#alyssa chang edit

[madisoncounty]

i know i'm who i am today because i knew you 20 YEARS OF WICKED: FOR GOOD idina menzel & kristin chenoweth • ana gasteyer & kate reinders • alyssa fox & mckenzie kurtz • christine dwyer & jenni barber • idina menzel & kristin chenoweth • stephanie j block & kendra kassebaum • alyssa fox & mckenzie kurtz • lindsay heather pearce & brittney johnson • idina menzel & kristin chenoweth • idina menzel, kristin chenoweth, & various elphabas and glindas of broadway

[tenaciousarcadeexpert]

Alyssa Chang in We're Not Worthy-3.01

[lwprodz24]

pov: your girlfriend interrupts you with a dramatic af entrance

[barbreypilled]

ok I rly want to finish the extremely long barbcat fic. I also have a backup version w the names changed in case it ends up actually being good

[floripire]

incorrect quotes ft. @founderscouncil

[samandcolbyownme]

Summary: anon request - "can you do a zach one where he like exposes him and readers secret relationship and she just goes with it , like " you weren't so quiet last night " and she just has her jaw dropped and says something back and it ends with smut" 

Warnings: this one shot will contain reader having sexual daydreams during the podcast, those dreams will include, oral (m rec), unprotected sex, the rest will contain Zach's usual banter and fluffiness

Word count: 2.1 k | not edited 

Also - I know it might get confusing, but the italics are what happened the night before, but in the form as if it's happening right now, like you're replaying the night in your mind. Hope that made sense, enjoy! 

╔═══━━━─── • ───━━━═══╗

"You want to know what I think is crazy?" Zach asks as his fingers drag up and down your arm. 

"Hmm?" You hum quietly as you keep your head on his chest. You feel him laugh slightly, "That no one has figured us out yet." 

You laugh, moving your head to look up at him, "Well now you just jinxed the hell out of that." 

He shrugs, a smirk on his face, "I mean I like us being a secret and all, but it's so hard for me to not say certain things when you're on the pod with us." 

You nod, "Yeah, I know what you mean." You smirk, "So what, is that your way of telling me you're going to out us at tomorrow's show?" 

He raises his brows, "I'm full of surprises babe. Guess you're going to have to wait and see." 

.·:*¨ ✘ ¨*:·.

The next day, you're sitting on the red bench, headphones on and you're getting ready to do the show, but your mind just isn't there. 

Instead it's elsewhere. 

Specifically, replaying the time spent with Zach the previous night. 

The way you felt coming back from the restaurant, you needed him, his hands resting on your hips as you unlock your door made you crave him. 

When you finally got the door open, it was like the energy that craved one another clashed, As soon as you push the door open, he spun you around, lips on yours as he backs you into your apartment. 

"Hey." A hand is woven in front of you, "Earth to y/n." 

You look over at Tara and blink as you take your headphones off, "Yeah, hi. I'm here." 

"Where the fuck did you go. You were like-" she mimics how you were staring, "Zoned out." 

You laugh, "Sorry. I'm tired. I was up all night." Zach and Jared walk onto the set, "Oooh. Up all night doing what?" Zach teases and you roll your eyes, "I was coming up with a list of places that've already been to for Sam and Colby." 

Zach sits down and raises his brows, "Wow that was very specific." Zach sighs, placing his headphones on and you can't help but laugh. 

Friends around friends, lovers when it's just you two. 

You lean back, placing your headphones back on and Tara speaks up, "So I have to ask, how does it feel being better than two of the most liked ghost hunters in the world?" 

You laugh slightly, "What do you mean?" 

"I know you do paranormal investigation stuff too, and just the fact that Sam and Colby are coming to you for stuff.. I don't know that just.." Tara laughs and you tilt your head, "Are you just saying that to make a jab at them?" 

She nods and lean in to your mic, "Well then it feels pretty damn good." 

"Alright, alright. Anymore and we'll be scraping your brain off the walls from your head swelling to the point of exploding." Zach tries not to laugh and you shrug, "Hey, I take it when I can." 

You give him a quick and subtle wink then quickly change the subject, "Cat got Zach's tongue so I'll just go ahead and do the intro for him." You laugh, "What's up guys, we're here with Tara, Alyssa, me, Jared and oh, I guess Zach is here too." 

Zach just stares at you and you can't help but laugh. 

"Okay, but I love the fact that she announced Tara and me first." Alyssa laughs and you point to her. Tara nods, "Yeah, I'm going to have to say that we need to all vote to make y/n the person who announces the show." 

"Like a pre-recorded track because there are days she isn't here." Alyssa points out and you nod, "I agree. All in favor." You raise your hand and instantly say, "Three versus two. Girls win." 

"Youre ridiculous. Who invited you here anyway?" Zach rolls his eyes and you furrow your brows, "Um, you?" 

"Can you just like, zip it." Zach motions at his mouth and you smirk, "Make me. Take my headphones away." 

Zach tries not to laugh, "I mean, I can. But you might moan a little." 

"Oh my god. No. No. No." you close your eyes and look away from him, but in secret, you'd be on your knees in seconds for him. 

Zach places his hands on your shoulders, urging you to your knees. You drop down, complying to his every silent request. 

You stare up at him as he shrugs his black jean jacket off, eyes locked on yours as his jaw is slightly slack from your hand sliding over his throbbing cock that's being held back by his jeans. 

"I don't think.. you should say that to our guests?" Jared says with a nervous laugh, "I'm actually surprised you haven't gotten sued yet." 

"Please." Zach shrugs, nodding to you, "She won't sue me." 

Tara points to you, "I think you should just for his reaction. 

You laugh, "Thinking about it." 

You weren't thinking about that at all, Zach undoes his belt, followed by his jeans. The quick sound of the zipper going down causes your skin to perk up with goosebumps, caused by excitement. 

You rise up from your calves, licking your lips as you work fast to free him from his boxers. 

Zach speaking pulls you back into reality, "So now that we're past that embarrassing ensemble.." 

Zach trails off and so does your mind, You loved hearing Zach's little moans and groans as you held his cock with your lips and tongue. 

The way his fingers gentle drug over your head, slowly pulling your hair as his pleasure grew larger, "Fuck." 

Zach didn't really swear in general, so when he did, and it was because of you. It was even fucking hotter. 

You blink, snapping back into reality. 

"So I thought we could talk about something serious today." Zach says and Jared laughs, "Oh no. Someone's getting fired." 

"Yeah it's you." Zach says, pretending to be serious and Jared laughs, "I'd love to see you try, I'll just tell you no and you'll listen." 

You laugh and nod, "No that's so true." 

"Yeah whatever." Zach rolls his eyes, "No I have an exciting announcement." 

Your heart thumps and your head snaps towards him slightly. 

His eyes move to you and he smiles a little bit, "So, I have some news that may shock a lot of people, but I think everyone should know this, from me." 

"What's the fuck is happening?" Tara asks and Zach sighs, speaking quickly, "We're going to be doing a live dropouts show." 

You let out a breath and keep your stare on him, "Wow, Zach. That's great." 

"Better be, because they want all of us who are here right now." Zach gives a thumbs up, "What a relief it was to get that off my chest." 

You laugh slightly as your eyes trail down his neck to his necklace that's lying comfortably on his chest. 

Your back slams onto the bed, Zach's lips kissing over any skin they can reach. You let out a moan as he sucks a hicky into the skin over your hip. 

He kisses up over your boobs and up your neck. He leans up and you feel his cock slip between the folds of your pussy. 

The shiny necklace dangling from his neck as you feel him slide into you fully. You find it so hot when it swings back and forth with each thrust.

"Hey, I can't lie." Jared laughs and Tara cuts him off with a yell, "Say it!" 

You look over, at Tara, laughing as she keeps pointing to jared. You look over at Zach and he gives you a look that would make your legs go weak if you were standing. 

It wasn't a weird look. It was him just staring at you, knowing why you keep zoning out, and he was just making it worse. 

"I liked y/n's intro." Jared sighs and you look over at Jared with a clap, "Thank you." 

"You definitely thought it was better than Zach's intro, right?" Alyssa asks and Jared laughs, "I'm not answering that." 

You yelling with excitement, "Fuck yeah! Because you know that girls are just better than boys!" You motion between you, Tara and Alyssa. 

"Whoa, whoa!" Zach says waving his hand out in front of him a few times, "Settle down. Settle down, I'm getting flashbacks." 

"War flashbacks." Jared snorts and Tara asks with a laugh, "Flashbacks of what?!" 

You look at Zach, laughing and he shakes his head while furrowing his brows, "I don't know what you're laughing about because these flashbacks are of how loud you were being last night." 

It all happened so fast you blank, "What the fuck." 

"What did he just say?" Jared asks, mouth dropped with surprise. 

"Oh yeah, okay." Tara rolls her eyes and as you're still staring at Zach, he tilts his head slightly, giving his brows a quick flick. 

He outted you at tomorrow's show. 

Might as well roll with it. 

"You gonna tell them or you want me to, princess?" Zach smirks and you shrug, letting out a dramatic sigh, "Whatever helps you sleep at night." 

"Oh, you know exactly what helps me sleep at night." Zach winks as you look at him and you shake your head, looking down to rest it in your hand. 

"I can't tell if they're joking." Alyssa laughs and Tara cuts in, "Yeahhh, I mean, okay. I've actually been extremely suspicions about these two for weeks now."

"Oh please tell us what made you think that, Tara." Jared leans in, super invested into the conversation. 

You look up and look from Tara to Zach and he shrugs, "Hit me." He nods to Tara and she smirks, looking between you and Zach, "Well for starters, he stares at her every time she looks away." 

"I like looking at the back of her head. It makes it so I don't have anything mean to say." Zach shrugs and you  just laugh. 

"What else you got, Tara?" Jared encourages and Tara laughs, "Another thing is, they'll stop answering me at both at the same time. Like I'll be texting both of them and then all of a sudden.. radio silence." 

"I have a very strict bed time, Tara." You and Zach both say, just adding fuel to the fire and you just laugh, knowing that you're caught. 

"See!" Tara tells pointing, "See!" 

"Well.. if you don't know you do now." Zach laughs and Jared eggs him on, "Know what? Zach. Care to enlighten us with a perfect confirmation?" 

"What's my lawyer?" Zach yells looking around as he raises his hand. 

"So isn't true? You and.." Alyssa points from you to Zach and you laugh, nodding your head slowly. 

"Wow." Jared says, "I honestly did not expect this is come out onto the podcast today." 

Zach reaches for his water and takes a sip, "Listen, we played dumb, but we knew what we were doing." Zach scoffs, "Alright. You can't tell me that you weren't fooled."

"I knew my suspicions were there for a reason." Tara laughs, "How long?" 

"Two months." You laugh and they don't believe you.  Zach nods, "No she's serious.  It was after the episode with Jake and Johnnie." 

"Oh shit, yeah I guess that was two months ago." Tara nods, "I'm just like.. having a holy fuck moment." 

"Yeah." Zach laughs, "She came to see if I was as rich as I bragged that I was, and I must have passed inspection because she didn't go home that night." 

"Oh my god." You laugh, "That's not.." you shake your head and Jared laughs, "I just.. that really does shock me, like.. y/n. Why him?" 

You shrug, smiling as you look over at Zach. He glances at you and smirks, "What can I say? I'm full of surprises."

.·:*¨ ✘ ¨*:·.

Thank you for reading! Let me know how you liked it. Love you all! Thank you so much for reading! 

Likes and reblogs are majorly appreciated!

[minustwofingers]

love is a laserquest p.2

series masterlist (read p1 here!)

pairing: rockstar!ellie williams x reader

request: @thatgiraffefromtlou so kindly included me on a post about writing something inspired by these beautiful edits :) thank you !

summary: after a serious of unfortunate events, columbia grad y/n y/l/n finds herself using her hard-earned journalism degree interviewing vapid stars and writing articles that she's convinced are rotting her mind. ellie williams has just dropped the album of the year and it's all anyone is talking about, but all she wants is to be off the press train. a certain interview with a certain interviewer might change this.

cws: explicit language, kind of suggestive phrasing? (i get a little feral with guitar playing descriptions), shitty bosses, mentions of nausea and throwing up (no one actually does tho dw), y/n is anxious asf, my writing is a little....yikes...in this one, loser!ellie

a/n: i lied i lied hehe. here's the next part. im still working on building this stupid app so i havent been able to write as much recently + holiday family stuff but oh am i back!

here's a playlist inspired by this fic

wc: 2.4k

tags: tags :) @intrnetdoll @dazedshoon @lovecaraya @pctcr @sariyaflowr @loser-keiji @prettyplant0 @666findgod @sawaagyapong @rystarkov @buzzybuzzsposts @addisonnie@galacticstxrdust @elliesbabygirl @pinkazelma @ariianelle @lu002 @blairfox04 @sparkleswonderland @elliesflower @muthafuckingstargirl @elliewilliamsissubermommyoml @eviestevie-14 @quicksilversg1rl @guacala @crtcrp @overtrred28 @diddiqueen @krisyslostsoul

enjoy mwah

It starts slow, like the drip of a broken faucet. It’s not like you’re actively seeking out anything Ellie William’s related, but somehow it seems like everything Ellie Williams related is seeing you out. 

In the grocery store, one of her hit songs from her newest album blaring over the speakers.

On the street, where you see crumpled pages of magazines with her face plastered all over them. 

And—perhaps the most offensively—on NPR and the New York Times, quite literally days after you’d met her. Suddenly Steve Inskeep and Leila Fadel begin the Up First podcast with a familiar song and devote an entire third of the morning podcast to Ellie and her band’s rise to fame. 

You decide to switch to the BBC World News for a while, but even they seem to be under her spell.

It’s not that you don’t like Ellie. She seems fine. Normal. Really cute, actually, and clearly very talented. But whenever you think about her, you think about the ill-fated, awkward, charmless interview.

“What happened?” Alyssa had asked you when she’d come back from surgery. “That wasn’t you out there.”

Which was actually very hurtful to hear, because you’d been holding onto the hope that you’d been all in your head about your interview being a failure. It all culminates in Eric, your 300 year old manager, sending you a strongly worded email that told you that your performance in the interview was so underwhelming that you were being pulled from the interviewer pool and exiled to article writing land. Which could be worse, you admit. You could be unemployed on the streets of LA. At least you’re still writing. 

And write you do. You spend all your waking hours either at your keyboard, on your yoga mat, or sat in a chair somewhere at a local cafe for a coffee chat. You’ve mostly deleted social media, since all you see nowadays are pictures of Ellie and Becca’s posts about her experience working and loving her life in New York (the algorithm apparently knows exactly what you want to see the most). 

It’s bizarre that, even as you try your best to place your focus on honing your craft and consuming only content that you think will make you a better writer, you still somehow learn everything and more about Ellie Wlliams and her band. It’s in the emails at work whose chains you’re CC’ed on. It’s in the advertisements and the billboards everywhere. It’s even in the conversations you have with your two roommates, Greta and Maureena. 

“She’s so fucking cool,” says Maureena dreamily as you sit around the TV in the living room. “I still can’t believe you got to talk to her.”

“It’s not like I actually got to, like, get to know her or whatever,” you say. “It was honestly kind of dry. Just awkward small talk.”

“That’s more than anyone else I know can say.” She reaches forward and grabs a fistful of popcorn. “How come she gets interviewed by the person who probably cares about her the least in all of LA? Like, what are the chances?”

“I care,” you say, and it sounds unusually defensive coming out of your mouth.

Maureena gives you a long, suspicious look, but before she can respond, Greta comes bursting into the apartment, purse swinging from her shoulder.

A greeting is halfway out of your mouth when she cuts you off. 

“You guys will not believe what I just did.” She’s nearly bursting with excitement, her eyes bright and wide. 

“Like, in a good way?” you ask. 

“Yes. Obviously!” Greta fishes around in her pocket until she pulls her phone out, waving it around. “Check your email.”

The last time Greta had come in with an entrance this energetic, she’d been coming to inform you both that she was getting engaged to her loser boyfriend Brian (which—thank God—didn’t actually last), so you and Maureena trade nervous looks. 

Maureena gets to it first. 

“Tickets to see Ellie Williams? Tonight?” Now she’s about to explode with giddiness, leaping from the couch and throwing her arms around Greta. “I love you, I love you, I love you. How did you get these? I thought they were, like, totally sold out. Or ten thousand dollars.” 

She grins wickedly, holding her hands out in a “who knows” sort of way. “You can all thank me later. We have to leave in about 20 if we want to get there in time. Y/N, you good?”

You’d been staring on in horror, jaw dropped and body completely frozen. You had registered that Ellie was playing in LA tonight—it’s all anyone you knew talked about at work today—but you never once considered actually going to try to see her. “Uh, yeah. Give me just a few.”

By the time you get to the venue, you’re convinced that you might actually puke from the nerves. It’s ridiculous. It’s not like three broke 20 some year olds were going to get last minute seats to an Ellie Williams concert that were genuinely good seats. It’s not like she would see you and realize that the girl who flopped while interviewing her was a big enough fan to attend. You’re going to be fine. 

“Shit, Grets, how are we so close?” asked Maureena as she leads you both closer and closer to the front. 

Horror steadily rises within you as you approach the front row. 

“I got these from my boss,” she says, turning around with a devilish glint in her dark brown eyes. “Her daughter got food poisoning, bless her. She had to stay back to take care of her, and I was the only one who stayed late to work, so…”

Greta’s boss was some filthy rich nepo baby who was a partner of a big talent agency. All of a sudden you feel stupid for not realizing this sooner.

“Shit,” you say, mostly to yourself. “Oh no. Oh my god.”

“Isn’t this so cool!” Greta jumps up and down, hands on your shoulders as she tries to rile you up. “Dude, what if she recognizes you?” 

“I think I’m going to puke,” you say miserably. Somehow the thought of her seeing you made you want to crawl inside your skin in shame and hide for the next calendar year. “Did you guys not see how ass it was? I was so fucking awkward.”

“It wasn’t even that bad.” Maureena pats your shoulder. 

“I literally was forbidden from ever interviewing again because it was so bad.”

“Because Eric hates women,” says Greta. “It’s not your fault he’s a horrible human being. Give it, like, a year or so until he croaks. Then they’ll let you back in the game.”

“Uh huh,” you say, feeling very harrowed. 

You remain in this state of abject terror for the entire opener performance. The nausea doesn’t subside. It only gets worse when you realize that if you actually puke, Ellie’s definitely going to see it. Just like she’s going to see you, with the stupid stars Greta had insisted you paint on your cheekbones with glittery eyeliner and eyeshadow. 

“She really likes space,” Greta had told you while you’d been getting ready, pretending like you didn’t already know all about this. “So all of her fans wear star stuff to see her.”

Before you can think to wipe off the glitter, everything goes black. Then the crowd goes wild. 

When the silvery blue light spills onto the stage, it illuminates Ellie, standing just a number of feet away from you. You barely have enough time to take in the black leather coat and loose white shirt she’s wearing before music explodes out of the speakers, her fingers flying up and down the fretboard. 

You’re spellbound as you watch her. Her voice rings loud and clear and slightly gravelly when it snags on her words. She’s nothing at all like the girl you’d met a month ago—there’s no discomfort, no awkwardness. She looks like she’s born to be on stage. 

When the first song ends, she steps back, grabbing the standing mic next to her. 

“Uh. Hi,” she says, and it’s so endearingly nervous compared to how she’d just sounded that something in your chest twists. She rubs the back of her neck. “I’m Ellie.”

Greta and Maureena join the crowd, screaming and cheering. 

“I LOVE YOU!” someone shrieks, louder than everyone else.

“You know,” she says, “I don’t think I’ll ever get used to people reacting like this to me just, like, saying my name. It’s really fucking weird. Oh. Shit. Sorry. Are you guys okay with me swearing?” 

The roar that comes from the crowd is entirely undecipherable. 

“Right,” says Ellie. “Um. I’ll take that as a yes. Sorry to anyone who brought their kids or something. Anyway, this one’s about the ex who cheated on me and gave me mono.” 

Before you can react to that, she starts playing. 

As she proceeds through the setlist, you’re struck by just how close you are to her, how many things you can notice that hardly anyone else in the crowd can see. You see the outline of her phone in her pocket, the pieces of hair that have fallen out of her little half bun and are sticking to her face, the way that the glitter on her collarbones trails down her shirt in little rivulets. 

And, above everything else, you can see the horrible way her fingers straddle the fretboard, curling and pressing with ease so practiced it looks tender. 

Apart from this bad, bad development (you can feel your mind going a million miles an hour about things you should not be thinking about), things are going great. Ellie hasn’t noticed you. Or even looked in your direction. You’re not even sure she can see you, given how little light is shed onto the crowd. The false sense of security makes you feel comfortable singing along with Greta and Maureena, your lips forming the lyrics you’d been pretending to not listen to whenever her songs came on. 

It happens during a slower song, a sort of ballad that makes your heart thud harder in your chest to hear from her mouth. The lights on stage dim a little. Light spills just the slightest onto the front of the crowd, and Ellie’s eyes fall and snap onto yours so decisively that it almost feels audible. 

For a moment, you can’t breathe. Ellie’s voice suddenly catches mid-word, faltering and missing a beat. She thrusts her hand with the mic into the crowd, which eagerly picks up where she left off and finishes the verse. 

It’s impossible to see on the screen projecting her image behind her, but you can see the flicker of recognition in her eyes, the stiffness that comes with realizing that you actually know someone from somewhere. 

You’re the one who breaks eye contact, focused with a sudden intensity on the way the thin fabric of your sleeves are situated on your arms. 

Greta pokes you so hard in your ribs that you gasp. 

“What the fuck!” you snap, but the words are swept away by the noise around you. 

“Why didn’t you wave?!” she hisses in your ear. “She totally recognized you.”

The realization falls over you with the subtlety of an anvil. Oh my god. You totally should’ve waved. That was the normal, well-adjusted thing to do. Now she was going to think you were weird. And it was too late now. But she didn’t wave to you. Wasn’t she supposed to wave first? Because you of course remembered her, but she might not remember you. Yeah. You could go with that.

Maybe she didn’t remember you. 

You can’t relax for the rest of the concert. You try your best to just act normal and dance along with your friends and casually mouth the words, but it’s hard when it feels like she’s staring at you. Which is completely impossible. The light doesn’t fall back onto the crowd until the concert is over and Ellie and her band are long gone backstage. 

~

Two months later, all you can think about is the way that Ellie stuttered over her words when she saw you in the crowd. Of course, this is definitely something you’ve made up in your mind, because there’s a number of reasons why she might’ve slipped up. Maybe she just thought she knew you from somewhere and couldn’t place it. That’s why she (allegedly) kept looking in your direction afterwards. Or maybe you’re completely batshit insane, and she didn’t look at you at all. Because if she had, wouldn’t she have waved? Right?

It’s almost bad enough to distract you from work. You find yourself prowling on Twitter, watching the #elliewilliams tag blow up following every concert date. It doesn’t give you any clarity, because in every picture, she looks just as perfect and cool and confident as she was at the LA show. You don’t know why you assumed she’d look different if it was true that she’d recognized you. More human, maybe. But she’s just as bathed in starlight as she was that night many weeks before, just as far away and untouchable. 

You spend so much time thinking about her that you’re convinced you might’ve slipped into a dream when Eric appears at your cubicle with the news.

Instead of saying hello, he plops a stack of papers on the desk in front of you, all labeled “PopNow! Interview Etiquette”. 

“Excuse me?” you say. 

“Start reading up, kid,” says Eric. “You’re back in the game.”

“What?” 

“You have an interview scheduled later this week.” He scowls down at you, gum smacking in his mouth. He smells faintly of tobacco. 

“But I thought I was removed from—”

“You still are,” he says. “But someone requested you. Their manager told us they wouldn’t talk to us if they didn’t get you.”

“What?” 

He huffs out a short laugh. “Believe me, I was surprised too. Don’t know what they’re on about after the last time you talked to their client. Fuck this one up and you’re out, okay? Got it? The info’s in your inbox already.” 

Somehow the words don’t quite sink in until you open the email and see the words on paper. 

SENDER: Maria Miller

RECIPIENT: Eric Bal

CC: ewilliamsmusic@gmail.com, y/ny/l/n@popnow!.com

Eric,

Great to hear back from you. Glad that 3 next Wednesday works. 

Best,

MM

final a/n: lmk how u guys feel about this...feeling a little unsure about where this is going but enjoying writing it anyway there are two wolves inside of me etc. etc. also ive missed u all! i hope everyone is doing well! dont b shy!

[horizon-verizon]

TG stans love to say that jaehaera can't die in HOTD because it's her marriage to aegon iii marks the end of the dance "two scared kids bla bla bla" but I think that in GOT canon this marriage is NEVER mentioned? Shireen doesn't mention Jaehaera and Aegon III, she just says how horrible the dance of the dragons was for House Targaryen and how she wouldn't choose any sides. this marriage don't exist GOT canon.

what TG uses is the narrated version of the dragon dance from youtube lol what I think has nothing to do with canon GOT and HOTD follows the line of GOT no?

Why would Shireen mention Jaehaera and Aegon's marriage when she was talking about the devastating effects of the war outside of the Targs themselves (their family's tragedies)? She also didn't talk about Aegon's marriage to Daenaera, once again bec how the Targs recovered or didn't recover personally was not what Shireen was talking about. Also, GRRM wrote F&B way after the first few main books of the series and after AWoIaF is published.

Either way, the YouTube also existed before GRRM wrote F&B, which had some changes from that narration. Team green (as in the fans and those who say they aren't TG but show themselves as such and lie to themselves) is clinging.

EDIT (10/29/24):

Let's review GRRM's writing and the records of Jaehaera's death/Aegon's marriage to Daenaera, and the considered "end" of the Dance for media literacy:

Davos would have given much to know what he was thinking, but one such as Velaryon would never confide in him. The Lord of the Tides was of the blood of ancient Valyria, and his House had thrice provided brides for Targaryen princes. A Clash of Kings -- Davos I

Vaelaena Velaryon (mother of the Conquerors)

Alyssa Velaryon (mother of Rhaena the BB, Alysanne, and Jaehaerys I, plus others who died young; even mother to Jocelyn Baratheon, the mother of Princess Rhaenys, rider of Meleys and mother of Laena and Laenor Velaryon, grandmother to Baela/Rhaena Targaryen)

Daenaera Velaryon (mother of Daena, Elaena, Rhaena the Septa, Daeron I, Baelor I; thus Daenaera is the grandmother of Daemon Blackfyre)

(AWoIaF -- The Targaryen Kings -- Aegon III)

(F&B -- Under the Regents -- War and Peace and Cattle Shows: Daenaera's entrance in the Maiden's Day Ball, and way before that, Jaehaera's death and Unwin Peake)

A Clash of Kings was published in November 16, 1998. (meaning this storyline that included Jaehaera's death had been a thing for years even before the publish date bc writers/authors plan and write stories to be published--which can take a while itself)

A World of Ice and Fire was published in October 28, 2014.

Fire and Blood was published November 20, 2018.

The entire "Game of Thrones: Histories & Lore" animated series of six installments began back in 2012 & ended officially in 2019.

The "The Dance of Dragons" animation was both published in 2016 AND was based on G.R.R. Martin’s novella The Princess and the Queen (published in December 3, 2013), not Fire & Blood.

The BluRay episode of the Dance didn't include anything about Jaehaera's death or marriage to Aegon, nor anything about Aegon's regency or Daenaera BECAUSE IT ENDED with it saying that Aegon's marriage to Jaehaera ended the Dance, or the war itself. But it didn't end the ambitions of Unwin Peake and others, (which lead to Jaehaera's death) the story of which existed since at least 1998 on record. But definitely GRRM planned and wrote this storyline years before said publishing date, bc that's how that works.

This means that whatever sort of BluRay feature they are clinging to doesn't matter bc Daenaera being Aegon's 2nd wife/mother to his kids means that Jaehaera was always slotted to die even as she marries Aegon first.

"The Princess and the Queen" was meant to be a sort of "teaser" for Fire and Blood, and thus doesn't include anything about the greens or Rhaenyra/Alicent and Viserys before the usurpation and after Aegon II's death:

beginning of "The Princess and the Queen":

end of The Princess and the Queen:

Why in god's green earth would GRRM upend years of writing Jaehaera and Daenaera's fates/narrative purposes the way he has for the comfort and delusions of a few so called "neutrals" and green stans?! Those who refuse to take in what they are "reading"?!

Apparently, this is the post (before this edit) that some in TG have decided to disseminate amongst themselves and choose to outright distort into me saying that Jaehaera shouldn't and doesn't become Aegon's first wife. Never said anything of the sort. I said she doesn't live to become the mother of his kids nor be a direct ancestor to any of the Targs who lived post-Dance and as scions of either Viserys II or Aegon III. I said so in seevral other posts, but this is the one they want to use to say I said something I did not say.

It is disengenuous and lazy, frankly. But what ese can you expect from people who would use BluRay videos as "true" canon or stronger evidence of Daenaera's not being Aegon's second wife/mother to his kids/grandmother to Daemon Blackfyres and thus ancestor to all Blackfyres OVER several AWoIaF and main series mentions/confirmations as the this?

Example of said green and their anon asker:

[anamazingangie]

my cup runneth over ☀️ timeline

This is a timeline for : my cup runneth over by me (AmazingAngie)

Note: 5/12/2024 -- i am making minor edits to the currently published chapters. some secondary names [of dragons, etc.] have been changed and continuity errors fixed. I have currently edited up until chapter seventeen and edited this post to reflect future changes, but if you spot any discrepancies in 18-24, that is why and it should be fixed soon!

This is a non-linear fic that focuses on concurrent relationships between Rhaenyra x Baelon Targaryen and Rhaenyra x Daemon Targaryen (who is technically her stepson). Below you'll find the timeline, chronological chapter organization, and the focal pairing for each chapter.

A brief summary:

In which Rhaenyra isn’t born a Targaryen, but still manages to become both the Realm’s Delight and Queen. Both titles were acquired thanks to her blend of charm and curiosity that seemed to endear her to every dragon she met—whether they bore the name Targaryen or wore scales, it did not matter, their love for her seemed inevitable. 

☀️ 🌩️ 🌥️ 🌙

He had no intention of kissing her before they took their vows—never felt compelled to, but— He would kiss her for his siblings who never grew old enough to know what kissing was.  He would kiss her for Alyssa, who—gods—probably would have wanted to kiss her, too, after a speech like that. He would kiss her for his son, Aegon, who never made it from his cradle. He would kiss her for his eldest brother, Aemon, who would have adored her just as he did. He would kiss her as his mother and father once kissed each other. And for himself, too, because he could no longer resist. (Some day, maybe even some day soon, his son would kiss her too.)

☀️ 🌩️ 🌥️ 🌙 TIMELINE BELOW CUT ☀️ 🌩️ 🌥️ 🌙

NOTE: This timeline subject to change because timelines are hard OK?

This is the timeline I made/use as a guide while writing so events remain consistent within the story, but years are generally not listed within each chapter. 

[It also includes some notes and nicknames for this reason, too.]

There are too many flashbacks for it to make sense or feel natural for me as the write to include dates. Instead I prefer to relate events within a chapter to dates established within the story itself [such as, this happened x years after they got married, he visited when baby was x years old, etc.] 

But I realize peoples brains work differently and might find this more confusing—so here it is all laid out! NOTE #2: This story is told in a non-linear fashion, so reading the timeline may offer spoilers for all currently published chapters and imply events of future ones!

Baelon born in 57AC

Viserys born in born 77AC

Daemon born in 81AC

Aemma born in 82AC

Rhaenyra born in 96AC

[All other characters/Baelon’s siblings/Targaryen’s have their canon dates of birth as specified on the asoif wiki, but they aren’t relevant enough to all list, at least not yet.]

Related Emoji's:

These represent their role, POV/chapter, and sometimes their nickname too.

☀️ = Rhaenyra, [so bright it hurts sometimes but you can't look away]

🌙 = Aemma [not always appreciated but important and softer in the light she brings to the world.]

🌥️ = Baelon, [soft, fluffy]

🌩️ ⚡ = Daemon [loud, unable to be ignored, electric.]

Nicknames: (I regret these but it is too late)

Rhaenyra: little vēzos [by Baelon], princess [by Daemon] ‘vēzos’ means ‘sun’ in high valyrian

Baelon: kepa [by Rhaenyra & children] ‘Kepa’ means ‘father’ and/or ‘uncle’ in high valyrian

Daemon: my lēkia [by Rhaenyra] [lēkia means ‘older brother' in high valyrian

Daeron: little jelmāzmar [by Rhaenyra] ‘jelmāzmar’ means ‘storm’  in high valyrian

Aemon: little sambar [by Rhaenyra] ‘sambar’ means ‘cloud’  in high valyrian

Aenys / Babies: little ērinnon [by Rhaenyra]

'ērinnon' means 'victory' in high valyrian

Events that have been established in story so far [as of chapter nineteen]:

93AC: Baelon visits Vale to meet Aemma 95AC: Baelon visits Vale to meet Aemma (again) 96AC: Rhaenyra is born 96AC: Daella dies [when Rhaenyra is born] 98AC: Rhaenyra comes to King’s Landing 98AC: ^Aemma / Viserys are married*

at this time [of wedding, in 98AC]: Rhaenyra is 2 Aemma is 16 Daemon is 17 Baelon is 41

*Viserys/Aemma’s wedding takes place 5 years later than canon despite birth years remaining the same.

99AC: Daemon marries Rhea Royce 99AC: Rhaenyra sees dragons for first time

100AC: Rhaenyra receives an egg* 100AC: Syrax hatches in 100AC* **just a few weeks between these events 100AC: Alysanne dies (Daemon attends funeral, meets Rhaenyra, again, see chap.3) 100AC: Aegon is born [Aemma/Viserys eldest son] 103AC: Jaehaerys dies (Daemon visits, meets Rhaenyra, again, see chap.3) 103AC: Baelon is crowned in 103AC 103AC: Baelon grants Daemon's request for an annulment (above events less than a week apart) 103AC: Rhaenyra becomes cupbearer AS OF 103: Seasmoke is almost large enough to ride (though not yet) and Laena has claimed Sheepstealer (not ridden, claimed two years earlier) 104AC: Prince Jaehaerys II is born [Aemma/Viserys son] 107AC: Princess Daenerys is born [Aemma/Viserys daughter]

109AC: War in Stepstones presumably avoided 112AC: Baelon/Rhaenyra travel to Dragonstone and announce marriage

112AC: Aegon proposes to Rhaenyra [on same trip] 113AC: Baelon/Rhaenyra are married at this time Rhaenyra is 16/17 and Baelon is 55/56 [first child conceived two months later] 114AC: Prince Aenys II is born Baelon/Rhaenyra’s first child, a year after they marry

114AC-115AC: Events dated in months [1=30 days, 2=60 days, 3=90 days, etc.] by how far they are from Aenys birth. The time between these events is the major change made when editing past chapters. Originally they took place over a 2 month period, now they span 6+! 114AC #1: Aemma visits the week after Rhaenyra gives birth. [when Aenys is 1-3 weeks old] 114AC #2: Daemon returns to King's Landing [when Aenys is 2 months old] 114AC #2: Daemon & Rhaenyra consummate their relationship. [one-two weeks after he arrives] 114AC #3: Viserys/Aemma/Kids visit King's Landing [three-ish weeks after Daemon arrives, they stay for approx. two weeks.] 114AC #4: Daemon & Rhaenyra visit Dragonstone [two months after Daemon's arrival in King's Landing] 114AC #4: Dany turns seven 114AC #4: Aemma oversees Daemon/Rhaenyra together *this event is the focus of chapter eleven. 114AC/115AC #5: n/a 114AC/115AC #6: Velaryon's visit, Daemon leaves for Essos.* *this event is the focus of chapter fourteen

114AC/115AC #6-#7: Daemon and Laena visit Tyrosh* [they stay for 2-3 weeks, receive letter from Baelon during that time] *this event is the focus of chapter twenty-nine 114AC/115AC #8: Rhaenyra is targeted via poison.* *this event is the focus of chapter fourteen

114AC/115AC #8: Daemon and Laena arrive in Dorne.* 114AC/115AC #8/9: Daemon meets Mysaria. * *this event is the focus of chapter twenty-nine

114AC/115AC #9 Rhaenyra is nearly in carriage accident.* *this event is the focus of chapter fourteen [Daemon receives a letter from Baelon during this time] 114AC/115AC #10: Rhaenyra is attacked in Dragonpit.* *this event is the focus of chapter fourteen [Daemon receives a letter from Baelon during this time] 114AC/115AC #10: Viserys is called to King's Landing 114AC/115AC #10: Rhaenyra & Baelon begin trying for a baby. 114AC/155AC #11: Daemon & Laena are in Norvos* 114AC/115AC #11-#12: Daemon & Laena & Mysaria visit Driftmark* *this event is the focus of chapter twenty-nine

114AC/115AC #12: Rhaenyra is shot* *this event is the focus of chapter fourteen AND sixteen! 114AC/115AC #12: Aemma arrives in King's Landing* [5-7 days post attack] 114AC/115AC #12: Laenor visits King's Landing [7-10 days post attack]

114AC/115AC #13: Daemon hears word of Rhaenyra's injury.

116AC: Prince Rhaegar is born [Baelon/Rhaenyra’s second child] 116AC: Baelon has his Lithotomy [within two weeks of Rhaegar’s birth] 117AC: Aemon & Daeron are born [10/11 months after Rhaegar] 124AC: Aemon & Daeron fly for the first time

125AC: Aegon has twin daughter in 125AC [two weeks later] 125AC: Rhaenyra, Aenys, Daeron, and Aemon visit Dragonstone* 125AC Aemon & Daeron learn Daemon is their father* *these all occur at the same time, subject of chapter seven!

[tbc]

[that says Rhaenyra's Children, lol]

☀️ Prince Aenys II is born in 114AC [Baelon is the father, confirmed.] [Has cradle egg/hatchling nicknamed Silvia Sōna.] 

☀️ Prince Rhaegar is born in 116/117AC [Baelon is the father, speculated.]

☀️Aemon [born first] Daeron [born second] born in 117 AC  [named after Aemma and Daella]  [both have dragons, first flew at age of eight, names tbd] [Daemon is the father, confirmed]

-Daeron nicknamed little jelmāzmar [storm, for he has a temper and is often emotional. Has light gold hair, takes after Daemon/Baelon.]

-Aemon nicknamed little sambar [cloud, for he is calm and quiet. Fairer than his brother with silver hair, takes after Aemon] ☀️ Vaelon is born in 122 AC [Baelon is the father, speculated.]

☀️Prince Baelon TBD [Daemon is the father, speculated.] [claims Vhagar] 

☀️ Princess Visenya is stillborn in 129AC  [Baelon is the father, speculated.] ☀️Unnamed Daughter TBD [Daemon is the father, confirmed]

[Aemma is the mother of them all.]

-mentions of miscarriage in fic, not listed!

🌙 Prince Aegon born in 100AC [has dragon, Sunfyre] [has twin daughters in 125AC]

🌙 Prince Jaehaerys II born in 104 

🌙 Princess Daenerys born in 107 [turns seven in 114, when Aenys is 3 months old] [has dragon named Laela]

[deaths that follow canon dates from asoif wiki]

Alyssa died in 84AC Aemon died in 92AC Alysanne died in 100AC Jaehaerys I died in 103AC Visenya is stillborn/dies in 129AC [All of Baelon’s sibling have their canon dates of death as specified on the asoif wiki, save for Saera & Daella.]

[deaths that DO NOT follow canon dates from asoif wiki]

Daella died in 96AC  [+14 years later than in canon] [dies during/after childbirth] Rodrik Arryn died in 122AC  [which may mean his birth date needs to be later than it was in canon, not yet relevant] Baelon dies in 129AC [originally when Viserys dies in canon.]

The main pairings are:

Baelon/Rhaenyra + Daemon/Rhaenyra Secondary pairings [dynamics discussed]: PRESENT: Aemma/Viserys <;> PAST: [because they are dead now]: Daella/Rickard, Jaehaerys/Alysanne, Baelon/AlyssaTertiary pairings [mentioned/alluded to]: past Baelon/Others, eventually past Daemon/Others, very brief Daemon/Laena, brief Daemon/Mysaria

This fic will eventually have more focus on Daemyra than Baelonyra, but it begins with Baelon and Rhaenyra being married after spending her entire childhood together.

Meanwhile, in the present timeline [as of chap #16] Rhaenyra and Daemon have just met, and without that any foundation between them built explicit/romantic scenes with them feel a bit wrong? But they are coming, I swear.

Daemon/Rhaenyra will have a very [the most] active sex life and children together while she is married to Baelon, and they will marry after Baelon dies. But we aren't there yet.

This fic is non-linear though, and you can skip chapters you do not like. The majority of Baelonyra content is from Baelon's POV and chapters involving explicit scenes between him and Rhaenyra are marked below.

(along with chapters that take place before Daemon/Rhaenyra meet, and when their relationship is developing.)

However, if you hate the idea of Rhaenyra loving multiple men at the same time (in different ways, but still), and hate the idea of her with Baelon, this fic probably isn't for you. Because even when she is with Daemon, her experiences with Baelon being her previous/only/first partner shape all that comes after.

Also: There will not be scenes in the traditional threesome sense nor any between Daemon and Baelon!

Unlike all my other fics with multiple partners where everyone wants to do it with everyone, there is no attraction between the two men [Daemon and Baelon]. They are only interested in Rhaenyra.

They may share a bed on very rare special occasions but Rhaenyra has different relationships with them both and no desire to have them at the same time. They might be spectating. They might take turns. But there will not be three of them actively getting off at the same time.

note: there are references to Daemon being bisexual/with men, but Baelon is not one of them, lol.

CHAPTER INDEX

Chapters + Focus + Pairing: key: pre-daemyra = before they met as adults developing-daemyra = falling in love [if it is not mentioned, then it is 'during daemyra']

💙 = Baelon [blue] <> 🖤 = Daemon [dark] ❤️‍🔥= smut <> ❤️‍🩹 = extra angst ☁️ = extra fluff

1. ☀️ Rhaenyra I ☀️ [proposal, first year of marriage, pre-daemyra]

2. 🌥️ Baelon I 🌥️ [proposal, first year of marriage, pre-daemyra]

3. ⚡ Daemon I ⚡ ☁️  [daemon's memories of rhaenyra as a child, pre-daemyra]

4. ⚡ Daemon II ⚡ [daemon meets rhaenyra as an adult, developing daemyra]

5. 🌥️ Baelon II 🌥️ 💙❤️‍🔥 [discussion of having kids, pre-daemyra]

6. ☀️ Rhaenyra II ☀️ 💙❤️‍🔥🖤❤️‍🔥 [pregnancy crisis]

7. ☀️ Rhaenyra III ☀️ [good mom rhaenyra visits dragonstone]

8. ⚡ Daemon III ⚡ [getting to know his stepmom, developing daemyra]

9. 🌥️ Baelon III 🌥️  ❤️‍🩹 [daddy almost dies, has the talk with daemon]

10. 🌙 Aemma I 🌙 [the first time she saw rhaenyra kiss someone, pre-daemyra]

11. 🌙 Aemma II 🌙  🖤❤️‍🔥 [she saw rhaenyra doing a lot more than kissing]

12. ☀️ Rhaenyra IV ☀️ [how i met my stepson, developing daemyra, minor 💙❤️‍🔥 at end]

13. ☀️ Rhaenyra V ☀️  ❤️‍🩹 [angsty, near death experiences and such.]

14. ⚡ Daemon IV ⚡ ❤️‍🩹 [angsty, daemyra-centric]

☁️ 15. 🌥️ Baelon IV 🌥️ [seeing his loves meet, speculating, developing daemyra, minor 💙❤️‍🔥 in flashback]

16. 🌥️ Baelon V 🌥️ ❤️‍🩹💙❤️‍🔥 [angsty, near death experiences, baelon/rhaenyra]

17. 🦁 Tymond I 🦁 [bitter angry man hates the fact Targaryen women have no interest in his furry ass.] 18. ⚡ Daemon V ⚡ ☁️ [getting to know each other via discussion of brothels, ALL developing daemyra!] 19. ⚡ Daemon VI ⚡ 🖤❤️‍🔥 [getting to know each other AT a brothel.]

20. ☀️ Rhaenyra VI ☀️ 🖤❤️‍🔥 [rhaenyra's first kiss with her prince, developing-daemyra]

21. ☀️ Rhaenyra VII ☀️ 💙🖤 [processing the kiss with her prince...developing-daemyra]

22. ☀️ Rhaenyra VIII ☀️ 🖤❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥 [hot springs sexy times]

23. 🌥️ Baelon VI 🌥️ 💙🖤❤️‍🩹 [aftermath of being spied on in the hot springs]

24. ⚡ Daemon VII ⚡ 🖤 [bonding over daddy issues with your stepson, developing daemyra]

25. 🌥️ Baelon VII 🌥️ 💙 [memories of alyssa's and rhaenyra's innate ability to make them easier to bear]

26. ☀️ Rhaenyra IX ☀️ 🖤❤️‍🔥 [body image issues, aftermath of brothel, and some breast sucking...]

27. 🌙 Aemma III 🌙 [aftermath of hot springs, a confrontation, and an admission...]

28. 🌙 Aemma IV 🌙 [aftermath of the confrontation, and admission, and daemon leaving]

29. ⚡ Daemon VIII ⚡ 🖤❤️‍🔥❤️‍🩹 [daemon's sad boy era in essos, part one, plus some raunchy flashbacks]

30. ☀️ Rhaenyra X ☀️ 🖤❤️‍🔥💙❤️‍🔥 [remembering the first time with her husband, having her first time with his son, and the results of daemon's school for deepthroating.]

31. 🦤 Viserys I 🦤 ❤️‍🩹 [viserys looks back on baelonyra's relationship and looks on in horror in the aftermath of an assassination attempt]

32. ⚡ Daemon IX ⚡ 🖤❤️‍🔥 [daemon has returned at last, and it is time for a good conversation and better fuck...ft. the iron throne]

33. 🌙 Aemma V 🌙 [memories of childhood--both hers and rhaenyra's, both good and bad. reflecting on the father she lost while fearing the loss of her sister]

Chronological order based on chapter contents [though it is not intended to be read this way]:

3. ⚡ Daemon I ⚡  1. ☀️ Rhaenyra I ☀️  2. 🌥️ Baelon I 🌥️  10. 🌙 Aemma I 🌙  5. 🌥️ Baelon II 🌥️ 4. ⚡ Daemon II ⚡  8. ⚡ Daemon III ⚡ 12. ☀️ Rhaenyra IV ☀️ 15. 🌥️ Baelon IV 🌥️  18. ⚡ Daemon V ⚡ 24. ⚡ Daemon VII ⚡  19. ⚡ Daemon VI ⚡ 20. ☀️ Rhaenyra VI ☀️  21. ☀️ Rhaenyra VII ☀️  26. ☀️ Rhaenyra IX ☀️  30. ☀️ Rhaenyra X ☀️ 22. ☀️ Rhaenyra VIII ☀️  27. 🌙 Aemma III 🌙 23. 🌥️ Baelon VI 🌥️  28. 🌙 Aemma IV 🌙  [FIRST HALF] 25. 🌥️ Baelon VII 🌥️  11. 🌙 Aemma II 🌙  14. ⚡ Daemon IV ⚡  29. ⚡ Daemon VIII ⚡ 17. 🦁 Tymond I 🦁 13. ☀️ Rhaenyra V ☀️ 16. 🌥️ Baelon V 🌥️ 28. 🌙 Aemma IV 🌙  [SECOND HALF] 31. 🦤 Viserys I 🦤  33. 🌙 Aemma V 🌙  32. ⚡ Daemon IX ⚡ 6. ☀️ Rhaenyra II ☀️ 9. 🌥️ Baelon III 🌥️ 7. ☀️ Rhaenyra III ☀️ 

[last updated at chapter 34!]

Events by chapter [will i keep this updated? UNLIKELY.]

Chapter One: Rhaenyra POV

Present time in this chapter is 113/114AC when she gives birth to Aenys. 

Look back on 98AC, through to 112/113AC  when she is proposed to and married.

Chapter Two: Baelon POV

Present time in this chapter is 112AC, telling Viserys and Aemma of their engagement. 

Look back on 98AC when Rhaenyra arrived in King’s Landing and the years that followed. 

Chapter Three: Daemon POV

Present time in this chapter is 114AC, weeks after Aenys is born.

Flashbacks are labeled and include: 98AC, 100AC, and 103AC.

Chapter Four: Daemon POV

All present time, 114AC.

Chapter Five: Baelon POV

Present time unclear.

Flashbacks to 113AC / conceiving Aenys [two months after marriage]

122AC / conceiving forth child.

Chapter Six: Rhaenyra POV

Present time, 116AC - twins are conceived with Daemon & Baelon has operation.

Flashbacks: 114AC, confiding in Daemon.

114/115AC, adventures in conceiving Rhaegar. 

Chapter Seven: Rhaenyra POV

All present time, 125AC

Chapter Eight: Daemon POV

Follows chapter four, all present time, 114AC.

Chapter Nine: Baelon POV

Present time, 116AC days post Baelon's operation.

+flashbacks

Chapter Ten: Aemma POV

Present time (?) Focus on Rhaenyra's wedding, 113AC

Chapter Eleven: Aemma POV

Present time 114AC

to clarify events [the days are not exact, but for reference of how much time passed]: Aenys is 60ish days old when Daemon returns to KL Aenys is 70-84ish days old when Viserys & gang visit Aenys is 114-ish days old when Rhaenyra visits Dragonstone.

Chapter Eight:

Chapter Eight:

[ratwavegamehouse]

Terminal, a digital pirate action TTRPG, is coming to Kickstarter on July 20th.

Life as you know it, turn of the 21st Century Earth, is nothing but a simulation called the Terminal. The real world is the Wake. The Robot Authority and the pirates of Libertatia trawl the seas and do battle beneath a shattered moon.

Inside the Terminal pirates plug back in, uploaded with skills and upgrades, and strive to destroy the manipulators and enforcers who keep the system running.

In the world of Terminal they talk about the Omen. A recurrent techno-fable of someone with extraordinary power, reincarnated across centuries. It's time for someone to walk this path again. But something has been changed, they won't be walking it alone.

This is a game about having felt alone, having felt crazy, and the forces that wanted you to feel that way. It's about forming new bonds and getting stronger through connection. It's about sharing and becoming who you are.

Written by me. The art is by Gormengeist. It's being edited by Alyssa from Biscuit Fund Games.

[calder]

"Some Tips for Exploring Skyline Valley"

Head to the lookout towers early! There's three of them in the region, and with the exception of one location (which I'll explain how to find in a moment), they'll reveal every map marker in Skyline Valley.

To find the one location the towers won't reveal, head to Hawksbill Weather Station and go straight through the facility to the other end. If you do this, there should be an undiscovered location marker that will eventually pop up, leading you to Three Ponds.

Nuke the region. The Storm and ICBMs don't mix, and firing a nuke at any point in the region will lead to the bomb detonating well above the ground. This will release no radiation, create no flux flora and destroy no players or CAMPs, but it will kick off the newest nuke boss in the event Neurological Warfare.

During Neurological Warfare, you're fighting three bosses at once and they gain resistances as they are defeated, alongside more dangerous fodder enemies. It's best to try and keep all three at the same level of health during the fight so you aren't dealing with the tankier versions for long. Also, Adeline’s (the assaultron camp ally) buff is immensely helpful for this event.

During Neurological Warfare and Dangerous Pastimes, don't try to camp on any sort of generator-type structures. Those will electrocute you and give a massive accuracy debuff and damage over time.

Dangerous Pastimes was providing improved repair kits during the entire PTS cycle on every clear of the event. This may have changed between the last PTS and the update, but I doubt it did, so the event is likely a fantastic source of repair kits.

Speak to Alyssa at Vault 63's door after you finish the Vault 63 main questline. You'll be taken to the door at the very start of the quest, but if you can't find it again afterwards, fast travel to the Slocum Joe's and head towards Sutton. Alyssa just has some fun dialogue after you finish the quest, but its worth seeing.

Boost your perception when you're working with Craig. Each part of his tasks asks you to find a trinket near a corpse, and having high perception (up to 12 with the last body) gives you a hint as to what to look for and where.

There's a Pioneer Scout scavenger hunt started at Camp Liberty. The note gives you some instructions on how to find it, but if you want to skip to the end by going to the north of the river's spring on the right side of the region and finding the rotted stump between three rocks , you absolutely can.

Within Skyline Valley, there are locations that will always spawn an Ogua and a Sheepsquatch (note that the sheepsquatch is non-legendary, unlike every other sheepsquatch in the game). I won't say where these two spots are to avoid spoiling it, but they do exist if you ever want to just kill these cryptids for sport.

Overgrown and fanatics are coming to daily ops, and bringing the aquarium and foundry with them alongside new rewards. Overgrown will not appear outside of the aquarium and fanatics cannot appear outside of the foundry; additionally, no Appalachia enemies will be found in these locations (thank you Gilpo!).

Ticket to Revenge saw a last minute nerf today without a PTS update. It’s now a furious, fire rate and weightless railway rifle that still has the doubled ammo capacity and custom mothman skin. It’s still fairly potent due to being a railway rifle, but the effects are far worse than the prior bloodied, vats accuracy and critical fill version (furious really hurts, but its okay for enemies that'll survive more than ten shots). The devs said that apparently the change was to ensure it’d be in a good place for ‘future systems coming to the game,’ so apparently they were thinking of game balance here. The thing definitely was brutally powerful before (might've even been overpowered), but it’s a shame this change happened at the eleventh hour.

Edit: 13. There's a small shed on the outskirts of Dark Hallow Manor that requires a key. The key in question is inside the security office of Vault 63.

[branwendaughterofllyr]

In "A Poison Tree," how will the romance between the green children Aegon and Helaena be? Will it be the same as in the book or the series? Or will they have a better relationship? And will Aemond have emotional issues as believed and be too serious, with Alyssa helping him? Although she doesn't seem to have a good emotional condition either, at least it seems that way to me.

okay, so when I first started a poison tree, I had a lot of various ideas, including a vague idea of a Helaegon romance (one of my mutuals at the time was a pretty big fan of them as a pair) but now that I'm actually approaching that period of time, I actually think they work better in my head as a deeply dysfunctional set of siblings that had to get married. I actually need to go and edit my tags, because I've changed my mind on quite a few things. (Might take off the rhaenicent tag too, because it's mostly implied rather than outright on screen...)

Will Alyssa help Aemond's emotional issues........ I'm going to give that a hard "no." As you have correctly assessed, Alyssa has plenty emotional issues of her own. So really, at best, we’ll being giving the simmering pot of Targaryen anger and resentment a slightly different flavour.

[lemonhemlock]

Alrite, gang, time for a crackpot theory. It is very possible I might be reading too much into this, but let's have fun for a hot minute.

In a previous version of the Targaryen family tree from 1998, Alysanne was Maegor's daughter with Ceryse Hightower, then George changed it to her being Aenys' and Alyssa's child.

In a previous version of the story, he had Jaehaera live as the mother of Aegon III's children, then changed his mind, killed her off and replaced her with Daenaera Velaryon.

(If someone could point out precisely in which edition of the supplemental texts this features in, I would very much appreciate it. Or if they have on hand the references to the first family tree.)

So, George basically went out of his way to remove Hightower blood from Targaryen lineage, not once, but twice. Would there be any reason why he would need to do this? Perhaps related to the main series and the final endgame?

Or was the transfer of Alysanne from Maegor to Aenys done just so Visenya's line would die out? And the removal of Jaehaera from the narrative done just so only Daemon & Rhaenyra's line continue? If so, then why?

NB. I am tagging this as team green, because I would rather not receive half-baked takes based on how evil / low-born / unworthy the Hightowers are to mingle their DNA with precious magical Valyrian blood.

Edit: Nevermind, I have already been debunked in the comments. Like Icarus, I flew too close to the sun, only to crash with melted wings!!! 😪

[rhaenizziettie]

Legacies 1x01 Rewatch

NO THE OPENING HAS TAKEN ME OUT. IT'S TOO SOON. HER LITTLE HERO AND VILLAIN SPEECH AND KNOWING ALL THAT COMES WITH THAT MOTIF LATER IS TOO MUCH.

She should've sprinkled a little "love and hate" in that speech honestly. The Hizzie edits would've slapped.

Everyday I wish we got more of Landon and Rafael's foster life. Like there was so much there to unpack and they never did.

Playing Halsey in the first five minutes. I was doomed to obsess over this show from the start.

The way we never got answers on whether that priest knew about werewolves and that's why he wanted to see him at the rise of the full moon or if it was coincidence or if that priest actually was a witch. Imagine if he came back.

HE USED TO SERVE ME MILKSHAKES I WAS NOT PREPARED I KNEW IT

"More like despair" 😭😭😭 Sorry but all her poking gets funnier on the rewatch knowing she had a crush on Hope the whole time

Truly wish we got to see more of the classes at this SCHOOL. Like we saw three??? And none of them had any substance???

"Before your hairier breatheren corrupted you" Sorry but I wanted the witches' distaste for the wolves to be addressed and honestly Tribrid Hope could've been the uniter of the kingdoms

"Talking about her gives her power." You say all that but then you bitch about people NOT talking about her later

Aww. I always forget when Josie used to just be a softy stoner witch. They should've kept that characterization.

Bisexually, we should've gotten to see Rafael throw that lawn mower through the patio doors

BABY HOPEG MY HEART IT THUMPS

"Take it from a guy named Alaric, I get it" 😭😭😭 Guarantee that Lizzie's "just be MG" speech from his tour was Alaric's "just be Ric" speech

You're telling me Landon worked at the Grill in MYSTIC FALLS and never encountered a vampire who tried to compel him before MG? I call bullshit.

"I'm not so good with small spaces" and all I'm thinking about is how he crawled through the air vents to save everyone in 1x11

Alyssa Chang made a broom fly in Physics. YEAH SHE DID.

"It's not a competition" I mean yeah that's fair because Josie was the only one competing in the competition in her mind but still ... she very much viewed it as a competition ...

"We don't mention her name anymore." Josie a week later:

"That was my inside voice" 😭😭😭 Now I'm dying imagining Caroline and Alaric telling Lizzie that sometimes, your thoughts are not meant to be spoken out loud because that is your inside voice after she insults someone on accident

"Hot, angry, damaged ..." So Hope Mikaelson? God the signs were there from the start and I MISSED them like a FOOL

"You're getting a little old for me to breaking your human bones." Don't worry, Hope. You do eventually.

"I don't have things" and meanwhile Jed is the only one in that school who didn't have a crush on Hope at some point. YOU may not have things, ma'am, but people definitely have things for you.

"I don't tell you to go out and fraternize with the human locals." ... isn't that LITERALLY what you tell them to do in the NEXT episode???

"Attempt to make an actual friend here and we can reevaluate" "I tried to be her friend and she never makes any effort" Oh yeah, "I want you to do anything for each other" is making so much sense now. The signs were all there.

ClEaN uP oN aIsLe L. Was it so hard to be like "Hey, my sister - your DAUGHTER - is having a mental health episode. Help?" Also, it's not like Hope doesn't know about her episodes. Josie already told the whole school five years ago.

Also I love that they put Josie immediately running to Alaric to help Lizzie in the very first episode and then have Josie claim she did everything to help and have Lizzie claim that Alaric wasn't around. LIKE YES MISS MIKAELSON, IT DOES DEPEND ON WHO IS TELLING THE STORY.

THE MOMENT I FELL IN LOVE WITH LIZZIE. I have long since gotten better with it, but I too used to want to destroy kitchens or [redacted] myself every time I messed up a social interaction and seeing that on screen absolutely blew my mind.

Throwback to the first time I watched Legacies and had NOT finished TVD or TO yet. Had no clue what Handon was talking about but I was still melting.

Why did we never see summoning spells come back up? Like?? That could've been so useful???

Josie out at a party while Lizzie sits inside recovering from her episode. Hmm. Tell me again which one Lizzie's disorder affects more.

Yeah, everyone's endings in 4x20 suck but RAFAEL'S EARLY ENDING IS CUTTING EXTRA DEEP WHEN ALL HE'S EVER TALKED ABOUT IS HOW MUCH HE BELONGS WITH LANDON AND AT THAT SCHOOL AND HOW BOTH GOT YANKED AWAY IN HIS "HEAVEN"

"I could just whip up a remedy with herbs from the bio lab" Wonder where she got the idea that there's a magic fix for her disorder from

"Do you think I'm broken?" 🥺🥺🥺 My baby girl

"Josie doesn't have freakouts." Don't worry, she does. She's just hiding them for now. She'll kill you one day though. Just for funsies. You're doing just fine, all things considered.

"She spends a lot of time worrying about other people's happiness." You mean how she can take it away or ...?

WHY DIDN'T WE EVER GET TO HEAR ABOUT THE ORIGINAL SALTZMAN CODEPENDENCY. LIKE NOT EVEN IN TVD?? WHAT DOES THAT LINE MEAN???

"I don't ever want to hurt anybody." "Maybe you'll finally understand if you have blood on your hands too." OHHHHHHH

HOPE AND LIZZIE MADE FRIENDS AND WE STILL NEVER SAW A GROUP TRAINING. I WAS ROBBED. ROBBED I SAY.

I TRIED TO BE HER FRIEND. God, they should just make a "Young Salvatore School" spin off. I'd watch all that play out between TO and Legacies.

"Everyone in here has lost something." WAIT BECAUSE I JUST REALIZED SHE'S NOT EVEN TALKING ABOUT HERSELF AND JOSIE. SHE'S TALKING ABOUT ALL THE OTHER STUDENTS NOT GETTING THE SAME SPECIAL TREATMENT DESPITE ALL OF THEM GOING THROUGH TRAUMA TO END UP THERE.

"Speak of the actual devil." Lizzie, haven't you met the ACTUAL actual devil??

"I'm missing a party??" THAT'S WHAT I'M SAYING LIZZIE.

POSIE CRUMBS POSIE CRUMBS POSIE CRUMBS

The fact that MG stopped talking about vampire stories is so sad. He should've kept that with his comic obsession.

"I'm not saying that y'all should kill your moms because that's messed up." I'll say it: MG should've gotten to kill his mom. Actually, did none of that come up again??? She works for Triad and he just moves on????

The way Rafael was an athlete yet he never played in the football episodes ...

ACTUALLY THE WAY WE NEVER GOT A S3 OR S4 FOOTBALL EPISODE AFTER J*LIE SAID THERE'D BE ONE EVERY SEASON

"I care too much. It's kind of a problem." I mean technically she did not lie but she also did not mention that the caring in question was about herself and about what she thought everyone else owed her.

ROSIE SHOULD'VE HAPPENED AND I STAND BY THAT. THEY WERE NOT ENDGAME MATERIAL AND RAFAEL DESERVED BETTER BUT MY GOD I STILL WANTED TO SEE IT HAPPEN.

Legacies S1 aesthetics >>> any of the other seasons'

That wolf Hope and Landon in the woods scene is just 🤌🤌🤌

HANDON LIBRARY SCENE HANDON LIBRARY SCENE

"I'm a lot of things." "Care to elaborate?" "Bisexual."

I lowkey forgot about the Pizzie (Menelope? PenelopeG?) kiss

"I'm offering to rock your world right now." So like ... did Penelope actually like MG? Was she just looking to get laid? Was she doing it because she knows he likes Lizzie?

Sorry but PosieG might be rising as my second favorite throuple (sorry Fosie)

The S1 Penelope-kissing-MG and Josie-being-jealous-over-MG's-romances is just too good

"Last I checked you were more into girls." Yikes MG.

"I am an equal opportunity evil temptress." Bisexual Penelope for the win.

Wait - do you guys think Penelope was the one to help Josie figure out her sexuality? Do you think Josie was the one who helped Penelope?? Where's the fics, Posies???

"Your binary assumptions about sexuality are dated." And here's how MG's bi realization comes about because he knows he likes girls but he thinks because he likes girls, he can't like guys and then Ethan and -

Josie getting jealous seeing MG and Penelope kissing AND THE WAY IT COULD GO EITHER WAY.

"Klaus Mikaelson: The Great Evil." "He wasn't very popular around here." Look, Hope, I love you and I love your relationship with your dad BUT MY GOD IT WAS FOR A REASON. HE LITERALLY WAS EVIL.

"I try not to get close to people anymore." "We thought you hated us." "That's what we do when we're scared - we push people away." Mmm hmm. Just inject the good stuff straight into my veins.

A UNICORN. THE FACT THAT SHE GOT PANCAKES ON THEIR ANNIVERSARY AND NOT A STUFFED UNICORN IS ACTUALLY ILLEGAL.

"Forget about her. Focus on somebody new." Oh I need to use this in a Finsie edit real bad.

"I'm setting my sights on Rafael." LIZZIE YOU DON'T JUST PICK A GUY TO CRUSH ON BECAUSE HE'S THERE. THAT'S NOT HOW IT WORKS FOR PEOPLE WHO ARE ATTRACTED TO MEN. BABY, IF YOU HAVE TO ARBITRARILY DECIDE TO CRUSH ON HIM, YOU'RE JUST NOT INTO HIM.

WE SHOULD'VE GOTTEN HANDON WATCHING THE STARS LATER TO PARALLEL THE CELLAR SCENE

"You are a really nice person, Hope Mikaelson." "Why were you so mean to me?" Oh the Handizzie ... I feel faint ...

"Is this the part where you run?" I just think Landon has a thing for girls who run away.

"I'm not going to remember any of this, am I?" "Probably not." AND IT'S NOT THE COMPULSION THAT MAKES HIM FORGET BUT HOPE JUMPING INTO MALIVORE THAT DOES. OH MY GOD.

"It's just not safe for you here." And then MG kills him and then he dies and then he dies and then he dies and then he dies and then he dies and then he dies and then he dies and then he dies AND THEN HE DIES FOR GOOD AND THEN HE'S THE GOD OF DEATH.

"All you gotta do is go home." MG ... sweetie ... he doesn't have a home ...

HOPE TOUCHING HER LIPS REMEMBERING THAT KISS OH I KNOW IT WAS SO GOOD FOR HER

"There's no way that the one time I get close to someone, they turned out to be a liar. It's not possible. I'm not that stupid." Let me give you a hug

I, for one, do not think they did enough plots about the threat of being exposed

"She puts those sex herbs in her weed, and I had a momentary lapse in judgement." No because I don't think we talk enough about MG straight up accusing Penelope of roofie-ing and assaulting him.

"Why does everyone find her so special?" Why do YOU find her so special Miss Saltzman? Hmm?

"She's not special. She's just ... available." OOF. I DID NOT REMEMBER MG SAYING THAT. THAT IS SO NASTY.

Maybe 1x01 MG and 4x20 MG ARE the same dude.

"Don't hate me, okay?" "What if I'm incapable of love?" Oh the good stuff could've been there.

Local Pyromaniac Lights Ex On Fire

"Are you blackmailing me?" Yes, she is.

Hope's little "sorry" to the mouse 🥺🥺🥺 You're telling me she's gonna become a killer someday? Hmm.

"Turns out, Landon isn't the hero of my story at all." Turns out, Hope's not the real villain in Lizzie's story.

"But when I hunt him down, I'm gonna be the villain of his." Hope, you were apologizing to a rat a few hours ago. I need you to be realistic in your goals.

[bohemian-nights]

Life

Word Count: 2,559

Pairing: Daemon Targaryen x Nettles

Warnings ⚠️: Spoilers for Fire & Blood; age gap relationship

Description: Life as always marched on. Just as sure as the season.

AN: This story takes place from 135 AC onward following the events of the Dance. I’ve also aged up Nettles a smidge and basically kept Daemon’s show age for reasons.

Chapter 1: The Visitor, Chapter 2: An Impossible Truth, Chapter 3: Spring, Chapter 4: Birth

————————————🐑—————————————

142 AC-Mountains of the Moon

Spring had come and gone. The seeds had long been planted. Birth had given way to life. Sprouting to a fine bloom. Giving way to summer. Life as always marched on. Just as sure as the season. Though a new beat reign. The page that marked the change turned to begin a new chapter. One of adventure. Of growth. Of exploration. Of enjoying the fruits of one’s labor. A ripe harvest. A sweet bounty. 

“This is the last one Daemon.” The man paid her no mind as he rocked the babe in his hands. Nettles barely was able to hold the boy before he was swept into his father’s arms. Daenerys, Addam, and Baela who had made the trek from Driftmark with little Laena, stood crowding him. Cooing over the newest edition to their family. A new brother.

Addam especially was overjoyed at the prospect of no longer living in “a den full of girls.” He loved his sisters dearly, but he would have a playmate now. A brother to join him in on his adventures. Of course, the little babe in his father's hold had some growing to do before the two could embark upon them.

Their youngest, a girl, who Nettles insisted they name after her husband's mother, let us do the name some good, Alyssa sat glued to her side. She had thrown her little arms around her middle after being warned to be gentle with her mother by her father and Shalla before she had left to give the family some privacy. 

Her babe was content enough observing her new sibling from a distance. At a moon shy of her third name day she no doubt wanted to be coddled as the youngest for a little while longer. Alyssa was still attached to her mother's hip. Not that Nettles minded. No, she enjoyed her little company. Her sweetest babe. The last of her woes went away with her birth

Nettles felt her eyes fluttering as she petted the back of Alyssa’s dark coils that twined hers. Her youngest son's birth had been quick. He was out into the world in a matter of hours. Her shortest labor yet and her most uneventful. An easy labor. A summer babe. Her first and her last. She was determined to hold true to her resolve and relish in all that she and her husband had been blessed by the Gods with. 

“He looks like a Jon, wouldn't you agree father?” Dany looked up at her father with a set of hopeful mix-matched eyes while Baela threw her father a smirk and a chortle. Causing the Targaryen man’s violet eyes to narrow briefly at his eldest daughter before reaching out to pat his younger daughter’s honey hand in placation.

Baela knew of his past relationship with a certain Jon in reference to her beloved stepmother. The relationship had improved tremendously, but it was still great fun even at her age to poke at the old dragon that resided within her father. 

The younger girls had innocently conspired to name the babe Jon. Dany was the first to suggest so. The name of a dead family friend who could be depended upon to provide them with entertainment, presents, and sweets. She had enlisted her elder sister to join in on her campaign upon her arrival. Alyssa was at a stage where she naturally followed whatever her elder sister suggested. 

“He looks like a Bran to me father.” Addam countered. He reached out a hand to grab hold of the boy's flailing arms. The boy was obsessed with the heroes of old. His newest interest as of late.�� The perfect interest for their most studious boy. 

Serious for a boy of six, but he had grown bold with each name day that passed. Not as his sister who had turned into a little troublemaker with a penchant for mischievous merriment, however, he was opinionated in his own way. Particularly when it came to the subjects he knew best.

“My loves, your father will name him.” Nettles offered her husband a tired smile, one which was returned tenfold. Their eyes met from across the room. Tis what they had long ago agreed upon.  She had named Alyssa and Addam while he had named Daenerys. Their first child. It was only fair that he named their last. 

If it was left up to their children the babe would no doubt find himself left with an ill-suited name. If it was up to Alyssa in particular her younger brother would end up with the name dragon or Sheepstealer. The girl was nearly as fond of her mother’s dragon as her elder sister. 

Over the years and their babes, Sheepstelar had yet to lay so much as a clutch of eggs. It mattered not. Nettles still took to the skies often with Dany in tow or her husband when he felt up to it. Flying around their glen and the valleys that dotted the Mountains of the Moon. Thrilling the Burned Men below that occupied said valleys when they caught glimpses of their Máthair (mother) on her dragon. 

Alyssa on occasion would accompany them. Addam preferred to stay on the ground with his head in his books. Little Lana and her mother were always invited for a ride or two whenever they graced Nettles glen and hearth with their lively presence. The first time that the brave little Velaryon girl took flight with Nettles it had brought a watery smile to her mother's face and a memory.

“My mother would fly us around Driftmark. Sometimes we’d make it all the way to Dragonstone.” A memory of a youth long since passed, but one that would never fade. Sheepstealer served his rider's family and the hill tribes well. The last dragon in the known world.

No dragons hatched upon Dragonstone or Driftmark’s shores nor in the Dragonpit of Kings Landing for the better part of five years. Aegon, the terrified boy king, who had become a rather solemn young man made no effort to save the beastly creatures from extinction or to command that Sheepsteelar, who was on occasion spotted by the smallfolk of the Vale, be brought to him. He remembered his now stepmother Nettles with some fondness. Remembering how and why she had come into their lives in the first place. A power that man mayhaps should have never meddled with. 

Morning had died some years back. Not long after Rhaena had married Garmund Hightower, the small she-dragon had grown sick. Lonely. The last of her kind and gone before she could take flight. 

They were informed of the news by Baela during one of her visits. Her twin was rightfully devastated by the loss. To lose a dragon so hard fought was no small woe. A thought that Nettles did not wish to worry over. Sheepstealer had always been a healthy solitary creature even when he resided upon Dragonstone with other dragons in counting. 

The time of dragons was near an end in Westeros and Rhaena was a causality of this, but there was hope yet. In time, just as in the change of seasons, she had recovered. Life had done her well. It had done them all well. The season had held true. It was a joyous spring. Life abound.

Dany and Addam’s births had marked the first of many. A fact which Baela teased both her father and her sister mercilessly for. “She’s as fertile as you are father.” A smirk was placed on her silver brow. “She’ll soon have as many babes as you’ve given Nettles.” 

 Her last words had caused her stepmother’s brown face to heat up at the insinuation. As if she were a maiden of six and ten. At one and thirty, seven years of marriage, and four children Nettles from time to time still found herself succumbing to moments of shyness.  

It seemed that every time the Lady of Driftmark made the trek to Nettles and her father’s glen or Oldtown to her sister she found them both with child. Neither Garmund nor her father could keep their hands to themselves when it came to their wives. The similarity couldn’t be dismissed much to the irritation of Daemon who was less than fond of the thought of his second child in a constant delicate state at the hands of a Hightower. No matter how estranged their relationship she was still his daughter and old sentiments died hard. 

A reconciliation of sorts between Rhaena and Daemon had occurred. The old dragon had put aside his pride to reach out an olive branch to his second daughter offering at long last his apologies for his poor treatment. A hurt that could have been prevented. 

Time does not heal all wounds, but it does dull aches. Rhaena had made her peace. The girl had moved on long ago from her isolating youth, but the ache of neglect would always remain. Letters between the two were sparse though there was some measure of correspondence for the children’s benefit, with Baela who served as a messenger between the two parties. Despite the strain, Rhaena would not be a stranger to her youngest siblings. She had made it plain that  Nettles and her children were welcome at Hightower whenever they wished. 

Civility was all that could be asked for between father and daughter. The distance would remain a mountain and sea that separated them. The young Targaryen woman was content and fulfilled with her life in Highgarden. Rhaena had a family of her own to care for and care for her. In Garmund Hightower had found a surprisingly happy union. It was more than could be said for her elder twin. 

Alyn Velaryon. The Lord of Driftmark. Baela’s husband. The match had turned out to be less than ideal. The two lived near separate lives. The lord was too busy trying to keep and maintain House Velaryon’s status which was ever-weakening. He was always at sea and made little time for his lady wife and children.

He had once visited his good-fathers and step-good-mothers humble glen. The children loved him. Addam relished in listening to tales from his adventures and the man himself was pleased with his brother's namesake, but his mind was away. Alyn was discouraged from it all.

Driftmark had been made into Baela’s domain in her husband's absence. The Lord and Lady of Driftmark had struck up a bargain and the lady had found her own joy in it thankfully. She had assured Nettles of that. 

“Do not worry mother.” Baela locked their arms together. An impish glint lit up her face as she gazed at the children playing a game of monsters and maidens. The slightly younger woman had taken to calling her mother in good-natured humor from time to time. 

The two walked hand in hand. Taking a stroll around the perimeter of her gardens. It had been a near-perfect spring day some year and a half ago. “Laena keeps me busy and I have my own diversions.” What those diversions were exactly Nettles would not ask nor judge her for them. She could not. They all deserved happiness. 

In the present Nettles let out another yawn. It did not go amiss by her ever-dutiful husband. The children would’ve been ushered out by now for their mother to get some much-needed rest, but their father had a weakness. Them. Baela, however, was just as observant but much less lax and the newborn babe asserted his own interests. With a cry for his breakfasts. 

“Come now children.” She held out a hand for Dany to take. Little Lana had taken her other. “Let us leave father and your mother alone.” Alyssa protested, but she was swayed by the promise of a treat. Trailing after her siblings and niece as they went in search of their sweets. Baela paused at the door. Gifting her old friend and the babe in her father's arms an affectionate glimmer. “He is a bony babe Nettles.” 

Daemon moved to help the babe to latch onto her teat once the children had gone off in search of some amusement. There was plenty of it to be found on what would morph into a warm summer day. “He does look like a Jon husband.” The old dragon let out a laugh. The pale skin around his eyes crinkled to bring attention to the smile lines upon his face. In the way, his wife liked best. He brought down a calloused hand to stroke their son's chubby cheek as he greedily drank his mid-morning meal. He was a hearty little thing. 

The babe looked most like his elder brother when he himself was a babe some odd years ago. Though his hair was more curly than wavy. A head of black curls. His eyes were as dark as his mother's, but there were flecks of lilac in his brown irises if one were to look long enough. 

Daemon let out a sigh as he threw her a cheeky glance. She could tell her husband was contemplating it. He was not truly irritated by the suggestion. He could be swayed. It was not a bad name and did hold some value. The name of a friend. 

Jon. The Vale man. A  sheepherder's son. Who her husband had once been weary. Who he had been jealous of as prideful as he was. He would admit to that now with a belly ache of a laugh. With the man in question nonetheless. He who had viewed him as competition for the lady of his heart. What a difference a season and some years made. His first friend within the Mountains of the Moon. 

Jon. A man who had taken the time to teach him the ways of the Burned men. Who listened to his stories and shared some of his own. Who had become his confidant apart from his little wife. Who would lend his hand when need be for him, for Nettles, and their family. The man had earned his friendship. He would trust him with the safety of his children. As would Jon likewise. With his and Bess’s ever-growing brood. 

The former Rogue Prince counted the dark-haired sheepherder as one of his closest comrades. More of a brother than a friend. If not by blood or name then by deed. They had named Addam after a friend. Why not name his brother for another? 

“I suppose sweet Netty you are right.” The babe began to quit. Having enough of his fill. His dark lashes fluttered closed. Lulled to sleep by his meal. “He does look like a Jon. Issa byka ōñosz.” My little light.  A kiss was placed on her hairline as Nettles began to rest her eyes. Resting her head upon her husband’s shoulder. She felt her own self start to drift into the land of dreams. Her husband stroked her black coils. Gazing down at her and their youngest. His silver brow softened at the sight of the pair. 

Jon. What sort of Jon he was to be remained yet to be seen, but there was plenty of time for himself to figure it out and his parents to watch in anticipation. To the rest of the year. To the rest of the summer. To every season and the many to come. 

Ao3 Link:

[nickmaghighlights]

Nick Mag Highlights - #114 September 2005

Welcome to another edition of Nick Mag Highlights! Today, we’ll be taking a look at Issue #114 from September, 2005!

Now, I understand you might be slightly surprised we went from Issue #1 to Issue #114, but I say take the whiplash in stride! Variety is the spice of life after all, and this cover exudes variety. We went from a roster of just one measly Nicktoon to a whole overload of shows spilling out from the top of the page!

But of course, front and center we have Drake & Josh, which was entering its third season at the time after facing massive success. Unsurprising too, since it really had everything going for it. Boys wanted to be Drake, girls wanted to be near Drake, and Josh was there to carry the show. How times change… now Drake Bell doesn’t even want to be Drake Bell.

But I digress, let’s dive into Issue #114! You can read it on the Internet Archive here.

Is a franchise really a “thing” if it doesn’t have a fast food toy line? Think about it. 

I remember that online game they’re advertising on the left, I’m pretty sure you never get to see your created ghost stand back-to-back with Danny Phantom himself, pretty disappointing if that was the prize you were after. 

Okay, after looking at some footage, it seems like you never get to see your created ghost even move! Explains why my memories of this game are pretty vapid.

There’s nothing else to incite fear into the heart of a child quite like the phrase “Back to School”. Except for maybe dentist’s appointments, needles, large bugs, and the Easter Bunny.

To tie into this most horrifying occasion, the overarching theme of this issue is stupidity. Let’s keep reading and find out if that was a dumb idea.

At this point Nick Magazine had dropped Ooze News, instead opting to advertise the biggest Nickelodeon headlines (Oooh, Tak 3!) near the beginning, with a special section later on for showcasing any upcoming episodes of their regulars. Stay tuned for that!

I’m not a Barbie expert. Are these based on outfits the doll wore at some point? ‘Cause otherwise these are just regular clothes that say “Barbie” on them.

First speech bubble from Zelda in the blog’s history!

Anyway, did you know Frankie Muniz (Malcolm in The Middle) is a NASCAR driver now? Crazy.

Lovely illustration work from Roger Langridge, who still posts comics on Twitter! Check him out after you’ve finished reading this post, liked it, reblogged, left a comment, followed, and bookmarked my blog.

I know what some of you may be wondering, just what exactly was the hot-ticket item kids were asking for Christmas in a pre-iPhone world? Well, I guess a Firefly might be a possible answer? I don’t recall ever seeing one of these back in the day, and apparently they don’t even make them anymore. 

What this ad conveniently doesn’t tell you is the amount of parental controls stuffed into one of these things, which makes them a fantastic safety tool, but maybe not that cool of a toy. 

Take note, this was back when having “animations” was a selling point.

Here we can the see the aftermath of Nickelodeon teaming up with Baby Bottle Pop for a bit of cross-promotion, which culminated with the crowning of the first (and probably only) “Baby Bottle Popstar”.

Indeed, kids across America were urged to send in their own rendition of the iconic “Baby Bottle Pop jingle” (which no doubt most of you are humming right now). Those performances were left to the mercy of the online populace, voted upon with the utmost scrutiny. Few died, but many were injured, and a young Alyssa of California was crowned Baby Bottle champion.

So it says in the history books, anyway. If you’d like to see the Baby Bottle ballad that shook the world, I recorded a video of the Nick.com link included in this ad, courtesy of the Internet Archive.

Sorry, got a little intense back there. Anyway this is a fun section! And anything reminding me about Jack Black and School of Rock is a positive in my book. Little odd lumping in The Dukes of Hazzard next to Finding Nemo and Spongebob, but I guess they might have wanted to throw a bone to the preteens in the audience.

Pretty cool full page spread advertisement for a Nicktoon, and for Catscratch no less!

Ah Catscratch, one of Nick’s oft-neglected 2000’s ‘toons, right next to The X’s and Making Fiends. Obviously I’m biased a bit, being a 2000’s kid, but it really sucks these shows fail to even get a passing reference nowadays. Oh well, if My Life as a Teenage Robot can escape Nick’s 2000’s dungeon, maybe there’s hope for the others.

A pretty funny comedy section here, depicting the daily newspaper of the fictional town of Moronia. I’d recommend checking out the full section if you’re not already reading along, it’s pretty funny!

Y’know I really wouldn’t have thought such generic phrases like “Feel Brand New” and “Make it Your Style” would be trademarkable. I would think at most you could get away with holding the rights to “The Lisa Frank Brand is for Every Happy, Cute Girl”. Although since they left that last one open, I bet the trademark is still available if anyone wants to snag it.

Additionally I’d like to give props to this company for being so bold as to have one of their mascot characters thank the Lord himself for their brand’s existence. You hardly see such tenacity nowadays.

Weird short fascination I had as a kid: I really liked the style of these ads that Pop-Tart was running at the time. I’m sure a lot of you remember the commercials in particular. I guess the black-and-white scribbly style just tickled my brain! Weirdest thing was they never actually inspired me to buy Pop-Tarts myself, it was only last year or so I had my first ‘Tart. Suppose that makes me a fake fan.

We’ve made it to The Comic Book, rejoice! 

Initially, I was particularly excited about this being the opportunity to introduce some of the regular comic series featured in this section, since I thought they’d have already started appearing by now, seeing as how we’ve jumped ahead much later into the magazine’s run.

But, uh, no, actually! This issue is completely lacking in strips from any of the notable ongoing comic series from the mag’s lifespan. Not even a Scene But Not Heard, which I guess disproves my memory of each issue having one!

Oh well, we’ll get to them when we get to them, the one-offs were usually just as entertaining. And we do at least have one recurring strip to talk about, Impy & Wormer!

Impy & Wormer was a regularly published strip for this section, created by James Kochalka. The strips were so small, you could find one of them at the bottom of each page of The Comic Book. It’s a pretty cute idea! I often found myself doodling Impy in the margins of my notebooks when the magazine was around. 

Say what you will regarding how Web 2.0 and the modern internet has affected society’s mental health and the overall cultural zeitgeist, but it did lead to this funny one-panel comic :)

Holy moly. Does anyone else remember Postopia? I swear for the last couple years I tried my damned hardest to find out what website it was that I played some weird Flintstones flash games on as a kid. I recently found out that it was indeed Postopia. Man, between this and Pop-Tarts it really seems like I would just buy into whatever weird viral marketing these fast food brands were pumping out as a kid.

I remember these being a fairly common activity in the mag: gag product labels. Cut ‘em out and tape them on to their intended packaging and you’ve got an instant barrel of laughs! Problem is they never seemed to be the right size for the products I tried them on. 

Come to think of it, my parents were really the only ones who got to see them finished, and they didn't really find them that amusing either. Was I really supposed to show my friends some dental floss I had taped a fake label onto?

“Nostalgia” is a term I honestly hate throwing around, what with how common it is, but this page in particular is really inciting some wistful childhood memories. Doesn’t seem like the worst deal in the world either, at least if you’re into membership cards, special edition issues, and stickers.

Sidenote, Step 4 isn’t really a surprise if you tell everyone it’s a Spongebob hat, guys!

Man, these guys hate teachers! I did not know a single kid in school who hated their teachers as much as the Nick Mag writers seemed to. A lot of my teachers were pretty nice, actually.

Yeah, in terms of replacing the Cartoon Calendar section (which we saw an example of in the previous NMH post), this leaves a lot to be desired. Still, I like when the magazine tried to give out fun factoids, it made me feel like my intelligence was being respected. Those puns are Zelda Van Gutters-tier writing though.

Now now, I’m not going to keep going on about Drake Bell. There’s only so many times you can shoot the elephant in the room before you start looking like the weird one. Drake & Josh was such a favorite of mine around the time this magazine came out, and it was really fun getting at least a little insight into what the behind-the-scenes view was like.

Small extra detail I find interesting is that almost every blurb below summarizing the new episodes for each show mentions romance and crushes (baring All That, but that’s a sketch show anyway*). Even the interview brings up that Josh had gotten a new girlfriend in Season 3. Guess Nick was really going all in on the love aspect to keep their preteen audience’s attention in the midst of puberty, which feels kind of manipulative in hindsight? Oh well.

*They were still making All That in 2005?

TurboNick, huh? I… think I remember this? Barely. Looking it up on Google gives me a faint sense of remembrance. Although I don’t remember Pick Boy. Sorry, Pick Boy. 

I guess the idea was you could check out clips from all your favorite Nick shows and eventually be graced with a full-on episode thanks to Pick Boy, and given his name I’m sure voting was involved to decide the full episode that was released. Not the worst idea! I certainly don’t remember Cartoon Network posting full episodes online. They probably didn’t even have their own Pick Boy.

I’m willing to give credit where credit is due. In the last NMH post I accused a lot of kids’ for being very fart-centric. I’m still sure in the Gnarly 90’s that was true, given all the stuff Ren & Stimpy were getting up to on prime-time television. But here in the Techno 2000’s we reference Spock and take Grandma to prom. A much more sophisticated fare.

Man, this must have been so cool for any Sly Cooper fans picking up this book. It’s a triple threat: questions, concept art, and a quick-look at Sly 3! I may not be a fan myself, but I can always appreciate some concept art and creative insight for a largely beloved character and series.

And rounding us off it's... Hey, it’s Bill Trinen! He was a sort of meme for a while, wasn't he? Back when they let him be in Nintendo Directs, anyway. Well, I say meme, but I guess he was more like an oyster stuck on the underside of a much larger meme named Reggie Fils-Aimé.

Yeah, definitely more like an oyster… What were we talking about? Oh yeah, NintenDogs! Never played it. Apparently they poop! Cool, I guess!

Well, well! That wraps up another addition of Nick Mag Highlights! I think getting the 2000's side of the timeline after the first issue was good for giving a bit more context on how the magazine looked and grew throughout its time on the market. I’m excited to see what’s next, and I hope you enjoyed it too. There’s tons more content and memories to read through. 

Also, one last thing. While looking up that one Danny Phantom flash game from the start of the issue I found that there’s apparently a new Danny Phantom graphic novel coming out this Summer? I’m surprised I haven’t heard anything about this! The art looks really pretty. If this seems like your thing, keep an eye on it!

That’s all for now! Until next time, keep reading!