#I think it's funnier making fan art of side characters

[jag-rat]

Do I understand it? No. But it has my full support nonetheless.

[genericpuff]

Are there any characters from LO that you actually like/don’t mind

I have a lot more appreciation for Minthe now with all the hindsight that Hades and Persephone are often way worse than she is. She still had a lot of issues on her own end that she didn't deal with well, and while I would have liked to see her actually develop properly beyond her struggles both internal and with Hades, I think the best thing we could have asked for was Minthe being written out of the story the way she was. At least then Rachel couldn't continue to use her as a punching bag (she just tagged in Leuce for that, sigh)

Helios is great, zero issue with him. This scene is a lot funnier and more relatable to read in hindsight:

like ofc Helios is gonna rat on her, he's the fucking sun who's been around for thousands of years, why would he put any more of his limited freedom on the line for macaroni art LMAO (and yes, Rachel herself confirmed that Persephone made macaroni art cards for Helios, it's like... yeah okay it's cute but Persephone and Demeter still hid a crime from Zeus, the sentimental value of the birthday cards have no bearing on that LOL)

Thanatos is also in the camp of "characters I appreciate more in hindsight and wish got better character development". Adding in the 'twist' that he was Hades' adoptive son after we just spent nearly two seasons watching Hades treat him like just a lowly employee who didn't deserve his respect was certainly... a choice. And I don't think I should have to explain why it was a very very BAD one LOL

Hephaestus is also great, I know he's an extremely minor character whose only real role was to delete the blackmail photos from Apollo's phone but, like. look at him???

amazing. precious. sweet boy. and it has absolutely nothing to do with my absent older brother issues why would you say that- (｡•́︿•̀｡) that said, there are still flaws in his design (his prosthetics especially because he's constantly wearing running blades for every occasion which I feel like Rachel only chose because they "looked cool" and were "easier to draw" but like. his poor hips and back, that's gotta be uncomfortable 😭) but even just his face on its own is ironically one of the most unique character designs across the entire cast, not for any sort of outstanding or creative reasons, you just can't possibly mistake or color swap him with anyone else LMAO and though I can't feasibly give credit to Rachel for writing a neurodivergent character - because I have no clue if that was her intention here, afaik she's never really talked about it - I can wholly relate to him being the introverted computer guy who just wants to be left alone with his work and his airpods, like that's literally just me LOL

And of course nothing Rachel could ever do would make me hate Demeter, I think it's so ironic and tone deaf that Rachel claimed she "didn't get" why Demeter was so hated by the fans and didn't "agree" with the comparisons to Mother Gothel, but like... Rachel literally wrote her that way. And while she did "resolve" it, it wasn't with any actual empathy towards Demeter's own side of things, it was just bandaids on top of bandaids and then going "yep! She's all better now! That's character development!" Out of all the characters who deserved better, she was the one who deserved the most 😔💓

[specialagentartemis]

As someone who doesn't really like grimdark -- my biggest annoyance in 'historical style' fantasy writing (y'know, the standard medieval fantasy, or other eras) is that everything is trying so hard to be Game of Thrones, and it's just like 'please stop'. Not everything has to be about the conception of society being a terrible place full of violence and violence being the only answer and everything is dirty and everyone is mean, and so on so forth that GRRM and his fans like to posit as 'historically accurate'.

People have always been people, whatever era they lived in. They liked colourful things, they wrote shopping lists and asked their parents to remember them to their siblings and friends, they cared about keeping up appearances, they found joy in the lives they lived and the things around them, they cursed poor candelight and cats smudging their ink, they left behind marks that mean we know even now that they existed, and they sang and told stories as they worked.

Yeah, sure, wars happened, plagues happened, they didn't have the modcons and knowledge we do now, but that doesn't change that they were people doing what people do.

... I think this is why I like Pratchett, honestly. He acknowledges the way that people will be people, even down to the faults that come of it, but he also acknowledges the funnier side of things, and even the brighter, more hopeful, more optimistic side of things.

But yeah, this is why I can't be having with grimdark.

Undeniably! I don't disagree with you that there's a lot more to life and history than suffering. That's important.

I admit I don't read a whole lot of medieval-esque fantasy. I actually really loved A Song of Ice and Fire for some of the most compelling character writing and political intrigue I've read in fantasy, but it's not my go-to genre. What books are doing it in a grimdark way? I guess I would hardly be surprised if there's that kind of trend-chasing in medievalesque historicalesque second-world fantasy, but I've often found descriptions of being "grimdark" to boil down to "I didn't like it" more than naming a consistent set of traits tbh.

I'm an archaeologist, haha; I definitely know the feeling of connecting with humanity across the centuries and millennia, looking and something and thinking, oh, wow! I do that, or I've seen that, or that's just like us... I study 700 year old pottery, and there's something special about holding a pot that was clearly made by a child, because it looks basically the same as the pinch-pots I made in elementary school art class. It's something that I definitely think people writing in very different times and cultures could stand to remember more, that people inhabited these lives. Making characters feel like real people who really live in this world is a perennial pitfall of second-world sff. That's for sure.

But people being people doesn't just mean being nice and funny and quirky. Like, very often it does mean being selfish or prejudiced or suspicious of people unlike them. Generosity is ubiquitous in humans vultures, and so is violence.

I love Terry Pratchett! I love Discworld! He definitely has one of the sharpest, most sympathetic satirical eyes for modern life, and I love Discworld for that. But the Discworld books are also comedies, and not the be-all end-all of fantasy. I dunno. I kind of get tired, sometimes, of the "people are inherently good actually" discourse of tumblr. I don't believe that. I don't believe people are inherently bad either; I don't believe people are inherently anything other than prone to ingroup/outgroup thinking tbh.

I'm definitely not saying you have to like grimdark fantasy. I don't think anyone has to like any genre. I try not to moralize liking genres. I get a lot of value out of books that feel to me like they're acknowledging that sometimes things really are that bad and sometimes people are mean and you gotta deal with it. I'm not always in the mood for that. Certainly I have plenty of faves that aren't depressing as well (I do love Discworld! I blog about The Murderbot Diaries a Lot!) I'm interested in books that make an attempt to portray the best, most utopian society the author can imagine. I just... also, for example, read Ninefox Gambit at the height of the pandemic when no one knew what was going on and no one knew when there would be a vaccine and there were protests every day being met with police brutality and I was throwing up nearly everything I ate out of anxiety, and the violence and the war and the heavy imperial dystopianness of it calmed my brain down a lot during that time. Because "react badly to plagues" and "violence" are also what people do, and at that time, it resonated to see someone agreeing.

[oneatlatime]

The Blue Spirit

Before we get into the episode, a couple of thoughts that have been rattling around my brain: -Last episode was heavy. I need jokes please. -it's been a while since I've seen a hybrid animal. I thought those were going to be a running gag. -It's been a while since there has been any gorgeous background art. -The last couple of episodes have really pushed Sokka and Katara to the background. I'm missing the ensemble style episodes.

Episode time!

It's Zhao. Hi asshole. Actually this conversation is touching on something I've been wondering about:

The fire nation has bigger fish to fry than a quarter-trained 12 year old.

If this whole episode happens at night time I'm going to really miss my CRT.

Zhao is now turbo asshole. Also there's a weird blue cat on his roof.

Imagine having a sick day on an Appa couch. Heavenly. And where are they hiding this time? Why is there a giant tapestry?

Looks like this won't be much of a Sokka episode.

Not going to be a Katara episode either. This is a novel way of benching your side characters.

How does airbending make you go faster? I could see earthbending making you faster, just by moving your running surface, but how does Aang do it?

I do like roadrunner shenenigannery.

Momo doesn't understand English confirmed. Also he has green-tinted vision? Do his irises coat his pupils? That would be weird.

Behold! A non-hydrid animal.

"It's been almost an hour and you haven't given the men an order." Ouch. Burn.

I'm not much of a Zuko fan, but even I have to admit that this is a sucky situation in a long line of sucky situations. You have to feel for him here.

Frog popsicles. Did not see that coming. Note the lack of hybridity.

Now he looks like those arrow guys.

Using aerial weaponry against an airbender seems really stupid. I guess they've got numbers one their side.

Is literally everybody in this world a professionally trained acrobat? Do all four nations include that in the school curriculum?

Compensating?

Could the action wait until morning please? I can't see.

Zhao doubling down on the asshole behaviour. Not cool. Keeping someone barely alive in captivity for as long as possible has to be some sort of war crime. Waging a war for a century against an entire planet is probably also a war crime, so again, bigger fish. There are assholes that are entertaining to watch and fun to root for, and assholes that are just plain mean. Zhao is now firmly in the latter category.

Poor Momo is trying his best. Zhao's right about there being no one to rescue Aang this time though. Even Appa's benched by babysitting duties.

The blue cat is back. Clinging to the underside of a moving cart using just your fingernails has got to be murder on the hands.

Good lord these guards are blind. This episode is too dark for me to see anything but I still saw blue cat guy hot foot it into the compound. His mask even has white parts.

Oh god he's monologuing. Blegh. Although convenient for blue cat guy. A desire to monologue may be Zhao's most consistent character trait.

Did the frogs do that?

The hallway-that-eats-our-guys just ate one of our guys. What should we do? How about send two more of our guys down the hallway-that-eats-our-guys? And leave only one to guard the door keeping the world's most powerful bender contained? Sounds good.

CAT.

He extinguished that guy! That gets funnier the more I think about it. All that fancy bending, years of training, and your fatal weakness is a bucket.

Exactly how many of those sword flourishes were necessary?

I like the blue cat's theme music. It's some sort of wind instrument, a bit kazoo-like, but it sounds a lot like this plastic toy trumpet I had as a kid that I'd play with whenever I was mad at my parents. I loved that thing, but it mysteriously vanished one day.

Blue cat is doing some seriously precision sword bending. Imagine if he'd missed? How do you live down cutting off the Avatar's hands and feet?

It WAS the frogs! Caught red- um. Footed? Do frogs have hands?

The return of One Man Army Aang.

Blue cat is surprisingly go with the flow for having just been catapulted dozens of feet without warning. Stuck the landing too. Sort of.

I'm sure there's some fascinating fight choreography going on at the moment but I CAN'T SEE IT.

Aang can briefly function as a load-bearing helicopter. Briefly.

So… how many of these guards are dead?

I am a dumb! How did I NOT see that coming? I am dumb! Much dumb!

Turns out there is one hairstyle worse than Zuko's usual.

In addition to roadrunnering, helicoptering, and ladderwalking, Aang can also carry someone taller and heavier than him at high speeds while fleeing the enemy. Is there anything airbending can't do?

Or maybe it was the frogs. Also I just realised that Fire Nation ships are shaped like Fire Nation shoes. I bet those shoes give you bunions.

Zuko was out for a WHILE. Might want to get that head wound checked out.

This hit unexpectedly hard. This episode's second surprisingly heavy scene. Can't they at least hug?

Was the kazoo-trumpet diagetic all along?

"Did you make any new friends?" "No. I don't think I did." Me:

Appa is your friend, not your toothbrush.

Final Thoughts

This was a character episode disguised as an action episode. Which I did not realise until I figured out that Blue cat man was Zuko all along.

Firebender Zuko has chihuahua energy. Blue Spirit Zuko has cat energy. Discuss.

Everyone needed a hug this episode. Including me. Except Zhao. Screw Zhao.

Zuko seems much more confident with those swords than he is with his fire. I don't mean to compare skill levels; I have no way of evaluating that. I mean he seems more sure of his movements with swords. Fire makes him shouty. Swords make him dance.

Can't really say much about Sokka and Katara this episode, although I do like that the reason they're out of commission is a direct consequence of last episode's exploits. Makes the through narrative feel more grounded if the small things as well as the large plot points have continuity/consequences.

Momo! Poor Momo. He really tried! Actually, I've been assuming, but is Momo a boy lemur?

I am utterly indifferent to the Arrow guys. Nice bit of stealthy worldbuilding, but I'll eat my hat if they ever recur.

This episode was The Storm part 2. Parallel angst threads concluding in the two mains staring contemplatively in silence after each other? Yep. Storm Part 2. This episode may have had even less humour than The Storm. I found the recurring frog jokes worked better than the Sokka and Katara are sick jokes.

I've been kind of nitpicky about this episode, but don't get me wrong, I did enjoy it. Kind of really ended on a downer though. It's also contributing to a growing suspicion of mine: would they pour all this development into Zuko, and set up a more powerful villain to take his place, if they meant for Zuko to stay the villain? The show started giving us insight into Zuko's character, and arguably a reason to pity him, at the same time as it gave us those things for Aang - The Southern Air Temple. This show has 60-some episodes. Would you humanise your villain in episode three if he was supposed to be the antagonist for the rest of the show's run? You could, but it would be a waste of writing energy. So what's going to happen? Is this war going to have three sides? I can't see Zuko fully switching sides, when his reasons for chasing Aang are so personal. Whatever Honour means in the fire nation, Zuko's only way to get it back seems to be capturing Aang. I can't think of anything Aang could give him that would be worth forever forfeiting his Honour.

I think this episode made the correct choice, in not having Zuko say anything when he wakes up in the forest with Aang. Like the end of the Southern Air Temple, and the end of (I think?) the Winter Solstice Part 2, some moments are enough - no dialogue needed. But - bear with me as I stray into fanfiction territory - wouldn't it be fascinating to hear the conversation Aang and Zuko might have had? And isn't it neat that Aang chose the conversational topic he did - not questioning why Zuko rescued him, but attempting to reach out? There was a choice made in his one-sided conversation with Zuko that I want to pick at. I can't put into words why I found that short scene so impactful. But I want to pick at it.

I'll be rewatching this episode on the CRT in my parents' basement when I can, because the brightness on my little laptop just does not go high enough. This episode was dark. Fittingly so, but still. I want to SEE.

[theverumproject]

WIP Questionnaire Tag!

Thanks for the tag @nczaversnick!

This is for Verum II: The Robotic Era

What's the first part of your WIP that you created?

Since TRE is the second book of a series, the characters and rough world building had already been created before I started. I think I began with writing all my ideas down for the story line.

If your story was a TV show, what would the theme song/intro be?

It would definitely be a metal song. Maybe orchestral death metal mixed in with some cyber elements.

What are your favorite characters you've made? Why?

I think it's Dethra. He's very hot, funny and badass. At least to me. I just love big scary killer machines that could crush me in an instant, lol.

What other pieces of media do you think your fanbase would share?

Uhhhh… idk?

How do characters travel/get around?

Planes and cars. And of course they’ll also walk if their destination isn't too far.

What part of your WIP are you working on right now?

Currently I'm writing a part that is on the easier to digest and on the funnier side, since the last two were rather heavy. It's Luce, Dethra and Bluctro traveling to India. 

What aspects/tropes do you think will draw your audience in?

There's polyamory, fuckable robots and a fuckable alien… I think this is the first time that I say this, lol. It's also a little Dead Dove: Do Not Eat-y.

What are your hopes for your WIP?

I hope that I will gain some readers, since my first book isn't doing well (justified, it's bad as hell, lol). Having a fan base that loves my work, talks about the characters and eventually even makes fan art and fanfiction of it would be my absolute dream. But I doubt I'll get to that point any time soon.

Open tag!

[aiyexayen]

🔥 please! Maybe adaptations (whatever that means to you)

i have no idea if this is a hot take but i think adaptations of any kind should exclusively be passion projects. not nostalgia bait. not number-go-up-up-up schemes.

they should be made by people who 1) actually know the original media and 2) have a genuinely unique take on the story that they want to say with the adaptation. essentially, budgeted fanwork.

adaptations should be really fucking clear on what story they are telling, how it is different or similar to the story the original is telling. and for whom, and why. and none of those reasons should be money or clout.

and if they want to pay homage to the original thing, or make a parody, or make it 'better' by metrics of their own, or critique it, or write an au or addendum or side b, or just use it as a vehicle to explore a new or updated perspective--that's all great. adaptations don't have to be love letters to the original art (though that's the kind i usually like). it can even still be unpopular or completely miss fans of the og because it wasn't made for them. as long as it really wasn't made for them. as long as the adaptation fucking cares about doing and saying something. as long as they commit.

people not caring and not committing and being lazy and money/power-grubbing and pandering while also fumbling the whole lackluster deal is truly my fucking pet peeve in everything right now istg.

like. okay fine get the costumes wrong but do it because you want to--do it with purpose, because you have a vision. change that one beloved character's arc but do it to serve your new themes and messaging because you need to. add in a dumb original character because this is a comedy now and it's funnier that way. and do it competently for the love of god; if you have a budget and you're getting paid and it's your job and you're charging people to consume the end product then act like it. i may still hate it but at least i'll respect you, and if it's also good just in a new way then maybe i will like it!

[parkquimin]

TF141 + Valeria and their relationship with kpop

Valeria:

Not a big fan but is smart enough to know that there's a shit ton of money in kpop.

She probably buys up like all the tickets ever for concerts and then charges 10x the original price. The original scalper.

I think if there's a group she likes, she'll save the best tickets for herself.

Also she definitely buys up all the merch and sells them at extremely high rates too.

I think she also uses them as bargaining chips. Like if she's talking to an important business person or whatever she's like "oh I heard your kid likes (insert group), I happen to have tickets to them I could give you a good discount on them"

She probably posted something negative about a big group just to stir up drama and quickly learned to never do that again because her location got leaked LMAOOO

She probably thought about hiring some of the stans because how tf did they even find her???

Gaz:

Idk why but I feel like he's an ultimate stan.

Knows some of the dances, but isn't super dedicated to learning them

He definitely has photocards, lightsticks, albums, etc.

Had a VISCERAL reaction when he was called in on an emergency during KCON and he had to sell his prized P1 ticket.

WHEN he's off duty OMGGG.

This man has like 4 different devices set up ready to get tickets (he's fighting Valeria for them).

If he's on base or on a mission and the time is right, he'll make the rest of the team open the ticket portals so he can have a higher chance at getting tickets.

Cried when he didn't get Stray Kids tickets and then screamed when they released more dates in his area.

Cries for like half of the concerts he attends and his voice is unusable the next day

Price:

I feel like he's not into it and MAYBE he knows like "Red" by Hyuna cause Gaz played it once and liked it.

MAYBE does a little research just to know what Gaz and Soap are screaming and giggling about

He hit Gaz with "I heard one of those kpop people you like on the radio" and Gaz just stared.

I feel like he set one foot into a kpop store because he got Gaz for secret santa and he grabbed the first thing he saw, paid, and never looked back (Gaz appreciated the effort)

Mixes up different groups' names (not even on purpose he just can't remember all of that info)

"Why are there so many people in NCT"

"Why are they called "Seventeen" if there are only 13 people in it"

Ghost:

I feel like he's heard it in passing, but doesn't really listen to it.

Maybe there's a couple songs where he bops his head to the beat but then nothing further than that.

Probably gives Soap and Gaz concerned looks when he catches them in a corner giggling over a piece of paper smaller than his hand.

I feel like he's been to ONE concert because he lost a bet to Soap. Soap would've gone, but it was a group he didn't know and he thought it would be funnier if Ghost accompanied Gaz. Ghost agreed mainly because he'd get to spend time with Gaz (he loves his teammates)

He watched all of the fans scream and cry and was lowkey scared

Soap:

He is more invested but not as dedicated as Gaz.

He probably learned a couple dances with Gaz and likes the more popular groups like Twice and EXO.

Would go to KCON if there were enough groups that he liked and just to bond with Gaz.

Gaz lends Soap his albums because he "needs to learn to appreciate art more"

Soap ends up getting a couple of albums of his own, and I KNOW him and Gaz trade photocards and do reveals for each other

Watches with concern as Gaz screeches at his computers when it's time to buy tickets.

Doesn't freak out when he sees other people with kpop merch in public, but he'll give them like a side eye LMAOOO

----------

I'm ngl I've never played COD and I recently just started getting into the characters, so please lmk if you think I've mischaracterized anyone in this post! I'm happy to make edits and do more research but I just though this would be a fun thing to write :). Also thank you so much for viewing my work, it means so much to me as a beginner writer <3

[prowerprojects]

Aside from noticing a shift in how "found family" is portrayed in fandoms these days, I wonder if this is a semi-conscious side effect of Tails over the years being semi-shafted until the past decade. (Aside from AOSTH{though was often a kidnap victim} and Boom, most adaptions had him downplayed or outright replaced. Yes, Prime, this technically includes you. The comics aren't exactly clean either, but Archie is the most guilty.)

But yeah, I get the appeal of "parental big sibling" tropes. Not every sibling relationship is the same though, or is all peachy. I don't think Sonic thinks Tails is so inept that he can't trust him to be on his own in most circumstances, young or not. (Fox is more likely to run INTO trouble than make it himself. High intelligence doesn't mean you won't do dumb stuff on occasion; especially if you're not well-versed, but I sooner buy the idea of 'baby' Tails having separation issues than willingly getting into a shootout with cops. Not unless he was saving someone anyway) Sonic's influence on Tails is mostly guidance and support. While Tails does seek approval, Sonic does not have huge authority over him. Tails striking out on his own and living his own life doesn't make his bond with Sonic any less close. Reunions can be just be as emotional, y'know? (Plus, wouldn't Sonic be proud of that? For Tails to achieve his dreams through his own efforts? Give me a Sonic being the loudest person at his little brother's science presentation.)

Also, I don't think Tails would care who Sonic dates. Curious at best, and I'm sure he would want to be on good terms with his romantic partner and even bond with them, but I don't think he nor Sonic would appreciate the former being babied at every turn. Plus, wouldn't Tails being a gremlin by giving snide, knowing looks to Sonic be funnier? (And there's plenty of sibling activities that doesn't involve parenting one another: Movie nights, water gun fights, pranking, sparring, camping, gaming. Even just napping in the sun under a tree.)

Likely another side effect to the "non-action" and "dependency" Tails got hit with. (Which is funny because I have witnessed at times back then of some accusing Tails of being potentially appearing too competent to the point of making Sonic look "weak". Wanting Tails to have limits on his mechanic skills is one thing, but saying he should stick to tinkering vehicles only is very restricting though?) Nine may have endured bullying longer, but it doesn't mean it stopped having an effect on Tails himself. (Called names, had his tails messed with, people smashing his inventions. He may grown to embrace his qualities, but he clearly still has self worth issues that is ripe for exploring more. Nine's is mainly trust. Companionship too, but mostly trust. They've both been hurt, one was just lucky enough to get support early and ongoing.) Heh, I could go on a tangent on how finicky fans are at the thought Tails talking back to Sonic or dare have a different opinion than him and Nine gets a pass because he's "Anti-Tails", but that'd be another essay. xD (But yeah, hopefully Prime ends well.)

((Oh, and cool ponytail Tails art, btw. :] ))

Hmmm, could be. Early portrayals call still influence the way people see a character, even after all those years. (I mean, Sonic and chili dogs thing even got canonized and everything)

I definitely see Sonic as more of a mentor rather than parent figure. I think Sonic has a lot of trust and respect for Tails, and it's hard for me to imagine Sonic like. Grounding Tails or something similar. If this happened I imagine it would be such a wild concept to Tails he would think it's a joke, but more importantly Sonic wouldn't even think of doing this, I don't think he thinks of himself as that kind of authority figure in Tails's life. And Sonic is Tails's biggest fan definitely. I like that one bit from a q&a where Sonic gets asked who's smarter, Tails or Eggman, and he immediately picks Tails... (It's so cute, idk, especially since there's no way to actually prove it, and it's probably not even true (of course, "smartness" is relative), and then he goes on to say how Eggman is still a close second and very dangerous and not to underestimate him)

[No comment on the shipping thing, I pretty much agree though]

I've mostly seen people wanting Tails to have a limit on his skills to make him as a character more "grounded" and "realistic", but Shadow can have 10000 superpowers and I don't see anybody complaining. You know what else is unrealistic? Flying by spinning your tails. Especially since Tails was portrayed as this "pan-purpose scientist" since the beginning, and it's not a part of "flanderization". Like for sure, vehicle engineering has always been his specialty and biggest interest, but for example he made a Chaos Emerald radar back in Sonic 3, and had a robot back in Tails Adventure. People bring up the fact that he struggled with a plane prototype in Adventure 1 as an example of him being not that great with his mechanical skills initially, but he had already made a rocket back in Sonic the Fighters at that point.

Yeah, bullying messes you up big time, and it's not easy to get over it... If this wasn't something Tails had to deal with in the past, he might have a completely different outlook on himself nowadays, even if he still felt inadequate. Though I do like how the games don't really push this into our faces all the time, it's just a part of the backstory that helps understand the character better but you can still understand what's up with him even if you don't know the details. (Also makes me think he probably doesn't talk about this, it's something that only Sonic knows about most likely, and even then still probably not in detail).

(There's a lot of things that I don't quite like in Prime, I just don't bother talking about it, but I'm pretty optimistic on how they're handling Nine! (& Tails))

(Haha thanks =^-^= )

[sideblog-for-vagueposting]

Being in a fandom with a relatively small presence on here is weird sometimes. - Part 1

This is actually why I finally made a sideblog! I thought about trying to vague about this on my main, but a bunch of people from that fandom interact with me regularly and I don't want to risk starting something. (Even if I didn't name the fandom, I've got moots from there who might figure it out.)

I just kind of wanted to mutter into the void about it, you know?

So I follow the tag for this one fandom, right? And there's a lot of good content, so I use the 'follow post' feature pretty often to keep up with interesting conversations, watch art projects progress, wait for someone to reblog that they gave in and started a fic about that one concept we spent two weeks talking about...you get the idea.

The thing is, in a close-knit fandom? If you keep track of things well enough? You can actually find out when someone in there blocks you.

(I mean, I guess you could also notice it if you used to message them and now couldn't, but I'd never talked to this person, so...)

So I made this funny post with a handful of headcanons about some characters one day. And at one point when I go to respond to a mutual's reblog, it turns out that the mutual was responding to someone else's (gonna call them Blog_A) addition. I hadn't seen Blog_A around before, so I try to click on their name, because I'm always down for more fan content in there.

But I get the "Ghost blog!" screen, which didn't make sense, because they clearly just reblogged my post?

I was really curious, so I copied the link and pulled it up in a browser that I wasn't logged in on. Turns out that if you pay for that $5 branding thing on here, people can read through your blog without having to be logged in.

So there I am, scrolling through Blog_A's stuff, and I didn't get why they would've blocked me?

It took a while (because it turns out that they don't actually post much in the fandom), but it turns out that they just have an intense hate boner for this one side character (let's call her X), and I think that might've been why? Best guess I have, anyway.

I'm only posting this now because this entire thing has become so much funnier since then.

So allow me to provide the context that makes this humorous.

First of all, basically no one bothers with character bashing in this fandom. Yes Blog_A's complaints about some of X's actions were understandable, but there's more than enough of that to go around here. Nearly every character has made some questionable choices, and I've never come across another fan with a legit hate tag for anyone. You're WAY more likely to find posts that say "You know, I really like this fandom because I can say that I like *insert character who is a villain/antagonist/objectively terrible person* and try to genuinely analyze them without anyone thinking that I condone their shitty, shitty choices. It's nice here."

Secondly, I don't actually post about X that much? I gave her like one line in the headcanon post, and she was only there because I was trying to list a bunch of characters. Anything about her on my main tends to be reblogged from other members of the fandom. I'm not out here writing fics or gushing about her or anything. You know who is? At least six other people that Blog_A is following. God, the irony.

Last and absolute funniest: The very first "X hate" post that Blog_A ever made? It was about this semi-popular ship in the fandom, X/Y. Blog_A strongly dislikes this ship, because they think that Y is a brilliant, wonderful person and that X is a one-dimensional irritant that should die in a fire. Now, this complaint was about the fandom shipping them, because while there had been a moment or two that could hint at something, no one actually thought that there'd be any on-page confirmation. Until recently, when it was not only canonically revealed that Y has feelings for X, but what's going on between the two of them is about to have MAJOR impacts on the plot.

FOR THE RECORD: This is NOT meant to be any kind of hate towards this person. I will not be sharing the url or fandom. Blog_A has every right to their opinions, which are hurting Absolutely No One. I just thought this whole thing was really funny and wanted to put it down somewhere.

[benjineedssleep]

(fanfic) silly things in my 100k+ word wip that i really fucking love

i talk about this fic out of context a lot to avoid spoilers since it's not posted anywhere yet but... i really wanted to share a couple of things that might be a little too in context. anyways! lol-- the list is under the cut. proceed with caution if you plan on reading it when it's done :3

p.s. it's a sambastian fic but has a ton of other fun stuff. there's somethin' for everyone in there. (if you care at all, here's an intro to it.)

as annoying as it is to write, reoccurring items/motifs are so fun. like yes, i can and will be referencing a joke from ten chapters ago. and yes, that character sebastian knew? yeah, well, haley knew her too because they all grew up together and went to the same high school. it's just fun and a way i world build in a space that's already pretty developed.

speaking of the motifs, my favorite has to do with touch; the boundary between something explicitly platonic and romantic. pretty much every character toes the line but there are certain things, like hand holding, that just really take the cake for me. see it's not just hand holding. it's guiding. to go from holding a wrist to a few fingers to a palm and to then intertwine. it's fuckin' fantastic. even more so because it's such a small detail you can miss.

haley and vincent are two of my favorite characters to write. they have very specific voices and mannerisms and trying to keep it consistent and in character is such a fun challenge.

on that note, haley and sebastian are my favorite dynamic to write (other than sambastian obviously lol, the fic is theirs after all). they're both catty and their love-hate relationship is my favorite thing ever. i recently wrote a part where haley comes to him for advice and half the conversation they're arguing/dragging each other for absolutely no reason. and what makes it even funnier is they continue the conversation all the while this is occurring.

sam is full of shitty jokes and even though i only throw them in there a handful of times, i adore how cheesy he is. he just thinks he's so funny and, despite everyone's grumbling, they can't help but agree.

robin and sebastian's relationship is also fantastic. a lot of what i wrote with them is early on and needs to be heavily revised, but generally speaking, they're both flawed characters who fucked up their relationship with each other and being able to explore that in a healthy way makes me cry. it's just so good. everyone needs a robin.

abby is the most omniscient character in the whole story because she's not only friends with sam and sebastian (getting both sides of their stories) but also with haley (the town gossiper). the way the two girls kinda orbit everyone else while having their own shit going on is just a blast to write. they don't exist just to fuel the plot, they're their own characters. but also, watching them lose patience and start forcing their friends together like barbies while playing house is REALLY fucking amusing SDFUIHSDFH

internal battles are just SO juicy. most of sebastian's issues are internal and self inflicted. he's just in his head too much and does dumbass shit to try and cope with whatever he's feeling (that he doesn't want to, even if it isn't inherently bad) at any given moment. the main plot and catalyst for the story's problems is literally him not wanting to accept that having feelings for people is okay!!! he's so stupid!!! i love him!!! (he's also me sometimes... i fear...)

i'm not typically a massive fan of ocs in written fan fiction (i for some reason eat art/comics up though???) but i cannot help myself by throwing in random and irrelevant characters. there are two market-esque things in winter year 1 and all the vendors the characters talk to have names and personalities. all of them were made up on the spot and will (likely) never reappear, but i don't care. they add depth to something otherwise limited to a handful of canon characters. i haven't tried out any expansion mods for sdv but i totally get why people like them so much and write those new npcs into fics. the options increase like... sevenfold XD

speaking of ocs, i basically make irrelevant canon npcs into ocs in this fic. welwick the fortune teller? i made them non-binary and they genuinely have thousands of words dedicated to them and are referenced multiple times throughout the entire fic.

SPEAKING OF QUEER FOLKS-- anyone i add is some flavor of queer. i don't give a single fuck. there's an nblm relationship and there's a trans masc character and there will be many more random inclusions because i said so.

super minor detail that i technically haven't had the opportunity to add yet but background ships? characters who literally don't have audible interaction? i'll be writing that in. haven't decided who's getting blasted with the miku-beam-of-homosexual-pairing yet but i'm leaning toward harvey and elliot. and both of them have their own lines in the fic already. so they're real... (and i love them...)

sebastian opening up as the fic progresses, letting people into his life, letting people love him unconditionally... A U G H-- it's fucking fanTASTIC bro. i already have an idea of the exact way i'm going to end the fic and it has to do with this exact concept and the way it's physically represented in his collection of 'cherished items'. more than just abby and your mama care about you now my love =((( /pos

okay. i think i'm good. i can seriously go on forever just like with my headcanons. i just love writing so much. i LOVE IT SO MUCH-- also, before i go, take a shot every time i said something was fun to do. you'll be drunk as hell by the time you get back down here, trust XDD

[worldunbent]

i was going to give my ranking of hxh arcs but tbh i enjoy/don't enjoy them for such different reasons that it feels impossible to try to directly compare them. i also could not possibly justify ranking the chairman election arc as highly as i would. general quick thoughts on each instead

hunter exam - it took me a little while to get into it, but starting from around netero's introduction it really picks up and the ending is stellar... on mc+ keith talks about how the show makes you nostalgic for the hunter exam as it goes on and it is kind of great how an arc that feels full of danger and uncertainty at the time becomes almost cute and whimsical in retrospect.

zoldyck manor? - not sure if this counts as an arc but i like it. there's some excellent work in tone with how simultaneously dark and goofy it is.

kevin's heaven's arena - sure does exist. speaking of arcs that feel different in hindsight, greed island kind of makes this arc look worse because that also had a shitton of exposition but it was with a wacky character in a wacky setting while in kevin's arena you're getting powerpoints from a kind of boring character in a kind of boring setting. there's nothing about this arc i really hate, but not much i enjoy either.

yorknew city/phantom troupe - YEAH BABEY. if we go by the dichotomy that everyone is either a yorknew fan or an ants fan, i am definitely a yorknew fan. i love the setting, i love the parade of freaks, i love the inexplicable lengthy digressions about art forgery. all of the character writing is so sharp and funny and tragic. i could talk for ages about how many things i like about this arc on a beat-by-beat level. on a broader level, the pacing is also excellent (even with the lengthy art forgery digressions) and i love how it's a break from the very typical battle shonen-y structure of the surrounding arcs.

greed island - i wasn't expecting to like greed island because i don't like training arcs and have very little interest in stories that deal with video game mechanics but for some reason i really enjoyed it - it's partly because the arc just has great character work (this is where killua emerged as my favorite and stayed that way for the rest of the series even though he was squarely my least favorite of the main four for quite a while in the beginning) and partly because togashi is having so much fun with his own worldbuilding and bizarre ideas that it's hard not to get drawn in. the video game aspect is less interested in the crunchy mechanics... well, it is interested in the crunchy mechanics, but it takes a very broad view of the game's design as well, which is a lot more fun to me. obviously the weak point of this arc is that the villain just sucks ass. i won't deny that.

chimera ants - wellll sure. i like a lot of this arc, especially the continued character and relationship development for gon and killua and a bunch of the new characters on the hunter side, but the stuff i enjoyed most wasn't really specific to the ants. i didn't hate them but i struggled to find them as interesting as togashi clearly did and that's... an issue when the arc is as long and ant-focused as it is.

13th chairman election - i completely understand the flaws that other people see in this arc but i simply enjoy the events that take place and sometimes that's enough. it's a stupid political farce that for some reason has been jammed into the same space as a fucked-up family drama. and the stupid political farce is also a fucked-up family drama itself. it's just so weird and specific that i can't help but like it.

dark continent - i barely remember anything that happened this arc. i do think it's really funny that togashi takes a second pass at the same bit nobody liked in yyh where he starts explicitly powerscaling and says that actually all those past insanely powerful villains are weaksauce b-tier fools and all the real strong guys are over there -> go there now -> -> -> it's not better this time but it is funnier because he's doubling down.

succession crisis - the fact that i don't like something called the succession crisis arc is hilariously out of character but sorry the pacing of this is just so weird and i find it hard to care about most of what's happening. there are definitely parts i like but they're swimming in a sea of togashi just throwing out absolute overload of new characters and ideas too fast to actually develop most of them.

[penguin--person]

Alík anon back for more. 1. I still think your OCs are cool as hell. I like all of them but Alík(obviously lmao) and Nastya are my favorites.

2. I love how you portray Anya and Dima, in both your art and your fics. Your stuff is part of the reason I like them, and also their side of the PAFL story more than before.

3. Your fics are so good. You’re scary good at, like, gory ones too, like with Divergence and the one where Sanya beats you up(sorry, forgot the name). Those two fics made me feel exactly where my heart was and made me feel the bile in my stomach. I mean this in a good way. 👍🏽

4. I think this is the last thing. Also, first reason for me wanting to send this ask. I saw the alík x sanya playlist and thought “hey that’s sick as hell, lemme like that.” First thing is, are you okay with that? Can I have the playlist in my library? And second, on a funnier note, I made a playlist filled with songs that made me think of sapphic longing, and it was unintentionally very similar to the alík x sanya playlist. Which makes sense considering their relationship. I think. First songs I can think of were Wet by dazey and the scouts and Squaring Up by Sir Chloe. Oh great taste btw that’s all for now bye

ohh anon thank you.... my dearest anon...

alík doodles just for you!! chomping on a mic... ive been thinking of making like, a comic for her !! ive never rlly done one before though, so, im scared it will suck. but. whateverrr alík would love whatever i'd make!! fuck it we ball!!! ive been neglecting her a bit lately, not drawing her much and all that... so sad ... i keep getting distracted... first with nastya, now with patho x pafl, my friends ocs, i wanna draw smth for my friends bday too.. and theres a dtiys that i wanna join .. there's soo much nastya stuff you dont even Know... So much nastya lore... 90% of it is in my friend discord tho !! my friend tarot (@/tarot-the-silly-one) is her biggest fan ever and has drawn her soo much!! hes posted some of his art of her there!! tho most of it is in the server hehe... look at this thing he made of alík!!! you may have already seen it but oughhh it lives in my heart... the other character in it is his oc zhenya!!:) i love her... shes my friend..

2. heheee!!!! my swag skillz!!!

3. thank youuu!!!! lots and lots thank you!!!! i appreciate it lots <333 the sanya beats you up fic, fun fact, is named after this

bc i love it so much... this could be us but yuo killed me ten times ten fucking times sanya when will yuo learnt o love me a gentleman gamer instead of going after dumb jocks?!!?!? bitch. gamers rise up.. thank you again!!!! its always nice to hear that people like my fics!! and its awesome i made you feel sick... thats the intent im going for... hell yes... my liefs work!!!

4. ya ofc!!:D you can like any of my playlists 👍unsure if i've shown you the alík one? well !! here's alíks playlist and nastya's playlist <33 hehe... thank youuu!! coolest anon of all time

[deepunknownyouth]

Donkey Kong VS Mario risk vs reword

Donky Kong has been going for a long long long time in fact it has been going on so long thta the first game is well over 15years old. Donky Kong has been loved for a long long time.

The games were loved for there fun platforming levels and great game play as well as fun story's and an over all amazing art style and design.

Mario has been going on even longer than Donky kong and is a very fun and fan favorite clastic game that nearly everyone knows and loves Mario.

The game was loved for its likable character great and simple game play and even the games sound track looks and parity much everything was loved about Mario.

Risk VS reward what is it?

Risk VS reward is when there is an item or something like a power up that you don't need but would aid you greatly in combat or in gameplay to help you complete the level. That is the reward part of the deal. The risk part is well what you think... There is risk to get this said reward weather that be bad guys trying to kill you or a jump you have to get arose a whole to get to the reward. Games have been doing this for a while for example in Minecraft to get demands you need to dig down and mine around laver but you don't need demands to complete the game.

In Donkey Kong the risk is always more enemies or a large jump that you have to make it across to get to get to the reward. There may even be a side level to get this said rearward it is hard but it is fun getting the reward.

Mario is also simmer offer going into a mini level to get the reward you want and offer having to fight a few enemies and jump a few jumps to get the said reared you are looking for.

I think that donkey Kong's is better I thin this because Dokey kongs risk and reward normally mean more and are harder to get making them more fun and valuable. It also makes the game funnier and over all a good time to play and gives the game some really risk as the enemies are far harder to fight.

[mintmoth]

OKAY I'm gonna do a big ask response here! There's a few I didn't grab which are mostly just people saying sweet things- to which honestly I can't thank you all enough 😭 it's so wild to me to see people enjoying my art so much

I'm gonna keep most of the replies under the cut since it's gonna get a bit long but I wanted to touch on this one real quick-

Absolutely anyone is free to use my art as an icon wherever! Just be sure to have something crediting somewhere and yeah absolutely go for it!

OH ALSO my submissions don't work on mobile for some reason? The formatting messes up I guess, but check out this awesome coloring!! I love how the layers of shading look 😭

LMAO okay so I've seen a good handful of older/mafia au designs for Floyd and Jade and a lot of them have either both of them with double sleeves or Floyd with sleeves and Jade with a back piece- though I've also seen somewhere both of them having one sleeve on the opposite side

Right now I'm just messing around so I don't have any official tattoo designs for either of them, but I do know I want Floyd with at LEAST the double sleeves, and Jade with some pieces he keeps hidden by mostly wearing business attire lmao

XBSISNK THANK YOU 😭😭 honestly drawing hair is one of my absolutley FAVORITE things to draw lmao, most of my ocs have long hair I just can't help it honestly

YES ABSOLUTLEY probably not too often but I could definitely see Azul going to bed and waking up to a very full bed lmao. Funnier yet because I think all three of them are the type to cling in their sleep when they have someone else beside them. They're just weird sea creatures used to small comfy spaces

I actually haven't thought about this! Honestly I think that would be really cool! Or even if he found that he had a specific shade range of color blindness as a human- though I could see Jade and Floyd taking advantage of that by doing something like giving him the wrong color shirt to wear that day or something lmao

Though you also reminded me! Eels also have terrible eyesight! So I've seen people both having the headcanon that the twins wear contacts, and also the headcanon that Azul needs glasses now because he did a deal to give part of his vision to both of them

Honestly it's really cool to think about! I don't know which headcanons here I like the most, but I love seeing them

Okay honestly I absolutley have to draw this because I LOVE this idea and part of why I'm answering this is to mentally catalogue that I need to draw this lmao

I also love this idea! Like at lunch, after classes before they go to work at the lounge, and after the lounge closes up for the night it just becomes the twins' gossip hour lmao

Because yeah they do spend a lot of time together, but they're still apart a lot, and there's no way they're not telling each other about all the nonsense they're getting up to once they meet back up

DBSISNSK DONT CRY LMAO I got a handful of questions about Niles I want to try to touch on here

Absolutley he wouldn't mind helping anyone set up games on their computer lmao, especially if it's a hard to get visual novel that he's a fan of because he's the type to want everyone to play and love the games he loves

He's definitely dropped hundreds of hours into "creature crossing" with one of those islands with tons of customization and cute shit, and his "island creatures" are mostly cats with a couple dogs and the pegasus LMAO

Also while he's not directly inspired by any specific character, since he's in Ignihyde he does have a little Greek mythos theming and has some inspiration from Eros, which is also why he's very "love" themed/romantic

OH MAN I'm actually not 100% sure which moray I think the twins would be, I'd have to look more into them specifically

But I did want to mention that my idiot self is tempted to make Yet Another Oc (though I probably won't post this one since I feel very oc heavy already) that's also a moray- but specifically a snowflake just because wow I want to make a design around the coloration they have 😭

ALSO!!! Regarding Eel Anon!

I wasn't able to screenshot everything you sent but it was absolutley fun hearing about the dorm idea you have!! I love hearing about new dorm concepts and I've seen a couple nightmare before christmas dorms so it's neat to see the different ideas people have! Also no way do Eri and Rika sound like knock offs of the twins lmao they both sound really fun and I like how they juxtapose one another- also how you have their whole family worked out??? It just reminded me I need to do some more backstory work for my group lmao but honestly it was really cool reading about them so don't even worry about long asks or anything!

[bnnuy-wabbit]

HAAIIIIII you can call me Lago, im 21 (i dont know how EITHER), im just some guy*. this is my main blog and where i throw funny things that makes my brain produce juices and also random ass personal poasts.

one of those he/shes they never warned you about (pathogenic variant they have yet to make any vaccines to protect you from)

my art tag is #feral art tag.

there will be adult things in this blog because im an adult. follow at your own risk etc. were horny in here towards men occasionaly.

I'm brazilian. From Brazil. As in born here, living here and stuck here for the foreseeable future. é nois 🤙

Everybody says I'm really nice! I am Unable to hit people up first though, but if you'd like to be friends, send me an ask and I'll give you my discord!!!!

i have many interests (mostly music and nerd shit) and funny things that I'll be putting under the read more lest this post get Unbearably Big. There are flashing blinkies down there by the way.

OK SO INTERESTS. I like MANY things! and i have favorite things! I think it's really cool of me to have favorites. i decided I'm going to wear them on my sleeve. anyways Here's some things i Like.

MUSIC!!! its one of my favorite things ever. I play the guitar and a bit of bass. heres stuff in no particular order of favoriteness. Just stuff i care enough right now to remember.

Linkin Park (meteora, hybrid theory <3)

My Chemical Romance

Red Hot Chili Peppers

Mindless Self Indulgence

scalene

Rammstein

Ft-rj (listen to it or i am going to chase you with a broom)

francisco el hombre (i recommend the rasgacabeza album)

danny bond

2000-10s pop!!! fuck it, lady gaga, britney spears, kesha, katy perry, black eyed peas, that sorta jazz.

Every single Homestuck song there is. i have listened to all of them multiple times. My favorite albums are colours and mayhem and also the beforus fan album.

Dad rock (acdc, queen, talking heads, nirvana, judas priest, Some pink floyd etc)

Industrial and Adjacent. I've been listening to code:redcore a lot and some grammostola actaeon lately. processor also fucks.

OTHER THINGS I ENJOY

Eragon (the books)

Disco elysium.

ADVENTURE TIME. I AM OBSESSED.

How to train your dragon (the books. specifically.)

Animated movies!!! Specially the hand drawn ones.

My horrible little OCs (@honsebeasts just go there but also Beware.)

Worldbuilding. I do aliens and monster speculative biology. Most of my thoughts on it are on the Above mentioned blog though.

Real life physiology and anatomy also

MEN (and like 3 fictional women.)

HORSES!!!!!!!!!!!

stranger things

Pokemen (i do not know a single thing after gen 6 though.)

Dungeons and dragons, sometimes

Traditional art like watercolors and oil pastels

Drawing my blorbos in the same side facing pose or just standing there.

Drawing in General actually! Designing characters is my passion

Fictional fathers

sewing and felting and sculpting and painting and singing and playing

COLORS. i love colors. i love looking at them. i love playing with them. i would like to eat them if i could. i love warm palettes.

Hiveswap (pissing screaming CRYING)

MONSTERS!!!!!! They're really cool and gay and hot.

Portal (the games. all of them. glafos........ kissing her)

Half Life.

y2k and 80s-90s vibes. i think its awesome.

I am afflicted by the human condition and also a few other funnier conditions. my brain and my body dont work right.

If you want to know the brunt of the brain ones: autism adhd avpd. they all impact heavily how i interact with people with people. Sorry in advance if i can't keep conversation going.

I'm some sort of queer thing. If we need to get really specific, id say "bisexual aromantic bigender femme", mostly into men and butches, but Queer will do just fine. I'm a self entitled part time pretty fag and ugly dyke in my free hours. Intersex it turns out.

[urrone]

I posted 2,100 times in 2022

34 posts created (2%)

2,066 posts reblogged (98%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@foofyschmoofer

@onionjuggler

@bropunzeling

@painterofhorizons

@liminal-zone

I tagged 2,070 of my posts in 2022

Only 1% of my posts had no tags

#loling forever - 246 posts

#oh tumblr - 54 posts

#fan art - 37 posts

#me - 34 posts

#tiktok - 32 posts

#critical role - 32 posts

#cats make everything funnier - 31 posts

#accurate - 31 posts

#relatable - 30 posts

#same - 28 posts

Longest Tag: 69 characters

#moving into the new houses built along the other side of victor’s row

I sent 1 gift in 2022

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Writing question! You write for a lot of different fandoms. Do you find yourself adapting your style to the fandom, or are there aspects of writing style that transcend different fandoms? (I imagine it's a mix of both, but I'm really curious about which elements stand out to you as being fandom-specific or universal when it comes to writing style!)

Hey, thank you for asking!

Thinking about this now, I feel like I adapt my writing style to the tone of the story more than the fandom. I think if you read through my fic you'll see how it adapted over time, but the style over the fandoms will feel very similar. Like I think my writer's voice is pretty strong.

That said, I just took a look at my Dragon Age fic vs my Julie and the Phantoms fic, and the prose in the DA fic is a bit more flowery, to fit the writing and the dialogue, than what I have in JATP.

But I always write in tight 3rd person POV and always in present tense. (Except for a few experiments in the early days of fandom.)

So the short answer to your question is you are correct, it's a mix of both. I like to be descriptive and I like to use a lot of metaphors in writing. Dialogue is my jam but I don't like to have a lot of bare bones back and forth and I hardly ever use "[character name] says" because I have a THING about overusing it, so I tend to get really in the moment of describing reactions to dialogue or how a character moves in reaction to dialogue in order to not have to tag the dialogue.

But like, funny/happy fics are gonna have short, bouncier sentences than anything that deals with angst or death, so that's kinda the style change?

This has been interesting, I've really never thought about this before. I'm curious what @swaps55 thinks since she's read everything I've ever written.

19 notes - Posted March 15, 2022

#4

fic: warm hands, soft heart

“You always do this. You always try to warm me up.”

Varric pulls Fallwyn closer to the fire, chafing her hands between his own. “Can I help it if looking at you makes me feel cold?”

Fallwyn inches toward the flames, stopping just short of actually getting into the fire. She’d singed more than one pair of trousers and had once burned the bottom of her boots almost clean off before she realized she’d shoved them too close to the fire. While wearing them.

The coldest night in the Free Marches had not prepared her for life in the mountains of the south.

Varric had been the one to take her back to Harritt for new boots and patches on her leather armor. It hadn’t occurred to her that she wouldn’t just have to make do with what she’d ruined. Harritt hadn’t blinked an eye, just tutted over the soles of her boots as he turned to his workbench.

Even among her clan, she’d learned at a young age to see to her own comforts. Having someone act as a mother hen is strange enough, but that it’s Varric of everyone in the Inquisition seems stranger still. But it’s a nice change to feel like someone’s worried about whether she’s cold or not. All anyone else wants to talk about is the breach or Andraste, as if Fallwyn knows anything about the shemlen gods. Like they forget she’s also a person who eats and shits like they do.

It helps that Varric never seems to leave this spot, so he’s always right there and tugging her in closer to warmth. It’s in the middle of all the camp and out of sight of Threnn, so it makes a sort of sense that he’d stick to this general area. Writers must always be observing or something like that.

“It’s so cold in the south,” she says, eyeing the open collar of his shirt and the coat flung over top of a nearby tent. “You never seem to feel it.” There are so many curls on his chest and she doesn’t mean to, but she starts wondering what they’d feel like under her palms. She wonders if all the extra hair he seems to have almost everywhere keeps him warmer.

Read on ao3

27 notes - Posted February 2, 2022

#3

who you were vs. what you are

Somewhere in your childhood,  someone you once loved betrayed your whole little heart and told you that you were not enough.

And because thoughts become things,  it became ivy inside your mind and body until this was all you believed about yourself and your self-worth became mutiny.

Remember that the stars and planets did not die for you to waste your time wondering  if you are pretty enough or worthy enough to exist.

You are still trying, in this body,  to be all the things that make a person. But the truth is you are bursting at the seams because you are a plethora of universes becoming a human.

your heart is the sea by nikita gill

27 notes - Posted October 25, 2022

#2

new fic for the late night crowd

“When you laugh like that, it's just—you’re so beautiful, you know that?”

“I am not.”

If Varric weren’t the kind of dwarf to pick at the edges of things, he might have taken caution at how quickly the laughter in Cassandra’s eyes sharpened into brittle disdain. But if he’s ever met caution, she’s never bought him a drink.

“You are though. I remember sometime around the . . . what . . . third day of interrogations in Kirkwall, thinking that if you’d just take off even the first layer of armor the whole conversation would have been much more entertaining.”

He can almost hear her teeth crying at the strain as her jaw clenches. “I have only the one layer—”

“Oh I wasn’t talking about the iron, Seeker.”

It’s good they’re in the middle of a very fancy party with drinks and dancing and that the guards have already taken her long and very pointy sword, though Varric is very well aware she doesn’t actually need the sword to kill him. “Are you telling me that you think I am only beautiful when I smile?”

“I mean you do it so rarely, who can say, but no. Did I say only? Words are my living, sort of, and I think I would have remembered making that implication.”

She narrows her eyes as her gaze flicks across the ballroom. Varric has had the very great pleasure of seeing her in all kinds of moods at this point, but it’s her haughty dragon princess he probably loves the most.

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28 notes - Posted April 3, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

in the deep dark

I’m playing DAI again and did the Descent. Then this happened. 

Varric/Lavellan | on ao3

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In the dim torchlight, she can just see Varric’s outline where he’s sitting up in his bedroll. He’d drawn first watch but Avriel knows that’s not the only reason he isn’t sleeping. They all look pale and sallow after two weeks underground, but the darkness hangs on Varric in ways it doesn’t touch the others. 

She’s met more dwarves over the last months with the Inquisition than she’s ever known in her entire life and she knows, better than anyone else here, that he doesn’t have much in common with other dwarves. 

“You don’t like being underground, do you?” she whispers into the space between them. There isn’t much, they’ve bedded down into a handy alcove for what Avriel has called the night, even though there’s no difference down here. 

He doesn’t startle but then, he never has with her. Somehow, he always seems to be aware of exactly where she is. “I’m not a very good dwarf,” he whispers back, cognizant of the others sleeping around them. “But no, I never have.” 

She scootches even closer, propping herself up on her elbow and curling around his back to give him something to lean against, if he chooses. He does. “Have you spent a lot of time down here?” 

“In Orzammar?” 

“Anywhere.” 

“No. To both questions, actually. I was born on the surface, I like sunlight and a cool breeze as much as the rest of you. The long dark makes my skin crawl.” 

“‘The long dark’ sounds like a story.” 

He’s quiet for a long moment and Avriel wonders if she’s wandered into a tale he doesn’t want to tell. 

“Well,” he finally says, so quietly she has to lean in closer still. “There was the time my brother tried to kill me in the deep roads.” 

“What?” she says, slightly louder than a normal volume in her shock, then cringes as Sera starts to stir. They both hold their breath until she stills again. 

“Geez, Sunshine. These aren’t state secrets. I told you about when we found the red lyrium.” 

“You did, but not the rest of it.” 

“I hate the stuff.” He shudders but takes a deep breath and starts again. “Bartrand and I were never very close. He was born in Orzammar, still remembered life down there and would have given anything to go back.” 

“Wait, your parents weren’t surface dwarves? Why did they ever leave?” 

“That,” he says slowly, “is another story for another time. I will tell you, just, let me get this one out first.” 

She doesn’t say anything, giving him space, but she does reach out her free hand, unsure of its reception. 

Her heart flips over—just a little—when he turns his hand palm up under hers and threads their fingers together. His hand engulfs hers, the calluses from Bianca catching on the calluses from her knives, but it’s real and comforting. For them both, she hopes. 

“It was how I met Hawke, actually. She and her brother signed on for an expedition to loot a thaig. He wasn’t always like this, but by the time my mother died, there were few things Bartrand wouldn’t do for gold.”

Varric spins the tale of deception and betrayal for her, quietly as he can. He sometimes punctuates the story with gestures she can just make out in the dim torchlight (none of them had wanted to sleep in the pitch black). 

He never drops her hand, though he does sometimes take it with his as he sketches out Hawke casting a spell with her staff, or Carver’s slashes with his long sword.

By the time the tale ends with his triumphant return to Kirkwall, richer than Bartrand could have imagined getting on this expedition, Avriel can almost forget the quiet whisper where it began: with Varric watching helplessly as his brother locks him in a room in the deep roads to die. 

She’s quiet for a moment and he laughs softly into the dark. “Have I actually rendered you speechless with my tale?” 

She squeezes his hand. “Hardly,” she says. “I’m sorry I brought you down here.”      

Varric pulls her hand up to his mouth and his lips press a kiss to her palm before he tugs further, pulling her face up to his. She catches her breath but all he does is lean his forehead against hers. In the quiet space between them, he whispers what she’s known for a while. “Come on, Sunshine. You’ve gotta know by now that I’d follow you anywhere.” 

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35 notes - Posted April 24, 2022

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