#Something about these series are really easy to mesh

[ghost-on-mars1]

soc Gk au

Can't stop thinking about Ogata and Inkarmat with a Kaz an Nina dynamic. They hardly interacted in the original series but as designated fox and cat I kinda wish they had. Kaz and Nina have something akin to a sibling dynamic where they aggressively annoy each other. They could have been annoying let them be annoying.

And I haven't actually watched the SaB show but I have seen clips from season 2 where Nina gets a flash of Kaz'a past when she touches his hand. Now imagine that but Inkarmat and Ogata. Where Inkarmats probably trying to use her ability to heal him (because Ogata doesn't really have anything that makes him panic like that) or just mad at him which is also understandable, and catches a glimpse of a figure just barely in her vision. She flinches but nobody is there when she turns.

The crew doesn't have a member that gets called Wraith like the crows (sorry Koito no scary nickname for you), there is an honorary seventh that one believes might actually be a wraith.

[fleur-a-whump]

Overloaded (#1)

Preventative Measures

so like. this is a thing. been toying with this little guy in my head for a few weeks and like, almost nothing is concrete but I'm hoping I'll turn it into a series.

content: ex-villain whumpee, hero/leader whumper, manipulative whumper, just like a LOT of manipulation, collars/collaring, referenced electrocution, low self esteem, subtle threats, guilt trips

I've never done this before, let me know if I missed something!!

masterlist | next

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Villain has finally been given a chance. A chance to prove he's more than what the whole city has always thought of him, more than what his father raised him to be. He wanted to do good in the world. The heroes were finally giving him a chance to be more than they've always thought of him. 

...or so he thought.

He gulps as he stares at the shock collar in Team Leaders hands. It's a small thing, sleek and unassuming. But he knows exactly what it is because Team Leader had shown him how it worked.  The man is currently speaking to him nonchalantly. Villain should really be listening to the hero that holds the key to a better life. But that collar... shakes Villain's faith in Team Leader. Just a little.

"Villain," the man says shortly. Impatiently. Shit.

Villain jumped to attention, nerves only growing worse. 

"Sorry, sorry! I'm just-just a little confused. I thought... I was a part of the team..." He tries to keep the heartbreak out of his voice. He doesn't quite succeed. 

"If you'd listen..." the Team Leader sighed deeply. Villain was going to throw up. 

Team Leader began again, speaking slowly as if to a child. Or a stupid person. Villain thinks he fell into the latter column. "I was just saying this will help you better mesh with the team. I'm sure you've noticed people are a little nervous with you around."

Hostile. Villain would use the word hostile.

"Given your past, everything you've done," the man drawled. Villain can't hold back a wince. 

"So, to ease their worries, and allow them to see how great I know you can be, this is just a little precautionary measure. A bit of a show."

Ryan swallowed thickly.

"So... It wouldn't be used..."

He tries to keep himself from thinking about electricity burning the sensitive skin of his throat as it shoots down his spine and into his skull to paralyze him. He's familiar enough with the feeling; he doesn't need to imagine it.

Team Leader gives him an easy smile. "As long as there are no issues, of course not."

"...Issues?"

"Oh, stuff that'll never happen. Just breaking any of the rules."

Villain arched his brow, slightly dubious. "Rules.”

"Yeah, like, follow orders, don't fraternize with any of your old contacts, don't leave our level, don't work unsupervised, don't harm the team. Stuff you've been doing this whole time."

"Wait, don't leave the level?

"I mean, that's pretty obvious, bud. If we can't see you, we can't know that you're following the rest of the rules."

He nods mutely, gaze wandering. this whole thing just. He didn't know. It hurt.

Team Leader gently tilted his head up. "Villain, I'm only doing this because I trust you. I know you'd never do anything that could jeopardize your place here."

He doesn't trust that Villain is a hero though, obviously. That he's good. Because Villain could never be good. Not now. Not after all he's done. 

No, he can only hope to do good. And the only way he'll be able to do that is with the team. If this is what it takes to ease his team into working with him, if this is what it takes for him to stay, then he'll do it.

"O-okay."

"Atta boy, Villain! I knew you could do it, man."

Villain nods, trying to give him a smile.

Team Leader moves towards him all too quickly, and he can't help the flinch. The man doesn't seem to notice—or at least he doesn't acknowledge it—and is soon once again gently tilting Villain's chin up from where it had fallen. 

Villain fights the urge to lean into the touch.

While he's distracted, Team Leader swiftly brings the collar, already disengaged and bent open at the hinges, and presses it to Villain's skin. 

Villain jolts at the cold metal and fights to swallow as it's closed around his neck.

The locking mechanism clicks right up against his spine. He can't help the shudder that trickles down his back at the finality of the sound.

"I'm so proud of you, bud," Team Leader says with a big smile and a ruffle of Villain's shaggy curls.

The tightness in his chest eases, just a little. A little part of him flares in anger at how easily he's comforted. He doesn't deserve the comfort.

But he's trying. The collar now fit snuggly around his neck, like it was made for him, is proof of that.

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ps ex-villain whumpee on the hero team but whumped by the hero team is my all-time favorite trope and it is so hard to find I have finally hit the point of needing to produce my own story to scratch the itch

[yuriskies]

Fishing Yuri vs Reproductive Fascism

Issui Ogawa's Twinstar Cyclone Runaway novel series caught my attention the moment I learned about it. A gay marriage allegory in a weird sci-fi setting? Sign me right the fuck up. I've always found explicitly political sci-fi interesting, and well, Ogawa is not exactly a small name in Japanese sci-fi. However, a Japanese hard sci-fi novel is not going to have an easy time finding a good translation to English, much less a fanbase. So I was really excited to see that it was getting a manga adaptation, and from what it has adapted so far (~half of the first of three novels in an ongoing series), it's really living up to my feeling of hype.

There is a general setting summary after the break, and then a section where I talk a bit about the most recent chapter (8), and how it really makes a cogent argument extractive economic systems are reinforced by patriarchal norms.

The plot centers around Terra Intercontinental Endeavor, a woman who has inherited her family's fishing boat. The fishing boat requires two people to operate, a job which is performed by straight couples as a form of marriage contract. The use of married couples is understandable, given that the fishing boat transformable rocket plane that descends from orbit to operate in the skies of a gas giant, an operating environment which requires almost preternatural communication skills between the pilot and the person transforming the ship. The fish that swim around in the gas giant's skies are special: they're made of a kind of clay that can be molded by thought. The catch forms the backbone of the planetary economy; otherwise, the planetary system is so resource-starved that humanity cannot sustain itself without something to offer through galactic trade networks. Terra is highly gifted at producing complex transformations of the ship, but cannot communicate well with the male pilots she is interviewing for marriage. Part of this is because her way of describing things is a little kooky, but the majority is because the patriarchal culture she lives in has produced a lot of condescending, sexist guys who Obviously Know Better.

Fresh off a round of failed marriage interviews, Terra is desperate to find anyone who can pilot the boat. In steps a mysterious girl named Diode, who proves herself to be an exceptionally talented pilot whose skills mesh well with Terra's. So far, the story has alternated between Terra's experiences within the stifling cultural life of her home, and the moments of dizzying freedom and connection that Terra and Diode find when they're out fishing.

(Spoilers from here on out, so stop here if you would prefer to read more on your own. )

As far as the broader world of Twinstar Cyclone Runaway is concerned, the first seven manga chapters have largely focused on how badly Terra fits in with the surrounding culture. She has a reputation around the port, mostly as a person who creates absurdly complicated fishing gear and makes up weird stories. Her aunt and uncle both want to see her happily married so she can fulfill her dream of fishing, but tend to push their preferences onto her. She works as a video distributor in the clan's dilapidated cultural archives, and appears to be one of the few people interested in the world of her clan's space station. In part, this is due to the conservatism of the culture - most people are strictly utilitarian and seem happy to accept the world as it is. There's also sexism. Woo boy is there sexism.

The first few chapters alternate between life on the station, where Terra is exposed to a constant stream of sexism. The chapters dealing with station culture are almost an exercise in masochism, but provided the set dressing for a chapter which does a really decent job at describing the organizing thought processes behind anti-LGBTQ lawmaking. In it, Terra and Diode's activities have drawn the attention of the authorities, who are none too happy that they're fishing together (and effectively presenting themselves as common law wives in the process).

They're both summoned to the clan council, where the clan chief immediately begins lecturing Terra (and belittling her with backhanded complements) before ordering her to surrender her family's fishing boat to someone else. During his lecture, he highlights the 'freedom' enjoyed by their clan compared to the even more stifling culture of the clan Diode hails from. He attributes that freedom to the strong sense of "culture and tradition" of the clan, and the work of those with "superior bloodlines" who support and perpetuate it by passing that sense of identity on to the next generation while countering the clan's slowly shrinking population. Under this logic, allowing Terra to participate in a same-sex marriage is considered tantamount to enabling a cultural collapse.

It is, from just about any perspective, a fascist perspective on gender roles. Women are valued not for their ability to contribute to the culture but for their service as reproductive cogs in the economic machine. Culture and tradition are interpreted as something transmitted through blood, not community. Terra's work in maintaining the cultural archives are viewed as useless make-work, as to the leadership, a woman who does not reproduce is preventing the transmission of culture. The stability and economic productivity of the clan is the organizing principle of society, highlighted by the fact that the roles of clan chief (political leader) and head fisherman (economic leader) are held by the same person. In this framework, the backbone of society is understood to be its captains of industry, those working in economically-prestigious jobs, and their social role is to maintain the economic prestige and exclusivity of the fishing class.

The chapter ends with Diode (having initially been begrudgingly convinced to allow Terra to do the talking) exploding at how the clan chief has been talking down to the both of them. She points out the hollowness of the underlying rhetoric - although it portrays culture as something shaped by struggle and ability to assert one's will, it systematically denies most people from the attempt. While pointing this out, she also mocks the clan chief's skills, clearly relying on the offense to his masculinity to provide the opening for herself and Terra to prove themselves. While the gambit works, the clan chief is clearly setting the terms of a challenge to make them prove themselves exceptional, a task which carries a high likelihood of death.

By the way, the art does a lot of the heavy lifting here. Despite Ahiru Tanaka's slightly cartoony style, he is incredibly skilled at getting the point across through composition. Terra's workplace in the cultural archives is dingy, cramped, and literally disintegrating, and Tanaka's line work reflects this - dense, imprecise, and messy. It really sells the apparent lack of maintenance since the archives were constructed. By contrast, the clan council's chambers is airy, bright, and characterized by cleaner, more precise line work. The difference is night and day, and I think it really helps sell the Endeavor Clan's underlying thinking of exactly where "culture and tradition" are transmitted.

Anyway, I just had to gush a little bit about this chapter, in what is quickly becoming one of the manga releases I most anticipate reading every month.

[witchofthesouls]

Ayoooooo, Primeval Anon here, to respond to your response (don't worry too much about how long you took to answer, it was worth the wait)!

Omfg, you had me hooked in when you mentioned Bloodborne-influenced lore. I love the hell out of Bloodborne, and just in general From Software's Dark Fantasy settings. And I love that premise. It definitely fits in with the Quintessons clearly aquatically-influenced nature.

I also enjoy the idea of the Primes balancing each other out with their different natures. As well as the idea that the Quintessons kinda... cannibalized him... fucking gnarly lol.

Just imagine, post-occupation, there's these series skirmishes, perhaps even smaller-scale wars, between the og Prime worshipping groups and the the emerging sects of Quintesson-influenced cultists. Something like

Priest from Kaon: For it is said that in his wisdom, Megatronus- Priest from [SETTLEMENT NAME REDACTED]: You mean Mortilus? Priest from Kaon: :| *The settlement of [NAME REDACTED] was procedurally, systematically decimated in their war with the Kaonites*

Now, I don't know about other continuities they've featured in, like Aligned, but in G1 they definitely had some sort of caste system. Only ranking I can immediately think of are the "Judges", which would be the ones people generally think of when it comes to the Quintessons, there were a few other variants if I'm remembering it right. There was a video that I saw that talked about this, I'll have to go and re-watch it.

Anyways yeah, maybe the castes are made up of different sub-species within the Quintessons genus? And then under them come the Sharkticons and Allicons (Those weird croc-like dudes who nab Kup and Hotrod after they end up on Quintessa). Maybe they were at one point Cybertronian Wilders who were abducted by the Quintessons during the occupation and, through a mix of selective breeding and genetic modification, were able to turn them in their own obedient, self-replenishing army, that whenever the Quintessons aren't enacting some campaign of destruction or conquest, just kinda vibe in the oceans of Quintessa alongside the local fauna of the planet.

Y'know... now that I think about it, since the Quintessons would clearly inherit Quintus' unhinged daydreamer work ethic, do you think they'd also fuck with the wildlife of their homeworld, perhaps even the planet itself??? Gods, I hate how the Quintessons are so underdeveloped because they exist in the same universe as the Transformers.

Yeah, I'm really disappointed how the Quintessons as a whole are really underutilized as characters and background lore.

I mean, the shit is right there!

Me, if given the chance to sit down with a new Transformers team to talk about leveraging the connection between Cybertron, Earth, and Quintessa with supernatural elements:

Personally, I'm more of the "Quintessons fucked with their own planet" camp. Don't get me wrong, the Quintessons had established a massive empire to command resources, including bodies, but the Allicons and Sharkticons seem to be directly from Quintessa. Both fit the aquatic theme going on. Plus, sharks are natural predators of cephalopods and attack injured or sick whales (another predator of squids). While alligators don't usually eat cephalopods, they are an apex predator that does go on land and will eat just about anything. Soooo, easy clean up as well as population control on campaign?

I totally believe it's within character for the highest castes of Quintessons to be cyborgs/techno-organic instead of full mechanoid because of certain kinds of resistances and the way they control their fully mechanical populations. And they would totally be in genetic modification, selective breeding, and terraforming as a whole because 1) absolute control, 2) meshes Quintus' own special interests with the Quintessons' military and economic might, and 3) sustainability, what's that!?

The last point is the kicker because it's what really cements their own origins via Quintus Prime. That particular Prime truly believed that life should flourish at all costs. The problem? Environments can only support so much before nature sets up its own checks and balances, or the entire thing ends up collapsing.

Well, Quintus bypassed nature's complex and fragile systems and would have shown his organic creations how to overcome their own limitations: biological, physical, and environmental. He's like the guy that would successfully crossbreed potato and kudzu because the resulting crop would feed millions upon millions... at the astronomical cost of arable land, soil health, decline of biodiversity, and property management due to accumulated damages.

Quintus doesn't worry about that because it's part of the process! He's collecting data for future reference and starts working on fertilizers to support the crossbreeds immense nutritional demands, animal husbandry so herbivores can chomp down on the remains, and construction materials/architectural designs resistant to plant growth damage.

Quintus, you crazy scientist of a dreamer, that's not the fucking point!

So yeah, because Quintus didn't have his siblings to kick his ass about sustainable measures (because everything from medicinal to food to construction had to come some somewhere), Quintessa got overharvested or destroyed. Because of the immense deprivation, Quintessons went colonial on their planetary neighbors. Because they succeeded with their neighbors and never thought to change their way of life because of yummy resources, they went on campaign into distant systems where they cut their teeth against mechanical species and subjugated them.

And because the If You Give a Mouse a Cookie pattern would take way too long to get to my point: the Quintessons literally built their way to conquered Cybertron, fuck that planet and its indigenous people and fauna over in the spectacular fashion they did to Quintessa, got kicked off as their empire almost collapsed, but literally had a direct hand to the civil war between Autobots and Decepticons that lead to the final stand off on Earth.

(Funny enough, the civil war was on a scale so massive that it encompassed galaxies and disrupted the current rendition of the Quintesson Pan Galactic Co-Prosperity Sphere. They literally built the greatest threats to their own empires. Who would have thought?!)

Religious tensions after the Quintessons been kicked off would have been an interesting direction to explore. Even life during the occupation as the Thirteen would have been symbols of rebellion versus the Quintessons' rabid methods to obfuscate their own origins as well as tactics to break the cultural roots and ties of new subjugated planets.

Because old names become illegal, new epitaphs or names are given to undermine the regime and eventually become the new cultural practice. Then, there's the cultural blend between the natives and the colonial powers as well as the generations purposely raised in a certain cultural mindset. Since the Quintessons took control of the Well, it's a safe bet that they also took control of the institutional pillars of the society: religion, science, and law.

Primes are still titanic figures on post-occupation Cybertron, so perhaps Quintessons had only limited success in destroying mythic tales and religious traditions. Because the newer generations took on the Quintessons' distaste towards beasts and untouched nature as well as kept Quintessons' way of social hierarchy that they knew.

Quintessons emphasized function as Cybertronians (and other mechanoids) are machines compared to them. All machines have certain functions, no? Some machines are meant for certain roles, no? Machines are only capable as much as programmed, but Quintessons are far more advanced because they overcame their limitations with their own creative endeavors!

Quintessons basically treated Cybertronians as living appliances, gadgets, and animals. To them, a Cybertronian was a more fun and dynamic Siri or Alexa than a real person. Sure, a Quint could bond and form an emotional attachment, but it's still not truly 'alive.' And they codified that into their own laws.

Basically, Quintessons would have been okay with Prima and his Guiding Hand. They would have propped up his specific actions on how civilization should be (cement more tensions between city-states and Wilder tribes and unregulated environmental policies), switch up or change key mythology (Prima and Megatronus being split-spark twins that rule together into Prima being the sole Sun and Megatronus becoming a late brother that became the Great Evil that became jealous of the Sun and destroyed Life.), and straight up destroyed or damaged historic and culturally significant items and practices that deem it otherwise (the Well of Allsparks; removing the golden horns of fully-trained doctors that pay tribute to Liege Maximo's ties to medicine; the removal of various sigils of specific Primes and associated groupings, Onyx's Mask removed from stages as it functioned as Comedy and Tragedy masks).

[spinningbuster98]

Metroid Zero Mission Part 1: Deja vu

Zero Mission is quite the special little game isn’t it?

It was the last Metroid game made by Nintendo R&D1, who had previously made every 2D Metroid game, and it was the last 2D game period until 2017, yikes!

I have quite a long history with this game, as it might just be my second most replayed game in the series after Super (though Dread is steadily catching up)

There’s a LOT to talk about with this game, but I wanted ti start with something simple: the controls!

With Fusion the series did away with Super’s run button, item select, wall jump and made the jump slightly less floaty, all in a way to make Samus feel more responsive and less loose, even if at the cost of all the cool stuff you could pull off in Super

Zero Mission both takes a step further with this approach while also trying to recapture Super’s moveset

Jumping is anything but floaty here: Samus is very heavy now and drops to the ground very quickly. I have mixed feelings on this: on the one hand it makes platforming much more precise than it was in Super, you should never have an awkward time jumping on small platforms like you would in old Tourian in that game. On the other hand however this also feels like an overcorrection to me, because a jump so short feels unsatisfying in some ways, while also being awkward in its own way depending on the circumstance. For example when it comes to wall jumping: it’s great to see this technique back, and it’s certainly put to good use several times...but man does it feel like shit to use! I will never understand why so many people shit on Super’s wall jump while also giving ZM’s a free pass: Super’s has a visual indication to tell you when you should perform it in the form of Samus preparing to kick the wall. The timing of the jump itself, while precise, isn’t really pixel perfect and, due to the floaty physics, you could reach some crazy heights with it. Here, with Samus feeling so heavy, you gain very little height with each wall jump, forcing you to perform several of them in quick succession to get some real height. There’s no visual indication for when to perform the jump, and the timing is borderline pixel perfect due to how briefly Samus will actually keep contact with the wall before falling down, which means that you’ll have to draw your thumb from one end of the D pad to the other super quickly, with a high risk that you’ll accidentaly press either up or down, which will cause Samus to stop somersaulting thus failing the wall jump. It’s taken me 10+ years for me to master this thing and it STILL feels like a total nut cruncher whenever I input the controls!

On the flipside though Infinite Bomb jumping is awesome here! I’ve always hated it in Super due to how long it took for the bombs to blow up, but here they blow up quickly enough for the player to get a consistent and quick rythm, which also makes diagonal bomb jumping surprisingly easy!

One thing I will say is that, if nothing else, the heavier jump mostly gells well with the level design and with Samus’ overall ground speed: Zero Mission’s level design skeleton is still based on the original Metroid’s, meaning it’s 75% composed of mostly straight horizontal hallways that are rather narrow in height and are heavy on the platforming. Samus is the fastest she’s ever been when running, so having a jump that will quickly put you back on your feet to keep on running helps keep the fast pace going, which in turn meshes well with the more horizontal level design. Had this game used Super’s physics, or even Fusion’s, with their floatier jumps, the game would have felt weirdly slow and the act of traversing the world unnatural

[bluerosesburnblue]

@oveliagirlhaditright I'm putting my Missing Link thoughts in another post because it would be too long, and honestly I have SO MANY thoughts about why the basic premise of KHML was a bad idea (completely separate from my own distaste for the "Ephemer is Xehanort's ancestor" stuff that might be in it)

Because you're right to mention Pokemon Go and it really, REALLY feels to me like it's just trying to ride the hype from the mobile ARG boom that started with Pokemon Go a whole eight years ago. Because KHML as a concept doesn't even seem to be utilizing any of the unique features of an ARG that make them appealing

There's two real franchise-based mobile ARGs that I ever remember hearing about: Pokemon Go and Harry Potter: Wizards Unite*. These two projects do make sense to me, as opposed to KHML because of the way that both franchises make use of the central concept of the augmented reality feature. They're additions to reality, which both series already played around with. HP takes place in our reality, but with a "what if magic was real and just hidden" premise, so it's insanely easy to make an ARG that's just "yeah, you're one of the people in on the secret magical society that always existed in the real world." Pokemon takes place in an alternate version of our world; every location in Pokemon is based on a real-world location. So that's also a natural progression for it, and it's easy to pretend that the "reality" you see in the ARG is just the Pokemon world. Other than location names and the presence of Pokemon, the Pokemon world is practically identical to reality

That is literally the central concept of an ARG. To make the game part of reality. And that just doesn't work with KH, a game about flying through space to reach Disney worlds. Sure, some of us might have wanted to pretend to be Keyblade wielders as kids, but did we want to be wielders in our small backyards? Not even imagining that they were another location, but the yards as they were? No! We wanted to be in the Disney worlds! Or Traverse Town! The central facet of ARG gameplay doesn't mesh with the functionality of a story-based canonical title. And so what do they do to force it to work? Complicate the lore with the Astral Planes, which completely take the "reality" out of Augmented Reality aside from... a map? Like, it might have worked with Quadratum depending on how much of "our reality" that ends up being, but that's not at all what they're doing

Additionally, ARGs are not conducive to story-heavy games! You're supposed to play them while walking around town, maybe stopping for a few minutes to take a break. Or you play them on work/school breaks. You need to be able to pick them up, play a bit for 10 minutes, and put them down. The typical gameplay cycle for most ARG players does not include 20 minutes just to watch cutscenes to get the Exclusive Lore before being able to do anything, and the people who like KH for the story aren't going to want to wait all the time for their mobile game energy to recharge before they can get their cutscenes (a thing that even KHUx did away with for story chapters after some time!)

The entire decision to make KHML an ARG, to me, feels like corporate checking off a box of "style of game that got popular in recent memory" and trying to copy it rather than thinking of the gameplay as a medium in and of itself to tell a story. Nothing about the ARG concept works with what KH is at its core, and I honestly feel like they unintentionally admitted that when it was announced that you'd be able to play it without leaving home. What is the point of making it an ARG at all if you're going to remove literally the only benefit that it has as a medium, as opposed to something that could benefit the story you're trying to tell? We are a long way from the days of TWEWY making revolutionary use of the DS technology to have its gameplay tell a significant part of its story

In an ideal world, I think that KHML should have been an MMO like we thought KHx was going to be back when it was announced. They wouldn't have to mess with the lore to make it work, other players running around would help to "populate" Scala ad Caelum in a natural way, people could form "families" with their friends to further the bloodlines narrative, and MMOs can function on the drip-fed narrative style that they wanted. It doesn't even have to be a big-budget MMO like FF14, because I actually do like KH3's artstyle and KHML's simpler usage of it (it manages to be distinctive and colorful, working in hallmarks of Nomura's hand-drawn style while still being more detailed than the PS2-era). It could just be... basically what it is now, but they add in new Disney worlds every couple of months to keep the story going

And now here we are, with a game that was supposed to be out by the end of 2023 still missing (lol) and only having had two betas by the near-midpoint of 2024 because they're having developmental issues that I would personally guess have to do with the game's self-defeating nature. I find it very frustrating

*Adding in, Wizards Unite literally ran for less than three years (June 2019 - Jan 2022) before shutting down so even being tied to a big-name franchise couldn't save it. I have a strong hunch that the Covid-19 lockdowns played a huge part in killing the ARG boom so it's doubly insane to me why Square Enix thought trying to bring it back was a good idea

[leafs-lover]

Too Far Gone - Part Fifty Four

Warnings: I didn't really proofread this so there's that, swearing, smut - oral (m & f recieving), p in v, I think that's it?

Series Masterlist

Word Count: 4,500

For the first time in a long time, Auston’s hockey game was completely uneventful. Aryne found Tia almost instantly. She was bouncing Jace in one arm and had a glass of wine in the other, she was quick to give her a hug and “officially welcome her to the family” but she made sure to point out she was a part of the Leafs family long before then.

Aryne then told Tia Auston paid her WAG fee, something Tia knew nothing about, but apparently it was used to cover events like baby or bridal showers, birthdays, and the WAG jacket, something else Tia was unaware of. Aryne explained what they were, and given Tia was a designer said she would love to get some input from her. Audrey overheard the conversation and being a stylist, she too wanted to be included in the process, and Steph being Steph had to be included. The four of them made plans to get lunch during the Leafs upcoming road trip to start planning.

Like every game before, Tia and Taylour ventured down to the glass during warmups and the second Auston saw her he knew he was going to have to talk to her. There is no way he can concentrate on hockey for the next three hours while she looks like that. Her pants were so tight they had to of been painted on. If at all possible, her bodysuit is tighter but it’s mesh, pure black mesh, and it leaves the lacey bralette she had on underneath fully on display. She had pulled her hair back into a high pony, and had put bright red lip gloss on, his favourite. He tapped on the glass and waved to Taylour, then took a deep gulp. He hated how good she looked, but even more when she winked at him, he hated that she knew how good she looked.

All game Taylour was grinning from ear to ear and could barely sit in his seat for more than ten seconds. He had a slice of pizza, chicken nuggets, popcorn, two chocolate milks, she didn’t know how he managed to eat so much. He was dancing and cheering and when Carlton the bear came by, he gave him a high-five, then got Tia to take a picture of them, all while wearing his new jersey with Matthews stitched in the back.

Maybe it was because every part of the evening was easy or maybe it was because it was the first time she wasn’t going just for Taylour but also herself, but Tia genuinely had a good time.

When Auston walked out of the dressing room with his tie shoved into a pocket and the top few buttons of his dress shirt left purposely undone, he expected to find Tia tucked off to the side with a sleeping toddler on her shoulder. Instead, he hears his sons small but joyful voice followed by the sound of little feet pattering in his direction. Auston crouches down and catches Taylour mid jump and brings him in for a warm embrace.

“You were so good Daddy!” Taylour cheers in his ear.

“Thanks Tay.” He places a kiss on his cheek and stands upright.

“Yeah daddy! You had so many shots and…and you got a goal!”

“Mhm,” Auston grins. “I did. I’m surprised you’re not sleeping.”

“I’m not tired,” he protests, even though his eyes are red and heavy.

With a soft laugh, Auston kisses his temple and scans the crowded hall until he finds Tia, a few feet away, and somehow, she looks better than before. When she spots him, her heart flutters and butterflies swarm her stomach. This anxious energy is new for her, but the smile and twinkle in his sandy brown eyes instantly put her at ease. He always had that effect on her. Walking over to him, Auston shifts Taylour to one of his hips and opens his arm to let her in.

“Hey T,” he smiles, holding her tight to his chest.

“Good game Aus.”

Auston already got her post-game text, but nothing beats hearing her say it in person. “Thanks babe.”

Tia leans into Auston and they kiss, except it wasn’t a quick, good game, lets go home and put our kid to bed kind of kiss. He wraps his arms around her waist and smiles when a sound escapes her lips. It took every ounce of strength to not back her up against a wall and slot a knee between her thighs. People were around and Taylour was rambling about something that happened during the game, but God he wanted to back her up against the wall and slot his knee between her thighs.

As his tongue worked with hers all he could think of was what he was going to do once they got home, how he couldn’t wait until he got her home, that it sucked they were going to her place because she lived farther away, but he couldn’t stop kissing her. He didn’t know if he ever could.

“Sorry Matts, I got to talk to your girl.” A hand finds his shoulder and begins to force them apart.

“Wha-“

“Mitch!” Taylour holds a fist out for him.

“Hey Taylour!” Mitch ignores the daggers coming from Auston and gives Taylour a fist bump. “You have fun tonight?”

“Mhm.” He is quick to nod. “Can I come visit Zeus?”

All three of them laugh, but Tia see’s a light ignite behind Auston’s eye. She’ll have to remember to ask him about it later.

“Obviously!” Mitch shares Taylour’s enthusiasm. “You can see him any day!”

“Daddy, I go see Zeus now.”

“It’s almost your bedtime, but how about tomorrow?” Auston asks not only Taylour, but Mitch, who smiles and nods. - they do have an off day before the LA road trip.

“Okay, I’m going to visit him tomorrow, Mitch!”

“Sounds good.” The two of them fist bump again. “I gotta talk to your mom real quick.” He then turns his attention to Tia and throws an arm over her shoulder trying to tug her free from Auston’s embrace. “So, T…I can I call you T, right?”

Tia doesn’t even have to look to Auston to tell his nostrils are flaring and face is contorting with disgust. She also doesn’t need to speak because Auston is quick to step in. “No. Only I get to call her T,” he growls out and pulls her back into him.

He has no idea what his friend is doing, ever since he found out they were dating, Mitch instantly said he had to talk to Tia, but never gave any hint as to what it’s about. It has only been about six hours, but Mitch brought it up countless times, always with a devious grin to accompany it. Mitch knew he was getting under Auston’s skin by the pulsing vein or hairs pricking along his neck, and that only added to his enjoyment over the situation.

“Private conversation.” Mitch hisses. Keeping a heavy glare directed at Auston, he tugs on Tia’s shoulder trying to draw her away from Auston. This time Tia takes a step away from Auston, which causes a cocky grin to form on Mitch’s face. “He is so nosy,” Mitch says as the two of them take a step, earning a dramatic eye roll from Auston. “But I got to talk to you.”

 “So, T –“ he tries again.

“No.” She quickly brings up her hand and shuts him down. “Only he gets to call me that.” Mitch’s entire face crinkles. Auston raises his eyebrow in an ‘I told you so’ kind of way as the smug expression returns to his face.

“Fine, Tia,” Mitch huffs in displeasure. “I’m sure you know this, but you’re wildly out his league and I don’t want him to get hurt, so just, take it easy on him kay?”

Mitch smiles directly at Auston in almost patronizing way, and Auston responds by just shaking his head. He can’t believe he spent the entire day worrying and this is what Mitch wanted to talk about.

Tia chuckles softly. Peeling her gaze from Auston she turns to Mitch, and her pony swings over her shoulder. She drops her voice to just above a whisper, but she ensures its loud enough for Auston to hear. “What if he doesn’t want me to take it easy? What if he likes it rough?”

If it were anyone else Tia would have had a different response, but something about Mitch’s child-like energy makes this more enjoyable. Mitch’s Adams apple bobs as he takes a deep gulp. His cheeks burn hot with embarrassment and his cobalt blue eyes pop out of his skull before he drops them to the ground, unable to make eye contact with Tia, his friend or anyone in this moment.

“I uh…I,” he stutters out and shifts uncomfortably on his heels. “I’m gonna go.”

“Have a good night, Mitch,” Tia calls out as he scurries over to Steph.

“Are you done torturing my friends?” Auston just shakes his head as he welcomes his girlfriend back into his arms. “Probably scarred him for life.”

“He’ll be fine.”

**

Not surprising to anyone, Taylour was asleep in the first five minutes of the drive. The radio played quietly and Auston held Tia’s hand over the console. The two of them talked over the hum of the heater, Auston periodically squeezing her hand as he maneuvered the dark Toronto streets. He parked in the garage, gave Tia a kiss, then unbuckled Taylour from his car seat. Once up in her condo, he stripped Taylour of his jersey and jeans, then put a pair of pajamas on, and gave him a kiss goodnight.

The lamp on the Tia’s bedside table casts a warm shadow on the wall as she sits with her knees bent, backs of her thighs on her heels and legs purposely spread wide open. As if the mesh top didn’t make his dick throb, the navy blue set she replaced it with certainly does. The colour compliments her skin tone perfectly and the bra pushes her breasts up, making them appear bigger and rounder than normal. The small lace underwear hugs her curves, revealing more than it covers.

Auston drops his duffle and garment bag at the door, and it lands with a loud thud. Tia crawls toward him on the bed then reaches out for his wrist, dragging him closer  – not that he needed much guidance.

“Good game baby.” She kisses his necks and lets her hand travel over his chest and under his jacket, pressing it off his broad shoulders to the floor.

“Thanks T.” Auston reactively tilts his head and allows her more space as his hands quickly land on her hips, toying with the lace hem.

Tia’s hands slide around his body, and she works at the tiny buttons of his dress shirt, slowly revealing more and more of his chest. He lets her take the lead, moaning and groaning as her lips find the newly exposed skin. Tia makes quick work of his belt buckle, and Auston curses when her palm nudges his growing erection.

Once all his clothes are in a pile on the floor, Tia guides him to the mattress then adjusts herself between his legs. He watches her lick her lips and listens to her uneasy breath when she sees the excitement that is waiting for her. One of her hands finds his thigh and she gently rakes her nails up and down and the other wraps around his length, giving him a few tugs until his cock has fully hardened in her grip.

Auston gasps when Tia licks the angry vein on the underside. He shivers when she swirls her tongue around his throbbing tip to clean up precum. She begins to bob on his length, taking more and more with each stroke but still using her hand to cover the remainder. He fists at the duvet from the pleasure of her tongue, then hisses as she massages his balls. Her hand and mouth work in tandem, stroking him closer to completion.  Following a deep groan, one that Auston feels vibrate around his cock, the two of them make eye contact.

Her nails dig into the skin of his exposed thighs as she sucks his cock. Warm tears coat her pupils as she smirks over his length, she always knew what he liked. Her pace remains steady and deep, and it doesn’t take long before he twitches against her tongue, and she knows he is close. Mere seconds from his release.

Tia moans as his salty release fills her mouth. She remembers a time when she didn’t think she’d like it, but she loves the taste of him, missed the taste of him, and if she is being honest a wave of disappointment came when the final drop hit her tongue.

Auston pulls Tia on top, her knees landing on either side of his waist. His hand is in her hair, and tongue is down her throat, and she grinds down on his hips, the thin cloth all that separates them.

Auston reaches around to release the clasp and her breasts spring free, then works to massage it, his thumb rolling and tweaking her nipple. A deep moan catches in her throat which makes Auston grin, and he can feel wet against his abs.

“Come’ere,” Auston mumbles through a kiss.

“I am here,” Tia whispers, a breathy moan catching in her throat as he works at her breast.

“Up here,” Auston kisses her again, harder this time. “Take a seat.

“Oh my god.” Tia pulls away and lets out a laugh.

“Do you not want to?” Auston asks, a playful smirk tugging on his lips.

“No, I do,” she laughs again. “I just can’t believe you said that.”

“Then get up here.”

The heat on her cheeks doesn’t subside, but she shimmies out of her underwear and climbs up into position. She can feel his exhale to the inside of her thighs, and she shudders while slowly lowering herself down. And its too slow for Auston’s liking, he roughly grabs at her hips until her heat is pressing on his lips.

He gets to work.

Her entire body jolts when he licks a stripe up her slit, tongue flat against her. He nuzzles his nose against her freshly waxed skin and Tia’s body falls forward, one hard tangling into his curls, the other finding the wall for additional stability. He flicks his tongue over and over her clit before eventually splitting her folds and shoving himself deep inside.

His breath is warm as he flicks his tongue in and out. The scruff on his jaw burns against her thighs while she claws at his dark curls. He can’t pull away long enough for anything more than a grunt to come fumbling out. He suckles at her clit just how she likes it, how he knows she likes it, and she’s crying out in no time.

As much as Auston loves her soft moans, shaky breaths, and the way she cries his name in pleasure, his favourite part was always when that stopped because it meant she was close. She presses her heat down onto Auston’s face and he let out a soft chuckle but doesn’t let up. He kept flicking and sucking on her clit, sliding his tongue between her folds, doing all the things he knows she loves until he felt her walls start to quiver.

He keeps at it, sucking at her clit to draw her orgasm out. When her walls are no longer fluttering, he leaves open mouthed kisses along her inner thigh. Once she has settled enough, he grabs at her hips and flips her onto her back, chuckling at the squeal she releases.

“My favourite thing is when you eat me out.”

“It’s one of my favourites too.” As Auston climbs over her, Tia sees how hard he is just from eating her out.

“One of?”

“I also love fucking you.” He grabs the box of condoms from the bedside drawer and dumps one single foil wrapper on the bed.

“I love that too.”

“Going to have to start buying these at Costco,” he jokes. Lowering himself for a sloppy kiss, his tongue is still drenched in her flavour. “I plan on fucking you a lot.”

Tia giggles in response, watching as he brings the foil to his lips, He bites down and starts to tear into the wrapper with is teeth. “You know I’m on birth control, right?”

“I’m getting DeJa’Vu.” They both laugh. “But seriously, I feel like it was four years ago to the day you last told me that, and we both know how that worked out.”

“I know,” Tia laughs again and gently tucks some of his sweaty curls behind his ear. “It’s a different method, a better one.”

Placing a soft kiss to her lips, he lets his forehead fall to hers. “I don’t want you to get pregnant.”

Auston pulls his wallet out and shoves a $50 into her chest. “Get yourself the morning after pill,” Auston hisses through gritted teeth, “I don’t want more kids with you.”

Tia is transported back to that Vegas hotel room and shudders at the thought. She can feel his hatred, hear the vitriol in his words. She hates how real it is, how she is trapped in one of the foulest moments they shared, the worst part is somehow her heart hurts more than that June morning.

“T?” Auston probes. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing.” She shakes her head, and adjusts under him, spreading her legs in preparation.

Her face tightened and body froze. Her lower lip quivered ever so slightly, and she tried to shake it off, but Auston saw it all. “What just happened? You went somewhere?”

Tia shakes her head as if she is about to deny it, but she knows she can’t. Apart from him being able to read her like a book, she wants this to work, and the only way for that to happen is for her to be honest. It’s not like having no more kids would be a deal breaker for her, but does he still feel that way? That having kids with her is the worst thing imaginable?

“Do you want more kids?”

“Obv-“

“I need you to be honest, even if it will hurt.”

“Where is this coming from. I’ve always wanted kids with you.”

“That’s not what you said in Vegas.”

Auston drops his head to look away while regret creeps in. Long ago Auston blocked that morning out, he couldn’t bear to think about it because the pain was too much. Even now it paralyzes him.

“I was mad.”

“I know that. But you said -”

“Tia, we both said things we didn’t mean.” Auston rolls off her, not because he wants space, this conversation deserves more than sex looming over them, and it’s difficult to do that with his rock-hard dick pressing into her thigh. “If I could go back, I’d do so many things differently.” Tia nods, wishing for the same thing. “But we can only go forward. I thought you knew I didn’t mean what I said.”

Tia blinks and thinks over what he is saying, wanting to get her own words right before she speaks. A part of her always knew there was no truth in what he said that morning because there was zero truth to what she said. Unfortunately, he said it more than once, and that adds more to her hesitation.

“At Christmas you said you didn’t want more, that felt genuine.” Her voice keeps sounding more and more hurt.

Tia watches a crease form on his forehead and prepares herself for the inevitable. He clears his throat, trying to muster up some courage. Then, like ripping off a band-aid he starts.” “After Zurich, it took me a bit to even think of what my life would be beyond hockey. I was so angry and upset I told myself I wouldn’t let myself go there with anyone. After some time, I started to consider that maybe one day I’d the woman I’d have kids with, but she always remained nameless and faceless, I told myself that it would take some time. Then you came back, and I got to see you be the mother I always knew you would be and, I don’t know, I just knew nobody else would ever compare.” Auston doesn’t know when, but at some point, when he was talking Tia started to cry. Slow tears are rolling down her cheeks and every time she opened her mouth to speak it would shut, no words seemed to be enough.

She slides closer, into his embrace while he gently tucks a few hairs behind her ears then pecks the tip of her nose and can taste the saltiness of her tears. He holds her for a minute, waiting for those tears to dry. Tia cracks a half smile while struggling to find the words. Not actually. Three words quickly land on her tongue, but she bites down hard on her lower lip, hard enough to draw blood. She can’t say them this fast, can she? But it’s not fast, she’s known him years, they have a child together, have said it countless times before, most importantly both have been flooded with the feeling more than once recently. It’s not too soon, and yet she can’t say it.

He smiles at her. “I knew very quickly into meeting you; I wanted kids with, that still holds true.”

She returns the smile, visibly relieved. “How’d I get so lucky?”

“Our rental house didn’t come with a coffee maker,” Auston jokes, bringing a gentle smile to her face. He moves to cup her face and grins back at her. “I know you love Taylour, but your life would have been so much easier if you didn’t get pregnant when you did, when we have the next one, I want it to be on your timetable.”

“You’re pretty incredible, you know that?” She sighs against his lips.

“So are you T.” Auston whispers against hers before giving her a soft kiss.

It’s slow and lazy with her sweet sighs filling the air. Unlike the heat and fury from before, they take their time, slowly working their tongue into the others mouth, swallowing every single moan they could.

Tia shifts to be more on her back and Auston positions himself on top, arms on either side of her face. Tia softly rolls her hips and can feel his cock start to reharden, a deep guttural groan coming through. One of her hands slides around and wraps around his cock, giving it a few gentle tugs to encourage him to grow.

Tia brings her leg over his hip to draw him closer. Auston brings his hand down and runs it along the outside of her thigh, softly caressing her skin. Now fully hard, his tip nudges her folds, still soaked from before.

“So, uh,” Auston’s head drops against hers. “Tell me about this birth control.”

Tia feels heat on her cheeks. “It’s a tiny device, the most effective method there is, nothing can affect it.”

“Nothing?” His cock twitches in her hand.

“Absolutely nothing.”

It’s not that he doesn’t want to, fuck, he wants too]so bad. It might have been years ago, and he may have been drunk, but that feeling of nothing separating them is something he never forgot no matter how much he wanted to. Now he has the opportunity to do it again, feel her again, but the only way he is doing it again is if she is absolutely positive.

“You’re sure?”

“100%,” she breathes out. “But babe, if you’re not then we don’t have to.”

That’s all Auston needed to hear, if Tia is certain than so is he. His hand replaces hers and she guides his length between her folds. The two of them sigh in unison. It feels so good, they always did feel good together, but this brought them back to Helsinki. The very first time they shared their love and themselves with one another.

He keeps her leg hooked over his hip and pulls out slowly, but he’s even slower sliding back inside. His eyes don’t leave her; he gets satisfaction in watching the way her face contorts and shifts as he fills her up. He pulls her hands above her head and pins them to the mattress. Staring down into her milk chocolate eyes. It takes all his willpower not to spill everything inside her tight cunt in that moment.

“I want more babies with you, we can have as many as you want.” Tia smiles at that. Her breath hitches in her throat as Auston continues to move inside her “One more, six more, doesn’t matter to me.”

Tia giggles. “I don’t want six more.”

“Okay,” Auston says, continuing to move inside her. “So less that seven kids.”

“Two.” Tia moans. “Maybe three more.”

“Can’t wait to see you all big and round with a baby.”

“Our baby,” she growls out.

“Can’t wait to hear their heartbeat, feel ‘em kick. We’ll have a little girl and she’ll look just like you, be full of sass and fire, constantly telling me my shirt doesn’t look good, or it doesn’t match my shoes.”

Tia lets out a laugh but a lump catches in her throat at the thought of their children. All she every wanted was this, for them to have a big house full of children and laughter, but up until now it felt like it was out of reach. Not anymore.

They continue to move in unison, but instead of talking they kiss and kiss and kiss until both of them are out of breath, then they kissed some more. Auston kept his pace and Tia gently scratched her nails down his back and across his broad shoulders. Auston knew Tia was close and Tia knew Auston was close.

It didn’t take much longer. A few shallow thrusts and her walls were tightening around his cock, and he was shooting everything deep inside. A loud grunt fell from his lips, he never forgot how good it felt to let himself loose inside her, but it certainly was better than he remembered.

Her leg drops and he collapses on top, the two of them a sweaty mess of limbs. A mixture of warm fluids slowly spill out around his cock, but he keeps himself buried a little bit longer, reveling in the way she feels. Not the physical feeling of his slowly softening cock in her heat, but the feeling of them together, the start of their forever.

Taglist: If you are in this list you have expressed interest in the series (either through likes/reblogs or by asking). If it’s crossed out your tag didn’t work. If you would like to be removed or added to the list send me an ask:

@youtxbemusic @nicoleloveshockey @emsully2002 @hockeypuckspottspot @ashleymarine @albal321 @b34ut1fulb4st4rds @biznastysloneshift12 @burkylover @c-tangerine @canadian-girl87 @crazzyfann @dana-hqy @delighttfulll @evawest5 @every-beautifulthing-thereis @greendragonzz @heatherawoowoo @hockeybabe87 @hockeyinaussie @hockeyisit @hockeypuckedmeup @je-ne-regrette-rien @jakekisska @partypoison00 @princesscameston @puccbunni @queenmarvel21 @sixmapleleafs @starswin @trashforbarzal @0kikina0 @1-fuzzy-squirrels @janeydeaux @stuff4me2do @callsign-denmark @monnbc @simpgirl-lat @huneyjojo221 @idfan21 @elly-dx @samanthasgone @holyalfalfasprout @lwstuff

[riding-with-the-wild-hunt]

your tolkien edits are always so lovely, do you have graphics editors that inspire you?

hey anon.. would you perhaps want to join me in a small and tumbledown cliff-side castle by the shining sea within whose shelter we can spend the rest of our days. circle yes or no

anyways!! tumblr is the school of athens and i am but a humble student sitting at the feet of greater talents, so here are a few of my biggest editing inspirations for your happy perusal:

@himemiyaaah / @tarninausta - probably my original editing inspiration back when i took my first waddling steps into making graphics myself! rosie just has such an amazing command of color, style, balance, etc.. her edits are so beautiful and harmonious, and i love her expressive use of text.

@miriel-therindes - also someone i discovered early on! i swear there isn't a form lyndeth hasn't tried her hand at and succeeded with in high style. her incredible sense and editing of colors and creative typography are just !!!

@arwenindomiel /@edwinas - the enormously talented mastermind behind tolkien south asian week! her edits are striking and have a real cinematic feel with bold, gorgeously cohesive color palettes (her dramatic shadows are spectacular) as well as innovative use of text and other graphic elements that just tie it all together each time.

@emyn-arnens - save me atlas of arda series atlas of arda series save me !! whenever i need inspiration on how to make dynamic edits that don't include people, i go to this master of her craft. her colors mesh so well together, her formatting is creative and refreshing, and her photo choices are on point. whence does her power flow.

@aredhels - so elegant and sleek! sari is so good at using all the parts of her edits to evoke the desired mood--for lack of a better word, everything she makes is just so aesthetic. i love her understated, low-text style and how she can make incredibly compelling edits just with her impeccable image choices and color editing. and besides all that she singlehandedly gave me the confidence to experiment with the eight-image picspam format yayay

@tilions - legendary user of non-text elements! i honestly have no idea how emily comes out with some of the image layering that they do. her edits feel professional-grade (hoping tentatively that this is a comparison that makes sense but who knows). she makes such bold color choices! it's easy to be scared off by bright palettes but apparently emily is immune to aesthetic fear. she also concocts these amazing silhouette edits that are like those 70s nasa posters and it's. so cool.

@russingon - i want to imbibe mayim's delicious color palettes into myself for real. something about them is so distinctive and pleasing! how much punch he can pack into a two-image edit never ceases to astound. i'm especially fond of their family/house edits (i love seeing their great faceclaim choices all together)!

@brighter-arda - toi is so endlessly committed to making the tolkien fandom a more diverse, inclusive, and accepting space, and i really admire all the work she puts in to uplift other creators. her own edits have really interesting and creative themes and formatting, and it's wonderful how she always incorporates meaningful elements of the character's culture.

@someoneinthestars - their use of darker colors is so evocative, and i love their latine tolkien series! they often align text to elements within the image, which takes such precision (i've only done it once, i think!), but when they do it it always comes out gorgeously.. awuagh.

@outofangband - the attention and research nelyo puts into their environmental edits could power three mid-size cities and i have nothing but respect for them and their dedication. honestly i think they know more about the ecology of middle earth than tolkien himself did when he made it (and he also never made edits about it, so another point to nelyo)!

anyways, this is only a cross-section of the plethora of amazing and talented people i get to share this community with, but i hope it was what you were looking for anon! many many thanks for giving me the ever-welcomed opportunity to kvell a little over some of my favorite creators, and as always, many many thanks to those creators themselves for sharing their spectacular works ♡♡♡

[natlacentral]

Ian Ousley

Ian Ousley recalls sitting on his parents’ bed, switching on the television, and completely transporting to a different, magical land: the land of Avatar: The Last Airbender. Like many other early 20-something-year-olds, he grew up with the show. “Avatar was one of the things that pushed me into wanting to do martial arts,” he reflects, “My parents were so sick of me pretending that I could bend stuff [laughs].” 

Some years later, Ousley received the news that he would be a part of the live-action rendition of the now highly-rated Netflix series — a very full-circle moment for the young actor that he describes as emotional. But this time around, viewers are given a glimpse of the Avatar universe through a new light. Departing from the original animated form, the actors in this new iteration all faced the challenge of translating these quirky characters to real life.

“Luckily enough for me, I had tons to pull from based on the animated version. Asking and answering those questions for Sokka was really important to me. Like, what was my relationship with my dad before he left? What was my relationship with my mom like? I dove into some things that the animation doesn't explore all the way,” he expands, “Music and costumes were great access points for me as well. Putting on that costume while I'm listening to music was really helpful. I would journal a lot as Sokka every morning too.” 

As a kid, Ousley reflects that he would actually mimic the actions of Prince Zuko, the anti-hero of the fictional series. He laughs when thinking of the irony of pretending to be Zuko but ending up playing Sokka, one of the less intimidating and more misunderstood characters on the show. “He wants to be a warrior so bad. And he wants to be valued so badly. He wants to have something to offer, but sometimes he doesn't always feel like he has the physical capabilities for that,” he continues, “So there's a really beautiful story there, I think with him finding ways to be helpful to his friends and the mission of saving the world — without having to be the muscle, even though he so badly wants to be.” 

In many ways, Ousley found it easy to shapeshift into Sokka for this project. “His sarcasm really brings things together. He's so complex and so funny. I joke a lot too, especially to deflect things. So I feel very tied with Sokka in that way,” he shares. But there were surely some challenges to channeling this character, like maintaining his air of comedic relief, as the threshold for comedy in animated television is much higher. Characters can launch off of cliffs or battle with larger-than-life villainous creatures, with little to no consequences. “Everything's weightier in our show because it's real. You're looking at a real little 12-year-old dealing with saving the world. You're looking at a real Katara and a real Sokka. But I was very passionate about keeping the comedy on set.”

While on set, Ousley and his castmates fostered a family bond not unlike the bond of all of the young characters in the series. “We feel so lucky to mesh with each other as a family unit. I think it came really easy 'cause we spent so much time together, on set, but also off,” he expresses, “Gordon is just like Aang in real life. He's just an energy ball and you feel like he's gonna save the world in real life too. Kiawentiio is just such a force in her own way. And then you have all the guest stars too, which I could go on and on about, but I just feel really blessed. I also shadowed a lot of the directors while I was on set because that's something that I am passionate about wanting to get into.” Ousley even lived with his castmate, Dallas Liu, for the duration of filming, sharing that the two fostered a close-knit brotherly bond.

When Ousley isn’t on set, he taps into another form of self-expression through fashion and design. During the SAG-AFTRA strike this past year, he joined forces with two of his friends, Ryan Sullivan and Hunter Baker, to help with the design and creative direction strategy for their vintage-inspired brand Kalo Soil. But this medium of artistry isn’t a novel one for the young actor; he’s been into sketching and designing for years now. “I started a clothing brand when I was 15 and was just making hoodies and embroidering stuff in the fashion district of DTLA. I had fashion internships with a professor from FIDM, so it's been a passion of mine forever,” he reflects. When he isn’t filming or feeding his interests in the realm of fashion, he flexes other creative muscles, sharing that writing or journaling provide moments of decompression for the 21-year-old who has been moving in the fast lane since he moved to LA as a teenager.

Between his diverse roles, Taekwondo, and creative outlets, Ousley has a pretty full plate. But he carves out the necessary time to unwind and take it all in. “I've always needed a creative outlet, so I'm constantly sketching and designing stuff just for fun. I've been doing that since I was 15 and it feels effortless at this point. I can always channel whatever I'm feeling into those things. I also love writing, so I try to stay consistent with that — songwriting, poetry, and essays — all of it. I journal a lot too. I spend time with God. I just try to stay rooted in the things that I can control with so many different things going on.” 

Staying rooted in his life is important to the multi-talented actor, but he still looks ahead in the hopes that his career in Hollywood will continue to flourish. A smile flashed across his face when alluding to directing, a skill he’d like to hone in the coming years, but he maintains that his heart really does lie with the current project that he spent the last year dedicating himself to. “The thing that I'm looking most forward to is to continue the show. We all love the show so much, so season two and hopefully season three would be the goal. Sometimes in busy cities like New York or LA, people want to move on quickly. But I think that we all have found a really fun home here, so I would like to enjoy that for a little bit.”

Just before concluding our Zoom call, Ousley indulged us by answering the hard-hitting questions — I mean, it felt almost unnatural not to ask. “[Laughs] My favorite character from Avatar is Apa. There's no other answer that should be allowed.” And though he masters Sokka’s playful humor and personal intricacies, he shared that if given a chance to occupy the grand Avatar: The Last Airbender universe, he’d definitely be a part of the water tribe. “That’s a hard question,” he posited, “Gliding on the ice and playing around with water powers looked so fun in the animated show — so I’d go with that.” 

Netflix’s highly-anticipated series, Avatar: The Last Airbender is now streaming, and has been renewed for another two seasons.

[palant1r]

Why do you think Matsuda was grinning when he offered to make the eye deal in Death Note? For that matter, what do you think would have happened if he had? How could it happen? What would happen differently if Matsuda died and Soichiro lived? Honestly, I just really want to know about this AU, and you seem like the fandom Matsuda expert!

hehehe i LOVE this question!!!

matsuda is someone who desperately wants to be useful. far from this being something he learns to deal with through the series, it's a need that gets exacerbated as the story goes on. he has a deep-seated anxiety about being useless, and this fuels a lot of his actions. theres a reason his Yotsuba Shenanigans were prompted by him being brushed off repeatedly by L and told to just do menial tasks. he wants to be important to the investigation, and at first, he's just kinda stupid about it — willing to put himself in danger to be useful, but it seems more like just recklessness than deliberate self-sacrifice. like he doesn't really understand the stakes

this...changes, after the timeskip. matsuda still gladly puts himself in danger, but there's a tint of desperation to it. like he better understands the danger, but that doesn't change anything. one standout example is when matsuda tells soichiro to tell mello that matsuda is L — it's very clear that this puts matsuda in massive danger, but he does it anyway. and, crucially, soichiro goes along with it. there's a new degree of trust there — the task force knows now that matsuda is gonna pull this shit and there's nothing they can do to stop him. and of course light picks up on it.

like, the thing about matsuda volunteering to take the eyes is that it's not an out of nowhere thing like the Yotsuba Shenanigans were. light was surprised by that. but five years later, he knows matsuda a lot better — enough to know he'll volunteer to take the eyes.

venturing into the realm of conjecture and hc, i think there's a few things going on here. i think that matsuda is someone who really keenly feels the danger they're in, and is most afraid when he's helpless. to him, that fear goes away when he's Doing Something About It. and i think this meshes well with my h/c that matsuda was on a riot unit prior to the NPA. while everyone else is a thinker and investigator, matsuda is a doer. he feels a lot of anxiety when he's just sitting around, and feels useless because he's not much help in the more cerebral parts of the investigation. but then something Must Be Done and Action Must Be Taken, and matsuda is in his element — he doesn't hesitate to come forward, and feels a rush of relief as he finally has some degree of control over the situation. so i kinda read his happiness as him finally having a way he can be useful and something he can do to catch kira.

as for what would have happened if he did take the eyes...well, it's not a happy story, and there's a damn good reason that light planned for him to take them. matsuda absolutely would have killed mello. wouldn't have even let him open his mouth. he doesn't have the same hangups around the death note that soichiro does — hell, after the chief's death, he was willing to let near use the death note to kill mello, though it's hard to know just how much of that was motivated by mello basically killing soichiro. light would have then used matsuda to prove the 13-day rule by killing him after he didn't write any names for 13 days. it would have been SO easy to convince matsuda's self-sacrificing ass that it was better for him to die than to live by killing criminals with the death note or something.

....though, well, there is a chance that, riding the high of the raid, light would have taken a risk. after all, he already thought matsuda understood him, and matsuda killing mello would only prove that further. why not have matsuda kill a death row criminal every 13 days? why not eventually escalate it to matsuda killing an escaped death row criminal? you see where i'm going with this. it would be a crack to open up, to start to let kira's ideology infiltrate the task force.

that could potentially work if soichiro died — it's pretty heavily implied that he would have only lived a few days after the raid if he didn't take the eyes anyway. but if soichiro lived, i don't think matsuda could have been convinced to use the death note after the raid, even to save his own life. matsuda's moral compass for much of the series is the chief, after all

[mwolf0epsilon]

Pls pls pls tell us how do you think clones react to trauma PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE

Full disclaimer, this is probably a lot of projection on my part in regards to coping with my own trauma and just seeing subtle things in media that helps me process a lot of thoughts I've had in regards to past negative experiences.

I am not an expert on trauma, and I am missing a lot of tcw lore because I haven't watched the full series, but I figure maybe I'm onto something on some aspects...

Anywho:

The clones are traumatized. That much is a given, considering their entire existence and undying loyalty is based on a set education/training/indoctrination regiment that's undoubtedly traumatizing.

They live and die for a government and people that don't really care for them (we've seen so many subtle and not so subtle instances of it, with the most recent additions to the roster being the clone veteran on Daiyo, and Riyo Chuchi fighting for the rights of the clones during the rise of the Empire) And the clones are essentially forced to understand and accept this wholeheartedly from an early age.

They have no basic rights, citizenship or even an actual home/lifestyle/traditions to return to once the war is done. Everything that is "theirs" is borrowed from someone else (Kamino, the Mandalorian ways they learned from their trainers, and what other bits and pieces they meshed together to to form into their own culture from the natborns they have limited contact with). Not even their lives, their bodies, are technically theirs. They are property in every sense of the word, and being forced to accept that so willingly and unquestioningly is not easy on the mind or heart. It could break a lesser being really...

But it's all they know. And that's one of the cores of certain types of trauma, and the basis of how you react to said trauma. Because is it really torment if you're born into it? If you don't know anything else? How do you want better if you don't know there IS better?

As someone who's been put through the grinder myself, I recognize reactions that are definitely born out of trauma. I'm most familiar with two very specific reactions that I do often write about: Silent complacency (which is a more passive defense mechanism in situations of stress) and outbursts of irrational anger (which is a more active defense mechanism in situations of stress). These are things I do on a daily basis that I can't help doing...

Most clones fall on the former over the latter, with just a few actually reacting in true anger when they are challenged in ways they can't really explain away, process, or deal with cleanly. Even so, silent complacency does have subcategories, so they way clones deal with their trauma is really up to which subcategory they fall into.

Rex for example, is complacent to a certain degree but not enough so that he isn't rebellious when things go sour. Even so he makes it his goal to try to fix things in the least disagreeable way possible (finding makeshift solutions to problems, trying to find the middle ground even if he doesn't entirely agree with how things are, generally trying to maintain the order of things by making himself useful in some way), even if it means sacrificing others's respect of him and risking going against his own moral compass (Krell, I'm talking about Krell here).

Echo is paradoxical in both being complacent to how things are (letting TBB do nothing for far too long, and sticking around in this sort of stupor of denial and uncertainty of how to proceed, because he honestly went through way too much and hasn't had much time to process), but also being rather obviously angry about how things currently are, and wanting to use that anger constructively (eventually leaving to fight for a cause he can believe in).

Dogma was truly complacent, submitting to the will of his superiors without question because he was taught that this was how you survive long enough to make a difference in war (I won't call it cowardice like I've seen some people do, Dogma was not a coward, far from it, but he was too blinded by his own dogmatic thinking and misplaced loyalty). He was a clear product of upbringing and trauma, and survived by the means that were provided for him since his very birth. The veil was only lifted when things got so bad that there was just no going back... And he still accepted it. He accepted his own death with open arms.

Slick was absolutely enraged by his and the others's unlucky lot in life because, for some inexplicable reason, he was able to see past everything he and the others were taught was their life's mission. Their unquestionable right. And it sucks that we don't know much about him besides what we got, so we don't really know what pushed him to rebel so furiously and so impulsively (endangering the lives of hundreds of clones and the Jedi WAS an irrational thing, but the reason behind it was not), but the fact of the matter is that Slick saw that there was something better than what he and his brothers got, and he was ultimately disgusted by how little their lives mattered in the grand scheme of things. Slick didn't want to die for the republic, didn't accept that he was going to die for the republic, and still died for the republic. There was no way around it. It NEVER mattered whether or not he fought against his set destiny.

There's others who react in different ways to their trauma as well.

We have Cody who's coping mechanism is a sort of nihilistic acceptance that clone lives don't matter in the grand scheme of things. Not 100% blind to the fact their entire existence is a bit of a sham, but also not 100% ready to accept they are now part of the problem until he stops to fully evaluate it. He can't fight the injustice so he accepts it for as long as he can manage. Even if it hurts to live with the fact there's no real better tomorrow for them, and that they're forced to make very difficult choices that are not morally correct. The best he can do is think there's a better tomorrow for the galaxy instead, that his service counts for at least those he serves and protects... He'll float along but never really want for more. At least not for himself.

We also have Wolffe, who eventually becomes so paranoid that he risked losing the one thing he still had: The respect of his brothers. He's lost everything and he's too scared to lose everything all over again, so he protects it tooth and nail without relenting. Protects others from themselves, because he's seen what's beyond the veil of lies and he's unwilling to have anyone else see the rot that has crushed his very soul. He's afraid and angry. Most of all, he's terribly tired of conflict that he'd rather run away from if it means his remaining family lives...

We have outliers like Gregor who have so many reasons to be resentful, but who instead take every given day like it's a blessing. Even if everything goes to hell tomorrow, he still smiles and jokes and deals with everything one step at a time. He is protective of others, that much is clear, and he can get a little lost in his impulsivity, but he doesn't let the trauma rule him or his emotions. Not entirely at least. He's got way too much on his plate to stop and think about existential horror and the injustice of a cruel apathetic galaxy.

We also have the entitled (TBB) who make their trauma everyone else's problem rather than deal with it like adults. Why be altruistic and mindful of your own faults when you can point the finger at your perceived enemies? They're traumatized just like every other clone, but they don't try to process it or even sympathize or empathize with others. They're even apathetic enough that they do many things that undermine one of their own (Echo). In their own eyes they have suffered more (false) and deserve to be regarded as more worthy of praise because they are different.

Just... The clones being traumatized from day one. Behaving based on their traumatization.

Instinctively striving for minimal forms of control through naming themselves, altering their appearance and the paint on their kits. Never really knowing that there's better in life than that which they all intimately know. Never even really getting to thrive because that was never in the cards. Not even when they had someone fighting for them...

There's so much to talk about...

And it might just me reaching hard and empathizing with characters that are undoubtedly tragic, but I just... I donno. I want things to end well for them. Even if I know that's not the conclusion they'll get.

[lewdcookies]

After reading the Cities of Sigmar 2e battletome I feel that the faction lost something in the switch over to 3rd edition.

The 2e execution stumbles. A lot. There's so much stuff that could've been written less jankily. Or less "We have this model, and by Sigmar are we going to squeeze out every drop of it in the lore".

But, at the same time there's a nice sense of unity present in the book that got lost the moment it turned human centric in their revamp.

The short stories in the book for each city goes to great length to show just how many different people are working together to stave off the darkness together..

I get why it happened, since the entire faction was just a mishmash of old Warhammer Fantasy units in plastic. But at the same time it was also a great way of showing just how many people worked together under Sigmar's banner for a better future.

And then all that got thrown away and it's all about humans fighting, and the elves and dwarves just got relegated to being a sideshow pretty much.

Which is kind of sad in a way.

Like the faction needed a revamp, no doubt about that. The WHFB design's doesn't fully mesh with the Mortal Realms design language. But undercutting the supposed unity between multiple groups fighting for a similar cause is disappointing.

Like I know there's rumors about dwarves finally getting back into the faction, but I never really take much stock in warhammer rumors. Far too easy to just spout off random stuff and go "Just trust me bro". Seen that happen plenty of time already.

Also, it's kind of weird to realize that GW dunked hard on Josh Reynolds. Like he wrote all of the short stories in the book, not to mention the Eight Lamentations series. Then all that got kind of swept under the rug in a sense when CoS got redone for 3rd edition.

[animehouse-moe]

Trigun Stampede Episode 1: Exceeding Expectations

I had hopes, I had abnormally high hopes. I was banking on Orange delivering, expecting some quality work. But this, this is another level. It's a love letter to the 3d medium in anime, and proof that within it exists the ability to deliver, action, acting, emotion, and far more. It's not just the inferior little brother to 2d animation, not just the stopgap for when there's not enough time or manpower for 2d, and Trigun Stampede proves this all within a single episode.

Art that meshes with the medium impeccably, both as background and focus is a huge proponent of it. It still has that "polished" look to it, but it's not something that sticks out. Everything is done to bring it together. And the aspect that I feel serves to get the most out of this cohesive effort is the visual effects. The overall look of them is absolutely incredible, there's zero room for critique on their quality, and they fit the episode perfectly.

In contrast to this though, the area that I think sees the most prolific improvement is the character acting. It's so ridiculously good, fluid, and expressive that it provides a better showing of creativity and movement than the majority of anime this season. Just look at this movement. It's not sluggish, it's not linear or abrupt. It has so much life in it.

Hell, they even play around with the character models in their expressions. They aren't overly rigid in their looks, and Orange is more than willing to mess with them to get the desired effect and feel.

The expressiveness is really just out of this world, and is still in part owed to the effort of the voice actors. I may be a massive critic of Vash's VA (Matsuoka Yoshitsugu) as they consistently play the harem MC of the season, but they do damn good work and it shows here. He draws out the harmless and comical charisma of Vash and it adds so much to the feel of the character.

My last piece as to what I love so much about this first episode is a bit of a twofer: direction and movement. The two are largely inseparable, but the latter is a component/influence of the former. Movement is an easy thing to forget about, in anime there's definitely a lot of sequences without it. Lots of moments where it's essentially stationary. Trigun Stampede though is a constant assault on the sense of the lowest order. That is, in almost every moment there's something moving. Even just background shuffling of nameless characters, or the wandering eyes of a character, or any order of things. There's hardly a stationary scene in the anime, and it's such a huge influence on how it feels. It makes it feel so full, like there's never a dull moment or a lull in the acting and interactions of the characters.

And with that movement comes the influence of direction. Orange is a predominantly 3D studio, so of course they know how to handle it. But personally, I'd still say it's a cut above what they've done previously. When the characters are acting the camera remains stationary, and helps sell the creativity and effort in their motion, but when they aren't being overly expressive, the camera flys about and makes up for that feeling of motion. It's a perfect understanding, and something that I always complain about with 3D animation. When you have something that isn't incredibly polished, but is 3D, the best course of action is to move. Shake the camera, fly it about and around the characters, give the illusion of more movement and motion than there is.

Studio Orange really went above and beyond to impress with this first episode. Hell, they did such a ridiculously good job with it that I forgot it was an original story. Trigun Stampede is proving within a single episode that 3D animation that well and truly deserves respect in the community outside of the stopgap and mixed media measures that many see it as. It has more than enough capability in emotion, movement, acting, and even animation to stand tall alongside 2D work. I really can't wait to see where Orange takes us with this series, and what else they'll be able to effortlessly show off with.

[the-yuri-librarian]

Can I ask, why do you love WLW romance better than Het romance? What makes them better? I did not mean anything negative, and I know everyone have their own like and dislike but I want to know your thoughts....

Also what do you think that made Asian WLW (GL manga/manhwa/manhua) romances different than western WLW romances?

This is a very good question on both fronts!

Answering the first part is easy: I prefer WLW relationships because I'm a lesbian. That's sort of all there is to it? Like, on some level, I have only been reading WLW novels for the past several years (and WLW comics since Sept '23), because hetero relationships in fiction have sort of dominated culture my whole life? I can't name a movie or a book series off hand from my childhood/teen years that did not contain a straight relationship. I would genuinely have to think about it. But, when I graduated from grad school for the first time and started to connect with reading on a level I hadn't since I was a kid-early teen, I made this very conscious decision to focus really really heavily on sapphic fiction, even more so than trans fiction even though I am trans, too. I think part of this is because I just wanted to see myself represented in the works I am reading. Another part of this is I relate more to sapphic romances. For all my life, I have only ever loved women as a woman, and that makes straight romances feel somewhat foreign to me? I think maybe it's because the way relationships are talked about in queer culture versus the way relationships are talked about in straight culture; it feels very different, though I don't have an example offhand to point to. On top of that, there is also a lot of historical precedent for lesbians feeling like their sexuality and their gender identity are somewhat meshed or intersected (if you want to know more I'd have to do like actual research lol), and I think I definitely feel that. The lesbian label is really important for me, and I think that importance draws me to WLW fiction

In terms of what makes eastern and western comics/yuri/sapphic romances different, I think that you could write an entire dissertation on this (but I'll try not to lol). Now, I am by no means an expert on Japanese or Korean cultural studies, in fact I am far from that, but I think the way the romances play out really highlights the way their cultures function differently from cultures in the west. Firstly, I think that eastern cultures place a much higher focus on cultural expectations. I would not say that eastern cultures are necessarily more conservative than western cultures (I mean, just look at any news coming out of the US, we're practically a theocracy). Instead, I would say that people living in eastern cultures are more bound by their culture. For example: in the US, or a similar western culture, it is generally ok to be gay in the 2010s and 2020s. From my understanding, this is also the case in Korea and Japan, but there is more cultural push back. I think this reality is represented in sapphic romance stories from the two places well. Look at any fiction featuring a lesbian main character coming out of America: their sexuality is never treated like some weird thing (unless the story is trying to realistically represent discrimination); instead, they just are gay. And, when a character is beginning to realize she might be a lesbian, she might have to adjust her view of herself, but it's really no big deal. On the other hand, look at Japanese yuri, especially high school stories: there is almost universally a moment where one of the characters will be like "but we're both girls!" to which the other character will be like "it's fine." I think this moment is included in those stories because the mangaka are consciously pushing back on the idea that it's wrong to be gay. A really good example of this can be seen in Rei's "it's ok to be gay monologue" in I'm in Love with the Villainess. In American fiction, something like that would likely feel unnecessary (though, for the record, I think American TV shows and movies are at the point where such a monologue is necessary, but that's a different story).

Another example can be seen in the way eastern comics treat cunnilingus. This is not a universal thing, but one trend that I've noticed in the more NSFW or smutty comics I've read is that, often, when a woman is about to go down on another woman, the one getting eaten out will protest like "no, not there" or "no, I'm not clean," and I think that this too is indicative of the ways women are entangled by cultural expectations in the east. In an America comic or novel, this would not be treated with the same hesitancy. But, in eastern cultures, there seems to almost be this expectation that the women turns down getting eaten out, only to relent and accept it when their lover insists.

I'm not sure if any of that makes sense, but it's the best I got without doing real research. Also, again, I am not an expert, so take everything I just said with about a tablespoon of salt!

[heredis-sanguinis]

𝐆𝐄𝐓 𝐓𝐎 𝐊𝐍𝐎𝐖 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐌𝐔𝐍

- Tagged by: @piltover-sharpshooter & @shimmerbeasts -

-Under 'Read More' for length-

What made you pick up the current muse(s) you have? He's one of my absolute fave League champions. There were hardly any out there and I dipped by finger in that sanguine pool for a moment and got pulled in instantly. To me he has a ton of potential to be fleshed out, that I hope to put down in writing. Riot seems to forget the 'unpolished' gem they have created at times. Especially since he seems to always end up as a joke to people in the community and even the playerbase, and easily gets ignored that way. Or at least in my experiences. The amount of times I've heard jokes like 'discount-ripoff-Lestat/Dracula/vampire/-clown are too.fucking.many...

Is there anything you don’t like to write? Slice of life stuff... I just don't get any motivation to keep anything going in that genre. The same goes for modern verses? I just don't get inspiration for anything on my muses for this either. And not even because I dislike them or anything, it just doesn't mesh with my brain.

Is there anything you really enjoy writing? A n g s t It comes naturally to me, with little effort. And considering how swamped my schedule is, this is a blessing. Though I am not that fuzzed about what genre I'm writing in. I enjoy most things, as long as there is something that moves forward. Development and something to work with to continue that pace and progression are absolutely <3

How do you come up with headcanons? Inspiration from other sources Trying to look behind the basic lore and colour stories, but also look at any potential related characters or other sources and see if anything meshes with Vlad. Like, besides his own lore, I also looked at Noxian lore, Camavoran lore, Viego/Kalista/Hecarim, the Blessed Isles, Ruination, the Darkin and so on.

Do you write in silence or do you play music? I write mostly with something playing in the background. This could be any relatable music to my muses. Or just any of my playlists. A Youtube series I'm watching/listening to. While at work I tend to write down keywords if something comes to mind, and then at home I'll see what comes out of it. (if I remember that I wrote something down)

Do you plan your replies or wing them? I wing them, 99%, mostly. I don't really enjoy planning out every step of muses interactions and relationships. And besides, Vlad is not one to let his life and actions be dictated as easily. He does as he pleases and so too do I write him.

Do you enjoy shipping? I am a shipping whore, but I am very passive in seeking anything in this regard due to really bad experiences where I got accusted of only seeking out interactions for ships, just because I like some characters together. Like, my absolute otp is VladVayne, but I never interacted with any Vayne for the shipping reason. I enjoy their antagonistic dynamic potential a lot too, but yeah stuff happened and now I just tend to not bother to seek interactions. It's a good thing Vlad is not an easy character to ship with, so that saves me a lot of issues as well in this regard.

What’s your alias/name? Cella

Age? 36

Birthday? May 20th

Favourite color? I have several: Black, red, green and purple

Favourite song? This changes whenever it does, But currently it is 'The Skies Above' by The Black Mages

Last movie you watched? I can't remember. It might have been a horror movie when I went to my bestie, sometime last year, to watch 'something'. But I have slept since then, and just don't remember a title.

Last show you watched? I think that has to be Hazbin Hotel? I don't watch a lot of series or shows. Heck, I haven't watched TV properly in a decade now. And rarely go online to watch anything.

Last song you listened to? 'Oblivion' by Masayoshi Soken (Yes, it is another Final Fantasy XIV song)

Favourite food? Listen, I love food, so I don't really have one specific dish or type that I consider a 'fave'. So I'll give a couple: sushi, steak (rare, I need it to bleed), chips (fries for you USA lot), kebab and ice cream (lemon being my absolute fave flavour)

Favourite season? W I N T E R No sun, no spiders (severely arachnophobic), no skin-blistering heat. What's not to love? And if I'm cold, I just. wear. another. layer. of. clothing.

Do you have a Tumblr best friend? Quite a few. Shoutout to @angelicxlly @piltover-sharpshooter @thegoldentigress @weapon-turned-jack These four have been with me through thick and thin for several years now. I love them dearly and they're precious to me. Heck, Monkey-brain-sharpshooter is practically my clone. Literal spiderman-meme stuff there and it gets creepy at times how much we act and think and say alike...

Tagging: You, yes you! I don't know who has been tagged or has done this already. But consider this your tag now~

[very-grownup]

Book 10, 2024

"Death's End" is the conclusion to the trilogy Cixin Liu started in "The Three-Body Problem" and it ends strong. He focusses almost exclusively on a single protagonist, aeronautical engineer Cheng Xin, which is definitely to the benefit of propelling the narrative and the reader forward. It was much easier to fall into a rhythm with "Death's End" than "The Dark Forest". Through hibernation, Cheng Xin's story has her witnessing events across hundreds of years of human history, jumping her from climactic event to climactic event.

As has been a constant through the series, the narrative goes through peaks and valleys of hope and despair, displaying a range of human responses to world-altering events and revelations. There are moments of incredible beauty and hope and cooperation that get yanked away to plunge you into some really dark places.

Something that is distinct in "Death's End" is that Cixin Liu plays with different narrative formats for telling his story, with normal novel prose, diary excerpts, and fairy tales. I love a fairy tale and incorporating them into the hard science fiction as a means of multilayered coded message transmission feels like a natural and human way to bring an older kind of storytelling into what is generally seen as a colder, 'serious' genre of fiction. It also meshes well with an overarching theme of how far humanity can change while still remaining human.

Colonization, climate disaster, and the intersection of fundamentally incompatible existences are mixed in, still distressingly relevant as they were when originally published in Chinese fourteen years ago. That combination of subjects also shows there isn't a strict line between 'hard' and 'soft' science fiction the way some shaggy snob gatekeepers try to impose. There's a section of the novel where most of humanity has to relocate to Australia and there's nothing hard or futuristic about the conflicts of resources and individuality versus the group that arise from the situation.

My only criticism -- and perhaps less a criticism and more an observation of what feels more like an incidental expression of the author's unconscious beliefs (in that I don't think it's an intentional theme the way other things are) -- is that there's some weird gender stuff peppering the work. An unquestioned heteronormative binary that feels a bit out of step in the 21st century, a presumed softness in Cheng Xin where her attitude to humanity is positioned as motherly versus Luo Ji, who returns from "The Dark Forest", and Thomas Wade, initially Cheng Xin's boss and later an antagonist of sorts who mirrors her hibernation-enabled progress through the eras. Observations on the trend of men appearing more feminine during a peaceful era of cooperation where humanity is particularly hopeful and pursuing what seems to be the most luxurious and technologically advanced society depicted in the novel. Although this section of the novel also introduces the beautiful diplomatic android of the Trisolarans, Sophon, who is described as being particularly delicate and feminine, almost geisha-like in her dealings with Cheng Xin in a very intentional, constructed way that, now that I'm writing it down, maybe Cixin Liu is saying something about socialized gender assumptions after all.

None of the books in Cixin Liu's series are easy reads, and "Death's End" is no different. It's long, it's dense, and it doesn't have a neat ending in a traditional sense (although in some ways it's as neat an ending as you can have). I think it is, ultimately, a story with a hopeful ending, but one where hope isn't saccharine but a hard, conscious choice that isn't the same as happy.