#and I absolutely do not want to discount that lmao

[foolishfalls]

Writing her is its own reward but it really does mean so much when I update your body is a burning book and people say they enjoy my lil interpretation of Riza. She is so close to my own heart!!

Like I’m at a point where I’m getting better at just writing for pleasure and for myself, which is part of why I think my results are somewhat successful, and it has taken me being two years out of studying fiction writing in school, learning to let myself be and figure out how to work with my own voice (which has always been more of a poet’s voice and learning to lean into that with some amount of abandon has been sooo freeing) to get to a place where the process can just be what it is to accomplish this and the process and the results themselves just make me feel happy and fulfilled.

So like, Learning that others are enjoying it is just a huge lovely cherry on top. I’ve always struggled to share my work despite feeling an impulse to do so, so it feels like a great place to be with it.

So just a heartfelt thank you to anyone who takes the time to read and engage with my work!!! Nothing brings me joy the way getting a comment or kudos does! Huge wet kiss thru the phone/screen for all of u :3

[moonchild-in-blue]

Why are box braids so damn hard to do it yourself. I have a renewed and greater respect for my DIY people 💙

[kenjaku]

Taking a brief moment to enjoy a piece of petty happiness as a Kenjaku fan.

To start, I don't think Gege is going to elaborate in the slightest on exactly what is going on with Takaba and the mystery person he's talking to in ch. 270. And it's sort of a meta comedy bit that uses the reader's engagement with the media for the joke that we just will never know the full uncensored truth (As in, the joke is on US). Even 'Kenjaku's' shirt has "lol" on it. It's fully conceivable that Takaba's technique could have played a role in Kenjaku returning. Perhaps reviving him as someone who is incapable of causing harm (no CE or CT). Maybe it really is a Kenjaku Tulpa. And I'm not fully discounting the idea that it's just as feasible that he could have gotten someone who looked similar/had them do their hair like that (although I feel it defeats the purpose of Takaba finding the perfect comedy partner in Kenjaku only to use a lookalike, but it's still possible.) What this brings me to is the absolute petty satisfaction that for annoying Geto fans who have plagued the timeline/mentions of just about any person who wanted to talk anything about Kenjaku, the "end" for Kenjaku might literally be that he gets to go on and live a normal mundane chill life with his perfect comedy partner and above all still, at the very least, looking like Geto Suguru.

After all the editing out stitches (including from people's fanart which is disgusting), attributing Kenjaku's pregnancy imagery to Suguru who is wholeass just a man, constantly pushing Kenjaku's accomplishments onto "actually being Geto", stinking up people's fanart with complaints that "it would've been better as Geto not Kenjaku", etc. This is what Kenjaku potentially gets, living out the rest of his life in a fulfilling way with someone important to him.

(Mind you I do think the merger plotline being dropped the way it was is disappointing as a person who thinks Kenjaku is objectively the most compelling villain in jjk, but I'm also not mad at the end result we get for him.) Anyway, if you were ever the kind of Geto fan who did all that annoying shit. Get wrecked lmao.

[urlocalnonbinarybastardwrites]

ok we got more the gang dealing with their each f!greaser crush. Like they all like different girls- but how tf are they with them/about them

Pookie sorry for the wait I was at school!!!

❤️🖤❤️

Ponyboy Curtis

-ok so bro is sooo awkward, most out of the greasers

-he literally doesn’t know how to talk to you

-needs a pep talk and lesson from dally and johnny

-he would be down so bad tho

-struggling in classes? Free tutor!

-he would do little nice things for you though like always keeping a spare sharp pencil in hopes you’ll forget/lose yours to ask him

-memorized your schedule to “randomly” bump into you

-daydreams 24/7

-tells you all about his books and talks about characters that remind him of you

-I feel like when he finally confesses he’d just do it thoughtlessly

-“You know how much I like you?”

-literally out of the blue and then instantly regret it until you grin

-“Ponyboy, you’re so smart. Yet so stupid. I like you too.”

Johnny Cade

-soooocute

-he’s also a daydreamer

-well, more like night dreamer?

-before going to sleep in the lot he thinks about you holding him or just you in general

-so cute tbh

-absolutely a secret keeper no one knows but him

-he blushes whenever you talk to him

-he gets really flustered trying to talk to you

-I feel like he’s the type to do secret admirer

-when he finally gets the guts to ask you out he would 10/10 pass a note

-“I really, really like ya y/n. Do you like me? Y or N (circle one)”

-biggest grin on his face when you pass him back the note circled “Y” with a heart ❤️

Sodapop Curtis

-totally a flirt

-gives you discounts on gas station stuff

-whenever you come to the gas station charm goes up 10000%

-he’s the type to go home and at dinner be like

-“GUYS today she asked me for the TIME!”

-“no way”

-“WAY”

-he’s literally that one audio

-he asks you out straight up and gives you a sweet smile when you say yes

-passes you his number on your receipt/piece of paper to make plans

Darry Curtis

-wouldn’t want his brother around you until it was official

-finds them embarrassing in front of you 💀

-one time you complimented his cologne and he hasn’t stopped wearing it since

-he always tries to look nice for you, I feel like he takes extra care of his appearance

-I feel like he would try to come off cool

-I feel like it would fail so hard lmao

-I feel like after he failed you’d give him a little kiss on the cheek like Darry you big dork

-and he’d grab your hand and look you in the eyes

-“You know, I like you, Y/n. Really like you.”

Dallas Winston

-ok we’ve seen this shit

-cocky bastard 10/10

-he flirts upfront

-hits on you everytime

-also casually so fucking vulgar

“If you ever wanna sit that fine ass on my-“

“DALLY!”

-catcall vibes 💀💀😭

-literally the most obvious guy ever

-I feel like you’d play hard to get

-yk keep his ego checked

-but I feel like you’d need to make it clear you were looking for committed

-and at first, he wouldn’t be into it, but over time realize… he really doesn’t want to break your heart

-when you finally go on a date you end up making out first date 💀👍❤️

Two Bit Mathews

-he does stupid shit to impress you fr

-whatever he thinks you’ll like him to do hes alr on it

-shoplifts stuff for you that he thinks you’ll like

-cracks jokes fr

-he tries to woo you with humor so hard

-it does work

-I feel like he would actually try to tell you he likes you through a joke

-and actually get kinda flustered in anticipation

-“what has two thumbs and likes a cute girl named

y/n? *says quietly* This guy…”

-you giggle and kiss his cheek

-“Me too, dummy. I like you too, two.”

Steve Randle

-he’s definitely more flirty

-he flirts with you fsfs

-I feel like it’s not quite as charming as Soda, not quite as vulgar as Dally

-smack dab in the middle

-fixes your car for you and is always suggesting you come there for free repairs

-TOTALLY not so he can just talk to you and be around you in general

-he would whistle to you tho “lookin good there baby”

-when he finally confesses I feel like he would be a bit nervous and tries to hide it so much he tells you completely stone faced 💀

-“I-Uh… I like you.”

-such a serious voice 💀😭👍

-but he gives you a smile (rare for him) whenever you say that you like him back

-I can’t stress this enough… FREE HANDYMAN!

[tk-duveraun]

Thanks for coming to Discount QiJiu Week where I just put post cool AU ideas I want to see

Pokemon AU

Peak Lords are all Regional Gym Leaders. YQY and SQQ are a doubles gym bc SQQ absolutely refuses to do the work of making different teams to fight fewer badge trainers, so YQY does it for him lmao

(Aside: In the cartoon where you follow Red rather than Ash/Satoshi it shows that the Gym Leader's combat team changes based on how many badges the challenger already has)

SQQ is Grass Monotype and YQY is rock monotype.

YQY got SQQ an eevee as a companion pokemon he could evolve into a leafeon, but it evolved very quickly into a Sylveon SQQ is extremely protective of and gives spa days, jewelry, clothes, etc. YQY was an aspiring champion, but there was a terrible accident where he was badly injured (severely torn ACL, he can mostly walk okay but has a cane for bad days) and his shelgon got shards of an everstone embedded in its flesh

(Bagon-shelgon-salamence line is about a pokemon that wishes to fly and actually can in its final evolution, the everstone prevents ever evolving, ergo can never fly)

[disordercinema]

To add to your retail AU-

Fred worked right next door to the store and was really close with Tubbo and Tubbo fell in love with him. The store ended up moving so now Tubbo sulks about it, especially when he sees Pac and Fit flirting. His background is also him and Fred.

Fred is the son of the store owner so he just moved with the building. Now instead of working next door, they work a couple of blocks from each other. Tubbo always acts like he moved continents.

Other members would come by and just talk for a while.

Bolas is just that one dnd group that hangs around after closing hours. Phil doesn’t do shit about it, he’ll actually join in with them every once in a while.

Bad would often yell at Tubbo for his mannerisms, like cursing while talking to a customer or back talking.

Pierre is the tech support that everyone calls if Tubbo doesn’t know how to fix it himself or makes it worse.

If someone is yelling at an employee and no one can calm them down and Phil is needed, he kills them with kindness. If someone yells at one of the kids though, he gets pissed.

The island is frequently visited. People will stay for a few months or less but most leave rather quickly. It’s small enough to where everyone knows everyone, but everyone knows the islanders as they’re own group.

The Islanders are one big family and are willing to do a lot for each other. If you argue cross one of them, you cross all of them.

The Federation is a government system and Cucurucho is the mayor

The eggs are the islanders children still. They came from an overcrowded orphanage so they took them in.

This is it! For now maybe- idk.

I like, I like, tho I don't follow all

I had imagined Bolas as like, the employees of the other store Philza owns across the city. All the employees are insanely terrible at their jobs but somehow always outperform the morning crew's store especially during holiday season and Tubbo absolutely hates them for it. He has a whole one sided rivalry with them and comes up with crazy plans to win against them while most of their stategy is just "Let's figure out a way to leave early".

I don't see a reason why the kids would be at the store, but I like Pierre being the tech support. I think Bad would be a former Karen turned regular after Philza won against him during a passive-aggressiveness-kindness-disguised contest. He starts going there out of pettiness, but actually becomes friendly with the employees over time and it is close to his job (daycare worker) so it's easy for him to buy stuff on the way home. Sometimes Tubbo convinces him to go terrorize Bolas when he finds out Bad has an errand across town and he does it for discounts.

I also like the idea of the Fred being from a nearby shop, maybe a flower shop?

The Federation would 100% the heads of the Retailers Association, always in contact with the government, observing and making sure the policies are being followed. Fit gets a spot in it for his strong presence in the union and all he does is cover up for all the things his store fails to comply on. Cellbit gets a place in it too, because he used to be a general manager at another big retail company, but he fucking hates it and wants to leave so he has been trying to get kicked out by leaking shit he shouldn't and it somehow doesn't work because no one figures out it was him.

I really like your ideas, this is just what my brain cooked since I made that post lmao

[oddmawd]

Out of curiosity (and of course please do not feel like you have to answer this)

How do you keep your story organized?

I use Miro Board to help me lay down my plot and timelines, but I’m always curious what other tools writers use to outline, organize and such for their writing.

Id love to also just create a post and have writers and artists add to it over time as a source of knowledge and help….but I’m not sure how to start it honestly.

i love this questions and for me it's SCRIVENER, baby, SCRIVENER

i'm using OCCULT PIECE as an example because it's a massive project and Scrivener absolutely helped me bring it to life (it finally corralled my brain into something manageable LMAO)

not sure how familiar you are with this software, but it combines a word processor with a file organization system so i can flip between documents within a work super quickly...keeps all my notes, drafts, and other docs at my fingertips

the column on the left shows the docs and folders i've set up to keep this massive AU project organized...i have folders for each story, with subfolders that have notes and chapters for each work, and then i have separate folders for worldbuilding notes, character notes, connections between stories, and similar...i expanded a bunch of the folders so you can see what's in 'em if you want a closer look

Scrivener also has a corkboard view so you can see your story elements all laid out, and you can move them around as you see fit, which makes rearranging scenes (should you choose to put separate scenes into their own text docs) very easy

i like this software for its utility but also because you pay for it once and then can transfer the license to different computers when/if you change to a new one, and you can get it pretty cheap using discount codes that come up pretty frequently (usually they're a NaNoWriMo prize)

i have never used Miro and IDK how it compares! will have to check it out and seeeeee

as for the post people can add to, do you mean like a Tumblr post with reblogs, or like a shareable document people can circulate and add to at will? would this be for a large collaborative story or universe or just general information? sounds cool either way! love it when a community comes together...

[atopvisenyashill]

Distraction Ask (sorry this is ever so slightly about those blond people)

I just wanted to say, as someone who would consider herself an HOTD fan first and foremost, I absolutely love your page. All your critiques of the show are in good faith (I've agreed occasionally) and you just have very good takes generally.

How do you think Cersei goes out in the books? Who will take her down?

firstly, thank you so much!!! and yes, i try to come at hotd from the frame of "how do you adapt this to tell a good story" and not "how do you adapt this so my faves look the best" which is like the main issue with the way people talk about hotd lol.

i debate this SO MUCH. okay so here is my thought process basically-

will the valonqar be as literal as everyone assumes?

who the fuck is the younger more beautiful queen?

what is the ending that would drive cersei the most crazy?

the thing about both the ymbq and the valonqar is that it just makes no goddamn sense if it isn't an answer that is a) obvious to cersei and b) relevant to cersei. all those theories about sandor or jojen or euron or whoever are missing the point. the prophecy is not about finding a loophole that will kill her, it is about how cersei's paranoia and fear brings about the exact ending she has been railing against since she heard maggy's prophecy.

so it's like. will the valonqar literally choke her? or metaphorically? our other prophecies speak in metaphor "a woman who was a fish" "a blue eyed king who cast no shadow" these are obvious but they're not literal. catelyn isn't literally a fish. cast no shadow is just as much about melisandre as it is about the shadowbbaby. etc etc. but "choke the life from you" is always taken as the valonqar will literally choke her to death. "oh well jaime dreams of killing her with his golden hand" and cersei also compares him to the stranger and the others, that doesn't literally make him made out of ice! this prophecy she gets is just soooo much more literal - she will have three blond children, they will be crowned, they will die, someone younger and hotter will usurp her, and then the valonqar will choke her. it's just like. it's crazy literal. so it's always one a struggle with.

and TIMELINE. WHOMST is even going to be kicking. WHEN would cersei be usurped. by young griff and joncon? the thing about that is it's like......what does it do emotionally for joncon to set off the pots of wildfire and send cersei fleeing to casterly rock? is arianne the ymbq here? is aegon lmao? so i wonder if she even comes across that group - i think it's more likely that before they can take the capital, dany unseats them both in one fell swoop. but that leaves like a lot of time. granted, we need both tommen and myrcella to die so who knows.

ALSO ALSO i think she's more likely to die in casterly rock than king's landing. one thing i feel much more confident about is that whatever unseats her from KL isn't going to kill her, merely drive her into the westerlands to casterly rock - AND THEN it's Cersei's final stand.

anyways so i guess my best guesses here are that i want cersei to be her own downfall. i want cersei to be the architect of her own demise. i want her to make a mistake and be the reason why she is taken down. who does it matters much less to me than cersei going out in flames of her own making! i think both tyrion and jaime are likely to play a role in this, i think it's not unlikely that some combination of brienne/sansa/arianne/dany are going to be involved as well (margaery is not the ymbq. why? because cersei thinks she is!). i think she's going to lose kl, then flee to casterly rock (maybe with the last of her kids, not sure), attempt a siege there, and get completely fucked, probably by a combination of jaime & tyrion fucking her over. i think it's most likely to be either dany or sansa that truly puts the nail in her coffin, but i don't want to discount brienne or arianne here, just for thematic & geographical reasons (they're closer than the north or fucking meereen). i remain unconvinced that the valonqar will literally choke her though i think positing that it's anyone other than jaime is silly. i also think the idea that cersei being The Lannister In Casterly Rock as it finally is breached and taken is too fucking good, and the idea that Tyrion might lann the clever it out from under her to give to one of his own descendants (SAILOR'S WIFE IS TYSHA TRUTHER FOREVER) is a really satisfying ending for her.

[fuck-customers]

I think this might be the case at other stores, but I don't have enough work experience to really know.

Does anyone else's corporate/bosses/higher ups semi-regularly become extremely obsessed with "improving the numbers" of a certain thing and force all the employees to obsessively do X thing to improve X numbers and make their lives hell for a few months and then completely drop it? Lmao

I'll give you 2 examples that I can immediately think of.

A few years ago at a job, maybe 3 years ago, the managers/corporate/whoever were OBSESSED with our greeting numbers. Like when a customer walks in the door, they were on our ass to greet them and say "welcome to [store name]" or at least "hi, welcome in" or some kind of acknowledgement. (Personally I didn't find this TOO irritating, more mildly annoying, however it did cause me to have a weird pavlovian response to automatic doors to the point where I've accidentally said "hi welcome in" when I was a customer in other stores with doors that made the same sound lmao rip) And then after a few months, they just totally dropped it. I haven't been told to welcome anyone in, haven't even heard a peep about any greeting numbers in at least 2 years.

The current one is still ongoing, but is tapering off.

About 2 years ago, corporate or whoever the fuck decided that we absolutely needed to start harrassing our customers into handing over their personal information in the form of their email, and then after we got a new register system, their phone number, under the guise of a "rewards system" that didn't exist.

(Sorry, side tangent here- this one is SO shady. I've never been able to get a straight answer as to WHY we need to get the info from customers or WHAT benefit it would have for customers, you know, since they were rightfully asking why they should provide this information. I had a manager say it was a "rewards system" and then when I asked how the customers could earn points and how I could view their points to tell them how many points they had or how could I apply their reward to the transaction, backtracked and said there was no rewards. Bro what?? This manager would tell customers themselves this, minus the part about it all being a lie, of course, so customers would get pissed because they weren't getting discounts that didn't exist. And THEN after this "rewards system" bullshit blew up in his face, the manager said that the phone numbers were so in the rare event that a customer MIGHT want to return an item but lost their receipt, they could do a return through their phone number. But....we've ALWAYS been able to do no reciept returns...it just had to be a manager who processes the return...the manager who was lying to me about all of this shit...hmm...)

ANYWAY, managers were pretty rabid about the stupid ass phone numbers and what each employee's individual percentages were and would publicly shame employees with low percentages by posting everyone's scores in the breakroom and highlighting those with low scores and put a condescending note like "[name] and [name] need to try harder" or "too many numbers below 70%" or whatever. And it was all the managers would talk about: how many numbers you got, how to increase numbers, tactics for manipulating people into giving their personal info, etc. etc.

And then it started tapering off about 6 months ago and for the past month or so, I have not heard a single peep about phone numbers or percentages or scores or whatever.

So what the fuck was that all about? Has anyone else experienced anything similar? Is this common or is my workplace nuts?

I know with the companies I worked for they would hire an outside audit agency to come in and look at our metrics and if one was low (i.e. not greeting) they would focus on that until the next one would say we were not promoting the rewards program. Next time it was asking if they found everything.

I'm not saying every company is like that but three of the ones I worked for did that.

-Rodney

[rustyvanburace]

nanananan nanashi 4 ask game🥹

favorite thing about them: NANASHI HAS STYLE, and I will die on that hill. People bitch and moan about Nanashi's "ugly" design, but he is PUNK and that fits really well with IVA's themes. I'd rather have a protagonist with a totally unique appearance than yet another bland kid. Maybe that is antithesis to the roots of SMT (they've always favored bland "nobody" characters), but I am nonetheless sticking to my stance. I love that he is dressed for the part as a Hunter, but still embraces his own sense of identity and style -- which frankly is important and natural for teens. I feel the same way about Asahi's own style. I love that Nanashi's design incorporates aspects of the two Akiras from IV. HE. HAS. GOOD. DESIGN.

least favorite thing about them: Once again this is more of an issue I have with IVA's writing and it is not solely about Nanashi, but I do wish that IVA did explore Akira's motivations more (especially with rescuing his sister, which is just absent in IVA) and how his actions and choices would've later impacted his later reincarnated self. There's a lot of stuff that Akira did in the background of IV that only barely gets examined IVA. Akira's "betrayal" toward the Hunters and Nanashi falling into that same fate makes for an interesting foil, but is just another foil that gets resolved way too quickly for my liking. Nanashi saves the day by repelling the Tokugawa Mandela and is immediately forgiven and praised by all with almost hardly any skepticism. Again it's an issue I have with IVA at large, but it still leaves me wanting more out of the characters and their development.

favorite line: Can I even say I have a favorite line from a silent protagonist, lol? I can say that I do like how "extreme" Nanashi is with his answers, either being very openly kind to downright crass and cold. It's much more extreme than some of Flynn's answers in IV. Arguably it makes IVA's alignment choices too obvious, but I like that it gives Nanashi a polarizing personality and it fits with his design too. Plus some of his anarchy answers are downright hilarious.

Additionally, I'm also amazed at Nanashi's "Dagda!" voice clip in the massacre route. For most of the game, he calls for Dagda in such a high-pitched voice. But as soon as you're locked in massacre, his voice suddenly turns really gruff and deep. Lmao??

brOTP: HE IS BROS WITH EVERYONE. But especially with Asahi, Hallelujah, and Navarre! I love his caring sibling relationship with Asahi, I love him being best of buds with Hallelujah, and I love that Navarre is basically like the cool fun uncle to him.

I posted that stupid edit of Morcedai and Rigby earlier, but actually Nanashi and Hallelujah are WAY more like Morcedai and Rigby. That's them for realll.

OTP: Nanashi x Hallelujah NATION LET'S GO. I will absolutely ship them both as bros and as a pair! They have the best ever chemistry.

nOTP: Yeah so, I really do not like Asahi x Nanashi and I hate seeing Nanashi get shipped with adults. Stop it. Enough said.

random headcanon: I like to imagine that, even before the events of IVA, Nanashi has always had dreams of his past life -- just not as frequently or as "unusual" as they later would be, stuff that he'd just brush off and keep to himself. I also like to think that, partly cause of that, he feels a closeness or yearning towards the Sky Tower and Firmanent but cannot put into words as to why.

unpopular opinion: Nanashi's concept design (the one where he's older, has glasses, and the giant robot arm) sucks and I'm tired of people saying it is "superior" than Nanashi's final design. Maybe the older design would have worked better for an earlier story concept, but for the way IVA is now, it fucking sucks. You can't just switch Nanashi's design with that and expect it to seamlessly work with the game's narrative. People complain about Nanashi being a "discount Demi-fiend", but actually Nanashi's design is much more subtle and it HAS to be in order to work with the narrative. A giant robot arm is the very opposite of subtle.

God I'm just, so pissed at people saying Nanashi's design is "bad". I'm pissed I'm pissed!!

song I associate with them: I'm just gonna cross these out with all asks going forward, I am not good at picking songs lmao.

favorite picture of them: Once again, it's Nanashi's precious smile~!

Thank you for the ask!!

[etsuven]

rating: fluff cw: none includes: maybe badly written, wingpaimon because i feel like she can be very smart and perceptive when she wants to be, reader is pretty because of course you are <3, summary: aether has a little crush on the merchant he visits often...

note: IM ALIVE DONT WORRY!!! i've had no motivation lately since ive been going to bed too late and waking up too early, and that just leaves me feeling drained.... anyways when i first started writing this it was 12:43 AM LMAO. it's not late now, buit it is a few days later-. anyways x2 i've had this in mind since before August 27th and i needed something quick to write and this was in my drafts anyways im rambling- also this is my first time writing for aether forgive me-

he saw you for the first time on an emergency food run.

aether and paimon had been on the road for a while, and because of that, they never actually had the time to properly shop. but now that everything in sumeru was pretty much done, he finally felt it was time to properly do some looking around. (also because paimon was begging for something other than sweet madames to eat.)

the famous traveler took note of all the items around him as he glanced around the market place, keeping track of things he might have wanted to buy in the future. paimon was flying next to him, talking his ear off about things he didn't care to listen to.

"traveler, look! let's go over there!" the small flying companion was already making her way over to the stand before he even had a chance to respond, which also meant that he had no choice but to follow. he noticed that the selection of items was quite nice, but they were quickly put on the back of his mind as he noticed the person selling the items.

you were already talking to paimon, a pretty smile on your face, and your hands gesturing excitedly as you told her about your items. due to the angle of the sun at that time of day, you had light shining on you in a way that looked almost angelic. the shrill voice of paimon reached his ears, but he barely registered it as he was too focused on the sound of your voice.

"i assume you're with this one?" you spoke, gesturing to paimon. aether nodded, snapping out of his little trance as you continued to speak. "she's been pretty interested in this harra fruit jam, and it was just made last night! would you care to buy some?"

harra fruit jam? he had heard of harra fruit being ground up into spices thanks to its aroma, but jam? a spicy jam wasn't the most usual thing, but it seemed fun to try.

taking out his bag of mora, aether handed you the amount needed for one container of jam, as well as a few other things paimon had secretly picked out. the two said their goodbyes, leaving soon after with new ingredients in hand.

-

aether continued to stop by over the next few weeks. for the harra jam, of course. nothing else.

he had to admit, it was quite good. adding it to certain foods gave them a bit of a kick that he didn't seem to mind very much. he even added it to the food he brought with him whenever he had a commission in dragonspine.

the jam was his way of disguising the fact that he secretly wanted to see you. you had become accustomed to his and paimon's presence over those few weeks, and you had even started to give him more of a discount than he usually got from other merchants.

'you're my most loyal customer!' you always said, the same pretty smile on your face. you were pretty too, but you wouldn't catch aether saying that out loud. paimon, however, seemed to catch onto the tension forming between the two of you.

the lingering touches you shared when you handed aether his items, the shy smiles sent between the two of you, the fact that her traveling companion seemed to be absolutely star struck when he first saw you. (and the fact that he constantly visited you 'for the harra jam.')

it was obvious that the two of you had a little thing going on, and paimon couldn't stand the sight of her favorite person fumbling around like a love struck idiot. which he was, but he could have tried to hide it more, he was embarrassing her!

paimon set her plan in motion one evening. aether had gone to bed super early after a long day of commission after commission, leaving the flying child to fend for herself. glancing at the sky, she noticed that it was around the time where most merchants began to close up.

flying out of their shared hotel room, paimon raced to catch you before you set off to your own place. luckily she was right on time, as you had just started to pack up you things for the day.

"(y/n), (y/n)!!" she yelled, her voice projecting over the almost empty shopping district. you jumped at the sound of her voice, a smile gracing your face once you realized who was calling you. "good evening, paimon! how come you're by yourself, is everything okay?"

there was a bit of worry in your tone, and paimon quickly shook her head, reassuring you that everything was fine. "nothing's wrong! aether's at the inn right now, he's had a loooong day, so he's turned in early for the night!"

you let out a little hum of acknowledgment, reaching into your bag. you handed her a small piece of homemade candy, her eyes lighting up in excitement at the sweet. "is that so? don't wander off too much, i've heard how easy it is for you to get carried away!"

paimon tried to splutter out an excuse, only stopping when she realized she had a plan to fulfill. "speaking of getting carried away.. i'm sure you've heard of the upcoming festival?" you nodded, a small smile on your face.

"of course i've heard of it! i've taken a day off, so i'm free to use it as i please!" the flying child smiled, feeling her plan slowly come into motion. she continued to talk with you for a little bit, only leaving when she finally finished her candy.

now, to start the next part of her plan...

-

the first day of the festival had come quickly, and aether was getting prepared to leave when a small cough caught his attention.

looking in the direction of the noise, he noticed that his travel buddy was tossing and turning in her bed. another cough left her mouth, and aether quickly found himself walking over to her with worry etched on his face. "are you okay, paimon?"

paimon nodded, a small smile on her face before it was ripped away by another cough. something was... off about it, but the traveler quickly pushed that thought to the back of his mind. "paimon's fine, don't worry! she's just feeling a bit under the weather... you might have to go to the festival without me..."

aether tried to argue with her. he could just stay with her and go tomorrow when she felt better, but paimon refused to let him do so. eventually he did agree, but not without leaving her with a few snacks to keep her fed.

now by himself, the traveler wandered around the festival area, taking in the colorful sights and smells of the area around him. it was quiet without paimon, but he found that he didn't mind it too much. now he actually had the time to look at what he wanted.

while browsing for items, aether thought he caught sight of you. he ignored it, thinking he was just imagining things. that was, until you called out for him.

"oh? aether, hello!" you grinned, waving at him from a stall nearby. you collected your items and skipped over, continuing to speak. "i saw paimon last night, so i was sort of expecting her to be with you today! did she wander off somewhere?"

aether shook his head, telling you the reason why paimon was gone that day, and that it was just him for now. "since i'm by myself too," you started, adjusting the bag you were holding. "let's hang out together today, it can even be like a little date! if you'd like, that is-"

the traveler nodded quickly, his face flushing as you grabbed his hand to lead him around. he had a sneaking suspicion that paimon had something to do with this, maybe she snuck out when he was sleeping the previous night.

oh well, perhaps he would bring something back for her. just as a little thanks.

[respocked]

The worst TOS episode - a trans perspective

I'm making my own post because I don't want to litter the polls with my ventpost/discourse.

There is a TOS best episode bracket poll going on and currently Turnabout Intruder is winning to Paradise Syndrome. Seeing which, has put me in a not very good mental space last night.

I have loved Star Trek for a few years now and engaged with the fandom, I feel very passionate about it - but the absolutely rabid misogyny in the source material makes it sometimes very, very difficult to be in fandom spaces. Seeing episodes with such rotten, dehumanizing view of people born as women being discussed in positive light is very difficult to me.

To make it clear - I'm not calling out anyone for voting for it, or saying it is inherently misogynistic to do so! (it's possible that people just hate The Paradise Syndrome more lmao). It is also possible to enjoy the works of fiction that are flawed, I mean, I AM a fan of Star Trek. In this post I will simply explain why I don't like this episode and why I don't like seeing it praised.

I wish that I could enjoy a sci-fi "utopia" in peace, without being reminded of heterosexism and violence. It upsets me to see misogyny not because I want things I am a fan of to be perfect, but because heterosexism and cis supremacy already affects my everyday life greatly and hurts me deeply. And seeing it in fiction rubs the salt in the wound.

I wanted to channel the way I feel into productivity and make a post abt Turnabout Intruder with some feminist analysis, but I genuinely don't think I can watch it again, and I would need to do so - so this is going to be a quick one.

If you haven't seen it/have seen it a log time ago: the plot of the episode is that Kirk's body is stolen by his ex, a woman. She is jealous of the oppurtunities he got as a man, so she impersonates him, wants to become him. However, the crew of the Enterprise realizes something is wrong, based of the woman's behaviour in Kirk's body - it is not like Jim Kirk to act the way she does.

The way she does, of course, is overemotional and illogical. The idea of a woman succesfully doing a man's job, assuming his place in society, is discounted immediately. The episode doesn't sympathize with her desires and wants. She is villainized and called insane. Gender cannot be transcanded, and not only that, but people who attempt are to be punished. A woman should know her place, and accept it. Submission is a woman's natural state - you are not supposed to want more out of your life.

The label of "insane", that features even (if I recall correctly) in the episode's synopsis is one that is to me especially violent. Psychiatry was (and still is!) weaponized against the gender-nonconforming. In my country people born as women who didn't agree with roles prescribed to them were for years forcibly institionalized, drugged, raped. "Conversion therapy" is still not banned in my country. Hate groups are trying to pass a bill which would ban autistic and mentally ill people from transitioning - weaponizing mental health care to beat people into conformity, into submission.

I read Turnabout Intruder as a transgender metaphor. The way the woman desiring to have a man's body is portrayed reflects the strategies of real life violence against people who do not conform to gender roles.

When I first watched this episode, I was in high school. I knew TOS was sexist, because I watched all the other episodes before. But it still deeply hurt me.

[gh0st-0f-luke]

Cat OMGOMGOMGGGG I am pretty sure lxc in "whether i’m gonna flip you off or pull you into the closet, i haven’t decided yet" was either observing this all happen and shipping wangxian in his heart or he's trying to save his bro and wwx from lqr for a bit more because the summary made it seem like this is all the compiled EVIDENCE against wangxian's sordid affair LMAO!! Also the fact results were INCONCLUSIVE ahahaha omg i cant stop laughing! as if the fic itself wasnt a hilarious masterpiece there's this lil detail... istg if i die laughing its your fault (compliment). There's a reason youre my fave crackfic writer everrrr. Thank you for writing another fic in this format and giving me more content of wwx who emails like the blog follower wwx in your other fic omgg! these both fics are competing for the spot of BEST CRACKFIC in my heart and i cant choose omg!!😍🥺🔥

P.S. please tell me anything and everything you wish to tell me about this fic including things you wanted to write that didnt fit in the fic, any behind the scenes stuff...anything aaahhh i am obsessed 🥺

P.P.S. I repeat, they fucked in that closet and more than once and i think atp everyone in the company knows but either stfu out of second-hand embarrassment or because it was TMI and theyre still scarred for life after waking in on this...or they ship wangxian and are glad for this...

Thanks again omg i love your crackfics so much youre an absolute crack/chatfic god! Have a spectacular rest of the week for all the happiness you brought this lowly one on period day 1!

LOL yes this is all the emails and slack messages relevant to their relationship that could be collected as evidence (personal texts and stuff outside of work was not admissible) and since lwj is in charge of HR this was escalated to lan xichen as vice president but luckily for wangxian he is either just totally blind to what is happening or (more likely) he is rooting for them hahahahaha so it’s kind of a cover-up but also…plausible deniability yk?

thank you so much <3333 i’ve been on such an epistolary kick these last few months hahahaha i kinda have an idea for a tgcf epistolary fic next but i’ll have to wait and see if any more wangxian ideas spark my fancy

p.s. idk!!??‽! suddenly there are no thoughts in my head lolol but i feel like the juniors def have a secret text gc off slack where they gossip about wangxian and i was considering doing like a second chapter with transcripts of interviews of various coworkers on whether they think wangxian broke any hr policies so the juniors would def have smth to say LOL or maybe a chapter with some bonus texts that are not admissible as part of the case file so they were discounted! but i’m tired after writing this fic so it won’t happen tooooo soon hahahaha just if i get inspired! i’m not sure if i would write what happens after the end of the fic bc to me it’s kinda fun how open-ended it is given that it’s a case file but never say never i suppose

p.p.s. they were absolutely using the supply closet for unprofessional purposes i fear but we’ll hope they were at least discreet about it

i hope u have a wonderful day as well!!!! i hope u survive ur period </3 and thank you <33333

[long-suffering-little-spoon]

I JUST REALIZED THAT YOU WATCHED THE OFMD FINALE

H-

How are you feeling 🥲🥲🥲

Pahaha not swimmingly, I'll just say. First I have been doing a bit of the ol' menstruating which means everything is immediately more extreme lol. I've been very conflicted and I'm still not 100% sure how I feel about *THE THING* especially, but this is where I stand right here right now at like 11PM lmao

Under the cut cos this ended up being exponentially longer than I thought it could ever be sorry

Overall I've loved season 2!! It has been so much fun to interact with the community and convert everyone to the Izzy hands cult engage with the fandom week by week. We've had some incredibly beautiful high moments and some lovely refreshing queer joy. I adore the new characters and the developments of our existing ones. I know my negative thoughts here are much more substantial than my positives but this doesn't mean I didn't like it!! I just don't feel the need to describe the positives because I feel like they're pretty obvious and universally recognised, agreed upon and beloved, y'know? (if you want a purely positive thoughts autistic happy flappy hands rant™, i can oblige dw)

Izzy's death is not the only reason I have mixed feelings on the finale. Obviously the episode cuts were a result of HBO'S meddling and isn't the fault of the crew, but the pacing still felt off and everything that happened just kinda washed over me like white noise (haha will wo-). The loose ends were tied up in wholesome ways and if we don't get a season 3 this would be a mostly decent way to end our characters' journeys, if a bit rushed. But then...

Izzy's death. A lot of people feel very very betrayed and hurt by Izzy being killed off, some people don't feel the comfort they used to from this show because of it and no longer want to engage. I don't wanna discount these people's views, more power to them; I cannot stop them from feeling what they feel and doing what they choose. I haven't given up hope on this show but Izzy's death just felt pretty unsatisfying to me?? Putting my bias towards him aside, I get the "killing off mentor at end of second act" trope but I just feel and wish way more could've been done with Izzy. I wanted to see more of him being happy and secure in himself and his found family and his queerness and his disability!! But now I don't get that and it very much stings. I think I could've come to terms more with his death if there had been more time to dwell on it all and get to see the individual characters mourn, but again episode cuts, thanks HBO!! /s. And I know they had the funeral but it still feels like we didn't really get a chance to mourn or treat Izzy's death with the weight it warranted. And I am far too tired especially right now to engage in "is this/is this not bury your gays/disabled character" but I will say I've seen pretty compelling arguments on both sides. As an able-bodied disabled person I don't feel it's fully my place to dictate, but I am upset Izzy was killed right after some big moments in his healing process and being a disabled person and in general just enjoying his life.

Personally I'm not giving up on the show as a whole because the finale left a sour taste in my mouth. I still very much like this show and I'm willing to stick around for a potential season 3 and on future rewatches I'll be able to see the stuff I loved separate from the stuff I didn't. But since looking back now, the latter is most recent, it kind of casts an unpleasant shadow on a very enjoyable season of television.

RIP Izzy Hands you deserved better sweetie, you would've loved Drag Race. And also shoutout to Con O'Neill for a fucking phenomenal performance last season, but especially this one. Izzy was absolutely iconic and a fan favourite for a very good reason, even if imo the writers did him dirty. He was hilarious and a petty little bitch man but then deeply broken and compelling and a genuinely beautiful character with a beautiful journey despite an unfortunate and unjust end?? He slayed.

Wow this was a lot!! Sorry if you were expecting silly goofiness lmfao I got very analysi-ish and a bit melancholic. Thank you so much for the ask JJ, it was a good opportunity to try and express all my thoughts and squish them into something cohesive for both you and me. (And thanks to my friend who I was discussing this with earlier; they helped me get a new perspective by sharing some of his thoughts. Dude, if you're reading this you know who you are, thanks a bunch!!!!)

[faroreswinds]

I’m sure sending you an ask off anon will probably get me put on a list of some kind but fuck it, I’ve already got one unhinged stalker, what’s another one in the mix lmao, and i want to make it extremely clear that I support you in this.

Like it really says something that these stannies absolutely do not quit after four damn years of the same thing. Doesn’t matter how factual you are (correctly citing art history in its original intent and context, canon game dialogue and timelines, interviews, etc), how polite you are, how straightforward you and others are because none of that matters at all to these chumps. This is a straight up gamergate-style sealioning campaign that in the end isn’t really about edelgard at all—she’s just the convenient platform for these people to expound their insane maximalist fandom-as-politics viewpoint that has irreparably damaged houses’ reputation for fans and has conflated videogame communities as a testing ground for in-group loyalty metrics.

Aside from what you and others have already said, it’s telling that they always follow a set script: Church Evil and Fascist, Edelgard Revolutionary and Morally Good, alongside truly reprehensible weaponisation of identity politics and socjus buzzwords. It’s not enough to assert that Edelgard is a pure lesbian hero (biphobia what), it must mean that by diametrically opposing her, Dimitri has to be evil, straight (but when they grudgingly acknowledge his queerness, it’s then asserting that said queerness can only exist within him being repressed and tamping it down because of evil Faerghian misogynist politics, never mind that Adrestia is the biggest misogynist of the continent lol), and singularly obsessed with targeting what she represents; Rhea, the chief architect of all that is evil in Fódlan and directly responsible for its misogyny, homophobia, and whatever else alongside with lobbing assertions of her being a “groomer” (which anyone with half a brain cell not dedicated to being chronically online know is now a popular right-wing argot used to directly target the lgbt community with truly heinous accusations equating them to paedophilia), among other things.

Only extreme statements and buzzwords for the characters, all the time: Edelgard as a hero, Dimitri and Rhea as representatives of ontological evil that Edelgard must defeat with extreme prejudice.

Let’s also point out the fact that in a true debate—because they’re not really debating at all and I say this as a professional debater myself who has won medals for this shit and trained youth teams in my country—the onus on the opposing side has to accept neutral statements from their counterparts. They cannot seriously say that their statements on Edelgard must be taken as fact while simultaneously discounting yours as fiction, because at best that would obviously be called out as ad hoc attempt to muddy the waters; at worst, blatantly trying to control the debate solely with their own parameters as the only acceptable ones, and thus openly attempting to silence dissenting opinions. If they really want to try to convince others that they’re really presenting legitimate debate, they cannot seriously pretend that their actions support that claim when they:

Approach you first and then continue to hound you

Constantly repeat themselves in an attempt to wear you down and confuse you, which is absolutely something that can be penalised in formal debate

Get offended and then accuse you of abuse when you firmly disagree with them and draw boundaries

Let’s also not forget the fact that their actions as a community absolutely do constitute harassment when they’ve been caught gloating about running moonlitboar off tumblr, the revelation that they keep a list of Edelgard critics to monitor them, forcing vas to apologise for expressing negative opinions about Edelgard (note how Rhea gets called so much bad shit but you don’t see Rhea fans calling for her haters’ blood), and even prompting YouTubers to change entire videos to avoid backlash, if not to simply stay in their good graces (and milk them for views and ad cash)

Aside from absolutely garbage essentialist Pure Lesbian Women are from Venus, Evil Repressed Hettie Obsessed Men are from Mars viewpoints, it’s truly mind boggling that they’ve bought into the belief that f/f is somehow purer and “less problematic” than m/m solely because they’ve decided that the heavy mlm moments for the Lions must point to their inherent moral degeneracy, which I would again like to remind them that that is actually homophobic; hell, I’ve seen quite a few using fujoshi as an insult. Let me take the time to explain that fujoshi and mlm fandom in Asia (explained by Asian fans themselves!) has always been seen as a symptom of mostly women fans being disgusting and “rotten,” and that their interest in mlm relationships is not only a betrayal of their gender (and ofc fujoshi as an insult in the west is a popular argument with terfs), but a sign that they’re degenerate and that something is deeply wrong with them.

Never mind that across the world, ff in media has sadly mostly been used as porn fodder for straight, misogynist men, because lesbian sex titillates them while gay sex repulses them. Utena is the outlier in a sea of garbage and said ff garbage is mostly shown as porn anyways. Gengoroh Tagame, a popular gay mangaka, has spoken about how female fans of mlm in japan are often big supporters of lgbt rights. Let’s not even get into the fact that the demographics of most edelgard spaces (like r/edelgard) are of straight men.

I also really despise how they’ve discovered “antisemitic” as a new buzzword. I’m Jewish. I loathe how most people only seem to care about opposing antisemitism when it’s in a videogame or movie, instead of in real life when we get hatecrimed. But it’d be remiss of me not to mention the way my blood boils when edelstans seriously repeat church slander of the nabateans being fake humans, evil reptilians wearing human skins as a disguise for them to manipulate the world from the shadows and using a fake, evil religion as their cover (not to mention how they describe the tenets of said religion as evil and conveniently forge and misrepresent its texts to make it look worse…where have i seen that before), who impede societal development to keep themselves on top, and, as the cherry on the shit cake, as miserly hoarders who keep monumental wealth to themselves and refuse to use it to help others.

Really makes you think then that it doesn’t take much for them to admit they see the Nabatean genocide as a positive, that its completion is necessary for edelgard to succeed (even if they hem and haw about what they think would happen to byleth, Seteth, and flayn), and borrowing from blatant irl genocide denial rhetoric saying that the agarthans (who are literal moustache twirling evil villains) were the original inhabitants who actually got genocided by the nasty coloniser lizards and that their retribution is absolutely justified and understandable. I laugh to think what their though process will be like if they even play the jugdral games.

And finally, since it bears mentioning, they should keep byleths name out of their fucking mouths. As a huge self admitted Byleth stan, seeing them whinge and whine and bitch and moan about poor Edelgard getting criticised really grinds my gears when the last four years has been seeing me constantly trying to navigate a fandom space that relentlessly shits on byleth and says they ruin the games and are nothing but player pandering or when people fucking celebrated the scene of shez killing them in hopes. Edelstans don’t get to try and use them as a prop to prove how edelgard is so good to them (and is so pure as a whole) when we have quantifiable data showing that Byleth smiles the most in verdant wind, has an incredibly strong character arc in azure moon, and that for THREE ROUTES OUT OF FOUR in houses (two if you count hopes scenarios when they’re kept alive) they always end up opposing her, because that is their actual character. Let’s talk about how r/byleth is mostly populated by r/edelgard fans who mostly post porn of fem byleth but have admitted to actually hating her, but liking the fact that she’s got big tits and can be used for yuri fanservice. Or let’s talk about feh: all their alts so far show their loyalty and closeness TO THE NABATEANS. And fuck it, I’m of the opinion that actually the devs’ edelgard bias is what ruined byleth and what made them silent. Because when they’re separated from houses (and thus not in her immediate focus), they fucking shine!!!

Tldr: hi raxis, what’s good!!

Addendum: edelgard has the most 3h alts in feh, cipher card art showing her naked and/or with suggestive costumes, is the most attached to the avatar characters in 3h/hopes/feh of her roster, is named first in the dlc for 3h in engage, has the tea set paired with hreslveg blend, ETC. if that’s not obv favouritism by an obv mostly male dev team, then, well…

Hey, how are you? Hope things are well!

When thinking about that exchange from the other day, @butwhatifidothis had an excellent post that put into words more eloquently than I could about issue:

They are right - I never mentioned it myself because my brain didn't quite go there, but many of the arguments were basically "this character would do this hypothetically", which is nothing more than mere headcanon.

Full disclosure, but I am not a professional debater. I am not even trained. Back in school I famously hated debates because I always felt they relied on twisting facts rather than empirical data. I liked data, that's why I went into the Sciences.

The only debating in Science is whether your results are accurate and if your method is indisputable. Is this ethical? What are we basing our ethnics off of? Proper science doesn't care about your opinions, or how bad so and so was back in the 1700s. Science - and Math - liked numbers, and numbers are cold and inflexible.

So I must admit that debating (not discussions, but debating) do tend to make me nervous at times. I like to learn, and to be challenged on how I view the world. But debating is not a skill I am honestly good at. I can lost track of the original point. I can get discombobulated by the lexicon and factoids when they are rapid fired at me.

That's why I engage in them. It's practice. If I don't do it, I will never get better.

And my untrained eyes could see that this debate... was not really a debate, but a shake-down. I was curious to see where it would go.

If anyone else finds this in this situation, here is my unprofessional advice:

Do not insult or use language that could be misconstrued as aggressive. Remain polite and sincere. Remaining polite does not mean agreeing to everything they say. But, instead of saying something like "You are wrong!" re-word it as "I don't agree with your view" or "I do not believe that is correct".

Do not let yourself be bullied. If this means you wish to disengage, just disengage. Make it comfortable for yourself. In my case, I was comfortable to keep going, but that may not be true for you. They make take this as a win, but you aren't being graded on this and this isn't politics. It's video game stuff.

Use only facts, do not use headcanons or opinions. This makes it harder for the other person to fight you, because you are remaining neutral. If you wish to discuss or bring up something that is not based on text, be sure to make it clear.

Call out when they twist your words. One user claimed that I had once used their name in my post. I never did, so I asked them where I had said that. It forces the other user, if they wish to respond, to either acknowledge they made a mistake, or they risk making themselves look like liars.

Never take it personally. They don't really know you. They are just bored and angry.

Always try to get them to think. This one I am still trying to master. When they make a claim, ask them why they think that. Why are they drawing that conclusion? What if they thought about it this way? If they are regurgitating whatever they have heard from others, they may get tripped up by this. This does run the risk of irritating the other person, but I find it is a helpful tool to both learn and to challenge your opponent to explaining themselves better.

This is the hardest one of all. Do not lose sight of the topic. It is not uncommon for these discussions to go a million different directions. If you lose sight, you may end up on a path you don't want to be on. Stay on topic. I'm still working on this too.

It's really cool that you are a trained debater. If you have any other further advice, or if my advice is terrible, I would love to hear it!

Ultimately, I think many of these types of fans just want to use whatever buzzwords and language they can to not only guilt the other party into bending a knee to their opinions, but to also shame anyone who likes another fictional character.

It's really a shame that other fans feel the need to go to such lengths over someone who is not real.

But per your addenhem, it is true that Edelgard gets a lot of love and attention from IS. She is popular. She doesn't need someone to come sweeping in defending her fictional honor.

Poor Claude really gets the shortest end of the stick in all this. This guy doesn't even have the same number of alts as Dimitri in FEH.

The sexuality stuff confuses me the most. Perhaps it is because my particular sexuality makes up 1% of the population, but I usually don't see why it is such a big deal when it comes to FE. FE doesn't make statements about sexuality. It is not try to teach about sexuality. It is not trying to push an agenda of any kind except the Make Money Agenda.

This weird vilifying fans of who likes mlm content, often framed as disgusting straight fujos who fetishize men. I find this an odd statement. From my point of view, anything that has any sort of sex is fetishizing, period. Straight, gay, whatever.

Well, regardless, thank you for the nice ask. I hope I could give is an answer that gives it justice. :)

[kmze]

I think it was you who said Dries wrote s7 out of spite & I never paid much attention since I stopped watching after a few episodes that infuriated me.But this is exactly what my friend who by the way is a KC shipper, LMAO ,said to me that whoever wrote this must be intentionally doing it and they are not even subtle about it.I mean Stefan lying isn't new but like with elena after he got exposed & called out there was some level of resolution but here it seemed like they were going out of their way to cut out all forms of communication.I never hoped more for Katherine to come out of wherever she was & rip out the throat of that discount version-skank like she did in the Stefan Diaries.

Yep that was me! The vitriol I have against that woman will never go away I felt immense joy when Ruby Rose came out publicly and said she created a hostile and toxic work environment because it gave me sweet sweet vindication. I will never forgive her for what she did in S7 (here is my meta on it) and honestly not surprised your KC friend noticed it because it wouldn't surprise me if she (Dries) was aware of the spoiler leaks that fandom was getting to make SC fans even more miserable during that season. I HATE HER SO MUCH! I'll also forever hate her because what she did took away so much momentum from Steroline, because in S6 where they were AMAZING and she was so petty and spiteful that her toys had been taken away from her she wrote that whole season with hate in heart and it wasn't even well written!

Perfect example with the lying because that is what always bothered me the most about the beginning of that season, Stefan was always a lying liar who lies but there was always resolution with it. Instead we had 7x06 where Stefan kind of dismissively tells Caroline to just trust him and then Val is throwing it in her face how loyal he is like the flames on the side of my face! Then she made sure the next episode they didn't even interact (and had the two biggest SC fanboys Chad and Joe write that episode of course) and then she CUT THE RESOLUTION SCENE! Compare that to early S6 when Stefan was being an extra jerk to Caroline as opposed to the others and SC shippers were like yeah he's doing that because she can break down his walls. Then 6x08 aired and he said he had to push her away THE MOST and we all had a great "I told you so" moment, because the writers CARED about them that season and gave them conflicts with the intention there'd be resolution.

Another thing that was definitely driven by spite was how Stefan and Caroline had a million phone calls that season instead of face to face conversations because touch was always one of Steroline's love languages. She wanted to sabotage that aspect of them, it's why 7x11 felt like such a breath of fresh air for them because Caroline grabbed his face and told him he's okay and he said no I'm not because he can't pretend with her. They always had a way that they could just look at each other and the other would know what was happening, even as early as 2x03 Stefan was telling Caroline the truth about how he knows being with Elena isn't safe for her. Just absolute intentional sabotage.

Okay so I don't completely get that reference lol was that from the books? I read them but my memory of them is so foggy but I agree with the sentiment lol. I'm just glad we got S8 because we got a lot of whining from other fandoms because of all the good stuff SC was getting (especially in the first half) and it was absolutely needed after that bullshit Dries put us through.