

These connections were proven further in Sumeru! During the Aranyaka (3.0) quest, specifically in a section called 'The Children of Vimara Village' the traveller is asked to tell three kids stories. Paimon references Kaeya directly and they follow the template of telling the children stories about our feats by following what Kaeya has said.

I won't include the whole dialogue section because it would be too long. But essentially: they tell Iotham about Dvalin, Kavus about Osial, and Sudabeh about Ei and Yae Miko. I believe that might be because Signora's story and ending aren't exactly suitable for children, given that she got executed by one of the 'distinguished ladies' after losing a match to the death against the traveller.

Later in the Caribert quest we meet Kaeya at the start and find out he's the descendant of the Abyss Order's founder, Clothar. Now, stay with me please, I admit that this might be a stretch on my part but I do believe if you squint your eyes it makes sense, but what if I tell you that was also foreshadowed in his story quest?

In his story quest, he talks about his grandfather and the sword he had. at the end of the quest, Kaeya does give us the harbinger of dawn to make up for him tricking us. now, if we take into account the time loop theory (which has been proven to at least some extent with the Aranara and all) and the fact that since Kaeya is a descendant of Clothar and our sibling is the prince/princess of the abyss order which Clothar founded, you could kind of say they're vaguely related, and since all that happened like centuries ago and Kaeya is in his alleged 20's, heck, the abyss twin is basically their grandparent!

It's also worth mentioning that the sword harbinger of dawn could also be tied to Dainsleif, otherwise known as "The Twilight Sword." the description of the sword could be vaguely tied to him as well as one who "failed in his duty".

Of course, that piece of dialogue isn't the only thing that foreshadowed the reveal of Kaeya being related to the Abyss Order's founder or even him being some sort of vague royalty. (Regent, I know, but still they're regents that stepped up and took charge)(For the sake of having consistent sources of where I got info from, the regent thing was confirmed in the 2.7 Hidden Strife event). However, before we knew he was a regent, the Kaeya prince theory was by no means unpopular, and there's a collection of things that allude to it. He has a voice line about Fischl in which he teases how appropriate it'd be for him to be a descendant of a royal person. he's the only blade-carrying Knight of Favonius whose normal attacks start with 'Favonius Bladework'. Instead, his normal attacks are titled 'Ceremonial Bladework'.

I cannot find photos for these which saddens me, but I can swear that his second passive talent was named 'Heart of the Abyss' before it was changed to 'Glacial Heart', and his first constellation was 'Royal Blood' before it was changed to 'excellent blood' both of which were great contributors for the theory. I'd greatly appreciate it if anyone who has the photos could provide them I feel like I'm going crazy, I'm sure I saw photos before but I can only find people talking about it.

and personally, the craziest one in my opinion is his 'More About Kaeya IV' voice line, which actually teased the five sinners of Khaenri'ah that Dainsleif told us about in Bedtime Story (4.7 !!?)

there was some suspicion about the voice line back in 3.5 when we originally met one of the sinners through our sibling's memories, but I thought nothing could be proven by one guy who goes by sinner because well, maybe he called himself that because that's what they're viewed as! and kaya saying that could be coming from a similar place of talking about Khaenri'ahns as sinners because that's the view that led to their downfall or something. but no there's a kind of group actually titled the sinners that mess with things, that Kaeya seems to be fully aware of.

honorable mentions for things that I personally think will also gain relevance at some point:

possibly relating to a Khaenri'ahn tradition about their right eye? he isnt the first one we've seen with something covering his eye.

Owls are closely tied to the Ragnvindr family actually, and I'm pretty sure that the owl of Dragonspine is supposed to like either a fictional made-up thing or something that's never supposed to be seen, i cannot for the life of me remember where i got that from i might be lying but i remember something like that (maybe the dragonspine gliders?)

Not a screenshot because it's just my personal idea, but I will die on this hill: Kaeya's vision backstory states that after Crepus died, Kaeya was overwhelmed with guilt about it, so much so that he actually went to Diluc's doorstep and confessed everything. Diluc was enraged and the two of them fought. Seems straightforward, except it isn't like, at all actually.

There was a side to Kaeya that he kept hidden from the world: In truth, he was an agent of Khaenri'ah, placed in to serve their interests. His father had abandoned him in this strange and unknown land to fulfill this mission, and it was Master Crepus and the city of Mondstadt that had welcomed him with open arms when they found him. If Khaenri'ah and Mondstadt went to war, which side should he support? To whom should he offer his assistance: his birth father, who had ruthlessly abandoned him? Or his adoptive father, who had loved him and raised him? For the longest time, Kaeya had agonized over these impossible questions, caught between the opposing demands of loyalty and duty, faced with an impossible choice between truth and happiness. But now, Crepus' death upset this delicate balance. He felt liberated, but also ashamed of how selfishly he was responding. As an adopted son, he should have saved Crepus, but he had arrived moments too late. As a brother, he should have shared in Diluc's grief, and yet as their father lay dying on the ground, he had hung back behind his brother, that ancient plot running through his mind.

I have two main points that don't make sense to me about this:

He felt guilty about not showing up on time to help Crepus and Diluc, and Crepus dying made him more conflicted than grief-filled because Crepus was one of the main things tying him to Mondstadt. He found himself deliberating 'that ancient plot' literally right there and then, not even as an afterthought. That guilt then made him confess all his secrets to Diluc, literally in the same day. What I think doesn't fully make sense is the fact that Crepus dying doesn't really feel like enough of a reason for him to go spelling all his secrets. I get that he felt guilty about not feeling all full of grief and instead thinking about a personal conflict, but imo that doesn't seem like enough of a reason to spill secrets of the gravity that Kaeya seems to be holding on to, especially on the same day that it happened in the first place. He spent almost no time mulling it over and thinking about whether or not he should tell Diluc or not, it's almost like not telling him right away would've made everything even worse somehow. Which brings me to my second point.

Why was Diluc so upset over what Kaeya had to say? Kaeya said he anticipated his anger, but what could he have possibly said to make Diluc in his state of grief be angry enough to immediately fight with full intent to harm and possibly even kill his brother, the closest person to him other than his father? Kaeya being an agent of Khaenri'ah doesn't seem like enough of a reason for all that I think. Maybe anger and being really upset, especially considering the timing of it all, but drawing their blades against each other? instantly? you could argue the response was that extreme because Diluc wasn't thinking clearly and was mourning, and the fact that Kaeya was lying about his whole identity ever since he stepped foot in the manor might've set him off, and I'd agree honestly. But I still think both of their reactions were incredibly extreme, even with their heightened emotions.

His vision! every faithful Kaeya enthusiast knows that his vision is slightly different from other Mondstadt vision holders, i don't buy that it was just an honest design mistake honestly, it's an easy fix and a weird mistake to make in the first place, and considering who the vision belongs to I think it was very intentional. maybe his vision is fake and his cryo is actually abyss powers or something ooo (also kind of a joke I have no clue)

I made a whole extensive post about Kaeya's design and all the little details in it (check it out you want to soooo bad it's pinned in my profile) but I think one of the things that could be a subtle foreshadowing and tying into the whole paragraph I made is that Kaeya has some vague fatui elements in his outfit! which is a crazy thing imo

This is all I can come up with at the moment. There might be more that I'm forgetting or unaware of, but I think all this is worth keeping in mind. I love Kaeya and he's been my main for three years, ever since I started playing, but I'd be lying if I told you I don't think he's lying to everyone about a whole bunch of things. I think he might be genuinely conflicted about whether he should stay loyal to his origins or the people who have actually raised and taken care of him, but that does not mean he's not privy to a lot more information than he lets on. Kaeya kind of seems like he knows how everything will turn out, everything he says and does is intentional and thought out. I need him dead, or a 5*.

I'd love to hear anything else you think is suspicious or might take on more meaning in the future from Kaeya! also please correct me if im wrong about anything, a lot of these are thoughts that have been circulating in my head for like years atp but i might've forgotten technicalities on some stuff.

[5iyoomi]

3H Leaders With an Overworked S/O

characters: Dimitri, Edelgard, Claude

warnings: none! just fluff

A/N: this kinda bled into an idea I had for them with an insomniac reader so these are sort of a mix of the two things! written for them pre-timeskip and with a gn reader (with one use of dear, darling & sweetheart, but otherwise nothing pointing towards a specific gender). I haven't written for fe3h in forever hopefully they aren't too ooc

Word Count: 1,770

‎

Dimitri

Like you, he's probably overworked as well

Being a royal and a leader has its merits, yes, even though he doesn't really like all the formalities that come with it, but that doesn't mean it's always easy

He's used to pushing through it, protecting his people and doing anything if it gets pushed onto him. That's his role, after all, and if he can take the pressure off of others then he'll gladly accept it

With you, though, he understands that's not the kind of advice you need. It's not uncommon for him to find you in the Monastery's Library hours after everyone had gone to sleep for the night, hunched over one of the large, elegant tables with stacks of papers and notebooks splayed out around you

He'll sit down with you when he catches the single, dim light on in the otherwise dark room, waving off your questions of how he knew you'd be there as 'just a feeling'

He's realistic, helping you with your workload even if you insist otherwise, that you need to get it done yourself before your deadlines hit. But he'll also hold you to it if you mutter out a 'just one more', his eyes looking between you and the clock mounted on the wall

"Here should be a good stopping point for now, don't you think? You've already finished most of what you needed to get done," Dimitri says with a soft smile, setting a piece of paper into a stack that you'd deemed the 'completed' section.

You'd been there long enough that he had time to go brew the both of you some chamomile tea, hoping the fragrance and sweet notes would help lower your stress. It seemed to be working, your anxiety lessening as you took small sips and noted the fact that you'd at least gotten the bigger, more important things out of the way.

"But-" you start, tapping your pencil against your head in thought, but your words get cut off with a yawn. "There's only a few more left, wouldn't it be better to just finish them?"

Dimitri shakes his head, reaching over to hold his hand out for you. You take it after a moment, interlocking your fingers and sighing when he gives your hand a squeeze. "They aren't due for another few weeks, right? They can wait until morning, you should really get some rest, dear."

You want to protest, tell him it's not even that late, but you've already thrown out every excuse you can think of to get him to not drag you to bed. He wasn't obligated to do any of this for you, and you knew these nights were something that ate into time that he could be using to get some much-needed sleep. So you finally, albeit hesitantly, give in, your teacup long empty and shoulders drooping in defeat. "I guess so-"

The blonde brightens at that, his thumb stroking over your own with a gentleness you'd grown weak to. It was hard to fight him when ocean blue eyes gazed into yours, his love for you obvious in the simple ways he showed his care. "If it helps, you can stay in my room for tonight. I'm sure one night won't hurt."

You nod, sparing a glance at the once disorganized mess of pages and deciding that you'd take his word for it. "I'd like that."

Edelgard

Similar to Dimitri, she's always dealt with things by trooping through them. As a more private person and a leader, she rarely ever lets appearances fall, so you're one of the few people that's seen what she can be like behind closed doors

Thus, her first instinct when she sees you nodding off in class is to gently nudge you awake and tell you to get to bed earlier. It might sound a bit harsh, but she only wants the best for you, and she thinks to what might happen if you were to fall asleep like that in the middle of a battle, which doesn't exactly help either of you (dramatic much?)

But when you tell her it's because you're swamped with work, trying to keep up with everything while simultaneously doing extra for people that, in her words, couldn't take the hint that you were busy, she gets upset

Not at you, but more at herself for not noticing the signs sooner when you're her partner of all things, and for making a comment that may have come off as insensitive. She still struggles with how to deal with these things, especially when it comes to you, emotionally or otherwise, so there's a chance she'll just ask you exactly what you need from her

She's a bit more lenient when it comes down to you staying up since she tends to do the same, but she'll still suggest taking a day off at one point

She'll take you to the greenhouse if you're up to it so that you aren't cooped up in your room all night with the idea that a change of scenery might help you avoid burning out or getting too frustrated

The Monastery was so quiet at night, most of the student body and staff already long asleep or busy with their own things. You only see a few people as you step outside, fingers interlocked with Edelgard's and a small crease in your brow from looking over the same words for hours.

You'd always thought it was beautiful, but lately you had no time to appreciate it, what with assignment after assignment piling up on you, so it was nice to get out for a while, even if the only things that awaited you when you got back were unfinished documents and half-filled in pages.

Scribbled notes that you took when you could hardly keep your eyes open. A breath of fresh air was almost enough to make you forget why you've been so stressed out. Almost.

The greenhouse was no different, the place always well-kept due to the student's tireless work. It made you feel a bit better, walking side by side with Edelgard as you're greeted by greenery and the like.

Pink and purple flowers bloom in one corner, slowly but surely growing underneath the bright moon visible through the glass, while seeds you assume to be newly planted sit beneath fresh soil on the other.

"Look at this one, it's the same color as your eyes." Edelgard says, grabbing your attention. You turn towards her in time for her to slip a flower behind your ear, her thumb brushing over your skin with a thoughtful grin. "It's good to get out, isn't it? That's why we're out here, so you shouldn't worry so much, darling."

You smile, feeling your cheeks and body start to warm. She was so effortlessly sweet sometimes; you think it's going to be the death of you one of these days. "Yeah, you have a point there."

Claude

He probably notices before you even say anything or notice you're feeling off yourself lol

He's an observant character, but it does still surprise you when he asks you if something's wrong out of the blue

"Huh? No, I'm alright, just a bit tired."

He sees right through it, but he doesn't wanna push you, so he'll just keep an eye on you for a while, making sure that you aren't overdoing it or setting aside your basic needs

If he sees that you are, he'll make it a point to put extra food on his plate for you. He'll come knocking on your dorm door every now and again to check on you, sliding a snack or drink your way and staying if you let him, though he mostly distracts you

It'd be hypocritical of him to tell you to take it easy when he's the same way, so he won't exactly tell you what to do, but he'll find a way to get you away from your work if he notices it's causing you too much trouble. He'll also have a polite word with your professor, maybe tell them that you're sick and need a few days off if he thinks it's bad enough

You might huff at him and say that that wasn't necessary, but he'll insist it was

It's another one of those nights, times when Claude comes knocking with another excuse at the ready for why he's there. You know why, it's become obvious over the last few weeks that it's his backwards way of telling you that he cares. He'll never scold you for your habits, but you know exactly what he wants to say even if he doesn't say it.

"Hey, wanna dance with me?" Claude asks after a comfortable silence had grown like a veil over the both of you. He'd made himself very comfortable on your bed, but you never actually minded. It was endearing in a way, really, even if you had to turn him down when you finish writing out a sentence, looking up at him from your desk.

"I'm busy, Claude, you know that."

"Come now, you can hardly even focus. Just a few minutes, promise." He gives you his signature smile, one that's saved for you but still equally mischievous as all of his other ones. He holds out his pinkie finger, chuckling at your muttered seriously? But he doesn't see you saying no. After a few moments of hesitation, you stand up, taking his finger in yours and shaking.

"Fine, but only a few minutes. I'm serious." You say, yelping when he stands up abruptly, pulling you up with him and taking your hands in his. He kisses your knuckles oh so softly, a glint in his eyes that you realize far too late that you shouldn't trust, but he's already got you right where he wants you, and he doesn't plan on letting go.

"I know, I know. I won't take up too much of your time, sweetheart." He hums.

It isn't just a few minutes, song after song playing on the record as you danced into the night. But you can't find it in yourself to be mad. Not when he twirls you around so carefully, a hand placed on the small of your back with your arms wrapped around his broad shoulders.

And certainly not when he coaxes you to bed, not even bringing up the thesis you had to finish since all of your attention was on him now. He presses a kiss to your forehead, wishing you sweet dreams, and you fall asleep in a matter of seconds with him by your side.

[ceasarslegion]

I never understood the argument that "well what if kids still see your properly tagged icky fic!" Or "what if they still go on the adult site specifically to host adult things!!" Because that is straight up not my problem or responsibility anymore if I have put up all appropriate signage saying that something I made is for adults. Yes it can and does happen but that is no longer my problem. There have been libraries with your "ewww ickyyyy" books in them forever and kids have been going into the adult sections and reading them out of curiosity for just as long. That is a conversation about personal responsibility that needs to be had between the parents and the kids doing it, not my problem as the creator who clearly labeled that it's nasty porn for grown-ups

And personal responsibility does not mean "tell them they aren't allowed to explore their own feelings and urges ever because that's icky!! They aren't 18 yet!! Don't you know that's the age where you unlock the horny on the stroke of midnight?" it means "teach them healthy strategies for dealing with different levels of discomfort, and how to recognize discomfort from the unknown vs discomfort that you are not yet equipped to handle, and what to do in each scenario."

If I had kids I'd tell them to disregard ratings more as legally required suggestions than some kind of absolute truth about everyone under the age of 18's ability to handle the content ever. To take them more as an indicator of what to expect from the synopsis of whatever media they want to consume, and what to do if they have questions, are uncomfortable, and what different types of discomfort feel like, because they aren't all the same and you do actually have to feel uncomfortable sometimes to grow as a person.

[ms-demeanor]

I've been poking around your website, I really like it.

I'm inspired to put together my own silly site, you've made a lot of posts about that. I know how to get started with a website builder or whatever, but that's kind of boring.

I'd like to imitate the look of Ao3's log in page.

I have several specific Ao3 searches that the 'favorite tag' section just can't manage. I have all of those links in a google docs but it's boring and clumsy. I want buttons to press.

Your website mimics wiki, so... can you point me in the direction to get started mimicing Ao3?

My website doesn't just mimic wikipedia, it is a MediaWiki site, which means that from the ground up the software it's running on is the same software as Wikipedia. When I write pages, I'm using wiki markdown ==Like This== for section subheads and [[like this]] to direct to other pages on the site, etc.

The reason that I chose to do this is because it's relatively easy to set up a site this way; I don't know enough about CSS to get a site to look like Wikipedia without running it on mediawiki software, and I don't know enough about CSS to get something to look like Ao3 without running it on OTW software.

Like MediaWiki, the OTW archive software is also open source, so you theoretically could set up a literal archive of your own, but it is not *easy.*

Walter from Squidge.org has created documentation for implementing OTW's software and has talked about helping others to set it up as well, so that is one option.

If that's not the kind of labor you're looking for (and it won't be for a lot of people! it certainly wasn't for me!) you could try something like using a site like wordpress and building a custom template. That would *also* be a lot of work (in terms of learning CSS) but might be easier than figuring out the whole backend as well as getting the visuals you want.

[nerdypagan1]

oh this is just fucking brilliant honestly.

okay so here I am on someone's blog, they have this link to "decolonizepalestine.com", to which I think "oh my, what WILL they cover?"

I go on it. it has the sections "palestine 101" and "myths database". okay, this could be fine, I say to myself. I check out "palestine 101". it starts with "introduction to palestine 1: palestine throughout history" and the date range 9000 BC to 1918 AD. that's a lot of history, I think; that covers thousands of years into prehistory until the British Mandate. but I guess they'll be skimming over a lot of it?

I click through. they mention an egyptian stele that says "peleset"- this does exist and it seemingly refers to a people group, so it's likely the same tablet (or a similar one) that bears our first mention of israel in writing. they bring up the Persians, the Romans, the Assyrians, and the Nabataeans. I'd never heard of the last ones so I looked them up- they're an ancient arab people. okay then. hellenic invaders would have made sense to bring up, given you did before (peleset may or may not refer to the philestines, given it has the same p-l-s-t root as pilishtim (hope I'm remembering that word right)). but sure, those people were all in charge once.

at the end of the section, before getting into whatever they'll say next, it says this: "This article does not aim to delve into the minutiae of this Palestinian history, indeed entire books could be -and have been- written on the subject. Rather the goal of this introduction is to describe the political context that lead up to the modern Palestinian question." okay then, reasonable. that's a LOT of history. I scroll down again, expecting to find maybe Israel and Judah, maybe the roman province of Syria Palestina and how the name came about. nope. it says "Palestine Under the Ottoman Empire".

WHAT. THE HELL.

you can't mention egyptian fucking stele and then jump right to the fucking OTTOMANS.

WHAT ABOUT THE JEWS?! never even fucking mind the romans and the assyrians and all. the jews? who had a couple kingdoms there for a while? the temple and everything? ugh.

I keep reading anyway. they mention Jerusalem (making no mention of its founders), they mention the ottomans dividing the land into three bits, and they mention the Millet system (the ottomans apparently dividing religious communities to govern themselves). they say this: "The Ottoman Millet system and its various manifestations provided a certain degree of autonomy to minority religious and ethnic communities. While this system suffered from serious flaws, and its breadth and tolerance waxed and waned with different governors and social and economic circumstances, it was still superior to the outright persecution and pogroms which various religious groups on the European continent had to endure." okay, sure- hey what was that word? pogrom? hang on, didn't the jews make that word to mean "riots against specifically us"?

I did not read any more and I don't want to. I just. how do you make a site that purports to tell the history of this stretch of land, then DON'T COVER MULTIPLE THOUSAND YEARS OF IT? don't even mention how the name became applied to the region? don't mention how every time it was conquered, there were more and more killings of jews?

I know how they do it. I just don't understand why. I am not even jewish, and I'm tired of this.

[allastoredeer]

your drawing guides are SO helpful. Thanks for making them! I was wondering, how did you get to good at breaking down and figuring out what forms/shapes to use?

Thank you! I'm so glad they've been useful!

Well, something I've learned is that you can basically draw anything, and I mean anything, with just a handful of specific shapes, which are cylinders, spheres, squares, rectangles, and cones/triangles.

These are your building blocks to drawing anything and everything, it's just a matter of breaking whatever it is you want to draw down to these shapes.

For example, here's a picture of my doggo.

Let's break him down.

It's all about ignoring the details, colors, textures etc... and simplifying your subject into its most basic form. And once you do that, it's easier to sketch them out using these shapes as building blocks to construct them. Once you have the basic shape, pose, or expression sketched out, you carve away what you don't need and add detail, clothing, hair, facial expressions etc..

We'll use Lucifer as another example, as I can go back to his character sheet.

You can even break down their clothes if you want, like Lucifer's hat:

You give the shapes curves and depth to show direction and action, don't feel like you have to keep them frigidly in their pristine, straight-lined shapes. Be loose with it.

So far, with deconstructing Hazbin characters, I've found that most of their shapes are triangles and cylinders (of various sizes and widths). They also tend to be very curved and fluid, which is fun.

In the end it kind of just takes practice and training your brain to strip away all the fancy details, cut the character 's body into the basic sections we know of (face, neck, chest, torso, pelvis, arms, legs, feet), simplify those into their most bare-bones shapes, and pay attention to how those those shapes connect together.

Hope this helped, or shed some light on my process XD

[stayteezdreams]

Halloween Requests - CLOSED

Status: CLOSED

These are requests for my 13 Days of Halloween in which I post 1 or more content posts every day from October 19th to the 31st. *some requests may not be written, and some may be saved to come out later on (if they are not strictly Halloween specific).

Who I write For: *will update if a member or group is requested too much

Ateez *No longer taking requests for Yunho!

Stray Kids

Seventeen

Tomorrow x Together

The Boyz

*all members of each group (x gn!reader)

13 Days of Halloween 2023 Masterlist

Things I do not write:

Detailed NSFW/Smut (suggestive content and PG13 is doable)

Pregnancy/child Content

Abuse/Member cheating

***Notes*** You can send in the number of the prompt(s) instead of the prompt itself if you want, but please specify which section it is from (dialogue, plot or scenario)

Feel free to send in your own ideas with or without prompts as well! These are just some ideas for inspiration :)

You can request 1-3 Prompts at once; feel free to mix and match or add a plot-line to your request.

If you are not sure who to request for, but like a prompt, go ahead and send a preferred group and the prompt and I will choose who to write it for.

*Crossed out Prompts are those I have received and are no longer available to request*

**No longer taking requests for** Ateez (all members) S.Coups Seungmin Bang Chan

Prompts under the cut!

Dialogue Prompts:

“I don’t think I’m alone in here.”

“This place creeps me out.”

“I thought I saw something.”

“Don’t you dare leave me in here alone.”

“You’re not scared of me?” “Should I be?”

"I don't believe in ghosts." "You will after tonight."

"If you say we should split up I will kill you."

“Love the costume but I’d rather see what’s under it.”

"Just because I'm not afraid of the dark, doesn't mean I like being in it"

"What do we do?" "Run!"

"Did you see that too?" "Yes." "Damn, I was hoping I was going crazy."

 “What do you do when a ghost has a crush on you? Asking for a friend.”

“I wonder, how many people are dead in that graveyard?” “Hopefully all of them…”

"Who needs a guardian angel when you can have a half-decent demon?"

"If I knew all it would take for you to hug me was a haunted house I would have brought you to one earlier."

"I've seen enough horror movies to know where this is going"

"If you get scared you can hold onto me." "Oh you'd love that wouldn't you?" "Very much."

"Are you scared?" "No." "Then why are you holding onto me so tightly?"

"I couldn't find a costume so I decided to come as your boyfriend."

"Where is that music coming from?"

"You look stupid" "I'm dressed as you."

"I know what you should be for Halloween." "What?" "Mine."

"Ghosts aren't real" "Then why is that person see-through?"

"I don't want you to wear that"

"Stop touching my hand." "I'm not touching your hand."

"Why is that guy staring at me?" "What guy?"

"Would you stop breathing so loudly!?" "I thought that was you"

"Why wont you come inside?" "You have to invite me in." "What are you, a vampire?"

"All the Angels were busy, so they sent me instead." "And what are you?" "Well I'm definitely no angel."

"Stop staring at me like that." "If you didn't want me to stare, you shouldn't have worn that."

"Are you and 'x' dating?" "No, why?" "Then why are you wearing a couples costume?"

Plot Prompts:

You get left behind in a haunted house and one of the cute actors helps you out and gets revenge on said "friends".

Meeting at a Masquerade

Lost in the woods

Carnival/Fair Date

A grabs B’s hand instinctively out of surprise or fear, and continues to hold it.

Finding out the "monster" costume they're wearing isn't a costume (monster/demon/supernatural au)

Visiting a pumpkin patch

Every Halloween you are visited by a stranger in your dreams, but this year, he shows up at your door in the real world.

Haunted House

Someone summoned a demon to take your soul, but the demon likes you too much to hurt you.

Choosing each other's costumes, and unknowingly matching.

You're scared and they try their best to comfort you.

Hearing a noise upstairs, but you live alone.

Ghost Hunting

Vampire Frat - you know the guys in the house beside you are Vampires. But they don't know you're a witch. Until Halloween, when your powers grow stronger, they can't help but notice odd things happening around you.

A cute guy shows up trick or treating with their younger sibling/family member, he comes back later just to see you again.

At a Halloween themed carnival/fair and the scary yet attractive actor wont stop following you around.

Cinderella/Masquerade AU: You recognize them but they don't recognize you. Don't tell them who you are and they search for you (college/office au - or something similar?)

You save a cat/dog/other animals on the street, only to wake up the next day to find a man in it's place instead.

You move into your newly purchased house, only to discover someone or something already lives there.

Every Halloween for the last 5 years, a package mysteriously shows up in your house. This year, instead of a package, you find a stranger waiting for you.

Halloween Date

You are invited to an office Halloween party, and someone in a monster mask seems to want to keep you company. But who is it?

Jealousy: You attend a Halloween party and 'x' can't handle the attention you are getting from others, this causes them to make their feelings known.

College Au Carnival Game: Bobbing for apples but the apple you manage to get indicates who you will go on a date with.

Cozy autumn camping trip with friends leads to confession from someone.

They mistake you as their friend at a costume party and accidentally kidnap you.

Seven Minutes in Hell: You lose a game and have to spend 7 minutes in a haunted house with 'x'.

Halloween Movie Night: You have a movie night with your friends and your crush takes the opportunity to get cozy with you.

Abandoned: You are left in the woods by a bad friend, you know there is something or someone in the woods with you, but you get the feeling they're watching over you.

Scenario/Headcanons Prompts: *will do multiple members or whole group if requested *some of these might include drabbles

How 'x' reacts to you wearing a sexy/appealing costume

How 'x' reacts to you wanted to wear a couples costume + what you end up dressing as

What you would do for a Halloween/Autumn themed date

You choose each other's costumes

*Crossed out Prompts are those I have received and are no longer available to request*

Feel free to send in your own ideas with or without prompts as well! These are just some ideas for inspiration :)

You can request 1-3 Prompts at once; feel free to mix and match or add a plot-line to your request.

[1moreff-creator]

hello my friend 1moreff-creator. today i was rewatching your vivisection of LGI video and came up with a related theory. it's about "subtract four due to tetraphobia."

arei is roman numeral 4. ace has phobias. could "subtract 4 due to tetraphobia" just be code for "ace subtracted arei due to his phobia of dying in the killing game?"

is it possible that it's literally that simple or do you think the surrounding context implies it has to mean something else

Hello my friend accirax. That's a pretty good interpretation! It's true that "subtract 4 due to tetraphobia" could mean "kill IV (Arei) due to fear" for the reasons you stated, and the theory holds up really well...

In a vacuum.

But like you mentioned, the surrounding context is an issue. Because the phrase itself is relatively innocent, but the problem has always been when it shows up more than anything else.

There are many places where your interpretation could fit perfectly. There's Teruko's numeral, as the number 4's connection to death makes it an unlucky number, and Teruko is Teruko. There's the whole section around Min's numeral, which references class trials and thus could be connected that way. Ace's numeral could have been a bit too spoilery, but it would technically work. And of course, the most obvious place to put it would have been next to Arei's numeral itself. And there's probably more places to put it, that's just the ones closest to the actual placement of the tetraphobia line.

But alas, "subtract 4 due to tetraphobia" isn't in any of those places. It appears here:

[Literature Girl Insane] XIV [Veronika]. Things like substance of the arts ["subtract 4, due to tetraphobia⁴" appears] XV [Whit]. Remaining ignorant, isn't that "happiness¹⁵"?

And... there's genuinely no clear connection to Arei's death here. Veronika and Whit both had nothing to do with it, "the substance of the arts" and the concept of "ignorance is bliss" don't connect in any clean way, and neither footnote really helps, as 4 just defines tetraphobia and 15 just talks about the origins of the "ignorance is bliss" concept. The color coding doesn't seem to help either, since despite what Tumblr makes it look due to the limited color range I have access to, none of the colors present in the scene can really be related to either Arei or Ace. If anything the fact most of the tetraphobia line is in pink just makes the Whit connection stronger. Hence the whole issue of 15 - 4 = 11 -> XI [Mai]. God is dead.

The connection between Arei and tetraphobia comes more from the fact that Arei has number IV in the first place, so I totally agree with you that the connection exists and that Arei was given that numeral explicitly to connect her to death, and I like the new connection you bring up of it specifically being death due to fear. But I don't think that means we can just hand wave away the context in which the tetraphobia line actually appears, especially when it's the only time two Roman numerals are on screen at the same time. It could mean nothing that it appears when it does, but it could also mean something, you know.

Alas, Whit has gotta take the allegations on this one, there's no way around it. Still, though, cool interpretation, thanks for sharing and thanks for the ask!