#I think I'm getting across the key ideas that first got ME hooked on writing this piece. But I don't know how clear things are

[mumblingsage]

The current WIP pitch is under the cut for all those willing to give feedback or simply curious about what I've been working on. I'm also still seeking beta readers -- if you're interested, please feel free to message me or drop a comment below, since I guess Tumblr's doing replies now.

Ransomed: Something More Than Honor

In this queer polyamorous romance, a wounded hero and his lovers find the courage to win back their broken hearts.

After two years as a prisoner of war, Konstantin Eadinford returns to a barony impoverished by raising a ransom he isn’t worth. He struggles to take up his responsibilities as his father's heir, dishonored by an escape attempt and carrying a heart gone rotten with betrayal.

He’s certain he can never share it with the two people who have come to care for him.

Catilyn, his wife by an arranged marriage, is spirited and creative, wary of what’s expected of her, yet intrigued by what she calls Konstantin’s charm. She approaches only so close. He hardly dares to look at her, much less touch her, after trying to keep her apart from all he did and felt while captive at Ausric.

Though a commoner, Nicolas Miller isn’t afraid to tell the future baron what he thinks. In his honesty and anger and wit, he burns brighter than any friend Konstantin’s ever had. Yet Nic is used to secrets, and to being kept one.

Cat isn’t afraid of Konstantin’s secrets, not in the face of her own troubles. When wounds from the past threaten the fragile peace built at Eadinford, she turns to Nic. Konstantin fears that revealing what he survived will mean losing them both. Yet with the strength of the three of them together, though they no chance at honor, they might build something more.

Content Information: This slowburn bisexual hurt/comfort romance includes (eventually ;D) explicit sexual content, both M/M and F/M. It also contains content that may be distressing as the characters survive in, heal from, and seek to change a culture of misogyny, homophobia, and physical, emotional, and sexual violence. These themes are treated both implicitly and explicitly.

The story concludes in The Heir, out DATE.

/end pitch

More rudimentary pitch for the sequel:

Ransomed: The Heir

“I don’t always know what to do with it. With what you give me.”

Konstantin, his wife Catilyn, and his lover Nicolas have created a sort of refuge in the months after his return from imprisonment. It’s not something any of them should expect to last.

The barony of Eadinford is a cruel legacy. Its expectations threaten the love they’ve built from the ruins of honor, and Konstantin remains uncertain how to fully open his heart when an open heart once wounded him.

When the chance comes to ransom the common men still held captive by their kingdom’s enemies, he, Nic, and Cat step into a wider world, one that holds potential allies—even friends—but old troubles, too.

As they win free of the past, their choices will shape the future and decide who will inherit it.

/end pitch

Tagging stormsbreadth because you mentioned being intrigued by an earlier version but were in full COVID recovery mode at the time!

[triskhellion]

20 Questions for fic writers

Tagged by @dear-massacre

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

Twenty-one. Twenty fics and one weird standalone soundtrack, lol.

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

195,750.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Just Teen Wolf so far, but I maybe I'll get around to some ideas I have for The Sandman or something else one day.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Thunder (Sterek. 12.1k. Explicit. Depressed loner Derek meets on-the-run Werefox/Kitsune Stiles in rural Montana.)

The Cold Moon (Sterek, 40.6k. Explicit. Part one of a story where Stiles is forced across a mysterious boundary by Hunters and encounters a semi-feral Alpha Derek. My first published fic.)

Second Chance Strays (Sterek, 8.5k. Explicit. Mage Stiles, Derek, & Larem the deer alone in the wilderness. A Fuck or Die situation ensues when a darach attacks.)

CLAIM! (Sterek, 11.9k, Explicit. Misunderstandings and making up after Derek & Stiles meet at Jungle and hook-up.)

Customer Service (Sterek, 10.9k. Explicit. Surly barista omega Derek and human college student Stiles. Banter, vulgar latte art, and heat sex. Dominant Derek, Service Top Stiles.)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Yes! Sometimes it takes a while, but comments are appreciated and I know I like getting responses.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I guess Amīca (Derissa) because it's an unresolved pre-relationship fic that's meant to be the first In a series. I've been a happy ending gal, so no real angsty ones so far. The angst is in the beginning and/or middle!

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

The rest of them? 😂

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I haven't yet. Knocks on wood.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Yes. Most of my fics have smut at some point, lol. Or belong to series that do/will.

Um, barebacking and creampie/breeding. Cum eating or play and marking in general, including hickeys and biting.

Virgin/first time bottoming, praise kink, light degradation, and knotting are also in a number of stories. Some spanking, bondage and pinning, and generally low-key dominance and submission. Chasing and claiming and a few omegaverse or just self-lubrication. (I have plans for more.)

All M/M or M/M/M so far, but I have WIPs and notes with other combinations. I have a bunch of Kinktober bits from 2022 to turn into fics that I'm both nervous and excited about. And lots of other ideas too.

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

Not yet, but I have a summary for a Sterek Teen Wolf/The Sandman crossover.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I'm aware of.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nope.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

No. Sounds both fun and kinda scary.

14. What’s your all time favourite ship?

Sterek is what finally got me into fanfiction and the whole shipping fandom thing a few years ago, so I gotta go with them. I enjoy a bunch of others from Teen Wolf too (especially Steter, Stetopher, and Sterek + various people) and from other fandoms.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

I currently intend to finish all my WIPs, but who knows what the future will hold. I have 3 posted WIPs that I definitely plan to complete: The Wolf Moon, The Depths, and 15 Shades of Red. I have dozens of unposted ones that I also hope to finish...eventually.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Apparently dialogue, world building, characters' inner thoughts, and being funny sometimes. Coming up with ideas.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Epithets. It's just tricky when the characters have the same pronouns and I hate writing their names over and over. (I don't mind when other people do it though, so 🤷🏽‍♀️. But then I'll be like, "I can't say Derek three times in this paragraph!")

I've started looking for ones to remove whenever I edit now (and I'm cringing thinking about earlier stories that I should re-edit at some point,) but I still use some and am self-conscious about it.

Also, sometimes I info dump, but that doesn't bother me so much. Boom, here's a bunch of background now let's get on with it, lol.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I've used a few words in Polish here and there in some stories, but I probably wouldn't try to write whole conversations in another language unless I was familiar with it or could ask someone about it.

There's some Patois/Patwah in Irie, which was interesting to write because there's no one set spelling of many words, so it was part looking at common ones and part "What did it sound like/how was it phrased when this relative or family friend said something like this?"

19. First fandom you wrote for?

I vaguely recall thinking up scenes, dialogue, background, etc, for a story with Byakuya Kuchiki/Shūhei Hisagi from Bleach approximately 5 billion years ago when I was a teenager, but I don't remember if I ever actually wrote anything. Definitely didn't finish or publish anything. So...Teen Wolf.

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

Hmm. I can't say that I have a favorite. I only started actually writing from my list of fic ideas around 16 months ago, IIRC. Maybe if I look back on them all after enough time passes I'll be able to pick one out (though knowing me...still probably not,) but right now they're all just...floating around in my head and also mixed with the particular experiences of writing them, idk.

Here's a recent one that was fun to write:

Legs (Sterek, 4.3k. Explicit. Snark and smut after college students Derek and Werecreature Stiles cross paths at the mall.)

If you want to play along, tag, you're it!

[captainsolare]

Also Sol, I'm here to request for your Event, if I may 🥰🙈 The dice is such an awesome idea 🥰♥️

May I please have a Rhya (Black Clover) fluff, roll 2 times for AU, 3 times for dialogue prompt and 1 time for trope, please? 💘🙈

I hope I got that right, sorry if it isn't right 😂😭 anyway happy writing! And feel free to ignore it if you don't feel like writing it 💓 also happy anniversary and happy birthday Sol darling 🥰♥️

A/N: Hello my lovely!! I hope you enjoy this! I apologize that it's so late :)

Rhya Fluff + Teacher AU! + My friends dared me to ask you out but you actually said yes + “You’re such a dork.”

The faculty lounge was largely empty, save for Rhya, the chemistry teacher, slumped over his desk snoring lightly. You stood in the doorway, sweaty hand clutching the strap of your bag tightly. You sighed quietly, cursing your fellow teacher friends for making you agree to this.

Making your way across the room you stopped at the sleeping man’s desk, heart pounding as you stood over him.

“What’s up Y/N?” He asked, voice gravelly from sleep.

“How did you know it was me?” You blinked, taken aback.

He sat up straighter and stretched, arms shaking as the muscles began to wake up. A finger pointed to the floor, “It was your shoes, they make a distinct sound. That’s how I knew it was you.”

“Oh.” You swallowed uncomfortably, suddenly feeling self conscious as you glanced at your shoes. Do they really make a specific noise?

“Well, did you need something? It’s unlike you to come into the faculty lounge this late.”

You tucked your hands behind your back, rocking on your heels.

“Um… well you see… You can totally say no, but I was wondering if you’d be interested in going out on a date with me?” You clasped your hands tightly together, half praying he’d say no and put you out of your misery.

Rhya stared at you for a long moment, if he was surprised he didn’t show it, instead he had the same bored expression he usually did.

You braced yourself for the impending apology.

“Sure. Tomorrow night sound good?”

You took a sharp breath, surprised by his answer, “Sure, that sounds great! I can meet you out front after work?”

He nodded, “Sounds good. See you tomorrow Y/N.”

“See you tomorrow Rhya.”

You tried not to listen to the sound of your shoes as you walked across the linoleum floor. As you paused in the doorway to risk one last glance into the room, you could have sworn you saw him smile.

-

Your phone landed on your bed with a thump, the ringing tinny as it rang on speakerphone.

“Hey there Y/N! What’s up? Got the hot goss?”

You rolled your eyes, “Would I be calling this late if I didn’t?”

Practically feeling Kasumi smiling on the other end of the line you relented,

“We’re going out tomorrow night.”

Kasumi gasped, “Oh my gosh! He really said yes? That’s so exciting! What are you going to wear? Where are you going? Eek! I’m so excited for you, you’ve had a crush on him for like, forever.”

You took a deep breath, Kasumi was always like this; her mind ran at about a hundred kilometers a minute, fast and incessantly making your life more interesting, sometimes, like tonight, more difficult.

“Yes, he said yes. I don’t know what I’m wearing or where we’re going. And it has not been forever! More like 2 months, if that.”

She tutted at you through the phone, “You know we all see the way you two looked at each other when he came into the lounge for the first time.”

You scrunched your nose at her even though she couldn’t see it, “Yeah, yeah, whatever. I just hope it goes well.”

Kasumi’s laugh was crackly through the speaker, grating on your already frayed nerves, “Don’t worry! It’ll be fine.” A brief pause, “Well, I’m exhausted, so I’ll catch you tomorrow ‘kay? I expect you to call me with all the juicy details afterwards.”

“Yeah, goodnight Kasumi.”

The call ended with a beep and you collapsed on your bed, her words echoing in your mind.

It’ll be fine.

-

You fussed over your appearance in the staff bathroom mirror. Did you look okay? Where were you going? Did Ryha say yes as a joke? Did he like you too?

The questions ran through your mind like a swarm of bees, a low hum that wouldn’t go away.

Finally, you decided that you could put it off no longer, you needed to go outside and face the man you’d asked out on a date.

He was standing by the school gate, a dress shirt and slacks with a blazer looked wonderful on him. He still had the same bored expression on his face, but it brightened slightly as you approached.

“Hey there, you ready? You look good by the way.”

Your cheeks grew hot at his words, “Yeah, I’m ready. You… look good too.”

He extended his elbow as a gesture for you to take it and you did, hooking your arm gently through the gap.

You walked down the street for a while, light from the street lamps illuminating the pools from the rain earlier in the day.

“So,” You said after a while, “Where are we going this fine evening?”

The corners of Rhya’s lips turned upward, “It’s a secret, but it’ll be great, I promise.”

Finally, you turned a corner and stopped outside a quaint looking restaurant; there wasn’t an obvious name anywhere on the establishment, but Rhya didn’t hesitate to open the door.

You walked inside and were greeted by a woman with pink hair, a flower crown placed lightly on her head.

“Hello! I have special seats reserved for you.”

“Thank you Fana.”

Rhya smiled thankfully, and you were led outside to a patio garden straight out of a fairytale. There were trellises covered in roses of all shades, bird baths and small fountains scattered around.

Fana led you down a stone path to a table in the center of the patio, lanterns hung around tossed delicate light over the space, lending to an atmosphere that felt ethereal.

There was a single tea light candle on the table, along with a single red rose in a vase.

Rhya pulled your chair out for you and you sat down, a menu soon placed in front of you.

Once Fana left you looked around, marvelling at the beautiful garden you were sitting in.

“Rhya, what is this place?”

“This is a little restaurant owned and operated by a few childhood friends of mine.”

Your mouth opened in a small ‘o’ as you looked around once more, seeing the setting in a whole new light.

-

The meal was enjoyable, Ryha was surprisingly good at making conversation once you got comfortable. By the time you were leaving the restaurant, you were grateful that your friends had made you go through this dare.

“Want to go on a walk before we head back to the school?” Rhya asked quietly once you were outside on the street.

You contemplated it, and decided that you weren’t ready for the magic of the night to end just yet. He gave you his arm to take once more and he led you down the city streets.

Wandering aimlessly you ended up in a square, there was a fountain in the center and a musician playing for patrons. It was a charming sight, the lights bathed the square in a soft light. Rhya cocked his head in a silent question and you nodded, making your way to the small crowd around the musician.

The musician’s assistant caught sight of you and smiled brightly, “Does the lovely couple want to dance?”

Both you and Rhya faltered, cheeks warm from being called out in front of a crowd and at the assumption that you were a couple. Rhya recovered quickly though and before you knew it he was extending a hand for you to dance with him.

He was surprisingly light on his feet, and dancing with him was easy. With several cheers from the crowd you danced to a few songs, hearts thrumming from the close contact.

-

Out of breath from dancing, you laughed and chatted on your way back to the school, hands barely brushing as you walked.

The parking lot was empty save for your cars. Your keys were in your hands but you were both still, not wanting to leave just yet.

Rhya caught your lingering gaze and you mustered up the courage to speak.

“Hey Rhya, would you maybe want to go out again?” You asked, hoping your voice didn’t betray just how hopeful you were.

“Yeah, I’d like that. I think we have a lot of chemistry.”

You smiled, then it dawned on you, “Rhya did you just--- did you just make a dad joke?”

He shrugged, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth, “Maybe I did.”

You rolled your eyes, “Gosh, you’re such a dork.”

Rhya cocked his head, a mischievous glint in his eye, “Yeah, but I could be your dork.”

Giggling, you gave him a swift kiss on the cheek, “Yeah yeah, see you tomorrow. Text me when you get home safe.”

“You too Y/N.”

As you drove away, Rhya stared after your car, fingertips lingering on the spot you had kissed.

“Wow.” Was all he could manage to whisper.

[wherestoriescomefrom]

ohohoho spill ur thoughts on the poppy war 👀

i love all of you for indulging me so much, but y'all are going to have the cancel police after me at this rate. i'm about to give a ~~~ criticism ~~~ of the most popular asian political fantasy in the market right now, written by a chinese person. my only credentials are 1. i am a person who reads. 2. i am not white.

jokes aside, first of all, everything i say has to be taken with a pinch of salt because not only am i not chinese, some of the details of the book go into the sino-japanese war - something that kuang's father personally experienced. i have no reference for this generational trauma, and i don't want to make any comparisons to things my family has gone through, so i will not. i will also be including other reviews, specifically of chinese or asian descent - because unlike white boy sanderson, this will probably require a more nuanced perspective. if you like this book and don't want to see this criticism, please block the tags "anti poppy war" and "anti rf kuang." spoilers for the first book, as i couldn't bring myself to read the other two.

second of all. if you are planning on reading this book, or have considered it and are only stumbling across this review... MASSIVE TRIGGER WARNINGS AND CONTENT WARNINGS for genocide, abuse, rape, assault, gendered war crimes, human experimentation, war atrocities, descriptions of violence, large scale explosives, and overall war based violence. you might think this is par for the course considering it is a book about war, but you would be surprised at how detailed these descriptions are, how painful they can be to swallow. if you go to the goodreads of the book, there are no trigger warnings, and the two questions highlighted by the author don't have these trigger warnings either,,, a fact that i find very upsetting. i genuinely feel like it was bad enough for there to be trigger warnings on the cover of the book. my stance on this is simple: i don't really get triggered very seriously by any of these things but i appreciate a warning.

ANYWAY, LET'S BEGIN. One of the first problems I'd like to talk about is the fact that this book... feels like two books. the first book is a standard YA fantasy where a young girl goes to the big school by hook or by crook, and is mentored by a strange teacher. it's got some interesting asian influences, conversations around propaganda, and so on. very drastically, the tone of the second half of the book changes without enough set up. suddenly, you are in a war situation and it feels very much like whiplash! you can obviously make the argument that that's usually what war feels like, but the lack of build up and tension to the armies arriving don't really do it for me. but i don't want to talk about the writing too much, there's bigger fish to fry.

to get into my more seriously problems with the book - i think the worldbuilding is... confusing. it's not as bad as sanderson, where the man clearly has no idea how human societies operate in the real world, but it's just a little confusing. there are clear and distinct areas, and the vibes of each of the cities feels unique and different - but at the same time, some key things in a politically oriented fantasy are missing. for instance, i'm still not sure why there's a war. is this just imperial conquest, what about the land is strategic, what are the economic benefits for a war? unclear. in the world of the novel, these wars are called "the poppy wars" - but even now, i'm not sure why. usually when you name a war after a specific commodity, you'd think the commodity had a significant role to play in the war, right??? but poppy seems to have nothing to do with these wars, apart from the fact that a chosen few people have magical skills unlocked by consuming poppy. there doesn't seem to be a major battle over poppy exports, over fertile land that is useful for poppy farming, over anything materially related to poppy at all. i'm not even sure why poppy is banned, or why these nations share such an antagonistic relationship with each other centered on poppy.

moving on. the battle is between fantasy china and fantasy japan, right? at one point, the massive size of the Federation army (fantasy Japan), and their near uniformity is described. plus, there's some conversation about how no matter how many you kill, more soldiers will sprout up. here is a map of these nations:

i don't understand how the federation of mugen has these many soldiers.

i suppose arguments can be made for their training, and that the federation has more money or whatever, but it still baffles me. it feels like i'm missing something, like someone explained something and i didn't get it. either way, i think there's more things to be said about the worldbuilding, but one of the biggest issues that i am going to highlight is the fact that it starts... feeling like this world wants to blend between fantasy and reality.

i don't know how to explain it, but, you're reading a fantasy fiction book with some weirdnesses, and everything is fine. out of nowhere, there are blocks and blocks of text that seem like they could be taken out of a historical fiction novel about the rape of nanking. it feels very jarring, and strangely out of place - like you're in a specific world, and out of nowhere, the rape of nanking takes place. i have already expressed my discomfort with the details of the war atrocities described, but here's a chinese person's review on how strange and out of place it feels to have the real world of china coming into the fantasy. to quote the reviewer, "Again, this is not a parallel universe novel or something like that. This is an apparently self-serious fantasy world that keeps throwing real-world people and places into the narrative." here's another review by a chinese person that finds the poppy war extremely orientalising. i didn't appreciate the war documentary in the middle of everything at all, and i don't want to comment on whether or not it does a disservice to the real life event that happened. the descriptions are also so much like a wikipedia entry... idk man, idk.

which brings me to my last... my difficult to articulate point...

i don't like the political implications of this book.

we're entering very murky territory now, so i want you to bear with me. rin is deliberately written as an anti hero, and she's actually supposed to be the in-universe figure of mao zedong, a very controversial figure in chinese history. i won't pretend to know more about this than that, but here's a breakdown of the historical grounding of the book. it's written by a taiwanese reviewer - this will come relevant in about a paragraph. she also quotes an interview by the author, where RF Kuang specifically states, "The question the trilogy tries to answer is: how does somebody go from being an irrelevant, backwater, peasant nobody to being a megalomaniac dictator capable of killing millions of people? I’ve always been interested in how people become murderers or perpetrators of genocide."

the book also refers specifically to the genocide of the speerly people, and if you go through the breakdown i have linked, you'll know that speer island is supposed to be a fantasy version of taiwan. this genocide is very serious, and has apparently left no survivors except for rin and her commander, altan. there are some uncomfortable ways in which altan is described - he's supposed to have animal like grace, darker skin, and he's also a persistently abusive figure in rin's life. the second genocide this book details is the rape of nanking, of which i already talked about. some truly gut wrenching writing takes place when you find some of rin's friends survived, and one of them was raped to the point of death, nearly. all of this is supposed to fuel the vendetta in rin, who uses her powers as someone who can harness a fire god and nukes fantasy japan.

i'm serious. she nukes fantasy japan, mushroom cloud and all. the book goes out of its way to even tell you that it wasn't as though she lost control of her powers, she chose to do this. she chose to harness anger and vengeance and obliterate an island full of civilians - civilians who were not actually responsible for the fantasy version of the rape of nanking. here's the real kicker: according to the implications of this book, a taiwanese woman, one who had suffered a genocide herself, reigns her vengeance and uses it to unleash nuclear war on civilians. what's worse is that she seems wholly consumed by the genocide that happened twenty years ago on speerly, and didn't spare a thought for the very real rape of her country. altan's anger over his people's genocide is centred so much more than venka's very recent and potent anger over her horrifying rape by the federation soldiers.

but, to underline the point i was making: in the real world, nuclear weaponry had not been used by the taiwanese, or those who saw the rape of nanking. it was done by white people, very far away, who only had to press a red button. they hadn't suffered anything more than one attack to their harbour, they entered the second world war late, and more than anything - they wanted to show off that they had nuclear weapons to their opponents. nuclear war was NOT done by people who had suffered a genocide themselves. i know i have limited experience, but idk, man - isn't genocide usually motivated more by imperialism and colonialism than any... vengeance? i don't know enough about mao zedong to comment on this at all, but i was so deeply uncomfortable with the political implications of this book i couldn't keep reading it. i couldn't. the link i have left above, is actually by a taiwanese reader who loves this book, so maybe i'm wrong, idk.

in all the reviews i have seen, i have never seen this point articulated. here's one review that goes into why its hard to even care about rin's angst after she nuked a country. here's another one that talks about how it feels like its less fantasy and would be better written as history. i feel like i'm alone in noticing how horrifying the implications of this are; that a taiwanese woman - or even a chinese woman - would have nuked a country for vengeance. the genocidal history of the original nuclear war is historically imperial: america wanted to spread its influence. by making that nuclear warfare seem justified... idk, this book really lost me. i don't know how well the author deals with any of this in the rest of the series, i don't have the stomach to keep reading.

it's also just. bad writing on different counts. rin's character doesn't seem consistent or coherent, neither does altan's. it seems painfully misogynistic - with the vipress empress who hypnotises people into loyalty and turns into a snake, with venka being the one girl who's mean to rin being raped repeatedly. with rin herself deciding to go through with obliterating her uterus and then towards the end becoming genocidal. what, a woman has to get rid of her uterus to become a monster? where have i heard that before... (i want it noted that when i started reading, i liked that rin decides not to have children and does it to matter of factly. it's just the later implications that i despise). the magic system is incoherent, i have no idea of the rules of magic and it feels volatile and uncontrolled. i just didn't enjoy this book's second half at all.

if you wanna read some really good asian inspired fantasy by asian authors, i would STRONGLY recommend ML Wang's The Sword of Kaigen. very often this book is put on the same lists as Kuang, and readers are assured that if you liked The Poppy War, you'd like this - but i can assure you this book genuinely stands out for me as one of the best books i read this year, if not the best fantasy i have read, ever.

anyway thank you anon for giving me the opportunity to do this!! unlike sanderson, however, i'd strongly encourage reading more reviews by chinese people and taiwanese people of this book. i've linked some, but there's a lot of people who love this book. once again, though, i feel like i'm missing something - like i'm not in on the joke or the main story. but that's ok as long as i have u guys encouraging me to write thesis presentations on the books i dislike.

[needs-to-stop-looking-at-valves]

Heuj valves, you know what I'm here for, go on. Make us a story dolly >:)

-cursed

Okay, in case you guys haven’t been around for like, the past day or two, let me explain. This is involving Bill Sykes, the villain of the movie ‘Oliver and Company’. Cursed came out of nowhere, showed me this man, and he has LITERALLY kept me up all night last night. I’m tired, majorly horny, and I hate this big, BIG man so much. Let’s go. (Also side note first attempt writing him, I'm trying)

Money. Money was a thing that made the world go round. It was something everyone wanted, something everyone would fight tooth and nail to get. Some people had nothing, and some had far too much. Like Sykes. Sykes had so much money, through brute force, through cunning, through anything and everything unsavory. And with so much money, came with the ability to have SO much power, of which he abused. If he wasn’t taunting people with how much money he had, he was luring more people in with his classic charm. As evil as he was, no one really seemed to see it at the beginning. They saw an older, rather likeable man. It was why no one blinked twice when he walked into the clothes store. If anything, he was welcomed, especially by the man behind the counter.

“Mr.Sykes! Just on time! Ever the punctual man! I got your new suit in!”

“Good, good. You’re one of the few in this city that DOESN’T disappoint me.”

“I should hope not, you’re my best customer! Speaking of, can I be daring enough to offer you a new set of shoes?”

“Wasn’t looking for a new pair, but what the hell.”

Sykes let him be walked to the counter. He JUST so happened to be on the counter next to some lady. Pretty thing, honestly. She somehow didn’t notice him, and pushed a handbag across the counter.

“Hey, I didn’t see a tag on this. Can you check it for me?”

This lady didn’t belong here. This was a real ‘if you had to ask, you can’t afford it’ kinda place. The guy behind the counter gave her a look, before glancing at the bag.

“Twenty nine fifty, miss.”

“Only thirty bucks? Okay-”

She went to dig into her current purse, before he cleared his throat.

“Ma’am, no. I’m saying it's two thousand, nine hundred and fifty dollars.”

“Ah. So when do I get the bull?”

“Pardon?”

“The bull. The one who's giving me this fresh batch of shit."

Sykes had to give her one thing, she had a mouth on her. Sykes sensed a fight, and decided to turn that into his favor.

“Hey, let me pay for the lady here.”

She looked at him, seeming to just now notice his presence. She was reasonably suspicious, and seemed to almost snarl at him.

“I don’t do freebies.”

“Not a freebie. Just thought a pretty lady should have pretty things. If you don’t want it, fine, won’t push it. Really, it’s on me.”

She hesitated, before seeming to put her guard down, pushing the purse back across the counter. He chuckled, swiping his card. This is how you brought the pretty ones in. Buy them something nice and shiny, show them you were a sweet guy. He grabbed his things, and stepped outside with her. She was staring at her purse in fascination, before turning to look at him.

“Thanks a bunch, by the way. Didn’t catch your name.”

“Sykes. Bill Sykes.”

He held his hand out to her, and she accepted the handshake. He took the chance to give her another look over, and realized; yeah. She was worth trapping. He threw his stuff into the car, before turning to look in her direction.

“You have plans for lunch?”

“No, why?”

“Feelin’ generous today. Assuming you can spare me some company.”

She looked hesitant, studying him and his ride. If he wasn’t rich, it would’ve been ‘hell no’. But she was, like many, allured by his obvious, flagrant weath.

“I mean...yeah, sure. Why not?”

Little did she know, she was digging the hole deeper and deeper.

-------------------------------------------

It had gotten WAY later into the night than he planned. He had meant to only spare an hour or so, but he found himself taking well into sunset. By the time they left the place, she was hooked, lined, and sinker, laughing and holding onto his arm as they walked back to his car. He opened the passenger side door for her, motioning for her to hop in.

“You want a ride back to your place? You DID have a bit to drink.”

She nodded, getting inside, practically giddy.

“Yeah, I can tell you how to get there, I think.”

“Good, good.”

He shut the door after her, and hopped in himself. He put on his seatbelt, and lit up a cigar. He hadn’t had a good smoke all day, and it felt good to finally get one in. He let her guide him to her house, and made a mental note of just where she lived. The drive was but a simple action, but it was a clever, discreet way of knowing just where to find her. He stopped right in front of her place, put the car in park, and exhaled the smoke into the car’s interior.

“You know, you put me in a real, real good mood. How about I do the same for you?”

She looked at him, confused, before he pulled out his wallet, and brought out a good chunk of cash. THAT sobered her up. Her first instinct was to clearly reach for it, but she stopped herself.

"What...is this for?"

"Spending money. Something for you to play around with, invest in stuff, whatever ya want."

"That’s...lots of money. A...LOT of money. You just carry that with you? You don’t think you’ll get mugged or something?”

“That doesn’t happen. Trust me on that.”

He chuckled. There were attempts, MANY attempts in fact, but...well. Didn’t end well, let’s keep it at that. She looked down at the stack, and he knew she was so close to being in his web. Just one movement of the hand. One moment of indulgence. And she fell for it. She took it from his hand, and counted it in her hand. The more she counted, the more lost she seemed to get, clearly in disbelief.

“Twenty five...t-thousand. That’s seriously how much this is?”

“Right on the dot. Now go on, get outta here. Sure I’ll bump into ya again, Doll.”

When she helped herself out of the car, he chuckled, and pulled out of the driveway. Soon enough made it home, where Roscoe and Desoto looked up at him, clearly wondering where he had been. It WAS a bit past their usual treat time. Fishing some out of his pockets, he tossed them towards his eagerly awaiting pups. He sighed as he sat down at his chair, leaning back a bit, and blowing rolls of smoke into the air.

“You boys ain’t gonna believe today’s catch. A real cute thing, you have no idea. Imma give her the usual week. Desoto.”

He snapped his fingers, and the mutt obeyed promptly, getting out of bed and sitting at his side. He allowed Sykes to run his big, firm hands through his fur, and thumbs rubbing at the tips of his ears. His master seemed VERY pleased by his new catch today, he almost never got special pets like this.

“You guys are gonna love her. Because If I don’t get a bite out of her, you two will.”

--------------------------------------------------------

He waited in his car, headlights off as he awaited her to return from work. He decided to take all this time to get back to some calls, rather than just sit here with his thumbs up his ass. 

“No. No. Swear to god ya bunch of morons- no. Take the teeth out BEFORE ya dump him. So what if he screams? Well ya in the warehouse right? Aight, ya gonna be fine then.”

His associate kept talking on the other line, but Sykes didn’t listen. He was too distracted by his hounds in the back, who were now fully sitting up and looking out the window. His dogs were a pain, but at least they were smart.

“Yeah listen, imma call ya back. Figure it out.”

He then saw her. She was even carrying the same purse he bought her. He waited till she went to her front door, before turning on the headlights, nearly blinding the poor thing. He stepped out of the car, hands out as if he was being welcoming.

“Aye, there ya are doll! Been a while!”

She seemed confused for a minute, but as he stepped closer, it clicked.

“Sykes, right?”

“Yeah, knew ya wouldn’t forget me. I didn’t forget ya in the slightest.”

He walked up to her, and leaned against the door, pinning her between a rock and a hard place. She shrunk a bit, before looking down at the floor. She had dropped her keys. Just before she could make the motion to reach for them, he covered it with the bottom of his shoe. He leaned down, blowing plumes of smoke into her face, making tears swell in her eyes.

“So, where’s my payment?”

“Payment?”

Of course she was confused. They always were. As if money was free in this world. He let the cigar roll in his mouth, before nodding.

“Yeah, my payment. You took a loan from me, doll. I need it back.”

“I didn’t know that was a loan! You didn’t say-”

“Little girl, nothing in this world is free, money included. Now, where is it? If you got it upstairs, I’ll go with ya to get it.”

Her little eyes looked so frantic under his gaze. He just needed to hear those words. Words that from any other mouth, would make him a very unhappy man.

“I...don’t have that kinda money.”

That was all he needed. He grabbed her by her arm, and yanked her to follow. She would’ve made a dash for her keys, had Roscoe not nipped at her heel, forcing her to back away. Turns out two barking dogs made for quite the deterrent. Sure, she struggled, screaming as his hand slapped over her mouth, but that didn’t matter. He managed to pull her away, and nearly threw her into the car. Desoto was a good boy, using those big, pearly whites to keep her there in pure fear.

“Roscoe, fetch.”

Roscoe went for the door, grabbed the keys, and placed them into his master’s hand.

“Good boy. Now get in.”

He waited till his other pup jumped into the back, before he went to the driver’s seat, and locked the doors. He adjusted his rearview mirror, and caught a glimpse of her scared little eyes. Yep. She was already worth every penny.

----------------------------------------------

“Don’t look at me like I’m a bad guy, sweetheart. You understand, ain’t nothing free. I fancy myself a good guy, but not good enough to just hand out money like that.”

Roscoe and Desoto circled her like vultures. She didn't even NEED to be tied up like this, he just liked the assurance, and the view. Like a little doe, she was still, powerless, and scared.

"I didn't know-"

"What you don't know, CAN kill you. I'm sorry, I know it ain't fair. But life is like that. Fortunately for you, I'm a very compassionate man. We can discuss methods of payment. Any family money?"

She shook her head, seeming to be a BIT distracted by Roscoe's sharp teeth. He gave a sharp inhale, shaking his head.

"Clearly YOU don't have the money, right? No 'under the sofa' cash?"

Another shake of her head. His fingers tapped against his table, shaking his head in clear disappointment. 

"Oh. I REALLY don't like your options now, Doll. Ya got two choices."

She squirmed a bit, stiffening as Desoto's teeth bared against her. He lifted his hands up a bit, and snapped his fingers. Roscoe followed the command, and dashed right for her, barking and frothing at the mouth. The weight of his body sent her falling, with the chair slamming onto the floor. He pinned her down, barking and covering her face in drool, teeth BARELY missing her own skin. 

Oh how she screamed. How she begged for mercy. How her legs thrashed as she tried in vain to get away. He let her sit there until he was certain there were tears in her eyes. Then he stood up, and slowly walked over to her, heavy footsteps clanking against the hard floor below them. He snapped his fingers, and Roscoe heeled, taking a seat next to his fellow fido. He squatted down to her level, blowing smoke into her already irritated face. He liked crybabies.

"That's option one. I'm assuming you don't want that."

She shook her head, sniffing. He rolled the cigar in his lips, before he lifted her face up with his hand, and pushed her chin down, forcing her mouth to open.

"Option two. You could provide me with a few...services. Then we can forget ALL about the pesky little debt you have with me. You're a pretty little thing, I'd be willing to let you work it off. I mean, you'd survive If I bit you, rather than my boys here. Not to mention if you're sweet 'nuff, I'll un do those pesky ropes of yours."

She clearly thought about it, but her mind was foggy, her eyes hurt, even her lungs felt sore from the second hand smoke. But, just as he suspected, she nodded. A huge grin came over his face, and he held onto the chair, pulling her off the floor.

"Alright sweetheart, let's EARN your freedom here. Open that pretty mouth for me."

He held onto her face as he pulled in, pushing that thick, rich smoke right into her mouth. All while his tongue slid into her mouth, grazing against hers. He took his time, getting a good, firm kiss out of her. He only pulled away when he needed to breathe. She needed it too, starting to fall into a coughing fit. It was cute. He put out his cigar on the ashtray, letting it sit there.

"Mm. You taste good. Damn good."

He undid his belt buckle, and whipped himself out. He turned her face at him, but with a bit of a...heavy hand, he pressed his cock against her face.

It was precious, watching such an innocent face under his thick cock. She whined a bit as he pushed her face into him, nearly smothering her with not only his dick, but his hairy, hairy balls.

"Open up for me Doll, nice and sweet. And don't you bite me. You'll regret it, trust me."

This time she seemed fairly willing, opening her mouth with not much more than a wince. He grabbed onto that pretty, pretty hair of hers, and pulled, really shoving her onto him.

"Oh that's the ticket, honey. Right there. Can feel that little tongue of yours."

He pushed himself fully, and held himself there, till he felt her gag, just like a good girl. He pulled away, watching her pant, lips covered in her own drool, and chest heaving. She was about to speak, before he shoved his balls right into her mouth, head tossed back in content. When was the last time he had his balls sucked by a cute, willing (somewhat anyway) little thing like her? He kept his fat, firm fingers in between her hair, really making a mess of it. Beautiful, poised girls were all swell, but cute, messy girls were such fun playthings. He granted her a bit of mercy, pulling away, while still pumping his cock.

"Mmm. You're a good little girl, ain't ya? Pretty too. I was gonna really put you through the ringer, but you're too damn precious NOT to be opened."

Not needing any scissors, he yanked at the ropes, making them snap under the force of his grip. He lifted her off of the seat, putting her on his desk, and using his big, strong hands to part those nice looking legs of hers. She was clearly hesitant, being felt up by essentially a stranger, but he didn’t care. Long as she didn't fight him, he could give less of a damn. He tore off her skirt, and took a gander of her panties. It was hot, knowing those lacey undergarments were paid for by HIM.

"Cute set here, Doll. Real, real cute stuff."

He took a hold of her ass, and pulled her closer to him, pressing himself right against that nice, cute fabric. With his free hand, he tugged at her shirt. Just because he was hungry, didn't mean he couldn't be a bit refined.

"Shirt, bra, off. Case you wanna keep your outfit in one piece."

He saw her hands tremble, as if she was confused. He gave another tug, and she seemed to finally get the hint, pulling her clothes off. She was worth the wait, honestly. Hell, he was so excited, he took his own shirt off, laying it as carefully as he could off to the side of the desk (it was hard to keep your shit neat when you wanted to be messy). He dug his fingers into her hair again, and yanked her into another kiss, this time really pressing himself against her. It wasn’t just their bank accounts that differed, it seemed. Where she was soft, helpless, he was firm, foreboding against her. He loomed over her, nearly suffocating her with not only his greedy lips, but his large, hairy, heavy frame. He pulled her away for a moment, ignoring the way she winced. He was pretty heavy handed, especially when it came to such a darling looking thing. He started to roll his hips into her, pushing his tip right against her clit. He liked the way she jumped every time, liked the way her toes seemed to curl. 

“You’re gonna handle me REAL well, girlie. I can tell. You’re really just a kitten, ain’t ya?”

His hand cupped at one of her breasts, kneading and pulling at the flesh. He was heavy handed with her, using enough force to make her wince. Not his fault she had a cute pair, with a face to match. He would sit there and play with them till they were nice and raw, but he wasn’t sure his cock would handle this much stalling. He hooked his finger into her underwear, and pulled them off. They were pretty much soaked, and something about that was just so charming to him. He let go of her hair, and groped her pussy, palming at her wet, warm folds. She held onto his hand, writhing under his firm grip. He pulled his hand away, letting her whimper as he checked out just how much she left on his hand. Needy little thing, it seemed. He slapped that hand over her mouth, and pushed himself right inside. You’d think he’d give her just the tip, get her used to his size.

You’d be wrong.

He pushed himself fully inside of her, balls deep, and watched her shake. Not that he blamed her. He was a big guy, afterall. He kept his hand over her mouth, despite how much she clawed at his hand. He held her like that, not moving a single muscle until she decided to settle down. He pulled his hand away, watching as her own drool (along with her own fluids) smeared over her delicate little mouth. She looked at the cock stuff inside of her, before looking at his face. He was expecting some kind of retort, some kind of insult, maybe even a slap to the face, stuff he was used to.

“You’re a terrible, terrible man.”

He opened his mouth to give her a life lesson (one he gave everyone when they barked that at him), when she suddenly flung herself at him, nearly smashing her lips against his own. That...was a first. But he was NOT complaining. He grabbed the back of her head, and returned the kiss with fervor, letting her moan right into his greedy, greedy mouth. Laying her right onto her back, he started to slam himself right into her. He had no idea how his desk supported his weight, especially when he was acting damn near belligerent on his new toy, but god was he glad it did. Especially since his new toy seemed just as excited as he was now, running her hands through his absolute mess of chest hair, and even locking her legs around him, as if she didn’t want him to leave. He parted the kiss, panting huskily against her lips. She moved not an inch, in either obedience, or the fact that his strong, fat hands were still holding the back of her head, as if he was scruffing a mutt.

“You’re taking me real nice, doll. You feel nice and tight, and you’re feeling me up like you actually like me.”

She didn’t seem to be focusing on his words for a moment, but rather keeping her focus on his big, hairy tummy. Not that he cared, he favored looking at her tits moving in sync with his thrusts. He favored watching the lewdness in her eyes, he favored knowing that her ravenous pussy leaked all over his desk. All of these he favored, over her actually meeting his eyes (Sykes wasn’t a real romance type, case you haven’t guessed). He let her continue her grubby little hands as he lowered his face right to the nape of her neck. He could tell that she liked hearing him talk, given the way she seemed to pull at his hair every time his breath brushed against her ear.

“It’s gonna feel so good when I cum right in you. You’re already handling me so good, you’re already gonna cum yourself. I can see it. I can see it plain as day, you wanna cum on my cock. Even if I’m a bad, bad guy, you want me doll. And that’s SO sweet of ya, really.”

He could tell she was trying to give him a bit of a fight. Just a little bit of one. She had such a mean little scowl about her, as if she refused to let him see her cum. Unfortunately for her, he always took what he wanted. And after just a few more thrusts, after taunting her with his sweet, sweet voice, and after grabbing her so tightly she bruised, she came. She shook something fierce as he fucked her right through it, relishing in her cries of ecstasy. He was used to screams. Screams of mercy, of pain, but hearing one from such a cute little dame cumming for him, it was just so refreshing. She pushed his face away, only to bury her teeth right into his big, meaty neck. Most bites tended to happen on his hand, so feeling it here was just something else. He didn’t have a chance in hell. With a swear under his lips, he came. He forced her to keep still, pumping cum right inside of her. Even as it trickled out of her, he didn’t seem to quit. He wasn’t timing it, but he knew he lasted a damn good minute before he finished.

“Shit.”

Was his only response. A simple, satisfied swear. One that helped ease all the tension in his poor, old body. His stomach rested on hers as he panted, ever so slowly calming down from a damn good high. She was quite a vision herself, covered in sweat and bruises. Pretty thing. She forced herself to swallow, before speaking, wearily.

“We uh...square, right?”

That made him laugh. He shook his head, leaning over to his discarded jacket, and pulling out a cigar. He lit it up, taking a good, deep inhale, right before looking down at her.

“Honey, that was a damn good fuck, really it was. But that was NOT worth twenty five thousand. You still got a bit of work ahead of ya, Doll.”

He watched her wince as he tapped his cigar, letting the ashes fall onto her exposed skin. Yep.

She was a keeper.

[stiles-o-dylan24]

Hi there! I was wondering if you could give me some advices? I'm planning a rewrite, but have trouble getting all the ideas in order, and finding how things could change. Basically, I got the idea, but no structure... And especially since Teen Wolf time line is not very precise, to know if it's the week end, the day after, or two days after? I can rely on the clothes they wearing but... I'm lost, and thought that you could maybe help? Your rewrite is so good!

Thank you so much bby!!🥰

Oh I’m so happy to help with any and as much as I can!

Completely agree about their timeline not being precise at all lol. Honestly, I basically would guess how much time had passed if their clothing, or dialogue didn’t fill in the blanks.

My view on the rewrite process was not focusing so much on matching the timeline exactly as it was on the show. I try to follow it as best I can, however I also want the story I’m shaping to make sense to the reader.

Especially depending on what person you’re writing in. Since I’m writing in 1st person and I can’t have my OC be in every scene that are key to the main story, I have to improvise recaps of events that happened.

The first season is a great example since a lot of the story is focused around Scott & learning the werewolf lessons with Derek. I would say “last night” or “yesterday” or “a few days ago” whenever Addy was learning about things that happened with Scott to flow them into my timeline I felt made the most sense.

Now I may be totally off on that but that’s how I perceived the episodes and the timeline for things. Other times there might be something in the dialogue an episode or two later about a certain event or topic talked about at a specific time and then I’d have to go back and alter something.

Also why I will suggest having a fair few episodes written out before you start posting so you can alter things if needed 🤗

As far as getting your ideas outlined...I made a google doc for each episode and I’d jot down ideas or how I wanted to work my character into a specific scene that stood out to me so I wouldn’t forget them. Now granted there were only a few scenes from each season I remembered and actually had an idea come to me just thinking about what happened in that episode, but it was helpful to see when it came time to writing that episode later.

For the most part reworking the scenes happens as I’m reading the script for the episode, then they get reworked more when I rewatch the episode and make sure what I edited/added when reading the script will actually flow based on how the episode actually plays out.

Ultimately you have to rework the story, the scenes, the dialogue to best work around your character you’re adding in. Otherwise you’re just throwing a character into cannon without actually making a story for them & for me as a reader, I wonder what the point was?

I’ve looked at adding Addy into the story with how I wish it was told originally. Meaning I’ve altered the story, I’ve altered relationships, and cannon dialogue quotes to fit her in the best way possible. It didn’t make sense to me to keep everything exactly like it was in the show and just say it’s not going to end up the same.

Which I hope is coming across to everyone as they read my story 🤗

It’s why I chose for Heather to attempt to hook up with a different guy than Stiles, why the black light party scene was altered, why Eichen happened the way it did, it’s all the pieces falling into place and gearing up for when they finally get together. Those scenes couldn’t stay cannon and have what I planned have as much meaning.

Hopefully I made sense & was at least a little helpful, if you need me to explain anything better please let me know! Wasn’t sure if I was covering what you meant about having your idea but no structure correctly so just let me know🤗

Always here for you! & I can’t wait to read your rewrite💛

[jinxthequeergirl]

The New Hero on The Block ( pt. 3/?)

Peter Parker x reader ( Mentor! strange x student! reader)

Summary: you take matters into your own hands after the fire and set out to save a the city to the best of your abilitys catching the eye of a few people.

Warning: cursing

Sorry this took so long guys I haven't been feeling my Hashtag Best but im trying to get back into a writing grove so enjoy!

Also I hate writing action because it always turns out so much worse than what I imagined in my head but! I gave it a shot and this is a superhero story so.

~~~~~

The convenent store wasn't to much help in your quest for finding a disguise.

There where quite a few avengers masks,spiderman masks and only a few left over from halloween. You sighed not liking anything you saw until your eyes landed on some goggles haphazardly placed on the bottom of the shelf. And an idea spring to your head.

"Sure this is it?"

You nodded at the cashier who eyes you supisously. "It-it really isn't what you think by the way." she raised an eyebrow as she scared the items. A pair of goggles, a bandanna, rope, a new back pack and a few other tools and items that with a single glance looked like the start to an awful crime. "Whatever you say." you smiled nervously and handed her the money.

Since the fire every night seemed colder. Which sounded like some weird movie line in your head but it was true maybe because just the thought of having your dad alive and knowing he was out there some where working made you feel comfortable and safe.

Now he was gone so it was a constant fear,glancing over the shoulder and now...

"Hey!" the gang of people you dropped down besides looked up at you. "What do you want!?"

"What I want isn't important...Now What I need is!" you pulled the baseball bat from your back pack and made your way to them.

"And imma need you guys to stop trying to Rob this place."

"What are you gonna do stop us?"

"If you won't yourself" one of them stood up and pointed a gun at you but you quickly swatted it from his hand with the bat and drove the handle of it into the other man's chest as he made his way behind you.

He stumbled doubling over but grabbed the bat and yanked it from you.

"What are you gonna do now?"

"Do you think i was stupid enough to bring one weapon!?"

The man frowned at you as you pulled your make shift grappaling hook from your belt. "Please that won't do sqwat." they circled around ready to attack. "That's what you think." you spun it in a loop in front of you quickly enough to set of the sling ring you attached to it.

"What the hell-" you spun around staging the newly open portal and catching all three men inside before yanking it shut. "Cool!" You smiled at yourself proudly.

You went on like that for a few months you handled little stuff you figured wouldn't hurt you enough so peter would start to notice when you got back. Besides the city already had a thousand other hero's defending it they just needed someone to look out for people like you.

Of course that was your initial plan.

Parker:

Are you going to be home tonight?

Parker:

C'mon (y/n) I'm worried about you!

Parker:

Please don't be of some where getting into trouble

Parker:

Come home tonight ok? Take a rest from doing whatever your doing please...

Parker:

Don't get hurt ok?

Your thumbs danced above the key bored once again. But instead shut your phone off completely and shoved it in your backpack. A troop of police cars raced down the street below you.

You followed them with your eyes noting the smoke coming from that place. "What the hell?.." you swung from the roof of the building you stood on and swung across to the next swinging along side a car and firmly planting your feet of the roof of the car. You pulled your baindana up over your noise and planted your goggles over your eyes. You rode the car until you got to your street corner swinging your grappling to the top of the building and swinging off the car and hoisting yourself to the top of the building.

Once you where firmly on the ledge you looked down at the remains of you home across from you frowning. Scowling actually. You wanted to find the men that man inside your apartment that night worked for. You wanted answers. But didn't have any solid things to work off. No evidence no witnesses. Nothing it was either nonexsistant or burnt to ash.

You watched now as men worked outside your building. Men who probably shouldn't have been. You opened a sling ring letting you step onto the building across the street next to the burned building.

"The distraction fire set!?"

"See the cops drive by!?" you looked up looking across the millions of roofs to see the smoke you spotted before with a light orange glow eminating from it.

"HEY!" you jumped thinking the voice called you out.

"Enough bikering get to work you know what I want now do it!"

The two men started climbing into the rubble as you attempted to look at the man who yelled at them.

He was hidden well in the shadow of the truck. You leaped through another sling ring portal landing on the other building.

The two men started sifting through the rubble looking for something. "Anything?"

One man shook his head in response. The man from the truck growled. And stepped out of it. "Move aside."

You gasped seeing one of your close friends father step out wearing a green suit with large metal wings attached. "Mr.Allen?..." his wings expanded and lifted him off the ground.

You groaned realising who he wlreally was.

"Fuck...ok..ok...HEY!"

You stood tall at the edge of the building gaining there attention trying to mask your voice.you where good friends with Liz and certain he would reconize you of you didn't "What do you think your doing!?"

"I could ask you the same thing kid."

"I asked you first?..." he looked down at his men and nodded to the truck. The both hurried to it and he flew over to you.

"Listen kid I've got a job to do I don't need you getting in the way so-"

You backed up off the edge on to the flat of the roof and heard something eletric charge up from below.

"We can do this the hard way or you can scram."

You narrowed your eyes at him. "Yea well...i don't see my self scaming MAN." you fell through a portal you conjured at your feet and pulled your baseball bat from your bag poping up behind him and slamming it into the side of his knees.

He hissed in pain and spun around smacking you with his wing. "Hard way it is!" He flew up above you and grabbed you with his talons attached to his shoes.

"Light her up boys!" your eyes widened in fear as the two men held up large not normal guns. You sneered and used all your strength to swing your legs above you to kick him but failed to reach.

His tailons dug into your arms restraining you from moving any more than you where. The fun lit up more as they aimed it at you. But just before they could pull the trigger someone kicked it from there hands. "You know you really shouldn't be playing with guns!" spiderman took out the two men and looked up at you.

You heard falcon growl as his talons realeased you. You fell into The rubble of the building below and falcon dove for spiderman. You sat up grabbing the sling ring and making a portal under spiderman sending him landing behind you. Flacon crashed into the truck.

"Wha! That's so cool how did you-" you looked at him confused and helped him up to his feet as falcon freed himself from the truck. "Magic! LIsten man you have to get us outta here!" falcon growled from behind you using his free leg to kick the truck from his other.

Spiderman nodded grabbing your hand and swinging the both of you away from him.

The both of you didn't make it very far when falcon got himself free he made a B line straight for you. "Hey can you go any faster!?"

He looked down at you surprised. "No! Can't you distract him!? What about another portal thingy!?"

You huffed. "Fine imma try something alright!?" spiderman turned the corner quickly throwing voulter off for a second. You pulled yourself up onto his back. "Hey! Hey! carful!" you pulling yourself up made it harder for him to swing slowing him down allowing vulter to catch up and grab the hood of your coat yanking you off him. "No!"

Spiderman stoped on a near by building. "You aren't getting away that easily!"

You smirked in zipping your coat. "I beg to differ!" you held your hands up letting yourself slip through your coat you bag came crashing after you.You pulled a big bomb from your pocket and tossed it up at him. You grabbed the strap of your bag just in time for spiderman to catch you.

"I have an idea! Get me to the top of the building!"

He quickly got the both of you to a building out of sight. "Here!" you tossed him a big bomb.

"Seriously!?"

"Hey I don't have superpowers like you! This is as good as it gets so-" you slid the sling ring on your fingers and tossed your bag over your shoulder.

"Follow my lead and we'll bag this sucker got it!?"

"Wow your pretty good at this stuff what your name?"

"Tell me yours first bug boy! Go all you have to do is anger him and lead him over to me!" you smiled from under your bandana and he nodded running over to the edge of the building.

Yelling at vulter. You had your grapling hook stretched across the two buildings and waited pastently for spiderman and vulter to round the corner.

"READY!?'

You nodded and opened up a portal in front of the two. Spiderman jumped of your rope and joined you on the building vulter flew into the rope and it sent him flying into the portal with that you shut it. "It worked!" you high fived him excitedly. "That was increadible!"

"I know!"

"Your increadible!"

"I kn-"

Before you could finish your scentence you fell through the roof and landed on an unfamiliar floor. "(y/n) (l/n)! We need to talk!"

~~~

Tagging:

@cutie1365

@crumpets-are-better-with-jam @spaceslonechild

[itbeatsbookmarks]

(Via: Hacker News)

Sam Lerner

Jun 5

I have one of those personal projects that I just can’t finish. I think most software developers can relate to this. You have some awesome idea but due to work and other responsibilities, it ends up being forgotten about or buried under other tasks.

Now this isn’t a success story of one of said projects being completed, but it is the story of a long-forgotten project being revived and given some new life. In fact, I’m hoping writing this forces me to eventually finish the project. But enough with introductions, let’s get into it.

The Project

The goal of the project is to build a Spotify client that learns from my listening habits and skips songs I would normally skip. Like many programs, the desire for this comes from laziness. I don’t want to have to create or find a playlist when I’m in the mood for certain music. I want to select a song in my library, shuffle the rest, and have the songs that don’t “flow” deleted from the queue.

To accomplish this, I will need to learn some sort of model that will be able to perform this task (maybe more on that in a future post). But to be able to train a model, I first need data to train it with.

The Data

I basically want my entire listening history, including what songs I skip. It is fairly straightforward to get my extended history. Even though the Spotify API only allows you to get the last 50 played songs, we can set up a cron job to repeatedly poll this endpoint, effectively keeping track of every listen. Code for this is posted here: https://gist.github.com/SamL98/c1200a30cdb19103138308f72de8d198

The hard part is tracking skips. The Spotify web API provides no endpoint for this. Now, in the past I created some services to control playback using the Spotify AppleScript API (the rest of this post will pertain to the MacOS Spotify client). I could just use these services to keep track of what is skipped, but that felt like shying away from the challenge. How else could I accomplish it?

Hooking

I recently learned about a process called hooking, where you can “intercept” function calls made from a target binary. I thought this would be the perfect way to track skips.

The most common type of hook is the interpose hook. This type of hook overwrites a relocation in the PLT but what exactly does this mean?

The PLT, or Procedure Linkage Table, allows your code to reference external functions (think libc) without knowing where that function is in memory, you just reference an entry in the PLT. The linker performs the “relocation” for each function or symbol in the PLT at runtime. One benefit of this approach is that if the external functions are loaded at different addresses only the relocation in the PLT needs to be changed, not every reference to that function in your code.

So when we create an interpose hook for say printf, whenever the process we are hooking calls printf, our implementation of printf will be called instead of libc’s (oftentimes our custom library will also call the standard implementation).

Now that we’ve got a little bit of background under our belts on hooking, we’re almost ready to try inserting a hook into Spotify. But first we need figure out what we want to hook.

Finding Where to Hook

As stated earlier, an interpose hook can only be created for an external function, so we’ll look for a function in the libc or in the Objective-C runtime.

While researching where to hook, I thought a good place to start looking would be where Spotify handles the “media control keys” or F7-F9 on my MacBook. It seemed safe to assume that the handlers for the these keys would call the functions that are called when, say the next button is clicked in the Spotify app. I eventually came across the SPMediaKeyTap library on: https://github.com/nevyn/SPMediaKeyTap. I figured I’d give it a shot and see whether or not Spotify copy and pasted the code from this library as that would make my life a whole lot easier.

In the SPMediaKeyTap library, there is a method startWatchingMediaKeys. I ran the strings command on the Spotify binary to see if they have this method, and sure enough:

Bingo! If we load the Spotify binary into IDA (free version of course) and search for this string, we find the corresponding method:

Partial disassembly for startWatchingMediaKeys

If we look at this corresponding source code for this function, we find the interesting parameter tapEventCallback to the CGEventTapCreate function:

Source code for startWatchingMediaKeys

If we look back at the disassembly, we can see that the sub_10010C230 subroutine is passed as the tapEventCallback parameter. If we look at either the source code or disassembly of this function, we see that only one library function, CGEventTapEnable is called:

CGEventTapEnable called in tapEventCallback

Let’s try to hook this function.

The first thing we will need to do is create a library to define our custom CGEventTapEnable. This is fairly simple with the following code:

#include <CoreFoundation/CoreFoundation.h> #include <dlfcn.h> #include <stdlib.h> #include <stdio.h>

void CGEventTapEnable(CFMachPortRef tap, bool enable) { typeof(CGEventTapEnable) *old_tap_enable; printf(“I'm hooked!\n”);

old_tap_enable = dlsym(RTLD_NEXT, “CGEventTapEnable”); (*old_tap_enable)(tap, enable); }

The dlsym function call gets the address of the actual library CGEventTapEnable function. We then call the old implementation so that we don’t accidentally break anything. Let’s compile our library like so (credit to https://ntvalk.blogspot.com/2013/11/hooking-explained-detouring-library.html):

gcc -fno-common -c <filename>.c gcc -dynamiclib -o <library name> <filename>.o

Great. Now let’s try running Spotify while inserting our hook: DYLD_FORCE_FLAT_NAMESPACE=1 DYLD_INSERT_LIBRARIES=<library name> /Applications/Spotify.app/Contents/MacOS/Spotify . Hit Enter, and uh oh:

Spotify opened fine but Apple’s System Integrity Protection (SIP) didn’t let us load our unsigned library :(.

There seems to be some sort of complaint about codesigning. Luckily, I am a member of Apple’s very reasonably priced developer program, so I can codesign the library. Crisis averted. Let’s sign our library with our $100 certificate, run the previous command, and…

fail. Not surprisingly, Apple won’t let you insert a library signed with any old identity, only the one used when signing the original binary. Looks like we’ll have to find another way to dig our hooks into Spotify.

As a side note, the astute reader might notice that the function we are hooking, CGEventTapEnable is only called when the media key event times out. So even if we could insert our hook, it would only be triggered on an edge case and we likely wouldn’t have seen any output. This section’s main purpose was to detail my initial fail (and oversight) and serve as a learning experience.

HookCase

After some digging, I came across the awesome library HookCase: https://github.com/steven-michaud/HookCase. HookCase lets us implement a much more powerful type of hook than the interpose hook, the patch hook.

Patch hooks are inserted by modifying the function you wish to hook to trigger an interrupt. This interrupt can then be handled by the kernel and then transfer execution to our personal code. For those interested, I highly recommend reading the HookCase documentation for it is much more detailed.

Patch hooks allow us to hook not only calls to external functions, but any function within the target binary (since it doesn’t rely on the PLT). HookCase provides us with a framework to insert patch and/or interpose hooks as well as a kernel extension to handle the interrupts generated by patch hooks and run our custom code. It is truly a great framework and invaluable for this project.

Finding sub_100CC2E20

Now that we have a way to hook into any function within the Spotify binary, there’s only one question remaining… Where?

Let’s revisit the SPMediaKeyTap source code to see how the media control keys are handled. In the callback function, we see that if F7, F8, or F9 (NX_KEYTYPE_PREVIOUS, NX_KEYTYPE_PLAY, etc.) is pressed, we execute the handleAndReleaseMediaKeyEvent selector:

And then the delegate is notified in said selector:

Let’s look at this delegate method in the repo:

Turns out it just lays out a template for handling the keys. Let’s search for the function receivedMediaKeyEvent in IDA and look at the graph view for the corresponding function:

Looks pretty similar, doesn’t it! We can see that one common function, sub_10006FE10, is called for each type of key, only an integer parameter is set to distinguish them. Let’s hook it and see if we can log what key is pressed.

We can see from the disassembly that sub_10006FE10 gets two parameters: 1) a pointer to the playerDelegate property of the SPTClientAppDelegate singleton, and 2) an integer specifying what type of event occurred (0 for pause/play, 3 for next, and 4 for previous).

Looking at sub_10006FE10 (I won’t include it here but I highly recommend you check it out for yourself), we can see that it is actually a wrapper for sub_10006DE40, which contains most of the meat:

Woah! That looks complex. Let’s try to break it down just a bit.

Looking at the structure of this graph, there is a single node towards the top that has many outgoing edges:

As IDA helpfully suggests, this is a switch statement on esi (the second integer parameter described earlier). It looks like Spotify’s handling a little more than just Previous, Pause/Play, and Next here though. Let’s focus on the block that handles Next, or 3:

Now admittedly, this took me some time to decipher but I want to draw your attention to the call r12 line fourth from the bottom. If you look at some of the other cases, you will find a very similar pattern of calling a register. This seems like a good function to look into but how do we know where it is?

Let’s crack open a new tool for this: the debugger. I had a lot of trouble when I was initially trying to debug Spotify. Now this could be due to me not being too masterful with the debugger, but I think I came up with a pretty clever solution.

We’ll first set a hook on sub_10006DE40 and then we will trigger a breakpoint from within our code. We can do this by executing the assembly instruction int 3 which is what debuggers like GDB and LLDB use to trigger breakpoints.

Here’s what that hook looks like in the HookCase framework:

After adding this to the HookCase template library, you also have to add it to the user_hooks array:

We can then compile this using the template Makefile HookCase provides (substituting filenames of course). The library can then be inserted into Spotify with the following command: HC_INSERT_LIBRARY=<full path to hook dylib> /Applications/Spotify.app/Contents/MacOS/Spotify.

We can then run LLDB and attach it to the running Spotify process like so:

After continuing past the initial trap, try pressing F9 (if Spotify is not the active window for the first press, it may open iTunes). The int $3 line in our hook should have triggered the debugger.

We can now step until we reach the entrypoint of sub_10006DE40. Notice that the PC will be at an offset address from the one shown in IDA (honestly, I don’t have the best grasp as to why this happens but I assume it’s due to where the process is loaded into memory). In my current process, the push r15 instruction is located at 0x10718ee44:

In IDA, the address of this instruction is 0x10006DE44 which gives us an offset of 0x7121000. In IDA, the address of the call r12 instruction is at 0x10006E234. We can then add our offset to this address and set a breakpoint accordingly, b -a 0x10718f234, and then continue.

When we hit our target instruction, we can print out the contents of register r12:

All we have to do is subtract the offset from this address, and voila, we get our titular address: 0x100CC2E20.

Hooking sub_100CC2E20

Let’s now hook this function to confirm our suspicions:

Add this to the user_hooks array, compile, run, and lo and behold: Any time we press F9 or click the next button in the Spotify app, our message is logged.

Now that we’ve hooked the skip function,

The Rest

I’ll post the rest of the code but I won’t go through the process of reverse engineering the rest because this post is already pretty long.

In short, I also hooked the previous function (a good exercise if you’re following along). Then in either of these hooks, I first check if I am past halfway in the current song. If I am, I don’t do anything, assuming I’ve just gotten bored with the song, not that it doesn’t fit. Then on backs (F7), I pop the last skip.

Where am I?

The way that I found out how to check if the current song is past halfway deserves a few words. My initial way was to actually call popen and then run the corresponding AppleScript commands but that just didn’t feel right.

I ran class-dump on the Spotify binary and found two classes: SPAppleScriptObjectModel and SPAppleScriptTrack. These methods expose the necessary properties we need for playback position, duration, and track id. I then hooked the getters for these properties and called them from with the next and back hooks (I think it makes more sense to swizzle but I was having trouble with getting that to work).

I use a file to keep track of skips where the first line holds the number of skips and on a skip, we increment this counter and write the track id and timestamp to the file on the line specified by the counter. On a back press, we simply decrement this counter. This way, when we press the back button, we just set the file to write new skips over the ones that were backtracked. Anyways, here’s the code: https://gist.github.com/SamL98/0cd20b00951b9a5cca6b5c9380ec5642

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed this post and learned something, I know I learned a hell of a lot throughout the process. Let me know what you think and if you think I could’ve done anything better/differently. Thanks!