#I've only gotten a paragraph into actually typing

[sillygoofyqueer]

sorry i send you so many asks i might as well go live in your inbox BUT pangolin!shen yuan is SO CUTE (panyuan? shen yuangolin?), i know he LOVES climbing on wei qingwei's broad shoulders and traveling to the peaks, listening to wei qingwei talk endlessly about all the peak lords and cultivators and their swords.

as a pangolin he has no job or anything so he'd wander off to watch liu qingge train, standing there with his little paws held together in that adorable pangolin way. maybe some bai zhan kids try to kick him and liu qingge immediately punts them to the other side of the field bc everyone knows that if you mess with the pangolins, you mess with wan jian peak, and you really don't want that. or shen yuan goes to qian cao peak to watch mu qingfang work his medicine magics. an ding peak is definitely the best place for treats, esp shang qinghua who just plops a whole bag of nuts and seeds in front of him when he visits.

also he'd hide behind wei qingwei's legs, little claws clinging to his robes like a tiny scaly child whenever shen qingqiu comes by for disciple swords, because that man is intimidating and everyone is so freaking tall when you're only 80 cm long.

shen yuan has also 100% bitten people.

You've actually fallen for my trap that I set out purely to lure you into my inbox and now you're trapped here forever and ever and we WILL be having tea parties every week. Sorry. You're my friend now, that's basically what I'm like with my friends. I've just realised that I'm basically atticwifing you....but platonically. ANYWAY. Shen Yuan absorbs so much information from Wei Qingwei's rambles, even squeaking and offering little sounds to ensure that the peak lord knows that he is listening! While the rest of the sect have gotten used to this little limpet hanging onto WQW, visitors are like "is one of your peak lords actually insane" and the peak lords are like "nah just watch this" and they listen as SY seemingly RESPONDS to something WQW has said with a questioning sort of hum. Shocked Pikachu faces all around. Also, I love to think about a couple of the more spiteful, spoiled disciples of one of the peaks ganging up on poor pangolin SY because they think they're above the consequences of their actions. SY stumbles his way back to Wan Jian Peak, where he is met by WQW. The man is. Very gentle. as he treats the pangolin's wounds. Then he turns his attention to finding who has done this to his precious little pet, and all of the peak lords are reminded of just how scary WQW can be when he has a valid reason to be. The man is horrifying, normally warm and friendly smile wiped completely off his face - instead, there's a scowl. A petrifying scowl that looks out of place on his face. Let's just say that the disciples are very quickly found and...dealt with. Also!! I read the last little paragraph and just...immediately thought of a different kind of panyuan - a little demon type creature that WQW likely took in as a baby because...listen, so what if it's a demon, the shimei on the beast peak said that it's okay because "pangolin-type demons are harmless, trust me bro". This little pangolin baby has a human form, meaning WQW basically has a little baby that is sometimes a pangolin. In human form, he has his little tail and spatterings of scales over his body, and he is just a little GUY. He's just as charming as a little child, peeking out from behind WQW's robes and clinging to him, often just resorting to communicating through his little chirps and squeaks when he gets scared or far too shy for words. He is still taken to literally all of the peak lord meetings, because he's just a little guy, and god forbid anyone finds SY NOT sitting on WQW's shoulders or cuddled in his embrace. Everyone else is, at first, kind of hesitant because bro that's a child get him OUT of our meetings. Then they're hit with the big ole eyes and they fucking crumble.

[bucktommyscones]

saw @typicalopposite-blog (I think) start this so I thought I'd pass it to you

20 Questions For Fic Writers

I'm doing it like this btw because I can't type all that so what's your answers Sarah?

How many works do you have an AO3?

88

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

298,501. oof.

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Right now, just 9-1-1.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Oooh. This was fun to look at. I haven't checked in a while.

Off the Deep End-1693

Just a Little Something- 1523

If Love is Fire, Then I'll Burn for You-1227

Call Me By My Name-1159

A Little Like Lightning-955

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

I try to, but oftentimes, I just get busy and don't get the chance. I treasure each and every one.

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

Oh god. It doesn't exist anymore, but I wrote an Alias fic in my teens that had a main character death. It was probably awful.

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

Lol, I'm such a sucker for fluff nowadays that they all have happy ending.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

No, not really. I get some comments that are like "I wish this had happened instead" or something but I don't really see those as hate.

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

I've only just started branching out into writing smut with my bucktommy fics. I think I'm getting better at it.

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

I've never written a crossover, but it might be fun to try one day.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I've ever seen.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

I don't think so.

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

When I wrote for House, a bunch of us wrote these little...well, we called them chain fics. But we'd each write a small paragraph or a few sentences and then the next person would pick it up. That's probably the closest I've ever gotten to writing a fic with someone.

14. What's your all time favorite ship?

Oooh, I think it has to be bucktommy. Like, getting to see a gorgeous queer couple becoming canon on my actual tv screen? amazing.

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

I started a magical au that I'm stuck on. It's sort of new for me and I'm not sure when/if I'll go back to it.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I think I'm really good at banter and dialogue.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Writing smut, for sure. I've been branching out to practice, I guess.

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

I only know English, I don't really feel comfortable using translators or anything. I wouldn't want to misrepresent a language I don't actually know.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Alias! I was 15/16.

20. Favorite fics you've written?

I really love the In the Name series. Just a Little Something was my first bucktommy fic and it jump started my love of writing for them.

Thank you, @tommy-kinard-buckley!

no pressure tags if anyone else wants to answer: @desert--moonchild, @actuallyitsellie, @tiltingheartand, @talktonytome

[evolutionsbedingt]

Which language is the most beautiful and which one has odd, arresting glory?

Oh wow, what a question dear friend! Your time was impeccable too because I had just had four hours of language classes when I read your question and my brain basically went into overdrive. Thank you for rolling this particular apple of discord into my hands, I hope I did it justice! 💚💚💚

My immediate response was that Chinese indubitably is the most beautiful language and odd, arresting glory should belong to Old English.

But then I questioned my own assessment, because of course I would. I tried not to get lost in the 'well, it's not like you speak all languages, so how can you really say which one is the most beautiful - you know but a fraction of them!' But it also made me think about the languages I do know and whether they can even stand up to comparison.

You see, I know at least two languages only by their bible translations (Gothic and Old Church Slavonic), three only by short inscriptions and religious texts (Hittite, Old Persian and Avestan) and they, together with a number of others, are languages I speak only through the definitions offered to me by the dictionary. This also includes Chinese and Old English.

Then again, Chinese and Old English are the ones I've gotten most up close and personal with outside of English and German. I have translated a chunk of the Beowulf epos and read books translated from Chinese in a way that preserved the original language as much as possible, as well as trying my hand at translating a few of the Tang dynasty poems myself. Old English feels familiar because it's very closely related to German; something that is definitely reflected in my translation of it as well because sometimes I didn't bother translating at all - just adjusted the spelling or conjugation a little and we were good to go.

And Chinese despite it's often purported title of the most difficult language to learn is a language that makes terrible amounts of sense in my brain - so much so that I started picking it up simply by watching series and reading books and translation commentary. It has no declension of nouns or adjectives, it has no conjugation and tense and aspect are simply expressed through classifiers. Does one have to learn at minimum one thousand characters to be reasonably fluent? Yes. But how many words do you think I had to learn to be reasonably fluent in English and French? The only thing that differentiates characters from words in the grand scheme of things is that we are not familiar with a writing system like this. If I can learn to read and write Ancient Greek well enough to get a Graecum in 1.5yrs (with considerable effort) the same will be true for Chinese.

And yet I wouldn't be able to actually, fully understand either language because that would only come with practice, with seeing it used in real life and learning the many, many ways it can be and is used - both colloquially and in elevated contexts.

So how can I dare to declare it a beautiful language if - at the moment - the only access I have to it is through translation? How can I compare any language that I'm not fully (or at least almost) fluent in? How can I compare languages that I only know from translated, religious texts (and we know they chose to translate closely to the original, making it an imperfect reflection of the language) with a languages I know mostly from poetry and fantasy novels?

I can't. But I can say that, knowing as many languages as I do, not one does poetry quite like Classical Chinese and Old English. They are similar in their economy of words and simultaneously strong imagery. There's a playfulness to both languages that makes them incredibly well-suited for the type of poetry I like and which thus makes them my choices for 'most beautiful language'.

You will notice that this leaves the category of 'odd, arresting glory' open again (and I promise it won't take me another- let's not check how many paragraphs -to answer this). The description of odd and arresting glory made me first think of Old English, because to me as a German speaker Old English certainly odd and having translated a bit of Beowulf it's certainly glorious.

But I think the language most likely to leave me to stop and stare (at least in translation) is Russian in 19th century prose. It's the very opposite of the minimalistic Old English and Classical Chinese, with its long and elaborate descriptions but closer to German prose (and even poetry) of the time and I really admire the imagery wrought there - it's one of the reasons why I still would rather like to learn modern Russian instead of 'just' Old Church Slavonic which is often bound by the Ancient Greek and biblical writing conventions. I want to be able to see that beauty for myself, instead of through the thick lense of others' translations.

Phew.

That became a very long answer and I'll definitely have to put a read more but I thank you very much for making me think about this and subsequently put my thoughts into words! A delightful way to spend my time while cooking the stew for tomorrow! I hope you enjoyed reading this 💚

[ourdramaqueen]

Fic Tag Game

I was tagged by @suchaladyy 🌸

20 questions:

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

55, divided into fandoms as follows: Wednesday (TV 2022) (24) The Boys (TV 2019) (21) The Lord of the Rings (8) Sin City - All Media Types (1) Almost Human (TV) (1)

2. What’s your AO3 word count?

368,862

3. What fandoms do you write for?

See #1. Currently only Wednesday, though I do hope to get back into The Boys soon, and I still have some unpublished LotR WIPs that I'd like to actually finish sometime...

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Private Tutor

Kinktober Day 8: Shaving (The Boys, Butcher/Hughie)

Kinktober Day 2: See-through (The Boys, Butcher/Hughie)

Kinktober Day 18: Rough Sex (The Boys, Butcher/Hughie)

How do I passive-agressively say ‘fuck you’ in flower?

5. Do you respond to comments?

Yes! I really appreciate when readers take the time to post a comment, so I always answer at least with a brief "thank you".

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

Defintiely the whole Closer series (LotR, Frodo/Éomer) because it is mostly canon compliant, so it ends with Frodo going into the West. 😭My Rough Sex series (The Boys, Butcher/Hughie) is also fairly angsty by its nature as a series of mildly canon divergent gap filler fics following through the episodes of S1 and S2 (so far).

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

I think pretty much anything apart from the above two series? Well, apart from the Struck by a Bolt series (The Boys, Butcher/Hughie), which has the potential to go either way.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I haven't gotten outright hate, but certainly a few rude/entitled/"clearly hasn't read the tags or the end note despite me recommending to in the a/n at the beginning" comments.

9. Do you write smut? What kind?

LOL! All kinds. Soft, kinky (probably more kinky), some a bit dark. I seem to enjoy my ships a little fucked up.

10. Do you write cross-overs?

I don't have a proper crossover on my AO3 (see #12 for the reason why I specify it like this), though I'd love to write one sometime since I love reading them. The closest I've come is Kinktober Day 15: Monster Fucking (The Boys, Butcher/Hughie), which is heavily Beauty and the Beast inspired.

11. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes! Little Brother was translating Private Tutor into Russian, though they haven't updated it in a while.

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

Oh yes! In fact, the first fics I posted online were cowritten with two (originally three, but one of then dropped out shortly after we'd started) friends, though under a different pen name and in a crossover of two small fandoms (with additional ones sneaking in here and there). I haven't written for that series in at least 15 years, though I still have fairly extensive notes for a trilogy of stories centered around my OC and I'd love to get back to that eventually.

But more recently, I've cowritten Line Without a Hook with erraticallyinspired (holyfudgemonkeys), who afaik isn't on Tumblr, and An Addams Family Guide to Kidnapping with @nonamemanga. I'm currently working on something with @suchaladyy, and who knows what and who will be next? It's a lot of fun!

13. What WIP would you like to finish but doubt you ever will?

Oof! I only have unpublished WIPs which I'm not sure if I'll ever get to finish them. Mostly for LotR.

14. What’s your all time favorite ship?

I really can't choose. Go look at my bookmarks on AO3, LOL!

15. What are your writing strengths?

Oh boy. Um. I think I've figured out quite well how to show character through smut, as well as to distinguish characters from one another by how they behave and talk.

16. What are your writing weaknesses?

Hmm... Sometimes I get bogged down in details, though I've gotten much better at catching myself now. Oh, paragraphs of really long sentences, but again, I've improved a lot there. 😆

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

Absolutely, as long as I'm confident in the language or have someone who's a native/fluent speaker to help me with it.

18. First fandom you wrote for?

Are we talking wrote for myself, or published? Because I started as a teenager in the 80s, writing your typical Mary Sue self-inserts starring my favorite celebs, like Nick Rhodes from Duran Duran, by hand on notepads...

19. Favorite fic you’ve ever written?

Nope, still can't choose, sorry!

20. What fic would you want to rewrite one day?

There's one story from my first cowriting experience I mentioned in #12 that I would dearly love to rewrite because the constant POV changes are driving me nuts when I read it now! I don't think there's anything that's currently on my AO3 that I feel the need to rewrite.

I don't know who's been tagged or not, so if you haven't been but want to participate, consider yourself tagged!

[f1-birb]

🧩🍄🕯️

🧩 - what will make you click away from a fanfiction immediately?

I hate poor formatting 😅 like no paragraphs, no clear dialogue, walls of text? hate hate hate

I'm not a fan of first person either, never have been in any type of fiction, it has actively put me off books in the past (and honestly sometimes even now) but sometimes if the plot is good enough I can cope

🍄 - share a head canon for one of your favourite ships or pairings

I actually don't really have any? the only one I'd maybe say is that Lando's a hoodie thief no matter who I ship him with lol

🕯️ - on a scale from 1 to 10, how much do you enjoy editing? why is that?

idk like a 3, I already wrote the damn thing what do you mean I have to go back over it and find my mistakes 😭 I also suffer from when I edit my word count also inexplicably grows

to get around this I've gotten good at almost editing as I go? so I'll write a chunk and then stop and go back over it so when I get to the end product I have way less work

[altschmerzes]

do you have any tips for how to get yourself to write, and more importantly, how to like your writing? i used to be so confident and sure of my skills in writing but recently it seems like i can never put down actual words, and when i do they just come out flat. it’s the worst possible time for this to be happening too 😭 i really look up to you as a writer and admire your dedication and your ability to write consistently so if you can, help please!! 🙏

first of all thank you so much for your lovely words!!! i'm beyond flattered that i'm someone you look up to in writing, you're so kind to say so, and i've been pleased with my own consistency recently tbh. it's not always like that, i go through long stretches not being able to get myself to write, which is always frustrating and upsetting.

anyways in terms of getting yourself to write and, more importantly, to like what you're writing, here's what i've got for you my friend!

telling yourself that you're not going to care about it being perfect is the only way to get through it, i think. i do what i call 'flashdrafting' which is the fastest and shittiest version of something. i don't even pay attention to punctuation and full sentences, i just slam through stream of consciousness as much as possible without thinking about it. i get really into the groove doing that and then i move that text to the bottom half of my screen and type at the top, just retyping what i wrote into full sentences and paragraphs, adding details, etc. it helps me not overthink things too much.

i also do sprints in discord! i'm in a couple of servers with people i write with and doing those timed writing exercises helps me not only get a couple sentences out at least, it engages a communal aspect that is really helpful to me. of course this only works if you have like. a server to write with people in, but similar effects can be achieved setting a timer for five, ten, fifteen minutes etc. or just telling yourself fuck it, i'm adding 100 words to this story.

writing the parts you're excited about first can also help, i think. of course then it's a pain in the ass to go back and lay the groundwork for them or connect the scenes but sometimes that helps you realize that maybe you didn't need the parts you weren't excited about in the first place, or it'll give you motivation to get through those parts.

if you feel like you really hate what you're writing, switch to something else. that's what i do. i think it's really easy to get n one's own head with any creative endeavour, especially writing. you probably hate it mostly bc you wrote it. i end up hating a lot of the stuff i write and even if i'm lying to myself when i say it, i get through that by telling myself 'you hate it bc you wrote it, it's not that bad'

and, finally, having people to write with/get excited about writing with/hype your writing up. i cannot emphasize how critical this is. i would not have gotten anywhere in any of my projects if it weren't for the wonderful people - here, on anon or with a name attached, or in my dms, or otherwise - who are cheering me on and hyping me up and getting excited with me. it's hard to feel like your writing is garbage when someone you respect and enjoy talking to is telling you it rules, yknow? and it can be hard to build that kind of community but honestly, it's just about showing up i think. join a server if one exists, start messaging with writers you like, just start posting about your writing. building that community is like. i wouldn't be writing nearly as much as i do as often as i do if i didn't know it mattered to other people too.

[freezingmcxn]

hi Moon! sorry for the second ask lol, it's shorter this time. I've been writing the introduction to my (possible) creepypasta fanfic, and i wanted to ask which site you recommend to post it on :) i just want a chill place with not a lot of toxicity.

good luck with your own AU btw, i lovee the concept and the world building is so fleshed out! keep it up!

Helloooo

Don’t apologise I love asks, they just take a long time to get motivation up for answering 😭

I posted my fanfic on Quotev.

I’m gonna heavily recommend it because it’s convient and I love the layout too. I’ve never had any issues with the site or the people, they are really kind, I’ve never gotten hate on there!

The next place I’d recommend is Ao3.

I’m working on posting mine there too actually. I’ve been a user of Ao3 for a long time, it’s the least judgmental place I think. Since there’s so much content on there, you’ve gotta be super specific with your tags that’s the only downside.

One place I’ll recommend not posting on is wattpad!

People rarely use it and depending on what type of fic it is will affect who views it! I leave it to those who enjoy more fun upbeat fanfics as they’re more popular on there! the layout is awful and from experience it fucks paragraphs up, especially on mobile (I’m honestly just a big wattpad hater 😭😭)

Thank you for the good luck wishes I wish you all the best too!!

[weebsinstash]

"If you're so successful and happy why do you feel the need to do this"

I'll throw you a bone bestie

Because it's genuinely hilarious and cathartic

I don't feel the "need" to do it, I just think it's funny to dunk on people who suck in various ways. Like yourself. Like ngl when I stumbled across your blog at first, seeing how horrible and loserish of a person you were simultaneously disgusted me so much and made me laugh so much. If someone is a loser but a good person, you feel bad for them and want to leave them alone or even help them. If someone is a bad person but isn't a loser, you have nothing to cringe at or look down on them for since they're doing better than you. But being a loser AND a bad person is like, you're the funniest person ever to get a rise out of and also you set off a disgust response that makes people want to give you shit. People don't pity you for your loserish life because you're an asshole, so we view you as undeserving of pity. That's why people like you, i.e. loser + a bad person, get shit online. Look at boogie2988, Chris Chan, Yandere Dev etc. for other examples of people like you. You'd get along with Yandere dev btw he's also a creep who likes rape porn :)

You've given me SO many laughs over the past year after I was stressed from studying for a tough exam, a busy week at work or other things in my life. This whole experience has been nothing but positive for me tbh. Sounds weird but my life and mental health have actually gotten a lot better. I can be resilient now for people who need me to be strong for them without getting stressed myself and people appreciate that. I've helped people through tough times because my stress level is lower and I can be zen about things I normally wouldn't be

All of this is literally just entertaining. I'm not trying to do anything or fight for a cause. It's just funny and cathartic to me. Seeing everyone in your degenerate rape porn community get bent out of shape over ridiculous and hilarious spam like "bitch lasagna" and shitty photoshopped porn. Maybe I have a weird sense of humor or something but whoever told you people only troll others if they have miserable unsuccessful lonely lives lied to you to make you feel better. It's genuinely just fun especially for people like you who give big dramatic reactions to things most of the time. Like this whole calling the police thing over me "going to your house" and being so goddamned confident I'm about to get arrested 😂 this type of shit is why I continue and you constantly insulting me makes me want to do it more and also not feel bad about it because you deserve it. I can troll people who suck and it's guilt-free fun. Like trolling a child predator, you don't feel bad about it yknow, it's just funny. It's just for kicks.

You know whats actually so embarrassing

When I initially said the whole karma works in reverse for you, I was talking about being ditched by your family, and your hysterical ass thought I was talking about your assault. You misinterpreted what I even said and used it as your excuse to act like a histrionic freak for almost a full year

You have literally done nothing but prove my point that you are an objectively shit person, and anyone who would be friends with you is probably a subhuman enabler and also a compulsive liar much like yourself. You use your alleged assault to cry victim and use it to harass other people. You cry victim blaming but then spout blatant ableism, misogyny, transphobia, and racism more than once. You have typical White Woman Feminism, screaming and whining that you aren't a slut but calling everyone else whores for having kinks you don't like

You're sitting here further incriminating yourself, writing so many paragraphs I'm not even reading them all, spending hours and hours and hours. I'm at work making a living supporting my family and you're at home, on your phone, for hours. When do you even sleep lmao. Homie you literally lied pretending to be a teenager, you could lie about anything. Does writing fanfiction about having a partner help heal the wounds from knowing you did something stupid and got thrown away like a used tissue

It was something with a dog, wasn't it? I know your types. You need attention from literally wherever you can get it. That's why you don't even care if everyone is screaming at you, you just need acknowledgment. This is such stereotypical neglected child behavior and you're so bitter and angry you're barely even coherent

Go dye your hair blue and attend a republican rally since you share their politics. I'll at least have the peace knowing I've never been so obsessed with a complete stranger I have to obsessively keep checking if they've replied to me. That's shit MIDDLE SCHOOLERS DO, but oh no, you're allegedly so successful and intelligent 😂 so successful and intelligent you're acting like a QAnon 4channer for entertainment on Christmas. Hey guys the person who spent literally hours and hours on both Chrisrmas Eve and Christmas wants us to believe they have a partner. Who wants to call cap?

[asteria-argo]

Answer the questions and tag five fanfiction authors you know!

tagged by the wonderful wonderful @altschmerzes

1. How many fandoms have you written in?

Written in about 15 but I've only published in two. According to ao3 it's five but that's because of the umbrella fandom of DC comics.

2. How many years have you been writing fanfiction?

Since I was around 6 and I'm now 20 so about,,, 14 years

3. Do you read or write more fanfiction?

I read way more than I write, I read a bare minimum of 3 fics a day and I go through really long periods of not writing anything so I for sure read more than I write

4. What is one way you've improved as a writer?

since I started publishing my fics I've gotten a lot better at actually finishing them, but my grammar and tense has also improved A Lot just from practicing even if it's still not the best out there.

5. What's the weirdest topic you researched for a writing project?

I mean it's not that weird but I get very hyperfixated on small details so I did a lot of researching into the different degrees offered at Yale and Harvard in order to decide what degrees I think would be offered at a fictional Ivy League university when I was writing character bios a little while ago.

Also for To All The Better Places I spent a truly inane amount of time researching grassroots U12 girls football teams for a side character so I could name one in the right area that would suit her needs the best.

6. What's your favourite type of comment to receive on your work?

long ones for sure. I love getting long comments especially on my longer fics where people like,, point out things they liked or quote my work as me. Also love those like,, live slug reaction comments you get sometimes where people go paragraph by paragraph telling you their thoughts as they have them in one long comment,

7. What's the most fringe trope/topic you write about?

I have a lot of ambiguous gender feelings a lot of the time, and I also grew up watching a lot of "boy" oriented media that would only have like,, one or two girl characters at best so from a young age I was fascinated with reading like,, canon divergent "always-a-girl" trope fics and I have written a couple of them myself which I think is a bit of an unpopular trope in wider fandom.

8. What is the hardest type of story for you to write?

angst and whump because I really struggle describing physical sensation and angst usually just ends up with me making myself sad and/or sick in the process of writing it if I don't have a happy ending planned and ready to go

9. What is the easiest type?

found family stories are my bread and butter, slice of life, friends just being friends, those kinds of stories

10. Where do you do your writing? What platform? When?

I usually write at home at my desk, since I study online I've got a pretty perfect set up to spend long hours there. If I'm not at home I'm at the library. I use Notion, because it's free, I have personal beef with Word and google docs sucks. It's not technically a writing platform in the sense I use it in but it works fine as one, it also makes it super easy to organise my files and extra notes of fics, on top of my editing and the drafts.

11. What is something you've been too nervous/intimidated to write, but would love to write one day?

I actually recently overcame my big too nervous to write fic. I am,, an asexual virgin but I also really enjoy reading smut. I've wanted to write some for ages, but on account of not knowing how sex works because I've never had it and also my inability to describe physical sensations I've been weary to give it a go in case it's terrible but I finally wrote some not long ago and published it over on ao3

12. What made you choose your username?

Well Asteria is just my name, and then Argo is a combined DC/Greek Mythology references. Argo comes from the Argonauts of The Golden Fleece myth, but it's also the name of the original supergirls home.

I do not know whose already been tagged or whose already done it so I'm just going to go for it and hope for the best @jamtartandsunshine @kvetchinglyneurotic @jamiesfootball @antitheticaally @its-not-easy-being-green-things

[howlingmoonrise]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

thank you for the tag @galvanizedfriend!!!!!!

How many works do you have on ao3? 45!

What's your total ao3 word count? 168,011 words

What fandoms do you write for? i'm an awful, awful fandom hopper :x but i write most consistently nowadays for petshop of horrors

Top five fics by kudos: 1) my dracula/barbie fic la petite mort is in first place, to the surprise of absolutely no one🤦‍♀️ 2) warrior, a post-movie shan yu/mulan oneshot 3) standing sentinel, an alien vs predator fix-it oneshot where lex goes with the predators and scar survives 4) surprising even me????? bonded, a soul eater soulmate au oneshot from 2014???? it has 8 comments total and half of them are my replies???? HOW. 5) not as surprisingly, in the woods somewhere, an ever after high cerise hood/daring charming au where daring accidentally ends up becoming the next riding hood. rare fandom/pair niche ftw!

Do you respond to comments? do you know when you reply mentally to things and then forget to actually do it irl? 😬 i have a really bad habit of opening comments on mobile, where i never type anything if i can help it, gush and draft the entire reply in my head, and then... yeah. i do eventually actually get to them all, but some will suffer through a year of no response before i pull up my sleeves and get to them. but dear gods do i try. the full answer is "yes, i do, and i absolutely love them all" but i feel very guilty about taking so long so i'll stick with "i try" 🙏🙏🙏

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? probably see you soon, a voltron legendary defender shidge fic, or songbird, a petshop of horrors angelica/p-chan oneshot with a bit of an experimental style. i think they're probably only fics i have that have a 100% unambiguously unhappy AND undeserved ending

What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? i usually try to aim for at least an ambiguously happy ending, so most of them? buuuuut that being said, i'm gonna point to my earlier fics in the soul eater or the yuri on ice fandoms, i was a lot sappier back in those. i've gotten a taste for a bit of a crunchier ending since then.

Do you get hate on fics? not really. i did receive hate for my voltron ships directly on the blog, but we all know how rotten that fandom was lmfao

Do you write smut? occasionally? i feel like i was in my smut-writing peak back in the soul eater fandom, but i was VERY productive in writing fic in general back in those days, and that no longer holds true. i feel like i'm a lot more self-conscious in writing smut nowadays and about how badly my writing in that genre would sound - the ideas are willing, but the flesh is weak.

Craziest crossover: i hate that my writer's block has cockblocked me from going crazier since despite wanting to write even wilder ships but. once again. my dracula/barbie fic la petite mort.

Have you ever had a fic stolen? not exactly. as far as i'm aware, no one has taken it ipsis verbis, but i have seen unauthorized and uncredited translations of my works floating around.

Have you ever had a fic translated? *side-eyes paragraph above* yep! my works seem to get podficced more than anything though

Have you ever co-written a fic before? i started writing one in my old, old days in the danny phantom fandom (hello, first fandom!), but our email exchanges petered out and it never got finished or posted anywhere

All time favorite ship? how the FUCK am i supposed to chose. my dude. why would you do this to me. it changes with the phases of the moon.

What's a wip you want to finish but doubt you ever will? i am 97.89% made of wips. 😬😬😬 there's just. so many. the first ones that come to mind is a magicstone (magica de spell/gladstone gander from the donald duck comics) angsty-ass oneshot, and also a jane darling/peter pan fic from peter pan 2 return to neverland, both of which i only ever posted snippets for a wip ask game years ago 😭😭😭 i also very much want to finish my shan yu/mulan longfic to the victor, the spoils and i have every intention of doing it but then i look back and. it's been half a decade already. rip.

What are your writing strengths? uhhhh. i find interesting dynamics and ways of bringing characters together? i'm a rare/crack shipping bitch so i need to find a way of really selling what i'm writing so that people will read it, so i guess i've honed my skills in that direction. i also usually get comments complimenting my writing style, though my own taste for it varies wildly. i also think i'm good at adapting my own style to fit the source material one.

What are your writing weaknesses? apart from being in a semi-permanent state of writer's block and never finishing anything, you mean? where do i START. action scenes. comedy. not doing run-on overly-wordy sentences no one but me will understand. too many italics. FUCKING PLOT. why can't i write solely vibes and pining, WHY does plot have to haunt me while blowing raspberries at me for not knowing how to plan anything more complicated than a fairytale-level quest.

Thoughts on dialogue in another language? english already IS another language for me 😂 that being said, i don't generally like it unless it's an untranslateable pun term or plot-relevant, in which case footnotes are appreciated. exceptions are titles/honorifics/actual names of things.

First fandom you wrote in? danny phantom, all the way back in like... 2009? it was how i learned to speak/write english beyond the basics. it was very, very bad, but i'm glad i got to go through that and experiment so wildly in such an encouraging fandom.

Favorite fic you've written? cinq d'épées, my princess and the frog dr facillier/charlotte la bouff 15k oneshot LITERALLY EVERYONE IS SLEEPING ON. why do people keep gushing on the dracula/barbie fic when that fic is RIGHT THERE with far less views than most of my other fics and way better writing quality. i honestly hate reading my own writing and even i enjoy rereading that one, villain/heroine morally grey ships my beloved.

--

thanks again for tagging me!!! tagging @sandmancircus @acernor @nemainofthewater @produdfctititty @starfishride @malgraw @olderthannetfic if you guys feel like it!

[sburbian-sage]

Hey, speaking of Dames... I have a Dame in my current session, a Dame of Light. He's a guy. And he kinda sucks. One of those conservative conspiracy theory types.

He has, shall we say, some OPINIONS on transgender people. We can mostly put up with it though- I'm agender, which is technically trans, and he's not tried to kill me for it or anything (gotten into heated arguments about it sure, but it's not gotten violent).

The issue of course is that he's totally convinced the game is trying to "turn him trans", and that's why he's been assigned Dame.

I've tried to tell him that the game just bugs out and gives supposedly gender-restricted classes out to just anyone sometimes, but...

Well, I think deep down, he's actually just fucking trans. I think he's using the game assigning him Dame as an excuse. "Oh no, I HAVE to act girly or it'll mess with my ARC levels!" that kinda thing.

Well, that all sounds fine, right? Just let him delude himself into thinking he's being forced into this, he'll (or rather, she'll, by then) probably come out of it a better person.

But like... I do have some concerns.

Firstly, he might just be right? Like, Sburb is not above doing fucked up shit to get people to mature. Forcibly transing a transphobe's gender doesn't feel like it's typical style, but like... how would I know, right?

This presents a problem. Maturity tends to go away at the end of a session. Is he gonna load into a new session, and just have a fuckton of trauma immediately from the game making him think he was trans, when he actually wasn't/isn't anymore/once more thinks he isn't?

Secondly, I consider myself a gender abolitionist. I try to be chill about it, I don't hassle people over having genders or anything, but when people ask why I'm agender, I will bring out my arguments about why I think the concept of gender is stupid. I'm sure there're people who'd find what I have to say upsetting. Is Sburb gonna decide one day that I'm a problem, and try and force a gender on me or something? I would assume not, but if it really doesn't care, why are classes ever gender biased at all?

Thirdly... IS HE FUCKING UP HIS ARC LEVELS IF HE DOESN'T ACT LIKE A GIRL??? I had assumed of course not, that the game doesn't give a fuck if Dame's "act girly" or whatever. But... why does the Dame class get assigned to girls more often? He's the Dame, and he's saying that's how this shit works, and it's not like I've ever rolled Dame, so is he actually right??? If I roll Dame one day, will I need to act girly for the stats?????

"Maturity goes away at the end of a session"? I don't know what you mean by that. Putting aside issues I'll get to in the next paragraph, the game doesn't mindwipe you or anything once you're done with a session. "Losing maturity" typically refers to the metaphorical slump in your soul that comes naturally when the game yoinks all your stats (and your powers and your items and your everything) when you begin a new session, which will naturally make anyone feel worse. Or like all that personal development they went through doesn't mean anything because now you gotta do it again. It's a figure of speech, not a literal construct, and you get used to it eventually.

That nitpick aside, no, SBURB doesn't forcetrans anyone. Another mistake is being made here, SBURB only assigns a meaningful title the first time. I was a native Sage of Mind because I needed that, all those years ago, and here I am now. Literally everything after that was purely randomly generated nonsense. Nonsense I had to "play the role" for, but nonsense nonetheless. If SBURB decided that you being agender was an issue, it would have done that in your first session. And I'm assuming it didn't, because the game is never that direct about stuff like that. If you're trans or genderqueer or whatever, any effect this has on your "maturity arc" is incidental at best. Some people have talked about how "SBURB made me realize I was trans", but that's flowery language, they went on their self discovery lovequest while playing the game and maybe they got some special insights they wouldn't have if they weren't a replayer. I couldn't imagine what that "special insight" is though, unless it's referring to the replayernet. Most people tend to realize they're queer through online communities, the replayernet is the only online community now (split into several sub-communities but still), and as we all know everyone who has ever touched a computer is gay and all the funniest shitposters are trans.

Now the elephant in the room. It is true that the game does sometimes bug out and give gender-restricted classes to people of the wrong gender. There's some debate that the "gender-restricted classes" just have a heavy gender bias but it's ultimately random (the dearth of female Knights supports this), but for all intents and purposes let's imagine that they ARE gender-locked. Dame is a female class, and it going towards this guy is a bug. However... Because SBURB does take data from your mind, it does mean that if you identify as female and your body isn't, the game registers you as female, and will assign classes accordingly. The "gender restriction bug" is extremely consistent in that manner. To the point where, let's not kid ourselves, it's not a fucking bug. Not to say that "every time you encounter this bug it's because the game knows", only that the game does recognize player gender, even if the player themselves is unaware. We're currently at a crossroads where it could be a sincere bug, or a sincere closet case, and there's not enough information to tell. If you're Weird and determined to get to the bottom of this transvestigation, you might want to check what gender their dreamself is. "Wrong gender dreamself" happens for the same reason "wrong gender class" does, but if BOTH happen then it's probably not a bug.

And no, the game doesn't count "acting girly" as part of the Dame's roleplay coefficient, that's stupid. The game hands out RP for acting as your title, not acting as your title's gender. I can't tell you why they made Dames a female class, because I didn't design the game, but it's probably an aesthetic flourish. Same reason why Princes are a predominately male class, it's called Prince, and Prince is the male form, ergo it's a male class. Except when it's not, but it's still called the Prince. If you're dead set on transvestigating, making up this obvious lie and then bemoaning the fact that "oh no, I have to act like a girl now or else the game will kill me, I hate that I have to act like a girl now but I have no choice" is either some MAJORLY sussy pantomiming, or he's cis and just very, very sexist.

My final note is that if you determine he's cis and don't want to hear him complaining about WOKE SKAIA'S plan to FORCIBLY TRANSITION these MINOR PLAYERS (with the brains of adults), think provocation might "pierce the veil and help bring her home", or just want to be very funny in a way that makes them not want to talk to you for a while, try busting out the classic "it's obvious that you're a woman because you're acting hysterical about this" line. Tactical Misogyny is a foolproof idea with no possible recourse or downsides.

[sesshy380]

OKAY

🌵🥑🍬 🔪 🥐 🏜️ 🧩

ಠ‿ಠ

🌵 ⇢ share the link to a playlist you love

I actually created a Spotify account and added my main work commute playlist (I've never had a reason to create a Spotify account since I got me rum and me parrot and me VLC 🏴‍☠️)

Daily Commute (yes, I actually named it that because I could no brain a better title)

🥑 ⇢ you accidentally killed somebody, which mutual(s) do you text for help?

So I 'accidentally' killed somebody? And I gotta rely on the moots for help? Hypothetically speaking...I won't need help.

Now if it's a character that I've accidently killed...I'll cry. Then both you and @resuri-art are going to hear all about it.

🍬 ⇢ post an unpopular opinion about a popular fandom character

This one is more for entertainment purposes (and it even gets mentioned in longfic).

It's been pointed out that Marik likes books. He probably got tired of looking over scrolls, but he actually loves to read. During the early stages of creating his criminal organization, he would go to bookstores and libraries to get a basic grasp of common languages. One of those being English. In his stubbornness to try and do things for himself (without needing to rely on Odion or the Rod), he attempted to ask for such a book on his own. Cue him becoming the owner of the complete works of William Shakespeare.

I think you can see where this is going.

So my uncommon HC for him is that he is fluent in Shakespearian English.

🔪 ⇢ what's the weirdest topic you researched for a writing project?

Common highschool chemistry lab accidents and how to make certain deadly chemicals.

Please note: I had two teens in school at the time. They walked past while I was making my search. They both seemed to know the answer, as they were giving me a list of sites to visit that had complete 'how to make at home' lists. No, it was not that surprising coming from them.

🥐 ⇢ name one internet reference that will always make you laugh

I'm a sucker for Rick Rolls that I actually get me. I will laugh while hanging my head lol.

🏜️ ⇢ what's your favourite type of comment to receive on your work?

Honestly, I get so few that I love them all, but if I had to pick a type that's my favorite...the ones that point out that little subtle detail (whether intended or not). I love throwing little hints in my longer fics, and when someone spots it and asks questions, I just wanna scream and word vomit spoilers (but I am good about not doing that last part). I think I've only gotten maybe 1 or 2 that pointed out something I hinted at.

A close tie for favorite is getting good comments about writing something that is relatable to the reader, like this one from TKB 2nd chance:

🧩 ⇢ what will make you click away from a fanfiction immediately?

WALL OF TEXT WITH NO PUNCTUATION

If I open and see wall of text, no paragraph breaks, I hit the back button. I just...cannot. I can do all lowercase. I can suffer through typo hell (within reason). I can even avoid eye-twitching inaccuracies (there are a few that make my brain scream, but I just carry on).

I CANNOT ignore someone writing a wall of text without a single break for changed PoV, dialogue, or basic punctuation. If I am forced to read that I will cry.

Ask Game here

[sablewing]

AI - Solving the Wrong Problems Because It's Cheaper - 325 - 15 February 2024

I've been reading the various opinion pieces on Artificial Intelligence (AI) and I definitely have opinions about what I've read. Here is a short list of some of the highlights of items I've found

AI is a public relations (PR) term for a predictive pattern generator, i.e. a text completion tool. The better term to use is Large Language Model (LLM) for language processing, and image generator for image generation.

AI is the latest attempt by the software industry to automate software development work and other jobs viewed as excessively expensive and easy to automate for businesses

The current models of AI available to the public are meant to present as pleasing eye candy to those who are inexperienced with different questions. When technical experts use the tools, the reports are about the lack of detail and deficiencies in the answers. The answers provide a starting place but not a complete solution for the questions.

AI is being used to solve the wrong problems It's being used this way because it is cheaper and easier than using it to solve the right problems

There are benefits to the current set of AI software models, if they are viewed as tools that need to be mastered instead of replacements for employees

AI is a public relations (PR) term for a fancy search engine

As I've gotten older and perhaps somewhat wiser, I've finally realized that the latest and greatest tech is often referred to using terms that are a good fit for marketing and may or may not be a good fit for the actual technology described. With the latest hullabaloo about AI I have found the same type of hype, that seems meant to better generate buzz and eyeballs on companies instead of describing the technology.

After reading a bit about AI and trying out one of the engines, here is how I would describe this new technology, which isn't all that new. The actual name of the technology, as used in the industry, is Large Language Model (LLM). A LLM is software that is used to predict what the next word, paragraph or other content based on a very large collection of data that has been organized. The software is used to process many various inputs and it is trained to emulate human behavior and write new content based on the information it has organized. For example, if someone asks the question, "What could I eat for breakfast?", the LLM might answer 'cereal', 'bacon and eggs', or 'fruit and roll', based on the dataset it has gathered.

There are problems that can occur when trying to use an LLM to write something like a blog article or a short story. At the current state of the software, it is creating a work based on the probability of the words and without a context that is tied to the real world. The only input is text and guidance from the LLM developers. A human has additional inputs through their senses, and their experiences in addition to information they have read or heard. A human also receives inputs from multiple humans of varying ages and backgrounds, while an LLM would receive limited input from a select set of humans, software developers specializing in the creation of neural networks.

In summary, LLMs are used to predict a probably outcome, not to use knowledge to generate an outcome. This means that the outcome is not original content but a result based on sifting through multiple sources to come up with what appears to be the best fit. As such, an LLM can at best emulate human intelligence in a very limited way. And if it receives new input in the form of questions, it will have limited context to process to find an answer. For example, for the question about breakfast, I asked what it would recommend, I got a fairly complete list of breakfast foods that seem centered on United States cuisine. I had to ask for breakfast and specify a different location in order to get different lists. A human might first ask, "Where do you want to eat breakfast?" before answering so they could have a context for the question. There are factors that we perceive, such as clothing, skin tone, gender and other physical characteristics that might change our answer. With a test LLM, it seems very sure of itself and if it can find an answer, it will provide one, even if it might be wrong.

Which to be fair, humans will also do this. People want to be helpful and it feels better to provide information instead of saying "I don't know." In the end, my assessment is that LLM's or AI as they might be called, are fancier search engines that can find existing data to answer questions, even if the information they provide is incorrect.

AI is the latest attempt by the software industry to automate software development work

Another feature I've seen recommended for AI is writing software. People are worried they might lose their software development job to an AI as they continue to improve in functionality. Based on trends I've seen in my career, I wouldn't be too worried about this as a problem. Here are some examples of attempts to automate software development that are no longer used or only used as a tool by software developers.

Have a few software architects design and write pseudo code that can be implemented by developers. The pseudo code will work perfectly so people with minimal skills can be used at a cheaper cost to implement the software.

Object oriented code will be added to libraries and create a foundation that only a few developers will need to use to develop software programs

Code will be designed to work in modules that do not require integration testing before they are deployed

A high level language will be used that will remove all possibility of errors introduced by developers. (This is a popular theme and based on articles about a new language, seems like it still occurs.

Eventually each language settles down into its niche usage or fades away from lack of use due to complexity/still requires debugging that outweighs its features.

App creation tools for phones will open up programming to anyone who is interested.

I've seen each of these trends come and go, and each one of them was supposed to reduce the number of developers required or reduce the skill level required to create good quality software programs. I'm still waiting for this to work and I don't think software development as a profession is going away any time soon.

AI is being used to solve the wrong problems and It's being used this way because it is cheaper and easier than using it to solve the right problems

Right now AI is used to reduce the time required to search large amounts of stored data. The search results are based on answers that are guessed due to the quantity and context of possible answers. The data itself is not organized, it is left as is and the AI builds a model to use when searching it.

These searches are based on the assumptions that The data is complete

The data is of high quality and covers the majority real world use cases

This model can be used to find data with accuracy approaching 100%

When looking at data that is not clean, it becomes easy to find examples where these assumptions fail. While this sounds like a worthwhile problem, it is also an easy problem for computers to solve, compared to other real world problems. Computers are very good at repetitive functions and searching for matches in an optimized matter is a core part of software development. But these searches are not generating new information, they are only allowing people to be somewhat more efficient at finding data. And if a person does not have skill or experience in generating good questions for AI, even this function is questionable.

There is a lot of money getting spent on this development so it sounds like it is a very expensive pursuit. However, there are other real world problems that would be of greater benefit, in my opinion, that are making little or no progress. Two examples of very hard problems to solve are sewing clothes and harvesting crops. Both activities are low paying and considered to require very little skill. It seems like they would be fields ripe for disruption and replacement by automation.

The reality is that both activities require things that automation does not have, such as

Vision

Manual dexterity

Ability to work in very bad conditions

Judgment

Current automation techniques are building machines that do have a type of vision and which can manipulate objects in the real world. Those machines are not paired with software that can also make quick and correct judgments and work in very bad conditions. If a machine is set to work in a wet, dirty and unsafe environment, it will eventually shut down or possibly break down. The machines have to operate in a very specific set of conditions and require monitoring to ensure they continue functioning. This monitoring is less labor intensive than the labor but it still requires human input. Sadly, a machine has to work in better conditions than a human or it will break down and lose the investment dollars. There are reports that describe the difficulty of generating profit when using technology to farm indoors.

In my opinion, the current efforts of AI are focused on the following goals:

Scrape existing data from as many on-line sources as possible Store the data in a database that is easily searchable Pair it with software that parses questions to search the data for the most populated result which may not be the correct result

This set of goals can easily make use of existing infrastructure and does not require any great innovation to gather data or organize the data for the search results. By great innovation, I am looking at discoveries like the creation of HTML, the microcomputer and other inventions that were a unique combination of existing technology that required insight and experience to develop. AI engines appear to be, in my opinion, simply refinement of existing search methods that is assembled in a user friendlier format to reach a broader audience.

If I were going to develop new tools that I think might be useful, here are a couple of my suggestions

Human reviewed data that is organized by categories. The categories are used to provide context for performing a search. For example, if searching for the word 'tile', there is a context of buying tiles for the kitchen, gaming tiles, historical tile work, or the manufacturing process for kitchen tile. Current search engines will provide the most asked for searches and depend on the user to come up with the correct context to find the term they want. There could be multiple filters selected, such as business versus educational, to help narrow down the results. AI might be used to search and suggest organization, humans would use this as a tool to review and approve/change the suggested categories. I think of this as a role for a type of librarian, one who manages on-line data instead of physical books.

Building algorithms that parse real world data based on input from various sensors. The algorithms would gather data and have self-modifying algorithms to organize the data in some method. Humans would be involved in guiding the algorithms towards societally and morally acceptable methods of parsing the data. The algorithms would have attachments that could interact with the environment that it is gathering data in. If this seems complicated, human children are performing these same activities from birth. Yet we seem to have a lot of difficulty training machines to do the same things that human children learn in the first five years of their life. I would not attach this type of software to the internet, it would be too easy for it to devolve and revert to the current level of AI algorithms that simply search and repeat back what they find. The intent is to have a machine experience parts of the world in the same way as living beings to see if they can respond back in a similar way.

Summary

The latest artificial intelligence algorithms are simply the latest of a set of tools that high level managers and investors see as a way to make money in the short term and not necessarily as tools for long term use. There are long term uses for this type of software, if in my opinion it is viewed as a tool and not a replacement for people and their experience. There are harder problems that if solved could be of great benefit. However, these uses of software would not yield returns as quickly as the current set of short term goals. Even with this short turnaround of return for investment, the software is advertised in ways designed to engage emotions and short circuit rational thought about the use of AI. My recommendation is to wait and see what companies survive the current advertising and pump cycle before investing or predicting how AI will change the world.

References for this article, including opinions from others who write more concisely than I do about AI and its possible impacts.

[amadwinter]

Making of Monday - the thrill of the fall

On Making of Monday, we share behind the scenes of one of our works past, present, or future. All the little things that would fit into a DVD bonus content section: cut scenes, outlines, director's writer's commentary, or basically any thing that didn't make it into the final version. Send me an ask if you're interested in knowing little details about any particular fic!

Today on this Making of Monday, I'm going to talk about my much neglected longfic the thrill of the fall. I've started going through what I've already posted and editing it in hopes it will get me back to writing, even if it may not look quite like this.

(fairly long post under the cut with photos included)

While most of my recent fics have been relatively short, this one is not so much. Almost 30k posted, and with another 30k that has yet to be finished, this fic absolutely counts as a long fic. My process for writing these is a little different than shorter fics. And I'm going to take you through the process of how a chapter gets done (or at least how they have gotten done in the past and how I hope to continue in the future)

To begin with, I have my outline. Each of these are divided into an approximate chapter, although this can change by the time it's actually written. Then, I print it out.

This is from chapter 4 (helpfully numbered up top), which is extremely similar to the end result. Some chapters have major structural differences in between drafts, but not this one.

As you can see, I write notes in the margins, cross out things I don't like, bold things I want to emphasize, etc. etc. Some parts are moved to another point in the fic, some are tossed in a bin in hopes I might use them later. I even keep track of my word count as I go along, but that comes a little later.

From this outline, I handwrite my first draft in pen. Now, since it's been over a year since I worked on this fic, I have misplaced the yellow legal pad I was using to write it (or maybe I was using loose paper, I can't remember). However, it looks a little something like this:

Ignore the fact that this is a Star Trek fic

Cursive, mostly no paragraph breaks (=> signifies a paragraph break, who knows why I chose that symbol. I've been doing it like this for more than a decade). Sometimes my writing turns into more chickenscratch than cursive, but it's mostly legible to me (... mostly).

Then I type it all up, and I get something like this:

That's just the first page of it.

And then after a few rounds of editing, I have this (again only the first page):

Full chapter here, but I recommend reading it in order if you're interested.

And that's how the chapters get made!

... well, okay. With Chapter 4, I worked and reworked and reworked the smut scene to death to make it good. But other than that, it's usually just a couple rounds of editing and then it's posted.

A notable exception to this was Chapter 2, where I had a lovely lovely friend who I met at an in-person writing class look over to get some of the pacing right. I never did that again because even though this friend does read and write fic, they are also the Dungeon Master for our weekly Dungeons and Dragons game, and I don't think I could look them in the eye for a while if I asked them to proofread my smut.

... but that's a little off topic. Anyway, one day in the future, I might tell the story of how I came up with the idea for this fic, and trust me, it's not straightforward in the slightest.

[pastelitey]

5, 11, 13 for the mcytblr ask game ?

thank you so much for the ask!!

5. How do you translate the world of Minecraft to fit into your fanfics when you keep the original setting?

this one is always a toughie for me when i keep the og setting. i do my best to implement the mc mechanics that are important to the plot, but the highest extent you'll ever see me going to to replicate the vibe of a mc setting is giving the characters pocket communicators. other than that they're just vaguely fantasy-based settings with vague mc inspirations, like the mobs and such.

11.Are you more of a planner or an improviser?

definitely a planner, at least for the most part! for lengthy fics i outline everything to the best of my ability and occasionally throw in a little detail or scene i thought of on the spot, so 95% of everything i write is planned. but if it's a one-shot, i usually start by writing a little paragraph on where i want to go with the piece and then just run with the idea!

13.Any segment of your work that made you cry while writing it? (because it moved you deeply)

due to how excessively planned out most of my writing is, i've never actually cried while writing. yeah, i've made myself a little emotional, but never to the point of tears. the only time i've really gotten teary-eyed while writing was when i was typing up the final endnotes for homesick, because i'd loved working on that fic so much and was sad to say goodbye to it. other than that, i don't think so!

thank you again for sending an ask!! here's the link to the ask game, hint hint :]

[queer-boo-radley]

Suuuupppppeeeerrrrr random question but do emma and regina play dnd together? Bc i the chill vs gory video game scene is just fantastic and i can see something similar for dnd

If yes, who plays what and whats their style of play? Who is the dice collector? Do they like to play or dm more? Are they super extra with minifigs and map creation?

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃😃 They do!!! As you can tell I'm excited about this ask. You see, the thing is, I want to do a one-shot where it's a big group of them playing dnd at Regina's house, but I have never actually gotten to play dnd before myself, so when I start writing it I am planning on coming on here to beg for some advice lol. Like I only understood the first half of your first question in the second paragraph and none of the rest. 😅😅 Oh and I understand the DM part and I think that will probably be Belle. I've watched it be played before but that was SEVERAL years ago. I was also fucking around with the idea of coming up with some kind of bracket-type poll to help me decide who plays what? Kind of like a way for me as a writer to randomize their stats if that makes sense?