#I'm not sure if there's anyone reading just on tumblr rather than AO3

[waytooinvested]

Forgotten, Not Forgiven - Chapter 19

This and previous chapters are also on AO3

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

She hadn’t meant to sleep at all, but somewhere around 7am Lena drifted into a light doze and lingered there, halfway between sleep and waking, until she felt Kara stir against her side an hour later. A sleep-heavy arm was draped across her waist, and Kara burrowed her shoulder softly, only half-way conscious of her surroundings. Then, as if suddenly remembering that snuggling was not in their usual friendship repertoire, she stilled.

‘Hey.’

Lena turned her head on the pillow to meet Kara’s gaze, finding her sleep rumpled and bleary eyed, her cheek creased with pillow lines and hair mussed into a tangle that caught the early morning sun like a halo of gold around her face. She looked so soft and cuddly like this that it made Lena’s breath catch, as the knowledge of what it would be like to wake up with Kara (not just beside her, but with Kara) hit her squarely in the chest.

‘Good morning...’

For a few indulgent heartbeats she let herself imagine pulling Kara in close for a morning cuddle while she was still all snuggly and drowsy like this. Kissing the golden tangle of her hair, then tilting her chin up to kiss her lips…

She pulled back from the thought before it could travel any further along this dangerous, tantalising road and stretched, the movement causing Kara to shift away just enough to allow Lena to think about something other than how cute she looked when she had just woken up.

‘How are you feeling today? Any bad dreams?’

‘Nope. I thought I would have, but I guess I felt safe with you being here... Thanks for looking after me last night.’

‘Always.’

The word slipped out so naturally that it was a moment before Lena realised everything it implied. Always. Not just until Kara’s memories were back. Not just if they worked out their differences and found a way to be together afterwards. No matter how bitterly they might fight, if Kara truly needed her she knew now that she would be there. Always.

‘So, what do you need today to help you start to recover?’

‘Huh? What do you mean recover? I’m not sick!’

Kara sounded genuinely puzzled, as if she hadn’t been caught in the grips of a terror so strong that she had barely been able to perceive her surroundings a few hours earlier. Lena answered carefully, not sure if Kara was just trying to put the whole experience behind her, and not wanting to push her too far if she wasn’t ready to engage with it.

‘No, I know you’re not sick, but last night was pretty traumatic for you, so I thought you might need a bit of support to deal with that...’

Before she was even done Kara was laughing, waving the suggestion away as if she had implied she might need to go to the ER for a scraped knee.

‘Oh, that! Lena, that was just a panic attack. I told you, I get them sometimes when I get claustrophobic, it’s not a big deal. I’m totally fine now. No more tight space, no more panic. Simple!’

‘Just a panic attack? Kara, you were petrified. And what you told me about the dream you had… it seemed a lot more that.’

She shrugged. ‘Okay, so I guess I panic big, I don’t know. I’m fine now though.’

‘Do you remember what happened in the dream journey with Nia?’

‘Sure. I tried to crawl through a tunnel and it was really small, and I got kind of claustrophobic. I guess I must have been breathing fast or something because you noticed and woke me up, and then I cried on you a bit, and then we went to bed. I’m sorry if asking you to stay over made it seem like a bigger deal than it was – it was just nice to have someone else here is all.’

While Kara’s version of events could loosely have been said to have described what happened the night before, it did not at all tally with the intensity Lena remembered. So how was Kara talking about it so casually? How did she seem so completely unaffected mere hours after coming out of the most horrific confrontation of every moment of pain and terror Supergirl had ever faced?

Oh.

Every terror Supergirl had faced.

Could it be that what Kara had experienced in the dream-space was close enough to being a Kryptonian memory that her mind had rejected it, to be replaced with the much more every day human explanation of a claustrophobic panic attack? Lex’s barrier was clever, she had to give him that. Twisted, cruel and evil, but clever. To get back to herself Kara would have to break through all of that pain and fear in a single push, or every failed attempt would simply add another layer to the wall between her human and kryptonian memories.

She reached up a hand to rub at her temple, trying to puzzle it all through and come up with a way their new insight might help them beat this, but as soon as the covers fell away Kara gasped.

‘Your arms! Oh my god, did someone hurt you? Who did this?’

Lena looked down at her own arms to see that the bruises that had been starting to surface the evening before had turned dark over night, blooming into a vivid purple-pansy ring around each forearm, ugly and shocking against her pale skin.

‘Oh. No, no one, it’s nothing Kara.’

She tried to tuck them back out of sight under the covers, but Kara didn’t let her. She pulled the blankets right off her so she could see properly, sucking air through her teeth in a pained hiss as the undeniable evidence came back into view.

‘It’s not nothing, you’re covered in bruises…’

Kara took hold of the arm closest to her very gently, cradling it with one hand and tracing over the marks on her inner forearm with the other. Her touch was so feather-light it was barely there, and yet it made Lena shiver at the unexpected intimacy of the contact against such a sensitive part of her skin.

‘They’re finger marks, what-’

Then the realisation hit her, and Kara let go of her immediately, looking like she might be sick.

‘Oh. Oh Lena. I grabbed your arms last night. Did I do this to you?’

‘No… well… not really. It’s not as bad as it looks.’

‘I did. I hurt you. Oh God, I am so, so, so sorry, I can’t believe I did that to you. How could I have done that?’

Kara looked down at her own hands as if they didn’t belong to her, holding them away from her body like she might be able to detach them altogether for daring to harm Lena, no matter that it had been accidental and in the midst of visceral panic. Lena reached out to gather them into her own and pressed them gently, just barely resisting the temptation to give them an absolving kiss.

‘Darling, it’s truly fine. It wasn’t your fault, it’s just the way I’m built – my skin marks if my bra’s too tight, let alone at a firm hold. I know it looks bad, but it doesn’t even hurt, and it was a total accident. There’s nothing to feel sorry about.’

It wasn’t true that Lena bruised particularly easily, or that the marks didn’t hurt. But it was a kind lie, and one that Kara needed right now, because without remembering how bad her fear had truly been she had no other way of rationalising to herself how this had happened.

Kara was still staring at the livid marks as if she could feel the pain of them on her own skin, her telltale worry-crinkle clearly in evidence between her eyebrows, though she looked a tiny bit less sick.

‘Kara, if it was the other way round and I had accidentally bruised you, would you be mad at me for it?’

‘Well no, of course not. I know you wouldn’t hurt me on purpose.’

‘Exactly. So please stop worrying.’

The crinkle smoothed out, mostly.

‘At least let me make you breakfast to make up for it?’

Lena relaxed, glad to be back on safe ground.

‘Breakfast would be great. What were you thinking of making?’

‘I actually don’t have that much in so we may be a tiny bit limited on choice until I next have a chance to go grocery shopping... But I could do pancakes?’

‘Sure, I’m up for pancakes.’

‘Awesome, I am amazing at pancakes.’

The regret was still there beneath the layer of determined cheer, but after another glance down at the purple marks Kara tore her eyes away and met Lena’s with something approaching her usual sunny smile.

‘One short stack coming right up.’

Kara headed straight to the kitchen without bothering to change or try to tame the wild lion’s mane of her hair after a night of unsettled sleep, and it felt so incredibly domestic that Lena was momentarily incapacitated by the wave of melancholy longing that swept over her at the sight. This could have been her life. Maybe, if she had done things differently from the beginning, or if Kara had, this could have been what she woke up to every morning.

Lena allowed herself a few moments to wallow in the bittersweet ache of the thought, then she pulled herself together and got up, pausing only to grab the robe from the back of the bedroom door on her way out. She wanted to cover up the bruises on her arms so that Kara would stop looking at her like she thought she had broken her, and could always claim to be cold if asked. Right now Lena didn’t want to think about anything more than Saturday morning pancakes. Saturday morning pancakes, and making Kara’s smile reach her eyes.

There would be time enough time later to worry about everything else.

‘I don’t have any packet mix so I’m going to go from scratch. Six eggs is enough, right?’

‘Six? That is way too many eggs Kara!’

‘Are you sure?’

Lena rolled her eyes and hurried through to join Kara in the kitchen before she could use up an entire carton of eggs on pancakes for two people. Kara Danvers was many wonderful things, but an accomplished chef was not one of them.

She arrived to find that in the minute or so she had been out of sight, Kara had already tipped half a packet of flour and a lake of milk into a large mixing bowl, and was now merrily cracking eggs on top with far more enthusiasm than finesse, though she did fish out the bits of shell that fell into the mixture before she started stirring.

‘Exactly how many pancakes were you planning on making?’

‘I’m hungry! And there’s no such thing as too many pancakes.’

‘Okay… well why don’t you at least let me help you with that?’

She held out her hand for the bowl, but Kara hugged it to her chest with one arm and tried to shoo her away with the other.

‘Nope, absolutely not. I’m making you breakfast, remember? That was the deal. You can go and relax, I’ll let you know when they’re done.’

‘If I’m not allowed to help, can’t I just stay here and talk to you while you’re working?’

At least that way she would be close enough to head off any major crises.

And she’d get to watch Kara being an adorable disaster.

‘Okay, you can stay, but no helping. If you so much as try to wash a dish I am banishing you to the couch.’

‘Duly noted, I will be the most useless, in the way visitor ever to grace your kitchen.’

‘That’s all I ask.’

Kara did her best to stir the over-filled bowl of batter, but it wasn’t combining properly, the mixture staying resolutely lumpy under her whisk.

‘I’m going to get the electric mixer. I’m putting the bowl down, but don’t stir it.’

‘Yes ma’am.’

That promise became harder to keep when Kara started trying to fit together the electric mixer. It was clearly not an appliance she used very often, and it took her a good five minutes to track down the right attachments and work out how to slot them into the machine. All the while Lena stood a pace behind her, biting her lip to keep from offering to take over (after all, if there was one thing Lena Luthor was good at, it was figuring out machines). She held out for what felt to her like an extremely respectable amount of time, but at last she couldn’t take it anymore.

‘Kara, couldn’t I just-’

‘Nope! And that’s your second warning Ms Luthor, one more and you’re benched.’

‘Is that right?’

‘Afraid so. You looked after me last night, so now I’m looking after you, no arguments.’

So she let Kara bash away at the mixer and instead leaned back against the counter to watch her. She had to admit, much as she adored Kara dorky and sweet, she liked her assertive too. It was… appealing (it was attractive). Kara had pushed the sleeves of her pajamas up above her elbows, and in spite of her fumbling there was an assurance in the way she moved, forearms flexing as she tilted the mixer this way and that to find the space where the paddle slotted. She somehow managed to look competent and strong even as she made a mess of a simple kitchen task, and Lena was almost disappointed when the job was finished and Kara stood back triumphantly, holding out her hand for the mixing bowl. Lena passed it over, stepped close to witness the moment of triumph.

With a quick flick, Kara turned the dial up to full power, and the mixer whirred abruptly into life, its not-quite-fully-submerged whisk attachment hitting the edge of the off-centre bowl with an angry clatter that set the whole thing wobbling alarmingly. With the whisk now hitting it side-on, the batter surged up over the tilted edge in a wave, coating the table, the floor and both of them with a generous spattering of raw mixture.

‘Argh!’

Lena leaned over to yank the plug form the wall, wondering if this would count as ‘helping’ and get her banished, but it seemed that stopping a tidal wave of pancake batter from engulfing the entire kitchen was allowed.

‘Sorrysorryssorry! I can’t believe I just did that. Oh look at you, you’re covered.’

Kara passed over a clean dish towel, and Lena used it to wipe the worst of the batter off her face with a rueful little laugh.

‘At least you made plenty of extra, so we can afford to lose a bit.’

‘That is a very generous way of looking at the fact that I just half drowned you in goop. Are you sure you don’t want to go and sit over there, out of the splash zone?’

‘Nope, we’re in this together now. Besides, I think that’s the riskiest part done with. What’s left looks pretty well mixed.’

‘It had better be. No way I’m turning that thing on again.’

The remainder of the process actually went comparatively smoothly, and after another quick stir with a regular whisk Kara fried the first pancake without incident (wisely opting to turn it using a spatula rather than attempting to toss it, though she had looked briefly tempted). Once it was an even golden brown she tipped it carefully onto a plate, added a knob of butter and a drizzle of maple syrup, then handed it to Lena with a flourish.

‘Voila, breakfast is served!’

Lena took the offered plate while Kara poured a second ladleful of mixture into the pan, and examined it. It actually did look very pancake-like. If she hadn’t been here to watch the process, she would never have known that Kara didn’t make them every weekend.

Then she took her first bite.

...And immediately ran to the trash can to spit it out.

‘Oh my god. Kara what did you put in these?’

Kara looked surprised, and a bit hurt.

‘Nothing! I mean, nothing weird, I followed the recipe. Is it really that bad?’

‘Try it.’

Kara took the fork from her and cut herself a bite of pancake. Lena watched her as the syrup hit her tongue and Kara shrugged at her, not getting it. Then she chewed, choked, and rushed to spit the mouthful back out just as Lena had.

‘OH MY GOD.’

‘What is that?’

‘It is the worst thing I have ever put in my mouth.’

Despite the lingering bitter taste on her own tongue, Lena couldn’t help smirking at Kara’s disgusted expression. She was staring at the pancake as if she couldn’t believe that something that was meant to be so delicious could betray her like this.

‘But I followed the recipe!’

‘Is there any chance that you might have mistaken a tbsp for a tsp when you were measuring the baking powder?’

Kara looked crestfallen for a moment, then sheepish.

‘Um… well that would be a really stupid mistake to make. I don’t think that sounds like something I would do... Maybe the flour’s out of date or something?’

‘Mmhmm, that sounds plausible.’

‘Extremely plausible.’

‘So… you’re amazing at pancakes?’

‘I did say that, didn’t I? Well. I’m amazing at eating pancakes. I kind of assumed that that would translate to making them better than it did.’

She wasn’t sure which of them broke first, but in another moment they were both laughing, clinging to each other for support as they took in the total disaster of Kara’s culinary efforts. It was at this precise moment that they were interrupted by the sound of a key in the door, followed quickly by the appearance of Alex, laden down with a large paper bag and a cardboard tray of coffee cups.

‘Hey, I thought I’d drop round and check how you... were… doing?’

Her gentle ‘talking to an invalid’ tone petered out into a question mark as she came in further and caught sight of them, still arm in arm and grinning at each other like idiots amidst the mess of their attempted pancakes.

‘Um. WHAT is happening.’

‘Alex, hey! Come join us!’

‘Yes Alex, come and try one of these delicious pancakes Kara made.’

Beside her Kara cracked up all over again, and Alex’s eyebrows shot up at this further irrefutable proof of her sister so clearly not having a post trauma breakdown. She mouthed a silent ‘what??’ at Lena, but there was no way for her to explain in front of Kara, and she just shrugged helplessly while Kara nudged her playfully in the ribs for her suggestion.

‘DO NOT try the pancakes. They were… not my best effort.’

‘Yeah I see that… what happened?’

‘Kara didn’t let me help, that’s what happened.’

‘I wanted to make you breakfast!’

Alex shook her head at both of them, like a half exasperated, half amused adult walking in on a pair of children getting into mischief.

‘Well, you sure made something. Luckily for you guys I am the best sister ever, and I brought bagels. I thought you might not be up for much cooking after last night. And apparently I was right, even if not in the way I expected.’

‘After last night? Lena! You tattled on me to my big sister??’

‘Oh. I…um...’

Kara didn’t sound seriously angry, but Lena felt her cheeks heating all the same. Because yes, she had told Alex about Kara’s melt down. Of course she had. And worse, they regularly talked about how Kara was doing in much more detail than she would normally consider acceptable to discuss a mutual friend behind her back, but… they had to. If they were going to help her get her memories back, they had to talk about how she was dealing with their treatment attempts in order to move forwards. When Kara knew the full story she would understand that, but there was no way to fully explain now, especially when she had so completely recategorised last night in her mind.

However, Alex thankfully jumped in to let Lena off the hook before the silence could get too awkward.

‘Nia called me after she left. She said you seemed pretty upset, and was worried you’d be cross with her for asking you to do the dream journey.’

‘Oh no, poor Nia, of course I’m not cross with her! I’d better call her after breakfast… it must have looked scary to her, but it was seriously no big deal, it was just the old claustrophobia thing and I had a panic attack. It was nothing. Right Lena?’

Both Danvers sisters turned to Lena, and, not knowing what else to do, she nodded.

‘Sure... Kara, is something burning?’

‘Argh I forgot the second pancake!’

Kara ran back to the stove and switched it off, then went to open a window to let out the smoke that was billowing up from the charred remains of attempt number two. Lena took the opportunity to shake her head quickly and mouthed ‘later’ at Alex, trying to convey that there was more to the story, but it would have to wait until they could talk privately. Alex gave a brisk little nod of understanding, then put the subject aside as she came over to deposit her bag and cups on the cleanest bit of table she could find.

‘Okay, who wants bagels? Lena, I pegged you for a smoked salmon and cream cheese kinda gal, but I also have an everything with everything, a cinnamon raisin or a peanut butter chocolate chip.’

‘The salmon will be fine, thank you.’

‘Cool. Kara, I got the everything and the peanut butter chocolate with you in mind, but I don’t mind switching if you want cinnamon raisin.’

‘Nope I’m happy. We should probably clean up a little in here first though, if the batter dries it’s going to be impossible to get it off.’

Alex looked around, taking in the full extent of the mess with a low whistle.

‘You are not wrong, this place is a wreck. And did you pour a ladle full directly over Lena’s chest? How do you even get that much batter down the front of a robe by accident?’

Lena glanced down at herself and discovered that Alex had a point. Clearly when Kara had turned on the electric mixer she had been more directly in the splatter zone than she had realised, and now kind of looked as though she had thrown up all over herself. Even though she knew she hadn’t, the thought was unpleasant enough that she immediately shrugged out of the soiled robe, intending to rinse off the worst of the floury paste before it had a chance to harden or clog up Kara’s washing machine, but Alex didn’t move out of the way of the sink to let her.

She was staring at Lena with a look of incredulous delight.

‘Oh my god.’

‘What?’

‘Ohmygodohmygodohmygodohmygod.’

Then Lena remembered her pink and white marshmallow pajamas, and winced.

‘Do not.’

‘I can’t help it. You look like one of those valentines candy hearts.’

‘They’re Kara’s. I didn’t exactly come round prepared to stay over and I had to borrow something to sleep in.’

Alex wasn’t listening, too caught up in her utter glee over what she was seeing.

‘Like a little puff of cotton candy! Can I please please take your photo like this??’

‘Absolutely NOT.’

‘Oh go on. I want to set it to pop up whenever you call me.’

‘That’s it, I’m getting dressed.’

‘It’s too late now, I’ve seen it. Next time you go all scary-Lena I’m just going to picture you in your jammies with pancake batter smeared on your cheeks.’

Lena fled the room before Alex could whip out her phone to take the threatened photo, but she could still hear the sound of her cackling even once the bathroom door was firmly closed behind her, as well as Kara’s more quietly amused admonishments to her sister.

She was never going to live this down.

[fangdokja]

MASTERPOST

Jesus Appreciation + Male Yanderes + Dead Dove + Psychological

Current Polls: What sex story do you want ; What smut content do you want?

Preface

♡ Dedication. I love Jesus Christ. Without Him, and my husband, I would’ve longed killed myself. I dedicate my everything to my God, including my blog, books, etc.

♡ Dark Content. Yeah, I write dark content; but it’s because it makes me cherish the light more since I know darkness intimately. Just shows that I need Jesus and my husband all the more. In fact, I wouldn’t be able to write any of this or do anything without God and my husband. So, this isn’t just my work alone.

♡ Disclaimer. And just because I write this doesn't mean I condone such behavior. I genuinely enjoy writing dark fudged up shiz. It's therapeutic for me. As weird as it is, I can NEVER relate to "happy" stories, fluff and slice-of-life seems like a fantasy to me.

♡ I love my husband. I love spending time with my God and my husband. I'm hardcore simp, lol. Whenever I write, I always think of my husband for example, it helps me write a lot.

♡ BEFORE entering, please read this. GENERAL RULES + REQUEST RULES

♡ Dead Dove + Mature Content. Due to the nature of my content, please read responsibly (with a mature mindset)! Welcome and please enjoy my blog! God bless!

♡ Favorite Bible Book. Lamentations 3:1-2 : “I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of the LORD’s wrath. He had driven me away and made me walk in darkness rather than light;”

All 7 Masterlists:

♡ IMPORTANT. I'm honestly unsure what Tumblr bans when it comes to sexual content and gore in writing. So, just in case, please follow or save the sites: the author's official website or Ao3, so the content you read doesn't get banned nor lost.

♡ 🎁. Available for Reader Requests. Make sure to read the RULES! ♡ 🔞. NSFW / extremely explicit themes (non-con, sexual torture, dangerous edge play, degradation, humiliation, BDSM, etc.)

♡ Masterlists Order. The following works are arranged by order of writing priority:

Light in the Abyss: A Jesus Journey

♡ Light in the Abyss. Want a break from all the dark content or even life in general? Here's some Jesus comfort from the One who loves you more than anyone or anything else ever will :))

🔞God's Protagonist

♡ God's Protagonist. If you want the most tragic, taboo, trauma-inducing, grimdark epic story.

🎁A Heart Devoured: A Dark Yandere Anthology

♡ A Heart Devoured. The middle ground of all the books, can be be a light or dark read, depending on what reader insert story you pick. Also available for original yandere (OC’s) requests.

Request Rules Fandom and Characters

🎁World Ablaze: For You, I'd Burn the World.

♡ World Ablaze. The lightest read in the blog featuring yandere anime, manga, manhwa, and video game characters; as well as, the ONLY book readers can make fanfiction requests to.

Request Rules Fandom and Characters

🔞Forbidden Fruits: Intimate Obsessions, Unhinged Desires.

♡ Forbidden Fruits. If you want an erotic, taboo, dark Yandere series featuring anime, manhwa, video games, etc. characters.

Yandere Psychology: A Comprehensive Taxonomy of Obsessive and Possessive Love

♡ Yandere Psychology. For the extreme writers, analysts and yandere enthusiasts.

Zero-Triggers Library

♡ Zero-Triggers. If you want manhwa, manga, novel recommendations.

▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃▃

Current Status - Posting a lot in break for December, because I'm busy the following month. December Schedule (Timezone - GMT+8):

Reblog Current Stories - 6:00 AM

Reblog Masterlists - 9:00 AM

Extra Content - 1:00 PM or 6:00 PM

CLEAN Oneshots / Imagines - 8:00 PM to 9:00 PM

Extra Drabbles - 10:00 PM

Explicit Non-con / Dub-con Content - 11:00 PM

Jesus Time - 11:59 PM

Possible January Schedule for New Content or Reblogs:

Sunday - World Ablaze: For You, I'd Burn the World.

Monday - Random Mystery Box

Tuesday - A Heart Devoured: A Dark Yandere Anthology

Wednesday - World Ablaze: For You, I'd Burn the World.

Thursday - A Heart Devoured: A Dark Yandere Anthology

Friday - Forbidden Fruits: Intimate Obsessions, Unhinged Desires.

Saturday - Forbidden Fruits: Intimate Obsessions, Unhinged Desires.

Additional Content: About Me Contact Me Art Gallery (Tumblr) Memes / Miscellaneous

Characters I relate to, but not limited to:

═════════════════

The author's works are only available in the following sites:

Official Website: https://dokjafang.wordpress.com/

Royal Road: https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/99582/gods-protagonist

Tumblr: https://fangdokja.tumblr.com/

Wattpad: https://www.wattpad.com/story/385617969-god%27s-protagonist

Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/user/FangDokja/

Archive of Our Own: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FangDokja

Traditional Publishing: (Future plans)

Official Art: (Future plans)

Manhwa / Manga: (Future plans)

Disclaimer: If it's not AI generated, most artwork does not belong to me. However, I'm the one incorporating edits and my own graphic designs into the images to fit the story.

[moniquill]

Saving this because the thread is probably going to be deleted. Mild rearranging done to show the actual flow of conversation rather than tumblr's befuckened threading

The players are @balearicbitch , @ollieoneill, and myself - @moniquill

On the question of 'Should I donate to ao3'

balearicbitch: no also stop reading fanfics and grow up

moniquill: I'm sorry that your life is so lacking in joy.

balearicbitch: it isnt tho i just read normal books instead

moniquill: "other people are reading and enjoying independently published fiction and I have very strong opinions about that, driving me to declare those people immature" is some seriously joyless behavior. Are you ok?

ollieoneill: People can do both. You’re really gross and the one who needs to grow up.

ollieoneill: Lol they are definitely not okay. I want to feel bad for people like @balearicbitch but they’re so hateful and pathetic all I can do is shake my head

balearicbitch: i dont know what to tell you but if youre older than 16 and still play pretend with fictional characters try to have experiences in the real world?!

ollieoneill: Babe I’m a married 36yo and travel the world pretty much constantly and have a wonderful, full life. I also read fan fiction. You seriously need to grow up and get a life and stop telling other people how to enjoy theirs you utterly pathetic gremlin.

moniquill: I'm 41, I play pretend with fictional characters, and I've won a Nebula and a Hugo about it. Who do you think authors the 'normal books'?

balearicbitch: "other people are reading and enjoying independently published fiction" when the fiction in question is just creating scenarios based on other people work to fulfill your need of Media Consumer

balearicbitch: looks like anyone is getting awarded these days ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

moniquill: You're the one who wanted to make a delineation between fanfiction and Normal Books.

balearicbitch: and i still stand by it. fanfiction isn't literature nor should be treated like it.

moniquill: Ok. I hear you. You're objectively incorrect, and welcome to be wrong in your wrongness. I'd say 'have fun with that' but it's clear that you're not having fun and that you don't want anyone else to have fun either. It must be a miserable way to exist, and I sincerely hope that you're able to move past it someday.

balearicbitch: have fun with your little blorbos, im sure what the literary world needs right now is another ali hazelwood

[andthekitchensinkao3]

Fic Writing Review 2024

Thanks for the tags @loki-is-my-kink-awakening @kcscribbler and @lokimobius

I should warn you, I'm a Debbie Downer when it comes to numbers even when comparing them to my own stats, so be prepared. These are some shitty stats, right here.

User subscriptions are for all years, not just 24. Not sure why that's static, but hey ho. Six years gone, 35 people keep tabs on my fic. Don't ask me why.

Words and fics:

198,186 words posted on AO3. Let’s not look at how many words I’ve actually written, it’ll give people nightmares. Possibly especially since English isn’t my first language.

Don’t know which month was my busiest, but I finished Tapestries of Time, my first Lokius fic in exactly 28 days, totalling 41 014 words.

24 773.25 is my average words per month (since May this year = eight months)

14 fics (WiPs and finished), including drabbles, one-offs and multi-chapter stories.

Words written per fandom:

Loki (including the Baldur’s Gate mashup) - 180 009 (since May of 2024. MAY)

Dragon Age: The Veil Guard - 1 557 (since November 2024)

Fics and words published:

14 fics published, out of which are as follows:

7 multi-chapter

7 one shots

2 drabbles included in the one shots

198,186 words published

Published fics per fandom:

Loki - 82.4%

Dragon Age: The Veil Guard - 17.6%

Top 2024 fics per kudos:

Tapestry of Time (181 kudos, multi-chapter, finished) - Loki

Loose Ends (78 kudos, multi-chapter, in progress. The sequel fic to Tapestry) - Loki

Want  (70 kudos, a Emmrich/male Rook drabble) - DA: Veil Guard (lol for the amount of effort I put into that fic, I got more kudos in a single day than I have with any other fandom or fic. Makes me wonder why I even try to write full-fledged stories.)

The Second Kiss (62 kudos, a Lokius one shot and tumblr ask game fic) - Loki

Sledgehammer (58 kudos, multi-chapter, finished) (Loki)

Top 2024 fics per comment threads:

Tapestry of Time (10 chapters, post-s2 fix-it fic; 41)

A Promise Kept (13 chapters, BG3 crossover, Lokius Fantasy Romance; 35)

The World’s Fair Hotel (WiP, Lokius versus H H Holmes horror fic set in 1893; 24)

Loose Ends (WiP, sequel to Tapestry, 16)

We Die with the Dying; We are Born with the Dead (Vampire AU one shot; 13)

Kudos, hits and comment threads in 2024:

Percentage of kudos per views: 7.9% (768 kudos divided by 9703 hits) Yaaaay, less than ten percent of people who read my fics like themmm… Why do I even write to begin withhhh

Percentage of comment threads per kudos, assuming everyone who left a comment also kudos’d: 24.8% (191 comment threads divided by 768 kudos)

If we instead compare it to hits or views: 1.91%

Fandom events in 2024:

Lokius Reverse Bang

2024-11: Wanksgiving the Third: Lord High Admiral of Smut

Rules: Feel free to show whatever stats you have. Only want to show Ao3 stats? Rock on. Want to include some qualitative info instead of stats? Please do this. Want to change how yours is presented? Absolutely do that. Would rather eat glass than do this? Please don’t eat glass but don’t feel like you have to do this either.

Artists and gif makers, please also join in with any quantitative or qualitative stats or facts you want to share about your year.

No-pressure tags in no particular order for @thosegayoldmen @elodiah @impulsemuppet @blackbirdofasgard @distracteddream @devilbearingtrouble @mobiusismycomfortcharacter @mobiusisawholemood @mobiuscutemustache @mobius-m-mobius @mirilyawrites and anyone else whose username I can't recall, sorry.

[sweet-as-an-angel]

So Dominic does reveal more when it's safe to do so? OKAY, okay, but what if it takes a lot of time for his beloved to come to trust him? What I mean by that is that some people do not care for their loved one's action simply because they favour them. A normally empathetic person could definitely do that. So if it took around... whatever, 3 years let's say, would he be patient enough if he knew it would lead to his object of affection to basically be okay with everything he does(crazy person behaviour, but it's fictional so it's fiNE)? I'm curious. He's willing to do "anything", but that doesn't mean anything his darling would want specifically. It's anything he would do to get to that specific goal. He isn't exactly known to be nice, especially when he views his kids as burdens. So another question that came to mind, if it hasn't been answered already, would be could he change his mind on his kids? If Y/N likes them, and just really likes kids (even more since they're his), would there be some type of affection growing for them if it came from the simple pattern of "The one I like likes this, therefore I like it."?

Sorry for rambling, I can't seem to pinpoint the man, and he always turns out to be even more vicious than the last ask reveals. I really like how you made him out to be, and as depressing (in the sense that he's a cheater, is clearly insensitive, and would fuck his honey's parent just to excite them?? He's disgustingly intimidating) as I find him to be, it feels more realistic. Would love to punch him, 10/10. Plus he's French. And I'm weak. SO TO SUMMARISE, GOOD WORK, THANK YOU THANK YOU UHM (ỌVỌ)

Thank you so much for writing in, my Lovely ! I am eternally grateful for your kindness and your dedication to reading my posts; I can tell you've even read the more niche ones because you know precisely what Dominic's like ^^. To answer your questions:

Yes, Dominic will only reveal his tendencies to a Darling he can trust wholeheartedly. Granted, he will stow away his true self in order to be with you, but being able to let loose and drop his veneer of humanity is...liberating. That being said, he would only do so if he knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that his Darling would not only be okay with it, but actively encourage it. He'll settle for the former, though. He knows not to be pushy when Fate hands him a win.

On the topic of whether Dominic would grow to care about his children if you cared for them...Honestly, Dominic is way past the point of forming connections - true, genuine bonds - with anyone that isn't you. And even then, if it's only his superficial charm you're attracted to, Dominic will wear it constantly, if only to make sure you keep loving him. Even at the cost of his real identity. So, to clarify, Dominic won't truly care for his sons. Not in the way that a normal parent would; rather, he views them as highly valuable assets he can use to keep you close to him. And while he may seem to go above and beyond when protecting them, it's only to ensure you don't fall into some kind of stupour if one or both of them ever came to harm.

If they ever did, Dominic would absolutely use the opportunity to convince you to have a child with him. Either through adoption or traditional means, he'll find a way to tether you to him. And no, he won't care about this child, either. Unless it is biologically yours, then he'd feel some sense of responsibility in taking care of it, but only because it is half of you.

Dominic is, for better or worse, an incredibly complex man whose motives stem from something that transcends the very pinnacles of human vicehood, and I'm so glad to hear that you like the way he is characterised, my Darling ^^ !

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[thefrogdalorian]

Hello! 

You may (or may not... I don't like to presume) have noticed my little break from posting. I just wanted to share something in case anyone was worried about me and assure you there is no need to be :) 

There isn't really one reason for why I've been on hiatus, but I guess a collection of things. 

I was really poorly with covid but thankfully I'm feeling a lot better now! But being so sick and stuck in I guess made me reevaluate certain things. 

Since recovering I got to see a lot of people I really adore with my whole heart, as well as being lucky enough to experience so many things I love with them.

And it made me realise what truly makes me happy in life. I suppose it really put things into perspective for me. I'm thinking more and more that tumblr (and being online generally) is something which unfortunately does not spark joy any longer. 

To be honest, (as I'm sure many people who were given far too much unsupervised access to the internet at a young age also do), I have a complicated relationship with social media. It doesn't make me feel good most of the time. I don't know how to handle some of the things I read and some of the things people have said to me. And just like I do irl, if the vibes feel off, I usually retreat into my shell to regroup. 

While I have made so many friends over the years of being chronically online and spoken to plenty of great people, I can feel myself getting drained again. And I really haven't missed it during the time I've been away.

I've filled my time with a lot of reading (I read Pride and Prejudice THREE times... doing amazingly), some writing and lots of long walks in nature. It's been really good for me!

As a result, right now, I just don't feel like continuing to post on this blog.

This decision wasn't caused by anyone or anything in particular. But when I've made my mind up about something, it's pretty impossible to change it. I've been mulling it over for a few days and my heart is telling me to go.

Anyway, I'm going to continue working on my WIPs and most likely continue posting them to AO3. It's by far the least social media-ish platform out there, and I really like posting on it. 

I need to take a step back to remember why I started writing, which was really as a way to get emotions out and to scream into the void a little. I don't enjoy sharing my work on tumblr, I kind of felt like I had to rather than genuinely wanting to. 

Truthfully, I just want to create and consume others' work in peace. I don't want to feel like I need to market my writing or whatever or compare myself to others. As much as I try not to, I think it's only human nature. 

So, I guess I'm really making this post to say I'll be going on a hiatus from tumblr. But I don't intend to stop writing or posting to AO3 and I hope to see you over there! 

I have no idea how long I'll be away for. Who knows... when winter comes around and my seasonal depression returns, or perhaps there is a major Mando update, maybe I'll return! 

For now, all there's left to say is how much of a pleasure it was posting about Mando and talking with you lot all these months. 

If anyone (mutual or otherwise) would like to keep in touch, feel free to message me for my discord! I'd be happy to continue chatting to you on there.

For me, in the headspace I'm currently in, one on one conversation is far less intimidating than being perceived by lots of people lol. 

I'll likely drop in at some point soon-ish and check for any of those messages, but until then, it's not a goodbye, but a see you later! 

Please care of yourselves and be kind to others :) 

Love,

Spud 🐸🩷

[faejilly]

i absolutely love your sh meta so i was wondering what are your thoughts on Alec’d relationship with his sexuality bc i always sort of read it as him knowing that he was gay but absolutely not saying it out loud

absofuckinglutely nonny

There's an excellent post by amorverus that I cannot find the original of so have my reblog HERE that articulates it really well

I even wrote a fic about it! #shameless self promotion [tumblr / ao3] (That is, in fact, one of my favorite things I've ever written.)

I do strongly believe that Alec knew that he was gay, and felt no shame about that in and of itself. He is not offended by Magnus flirting with him, would not, I think, be offended by anyone else flirting with him, regardless of gender. (Tho prior to Magnus I also think he just... wasn't interested, but that's a separate conversation.) He knew, however, that it was not allowed in his culture and it would hurt his family and not just him if it came out.

(This is why Izzy makes me so uncomfortable in s1 regarding Alec, tbqh, because she lives there too, but refuses to see the danger to herself and, more egregiously in Alec's mind, because obviously she can chose to risk herself for him if she wants, for all he doesn't like it, but she's causing risk for their little brother if Alec is outed, and that's unacceptable. Even if I'm quite sure Max would agree with her priorities.)

I do, however, think Alec felt a lot of shame regarding his attraction to Jace. Jace was hurting and was supposed to be his brother and yet... Alec felt an attraction that he knew Jace wouldn't return. So he's got all the societal pressure on him not to be gay, and all this personal pressure not to manipulate or abuse someone in a vulnerable situation (because Jace was, even if he wouldn't admit it), PLUS all the normal human issues with feeling attraction for someone who is important enough to you that you can't lose them, and you can legitimately be terrified that if you can't get it under control you MIGHT... (Even more so for him than a mundane romantic vs platonic situation, obviously, because there's questions of command and exile and punishment, not just ruining an interpersonal dynamic in a way it never quite recovers from.)

Plus Alec's kind of also Jace's commanding officer which is yet ANOTHER unequal power dynamic, and he's supposed to be protecting an entire Institute, not just this one person, but he can't stop thinking about it because it's fucked up and he knows he should stop and he can't.

(Because, he realizes with the benefit of hindsight after he meets Magnus, by fixating on Jace he was safe, he was never going to fall in love for real with someone he might have a chance with, would never have to actually choose between his culture and his personal desires, while still telling himself that he already had, that he'd chosen his family and it was fine, he was FINE.

(He was so not fine.))

And so, even though he truly believes there's nothing wrong with being gay in general, he does believes there is something Very Wrong with him specifically being gay.

But he still never has any doubt about it. He never tries to project heterosexual interest in anyone, is very up front with Lydia about the terms of their engagement. (It seems clear, even if we never see that conversation, that they're both aware that their marriage would never be romantic or sexual unless they mutually decided to go the so-called traditional route for children.) And she agreed to it! She, unlike Jace & Izzy, had zero illusions about her relationship with Alec, and I ADORE HER FOR THAT.

And I've totally lost the thread of this rambling, I'm not sure I have a conclusion for you? 😅😅😅

Alec is, imo, refreshingly self-aware about most things, and many of his issues are legitimately external stupidity punishing him into a life of self-recrimination rather than him having internal bigotry or biases against his own sexuality in and of itself.

[fourraccoonsinacoat]

Head Full of Ghosts

Pairing: Astarion x Dark Urge

Summary: Takes place during the events of Baldur's Gate 3 and explores the romance between Astarion and the Dark Urge, as well as the friendships and relationships she has with her companions. Plus, everyone gives shit to Gale about his cooking. Tags: Slow Burn, Angst, Pining, Humor, Violence, Friends to Lovers, Developing Friendships, Developing Romance, Spoilers for the Dark Urge and BG3 in general, Dark Urge as Original Female Character Rating: Mature (Will eventually be Explicit, just not there yet.) Current Chapter Count: 3/? Read on AO3 (Will post chapters to Tumblr, as well.) Current Word Count: 13,050

Author Notes: Hello, Tumblr! Longtime lurker, first time poster. BG3 has reignited my love for writing fanfic - I think it's legit been over seven years since I've written a fic. The dry spell has now been broken. BG3 has grabbed me by the throat and pulled me back in and damn, if I'm not enjoying the hell out of it. I've got an ongoing fic on AO3, so I figured why not officially join Tumblr and dive headfirst into the fandom? Should anyone read my silly fic, I dearly hope you enjoy it. All these characters currently live in my head rent free.

Chapter 1: Misfits

The toll house burned as Karlach whooped, exacting rage and fury on everything within the abandoned building. Her glee might have been infectious if it hadn’t been so damn dangerous.

Luckily, Eli and her merry band of misfits had gotten clear of the structure before the worst of the fires caught. They now stood in the middle of the dirt cart path that led to the toll house entryway, watching the scene unfold in front of them with the same morbid curiosity with which townsfolk might watch a public hanging.

Wyll rubbed the back of his neck, cringing slightly as the loud and unmistakable crash of something glass-made reverberated from within the inferno.

“Maybe…” he started hesitantly, then cleared his throat. “Maybe someone should stop her?”  

Honestly, Wyll was too pure for their group of maladjusted headcases. Between being forcibly inducted as Emerald Grove’s newest mediator, and trying to figure out just what in the nine hells was going on with the illithid tadpoles in their brains, Eli had not had much time to get to know Wyll. Like her, he was a warlock, though he was being rather cagey about who or what his patron was. She guessed it had something to do with his contract, and it wasn’t as if she had much room to judge.

Eli couldn’t even remember who the hell her patron was. That knowledge was a gaping black hole in her ruptured memory. Sometimes, late at night, in the stifling silence when the chaos of the day had finally died down, she’d try to recall…anything. Anything about her past life beyond the images of blood, death and rot that swirled in her mind. She was never successful, and her attempts usually ended in a roiling headache. The holes in her brain were deep, dark and remained unknown.    

“These days I’m trying to avoid situations that end with me burnt to ash,” Astarion’s snark brought Eli back to the here and now. “But if you’re confident in your ability to be fire retardant, then by all means,” he finished the thought by motioning towards the building with a bit of a flourish.

The building was now practically engulfed in flames so bright that it was difficult to look at. She was pretty sure she could hear the roof caving in. Eli pinched the bridge of her nose and shut her eyes, the light and sound of it all was causing her already throbbing headache to grow and fester behind her eyes.

“Stop trying to suck the joy out of things, Wyll,” Eli said, with a bit more bite than she had intended.

She couldn’t see it, but she heard the eye roll in his response. “Fine. Far be it from me to deny someone their little moments of destructive bliss.”  

Eli huffed in response and felt a presence move up next to her.

“Another headache?” Shadowheart’s voice wasn’t quite concerned, but it did have a hint of guarded interest, and for Shadowheart that was just as good.

“Think I’m going on day three now,” Eli responded with a groan. She let her hand drop from her face and opened her eyes, blinking back against the influx of light.

No one spoke it out loud, but they all knew the significance of that statement. Three days ago, Eli had woke in the middle of the night to discover Alfira, a kind and gentle tiefling bard, brutalized and dead…by Eli’s own hands. The shame, guilt and confusion from that night was still a gaping and painful wound within. Alfira was a constant and haunting presence, a reminder that her mind and body were not her own. She could recall flashes of memory from that night, and she desperately wished that was not the case.

The fear in Alfira’s eyes was emblazoned upon her brain and it followed her into her dreams. She was not sleeping well, if at all. And the terror that she would once again wake up to find she’d torn open another of her companions, one of her friends…it was enough to fill her nights with nauseating dread.      

“Maybe Gale can cook up a sleeping potion for you when we get back to camp,” Shadowheart suggested with more softness in her voice than Eli was used to. “I’m sure your penchant for rummaging through our wares until all hours of the morning isn’t helping things,” she chided a bit more coolly.

Eli gave her a non-committal half smile. She’d taken to perusing their camp’s growing hoard of books during her sleepless nights. Reading kept her mind busy, and off of other darker thoughts that stalked her steps.    

“Given the unholy smells being extruded by Gale’s cookpot the other night, I’m not sure I’d trust him to brew a sleeping potion someone is expected to wake up from,” Astarion said cheerily, stepping up to Eli’s other side opposite Shadowheart. “Besides, there’s nothing wrong with a little extracurricular nighttime activity.”

The suggestive smirk he gave Eli caused the pit of her stomach to tighten.

“Yes, because reading is so titillating,” she deadpanned back at him. Astarion was a shameless flirt, and Eli wasn’t in a mood to deal with him while her head was splitting open from the inside out.

Astarion, however, was not dissuaded.

“Darling, it’s not my fault if you choose a boring activity.” He emphasized the word ‘boring’ and Eli knew exactly where this was going before they even got there.

He leaned in closer and she caught the faint scent of spice and rosemary that always lingered in the space where he’d been. Nine hells, why did she know that?

“You know I’m only a few tents away if you ever want to try a more stimulating activity,” he purred. A small shiver ran up her spine as she felt the breath from his words against her neck.

A derisive snort came from Eli’s other side. “Really, Astarion, were you never taught not to play with your food?” Shadowheart said with the hint of a smirk, which turned into a full grin when Eli shot her a dark glare.

Eli suddenly felt very aware of a certain spot on her neck as she looked back to Astarion, whose red eyes had been lingering there before they flicked back up to her face. She met his gaze and thought she saw something hungry flash across his expression before he looked to Shadowheart.

“Call it an appetizer,” Astarion replied in that smooth and sultry voice that danced so effortlessly from his lips. “Something to get the blood pumping before the main course.”

Eli was starting to feel something akin to what a rabbit may feel when being circled by wolves. Astarion had inched closer to her as he spoke and teased, pushing into her personal space with bravado and squaring up to her like an animal on the prowl. Eli had experienced this behavior from him before, and she hated it. Not because of any issues with personal boundaries - she didn’t even know if she had issues with personal boundaries, considering how full of holes her memory was. No, she hated it because of how her body responded. And she doubted it was the sort of response Astarion was looking for.

All of his bravado, his confidence, how sure of himself he seemed when he pressed near to her, playing his games. It triggered an anger in her she didn’t recognize. A cruel and dominating rage that wanted nothing more than to grab him by the throat and force him to his knees, demanding respect. She was no rabbit fearful of wolves, no plaything for him to tease. She’d flay him sternum to navel for his insolence.

“Stop,” Eli muttered, moreso to herself than to Astarion.

Her head was pounding as she tried to shove those unwanted and vicious thoughts back down into the unknown void of herself. She took a tentative step backwards and nearly collided with Shadowheart, who managed to step quickly out of the way. Eli felt a hand on her shoulder and reflexively flinched away, internally trying to wrest herself from the cloying vile madness that was building in her brain.

“Sorry,” Eli heard Shadowheart say.

Glancing to Shadowheart, Eli saw she had her hands raised in a conciliatory gesture. Likely, Shadowheart had reached out to try and steady Eli. The problem was, Eli didn’t trust herself when her mind went red and hazy.

She didn’t want anyone touching her in those moments. She didn’t want anyone ending up like Alfira…

“That’s enough of that,” Wyll’s strong voice held a very clear note of annoyance in it. “Leave her be and let’s get back to camp. Lest we get lost out here after the sun goes down.”

Eli appreciated the sentiment, but she almost wished Wyll had stayed silent.

“Ah, the dashing Blade of Frontiers here to save the pretty damsel from the dangerous vampire,” Astarion said, with more than a hint of contempt to his words.

Astarion and Wyll did not play nice. They reminded Eli of two dogs posturing and vying for control when they were near one another. And, unfortunately, everyone else got pissed on in the process.  

Astarion continued to bait the hook, voice sickly suggestive. “Hoping she’ll offer you a place to sheath your blade tonight if you play hero?”

Eli wheeled on Astarion with a glare that only succeeded in making the elf smile wider. For all of his pompous confidence, Eli did take note of the fact that Astarion had backed off from her. At least in the physical sense. He seemed more than happy to continue his verbal assault.

“You vulgar bastard!” Wyll barked back, angrily stepping towards Astarion who was grinning like a feral cat. Wyll was taking the bait.

“Lolth’s rotten nickers!” Eli exclaimed, exasperated and over all of this. “If the two of you want to have it out, fine! Just know I’m not asking Withers to bring either of you miserable assholes back if one of you kills the other!”

The blood in her head was pounding again, pulsating painfully behind her eyes. Eli threw up her hands and turned away from the squabbling men, only to see that tiefling barbarian, Karlach, watching all of them with a grin.

“You lot seem fun as hell!” she proclaimed with a laugh as the toll house continued to blaze like an inferno behind her. “Still cool if I tag along?”

“Yeah, sure,” Eli responded. “We all seem to be in the same shithole of a boat, so if you want to grab a paddle I’m not stopping you.”

Eli smirked and Karlach’s face lit up with excitement. “That’s the spirit!”

The next few moments were a blur. Moments in which Eli felt very much like a passenger in her own body. Astarion wasn’t letting up, and from behind her Eli heard his goading voice as he continued to taunt Wyll.

“You know, Wyll, if you’re ever curious about what our dear, sweet Eli tastes like, all you have to do is ask,” Astarion’s sly words were dripping with inuendo.

Eli snapped.

She rounded on Astarion like a displacer beast loosed from hell, stepping into his personal space just as he had done to her earlier. Eli, however, was not playing games. Her head felt like it was exploding from the inside and her vision was beginning to swim. She needed to get out of here. She needed to leave before she lost control. She needed to put this flippant, disrespectful maggot in his place.

“Would you FUCK OFF with your self-aggrandizing bullshit!” she roared.

Eli was up in Astarion’s face now, all venom and rage as she tried to maintain enough control to keep herself from driving a dagger through his eye like the monster inside of her was demanding.

“I’ve let you feed on me ONE time, and that has been the extent of any nightly activities between us,” she growled, locking eyes with the vampire spawn.

Astarion was a few inches taller than her, but in this moment it didn’t matter. They had all seen Eli fight. They’d witnessed the absolute carnage and power that she was capable of, and while most of that ability came from whatever deal she’d made with her patron, they had all sensed something else beyond her skill as a warlock. Something foul and brutal and violent that she seemed desperate to keep restrained.

That thing was leaking out now. Pressing at the barricades in her mind wrestling to break free. It wanted blood and gore and anguish. It wanted out.

“So, keep your pathetic attention-whoring charade in check or I’m going to lock you in a coffin and burry you so fucking deep even the worms won’t be able to find you!” Eli snarled, eyes glittering with a mania that indicated she was far from joking.

Eli didn’t know the chord she’d struck in Astarion – she didn’t even know if he had chords to be struck. She didn’t know how her words wrenched unbidden memories to the surface of his mind, like puss oozing from an infected wound. She didn’t know the torments inflicted upon him. Didn’t know that her words caused his chest to tighten with anxiety as unwanted recollections flashed in his mind. Days, months, years trapped in lonely confinement at the whim of his abuser. Locked away and starved because he said something displeasing or because he begged to be spared the agony of having his scars cut open once again because his master was bored and wanted to play.

Astarion had gone very still in the face of Eli’s wrath. And as the haze of anger in her mind dissipated and the realization of what she’d just said crashed down upon her, her eyes went wide and she took a quick step back. Her head was a mess and she felt like she was coming up out of a dream and seizing control of herself once more.

Shadowheart, Wyll and Karlach stood by, staring with a mix of shock and morbid curiosity. They were not going to get involved, but they damn sure were going to watch this disaster play out.

“I…uh…” Eli stuttered as she pulled herself back from the brink.

Her movements felt lethargic and wrong, as if she were a step removed from the actions her body was taking. But she kept hold of her mental steering wheel and willed herself to maintain control.

“Fuck. I’m sorry, Astarion,” she lifted her gaze, wanting to meet his eyes so she could explain and apologize again.

But Astarion wasn’t looking at her. At least, not at her face. His eyes were fixated on the collar of the burgundy undershirt she wore below her chest armor. His expression fluctuated somewhere between grim detachment and smoldering hatred, crimson eyes glassy and distant.

Eli felt an unnerving sensation of being looked through.

“Astarion?” she questioned, voice softer and tinged with an edge of worry.

She took a tentative step forward and raised a hand towards him. Had he been struck with an incantation? A curse? Maybe Shadowheart or Wyll had cast something as a means of intervention?

Eli was about to turn and ask them when Astarion flinched back from her outstretched hand as if she’d struck him. His eyes snapped to hers and burned with a hostility she’d never seen from him, not even during the famously vehement rows he and Gale would get into over Gale’s cooking (the arguments usually ended with Gale shouting, “You aren’t even going to eat any of it, anyway!” and storming off in a dither).

“Don’t,” Astarion snarled through clenched teeth and a tight jaw. “Don’t fucking touch me!”

Icy loathing dripped off his every word and Eli suddenly recognized the defensive posture he’d put himself in, leaning back and away from her with hands ready to go for a weapon or even swing at her should she move closer. He reminded her of an animal trapped in a corner, baring its fangs at something…

At something dangerous. At something intent on hurting them.

Shit. Had her outburst really been that bad? Had he really thought she was going to attack him?

A pang stabbed through her stomach as she realized…of course he had. Because of what she’d done to Alfira. She’d already proven she was capable of brutalizing the people around her, no matter how innocent they were. They thought she was dangerous. Astarion, a godsdamn vampire who’d crept up on her in the middle of the night, thought she was dangerous.

She needed to get herself under control. This wasn’t a sustainable lifestyle. At least not for the people around her…

“Astarion, I’m really fucking sorry,” she backed away from him, giving him space and bringing her hands back to her sides. “I’m not even entirely sure what happened. Things got…hazy. I’m really sorry.”

It was a piss poor excuse, and an even worse apology. She knew. And it seemed he agreed.

“You can choke on your apology,” Astarion snapped as he shoved past her. “If the tadpole turns you tonight, it wouldn’t be too soon.”

The sheer venom of his words stung as painfully as if he’d stabbed her right there on the spot. She opened her mouth to reply, but could think of nothing worthwhile to say. So she snapped it closed and watched him walk off down the path that led back to camp.

Well, some fantastic leader she was turning out to be. She already didn’t understand why anyone thought she, with her magnitude of memory loss and murder happy tendencies, was the ideal candidate for a position of authority. She was awful at this shit!

Eli had spent a lot of time combing through her fractured psyche, trying to piece together any semblance of facts about who she was. In all that self-reflection, she’d concluded there were two things she was really good at. Killing people and drinking.

Fuck, what she wouldn’t give to be doing either one of those things right now instead of this.

She turned a miserable expression on her remaining companions. “Is it too late to go back to the mind flayer ship and just surrender?”

Wyll laughed and sided up to her, clapping a hand on her shoulder and trying to be reassuring.

“I’m sure he’ll get over it,” he said. Then, with a somewhat darker smirk, “And if he doesn’t, we’ll just stake him. Luckily for us, our benevolent illithid captors saw fit to crash us in the middle of a forest. Trees everywhere.”

Wyll grinned while Eli just gave him a deadpan stare. He wasn’t helping. Maybe he wasn’t too pure for their little group, after all. Maybe he was just as much of a dumbass as the rest of them.

Eli looked to Shadowheart, who simply rolled her eyes before glancing after Astarion as he continued to walk further and further from the party.

“I bet he just needs some time to cool down,” Shadowheart mused. “Men can be irrationally dramatic when they put their minds to it.”

The grin on Wyll’s face fell as Shadowheart started to follow Astarion down the path. Eli trailed after her, glancing to Karlach in the hopes of making some sort of conversation to distract herself from all the pain and noise in her head.

“I’m just happy to be here,” Karlach laughed.

[jaysehasnograce]

11. What makes a fic 'successful' in your opinion?

15. Does anyone you know in real life know you write fanfiction?

16. What do you struggle with most when writing?

17. What is something you recently felt proud of in your writing?

(feel free to answer all or pick and choose ;w;)

11. I feel like what makes a fic 'successful' depends on the fandom. Smaller fandoms/ships my expectations for interaction will be smaller, but more popular things I def will be a bit sad and feel like the fic isn't successful if there isn't much interaction.

Either way, it's definitely interaction-based. Comments ESPECIALLY make me feel like I've successfully written something good, though views/bookmarks/kudos also contribute.

15. Yeah! Well, it depends on what you mean by irl. All my friends know I write fic, but they're all long-distance. My therapist knows, but that's telehealth. One of my sisters knows, but I don't talk to her anymore. I've told my grandmother and nana in the sense that I just explained the concept rather than using the word so they Sort Of Know? I think my parents know I wrote HP fanfic at uni, but I don't remember for sure and I don't talk to them either.

So yeah, that's probably a yes.

16. I struggle the most with action for sure!! Anything that requires action or heavy plot that isn't character-driven, I just struggle like hell with. Which is unfortunate because i LOVE action and plotty things and casefics, etc. But I just can't do it myself. I'm good at people and emotions and trauma, and also sex lol but I mostly do that on my other account. Gotta play to my strengths!

17. I recently felt proud of finishing my rewrite of my first fic!!!! I'll be making a post on this tumblr for it when I actually finish posting it to ao3, but it's already up on wattpad bc it was a LOT more popular over there, which was the whole reason I rewrote it. I was like look, if literally a million people now have read this i don't want THIS, my FIRST book ever, to be the face of What My Writing Is Like. My writing has improved SO MUCH in the last 8yrs, and so I just needed to update it if people were insistent on reading that one over everything else!

I love how it turned out, I fixed the plot holes, i made it just an overall richer story, and I think it just turned out great.

Also, I've been struggling to write AT ALL in the past like 4 months, because of mental health stuff, so I was just so so happy to be writing again AND to finish something!

[crystal-overdrive]

Top Four Fic Recs

@fangbangerghoul tagged me in this ages ago and I've only just got a moment to sit down and think about it! All Gortash romance fics, of course.

Rules: Post links of your 5 (I did four because I'm tired and want to go to bed now) favorite fics (tumblr/ao3/whatever), doesn't have to be your top favorite, doesn't have to be within the same fandom. Just five fics you find yourself thinking about at random times of the day even long after reading them.

The Closed Fist of Bane and the Open Hand of the Fae by All_The_Ships_I_Sailed_Before | Rating: E | Words: 30,179 | Chapters: 6/? A year after the events of Baldur's Gate, only one of the heroes remains in the city. Roisin, a warlock of Oberon, traumatised and broken from the fight the previous year has entered into an alliance with the Chosen of Bane who holds onto his position with his god only by the skin of his teeth. The whole city needs rebuilding and two people with completely different views must work together to clean up the mess made. Unbeknownst to them, however, a greater evil stirs the shadows, forcing an unlikely alliance between gods with their champions as their lanceboard pieces. This fic is criminally under read! A wonderful clash-of-values-and-hearts Tavtash fic.

10,000 Deaths for Bhaal by @doxieandthedead | Rating: E | Words: 15,955 | Chapters: 7/? The papers talk of Archduke Enver Gortash, rebuilding the city in accordance to his glorious vision. For Tamasvi, a new life without the oppressive control of her divine father lies before her, her first opportunity to find out who she is without his bloody influence. But the city still has the scars of a past she does not remember, and obligations made in love and duress still keep her close to those she would rather avoid lest she fall back into the seductive web of lies and secrets that so impressed the Chosen of Bane over a decade ago. No slate can be truly wiped clean, and the nightmare of her heritage could never remain hidden for long. There are divine consequences after all, when one commits ten thousand deaths for Bhaal... A really wonderful exploration of the blue-and-orange morality of a Durge who has rejected Bhaal, but isn't necessarily a good person.

Til Death Do Us Part by @bearhugsandshrugs | Rating: E | Words: 47,454 | Chapters: 19/19 Tav enters an arranged marriage with Gortash in exchange for him to abandon the Absolute and give her the Steel Watch against their forces. In turn she supports the sham Archduke and lends him her hero credibility afterwards. But when their first night rolls around, she suddenly finds herself biting off more than she can chew. I'm sure anyone who likes Tavtash has probably already read this one, but it was one of the first fics I read for the fandom so really holds a place in my heart! It's super sexy, sweet, and so well written.

The Final Threshold by aladale | Rating: E | Words: 45,230 | Chapters: 19/? The wedding reception is as grand as could be expected when one is marrying an Archduke, though that is not what occupies Tav's thoughts as festivities go on. The rest of the still-living party (save Wyll who is taking his father's place as Grand Duke) will be following Karlach to Moonrise Towers. They would be leaving her alone with him, with this vile Enver Gortash she must now call her husband. (It is an absence he is more than ready to take advantage of, but perhaps she is not the only one who will be changed by all this.) I really liked this fic's take on Gortash as a father! Another values-clash Tavtash one.

[g0lightly]

tinfoil-encrusted brienne/sansa "foreshadowing" that makes me feral

so i love the blog @jonsaforeshadowing bc i think it's such a fun look at shipper goggles in this fandom regardless of your thoughts on that particular ship. while i do not ship j*nsa i think it's healthy to remember how absurd shipping in asoiaf is even if (especially if?) you are a shipper! largely bc like... what do we even think of as endgame in this series? being married? we know not everyone who marries in a feudal system even likes the person they're married to. also... pretty much anyone could die! and so many characters are thematically linked in significant ways that aren't necessarily romantic! so i think there's a ceiling on how sure anyone can be of any ship being endgame. especially since we may never get another main series book lmfao! so just want to be clear that i'm not coming at this from an angle of knowing better than people who prefer other ships, we are all equally right and wrong unless/until the series is completed IMO.

in that spirit i wanted to post my own niche shipper theories in wildly varying degrees of seriousness about brienne/sansa because i believe in gay ships' right to be as delusional as straight ships. mostly for fun but i'd being lying if i said i don't hope you read this and think "oh i never thought of them together but this eats! i should start shipping the one true pairing briensa and also read tumblr user g0lightly's post-canon fanfic mostly about them on AO3 🤔" while they’re my otp, I want to be clear that I only ship them as adults.

starting strong with the dumbest one: brienne's ancestor dunk has a romance with rohanne webber, a redheaded woman who has had several husbands/betrotheds die on her and eventually marries a lannister like sansa. i know ppl say this is about jaime bc rohanne is his great-grandmother but in the spirit of getting silly with "foreshadowing" jaime is now a sansa stand-in for the purposes of this post 🙂‍↕️

in AGOT sansa i, sansa says that joffrey is "so gallant, she thought. The way he had rescued her from Ser Ilyn and the Hound, why, it was almost like the songs, like the time Serwyn of the Mirror Shield saved the Princess Daeryssa from the giants..." as ned later points out, joffrey is nothing like the knights of the songs sansa dreams of. littlefinger's sigil is a giant. serwyn is one letter off from selwyn, brienne's father's name. perhaps brienne will help sansa get away from littlefinger.

mirroring (ha) the above point, in AFFC brienne vii, randyll tarly gives a whole speech to brienne about how he thinks her father would rather have a living daughter than a "shattered shield." while i think the shattered shield imagery in this text (also in F&B when jaehaerys has saera's lover executed and in ACOK sansa vi when cersei talks about highborn ladies' "golden shield" against SA) represents a "ruined" woman, i think the imagery is also evocative of a mirror shield.

in AGOT sansa vi, sansa reads about aemon the dragonknight, florian and jonquil, lady shella and her rainbow knight. sansa is related to lady shella whent and in ACOK brienne becomes a rainbow knight for renly's kingsguard. i can see brienne mirroring aemon the dragonknight in the sense that she and sansa would have a forbidden love like aemon and naerys but for different reasons.

in ACOK sansa ii, sansa prays for a true knight and a friend to champion her. of course, she gets dontos as her "florian" instead and learns that life is not a song. later in catelyn ii, catelyn meets brienne who later swears herself to bringing sansa to safety. catelyn notes her similarities to sansa. brienne is also connected to jonquil through her maidenpool chapters; does this mean sansa will end up with a jonquil rather than a florian? perhaps a jonquil darke type? idk but i want to believe!

also in ACOK, both brienne and sansa hang onto bloody kingsguard cloaks that were technicaly supposed to belong to barristan selmy. i have written about this in far greater detail here and here.

jaime is a sansa stand-in because they are both maiden-coded and called kingslayers (this is a deeply unserious point btw)

speaking of jaime, his attraction to brienne mirrors sansa's possible attraction to mya. both sansa and jaime are conventionally attractive characters used to being praised for conforming to their gender roles reckoning with the beauty of a gender-nonconforming woman when they have come to understand their own beauty through a conventional framework. i have also written about this in greater detail.

both sansa and brienne are paired up with a lannister twin who holds the gendered societal role they aspire to (queen and knight of the kingsguard, respectively). their respective lannister twins show them the dark reality of those roles while brienne and sansa fight to remain hopeful.

famous lesbian rhaena targaryen was too gay with larissa velaryon so larissa got shipped off to marry the second son of tarth. she also had a favorite from the vale named alayne royce. she also had a red-haired, mail-wearing favorite named melony piper - kind of like an inverse of brienne and sansa visually. her true love, elissa farman, was from fair isle which is kind of like the west coast version of tarth; they also had the same age difference as brienne and sansa. rhaena was the eldest sister, like sansa, and dealt with a lot of loss in her life due in no small part to the strength of her claim making her a sought-after bride. i am aware this proves nothing but i do seriously think rhaena is the in-universe historic figure sansa is most like. gay sansa confirmed!!!!!!!! (jk... unless...)

and finally, i present what is either my most tinfoil hat theory or my oh-shit-i-cracked-the-code theory: brienne is foreshadowed to be the next bearer of the hound's helm so when GRRM said there's "something there" with sansa and the hound, he was actually talking about brienne and sansa :) if you enjoy the idea of sansa finding love and beauty in a brave, gentle, strong protector figure with low self-esteem whose face is covered in scars but you also (very reasonably!) hate the idea of her ending up with a man who held her at knifepoint and tried to SA her when she was a child, may i suggest hound!brienne x sansa? again, on an age appropriate timeline!

and if you're curious what i mean by hound!brienne foreshadowing and shattered shield references, i've included my running list of quotes, an analysis of those quotes, and a conclusion below the cut bc this post is long! TW for canon-typical references to sexual violence.

i think the references to brienne being "the hound with teats" and later references to the hound cutting off women's teats may connect to pretty meris, a sellsword with the windblown who is theorized to represent what GRRM had planned for brienne after the five year skip. quentyn notes that it's said that men cut meris' breasts off. if this hardened sellsword is some version of GRRM's original five year gap plan for brienne, who's to say that she won't be the hound instead of a sellsword in the forthcoming books? but that's assuming we'll get more books lmao.

the threat of SA is uncomfortably present in brienne's AFFC chapters. whether or not brienne experiences the types of gendered violence mentioned above, i think that the hound's helm would provide brienne with safety from that threat of SA on the road. for male characters, on the other hand, it may just draw more attention from people who wish to kill the hound for (mostly) rorge's crimes. there is a lot of talk across the books and across POVs about the hound being dead. you get tyrion describing him as dead after the blackwater when we know that's not true, septon meribald (which kinda sounds like meris now that i think of it 🤔) tells brienne that he is dead, jaime talks a lot with the freys and lannisters about killing the hound. there's also a lot of talk about the hound killing other people, namely brienne and sansa.

since it's all but confirmed that sandor clegane is now the gravedigger on the quiet isle rather than the hound, i think that "death" in the context of the hound is about letting your old self die so that the new you may be born. brienne needs to let her rigid ideals about what it means to be a knight die and sansa needs to let her rigid ideals about what it means to be a lady die. i think that lady's death at least partly symbolizes the fact that sansa can be a perfect lady and still face dire consequences through no fault of her own. and for brienne, she will most likely learn through lady stoneheart that not all oaths can be kept.

some people take the below quote as romantic foreshadowing for sansa and sandor. i take it to mean that to sansa, sandor and his cloak represent the opportunity she had to escape the life of a dutiful lady in a castle. perhaps brienne will wear the hound's helm when she rescues sansa, and sansa will give her the hound's cloak -- brienne's very own kingsguard cloak -- to complete the "uniform" of the hound.

i also want to offer my debunk to the idea that sansa keeping sandor's cloak is marriage imagery. sandor does not give his cloak to sansa, he does not put it over her shoulders as is done in a wedding ceremony. he leaves it on the ground because he does not want to be a member of the kingsguard anymore. sansa chooses to wrap herself in the kingsguard cloak. to me, this signifies her growing disillusionment in the systems set up to keep her safe and the autonomy she has to leave that system. perhaps she will be brave enough to ask brienne to take her away from the eyrie (or wherever she ends up) when they meet (again, assuming we get more books lmao).

i think it's relevant that sandor's place in the kingsguard - and by extension, the cloak as a symbol - had originally belonged to barristan selmy. i did a thread on this in relation to true knighthood and brienne if you're interested in reading more. sansa has a heroic deed in common with barristan selmy that also involves the hound in ACOK: like barristan, she saved dontos hollard from execution by a cruel king that she was sworn to. sansa was sworn to joffrey as his betrothed and barristan was sworn to aerys as a member of his kingsguard. i'm not even anti-sandor, i just don't think that his redemption arc needs to or should include the girl he held at knifepoint falling in romantic love with him.

to conclude with my point about characters having deep ties within the text not necessarily equaling romantic foreshadowing, i want to acknowledge that i don't think brienne and sansa need to have a romantic relationship for these textual connections to be meaningful. one way another i think these two are meant to be important to one another's stories. however i think that putting these two together romantically would be a beautiful way to tie together some key themes (gender, true knighthood, romanticism, idealism) and set up some really interesting character development.

however the romantic in me loves the idea of the aemon the dragonknight figure in sansa's life being a woman, specifically brienne who has sworn to defend her without even knowing her. they're both women, so there's nothing for brienne to gain from sansa's claim and nothing for sansa to gain from brienne's claim. brienne is the gentle, brave, and strong person ned wanted for sansa and catelyn sent her in sansa's direction and i think that's beautiful okay :')

[silvercityyir]

Karma read by Michealangelo

AO3

Summary: Based on my headcannon that after the event of Grudge Match, Mikey reads about karma.

This is my first tmnt fanfic, I enjoy writing Mikey and Splinter here since Splinter reminded me of my own parents. it was just a little idea that I once ramble on tumblr and it grew into a fic but only ended up as a one shot because I wasn't able to work on the ideas due to irl stuffs that I need to do. I only wrote about the definitions of karma although I read online article as I write, but I'm sure my way of understanding it is just different because my religion is not budshism or hinduism so the understanding is only surface level. So, apologies in advance, to anyone who's religion is hinduism or buddhism if I offended you with this fic. Originally, want to I wanted to write another chapter and make it a series tittled 'Wise Guy Michealangelo' but I don't really have any ideas for the next chapter so I'll leave it as one shot for now.

English isn't my mother tounge so let me know if I make a mistake grammer, or spellings in the comments.

“Psst, uh, Master Splinter, are you still up?” 

“Michelangelo?” Splinter opened the door to see his son, but rather than the usual mischievous self or at least before the battle nexus rematch a grin full of pride with his happy go-lucky expression, now stood a sheepish turtle “Is there something the matter, my son?”

As he recalled Leonardo was the one who helped Michelangelo for the Battle Nexus rematch which turned into a grudge match but he managed to survive the match. Splinter was slightly worried for Michelangelo with Leonardo’s inner turmoil…anger – Did he get scolded by Leonardo while he was trained? Splinter does not know. He chose not to intervene and told Donnie and Raph not to either. It all worked out just as he prayed for.  

“Remember what you said about karma that day, before Battle Nexus? Somehow I can’t stop thinking about ‘karma’...I know it means like, do bad and I got something worse than that, which happened and after the match that day, then I remember the karma book that you have, I want to read if that’s ok with you. 

There was a pause between them. Splinter blinks twice and his ears shot up.He raised his right arm and pointed beside his head. 

“Get out of my home, ghost,”

“Dad?! It–it’s me, I’m not a ghost, how could you say that?”

“Oh, it is you, Michelangelo, Sorry, I am very sorry my son. It is not like you to request such a thing that I even nearly thought that you were a ghost in disguise. I guess ghosts cannot take form of us mutants”

“Daaaad, I’m not a ghost, I really, really,really, really want to read your karma book. I should’ve come in the morning but I don’t think I really want Leo, Raph and Don weird stares and their ‘lectures’ at me just yet. Especially Raph and Don” 

Mikey whines and hugs him. Splinter pats his on the shell.

“I am very, very sorry, my son, a similar thing happened to Master Yoshi in the past that I was able to bare witness off, I was merely doing what he did at the time, I guess I did not understand why he did so,”

“Wha…?” “That is a tale for another time, I will give you the book, but if you want lessons about it, it shall be in the morning, my son.”

“Hai, Dad.”

 He bowed.

Splinter takes the karma scroll from the shelf and gives it to him. Mikey’s eyes lit up, smiling, like when he receive a comic but as his hands touch the book, Splinter tightens his grip on it, one more thing: 

“Take very care of it, it has notes, hand written by Master Yoshi and his master,” 

“Keep it away from Klunk, dirty spaces and everything else, ” 

He releases his grip on the book and lets his son take it. They both exchange bows and Mikey returns to his room, walking happily, as if he just got a new comic or a new dvd. Splinter feels no worry for the karma book that he gave to Mikey, perhaps he’ll be more focused in his training, his sons are growing up little by little, and he will grow older little by little, time has passed by without realizing.

As a father, his heart feels heavy for Leonardo’s mental state since Shredder’s defeat, what should he do? What should he tell him? He tries not to worry too much. He’ll work something out, perhaps tomorrow he should meditate with all four of his sons. 

Leonardo often meditates in his free time with incense or candle but he did not smell any of it tonight instead there was a small sound woosh from above, only Leonardo’s room had a long piece of worn fabric at the door. Splinter’s ears could only flick at sound from what it seems to be the source of the sound as he closed his eyes and let his body rest for the night.

For a moment, he recalled the tale he had told Michealangelo about, he was surprised that he remembered the spirit bothering Master Yoshi who was bothered by his restless sleep and he stood his ground, telling it to get out of his apartment. 

Splinter had no voice back then but his admiration for Yoshi was astonishing as ever. Yoshi, on the other hand, thought that he was frightened by the ghost, he could not bring himself to ‘correct’ him even if he had a voice.

“Have I made the right choice, Master Yoshi? It was yours and Ancient One’s book after all.”

Splinter sat down and gazed at the framed photo of his Master.

“I trust Michelangelo, he has always been a cheeky boy since he was a baby, always have, he can be overconfident when he is confident but he is optimistic and idealistic, I do not worry about him now.” 

“If I made a wrong choice, will you come and haunt me?”

The photo said nothing. 

“I’m only joking.”

Splinter chuckle. 

As he was about to sleep. He heard something from outside of his room. He rather not guess and went to sleep. 

____________________________________________________________________________

He just wants to lie down and read the karma book but it seems that Klunk has dominated his bed. And Mikey finds his beloved cat, Klunk, sleeping with her belly up, and her paws almost like she was jumping like a cartoon character yelling ‘yahoo’.

He is laughing, wheezing, clutching his stomach as tears welling up his eyes.

“I-I– can’t believe you sleep– like tha–’’

He felt something bending against his plastron–The karma book! Mikey immediately pull himself upright, checking the book's condition. Luckily, it did not bend so much. He let out a sigh of relief.

“Good thing you’re ok,”

He looked back at Klunk that slept soundly with an extreme pose, stroking her head before taking the pillow and dropped himself to the extra blanket on the floor. He lay on his stomach comfortably and he read and read throughout the night. 

When he had finished reading the book, he looked at the time at the alarm clock on the floor, it is five a.m. Morning already! 

Strange, what time did he ask Splinter to borrow the book again? Like he would know, he did not look at the clock, rather just waiting for his brothers to sleep then went out and ask him for it – but he shook his head, put the karma book on top of his pile of comic books before he sinks his head into the pillow and sleeps in peace but his mind voice some questions. loudly. 

What he understood about karma is that, it is not just bad action that leads to a worse future consequences, it can even affect ones life when they reincarnate.

Reincarnate...

An intriguing word that, somehow he cannot explain, it's a word that calms him, or maybe it is sleep embracing him. He wants to ask Splinter and tell Splinter what he understood. But he should sleep first.

[baronessblixen]

20 questions for 20 writers

tagged by @queeenpersephone and @randomfoggytiger. thank you!

1. How many works do you have on AO3? 417

2. What’s your total AO3 word count? 774,561

3. What fandoms do you write for? At the moment, it's only X-Files.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos? Prompts & Drabbles, Fictober 2020, Fowl Play, Some Things You Just Can't Fake, Love is not Blind

5. Do you respond to comments? No. It's my greatest shame. I always tell myself to respond and then I forget. Every once in a while, I do.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? I once wrote a fic where Mulder dies. That's probably the angstiest thing I wrote.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? Most of them them 😂

8. Do you get hate on fics? Once or twice. Usually it's an anon ask on tumblr if I do.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Not often. It's not really my thing. I like my characters to get some action, but the details are not important to me.

10. Do you write crossovers? I have written one or two, but in general, not my favorite genre.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? I don't think so!

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? I don't think so.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? Yes, I have! It's so much fun.

14. What’s your all-time favorite ship? Mulder and Scully, for sure.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? So many. I really want to continue my Five Minutes series. Last updated in 2019... well.

16. What are your writing strengths? Truly not sure I have any, but I like writing dialogue best.

17. What are your writing weaknesses? Everything else. Description especially because I'm not a visual person.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic? All the dialogue I write is usually in a different language since English isn't my native language. I'm always toying with the idea of writing more German fic for Mulder and Scully cause it's so much fun.

19. First fandom you wrote for? If we're talking just for myself then it was ER and Scarecrow and Mrs. King.

20. Favorite fic you’ve written? Hard to say. Maybe Fowl Play is growing on me - thanks to @xxsksxxx and her endless support on that fic.

Randomfoggytiger's additions cause I love them!

1. Is writing a hobby or way of life?

A hobby but also the thing I earn my money with, so maybe a bit of both.

2. A journal full of writing notes or a clean, completed manuscript?

Writing notes for sure.

3. Who (or what) is your writing inspiration?

Everything I read/see/hear that touches me deeply is an inspiration to create something just as beautiful.

4.Which is worse: someone you "idolize" reading your first draft or listening to you sing?

I would never make anyone listen to me sing. That's torture.

5. Has writing from someone else's POV ever changed your own perspective?

Plenty of times!

6. Tumblr, AO3, LiveJournal, or FFN?

I really prefer tumblr, but AO3 is nice with the comments section.

7. AO3 wordcount, and are you satisfied with it?

774,561 - numbers shouldn't matter but do I wanna make it to one million? Yes.

8. What movie/book/fic gripped you irrevocably?

The 1945 movie Brief Encounter.

9. What's the highest compliment you could ever be given, and have you been given it?

I've been lucky that I have been given compliments and it's always nice. Rather than receiving a particular compliment, I'd love to learn to accept them and see things the way the people complimenting me see them.

10. What defines your writing style?

Ehhh, sparse prose?

Tagging the aforementioned @xxsksxxx, @thursdayinspace, @cecilysass, @katy-kt-katie, @frogsmulder

[use-your-telescope]

When Everything's Made to be Broken - Chapter 8: You're Just Business

Summary: Loki confronts Theo about her avoidance of the other Avengers.

Author's Notes: Fun story/trivia about this song: In an interview with the Grammy Museum, it was revealed that some of the phrases in this first verse resulted from producer Tony Berg’s mishearing of Jon Foreman’s original lyrics: “You come ‘round like a prison ship” was misheard as “pirate ship”, and “You got a fist for a lower lip” was misheard as “fish.”  Ultimately, the band decided to record the song with the mondegreens as the song’s final lyrics. I like to think that Theo was aware of this little tidbit and it led to part of why she chose this particular song.

Side note, would anyone be interested if I shared more of these goofy little trivia bits/non-spoiler reasons that certain songs appear at certain times (and maybe even captions that Theo might have posted with the covers)? I’d share them on tumblr as a little “behind the scenes” sort of thing. 

I’m posting this a day early because tomorrow is the last day of helping my parents move, which also means saying farewell to the house I grew up in; I’m sure I’ll be all up in my feelings and distracted, so rather than risk missing my (self-imposed) deadline, I’m doing something wild and posting early.

If you enjoy, please reblog!! I'm a lil' blog and reblogs really help me out <3

Content Warnings: None?

Word Count: 5,314

Read on AO3 | When Everything's Made to be Broken Masterlist

Song: I need you (to be wrong) - Switchfoot

You come 'round like a pirate ship You're just business You got a fish for a lower lip You're just business You're the parentless, nightmare kid You're just business You don't answer for any of this You're just business

The end of onboarding meant the return of lazy days off.

Other than the sound of a sleety-drizzle outside, it was probably quiet enough in the tower to hear a pin drop. Any reprieve from commotion could best be described as blissful, and not needing to peer around every corner so Theo didn’t run into the Avengers brought a different kind of relief. 

In a normal day, Natasha and Steve were always the first to emerge, since they liked early morning training sessions. With how they timed their workouts, Theo typically had to wake up at the ass-crack of dawn just to have 30 minutes to get into the kitchen, make herself a cup of coffee, and then slink back to her corner of the tower or get the hell out, which meant going down to the hospital to get ready for work.

Then again, when Theo got back to her suite at night and heard the commotion and the raucous laughter echoing from down the hall, something painful twisted in Theo’s chest, making her miss her life before the Avengers. It didn’t help that ever since she visited Mémère, Theo caught herself weighing whether it was worth trying to make friends with anyone while she was here.

She hadn’t planned on staying with the group after her favor was done, so on the one hand she didn’t want to grow attached, then ditch them. On the other hand, now that she couldn’t see her other friends, life had become little more than work, which was a lonely way to live. And though she loathed to admit it, Loki’s visits and Julie’s perspective on the Avengers made Theo wonder if her trepidation was truly warranted.

Then again, the Avengers didn’t know the full extent of her history or her powers. Given the reactions from people who knew her sob story, she didn’t anticipate they’d like her very much if they learned the truth. That meant every social interaction felt like it required Theo to put on a show; every word, every action was a calculated risk. She’d been doing it for so long that it felt like second nature, but it didn’t mean she liked it.  

However, none of her concerns around socializing mattered, at least for the time being. According to the side discussions before the most recent debrief,  all of the Avengers had plans for the weekend which took them away from New York, so she had the entire tower to herself. Wanda and Vision snuck out on a weekend getaway to Maine, Tony and Bruce were presenting at some science conference in Switzerland (and Peter tagged along), the super soldiers agreed to help with an event for the US military down in DC, Natasha and Yelena decided to visit Clint and his family out at their farm, Shuri happened to be in Oakland, and Thor had gone to New Asgard for something. Theo assumed that Loki had gone with him, since he was also an Asgardian prince and all. 

Regardless, Theo’s agenda for the day consisted of one thing: reading. A mountain of SHIELD reports loomed on Theo’s desk ever since she started, consisting of both recent and past missions that would hopefully provide the context she needed to offer her expertise on the shadow creatures. Even if she would have rather been marathoning Queer Eye or visiting Mémère, a rainy Saturday morning without anyone around seemed like just as good of a time as any to check the reports of her never-ending list of things to do. 

But even before she dug into the stack of reports, she needed coffee.

Theo padded through the halls of the tower, relishing the echo of her footsteps and the lack of chatter filling the air. Upon entering the kitchen, Theo decided that rather than work her way through the reports in her suite, she’d indulge in a change of scenery and set up shop at the kitchen island.

After starting the coffee, Theo brought out her laptop and the pile of reports, scattering them across the breakfast bar for easy review. She placed her headphones over her ears, cranked up her music, and became so absorbed in reading about the fallout of Ultron and the Sokovia Accords that she forgot about the coffee brewing… 

… She also failed to observe that she wasn’t the only one home. 

A coffee mug appeared next to her out of seemingly thin air, to which Theo yelped and practically flew out of her seat.

“What the – “ she tore her headphones off and whirled around to find Loki standing there, holding his own cup of coffee. “Jesus, Loki, creep around much?”

“I was in no way creeping. Your decision to wear headphones impeded your ability to hear me.” Loki’s tone remained cool and unaffected as he took a sip of his own coffee, leaning back against the counter. “Perhaps you might demonstrate some gratitude toward me; after all, I prepared your coffee for you.” 

“In my defense, I also didn’t realize I wasn’t the only one home – I thought you went back to New Asgard with Thor.” Theo protested, trying to ignore the searing heat that rose on her cheeks. She palmed the mug of coffee in one hand, glancing briefly at the swirls of steam rising from the ceramic cup.

“I’ve no reason to be in New Asgard at present.” He shrugged, before narrowing his eyes at Theo. “If you believed you were alone, why not use Stark’s audio system to listen to your music? It is not as if you would cause a disruption.” 

“It’s a habit,” Theo shrugged casually, allowing her focus to travel to her new teammate. Unlike Theo, whose heart still pounded in her chest from the surprise, Loki's casual posture and amused expression left him looking cool as a cucumber, because of course he would. “Besides, high quality headphones have better sound quality than any stereo system Tony Stark could build – it’s easier to hear the nuance and little details in the recordings.” 

Loki cocked a skeptical brow at her before sauntering over to the refrigerator. As he bent down to rummage through the contents, Theo took advantage of the opportunity to drink in the full sight of Loki in the mornings. 

Loki’s Saturday morning attire was more relaxed than she had ever seen from him. Black joggers slung low on his hips and followed the line of his slim form, while a gray t-shirt clung to his torso and hinted at the toned muscle beneath. He pulled his black curls back into a loose bun, but left one strand hanging down to frame his face, highlighting a jawline that cut like glass. 

For all the jokes Julie made, she wasn’t kidding about Loki’s attractiveness. But that was like saying the sky was blue - no one would question that a god was objectively attractive.

In comparison, he probably thought Theo looked a bit sloppy in her oversized sweatshirt and yoga pants, her own hair tossed up in what looked less like a bun and more like a rat’s nest…

Channeling her inner gremlin, as Max would say.

Loki turned around and caught Theo studying him. 

“Are you enjoying the view?” He smirked.

“I’ve never seen you in anything remotely casual before,” Theo said, mirroring his expression. “Looks good on you.”

Loki hummed, something devilish twitching on his lips to match the glint in his eye. “I should hope so.” 

Theo rolled her eyes. Of the many traits Loki held, humility did not seem to be high on the list. Then again, Theo knew that if she was that attractive, she wouldn’t be humble about it, so it wasn’t like she could hold that against him.

Instead of feeding Loki’s ego, Theo returned her attention to the Sokovia report. She knew herself well enough to know if she didn’t make substantial progress on the reports that day, she would never catch up.

However, Loki either did not get the hint that Theo wanted to be left to work or he chose to ignore it, positioning himself across the island from Theo. With each passing moment, Theo felt his burning stare intensify.

“Keep looking at me like that and I’ll hit you over the head with a chair.” Theo threatened, not even glancing up from her work.

“Darling, such a temper from you this morning.” Loki practically purred. “I would have expected gratitude - after all, I prepared your morning coffee for you.” 

Theo rolled her eyes, but couldn’t help the hint of a smile that quirked up. Of course the prince would make a big deal out of a small gesture. “Well, thank you for the coffee, your highness, now will you leave me alone to work?”

“How are you settling in?”

Ugh. 

He couldn’t have been that dense, right? He must have known Theo did not want to talk to him at that moment. No one became a renowned diplomat if they couldn’t understand basic social cues. 

“Fine,” Theo drawled, “Better if you leave me to read in peace.”

“You never choose to spend time in the common areas like this. Why today?”

A loaded question, delivered with a deceptively light tone, had Theo’s hair standing on the back of her neck. 

No, he wasn’t clueless or dense - Loki wanted something; information, probably.

Something unsettling lurched in Theo’s stomach.

“Because I thought I was going to be alone?” Irritation colored Theo’s response; she gritted her teeth, debating if she should try to divert the conversation or just piss him off so he’d leave her alone.

Her morals leaned towards the former, but her temper leaned towards the latter.

For the moment, she held her tongue.

“Perhaps this will surprise you, but you are allowed to venture into the common areas while others are around to spend your leisure time and… Do whatever it is that you are doing,” Loki casually gestured to the stack of papers scattered between them. “As you previously stated, you are not a princess to be locked away in a tower.”

“Currently, I’m reading reports,” Theo muttered, “And you’re proving to me exactly why I don’t do this in common areas – because you’re distracting me.” 

It took a significant amount of willpower not to slam her computer closed and retreat to her suite; after all, the heavily redacted report about Budapest that was next on her list looked like an enticing read.

“See, that brings me to my next question: why, when you have a beautiful Saturday morning to relax, are you spending your time reading reports and paperwork?” A playful, lighthearted tone graced Loki’s question, but Theo’s patience wore dangerously thin. “If you wish for quality reading material, you only need to ask. I’ve plenty of recommendations.”

“Okay, since apparently you refuse to get the hint, I’m just going to be blunt: I am trying to work. I don’t want to talk right now. Quite frankly, your impromptu interrogation is pissing me off. So for the love of all that is holy, can you leave me alone?” Theo huffed, outright glowering at Loki. 

“You may not be interested in speaking, but I’m certainly interested in answers to my question.” Loki arched a brow at Theo, sipping his coffee as if he could wait all day for a response.

“Because the world isn’t going to save itself and I have a lot of background knowledge to catch up on if I don’t want to fuck up one of these missions and get a bunch of people killed.” Theo’s frustration made its open debut, but amidst her ire she failed to hide the undercurrent of anxiety in her answer. 

Before Theo even finished, Loki’s demeanor shifted from taunting to serious - he must have recognized that he struck a nerve. 

Shit. 

She let her guard down and he latched onto it instantly… Careless mistakes like that could get her killed.

“Are you aware that it is not a requirement to memorize every piece of SHIELD’s history?” Loki leaned in so he could look at Theo over her laptop, face shifting to something unreadable before he continued. “Generally speaking, we have only enough knowledge to complete the individual mission. You need not push yourself to learn everything so that you might recall it at a moment’s notice.”

It wasn’t about knowing everything - it was about assessing the risks. Theo needed to know the history in order to understand the potential risks. If she was in an emergency department, she knew the environment. She knew the variables. She had control over her situation.

But in the field? Knowing anything was a laughable thought.

“It’s not about memorizing, it’s about learning what I got myself into,” Theo flatly replied, hoping to make up for her slip. “I know Fury is fond of leaving out important details in favor of creating a narrative, so I want to make sure I know what he hasn’t told me before I’m sent out into the line of fire.”

“And you believe reports are the way to learn such information?” Skepticism dripped from Loki’s question. 

“I didn’t say I liked it, but this,” Theo gestured to the mess of documents around her, refusing to let her nerves show once more, “is better than letting Fury trot me around like a prize horse or his little puppet.”

It was a half-truth; he didn’t need to know all the details, but perhaps she could spin it to take some of the pressure off.

“I do not believe you’re giving yourself enough credit.” Loki stepped around the island so he stood next to Theo, then shut her laptop so she would look him in the eye. He certainly accomplished the goal, but earned a frustrated groan from Theo in the process. “You’re an immensely sharp and powerful sorcerer – I can feel the magic pouring off you. You easily handle extreme physical duress during training, you effortlessly adapt to any social situation, and it has not escaped my attention that you’re extremely well-studied in a variety of areas.”

Sure, Loki saw Theo spar with Steve, and obviously they’d hung out a few times; they spoke at the party from the first night, and showed up to the soccer game and the bar show…  But a handful of interactions wouldn’t have been enough to draw those conclusions, right?  

Maybe it was a bluff, or an attempt at wooing her with his famed silver tongue so she would give him the information he wanted. 

It wouldn’t be the first time someone lied to her in hopes of gaining her trust. 

“First of all, I’m not sure whether I should be flattered or creeped out that you’ve been watching me so closely,” Theo retorted with a scowl. “Second of all, what’s your point?”

“If you are concerned about your ability to defend yourself on a mission, you need not fret.” Loki sounded cocky, almost arrogant – how would he know what they were up against? “You realize you are not the only one responsible for your safety in the field?”

“You really think that the others, who look at me like I’m a terror, give a shit about my safety?” “They do not believe you are a terror.” 

“Cool, tell that to my grandma when she has to deal with my dead body,” Theo muttered. She attempted to snatch her laptop from Loki, but he held firm.

Loki may have been nicknamed a silvertongue, but the only thing his tongue had done was piss Theo off. 

Enough was enough.

“ I don’t have time for this shit.” With a flick of her wrist, a swirl of shimmering runes encompassed the reports and her laptop, teleporting them back to her quarters. Theo snatched her coffee mug, then offered a final wave and a bratty sneer before transporting herself to her suite.

In the solitude of her suite, Theo let out a sigh.

So much for a peaceful Saturday morning.

I got a body, but I lost my mind I'm just business Placeholder with a bottom line I'm just business Please don't take this personally It's just business

Standing in the kitchen, Loki gaped at the empty seat before him and replayed the events which led to his current predicament.

In some ways, he could have foreseen such an outcome. Initial interactions with Theo had been far more successful than Loki anticipated, to the degree that he almost believed Theo might actually wish to befriend him. Thus, it was inevitable that he would ruin his progress in a truly spectacular manner.

In his defense, walking into the kitchen and finding Theo there had not been something he anticipated. The circumstances practically begged for Loki to engage; when else would he see Theo anywhere besides her workplace or mandatory Avengers engagements? 

Yet, after a handful of occasions spent casually making each other’s acquaintance, Loki expected something with a bit more banter, or at least something more lighthearted. Instead, she met his questions with barbed remarks and vicious glares, culminating in another disappearing act.

The Theo that Loki encountered in the kitchen was vastly different from the Theo he first met, or the one that he spent time with in the research library; that Theo seemed confident and self-assured, sharp-witted and formidable regardless of the circumstances. But when caught off-guard, she became aggressive and downright irascible, to the extent that Loki questioned whether or not it was the same woman who he’d spoken to before.

However, deep within Loki’s chest, something uncomfortable twisted. He recognized the behavior, mostly because he had once acted in such a manner;  if he was entirely honest with himself, he knew exactly what motivated such behavior:

Protecting oneself at all costs.

Seeing Theo in such a state brought to mind his mother’s gardens in Asgard. When flowers were cut and taken from the gardens, they eventually wilted and withered, unable to adapt to their new surroundings. Roses, one of his mother’s favorite flowers, eventually developed thorns all along the stem, which made cutting the blooms a much more challenging task; a defense mechanism that evolved over the course of millennia. 

Like the thorns that protected the roses, Theo’s hostility served as a defense mechanism, an instinct developed to protect herself from something which previously scarred her, something which might have caused her to wither and wilt until nothing more than a shadow of her former self.

In Theo’s behavior, Loki saw himself. There was once a time where he had been so guarded that the other Avengers called him a cactus because of his prickly, sullen demeanor. Though the moniker had become a relic, the instinct remained firmly ingrained upon Loki’s psyche.

Theo was by no means a cactus, but she certainly had some thorns. 

Loki sighed, smoothing calloused fingers over his hair. Ideally, he could remedy the situation with minimal lingering damage to the delicate kinship he struck with Theo; yet the manner in which he could achieve such a feat eluded him.

If he approached too soon, she would only recoil, particularly if she felt cornered. If he waited too long to speak to her, she might suspect his intentions stemmed from less than savory desires - exploitation or a means to an end.

After much dithering, Loki settled upon a plan: if he did not see Theo around lunch, he would knock on her door. If she failed to respond, he would try again at dinner time.

If he still had not heard anything, he would send her a message through his mobile, leaving the onus upon Theo - if she wished to interact she could, however he would not push further.

Any and all confidence Loki held in the plan dwindled when noon came and went with no sign of the silver shadow. Despite the aura of magic radiating from within, Loki’s knocks were met with silence, only dampening his spirits further.

To be on the receiving end of rejection brought a certain discomfort which Loki had not outright encountered in quite some time, and it remained at least as unpleasant as he remembered (if not moreso). Midgardians never outright rejected him - first, they feared him, but over time some came to lust after him. As for the Asgardians, they knew better than to disrespect a crown prince, even if his lineage brought disgrace upon the throne. The more he dwelled on the matter, the clearer it became that he could not remember the last time someone outright turned away from him in such a blatant manner.

Without any sign of Theo in the afternoon, or around the time when the others typically took their evening meal, Loki braced himself for the worst and made the trek down the corridor.

As he approached, the faint sound of music could be heard from inside Theo’s quarters, which combined with her aura confirmed she was present. After pausing for a moment to gather himself, Loki rapped his knuckles upon the door.

Much to his surprise, the music stopped. Footsteps grew louder as Theo approached the door. The noise ceased for a beat, then the lock clicked, and the door swung wide.

Theo stood before him, arms crossed and brows drawn tight as she scrutinized Loki.

“I don’t know if I should be impressed or annoyed by your stubbornness.” Theo skipped any formal greeting, leaning against the doorframe as she gave him a once-over. “Then again, I’m the one that answered the door, so maybe your strategy is effective, or I’m a glutton for punishment. Either way, are you here to continue badgering me about work, or is there something else you want?” 

Loki drew in a deep breath. 

“It seems I struck a nerve,” he observed. “For that, I apologize.”

“Is that all?” Theo eyed Loki warily, as if she knew other matters remained on his conscience.

Loki sighed; it seemed as good of a time as any to address what Midgardians often referred to as ‘the elephant in the room.’

“I noticed you’ve not yet made the acquaintance of the others.”

“I socialize with the other hospital staff,” Theo countered.

Loki scoffed. “I am referring to the other Avengers.”

“I know.” Theo answered as if she had no intention of continuing the conversation. Loki raised his eyebrows at her in a silent question; she rolled her eyes and sighed. “Look, I’m sure they’re fine, but I’m not really interested.”

“Dare I inquire as to why?”

“For one thing, the only reason they’re pretending to be interested in me is because Fury gave them the mission of convincing me to stay on as an Avenger.” Theo cocked an eyebrow at Loki as she slouched further into the doorframe. “So it’s not like they’re really trying to be my friend. And besides, most of them were more than quick to jump to conclusions about who, or what kind of person, I was.”

“If that is so, then why have you not shunned my company?” Loki challenged. “How do you know I am not making your acquaintance to win over the director?”

“I don’t,” she admitted, “but you don’t seem like the type of person to crave Nick Fury’s adoration, or like you’d let him make you his bitch. I suppose I could be wrong, though.” 

“Such rousing praise,” Loki drawled. “Truly, the utmost of faith you place upon me—“

“Okay, fine - you really want to know why I’m willing to talk to you?” Theo interrupted, silencing Loki in the process, “Because in that first meeting, you didn’t automatically assume I was the villain.” 

Something painful twisted in Loki’s stomach. Nowhere in the list of potential responses that Loki developed prior to asking the question was Theo’s answer, yet what she described was an experience he knew all too well. The memory of Barton’s initial reaction to Loki’s presence remained painfully vivid to the Asgardian, which only diminished Loki’s confidence in his argument. 

Still, Theo’s perceptions of the situation were not entirely true. “I was not the only Avenger who made no assumptions about your morality—” 

“Not out loud,” Theo agreed, “But you were the only one who didn’t look at me like I was some kind of terror. You actually looked at me as a person.”

If anyone could empathize with Theo’s experience, it would be Loki. Joining the Avengers, a group who he didn’t truly know or trust, and who didn’t know or trust him… For quite some time, Loki believed wholeheartedly that he made a terrible mistake. 

Months passed from when he first relented to Thor’s pleas to become an Avenger to when Loki partook in a movie night, and that only happened because Thor physically dragged Loki from his quarters. He lost count of the number of times he turned Maximoff down before finally relenting to her constant requests to spend time together. 

In the end, it took over a year for Loki to feel remotely comfortable simply existing in the common areas during the day, going on missions without his brother, or speaking to anyone that was not Thor. Even after so long, he still questioned whether the others valued his contributions to the team, or if they simply tolerated his presence.

“I will admit, the others are not always the most… open-minded, shall we say. Not in the beginning, at least.” Loki chose his words carefully, recognizing the delicate nature of the situation at hand. “However, I truly believe they have moved past the false assumptions, and I would highly recommend you use the opportunity to demonstrate that you are not the terror they assumed you to be.”

“And how do you know that they even want to get to know me?” Theo pressed, piercing blue eyes scrutinizing Loki’s every move.

“Because I was once in a similar position.” The answer slipped out before Loki could stop it. He carefully schooled the surprise from his features; meanwhile, Theo made no effort to hide her skepticism.

“I understand that you may not fully trust me yet – I’m the trickster god, I have a history of manipulating people. Quite frankly, it would be in your best interest not to trust me. But!” Loki admitted, then continued before Theo could get a word in edgewise: “You remind me quite a bit of myself, when I first became an Avenger. I believed the others assumed the worst in me. I held no trust in the others, and in turn they placed no trust in me. It remained as such for quite some time – too long, in hindsight. 

“The change in my relationship with my colleagues came when I finally relented to my brother and Maximoff’s incessant attempts to force me to socialize with the others. If it were not them, I would still remain hidden away in my quarters at all hours. 

“Honestly, at the time I desired nothing more than to kill them in a spectacular manner for their belligerent pestering and sickening optimism. But between you and I, it helped me far beyond simply becoming a part of the Avengers – it helped me move on from the past that used to define me.”

To be so genuinely forthcoming was a bold decision. Had it been anyone else, he would not have dared to reveal such information, particularly someone so new. However, Theo had a knack for drawing the unexpected from Loki, even if it often caught him by surprise. Additionally, the mystery surrounding Theo piqued his curiosity, which only grew with the reluctance to socialize with the others. 

Without taking a risk, there would be no reward.

Theo narrowed her eyes at the God of Mischief, chewing the inside of her cheek as she mulled over his words.

“I remind you of… you?” Distrust clung to every word, only amplified by the doubt written across her expression in big, bold letters.

“Well, yes,” Loki replied coyly. “but you are far more charming and engaging. When I first arrived, I was simply full of spite.” He chuckled, earning a hesitant smile at Theo as a faint hint of pink rose on her cheeks from his compliment. “Had there been no consequence, Stark would have gleefully made a spectacle of launching me off the top of the tower.”

Theo’s shoulders bounced as she chuckled at Loki’s remarks. A sense of relief washed over Loki - perhaps he hadn’t made a mess of things after all.

“The winter soldier, the scarlet witch, myself - at one point or another, we were enemies of various factions of the Avengers. Romanoff is a former black widow, as is Belova. If we can be accepted into the Avengers, I’ve no doubt that you can as well.” Loki assured her, his confidence building with every passing moment. “However, you must be willing to engage.”

Before Theo could roll her eyes and offer a snarky dismissal, Loki held up a finger to silence her.

“At least humor Maximoff once,” he bargained. “I’ve listened to her prattle on endlessly about her excitement at your addition to the Avengers ever since she learned the news, and if I have to endure any more of her moping because you’ve rejected her invitations to socialize, I very well might lose my mind.”

After far too long of a pause, Theo finally answered.

“Okay, fine. I will stop turning down the invites to hang out and I’ll try to ‘play nice’ with the others,” she relented, sounding none too pleased as she straightened up. “For the record, I never agreed to any of this. I am here reluctantly, at best.”

“Yes yes, the reluctant Avenger - you’re not the first one. I wrote the book on it.” Loki ribbed, earning a real laugh from Theo. “Now come, it is far too beautiful of a day to spend it reading such dreary reports. Why not spend your time on something you might enjoy?”

“You know it’s raining outside, right?” Theo pointed to a window behind her, where an onslaught of water undoubtedly pounded against the glass.

“Of course I do;” Loki lightly scoffed. “That’s why it is such a beautiful day - it is perfect for settling in with some literature and forgetting about the tomfoolery the rest of this dreadful realm subjects us to.”

Theo didn’t argue with him, but she continued to peer at him rather suspiciously. 

“You have worked non-stop ever since you started here. What is the phrase that you mortals love? All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy? I fear you might become dreadfully dull if you keep this up.”

“Good thing my name isn’t Jack.” Theo winked, her quick-wit making its blessed return. 

“All work and no play makes for a rather wretched existence.” Loki amended his statement, smirking at Theo. “What you ought to do is put those reports away, find a novel that you actually enjoy, and join me in the sitting room to indulge in some reading. We might even listen to some of your music over the speakers, since you seem to be averse to silence yet easily startled when you wear your headphones.”

“I don’t know, this Budapest report looks like a great mystery to crack.” Theo shrugged, though her tone no longer held any trace of the tension or animosity that had previously dominated her replies.

Loki rolled his eyes, though he couldn’t bite back a smile. 

“Okay,” Theo finally agreed, “let me put this stuff away, and then I’ll come join you.”

As she joined him in the corridor, Loki concluded that one thing was certain: he much preferred Theo’s banter to her thorns. 

I need you to be wrong  (All along wе both were wrong) I need you to be wrong  (All along wе both were wrong)

[slow-burn-sally]

20 questions for fic writers

Thank you @totallysilvergirl for tagging me <3

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

171

2. What’s your total A03 word count?

2,559,305

3. What fandoms do you write for?

I live for the days when anyone asks me this question, because listing things I love is just so great. I don't actively write for all of these any longer, but I would go back to all of them if anyone threw me like, half a prompt.

BBC Sherlock

Good Omens

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell

The Terror

Our Flag Means Death

What We Do In The Shadows

The Adventures of Tintin

The Hobbit

BBC and CBS Ghosts

Pacific Rim

Father Ted

Lord of The Rings

The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel

Death In Paradise

Dalgliesh

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

1. Crowley's Game - Good Omens (Ineffable Husbands)

2. Return To Sender - Good Omens (Ineffable Husbands)

3. Silk All Around You - Our Flag Means Death (Ed/Stede)

4. Oh Good Lord - Good Omens (Ineffable Husbands)

5. Out Of Suffering Into Love - Good Omens (ineffable Husbands)

hmm. Guess GO fandom is where I've cashed in the biggest, kudos-wise *Raises a glass to Good Omens Fandom*

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

I try to respond to as many as I can, and I want to respond to all of them, but ADHD and work and life keep me from doing it right away, and then ADHD and being off work and life make me forget. I will sometimes loop back around to read a new comment, then see that I never replied to another, far older comment, then go about replying to several, two years after they were left. I hope people don't mind. I promise everyone who's ever left me a positive comment, that I eat them all up like chocolate bonbons and count myself blessed for each and every one.

6. What’s the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Probably that Childercelles fic where Henry dies in the end. I think maybe 10 people read it. If you're in JSAMN fandom, and you ship Childercelles, and you want a link, PM me, but I can't remember the name of the fic for the life of me. It was pretty angsty. Outside of that, I hate angsty endings. Everyone eats ice cream and cuddles at the end of my fics.

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

Gonna echo the wonderful @totallysilvergirl and say that I don't do unhappy endings. That Childercelles fic was the only one I think I ever wrote with an unhappy ending, and even that was more of a melancholy ending. Everything else is Häagen-Dazs and rainbows.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I've gotten a few harsh criticisms, and a few snarky comments, but never actual hate.

9. Do you write smut?

I sure do! I've written a whole lot of smut, and I really love it. Regardless, it can be challenging sometimes. I have to be in the right place, and have the right focus to write smut, and lately, it's been feeling more labor intensive. I've been taking a step back from the explicit stuff lately, and playing around in M rather than E, and less sexual waters for a change. Sometimes a gal needs a break. I'll always happily write it for others, but don't feel inspired to write it for myself right now.

10. Do you write crossovers?

I really see my Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell/BBC Sherlock crossover as my first and only crossover. It involves main characters from both fandoms meeting one another, and John and Sherlock live in a world where England's history is the same as the history in JS&MN. It's been a very fun experience, but I'm really writing it for @keirgreeneyes 's birthday, because we share a lot of stuff between those two fandoms, not because I love crossovers. I don't feel drawn to them at all usually.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Nope. Someone came to me a couple of years ago, saying they were being bullied over accusations that they were plagiarizing my good omens fic. They even showed me the fic people talked about, and after scanning it for a bit, I didn't see anything that looked like plagiarism. I posted on tumblr saying I'd rather people plagiarize me than cause one moment of suffering due to bullying, and left it at that. I was really just jazzed to have people *want* to plagiarize me, honestly. It was flattering.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes! In Korean I think.

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

No, and I'm not sure I could. I also don't like cooking with other people or showering with other people. I just like having the reins on writing and cooking and showering fronts I guess.

14. What’s your all-time favourite ship?

Oh god please don't make me choose. My children, my precious children. After careful consideration though, I'm gonna have to go with Crozier/Jopson - Jopzier from The Terror. I mean. Come on. It's me.

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

I wrote many chapters of a really fun, but really complex and pain in the ass multi-chapter mystery fic for the rarest of rare pairs, Jack Mooney/Florence Cassell from Death In Paradise. So yeah, I would love to finish it, but I don't have the spoons, and it will have a readership of roughly four people.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I think I write good dialogue. I write good smut. I can make up stories at the drop of a hat, and then put them down very quickly, in large amounts of words. I'm a long distance runner when it comes to fic. I like my sense of humor in fics, and I'm always so happy when someone leaves me a comment telling me they laughed really hard at something I wrote. Ditto incoherent babbling about my fics making them horny. Those comments are so good.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Eh, my weakness is I'm just not an amazing writer? I do it because I love it, and it brings me so much joy, and people reading my fics brings me so much joy, and that's pretty much it. Also, I use a lot of run on sentences, and I have like six tropey things my characters always do, and I can't break out of it.

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

I didn't understand this one. I would love to write dialogues in other languages if I spoke them fluently. Outside of speaking a bunch of Spanish, I'm not fluent in anything but English.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

eeeeeeeeee @keirgreeneyes @totallysilvergirl my first ever fanfiction was BBC Johnlock! I tried writing a fic, probably back in 2013 or something, and gave up after a handful of paragraphs. I just lacked the confidence. Then, it wasn't until 2019 when I went nuts for Good Omens and wrote a bunch of fic that I wanted to go back and write that one, first, Johnlock fic. And I did it! It's Homecoming. BBC Sherlock is my first fanfiction fandom, and my introduction to fanfiction.

20. Favourite fic you’ve ever written?

Oh wow. That's a tough one. I really loved my one Father Ted fic, A Sweet, Hot, Sticky Romp, because I loved emulating the comedy style of the show and thought I did a good job.

I loved Out Of Time, my Jopzier time travel wackadoo fic for The Terror.

I guess I'll stop at two. I've written 171. I should get at least two favorites.

I tag @fol-de-lol @ilthit @yeswevegotavideo @keirgreeneyes @holycatsandrabbits

[theradicalscrivener]

Probably you are asked this a lot, but what would you recommend to someone who wants to write smut and publish it?

I ask both because I have no idea what I should do, where to post and things like that.

But also because... How do you stop feeling embarrassed from publishing smut? Not because there is something bad about it, but because... You know. Like, how do you get over it?

You don't have to answer, but I would like to hear your thoughts.

Depending on what you mean by publishing. I keep kicking around the idea of doing like kindle publishing rather than just uploading stuff for free to various sites, but I haven't really gotten too far in those plans. Doing something commercial is a bit outside of my purview.

As far as just posting it online, it helps to have a place in mind to get started. Which, unfortunately, it feels like it's harder and harder to find good places to post written smut nowadays. I still get a decent amount of interaction via tumblr, but the userbase here is a small percentage of what it used to be and other sites like FA have also seen a sharp downturn in user interaction.

But those points aren't super related to your question. The irony is that I started doing smut because I was nervous to do legit writing. I felt like the bar for writing nsfw was much lower than posting sfw. I'd seen so much bad nsfw that I was like, that would be a safe place to practice writing. Like, there was no expectation that it would be good. Since I didn't feel like I had to be good at it immediately, I was able to relax a bit and just enjoy writing for the sake of writing.

Of course, that was super naive. I know now that there are tons of great sfw fanfics and original works, and even something being "fanfic" doesn't have any real baring on its quality. I should have been just as comfortable starting out in sfw as I did in smut.

At the end of the day, that's the biggest trick. Just write because you want to. I realize it's hard to do. I get stressed out a lot about it too. Like, I'll write a bunch of stuff but then not post it because I don't think anyone wants to read it. I'll write big chunks of stuff and then when I post the first chapter, there's zero interest or feedback in it, so I just don't post the other chapters.

I know a lot of people say to not post for engagement, but engagement feels good and can inspire you to do more. The opposite side of that argument is that there are a fair amount of assholes out there. There's plenty of people who have nothing better to do than to find stuff to hate on, and most people who enjoy stuff don't feel like commenting or sharing it because they either don't feel like their comments would be appreciated or they are afraid to admitting liking the stuff they like.

Even knowing this, it can be hard to keep going, but I have rambled a lot and I'm not sure how good a job I did of answering the original question. I started writing smut because I didn't think I was good enough for "real" writing, and I got much better at writing as I went. Just accept that you won't be amazing starting out, but there are still people that will enjoy it, and the more you do it the better you get. Depending on what you are writing, there are plenty of sites that will appreciate it. I keep hearing I should start posting at DA since they allow smut writing, so maybe that's a good place to start out. If you do fan fic, then def do AO3. If you're worried about negativity, you can turn off guest comments.