#I’ve been following like the same people since I was 13 and I don’t know how to change that

[uuhhhhhhhhhhhhhh]

Guys I’m gonna be honest I still have no idea how to use tumblr,, and at this point I’m too afraid to ask

[astropookie]

Ascendants at different degrees 🦚🦢

my natal mercury is square with transiting mercury 😭 km pls. my mind has been a MESS I can’t and that’s why all my fucking ideas seemed difficult to write. srry if it’s not it.

julianlandini

Ascendant at Pisces degree (12° or 24°)

that’s fucking meee. i have this fairy vibe or they often call me hippie. that sensible and humanitarian side it’s there, the wanting to contribute for the best of others, to make that world they dreamed of basing it on the different perspective of others, of what the other have felt and how they have felt when they witnessed it. since the origin, since the depth of things. the path of their life is about to express themselves and to speak for others? The ones that couldn’t spoke? Bc all their life they have been listening to them, looking from a side the reality they’re scared of. -they’ve been psychologists if you want to call it that way-. They want to give love, they have so much love to give. During a period of their life -mostly childhood- they could have felt isolated from the world, these period of time could have been pretty sensible for them and helped them to “open their eyes”, how the world they thought worked was a lie.

Ascendant at Taurus degree (2°, 14° or 26°)

the difference of a person when the degree of the ascendant changes it’s incredible. There’s two people in my life that have aries rising but the one with taurus is completely different of the other. How a person with taurus degree on their ascendant live or the vibe of their life…they want comfort but at the same time have to have what they want, they’re persistent in to what they want and that’s attractive. I have seen people with this placement having a lot of romantic interactions or situationships, it’s easy for them to attract lovers👅 I’ve noticed they make good use of opportunities, they remind me of a bear bc I want to hug them no matter what. They’re realistic or practical. They indeed are critical with food, they need to take their nap to feel good. They’re like old people, how they point out manners and limits people have to have on their perspective and etc. I’ve seen a lot of people with these placement that had moved to their natal place to other bc of the opportunities. could mean also they are part of a family that can provide them economic support or/but with time they had struggle with it.

Ascendant at Aries degree (1°, 13° or 25°)

they’re pretty erratic, they look fucking mad all the time. They’re impulsive, their emotions, their decisions, they don’t know how they ended up the way they ended up. You can see from aside they’re natural liders. however, their whole life they’ve been fighting for being the liders of their life. there’s people around them that don’t understand limits, that think they have the right to control the aries degree life. these placement have to learn that they have the right to stand up for they want even if others don’t want to or don’t let them. they want to have something build by their own, THEIR thing, if not they’ll feel lost. they follow their heart and not doing it will cause problems in the future.

Ascendant at Capricorn degree (10° or 22°)

I have a friend that has Leo ascendant but she wasn’t giving me the stereotypical explosive energy someone expects from a leo. I did my research 😌 and of course she has a Capricorn degree. She is a very career focused person, grounded and driven by her goals. Also an introvert or priorities the company of the ones she likes the most or thinks is the best. She’s studying to be a doctor, her whole life will revolve around her work, she is devoted and has a BIG heart for her loved ones and the ones that would be part of her path. She looks serious. They’re seemed as reserved bc they’re 🤪 and when you get to know them they’re a beautiful soul. They won’t let anything get into their way when it comes to their career and goals, they’ll risk it all. Around their life they’ve had this introverted behavior or they’re Saturn ruled, which means they know bc they have to experience things, little by little but they have had and have to. In other words, they have seen and been in difficult situations that later -bc they have the power- analyzed the situation in 3er person to comprehend bc if not saturn will do what they do🤭

—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•—•

❀ Based on my personal experience and what I’ve analyzed in my surroundings.

❀ English is not my first language.

❀ I’m not a profesional astrologer, I just love astrology and I’m willing to learn.

Thank youu. baibaiii🫣🫶🏼💋

Do not copy. Please give me credits.

[jeonscatalyst]

Hello!! I’m so glad I found your blog when I returned to tumblr after 5 years haha, your posts and opinions are always sound and thought provoking :)

I was just curious, and I’ve asked this of a couple others since I’m like a dragon with a hoard I love me some opinions, after 9+ hours of AYS do you still think jikook might be real? And do you think it showed that they were together thru chapter 2 (I know some believe that there was a break up).

My answer is yes, that there is strong chance that they are dating and were doing so throughout chapter 2. But would love your insight too :)

Hi anon,

Let me just make it clear that I’ve never claimed to be 100% sure that Jikook are a couple but I 100% believe that their relationship over the years hasn’t always been a platonic one.

After watching over 9 hours of AYS I am still certain that Jikook love each other and are important to each other. I am also certain that the nature of their relationship hasn’t always been platonic but I am one of those people who believes that something was off with them during parts of the solo era. I don’t know if I would say they broke up or were on a break (because I don’t know that) but I do think something was a little off especially around the time when they shot the NY episodes. It doesn’t necessarily have to be that they broke up or were on a break but sometimes when people’s circumstances change, it is normal that they go through some hurdles in their relationships. We all know that the solo era came with Jimin and Jungkook having completely different schedules and I also think that at some point they were both operating on different wavelengths and probably needed other people more than they needed each other (this is normal and there is absolutely nothing wrong with needing other people more than you need you lovers at certain times) I think that at some point their very different lives and schedules made things difficult for them to maintain a normal relationship and it possibly caused some distance between them. I have never been one who has always been stuck to the opinion that Jimin and Jungkook have a normal or conventional type relationship. I have always been open to the possibility that maybe they couldn’t quite have that because of their circumstances but i’ve never doubted that there was something more going on between them.

So to answer your question more directly I would say i’m not positive that things were the same during certain points of the solo era and that includes when they filmed the NY episodes of AYS but I think by the time they filmed Jeju and Sapporo, things were pretty much back to normal and Jikook seemed like the Jikook we knew. I cannot say for sure if they were on a break or if they broke up but what I can say for sure is that, that something which felt a little off with them at the beginning, disappeared as we progessed through the episodes as I could sense a shift in energy, plus, just watching the episodes after NY and aside from noticing the obvious closeness and connection between Jikook, you could see that they were very updated about each other’s lives. We had Jimin singing Jungkook’s unreleased “3D”, Jungkook knowing about Jimin’s upcoming album and also seeing his performance video with the kids way before it was released and even just the fact that they decided to enlist together. All these were proof that whatever was off between them before, had been sorted out.

I know this is a touchy subject for Jikookers as many people have different opinions about Jikook in chapter two and some jikookers don’t like hearing about the possibility of Jikook having off moments or possibly being or breaks or breaking up, but it happens. I feel like sometimes we forget that we have been following up moments of these guys lives that have spanned for over 13 years and there is no way in these 13 years it was always smooth sailing. I think it’s normal that within these periods, we would experience them in all sorts of states and probably watch them go through thick and thin without even realizing exactly what they are going through.

I think by the time Jikook were done filming AYS, they were ok. I think alot of the “offness” that I sensed probably happened because of a drastic change in their lives which they both probably didn’t know how to handle well. Jimin and Jungkook had been used to being together almost all the time. Going through all the years since they met in 2012 and then debuted in 2013, there is not a single year that went by without us seeing or hearing about Jikook being joined at the hip. I think the first time they had to deal with that kind of separation since they met was the solo era with Jimin being neck deep in work and having to move in with producers temporarily to work on his album while Jungkook wasn’t doing anything at all. They were in very different places at the time so I think some distance crept in. Jimin was in work mode and needed people in work mode while Jk was on rest mode and needed people on that same wavelength. At the beginning of last year, it was crystal clear that Jungkook was going through something. I don’t want to be presumptuous and say that what ever seemed to be bothering him had to do with Jimin because I don’t know that but I think it was interesting how much he couldn’t hide the fact that he missed Jimin. Whether as a friend or as a lover, it isn’t debatable that Jungkook missed him so much. Him instinctively asking Jimin to come over and do stuff with him everytime Jimin commented on his lives, him watching tons of Jimin content and talking about him alot, him replying to Jimin’s “I miss You” post on weverse and then proceeding to watch a bunch of Jimin centric content….he missed him. I cannot put my finger on whatever was going on but the dots are connecting and something sure was off at the some point last year but all is well that ends well. We may never get to find out what exactly happened and may just be stuck with speculation but I guess we can all rest easy knowing that at this very moment, at the end of everything, Jimin and Jungkook found their way back to each other and are together right now going through one of the most difficult moments of their lives together and they’ll only come back, closer and much more connected than they ever were. (gosh this sounds so cheesy lol)

[gogogodzilla]

day 26, sensory deprivation

wanda maximoff x reader warnings: nsfw 18+, reader calls wanda mommy, slight dubcon, fingering, cunnilingus, dirty talk, more plot than porn, im sorry yall i got carried away, continuation of day 13 kinktober ☠︎︎ main masterlist ☠︎︎ read on ao3

You hunch over the kitchen sink as the steady thrum behind your temples refuses to cease. Ever since Halloween, you have been getting these sharp pains that radiated throughout your skull, not to mention the visions. 

You see hallucinations of yourself or someone who looks like you, living another life. You see yourself wearing that same outfit that you did on Halloween fighting monsters that you can’t even begin to describe and robots, out of all things. You see yourself lounging around with people who you think are your friends drinking and attempting to lift a hammer of sorts. 

The visions come in quick flashes that leave you sick to your stomach and disoriented afterward. Slowly, you regain your senses enough to straighten. The sounds of Billy and Tommy’s video game and them rapidly pushing the buttons on their controllers fill your ears as you get your bearings. You’re right where you’re supposed to be. 

Suddenly, they call for you. You hurry to right yourself, trailing a hand soothingly over your temple before you venture into the living room. 

“Our game keeps changing,” Tommy complains as you watch as the controllers are surrounded by red, pixelated energy every few moments and change in their hands.  You raise a brow, at a loss for words. 

Before you can even begin to offer an answer, the twins are off running upstairs. “Boys!” you call, but they’re already gone. You chase after them, your footsteps echoing on the stairs. 

“Mom, our game is freaking out!” you hear Billy exclaim as they rush into your bedroom. 

“Is she asleep?” Tommy asks as you reach your bedroom door. 

Wanda’s voice is muffled as she replies, “Mommy’s not sleeping, honey. She’s just resting her eyes.” 

You rest a hand on either of the boy’s shoulders, “What did I say about letting mommy rest? I told you she’s not feeling well.” 

Billy turns to face you, rubbing his temples, “But, my head feels weird. It’s, like, really noisy. I don’t like it.” 

You pressed a kiss to his forehead. “My head’s been feeling a little funny, too,” you murmur before ushering the boys out of your bedroom. “It’s okay, honey, let’s let mommy rest, and we can find something for your head.”

As you reach the bottom of the stairs, your vision blurs for a moment and you blink rapidly. You’re sitting on the living room couch with no one in front of you. You find yourself talking to an invisible presence. 

“I’m not sure what’s happening to me,” a mix of a sigh and a laugh leaves you. “Wanda is bedbound, and I have two boys to take care of. I don’t what I’m doing, but I do know that they don’t need to see her like this.” 

Your vision blurs again and the next thing you know you’re standing at the bottom of the stairs, right where you were. You stumble a little bit, as you shake your head slightly. 

As your vision clears, you notice the boys tugging a Wii remote between the two of them, arguing.

“I got to it first!” Tommy grunts, attempting to pull the controller toward himself. 

“You always get to it first!” Billy counters. 

You take a step between them grabbing the controller. “Boys,” you hiss, “now is not the time for petty arguments. At least wait until I’ve had my coffee for today, please.”

Tommy clings to your side, “We’ll be good.” 

You lean down and press a kiss to the top of his head, “Thank you, honey.” 

Movement out of the corner of your eye catches your attention and you turn toward the stairs. Wanda shuffles down the stairs, wearing one of your old t-shirts, sweatpants, and a robe. You’re not quite sure how you know it’s your shirt. Billy and Tommy share a look, confusion evident on their faces. Billy shrugs before turning his gaze toward you. 

You follow Wanda into the kitchen, watching as she sets the jug of milk on the counter and retrieves a box of cereal out of the cabinet. She pauses as the jug flickers with the same pixelated red energy and changes into a carton. 

“Honey, what’re you doing?” you question as you stand on the other side of the counter. Wanda sniffs her spoonful of cereal before bringing it to her mouth. 

“Cereal,” she answers as the milk flickers and changes once again. 

She shuffles out into the living room and you follow closely. She takes a seat between the boys, and a knock sounds at your door. You take a few steps toward the front door, but Wanda raises her hand and red tendrils surround the door and open it. 

“Hi, Agnes,” she calls as Agnes enters your home. “I’d get up,” she says as she begins to laugh, “but I just don’t want to.” 

Agnes’s eyes dart from the back of Wanda’s head to yours, and you grimace. She rounds the couch and you follow her, “Hey, boys, why don’t we give your parents some me time?”

Wanda straightens and gasps softly, “Agnes, are you sure?” 

“Oh, abso-positively,” Agnes beams, reaching a hand out to the boys. 

“Do we have to?” Tommy groans as he nears Agnes.

Both you and Wanda nod. You need to figure out what's going on with her and be there for her. You can’t do that if you're looking after the boys and making sure they don’t destroy your house. 

You shoo them along, “It’s okay, boys, I’ll take care of mommy. You go and have fun with Agnes.” 

Agnes chuckles, “I promise, I won’t bite.” 

And with that, they’re gone. It feels like it’s been years since you’ve been alone with Wanda, even though you were with her all of last night. You take a seat beside her on the couch and set a gentle hand on her thigh. 

“Are you doing okay, my love?” you ask, gaze soft as you turn to look at her. 

She flicks on the TV with a grin, “Why wouldn’t I be okay?” 

As soon as she answers the potted plant begins flashing just like Billy and Tommy’s game and just like the milk jug. Next is the fireplace and then the TV. Wanda straightens as the various items in your living room begin rapidly changing. With a flick of her wrist, all the items are back as they once were. 

“Why don’t we go upstairs and relax? Everything seems a bit… distracting down here,” you suggest as you stand. You hold out your hand for her to take, and she hesitates for just a moment. “C’mon, let me take care of you,” you urge, shaking your hand slightly. 

Wanda grasps your hand and you lead her up to your bedroom. Memories of the last time you were here flood your mind, and the thoughts lingering in your mind make your cheeks flush. 

You turn to face Wanda, and it appears as if she had the same line of thought as her gaze drifts to the bed, left messy from her groggy exit this morning. Wanda tugs her robe off and throw it to the other side of the room. 

You gently grab her hand and usher her toward the bed. The backs of her thighs hit the edge of the bed and she sits, allowing you to tower over her. 

You tuck a loose strange of red hair behind her ear, “It’s going to be okay, love.” 

She leans into your touch, humming a bit, “You know, I’m usually the one taking care of you.” 

“You think you can let me take the reins today?” you ask, grinning. 

She pretends to think it over before sighing, “I think I would like that.” 

You reach into the bedside drawer and are pleasantly surprised to find exactly what you were looking for. You pull out a silk blindfold and silk restraints, holding them up for Wanda to see. She nods, wordlessly giving you permission to have your way with her. 

She lifts her arms so you can tie them up, and your fingers work expertly as they secure her wrists to the headboard. You aren’t sure how your hands know what to do, it’s almost like muscle memory. You reach for the blindfold and gently pull her hair out of its ponytail so you can wrap the blindfold around her head. 

“You’re gonna let me know if it’s too much?” you ask as you straddle her waist. 

She nods, “I trust you, baby.” 

You hum before pressing a soft kiss to her lips. It’s sensual and sweet— the exact opposite of the thoughts that are currently running through your mind. Desire courses through your veins as you deepen the kiss, swiping your tongue across her bottom lip and ravishing the inside of her mouth. 

You groan at the taste of her, sweet like the cereal she had earlier. You pull away, just for a moment, to trail kisses down the side of her, loving the little gasps that leave her. 

You slide down her body, trailing your hands over her breasts and down her abdomen. You hook your fingers into the waistband of her sweats, looking up at her through your lashes. She gives a curt nod, sensing your silent request for approval. 

In one swift motion, you relieve her of her pants and underwear, leaving her bare. You gasp at the sight as heat pools in your belly. You situate yourself between her thighs, flushing as they automatically spread for you. 

“So pretty, mommy,” you whisper, your breath fanning across her core.  Her breath catches in her throat as she bucks her hips. You wrap your arms around her thighs, keeping her steady as you press kisses along the insides of her thighs. 

She whines as you avoid everywhere except where she needs you. 

“Don’t make me beg, baby,” she pants, a hint of warning dancing in her tone. She could easily flip the script and have you be the one begging. All it would take is a flick of her wrist and your reality would change. 

The thought causes you to freeze just for a moment. Your… reality? 

You’re drawn back into the moment by Wanda bucking her hips in your direction, and you’re reminded of the task at hand. 

You run a soothing hand over her thigh, “I’m sorry, mommy. I’ll make you feel better. I promise.”

You press some final kisses before latching your lips onto her core, swiping your tongue through her folds. She tastes exquisite, and you can’t get enough of her. You eagerly lap at her core, taking in all of her. You dip your tongue into her entrance, loving the way she clenches around you. 

Those perfect little whines and gasps were escaping her as your mouth worked its magic. You slide a hand up and under her shirt, kneading her breasts and relishing how soft her skin is under your fingertips. You rolled the pliable bud of her nipple through your fingers, eliciting a whine from her. 

You slide the index finger of your free hand through her folds, coating it in her slick. You languidly sink your finger into her entrance and then pump it just as slowly. She groans as she throws her head back against the pillow. 

You latch your lips onto her clit as you add another finger, increasing your pace.  You swirl your tongue around her clit in a way that has her arching her back and whining. You curl your fingers inside her and reach that spongy spot that had her toes curling. 

“Love that pretty little mouth of yours, baby,” she whines, clenching against you. 

With one final thrust of your fingers, she’s cumming around you, a high-pitched mewl leaving her lips. Her hips rut against you, sending your fingers even deeper inside her. As she cums, red tendrils rush out of her and swirl around the two of you. The room changes rapidly around you, and your vision goes black. 

You were a black widow. Natasha Romanoff rescued you from the Red Room, and you became an Avenger. You met Wanda when Ultron lifted Sokovia out of the sky and changed your life completely. Your life was never the same after that, and you’d been by her side ever since. That was until Thanos came and ripped your entire life apart at the seams. He took Wanda from you, and you wanted him dead. You grieved her for those five years, and you grieved everyone you lost afterward. The pain was too great, and Wanda wasn’t the same afterward. You couldn’t do it. She created this idyllic life for you. To keep the pain and the grief and the heartache from hurting you. To keep you with her. 

You shake your head and blink rapidly. Your head is pressed against the plush of Wanda’s thighs, and you slowly lift your head. She was still coming down from her high and you remove your fingers from her, earning a sigh from her in return. Slowly, you go through the motions of untying her restraints and removing her blindfold. 

She blinks a few times as her eyes adjust to the midday light shining through your bedroom window. You press your lips to her, attempting to convey all the emotions that were swirling through your mind. 

She cups your cheek, and her eyebrows furrow as she looks over you, “What’s wrong, baby?”

“Is this real?” 

She straightens, “What do you mean?” 

“Please, Wanda,” you beg as your throat tightens, “how did I get here? What’s happening?” She stands and begins throwing her clothes back on, avoiding your gaze. You stand along with her, watching as she moves throughout the bedroom.  “Please, just tell me. I won’t be mad, I swear.” 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she states as she heads out your bedroom door. You follow after her,  your thoughts racing a mile a minute. 

“I love you, and I don’t care how you made this possible. But, I deserve to know,” you pleaded with her as she walked into the kitchen. 

She retrieved a cup from the cabinet, pressing her lips into a thin line. “I told you, I don’t understand what's happening and why I can’t fix it,” she says, exasperated as she throws her hands up. 

“Wanda!” someone calls as they enter your home. You both straighten as you turn to the front door. Monica comes running into your house, panting. 

“What are you doing?” Wanda hisses as she rounds the corner of the counter and steps in front of you. 

“Wanda…”

“How did you get in here?” 

“Listen to me,” Monica holds up her hands. “This whole thing is about them,” Monica started, pointing to you. 

“Get out of my house,” Wanda demands, rage burning in her eyes. 

“Hayward was trying to bring them—”

“Don’t talk to me about that. Don’t talk to me about my family,” Wanda orders as red tendrils wrap around Monica and push her out of your house. “I don’t want to hear about it.” 

You follow as Wanda lifts Monica into the air for all the neighborhood to see. You are stunned as you watch their interaction play out. You don’t think you’ve seen this anger in Wanda before. 

“The drones, the missiles, Pietro?” Wanda questions, lifting Monica higher in the air. 

“No, wait, Pietro, no, no, no, that wasn’t us,” Monica stammers. 

“All you do is lie!” Wanda shouts as she throws Monica toward the ground. 

You rush forward, ready to catch Monica, but she halts her descent. Blue energy rushes out from the ground as she lands and looks up at Wanda with electric blue eyes. Wanda lets out a gasp and grabs your bicep, yanking you behind her. 

Monica straightens as she stares down Wanda, “The only lies I’ve told are the ones you put in my mouth.” 

A red ball of energy appears in Wanda’s hand, and the air seems to shift. “Careful what you say to me,” she warns. 

“Don’t let him make you the villain,” Monica urges, an unspoken understanding of who they’re talking about passing between them. 

The ball of energy brightens in her hand and she raises her brows, “Maybe I already am.” 

You’re about to step in when Agnes rushes over, “Young lady, I think you overstayed your welcome. They’ve been through enough.” 

She wraps an arm around you, and the hairs on the back of your neck stand on edge. She looped her other arm through Wanda’s and began to tug the two of you away. 

“This doesn’t concern you,” Monica began. 

“Run along dear,” Agatha urges as you begin to walk toward her house. 

“Wanda, you have to take it down,” Monica calls, pleading with her. 

“No,” Wanda snaps, turning to point at Monica. “Don’t make me hurt you.” 

Your thoughts are racing as you get tugged away by Agnes. Wanda wraps a protective hand around your waist and pulls you closer. What have you gotten yourself into? 

[briebysabs]

I have to talk about Misha I’ve been holding this for so long. I am not defending him, everything he’s done is fucked up. I just want people to understand him better and idk how coherent this will be but HSVDVXHSBSJJDF

Bc if you hate him, totally justified. But I don’t want Misha to ever be simplified to the jealous crazy younger brother. Yes he is technically that but one thing about mochijun characters is that most of the time, you can always dig further into their psyche. And I feel like not enough people do that with Misha. I haven’t made an in-depth Misha discussion until now mostly bc I’m a potato. He isn’t 2-dimensional and he fits perfectly in the themes of vnc. Misha cannot be saved, he is a hopeless character, he bears Luna’s Mark while using the Book he is doomed. You can say he was doomed the second he entered the story. His brotherly love for Vanitas is twisted. He is the embodiment of tragic. Everything that led him to this point was not his fault. The only thing he chose was to follow Luna and join their clan bc he would’ve died otherwise. Luna and Vanitas are the only good things he ever had.

We all know his backstory. So of course losing both would make him snap. And on top of all this he’s being manipulated by Teacher. Who fucking knows the lies or orders Teacher has been feeding him. All this when he’s like 12....13 at most.

And let’s approach the vanoé situation. We know the depth of vanoé’s relationship and even though Misha might’ve observed from afar, he doesn’t have that context. To be fair he probably wouldn’t care but point is, he sees Noé as some random guy. And again, let’s withdraw ourselves a bit and see things from the outside. How much time has passed since chapter 1? How long has Vanitas and Noé actually known each other? We know that a couple weeks passed since the end of the Gevaudan arc. We know that a week passed after Vanoé got kicked outta Ruthven’s study. If there are any other mini time skips I’m forgetting pls lemme know. But let’s be honest, they’ve known each other for two months. If we wanna push it, three. Of course how long you know a person doesn’t solely decide how close you get to them. You can know someone for two weeks but depending wtf goes on in that time frame, they can become your ride or die. But let’s use Misha’s logic for a minute.

You’ve known Vanitas longer, both of you went through hell under Dr. Moreau. You have the same Mark, you’re gonna suffer the same fate. And from how you see it, he chose a man he met by chance a few months ago, over you. Someone who will never truly get it. He is putting his life in the hands of a stranger over yours. You finally meet again after all this time, and the brother who you believed puts you above everything, points a gun at you. Yeah, Misha fucked up. But that will hurt anybody.

Misha challenges their relationship. He questions how much it even makes sense. It’s not only “how can you chose Noé over me?” But also “How can you kill Father but not him?” Is he more important than us?? And that’s a valid question. Messed up but understandable to ask. Noé has protected Vanitas and has been pretty helpful. But Vanitas doesn’t need him to survive. Noé isn’t essential for this suicide mission he’s on either. Misha cannot understand what Noé brings to Vanitas’ life.

Misha was so dependent on Vanitas that he couldn’t fathom his brother not feeling the same. Vanitas loves Misha, no matter how strained or corrupted that bond has become. But he is not emotionally capable to stay with him. And he is allowed to feel that way. And Misha is allowed to scream and wail and be broken about it. In conclusion, Misha is an amazing addition to the narrative, I love him a lot. But I also love Vincent from ph so that explains quite a bit doesn’t it?

[literary-illuminati]

2024 Book Review #13 – Victory City by Salman Rushdie

One of my goals for the year is to read more proper literature (here defined as fiction I can mention reading to my mother without getting judged for it). I’ve never read anything of Rushdie’s before, but I did remember his name in the news recently due to the whole attempted-murder thing and, happily, my library actually had a copy of his newest work. So, picked this up and read it sight unseen!

The book follows one Pampa Kampana – a nine-year-old girl who, in the 14th century, witnesses her city destroyed, and her mother burning herself alive. She is then inhabited and blessed by a goddess, blessed/cursed with a lifespan measured in centuries and the destiny of raising an empire up and seeing it fall before she dies.

The narrative is framed as a modern adaptation/summary of the epic poem recounting her life Pampa completes before finally dying, finally discovered and translated after being forgotten in the ruins of te imperial capital for centuries. The story is largely a story of this miraculous, semi-utopian empire, as told Pampa’s eyes (and with a lengthy digression during the years she spends in exile).

This is a story that exists somewhere in the muddy middle ground between historical low fantasy and magical realism – it’s in some sense an alternate history of the Vijayanagara Empire, and replete with historical trivia and references, but is quite clear from the outset that accuracy is not really something the book cares about. Instead, the book’s Vijayanagara – always written as Bisnaga, as it was translated by a historical Portuguese chronicler whose also a minor character in the story, to prevent confusion – is basically allegory and morality tale with a light coating of history for flavour.

Not that I can really begrudge Rushdie for his strident politics (as far as I can tell I basically agree with him on all of it), but this really does feel like one of those old fantastical utopias, or a political treatise that gets past the censors by pretending to be the history of a foreign country, more than it does a novel. Which could definitely work! But in this case really didn’t, at least for me. There’s enough time spent on characterization and character drama to eat up pages, but not enough for it to ever feel like they’re people and not just marionettes acting out a show. I suppose the best way to get across the reading experience is that I was reading a proper 500 page history book at the same time as I read this, and this felt like the bigger slog by far.

Though part of that might just be disappointed expectations that I really had no right to have in the first place? As I said, I had Rushdie slotted in my head as a literary author, but really I don’t know nearly enough about him or his work to justify that. So I came to this expecting to be at least a bit wowed and bedazzled by the artistry and beautiful prose on display – and like, eh? Not bad, to be sure, the narrative voice and the framing device are both fun and fairly well done. But having read it there’s really not a single passage or sequence I can say has stuck with me.

The comparison that comes to mind is Kalpa Imperial by Angélica Gorodischer, which is also a book-length epic history of a fantastical empire that never was which laughs at all conventional wisdom about pacing, characterization and plot (and which also has been shelved as magical realism for what are basically reasons genre snobbery imo). It’s been a few years since I read it, but from what I recall that agreed with me far more. Maybe just because it abandoned the conceit of a single protagonist and family melodrama entirely, or maybe because it had a bit more subtle in its social commentary (or maybe it was just better written on a sentence-to-sentence level).

Though I should say, there’s every possibility I’m being a bit harsher on this than it entirely deserves – it’s an entirely competent book! The politics are blatant but like a) they’re politics I agree with and b) they’re nowhere near the most blatant or forced-feeling inclusion of progressive politics in fiction I’ve seen recently. However, this is also a piece of writing that’s among other things very clearly and directly about how important and sublime and world-changing the art of writing is. Which is like a movie about making it in showbuisness, or a musical about how great singing is. Automatic deduction of a full letter grade.

[something-tofightfor]

A PSA:

This wasn’t a post that I ever thought I’d make on here, but it’s something that I’m choosing to do because I want to be transparent about it - and about myself. 

It was brought to my attention that there are people that used the information they knew about me gained through a private space to seek out my twitter account. They then used the discovery of my twitter to search for a slew of very specific words and phrases in order to drag up things that I may or may not have said throughout the years in order to use what they found against me and to paint me as a variety of things that I am not. Unfortunately, there were tweets that they did find. I’m not proud of the way I spoke and behaved online in my early 20’s. I said hurtful things, and portrayed myself - via these words - as something that I am completely ashamed of now. Of course, looking back, it’s easy to say “I definitely shouldn’t have said these things” - but that’s the truth. I shouldn’t have, and I regret that these things exist under my name, even if only via screenshot in present day.

I’m including some of the examples beneath the cut, because I don’t want to trigger anyone without their consent. But in the spirit of being open about the things I said in the past, I think it’s important to admit to them as an example of the way people can and do change their behaviors over time - and in recognition that these tweets do not reflect me as a person - or my feelings and opinions - any longer. (TW: the following images contain text that includes instances of racism and homophobia).

These tweets as well as others in the same vein I have been able to find have been deleted from my profile - which should have been done sooner - because they are horrifying to me as I look back on them. In reality, they never should have been tweeted in the first place. Many of them, I don’t remember tweeting, but that doesn’t excuse my past behavior - or negate the fact that they were up in the first place. These are not a reflection of me, today, as a person, and if I met younger Rachael, I would call her out on her shit immediately.

But as you can see, the dates show you that the majority are from well over decade ago - and in the time since, I’ve reevaluated a ton of things including the way that I speak, the things that I say, and the phrasing that I choose to use. Using terms like “gay” or “lesbian” in the manner that I used to is unacceptable. Bringing up race or ethnicity as a generalization for a group is also unacceptable. I have no ill will toward people based on their sexual orientation, race, gender etc.

I will also say that - because it is public information - I am a registered Republican voter (as I was encouraged to sign up that way when I turned 18) and have voted for occasional Republican candidates in recent local elections, but have not voted for a Republican presidential candidate since Mitt Romney in 2012. Many of my family members are Republicans as well, and before I really had a chance to be out on my own after college, I unfortnately echoed a lot of their sentiments about R vs D when it came to politics in my late teens and early 20's. I had a lot of issues with Obama's presidency, but NONE of them were based on his skin color. That tweet above absolutely fills me with shame even 13 years later, and I can't put into words how uncomfortable it makes me to know that at some point, I actually typed those words out and then POSTED them, because present-day me cannot reconcile with feeling that way and expressing that type of sentiment.

There is certain context, also, to the 'thanks for not being gay' tweets that wasn't shared - and while it doesn't excuse them, the phrase was used between the friend whose name is blocked and I due to the exact thing being said to HER by a coworker, and both of us thinking it was an absurd thing to thank someone for. And Spangler Park was a running joke in the city that I used to live in, due to the fact that the weekly police blotter was filled with reports of gay men using it as a meeting place for public sexual acts.

Trying to explain myself isn't a valid defense to much of the content here, but it's also important to remember that context matters in many cases - like with the Daniel Tosh (who is a comedian) reply, that was clearly in response to something he said on his own account, but what that was is unknown to me 13 years later since it wasn't a quote tweet.

I am constantly trying to hold myself just as accountable as I hold others in my life for the things they say, do, and believe. I would not tweet or say any of these things today. I do not believe any of these things today. I have grown and learned a lot in the last decade plus, and I hope that that is reflected in my current behavior and with the people and causes I support. I am not the same person at 37 that I was at 22-23 - very few people are.

I will end this with a sincere apology to anyone that I may have hurt with these messages and my behavior - both now and in the past. I regret saying these things. I regret the fact that for a period of time, I "spoke" with very little thought about the impact of my words, or how wrong these things were to say. I have tried to - and hopefully accomplished - make changes in my life throughout the years, and continue to do so every day. 

It's impossible to make meaningful changes overnight, but I hope that you believe me when I say that over the course of the last decade, I have changed a great deal about myself and my behavior, and work hard to keep learning as the world around me changes, too.

Thank you for taking the time to read this. My inbox and DMs are open for questions and conversation, if you have anything to say. If this is where you choose to part ways with me, I wholeheartedly understand that, too, and wish you the best. An additional reply to an ask I received

[teaandinanity]

7KPP Week, Day 1: Background (remix)

Fair warning to my followers, it is that time again and I'm gonna be posting Nonsense for the next week (if the executives function and I manage to be productive) or at least a few days of it (if the executives are typically dysfunctional).

Putting this under a cut because just the blather is Long and then the ficlet for Baby Weaver Valya is Longer.

Day 1's prompts were

What is your character's background and why did you pick it? How do they feel about it? If you've talked about this before, you can instead consider the following: Have you considered using an existing MC for one of the secret backgrounds? Is there another background you think might be interesting for your MC? Elements of another background you could incorporate into them for an AU?

Calanthia is a Widow because I wanted a Katyia's Legacy MC and found Widow easiest to min/max. Valeriya came into existence because I did Lyon’s date on Calanthia just to see what it was like and immediately said ‘oh no’ because it is My Exact Jam. Then I went ‘… does he still say you’re a good person if you are Entirely Morally Neutral’ and then the answer was YES and I got brainworms SO bad. Valya hates pretty much everything about being a Widow because everything about her backstory is worse than Calanthia’s. Anthy’s parents are bumbling idiots with no financial or political acumen but she and her siblings figured out how to manage them by the time she was like 13. Valya’s parents are genuinely bad people made infinitely worse by unhappiness with their circumstances and are cruel to each other and their children and the next-oldest of her siblings actively hates her and tries to ruin her life on a regular basis. Anthy’s marriage was of course mercenary but it was also mutually beneficial and she and her husband were friends. Valya’s marriage was a nightmare; she was justifiably terrified going in, she was way too young, she went through with it mostly because she knew she’d outlive him even if she had to get blood on her hands to make sure of it and because otherwise her mother (who hated her a lot for being ‘the reason’ she had to marry her husband and therefore also ‘the reason’ her life has sucked so much since) would have seen her married to less advantage and to someone she really would have been shackled to for the rest of her inevitably-much-shortened life. Anthy is older and well-adjusted. Valya is still in her teens, traumatized, and just DESPERATELY wants to be safe. The main thing they have in common is that they fall in love and go ‘oh no.’

I’ve considered making Valeriya a Weaver, and I really want to try that once the secret backgrounds are in the game! It’s interesting to consider how DIFFERENT her life would have been if her mother had NOT married her father and just gone off to the countryside and then sent her oops baby away to be raised by her sister in Arland. Valya would be so much more well-adjusted under those circumstances, so she’s probably much happier and way less tentative with Lyon.

Probably also less careful in general, and more apt to meddle, so I imagine there’s at least one extra assassination attempt. The rest of her life probably looks very similar, though; after her marriage, even a very traumatized Valya grows into her new life and eventually feels very happy and safe.

I’ve also considered making Anthy a Weaver because I think it would be fun to do Jasper’s romance on a Weaver. I have considered making her a Historian for the same reason and because that would make the ‘you don’t have to act. I will.’ line hit like a TRAIN. We'll see how I feel about all of that once the secret BGs are in; the one I'm sure of is that I'll be trying Weaver Valya.

With that initial meta babbling out of the way:

On to the Fic!

She isn’t in the least Arlish and she is made to know it very young. She doesn’t mind, though; she looks like her aunt, and her uncle looks at both of them like they’re marvelous.

The fifth time she is allowed to attend a dinner party with her guardians, the first time she is permitted to separate from both of them to play with a few of the other children present, one of the other guests says something unkind. Valeriya hardly notices; the lady isn’t very important, and her opinion is so much hot air. But the other children freeze, and look at her, and she realizes she has to respond. Valeriya raises her chin the way she has seen her aunt do and says,

“I see why you’ve come over to play with the children, Lady T--- - you certainly still need a governess to teach you manners.”

It’s not the graceful set-down her aunt might have managed, but she’s nine. And the adults close enough to overhear all seem to feel, nonetheless, that she’s won the bout, especially when the lady flushes and flounders and can’t seem to come up with a rejoinder.

When they leave, her aunt slips her a few dried cranberries, clearly a reward, and her uncle puts a warm hand on the crown of her head with an approving smile.

“Well done, little Valiant.”

Her aunt laughs and asks why he’s never given her an Arlish nickname drawing him into a bantering conversation that means Valeriya doesn't have to respond. Instead, she considers the name. It’s a nice gift. She likes it.

Courage isn’t a virtue often ascribed to Arlish girls, but then--

She’s not Arlish.

--

Aunt Eleonora has been away for a week visiting friends. That’s what she said when she left, at least – that she was going to visit two of her friends. It may or may not be true; it’s entirely possible that she is instead averting an international incident, or perhaps even causing one, but if it’s either of those, she didn’t see fit to mention it to Valeriya prior to her departure, and Valeriya didn’t notice any of the usual signs and appurtenances of an aunt intending to involve herself in something exciting.

Regardless, factually, Aunt Eleonora is presently from home. In her absence, Uncle Earnest is the one who receives the post.

He isn’t the type to open anything addressed specifically to his wife. He’s good like that. Eleonora genuinely loves him because he’s good like that. Also because he doesn’t ask too many questions if someone turns up dead somewhere she’s recently been, even if it’s someone he knows her to have been profoundly annoyed with. Valeriya honestly cannot tell if he deliberately cultivates a certain ignorance or if it has simply never occurred to him – a good man, in the pure and simple manner of a friendly dog – that his wife may occasionally moonlight in murder.

It likely helps that Aunt Eleonora is scarcely taller or broader than Valeriya, who at fourteen is far from finished growing, and has wide, innocent eyes that she can use to great effect. Aunt Eleonora isn’t what people imagine when they picture a murderer. It’s not as if she does the thing with her own hands, but she’s certainly culpable for at least two deaths, and that’s just the ones Valeriya knows about.

Valeriya feels that she probably ought to disapprove of that. Probably.

In principle, certainly, she disapproves of murder.

Duke Adam absolutely deserved it, though; she spoke to the maid who was serving them while they visited and she’d have swung a poker at the back of his head herself if she’d thought a twelve-year-old girl could muster sufficient force to do the thing in a sufficiently decided fashion to effect the desired result. Whoever her aunt arranged to deliver the blow had significantly more arm strength than Valya can ever personally aspire to. Might’ve been one of the stable boys, but in this case, Valeriya elected to cultivate her own willful ignorance so that dropped hints would elicit only the truest blank incomprehension.

Aunt Eleonora approved; it doesn’t do to cause problems for the people willing to do your dirty work.

Cold-blooded murder generally ought to be avoided. Of course it ought. Occasionally, however, someone thinks power will insulate them from the consequences of being a horrible person. Aunt Eleonora does not think that ought to be the case.

Valeriya can't bring herself to disagree, and so she cannot disapprove of her aunt's inclination, in such instances, to be a surgical implement that excises such cancer from the body of their adoptive nation.

Valeriya once overheard one of her aunt’s friends imply it was the Revairan in them, and of course their birth nation has acquired a certain reputation for bloody hands and ruthlessness. It’s a silly conclusion, though.

She’s overheard enough conversations in the halls of power, sheltering in her aunt’s shadow. She knows how cheaply Arlish nobles hold the lives of a hundred, even a thousand, peasants. They pretend to be appalled by the bloody purges in their neighbor, but dressing suffering and sacrifice up in courtly manners and talk of duty doesn’t reduce the resultant suffering. Pretty words don’t make their own victims any less dead.

Valeriya has been informed she is not allowed at court again until she’s better at keeping her face as still as her tongue. She’s good at being quiet. She’s less-skilled, apparently, in keeping her judgmental disapprobation from showing when people are being overtly terrible right in front of her at dinner.

In any case, for reasons benign or otherwise, her aunt is from home, and thus it is Uncle Earnest who receives the post.

Valeriya saw the envelope; the direction was only to this house, not to her aunt specifically. It came from Revaire.

Likely more bad news; the news from Revaire is never really good. The most recent round of purges seems to be over, but the current regime won their throne with blood and have shed significantly more to maintain it. The internal unrest has made them uneasy neighbors, although Valya personally thinks that the turmoil makes them unlikely to actually have the strength to threaten other nations, particularly Arland; with the marriage alliances currently in place, anyone attacking Arland is liable to find themselves facing the combined armies of three nations on the field.

Her aunt has been upset by much of what they’ve heard, although not upset enough to set up reprisals against anyone. Valya sympathizes somewhat, but she doesn’t know anyone in Revaire, not the way her aunt does. Aunt Eleonora grew up there, and does not entirely despise her family. Valeriya wasn’t even born in the ancestral home of their family, and was fetched across the border with a wetnurse before she was two weeks old.

The conviction that it is bad news is borne out by the way her uncle acts when he comes back out of his study. He spends much of lunch very overtly not staring at her, and much of the afternoon passing by the doorway while their governess oversees their history lesson – or rather, while Valeriya is engaged in the process of a takeover, because she’s better-read on Katyia and the first Summit than Miss Henrietta, and she loves this subject, and Merit is asking questions which Henrietta is not equipped to answer without consulting reference materials but which Valeriya knows by heart.

He finally does address her, when Henrietta has taken Merit off to help her dress for dinner – an indignity she, at ten, has not yet escaped, but which Valeriya, at the advanced age of fourteen, has been long-since liberated from.

(Merit likes people helping her dress. Valeriya personally prefers to see to her own affairs. Aunt Eleonora says Merit is well-adapted to life in Arland, but she says it with a certain tone that carefully contains no disappointment; there’s a reason she takes Valeriya with her on some of her visits but almost always leaves Merit at home, and it’s not solely down to their respective ages.)

“Valya, dear,” Uncle Earnest says, sad-eyed as a hound dog, soft-voiced. Yes, assuredly bad news. She finds herself more curious than trepidatious, but holds herself very still and looks up at him. Not so far, though, not anymore.

“I’m so sorry,” he tells her gently. “Your mother is dead.”

For half a heartbeat, all she feels is confused.

She doesn’t have a mother. She has an aunt and an uncle and two cousins. But she takes her cue from her uncle’s expression even before she's really managed to make herself understand the information: She ought to be upset. She pushes her face into something more appropriate than blank incomprehension, wide eyes and raised brows, a soft mouth, and her uncle – a good man to his bones – reaches for her shoulder, offering contact, and then folding her into a comforting hug that she receives with real gratitude when she leans into it.

It lets her hide her face and think.

She has never met her mother. Well, she must have, after a fashion, but not really. Not as a person rather than a squalling larvae full of needs rather than thoughts. Now, she supposes, she never will.

Should that upset her?

She feels very little about the matter. A stranger is dead. Many strangers die every day; she is only moderately bothered about it, in general.

In this case…

Maybe it's awful, but she thinks she may be a little relieved. She can never be made to leave this life, which is comfortable and familiar, and be taken away to a strange place simply because the people there have a claim on her by being her nearest blood kin.

She will have to be careful not to let that show.

--

Aunt Eleonora tries, the year she turns sixteen, to talk to her about boys. About trouble girls can get into, liking boys.

Valeriya realizes, repulsed,

“Is this because Baron Cammus’s son was being stupid at me?”

It’s safe, here, to be so gracelessly blunt; they’re alone in Aunt Eleonora’s private parlor, and she’s allowed to be both honest and overt here, the way she never allows herself in public anymore. She doesn’t bother to hide her absolute revulsion, and Aunt Eleonora laughs.

There’s a note of relief in it.

“Ah, I should have known better. You won’t make your mother’s mistake.”

Her mother sent her away because she’s a bastard. She was lucky that she had family who could easily take her in to raise her up to the same station in life as her kin, rather than dumping her at an orphanage. She’s not ignorant enough not to have some idea what might have happened to her, if she hadn’t been lucky.

“I won’t,” she swears.

--

“I want to go to the Summit,” she tells her aunt.

Eleonora looks at her consideringly.

“You’re a touch young for it,” she muses, “but Arland does prefer to send girls who are young and pretty. In theory at least, Arlish girls who attend are supposed to know they’ve a duty to marry for the benefit of their nation, and it’s easier to persuade them of that if they’re too young to have formed any real opinions on the matter.”

Valeriya keeps her face perfectly still but for the slightest quirk of one brow, and her aunt inclines her head.

“I do think you might do well. Prove it to me, dear.”

She could ensure Valya got a spot on the delegation, but winning her own place is a test of her abilities. A test to see if she truly would do well with the opportunity. She feels a spark of satisfaction; she’d expected as much, and she does like to be correct. She presents the letter – penned by the queen’s secretary, but signed and sealed by her highness’s own hand – and her aunt smiles, bright and broad and ferocious.

--

Her aunt is happy to be seeing her off; she has a few errands for her niece to attend to on Vail Isle, and instructions on the precise wording she should use greeting Wellin’s chaperone, and encouragement to stretch her wings. Her uncle is actually crying a bit.

Well; he’s Arlish. He might actually think she means to make a miserable marriage for herself. It’s what nearly every other girl Arland has ever sent to the Summit does, including their paragon of a princess just seven years past.

He hugs her, and she hugs him back.

“Make us proud, Little Valiant.”

It’s still not at all a girlish Arlish virtue, but it is one she wants to embody. With the political situation so tenuous, with the way she intends to get involved, she will need to be brave.

"I will," she promises.

[bleachbleachbleach]

8/12 - 8/18/2024

I wrote a version of Renji 11 what is at this point several years ago (RIP me), and have since just been throwing random stuff/required additions into that Note with no rhyme nor reason, so it took over two hours this week just to sort it all out. But! It is sorted!

Modern-era Renji 11 consists of 3 new scenes and 3 already-existing scenes. I wrote 1.5 of the new scenes. As far as how well I think this Chapter is going, I dunno. As a narrator, Renji’s kind of like, oh hey, here’s a thought I had. And here’s another one! Which feels legit but I’m not sure if it allows the reader to understand which pieces of information are actually important for following the narrative.

You know those reblog memes that like, ask people to identify hallmarks of your writing? The concept is fun, but it wouldn't work in practice because 0.02% of anyone who might see that post would have any familiarity with my writing. SO. I WILL SIMPLY TELL YOU. My hallmarks are that I love an interstice—love having things that should be on the cutting room floor not on the cutting room floor—but am also a firm believer in stories not needing to have every scene the characters experience to exist on the page. This combination means there’s a good chance that actually relevant, defining scenes simply do not exist and only the interstitial nonsense does. I think in certain stories this can be a real thing that works. I think it can also have the effect of nothing hanging together, making any sense, or meaning anything, without certain bits of key information/certain scenes that I simply did not include because they exist in my head and therefore exist everywhere right. I think that’s where this chapter is.

Maybe the remaining 1.5 new scenes will help ameliorate that, but I feel like that’s asking a lot of them. And then, theoretically, you’d think fixing the existing scenes would go more quickly than writing from scratch, but I don’t know that they will. Because the story leading up to this point has changed enough that the characters are in very different headspaces and perceptions of each other than they were when I first wrote those scenes. Well, that’s not true—Kensei and Renji are in a very different place with each other. Renji and Hitsugaya need to have the exact same conversation but, you know… better. And FRANKLY, I do not know whether entirely overhauling Kensei and Renji will be harder or easier than merely line-editing Hitsugaya and Renji. =_=;;

I’d really like to finish Renji 11 by the end of next week, and then take some time to finish out the revisions on Rukias 7 and 10, which are the most related to Renji 11. Then I’d like to go back to do final line edits on Chapters 4, 5, and 8 before heading into the big mess of revision that is Hisagi 9, because those revisions will be most related to Hitsugaya 12.

I’m not anticipating getting much done in September, because I have a major work deadline September 30th, and the rest of autumn will probably be kind of garbage, too, and I probably won't exist. But I would love to finish Part II (so, Chapters 12 and 13) by December. Well, speaking honestly, my original hope was that I would finish Part II by May, but here it is, August, and I am still working on Chapter 11. So: I would LOVE to finish Part II by December.

—

I did a low-res mockup of the fic banner several months ago (okay, this might have been last November). I pulled out some high-res assets to work with on Friday and played around with a new design I thought was fun, but it turns out design-wise the old mockup looks much more polished. Or it would, if I were using higher-quality materials. XD So I’ll probably go back to the old design. The only reason to continue with the new one is that it reflects the clusterfuck spirit of everything that happens in this fic, but I kind of like the way the old banner puts a pretty bow on the clusterfuck lurking beneath the surface. Maybe I’ll solicit opinions once I’ve made a more serious mockup of the first version.

[winterfireice]

look at me posting a fanfic for the first time in months (also the first time this year so yay) anyway here is some Sophiana because when and doubt write random gay stuff for pride month.

story under the cut

Age 13

I’m walking through the pier with my family, it’s June 15th and my parents wanted to find somewhere to eat with a good vegetarian menu and outdoor seating. My brothers are playing some random game where they try to attach sticky notes to each other’s backs without the other noticing and my mom has tried to stop the game three separate times but since then has given up, they’re both being quiet and that seems to be all my parents care about. 

I on the other hand am window shopping. I’m looking at colorful beach bags and darkly-tinted sunglasses, I pass by all of them without a problem. The only thing that catches my eye is a flowy sundress that looks long enough to touch the floor even if I am wearing heels. But my attention is quickly taken away by a little piece of fabric on the counter. It has all the colors of the rainbow and a thin tan stick anchoring it into a pen cup. 

My mom notices me hanging behind and wraps an arm around my shoulders into some weird side hug and gives me a look I don’t know how to process. Just a second later Fitz, one of my brothers yells out because he finally notices there has been a bright green piece of paper stuck on the back since we left the house and Alvar has just been adding to the collection. Aka Fitz has been losing this made-up game since it started. 

The rest of my family’s attention is diverted to my brothers and even mine is taken away from the flag.

Age 14

I’m on a run with my brother Fitz’s best friend, Keefe. I hate running alone and he was the only one free so I asked him to go with me. My dad gave me an extra long look which I ignored, I’m pretty sure the majority of people we know think we are going to start dating since he’s only a year older than me, and were both single. Plus he’s been hanging out around our house a lot more, one of my friends said it's because he likes me but I’m pretty sure he likes my brother more. 

My side starts to cramp so I slow down waiting for the pain to subside and taking deep breaths. Keefe notices I’m no longer next to him and turns around to find me. He gives me a second to catch my breath and looks around, we are on a residential street a couple of blocks away from my house, and while there are a lot of trees providing shade the June heat is still beating down on us so much I can feel the sweat dripping down my neck. 

I’ve closed my eyes to try to get the sun out of them but when I open them I see Keefe’s head turned to one of the houses. I follow his gaze and see a flag hanging by someone’s front door, it's the same color pallet as the one I saw a year ago and I can see Keefe smile to himself before asking me if I’m ready to finish up our run.

Age 15

I’m on a picnic with one of my best friends, Sophie. She has pined up her long blonde hair to beat the heat of mid-June. She prepared the whole day, made little sandwiches, and packed different fruits and cookies, there are even some baked goods her mom taught her how to make.  

The two of us are leaning against a huge oak tree in the park and watching the neighborhood kids fly kites and chase each other around the other trees. 

“Ooo look a rainbow!” Sophie gasps and points past some clouds on the other side of the park. She pulls out her phone and I notice her lock screen has a photo of her holding two little flags, one is rainbow and the other is a combination of pinks and oranges, she swipes away the photo as she opens her camera to take a photo of the rainbow and I can't ignore the butterflies fluttering in my stomach.

Age 16

It’s June and I’m sitting in my room with my brother, his boyfriend, and my girlfriend. We’re getting ready for a parade that Sophie and Keefe heard about. Soph is using her phone as a mirror since all the other ones in my room are currently being used but before she opened her camera I saw her newest lock screen which is a photo of the two of us holding up a pride flag just like the one she got me a couple of months ago that sits in an old cup on my desk that I use to hold my pens.

But hey, it's just a cute little flag.

[analogwriting]

It Comes in Waves

Chapter 13: Kelvin Waves

Trafalgar Law x gn!reader word count: 3k a/n: also it's been a while since I've seen Dressrosa so pls don't hate too hard lmfao first|next

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You were led into a room with a few injured people. “This is just the first wave of people. You are to heal them so that they can go back into battle,” your escort said. You sighed, nodding. “No shit.” You felt a smack at the back of your head and you cried out. “Watch your tone.” You glared at the person next to you, grumbling more insults, getting you another whack to the head. 

That’s when you noticed a very tiny person standing next to a row of people that were currently out of commission. She seemed to be arguing with an old lady. They looked up as you were brought over.

“And who is this?” the old woman demanded. You were pushed forward and you grumbled, glaring at the man who had escorted you here. Once you got out of here, it was game over for the bastard.

“Y/n. They have the same kind of power as the princess.” The old womans’ eyes lit up. “You mean the one from the island?” She looked at you with a wide smile. “Oh, well isn’t this just wonderful! This will speed everything up.” 

The grunt shoved you again, falling to your knees this time. You noticed the tiny person crying. “I don’t want to heal bad people anymore,” she cried. You looked at her before looking at the woman before you. Seems like she was prisoner too. “Don’t worry,” you said with a small smile. “We’ll get out of here before you know it.” She looked at you with wide, teary eyes.

“Do you really mean it?” You nodded, patting her on the head.

“Well, how touching. Lying to comfort her, are you?” the old hag taunted. You glared at the woman, standing up. “Who said I was lying?” Honestly, you were bluffing a little. You weren’t sure how you were going to get out of this, but you knew that you were. You were going to get out of here or die trying. You weren’t going to be a slave to these people.

You removed the cuffs on your hands, causing your escort to blanch. “H-How did you do that?” You looked at him, shrugging. “Oh, they’ve been undone. I’ve just been waiting for the right moment. I wasn’t going to try to take on Doflamingo and his lackeys on all by myself, that would be suicide.” You snorted, rubbing your wrists. You hated cuffs. They also would irritate the scars put there by previous pairs. All around annoying.

You pressed your hands to your necklace, your next movements as quick as light. You pulled out two daggers and sent them off in different directions. One hit the old hag in the shoulder and she cursed. The other hit the grunt in the leg, causing him to cry out and fall to the ground. You knelt down, putting your hand out for the little princess. She climbed into your hand and you set her on your shoulder. “I told you we’d get out of here.”

“Oh, golly. You’re amazing!” 

“Not so fast!” Damn, you should’ve known that it wouldn’t be enough to take down the old hag. Suddenly, the door flew open and next thing you knew, all the officers were connected and sewn to the old lady. You blinked. 

“Leo!” the princess shouted. You followed her gaze to another tiny person. Just how many of them were there? You saw a few more of them, your head reeling. Leo took one look at you and then readied himself. “Unhand our princess!” You blinked, stepping back.

“Uh, I think you’re mistaken…” You held your hands up. 

“No, Leo! They are here to help!” Leo seemed to relax at this and you put the princess down. You watched as the two bickered for a moment. “We don’t have time for this. Leo, take the princess. We need to head out of here. I’ll take care of anyone who stands in our way, so you focus on running okay?” You hated to interrupt…whatever that was, actually, no you didn’t. You had shit to do. 

Now that most of the officers were down, everything was in disarray and it was much easier to get around. Chaos was fully ensued. No one really stopped you and those that tried, you took down with ease. They were just grunts, after all. Not really meant for intense combat. A quick dagger to the leg or shoulder easily took them out of commission.

You ended up at the flower field. “Lady Rebecca! Robiland!” You reached a clearing with a group of people and you noticed Robin. “Robin!” She looked at you, smiling. “Y/n! You’re okay!” You nodded, sighing in relief. It was nice to see a familiar face after all the craziness.

The both of you caught each other up on what has been going on. You looked up to the very top plateau where Luffy was apparently fighting Doflamingo with Law. You believed in Luffy. You knew he would win. No matter what. You had to believe that. 

“Luffy!” You heard Robin call out his name and looked up. You saw him and felt a rush of relief but…your heart sank. Was that…Law? Was he…? You felt your whole world stop once more and you immediately began to blame yourself. Maybe you should’ve stayed with him. Maybe deciding that splitting up was a terrible idea. You swallowed hard, holding back tears.

“Robin! Y/n! Take care of Traffy! He’s hurt!” So, he wasn’t dead? Relief washed through you and you let out a breath you hadn’t exactly realized that you were holding. Luffy dropped Law down to the two of you, Robin catching him with a net of her arms and you ran over to him. You carefully set him on the ground, looking him over. You noticed his arm being detached. “What the hell happened up there?” you muttered softly.

Then you had a plan. “L-Leo! We need your help!” You had seen his power for yourself, after all. “And Mansherry, if you could also help…” You felt your voice betray you, beginning to crack. You cleared your throat. The two tontottas ran over to you, looking at Law. “Leo, if you could sew him up and Mansherry, if you could heal him, even if just a little, I would be forever in your debt,” you said. 

The two looked at you and smiled. “You protected us, remember! We’ll gladly help!” You felt like crying, but you knew it wasn’t the time nor place. You settled for a nod while thanking them. You watched as the two of them worked quickly. You looked up towards the top of the plateau, worry filling your heart, but you pushed it down. He will win - he had to.

You heard a giant crash and the castle began to crumble. “Follow me!” You looked up as the dust settled, noticing a young man dressed like a musketeer. “Who?” You blinked then noticed Law was in his arms. You pulled out a knife. “What do you think-” 

“Y/n, he’s not an enemy.” You looked towards Robin, nodding as you sheathed your knife.

“Put me down…” Your eyes snapped to Law’s limp form. “I need to watch this fight.” You watched as the man put down Law. “I’ve waited thirteen years for this, I’m going to watch Luffy take down Doflamingo.” You moved next to him. “I’ll stay here with him,” you said, looking at the other two. “You go.”

Law looked over at you, shocked to see you there. You could see the relief in his eyes as they laid upon your face. “You’re okay,” he said. You nodded, feeling your chest tighten. “I am. And it seems you are too. Well, as okay as you can be after being shot and having your arm cut off.” 

Robin looked at the both of you. “I trust you will be okay, then?” You looked at her, nodding. The other man shook his head. “I shall stay, too. I owe it to Luffy.” You looked at him, not even bothering to argue. “Sounds good,” you said.

Then Robin headed off with the others and you settled down with Law, his head resting in your lap. “Oh, by the way,” you said, pulling something out of your necklace. “I came across this on my way out here.” You pulled out his hat, placing it on his head. “Can’t forget your signature look.”

Law looked up at him, scoffing slightly. “In the midst of battle, you saved my hat?” 

“Who said it was a battle? It was just chilling there on the ground and I picked it up.” You rolled your eyes. “Well, seems like you’re just fine with your attitude,” you said. He just smirked.

You moved to pull a flask from your necklace.

“Drinking at a time like this, y/n?” You rolled your eyes, ignoring him. “I need you to drink some of this so that I can heal you up a bit more,” you said softly. He stared at you.

“So…he was right?” You nodded, not really knowing what to say at this moment. He let you help him drink some of the water. You placed a hand to his chest, closing your eyes and concentrating. You began to reset a few bones, holding back your own winces. Healing came at a price for you. You took some damage when it came to healing others. Not the same amount that was dealt, but some. It led to healing too much being deadly. 

You healed most of his cuts and bruises, him being able to sit up after a bit. It took a lot out of you and your body ached all over, but you hid that part. You didn’t want him to know.

You both watched the battle above for a moment before you spoke - ripping off the bandaid.

“I do remember, you know,” you said. Law looked at you, blinking. Time seemed to stand still - for just a moment. “I remember you and Corazon visiting my island.”

Law let out a soft chuckle. “You do? About time.” You rolled your eyes. “I’ve known since Punk Hazard, dumbass. I just didn’t know if you did and when I realized that Corazon wasn’t with you…I didn’t want to open up a wound…” You frowned slightly. You recalled him scolding you for risking your life to save him. He had mentioned he didn’t want to lose someone else by them protecting him.

“I’ve remembered. For a while now.” His voice dropped. “I…didn’t know you had lost your people because of Doflamingo.”

You shook your head. “I didn’t know either. Until recently. Just like you saw.” You swallowed hard, looking down at your necklace. “But, I know that Luffy will beat him. He will avenge both of us.” You looked towards the plateau with a fond smile. 

Law looked at you for a long moment and you finally spoke again. Your tone was somber. “It happened a week after you both left. Doflamingo visited a week before the two of you arrived, then my island was destroyed a week after you left.” He stared at you with wide eyes. “A week?” You nodded.

“Fate has a cruel way of lining up our lives.”

“What do you mean?” 

“Corazon died a week after we left your island.” You stared at him with wide eyes this time. It all…happened at the same time? What was the reasoning in that? Was fate really that cruel? Not only were your loved ones pretty much killed by or because of the same person, but the same time too? 

“Is that what you meant? In Punk Hazard, you told me you didn’t want to lose someone like that again. Referring to me sacrificing myself to save you…” You looked at the ground. “Is that what Corazon did?”

Law nodded. “He sacrificed himself so that I could keep on living.” His voice was soft and you could hear the pain. Before he could say more, you both heard a crash followed by Luffy’s voice ringing through the air.

“GEAR FOUR!” You stared, mouth opening. Another gear? Just how many did he have up his sleeve? He really did become stronger during the two year gap. This was your first time seeing him fight since you ran into him again.

You both watched as he sent Doflamingo flying into the town. You noticed Luffy was now a…giant rubber ball? You blinked, narrowing your eyes to try and see him better. “He’s using too much Haki. Is he going to be able to beat him before he runs out?” you muttered, slightly concerned. Sometimes Luffy didn’t exactly think things that far. 

You watched as Luffy relentlessly pummeled Doflamingo and for a moment, it seemed like he defeated him. “Did he?” 

“Wait, look.” You looked at Law before following his gaze upward. The birdcage. It was still up. You looked back to Luffy. “That’s not good. He has to be running on fumes by now, too.” Worry filled your chest. Then you suddenly saw him deflate and that worry grew. “Oh, Luffy,” you mumbled.

You heard a crash from above you and saw someone bounding down to the ground. “Did that man just jump?” You blinked. Law looked equally confused. “I guess so?” You watched as he bounded over to your friend. “Luffy!” You leaned forward, closer to the edge without really thinking. Then you noticed someone step in the way. You narrowed your eyes. Was that?

Then you felt the edge of the cliff give away and you almost toppled forward. You felt someone grab you by the scruff of your collar and pull you back. You landed against something that was solid, but not quite ground. Looking up, you realized it was Law. “Uh…” You felt your face warm as you moved out from his lap. “Sorry,” you mumbled, turning back to the events unfolding.

He sighed, shaking his head. “You really need to pay attention. You could’ve died.” He rolled his eyes, settling next to you as the two of you watched below. “I have to go help him,” you said, standing up and dusting yourself off. “It’s too dangerous.”

“Well, I can’t just sit here?” 

Law sighed, standing up with you with a groan. Your healing helped him some but you knew he was still in a lot of pain. “Then I’m going too.” You looked at each other for a moment before nodding. “Sounds good.”

Then you both made your way to the streets below, quickly finding your way to Luffy who was on some guy’s back. “We’ll take it from here,” you both said. The man looked from Luffy to the two of you and nodded. “Here he is then.” You took Luffy in your arms, settling down on the ground, tucked away in an alley somewhere. You had Luffy’s head in your lap and you ran your fingers through his hair. You watched him with worry as he slept, Law watching you. 

“He’ll make it through. He’ll win,” he reassured you. You looked to him and nodded. “I know, but can’t help it.” You let out a weak laugh.

You pulled out your flask, pouring some on Luffy’s chest before beginning to heal him. You wouldn’t be able to do a lot, but anything to give him an extra boost for when he woke up. “I thought you had to drink it?” You looked over to Law as you worked, feeling your body ache even more.

“Ah, yeah. That’s the best way for it to work, but this will work too. Just not as quick or effective.” You looked back down at Luffy before hearing a voice ring out. You looked around, trying to see where it was coming from. “What is that?” you mumbled.

It spoke of Luffy’s courageous efforts here in Dressrosa and pretty much hyped him up. Your heart warmed to hear so many people admire one of the people you admired most. One of the people you cared about most. You looked down at Luffy and smiled. “Hear that?” you mumbled. Then the countdown began and Luffy opened his eyes. He looked at you, groaning.

You smiled at him. “Good morning, kiddo,” you teased softly, feeling like you were getting ready to cry. He slowly sat up, collecting himself. “Y/n.” You looked at him, blinking. “Yes?” 

He stood up, brushing off his pants, the countdown still going. “Don’t worry. I’ll make sure Mingo pays for what he’s done to you and everyone else.” Your eyes widened at his words. How did he know? You looked to Law, who mouthed an apology. You assumed he said something when they were fighting together. Then you looked back to Luffy and nodded. “Go get ‘em, kiddo.” 

He nodded. And with that, he took off again.

You stood up, heading to the edge of the alleyway, watching. You felt Law move with you, standing close to you. You noticed he seemed to be struggling to do just that, so you slid your arm around his waist and he placed his arm over your shoulder as he leaned into you.

“It’s almost over,” you mumbled. He nodded, looking like he was ready to pass out again. “It’s almost over,” he confirmed. You both turned your heads towards the sounds of fighting. You watched as the fight took itself back into midair and before you knew it - it was over. Doflamingo had tried a new trick with his strings, but it didn’t stand a chance against your friend’s resolve. 

Then you notice Luffy deflate and begin to fall. “Oh no.” Law stood up, raising his hand. A few moments later, Luffy was right above the two of you and you caught him in your arms as he fell not far from you. Law must have switched him places to soften the blow. “Luffy!” You held him, relief and pride coursing through you. “Good job, Luffy,” you mumbled, placing a kiss to his forehead. 

You watched as the birdcage disappeared and the announcer claimed Luffy as victor. The city erupted in cheers and screams. You smiled widely, looking down at the man in your lap before looking over to Law who sat next to you with a grunt. “He won.” Law nodded. “He won.”

[websitewizard2005]

A guide to my OCs!

hey guys, figured i’d make this post because i have a shit ton of OCs that i post a lot of and i haven’t really explained most of them. they’re all part of different stories/universes, so i’ll be listing them based off of that.

Rex Sucks at Bass

Rex Sucks at Bass, or RSAB, is my webcomic. as of making this post, i’ve posted the entire first chapter! i’ve been planning this comic since late 2021 and i’m holding myself accountable to finish it no matter what. it’s a supernatural/coming of age story that takes place in 2009 about young adult named Rex who has to deal with relationship issues, worries about his future, sexuality crises, and of course, the impending apocalypse. also all the characters are anthro animals but that’s mostly because they’re easier to draw than people. some prominent characters from RSAB are Rex Xavier, Frederick Zhansky, Henri Bal, Sylvia Rose, Alex “Cowboy” Lorenzo, Lola Ramon, Scott “Spott” Simmons, and Marvin Xavier.

We’re Just Young

We’re Just Young is a fake sitcom about teenagers making bad decisions and friendship. it has a bunch of storylines i’ve planned out, but i mostly just draw the characters out of context. its main character is Gilbert Quarters, who is a gay bass player just like every single other character i’ve ever created. its main story takes place in 1997-98, during the characters senior year of high school. there’s also a “spin-off” to We’re Just Young, which follows Gilbert and a few others in college as they form a band called The Halloween Goats and gain some mainstream success as both musicians and ghost hunters. some prominent characters in We’re Just Young are Gilbert Quarters, Gerry Dawson, Marzy Lee, and Jackson Jefferson. some more prominent characters in the spin-off are Raymond Emerson, Wallace Waxman, Leo Hall, Jimmy Nickel, and Sebastian Ingalz.

Untitled Space Story

when i was 13 i read The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy and thought “I need to write my own sci-fi story” and then this past summer i got really into Star Wars and ELO and decided to revamp the whole thing. Untitled Space Story follows the adventures of a small crew assembled by infamous space pilot Sonya Blasmo, who is essentially the butch lesbian version of a cross between Zaphod Beeblebrox and Han Solo. she was “retired” because she accidentally turned her wife into a robot but nobody knows that! all they know is that she’s taking to the skies again! the other characters in Untitled Space Story are Alexis “AL3X15” Goldberg, Mindinoma Lycentine, Mariella Young, Sheldon Spinelli, and Casper “Capers” McFarlin.

Heartstake Heartbreak

a really shitty, simple love triangle story about lesbians at some sort of shitty boarding school in the mid-2000s. the only three characters are Maxine “Max” Dallas, Phoebe Jean Weathers, and Francesca “Frankie” Knight. i created this one like a week ago.

Friends of Daisy Harrisson

Friends of Daisy Harrisson is a musical i wrote, and i don’t draw the characters too often, but i figured i’d still put it on this list. it’s got a really vague story, essentially Daisy goes missing and her wife (Freyja Windsnap), ex-husband (Jim Hartley), and childhood best friend (Barneston Williams) are all brought together through her disappearance.

i have a few other miscellaneous OCs that i draw on occasion, but those are all the main ones! thanks for bearing with me on this long post. if you’re curious about these guys/their stories, feel free to check out their tags! i’ve posted a lot of other character/story info outside of this post. also feel free to send me asks about them like please send me asks about my OCs that is my dream.

fun fact: Rex Sucks at Bass, We’re Just Young, Friends of Daisy Harrisson, and Max Dallas is Not a Lesbian all take place in the same town! mostly because i do not want to create another town. the only reason Untitled Space Story does not take place in that town is because it takes place in space.

[swords-of-a-soilder]

Bless you for compiling what’s going on with that ex-bird app. It’s been genuinely insightful for me to understand the thoughts of the kinds of people behind those accounts.

That person trying to cancel creators for associating with Forever (and probably advocating for his lore to be excised from the server) saying “but I can’t possibly give up guapoduo, it’s My Hyperfixation” is very telling. Hypocrisy specifically in the context of “separating the art from the artist” isn’t something I’ve seen before, shockingly, so I guess I get to add that to my Social Media Discourse Bingo. (I had an online friend in 2016 who I was terrified to talk about my interests with because I didn’t know what angry punk teenagers on tumblr had deemed “evil and disgusting”, and even SHE stopped listening to some of her favorite metal bands when she learned they were homophobic, and had absolute turmoil when she learned that David Bowie might have allegedly slept with an underage groupie in the 70s. Her constant, unpredictable rage at seemingly random pieces of media was awful for my mental health, but at least she wasn’t a genuine hypocrite.)

Also that tone of “I’ve had good memories here… but I just can’t handle it anymore.” It sounds like someone whose meaningful but soul-crushing work has finally broken them, almost sounding like someone I knew at the frontline worker job I had mid-pandemic who missed her own birthday three years in a row, got repetitive stress injuries, and then got passed over for a promotion that was given to someone who did a fraction of the work. But the “God willing, I’ll never come back” was followed by “I’m 13” …damn, I got whiplash so hard that I astral projected into a universe where things made sense for a second. Because of course kids don’t have a complex view of other countries’ political systems or cultural pressures. Or the nuances of personal change and redemption. Or that sometimes people are just not online for a few days. And of course a 13-year-old doesn’t understand how dumb and petty they look by trying to ruin other peoples’ careers in the name of Activism (tm) while having a fandom portmanteau username.

“I didn’t want it to come to this but… I’m going to delete twitter!” I hope so, but more for their own sake, honestly. I actually have less anger towards most of them now. Many are kids with a false sense of grandiosity that makes them believe they are the ultimate moral authority, but have very little understanding of how messy people or societies can be. I just hope they can learn one day, and look back on who they are now and cringe. (And then many years after that, have the grace to forgive themselves.)

Oof, sorry for the wall of text.

I’m still not over the whole situation with Forever. I miss his energy, and his accent, and his silly bits with Richas that always dragged on too long, and N.I.N.H.O. (and everything it represented), and how different he and Cellbit are but how they understood each other WAY too well, and how he tried to make people who didn’t log onto the server as often still feel welcome and wanted, and how happy he got when anyone non-Brazilian even tried to speak a little bit of Portuguese. (I was learning, but I’ve barely touched it since.) I won’t lie, it’s affected me far more than I thought it would.

I miss Forever. Thank you for your blog being a little space where that’s okay.

I'm honestly a little worried for the kid (s), not in a "oh I just want the best for" fake bs way just a little concerned tbh. I still don't like them but I don't hate them either, they're a kid.

But at the same time I'm worried for their well being, they have like 5,000 follower on their main Twitter and 28 on curious cat (which is apprantly high for that app )

That's 5000 people (teens or not) waiting for you to tell them how to feel that can't be good for their mental state, not for a 13 yr old kid.

Most of their life was spent learning about the world and their still learning, these are the ages where you're worried about the sun blowing up.

You haven't seen how awful the world can be yet, You haven't seen how much worst it could get you haven't learned calculus yet!

To you the world is only these 13 years and you think if you don't act now everything will be over.

I get it, I had that fear too, most people grown into it and realize just how shitty it can get an settle in choosing their own battles and not letting It consume them, because no one had time for that anymore.

You want to experience the most out of live while you can and the older you get the easier it is to balance.

To me it looks like one of those situation where you'll look back and think "I wish I enojyed my childhood."

Because 5000 people waiting for you to tell them who to bash, 28 people prasing your while admitting they use to hate you.

It can't be good. And if they were to read this they'd probably say "oh you don't actually care you just want to shit on me."

And like, yeah I don't care, but am I saying all this because I want to shit on them? no I'm just pointing out concerns.

Apart from that I fully agree with anon.

[danpuff-ao3]

@hprecfest 2/3: Days 11-20

Day 11: a dark fic

The Dreams We Forget (Are Those We Most Regret)

by Serpenscript. Harry/Severus. Rated: E. Words: 4,738. Rape/non-con. Forced infidelity. Obliviation. Mindfuck. Angst. Fairytale. Angst. 

Once a month, Harry Potter is summoned to the Ministry for personal Auror training. Afterwords, he never remembers what he learned….but he dreams of empty eyes and black hair.

It’s sad, it’s dark, it’s fucky, I love it.

Day 12: a WIP you're following

The Afterlight

by perverse_idyll (@perverse-idyll). Harry/Severus. Rated: E. Words: 45,661 (as of chapter 6). 

After surviving the Battle of Hogwarts, a long convalescence, and a short trial, Snape walks free and promptly vanishes from Wizarding society. Six years pass before he shows his face again. A lot can change in six years, and a romantically disillusioned and inebriated Harry hits Snape up for a friends-with-benefits arrangement. After all, they share an experience most people have never had: they both know what it’s like to be dead. Their liaison works surprisingly well until Harry’s reckless behaviour as an Auror leads to unethical practices and personal calamities, and things start to fall apart.

Listen, I don’t read many WIPs (I’ve been burned many times in the past), but PI???? I can’t stay away from a PI fic. I’m so obsessed already. I was SOOO hooked from the start. It’s AMAZING. Snarry done just how I like it!

Day 13: a fic over 100k

Nights of Gethsemane

by starcrossed. Harry/Severus. Rated: E. Words: 363,198. Dark. Angst. Torture. Rape/non-con. 

Harry is a prisoner of the Dark Lord and Snape, his prison guard. Completely cut off from the outside world, Harry struggles to hold himself intact as he is forced to rely on Snape for everything. Yet Snape may not be all that he appears….

This is one of the fics I’ve read most over the years. I cannot start this fic and pause while reading it, despite the length. If I’m going to read this fic, I’m going to INHALE it. 

The link above is AO3, since most people will prefer it, but I originally read it on LJ and recommend reading it there instead (the AO3 version has some formatting issues in places. I don’t think it’s egregious, but worth note). 

It’s also worth noting how friggin’ COOL this is. One, I love how true to Harry’s POV this fic is and what a very thoughtful consideration for his voice, as a teenager in a dire situation. It’s interesting how the story is told from such a limited POV, to then move onto the companion piece (Invictus) which tells the same story from Severus’ perspective. Then to read both side by side and see where they misunderstood one another, or made assumptions, or how they each viewed a situation differently, etc. This concept is one I love and what inspired me to do similar with my fics Contempt and Devotion! 

Livejournal Links: Nights of Gethsemane, Invictus, Release of Sisyphus

Day 14: a favorite series

Needs Must

by silvereye5 (@silvereye5). Harry/Severus. Rated: E. Words: 115,891 (incomplete). Works: 3. 

After Ginny Potter dies suddenly, Severus Snape is among those called in to help Potter juggle his new reality. As the other helpers fade away, a desperate and penniless Severus agrees to become the regular caregiver to Potter’s three young children. But Severus finds that the Potter household is not the sunshine and roses he’d imagined.

So many good ones out there, but it has to be this one! Deliciously angsty. A kidfic (which I’m a sucker for). Best of all is how imperfect Harry is in this story. So often I read about a soft and impossibly good Harry, so it’s good to see him as a bit of a mess and a workaholic, and his own flaws being showcased just as much as Severus’. I’m obsessed with it!

So it is

by Threadbear (@ogthreadbear). Harry/Severus. Rated: E. Words: 8,291. Works: 4. Background Harry/Ginny.

Harry Potter was getting married tomorrow. He was thrilled.

This series has so much I love. The infidelity, the angst! The breeding kink. The intensity and passion and hurt of it all. The mess of it. It aches so beautifully and I love it.

Day 15: the most recent fic you bookmarked

For I Have Found Salvation

by lumosatnight (@lumosatnight). Harry/Severus. Rated: E. Words: 7,117. Priest Severus. Muggle AU. Written for Snarry Auctoberfest 2023. 

Severus is a priest, and Harry is the parishioner who may just make him break his vows of celibacy.

Super spicy. Super sacrilegious. I’m still obsessed. Also seeing the gift notification on this one MADE MY DAY.

Day 16: a fic that made you laugh

Spy Glass

by suitesamba (@suitesamba). Harry/Severus. Rated: E. Words: 18,135. Spying. Voyeurism. Humor.

England wants to insure star Seeker Harry Potter and his fabulous broom. Enter Severus Snape, wizarding investigator extraordinaire, ready to calculate risk and assess value. Tailing Harry Potter turns out to be the job of his dreams, though he wishes it could be done without the disguise. A tale of a man’s obsession, another man’s obsession, and a heartwarming ending where everyone ultimately gets what they want – or what they need.

This fic is such a good time.

Old Dogs and New Tricks

by youcantseeus. Draco/Sirius. Rated: T. Words: 14,099. Humor.

Draco isn’t gay, he just appreciates a good looking man when he sees one. Honest! And Sirius Black is a good looking man.

This is my favorite Drarius fic! It’s funny. Draco’s voice is great. 10/10. What a good time this is.

Day 17: a fic that made you cry

Loose Ends

by Arrisha (@arrisha-ao3). Harry/Severus. Rated: E. Words: 9,865. Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings. Heavy angst. Dark. Trauma. Mystery. Psychological horror.

I love you, Severus wants to say. But the timing is never right. 

DAMN YOU, ARRISHA. (But also ily.) If you’re gonna let anyone wreck your heart and soul, let her do it.

Day 18: a fairy-tale inspired fic

Red as Blood

by Likelightinglass (@likelightinglass). Harry/Severus. Rated: M. Words: 9,942. Vampires. Fairytale retellings. True Love. Snow White.

Once upon a time there was a strange and magical land. One filled with ordinary villages and ordinary people, a dark and forbidding Forest, and a castle shrouded in mist. In the castle lived an Evil King, whose court of Death Eaters did his evil bidding. And there was a curse. There was a curse, and a magic mirror, and a boy as white as snow. But first, there was a Huntsman.

I'm such a sucker for fairytale fics, and this was the first one that jumped to mind. Such a lovely story! I remember one year I read it during a hurricane when our power was out. I was worried about my Kindle battery draining, but I couldn't put it down!

Day 19: fic with the hottest smut

Warm

by perverse_idyll (@perverse-idyll). Harry/Severus. Rated: E. Words: 11,323. 

Severus still suffers the after-effects of Nagini’s venom, especially in winter. Harry knows just how to warm him up.

This might be my favorite established relationship fic ever. Not to mention, like??? Bottom!Snape?? And rimming???? And just????? Everything???? Sorry, fic too hot, brain no work. OBSESSED.

Day 20: a fic rated G

Lilac

by emeraldlove (@givereadersahug). Harry/Severus. Rated: G. Words: 1,366. Humor. Crack. Curses. Love Confessions. 

“You’re cursed,” declared Hermione. She dropped several books onto the table, scattering the flowers lying about, and took a seat. There were petals on the table and on the floor — especially on, above, under, and surrounding Harry.

It’s funny. It’s cute. It’s got flowers. I love it!

[gothamghostwhispers]

Hello ooc introduction! Last updated 11/20/24

I’m Coolcat101s (that’s where I follow from) I’ve been rping on and off for over a decade now, but this is my first time rping in the dc community. My response speed and length varies but I’m online often. I’m primarily a mobile user.

Much like dc canon the ‘canonical’ (for lack of a better word) nature of any given story line is decided by vibes especially since this is a crossover friendly blog I figure this approach will help make things mesh best so if I ever have plot holes or contradict myself maybe that was a different continuity

Along that thought line while there are plots happening and time passing, because rping takes time I won’t say there’s like a set matching timeframe if that makes sense? comic time logic you know? Sometimes a day takes 3 panels and sometimes it’s 3 issues.

It can take people a while to reply I get that ^^”

Posts are in character unless otherwise specified, but some posts are meant to be things that happen in the “real world” the stylistic chooses should make these posts obvious but I like to practice writing with my ocs so expect those sometimes

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I am okay with shipping/flirting with Artem I think it’s fun ^^ but be aware that they are pretty oblivious to many things

I’m okay with violence in rp but I’d like a conversation before we do anything that would need a content warning

Update for suggestive content, all of it will be done on a sideblog instead of here bc of how family centered the main blog has become and how many kids follow this blog. So conversation required to get the url for the nsfw side blog

Minors can interact with this blog but be mindful! Muse and mun are the same age (You should really be mindful anytime youre in a mixed age group but that is sometimes forgotten by many in online spaces) I tend to keep things pg 13 and anything not would be tagged as ‘suggestive’. Any minors caught interacting with anything tagged as suggestive will get one warning in case they didn’t read this post but after that you will be blocked if it happens again

Im crossover friendly but only for content that I know if I don’t know it Artem will act confused and will wrap it up to multidimensional shenanigans causing worlds to temporarily touch or whatnot. ( known crossovers that I’m chill with: Danny Phantom, Miraculous Ladybug I’ll add more as I come across them I guess)

Artem was a self insert at one point but they became their own thing after rotating them in different scenarios so now they’re their own oc

Ongoing arc(s):

Power suppression arc (hiatus kinda, abduction interrupted so might be done)

Magic experiments

Completed arc: abduction arc

Bread boy arc

Not really an arc but the manor move

-4’11 blue eyes, hair is naturally brown but they keep it blue

-birthday June 11th (whatever year makes their age match mine in whatever continuity also their chart isn’t mathematically possible but it’s what makes sense for them)

-they’re agender and pan/demisexual, also polyamorous in theory but single in practice

They have a boyfriend fiancé husband ( @bugboi-of-gotham )

-currently has 3 children legally and fostering the Lyra siblings but in the process of adopting more and more then that live in the manor

-went to college on a full Wayne scholarship, they have a bachelors in English with a minor in folklore

-job hops between restaurant (quit daytime gig after coming into money )and goon positions

-the first goon job they ever worked for was calendar man when they were 17 and they currently work under riddler, penguin, scarecrow, and ivy

-they get robbed a lot because they have a resting smile and generally give the vibe of an easy mark when not hanging out with scary people (subsequently they hang out with scary people often)

-lives in a building owned by Red Hood but it’s debatable if they know that

Due to plot they are moving to the Manson family Manor that they inherited with their kids and bb

-Forcibly outed as a meta publicly during the abduction arc

Artem also has an easy time learning instruments and perfect pitch but they don’t equate those to a meta ability (it is linked to their power though)

-has a cat and an aloe plant

-soft spot for kids

-Artem is a witch but doesn’t have much time to study, does small spells though

> their magic is growing a lot kind of fast with the ingesting of fae food, tying themselves to bb, and training with their alt future self

-grew up going to an anti meta church/cult

-Joker killed their mom in front of them when they were 16, they aren’t really the killing type when at all possible so they don’t seek vengeance but they avoid him at all costs and will not work with him

Layout of the Manson Manor! (Manson being Artem’s mother Amara’s maiden name, if the Wayne’s are gothams royal family then think of the Manson family as like barons of gotham I guess? Rich in an old money way. Probably not well known by average people but press/other gotham elites might recognize the name. They’re like the 42nd richest family in gotham)

The fourth floor is magical and not accessible from the outside (the balconies still work somehow cause magic)

Also promises made in the manor are magically binding

From the outside this building still has 3 floors

Protections listed in link bellow

Source: https://archivaldesigns.com/collections/mansion-house-plans/products/balmoral-castle-house-plan

[new-employeeamillion]

Someone might ask me about this for next year’s QnA, but what the heck.

My immediate thoughts regarding the tentative Warner/Paramount merger.

I’m no business expert, but I’m educated enough to know that merging two already huge media companies will be a bad thing for workers. Remember what happened when Disney bought Fox 5 years ago? Content from both companies has become more homogeneous since then.

Just thinking about the idea that Cartoon Network and Nickelodeon could share the same parent company has me worried. They’ve already been dealing with identity crises since the streaming bubble took people’s attention away from cable, and if they both have the same executives controlling them, that’ll just make the situation worse. Think about how low their viewership has gotten in the past decade. If they’re both under the control of the same company, one or both of them will have the plug pulled. And with Cartoon Network Studios shutting down recently, I bet it’s going to be them.

I’m spitballing here, getting paranoid over a hypothetical outcome that only exists in my head right now, but if Cartoon Network is no longer a studio, channel or active brand identity by 2025 or 2026, that’ll make me really sad. Sure I don’t follow their new stuff as much as I review their old stuff, but I focus on their old stuff for a reason. It’s a symbol of the animation renaissance of the late 80s, 90s and early 2000s. The medium was in crisis before then, but an impassioned new wave of animators brought it back, with the help of a business tycoon and his channel that actually saw value in the art form. I can’t see that happening again when there’s less companies and less job opportunities for animators. Time isn’t always cyclical. This could very well be the end what we currently consider the Modern Era of Animation.

And the possibility of Warner Bros. owning SpongeBob has me even more concerned about its future. They could do one of two things:

-Cancel everything in the franchise as a tax write-off (can you blame anyone for thinking they’ll do that?)

-Dip even harder into movies and spin-offs, making Nickelodeon’s current strategy seem quaint

Here’s the thing. I wouldn’t be so apprehensive about movies (beyond the first two) and spin-offs if the main show was over already. I’m not saying Season 13 and 14 are bad and shouldn’t exist, just that Nickelodeon should only be doing one or the other, the main show or subsequent media. At this point, I’ve come to terms that SpongeBob is like Mickey Mouse and Looney Tunes, this animated mascot that’s outlived the creator and so will always be a symbol of the corporation it came from. But notice how with Mickey Mouse and Looney Tunes, their original serieses ended decades and decades ago. We’ve been getting spin-offs, film appearances and complete reimaginings for far longer than their original theatrical shorts were in production.

I’m fine with SpongeBob still being around as a mascot in 50 years like them, but not if the show is going to be in its 44th season and a virtually different production with different people behind it. There is the likelihood that Warner Bros. Discovery Paramount will look at the ratings it’s getting on Nick and put it to rest, leaving behind spin-offs and reimaginings. As harsh as it is to say, that’s the safest possible outcome, but I don’t think that’ll be what they do. They’ll either do even more to oversaturate the brand, or throw it all away like it’s worthless. Sorry if this spiel has been pretty cynical, but I have no reason to be optimistic if this goes through.

The only thing people are excited about with all this is all the crossover possibilities if all the NickToons and Cartoon Network Originals were owned by the same people. And while they seem tantalising, those old franchises were only so good because the creators were encouraged to compete, encouraged to experiment, encouraged to make what they wanted to watch, and encouraged to leave a lasting impact. If the merger goes through, that might not be the case. Crossovers are literally the only positive people seem to be gleaming from this, so fair enough. Have those happy thoughts, because you’re really gonna need them. A SpongeBob/Looney Tunes crossover will break everyone’s brains though, and I mean that in bad and good ways.