#and hope that you rediscover this post at some point

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

dear future me, Please remember to write the metamorphosis fic and title it ~✨the yassification of howdy pillar✨~

[604to647]

Marine Attraction

4.3K / Detective Tim Rockford x fem!reader

Summary: When a stakeout at the aquarium does not go as planned, Detective Tim Rockford must interview all the aquarium visitors, including you.

Warnings: Fluff! Meet cute! Maybe a dirty thought or two that reader really should not be having about a (hot) man just trying to do his job 🤭 Made up Merge Mansion lore. One cute nickname because it’s me (won’t spoil).

A/N: This was written for @mermaidgirl30’s Ocean Challenge – thank you for hosting a lovely event.  Please see #Jamie’s Ocean Challenge for all the wonderful works! I’ve noticed that as of late, some of the authors that I look up to and consider mainstays in this community since I started lurking 2+ years ago have wanted to leave, needed to take breaks from the fandom or felt disconnected from the community.  This story is for you, about stepping away when you need to and maybe rediscovering how something old can still bring you joy. Xoxo, love you all.

Fishy dividers by @saradika-graphics 🥰

EDIT: Oops this turned into a series - Masterlist

You’re not really sure how this happened.

You’ve been feeling a bit off, as of late.  Nothing was wrong, per say - your job is fine, your friends are dear, your life leaves you grateful.  It’s just that you feel… untethered.  Like you should be doing something more?  Work is fulfilling enough – you achieve and excel.  Friends and family make for wonderful company, but your social battery isn’t infinite and as much as enjoy your get-togethers, they can leave you drained.  Even some of your solitary pursuits, cooking, watching tv, scrolling through social media don’t seem to be as satisfying as they used to be – you consume, but you don’t create.

On a whim, you decide to take the day off work (the first in who knows how long?) and go somewhere you’ve always loved: the aquarium.  You’ve been visiting this aquarium since you were a child – something about the gentle hum of the tanks and the darkness that’s illuminated only by the glow of the exhibits has always relaxed you.  You’re going to go specifically to take photos.  Photography used to be a casual hobby of yours; you were even featured on local news blogs and had your photos chosen for a gallery showing once – but as life got busier and your other endeavours required more of your time and energy, it had fallen by the wayside.   It’s been forever since you took a photo walk or even a picture that wasn’t for capturing a moment rather than a snapshot.  You’re actually getting excited about shooting photos again.

It had been a serene couple of hours spent watching your unhurried fish friends and the silent watery dances of the marine plants that shared their abodes.  The aquarium is playing host to a few young families and two eager fieldtrips, but otherwise, you’ve had the place nearly to yourself.  Able to loiter so you can try different lenses and play with the lighting of your shots, or wait as long as you want in order for a mixed rainbow hue of fish to swim into frame, the morning had passed quietly and contently.

But now you sit in the children’s play area, the last of today’s aquarium visitors, waiting for your turn to be questioned by the police. 

---

Detective Tim Rockford is not really sure how this happened.

It had been a simple enough stakeout operation.  He and his team had received a tip a few days ago that there would be a handoff taking place at the aquarium today: an exchange of money between one of Grandma Ursula’s henchmen and a mystery player whose identity has eluded Tim for the entirety of this case thus far.  Perhaps it was unreasonable to expect Mr. Pie (so nicknamed by the squad for the Bolton Berry pies he consumed) to show up himself, but Tim held out hope that whomever they nabbed today would provide the break in the case that he so desperately needs.

Only, Grandma’s man had come and gone and none of the six men, Tim included, posted at the various vantage points and exits had seen a damn thing.  At some point between spotting their target enter the aquarium with a briefcase in hand, they had lost track of him and picked up his movements again only when he was already leaving the gift shop, empty handed.  How was it possible they couldn’t account for what happened in the aquarium?  Did the meeting with Mr. Pie occur?  Or was the briefcase stashed somewhere?  Tim presses the heels of his palms to his eyes and grimaces – the operation had been an utter failure. 

Not only did they not get what they came for, but now the remainder of the day was completely shot.  What had followed once the police realized just how out of depth they were, was a complete shut down of the aquarium with all visitors locked in and needing to be interviewed before they could leave.  Even the elementary school trips of thirty children.  Each.  After giving instruction to the additional LAPD support he called in to search the aquarium top to bottom for the missing case, Tim had settled in for a long afternoon of what he expected to be fruitless Q&As.

As he wearily enters the kids play area once again (an officer more considerate than he had suggested that given the number of children being held, it might be the best place to have everyone wait), Tim sees only one witness left to interview: you.  He had noticed you earlier, each time he came in to select another interviewee, in fact – if your pretty features and sweet smile hadn’t caught his attention first, your everlasting patience and kindness would have.  Several times, he spotted you playing patiently with the children – the sound of your melodic voice and gentle laughter floating above the grumblings of the other adults who had also had their days ruined. The sound eased the tense spot in his shoulders where his holster straps had started digging in a little bit.  At first, Tim thought you might be one of the teachers or a field trip chaperone, but then he noticed that you let all the school trips and families with children go ahead of you, and he overheard you tell his fellow officer that you didn’t mind waiting, that it must be much harder for the children.  He was grateful for you and he didn’t even know you.

As Tim approaches, you look up from your phone and shoot him the soft smile that’s been his one bright spot in this disaster of a day, though he thinks it seems a bit more tired than when he first had the pleasure of seeing it earlier this afternoon.

“Is it my turn?” you ask him, still in good spirits despite the circumstances.

“Sorry for the wait, miss.”

“No need to be sorry… Detective?”

“Detective Rockford.  Tim Rockford.  I appreciate that, it’s been… a day.”

You hold out your hand to shake his before repeating his name, then giving him your own.  Tim can’t decide if he likes the way his name rolls off your tongue, or the way your own name floats above the cheer of your voice more. 

“Well, hopefully I can help with… whatever has made it such a day,” you give him a sympathetic smile.

The kind of smile you might offer to him when he comes home after a long hard day.  Damn. He’s in trouble.  Focus, Rockford.

Since you’re his last witness of the day, he offers to conduct the interview right here instead of the stuffy office that the aquarium staff had lent him.  As you acquiesce to his suggestion, you stretch out your arms and legs, arching your back to work out a bit of stiffness from having sat for so long and Tim finds himself admiring your figure in a way that is decidedly not going to help him solve this case.  He tries to cover up his less than professional gaze by stretching himself – it feels good.

After collecting your information and starting with his routine questions, Tim realizes he’s pinning his hopes on you having seen or noticed something today – not only because no one else has, but so he can keep speaking with you.

When it becomes evident that you didn’t, he sighs a heavy sigh of disappointment. 

He hadn’t realized that he’s done so until hears you apologize; quick to reassure you that that you don’t have anything to apologize for, Tim places his large warm hand over yours before he can stop himself.  You gasp softly, you think only to yourself, but Tim hears the sweet noise and smirks a little – it’s nice to know he’s not the only one who’s been affected.  When he notices that you don’t move your hand away,  he lets himself revel in the feel of your soft, small hand under his for a beat longer before he removes it and somewhat begrudgingly starts to wrap up the interview.

---

Fuck. This fucking detective.  Rockford.  Tim Rockford.

Even his name is hot. 

You had noticed him earlier, of course – how could you not?  He was a hulking presence, impossibly broad and tall, and he carried himself with the authority and gravitas of a man in charge.  During the earlier hours of your wait, you had been preoccupied with helping entertain some of the young children in the waiting area who were restless with boredom, not sure why their promised day of aquarium fun had to be ruined by something as trivial as a police matter.

But once you caught sight of Detective Rockford’s handsome profile, it became impossible to not be captivated by the deep richness of his brown eyes or that strong nose that centered his face perfectly.  His grave countenance conveyed the seriousness with which he took his work (that facial scruff screamed he worked too much), but he was quietly calm and his tone gentle with all the witnesses, especially the children.  You couldn’t help but hope it was him every time an officer entered the waiting area. 

Some time between now and the last two times he had come in to call forth witnesses, the detective had lost his suit jacket, strolling in wearing only a gun holster and a white dress shirt that stretched taut over his firm chest and bulging arm muscles; you thought you were going to have to dunk yourself into one of the aquarium tanks to cool off just from the sight of him.

Your heart picks up a little when it’s him who appears when you’re the last one left to be interviewed; silently, you pray to Beyoncé to give you the strength needed to coherently answer the detective’s questions when he asks them in that honey laced baritone of his.

When Tim mirrors your big stretch, you hope you’re discrete enough that he doesn’t catch you staring: his limbs extend fantastically long, arm span wide enough to cast a shadow that reaches across the floor in front of you - he's huge.  After hearing the detective inhale a deep breath, it feels to you as if all of the air has been sucked from the room, leaving you dizzy as you gawk at his hard chest, expanding and pushing up against his crisp dress shirt, held closed only by the strained efforts of a few valiant buttons.

You feel bad that you have to answer in the negative to Detective Rockford’s questions.  Unfortunately, you hadn’t noticed anything out of the ordinary during your visit, too engrossed in your own photo taking, and you don’t remember seeing the man in the picture that he shows you.  You can tell that Tim tries hard not to show his disappointment and wish very much that you could please him, be the one to wipe the weary look off his face and the release the tension from his hunched-up shoulders.  Maybe please him in other ways, as well.  You have a feeling that praise from one Detective Tim Rockford would have you dripping wet and clenching around nothing embarrassingly quick. 

GIRL. GET IT TOGETHER.  For all you know, a serious crime took place here today!

You apologize.  Outwardly, for your inability to help him with his case, and inwardly, for the dirty thoughts that are wholly inappropriate to have about a complete stranger who is just, very competently, doing his job.

To try and put you at ease, Tim relaxes his handsome face and hopes to reassure you when he gently pats your hand; instead, a jolt of electricity shoots through you and you warm all over from his touch.  Maybe it’s your imagination but Detective Rockford seemingly lets his bear paw of hand linger over yours for a bit longer than he needs to, and you think you spy his plush lips curve up slightly at the corners when you gasp.  You might just melt off this bench right now.

“Oh, one last thing, did you take any pictures at the aquarium today?”

You nod, but are suddenly shy as you anticipate the Detective’s next question.  Tim nods at you matter of fact, “Good.  Could you please show me?  I just need to look through them quickly to see if there’s anything in the background that might be useful.”

He holds his hand out, not really expecting any resistance - you’ve been nothing but perfectly cooperative so far.  But when his hand remains empty, he looks over to find you adorably chewing your bottom lip while gripping your phone tightly with both hands, making no motion to hand it over.  For one ridiculous moment he panics, Are you Mr. Pie?!  He shakes his head slightly to rid himself of that ludicrous thought, and waits patiently for you to tell him what you’re ruminating on.

“It’s just that there are a lot of pictures..,” you start, “… and a lot of them are kind of duplicates…”

You know you’re being deliberately vague – sighing in resignation, you decide it’s best to just rip the band aid off.  Unlocking your phone, you go to your camera roll and filter to today’s library before handing over your phone without meeting the detective’s gaze.  Out of the corner of your eye, you see Tim scroll slowly through hundreds of photos of the aquarium’s exhibits; you attempt to avoid meeting his eye by focusing on how your phone looks inexplicably small in his big, rough hand.

“That’s… a lot,” Tim finally says when he reaches the bottom of the roll.

When you look up, you expect to see maybe a cringed look or even a mocking expression on the detective’s handsome face, but instead you find the massive man looking at you with a gentle curiosity, maybe even holding himself a little smaller in an attempt to not intimidate you.  It doesn’t seem to matter that you don’t really know him, you suddenly feel comfortable enough to tell Detective Tim Rockford this very personal thing about yourself – he might look like he's perfectly cast as the 'bad cop' in interrogations, but you have a feeling he’s got just as good of a track record playing 'good cop'.

“An old hobby of mine was… I guess they call it iPhoneography? Using apps to mimic traditional camera captures?  I used to love it, actually.  Selecting the different lenses and choosing different exposures, then seeing how the images would developed – of course, with the phone, you wouldn’t have to take it in and wait for a week or anything, it would be processed digitally in a matter of seconds.  But… editing apps are so common place nowadays, and most social media platforms have built in filters and effects - iPhoneography has sort of fallen out of favour,” you explain.  Tim is nodding along - he doesn’t really know what you’re talking about, he has three apps on his phone that he uses regularly (Weather, Candy Crush, and the app from the City that reminds him when to put out his garbage bins); the rest of the apps on his phone were preinstalled and he can’t figure out how to delete them.  But he encourages you to go on.

“In fact, I haven’t really gone out to shoot in years.  But lately… I’ve sort of wanted to get back into it?  I came to the aquarium today to fire up the old camera, so to speak.  That’s why there’s so many – a lot of the pictures are just of the same frame but where I was trying out different lenses or exposure options.  I’m not, like, super obsessed with fish or anything,” you finish up quickly, hoping you haven’t made a complete fool of yourself.

Tim hands you back your phone, still open to today’s photos, and smiles, “Why don’t you tell me about what you shot today?”

“Really?” you look up, surprised.

“Really,” Tim tries to convey his genuine interest via his eyes, and is instantly rewarded by a smile on your face that could light up the room.  It’s certainly lighting him up.

And so, you tell Detective Tim Rockford all about the photos you took today.  You swipe through your pictures and show him how the different lenses affect the lighting, exposure, saturation and even colour tinting of the resulting photo.  You proudly tell him about how you had to switch up your technique and settings when shooting the tanks where the marine animals or plants thrived primarily in the dark or relied on bioluminescent light.  You laugh, mainly at yourself, when you tell him about how long you stayed at certain attractions, waiting for a particular school of fish to swim perfectly into frame.

Tim thinks your laughter is the loveliest sound he’s ever heard.

You tell him your favourite sea creatures to photograph are the jelly fish because they’re so weird and they move with such alien grace, unpredictable yet seemingly purposeful, and that’s why there are more pictures of them than any other animal in your camera roll.

Tim finds himself enchanted watching you get more and more animated and excited as you go through the pictures you took today; while your eyes are peeled to your screen, he admires how they twinkle and the way your mouth slopes upwards, grinning wide even as you talk non-stop about your long-forgotten hobby.  Your pretty face is aglow.  He thinks he could listen to you talk about the things that bring you joy forever.

He lets you talk for an hour.  You don’t even realize until you get to the last photo (a school of clown fish weaving between the tentacles of their anemone home) and glance up at the time at the top of the screen, “…oh my gosh!  I’m so sorry!! I’ve prattled on for so long, I’m sure none of this was helpful at all!”

Tim won’t have any of that, “Don’t be sorry.  You had fun.  I’m glad you had some fun today… before I ruined it by sequestering you here in this waiting area for the entire afternoon.”

You shyly look at his apologetic face, “I’m having fun now.”

Tim can feel his ears warm and is sure they’re pink at the tips.  Darn, you’re sweet.  He distracts himself by flipping to a brand-new page in his notebook, “Me too.”  You feel your heart expand at his soft confession.

“Now, I have some good news and some bad news.”

You look at him expectantly with an innocent, doe-eyed expression that Tim thinks might be one of the most dangerous things he’s ever encountered in all his years on the force, “The good news is that I think you’re a very, very good photographer.  It’s clear you enjoy it and there isn’t a single photo you showed me today that isn’t obviously a labour of love.  I think you should get back into it if you can.  The way you were talking about your photos today, I don’t think I’ve seen that much joy on someone’s face in… I don’t know how long.  I’m grateful you shared that with me.”

You’re speechless.  His words are so, so kind… and exactly what you needed to hear today.  You’re filled with tremendous gratitude and fondness for Detective Tim Rockford.

“… the bad news is, I spotted the reflection of our man in the shadows on the glass in some of your photos, and I’m so very sorry but I’m going to have to confiscate your phone,” Tim could not be more truly sorry.

After the initial shock of being told you’re losing your phone for a few days, you quickly recover and tell Tim that you’re genuinely glad you could help.  You give him your email and use your phone to send off a message to a few of your group chats regarding how you can be reached for the next few days before dropping your phone into the evidence bag Tim produces.  Under different circumstances, you might be upset at this turn of events, but the expression on Detective Tim Rockford's face is more than enough to make the minor inconvenience worth it – he looks invigorated, energized.  Clearly, this is what he loves doing.

Walking you to the aquarium exit, Tim apologizes and thanks you again before seeing you out.  Right before the door closes behind you, you turn and see him already rushing off to brief his team, your plastic covered phone clutched in his hand and an excited grin on his face.  After the kindness and patience the detective has shown you today, you’re glad to have played a small role in putting that smile on his face.

True to his word, you receive an email from Timothy.Rockford@lapd.online.org just a few days later, letting you know your phone is ready for pick-up.  When Detective Rockford meets you in the precinct lobby, you have to suck in your breath – he’s even more handsome than you remember, and you’ve been spending nearly every waking minute over the past few days picturing his strong jawline, soulful eyes, and that charming facial scruff you’d give anything to run your fingers through.  He’s jacketless again, just another pressed white dress shirt that his broad frame threatens to rip through, bordered by those leather holsters that make you want to swallow your tongue.

As Tim takes you to Evidence so you can sign out your phone, he tries to chat amiably and not cast too many obvious and admiring glances your way; you’re all warmth and serenity in this place that he only ever associates with being loud, bustling and cold.  He simultaneously never wants you to leave and wishes to sweep you far away and keep you only for himself, distanced safely from this place where his every day is synonymous with darkness and mystery.

When you’re once again outside, Tim leans against the frame of the precinct’s front doors and you look up at him from one step down, hopeful, “Did I help?”

Yes.  You help more than you know, Tim thinks, having been unable to get your incandescent smile out of his mind since he last parted from you; finding that it’s become the image that grounds him during his long grueling hours.  Instead, he says, “I’ve got good news and bad news.”

“Oh no – not this again,” you grin.

Tim smiles back, emboldened by your cheery demeanor, “The good news is that a lot of your photos and what the tech guys called… um.. meta data?  A lot of it helped generate some good leads that we’re now following.”

“Oh!  That’s wonderful!  I’m so glad, Detective Rockford!”

“Tim.  Please call me, Tim.”

“I don’t know, I kind of like calling you Detective,” you tease, good naturedly.

Tim should not feel his pants tighten at this, “The bad news is, because your photos had so much useful information, there is a very good chance they will be used as evidence if this case ever goes to trial.  I don’t think you will need to testify, as you yourself didn’t see anything, and that meta data gives us the info on when and where the photos were taken.  But even so… it means I can’t ask you out until the case is over.”

“Oh no,” you’re disappointed, but somewhat mollified that Tim has just basically asked you out without asking you out.  “That is bad news indeed.”

Tim looks around to make sure no one is looking before he reaches out with his hand and gently strokes your cheek with the back of two of his thick fingers just once, whispering, “I’ve never wanted to put a case to bed more.”

You can’t let the joke pass you by, “The case?  The case is what you want to put to bed?”

The booming laugh that shakes Detective Tim Rockford’s entire torso reaches all the way to his eyes, crinkling them in the most adorable way.  It’s staggering the difference it makes – he looks 10 years younger, you think. 

He’s needed this.  A really good laugh.  He’s needed it more than he realized.  He’s needed you.  He looks at your impish grin, so proud of yourself for pulling this sound from him, a sound so rare that it’s become almost foreign to his own ears; Tim hopes he’s able to convey his gratitude for you with the way his eyes have brightened, flecked with gold and mirth. 

He thinks you just might understand him perfectly. 

When you lift up on your toes to brush your lips softly against his scruffy cheek for a goodbye kiss, he whispers low in your ear, “I’ll call you, Shutterbug.” 

A promise.

7 months later

The Grandma Ursula case has taken the nation by storm.  The TV in your workplace breakroom is permanently dialed to the court case broadcast so no one misses a minute of the scandalous proceedings, a single interview with those involved in the case, or any legal and criminal analysts’ commentary.  For someone who is billed as the Lead Investigator, Tim makes shockingly few appearances onscreen, but you feel a little thrill go through you whenever you catch a glimpse of his striking figure in the background of a news broadcast about the case, or when you see him standing stoically behind the head prosecutor while the latter debriefs the press from the steps of the court house.

You gaze dreamily at his face while the press shouts out what everyone (your friends, colleagues, the public) all want to know:

How many aliases does Grandma Ursula really have?

Can we even call it the Bolton Mansion anymore?

Why that particular number of pies?

You’ll be honest, you’re just as interested in the case as everyone else, but you have one pressing question that you know no one else is asking: Will he call when it’s over?

You’re in a departmental meeting when the verdict is read.  It takes you forever to get back to your desk, caught up in everyone’s excited chatter about the ruling, but when you finally sit down and pull out your phone from your drawer, it’s to the best outcome you could have hoped for from the Grandma Ursula case.  Positively beaming, you reread the text message sent from an unknown number only two minutes after the verdict was announced: Hey Shutterbug, take any good photos lately?

End note: The iPhoneography aspect of this fic is a bit self indulgent; some might know that this Tumblr used to be a photo blog before it became my writing blog. Just like reader, it's something I used to enjoy a lot but I haven't opened those camera apps in years - maybe I'll get back into it one day! In the meantime, yes - the aquarium photos in the moodboard are by yours truly 🤭

[thecartoonrambler]

Why Wander is such an important character

Very long post below!

Ill be rambling about Wander over Yonder, specifically, WANDER!!

The show in itself is already amazing, the episodes are short and fun, each character is oozing with personality and fun interactions and there are always ways in which it is all connected. Further on the animation of the show and overall look is absolutely adorable!

For me personally, Wander is simply such an important character and not for few reasons.

I love that Wander's silly happy go lucky personality is so addictive. He's a happy person, who gets happy by helping others in need, even to points where he gets himself in trouble (every episode LOL) But regardless i think they are such an important character traits to have (Happiness, altruism, Optimism).

In today's depressing and violent world, where everyone just fights with each other, a character like Wander can be a sense of hope or inspiration!

Of course, many main characters have these traits as well, but i think a key difference between Wander and many other optimist protagonists lies in their EXPERIENCE IN LIFE!

These other protags are innocent, naive optimists, because they haven't experienced "the real world" yet. And while it makes sense to have characters like these (as an allegory to growing up), they get really tiring and repetitive really quickly. They also commonly showcase optimism and naivety to go hand in hand. And its why a lot if people commonly believe that "realsim" is inherently "pessimistic" (it isn't btw. Theres good and bad in life, denying theres good, is denying reality)

Its extremely refreshing to have a main character like Wander, actually be hinted at being millennias old, repeatedly converting villains to good throughout the eons, out of a sense of duty (and perhaps also Pacifist revenge for his childhood, where its hinted that his entire planet was destroyed and he was the only survivor.)

not only is this also something that one learns, the more one watches (keeping the viewer intrigued) but the fact that so much about Wander's life and past is a mystery is what makes him a fascinating character. At first glance hes just some helpful guy, and the more you learn about him, the more you more you think "who is this guy?" Not in a negative way, but in a complete curiosity. Is it possible he's as old as the universe himself? If so does he know it? Who is he? What actually happened in his past? How did he live before his hat? Was there a time he wasn't as helpful? What caused him to change? Who is he? But at the same time, the viewer doesn't NEED to know. Theres no stress to, no hurry to uncover a mystery. Its like "mystery but it's actually completely low-key". I like that. (Im the kind to get into conspiracy theories or get crazy over plot holes, so the show managing this is insane)

Traits like these, especially in contrast to their personality being so so happy, child-like, goofy, charitable, it makes for an extremely interesting and fascinating character, that one doesn't commonly see in media! Which is really awesome! Someone that's seen so much horrors, lived through civil wars, yet tries to help a skeleton get together with a butch lesbian??

Its awesome!

Other that just that alone, he's helped me out personally! He in many ways reminds me of myself as a kid, i too was altruistic, always trying to help, struggled to say no, was positive and happy go-lucky and adventurous (well, as all kids i suppose), recently rediscovering the show made me realise how much i missed those personality traits in myself. That i had hidden them away, due to people making fun of me of being "too naive" and "too childish". Eventually Making me not talk to people really, and develop really bad self esteem. Rediscovering this show, and specifically how these "childish" traits can be seen in a very positive charming light, helped me realise that being scared of "coming off wierd", "coming off as toxic positivity" will always be worse than not being positive.... At all.

Ive heard from other people too that this show has helped them through tough times, and allowed them to reconnect with more positive thought patterns. Which is why i think characters like Wander are insanely important for media!!

Too much is too depressing all the time! We can create media (ESPECIALLY ADULT MEDIA) that isnt depressed. Positivity and happiness are not a crime! And im so glad a character like Wander exists to exhibit that!

[drawbauchery]

This is going to sound nuts, but I'm here because I'm a... Technically rediscovered fan! See, I was aware of your art back when Steven Universe was big. But I guess lost track after that, somehow. I found this blog again because I found myself accidentally embroiled in anti culture. I'm no longer one of those.

It was in this Discord server, a Danganronpa Discord server that claimed to be non toxic. Anyways I called them out for telling artists to kill themselves because they knew I was struggling mentally and I was offended they'd even think it was remotely okay.

As a result they decided to post about how my ex friends, who traumatized me, were right to cause the damage they did.

I don't know if that server still exists if I'm being honest but the point is at some point they were targeting you. I told them to knock it off and block you, but they never did.

So I wanted to apologize to you for this.

I'm sorry. Please continue to create and share your amazing art. Thank you for reading

eeehh i can only imagine what those weirdos were upset at me about sdkfn

but i'm glad you got away from those abusive people. don't you love how they'll do anything to "protect" cartoon characters, but then turn around and tell real people that they deserve abuse??? like????

thanks for reaching out, though. i hope you've been well QWQ

[lemotmo]

This is kind of a question for Ali (hi Ali!) but also a question I’d love to hear your thoughts on.

A lot of people (myself included) have noticed similarities between last seasons promo and bts being really focused on Oliver/Buck and this seasons being really focused on Ryan/Eddie.

We now know the focus on Oliver/Buck was because of the bi Buck arc. Do you think the focus this year is because we’re (hopefully) getting a queer Eddie arc? Another major Eddie arc that isn’t about his sexuality? Not about Eddie at all and everyone just really loves the mustache?

Hi Nonnies! if it's okay for you guys I'm going to answer your asks in one go.

First of all, if anyone is interested in what that link leads to. It's someone on Twitter who points out that all this Ryan promo is the exact same thing they did with Oliver last season.

All right, let's get down to business and answer this:

I actually went back to check all the pre season 7 interviews and bts. And yes, there was so much focus on Oliver, both in the bts and the interviews. There were so many questions about where Buck's story was going and talk about his professional life and love life. Oliver even used the words 'self-discovery' when he talked about Buck. Something Ryan has been heavily hinting at himself in some interviews he did during 7b and post season 7.

All of the PR follows the exact same pattern. I expect more interviews and articles to come out with the same questions about Eddie's professional life, love life and of course his role as a father to Christopher.

So yeah, looking at all of these comparisons, it's clear we're going to get to know Eddie a whole lot better in season 8. They're gearing up towards something big for his character. Now, whether or not this 'something' has to do with his sexuality and eventually Buck's role in Eddie rediscovering himself?

Well, it sure does seem so, doesn't it. It all adds up. What else could possibly be something so big for Eddie's character that he gets so much focus? He's already rock bottom because Chris is gone. He dealt with some unresolved Shannon feelings (weird Kim took care of that with her dead wife cosplay) and I highly doubt the show will keep repeating the same Shannon story line. So, what else is there to explore?

The way I see it is that the moustache is a visual way to set Eddie apart. It makes him 'different' this season. It's an important new part of him, but it isn't the main storyline. The moustache indicates change for Eddie. Just the moustache isn't enough to build an arc for a character. But it is a way to tell the audience something is going on with Eddie, because he changed his look. So what is behind that change? That is what is really going on. And yeah, I do strongly think it might have something to do with his sexuality.

Disclaimer though! I'm always cautious when I talk about these things, because the truth is that we won't know for sure until we get some kind of confirmation from the show. Until we get that, we need to keep in mind that this might not go the way we all expect it to go.

This doesn't mean that we can't be happy, positive and hopeful about all of this. Ryan is obviously important in season 8. We get tons of content and the cast is having the time of their lives. And we get to speculate and theorise over every single scrap of content that we get. What more could we possibly want as fans? We're living the dream right now. 😁

So, I say we wait this one out for a while and see what other promo we're going to get. I'm also heavily side-eyeing the fact that they keep pushing back the Family Feud episode. Who knows? Maybe they did really spoil queer Eddie in that show after all? 😋

As for Ali's point of view. Well, I just received an ask from one of the nonnies. Thank you by the way! It's somewhat about this topic, so I'll just copy/paste it in this post. She doesn't address a possible queer arc for Eddie here, but she does address the Ryan promo.

I'll tag Ali's tags as well under this post and if an Ali ask about Eddie's possible queer arc gets dropped into my ask box I'll make sure to share it with you Nonny! I promise.

I hope you both have a great day!

IMPORTANT! Please don't repost this ask and/or a link that leads straight to my Tumblr account on Twitter or any other social media. Thank you!

Heads up! For anyone who is giving me the shifty eyes for reposting Ali's updates instead of reblogging. Read this.

Remember, no hate in comments, reblogs or inboxes. Let's keep it civil and respectful. Thank you.

If you are interested in more of Ali’s posts, you can find all of her posts so far under the tag: anonymous blog I love.

[captainsophiestark]

No Way To Know For Sure Part 2

Daniel Sousa x Reader

Masterlist - Part 1 - Join My Taglist!

Written for my personal fic writing challenge for 2024, Sophie's Year of Fic! Featuring a new fic being posted every Friday, all year long :)

Also written for @ghostofskywalker as a part 2 to the fic you let me adopt a while ago! I've had this in my drafts since all that AI stuff and I'm happy to have rediscovered and finished it 😄 Hope you like it!

Fandom: Marvel

Summary: Now that you've decided to move to LA with Daniel, there's a few loose ends left to tie up in New York.

Word Count: 2,174

Category: Fluff, Humor

Putting work into an AI program without permission is illegal. You do not have my permission. Do not do it.

I sighed dramatically as I sared straight ahead out the window, watching all the people bustling around the streets and the familiar, giant buildings hovering over them. I'd been gone for some time now, but New York hadn't changed.

Jarvis, currently in the driver's seat of the car, was positively buzzing, and I could tell he was struggling not to say anything. Even the great city of New York couldn't keep me distracted from all the ridiculous energy he was projecting.

"Alright, Mr. Jarvis, spit it out," I said, at last turning from the window to look at my friend. He glanced at me, lips pursed tight to try and hold back a smile before he had to turn his gaze back to the road.

"I'm sorry, it's just... I must admit, I'm rather excited. Since Mr. Stark has been spending more time in Los Angeles, I've missed seeing all of you here in New York. Having you regularly in Los Angeles as well as Rose and Chief Sousa... well, it will be a delight."

A smile made its way onto my face despite my best effots. I'd wanted Daniel to drive me in to the office this morning to put in my transfer request for the LA office, but he had a meeting with an informant he couldn't move. I hadn't really wanted to resort to Jarvis, only because I knew he wouldn't be able to stay calm about my decision, but now I had to admit I was happy to be here with him.

"It'll be wonderful to get to see more of you too, Mr. Jarvis," I said with a smile. "You, me, Ana, and Daniel should set up a regular double date."

"Oh, that would be lovely!" Jarvis turned to give me a big smile as we at last pulled up in front of the New York SSR. He hopped out and ran around to open my door for me, beating me to the punch of opening it myself, something we'd turned into a bit of a competition. "Ana will be delighted at the idea too, I'm sure."

"Maybe we can even invite Howard," I said, my voice serious even though I was cackling in my head. I got out of the car and stood, smirking at Jarvis' less than enthusiastic expression as I continued. "He can bring along whoever he's brought home with him on any given week."

"That may be the single most horrifying suggestion I've heard in my entire life."

I cackled, clapping Jarvis on the shoulder as I walked past him and towards the entrance to the "telephone company".

"Thanks for the ride! I promise I won't let Howard crash any of our couples' nights, unless he finally gets a girlfriend who sticks around for more than a few weeks."

"At this point in Mr. Stark's life, a few days would be impressive," he called after me. I laughed, then turned back at the door to give Jarvis a smile.

"I'll see you back in LA!"

"I'm looking forward to it!"

I smiled and waved before finally heading through the door and back into the familiar hallways of the New York SSR. Daniel would be picking me up later, after I got everything sorted out for my move, and then who knew when I'd next be back in this place and this city. We had plenty of friends here and the other half of the SSR, so it's not like I'd never see the city again, but for the first time since I'd started working here I had no idea when I'd next be back. I tried not to let it get to me, but stepping into the currently-empty bullpen of the place I'd spent so much time in the last few years drove the knife in a little harder.

I'd intentionally arrived before most of the other agents got here, hoping to avoid a lot of hubub about my transfer request. No matter how nostalgic I felt being here, my decision had been made. I loved Daniel and the life I'd started building with Daniel in LA enough that nothing could make me want to leave it. Not even my favorite pizza place on the way between here and my former apartment.

"Well well well. Look what the cat dragged in."

Of course, I couldn't get away with avoiding Chief Jack Thompson, especially not when I had to turn my transfer request papers in to him. He came striding out of his office, a massive grin on his face as he crossed the bullpen towards me.

"Long time no see, Agent."

"I saw you two weeks ago, Jack."

"Yeah, but in LA. You've been on-loan for a while. I haven't seen you as my agent, in New York, in a long time."

I just rolled my eyes. "Yeah, well, enjoy the next half hour then, because as soon as these papers are finalized, I'm officially Daniel's agent."

"Now hold on a minute, I have some serious concerns about you leaving that we need to address before I finalize anything. I mean, is it really appropriate for a chief to be dating one of his own agents? Sounds like a disaster waiting to happen if you ask me."

"Jack. You are the one who sent me there, you meddling mother hen, with the exact hope that this would happen. I will literally fight you in the middle of the bullpen if you want to use that against me now."

Jack held up his hands. "Alright, relax. Your transfer's basically already finalized, I just need your signature next to mine. Then you can go run off into the sunset with Sousa and leave the greatest city in the world behind like it's nothing."

"Alright, you went to Ithica for college. At least I'm leaving for another interesting city, even if it's not as good."

"At least we can agree on that last part."

I snorted, but I couldn't totally keep a smile off my face either. Jack and I had actually kind of become friends in the past few months, especially in the wake of Daniel leaving, and I was surprised to find a little ping of sadness in my chest at the thought of leaving him behind with the rest of this city. If you'd told me a few years ago I'd be missing Jack Thompson, I would've laughed in your face.

Jack pulled the transfer papers out of a file on the nearest desk where they'd apparently been waiting for me all morning, setting them down in front of me. In turn, I handed him the papers I'd filled out since I last saw him, then glanced at what was in front of me. True to his word, they only needed my signature to be finalized.

"We're gonna miss you around here," he said, his voice unusually serious. I glanced up to find him holding out a pen to me, a small smile on his face. "Seriously."

"...I'm gonna miss you too, Jack."

We held each other's gaze for a few moments, maybe the first time we'd had a sincere exchange in my entire time working here. Finally, he cleared his throat, looking away as I finally took the pen from his hand.

"Alright, that's enough of that sappy crap. You bring a box to clean out your desk? I don't want to have to waste agency time clearing out whatever garbage you left in there before you went to LA."

"Don't worry, I've got a plan for all my leftover trash and scribbled notes I don't need anymore."

"I don't like the way you said that. What do you-"

"Oh, thank goodness!"

I straightened from signing the documents after finishing the last one to find Peggy coming through the doors into the bullpen, looking slightly more frazzled than usual. She shook her head at me as she approached, dropping her stuff at the base of the desk and putting her hands on her hips.

"I thought I'd missed you. I can't believe you were planning to just duck in and duck out this morning. What were you planning to do if Thompson hadn't called me to tell me when you were coming in? Just leave for Los Angeles without a goodbye?"

"Actually, Daniel and I were planning to invite the two of you to dinner tonight for a real goodbye. I'm just trying to avoid causing a scene in the middle of the bullpen, in the middle of the SSR's workday."

Peggy and Jack both scoffed, the sounds eerily similar. I raised an eyebrow, but Jack leaned in and snatched the papers off my desk before I could comment.

"Alright, I'm gonna go process these since you don't want to hang around here. By the time you're done with your desk, I'll be done with these."

I nodded, watching Jack's back as he headed back into his office. As soon as he disappeared through the doorway, I turned back to Peggy.

"I need you to get him out of his office for, like, five minutes between when I finish cleaning out my desk and when I head out of here. I'm gonna put all the papers and stuff I don't need in his desk."

Peggy grinned. "I'll make sure you have the window of opportunity you need."

"I knew I could count on you."

We snuck a high-five before Jack could notice, then I headed over my desk to start the packing process in earnest. There really wasn't much I needed to get, since I'd brought most of the things I needed with me to LA the first time, but a handful of the things I'd collected found a temporary home in my bag. Even better, the stack of trash I was planning to stick in Jack's office was substantial, and just like Peggy'd promised, she dragged Jack away from his desk long enough to give me just the opening I needed.

I stepped out of his office and back into the bullpen after finishing my mission, and a moment later, Peggy and Jack came around the corner to join me. I smiled at the both of them.

"Desk's been cleared. Papers are done. I think... I'm officially all finished up here."

"You sure I'm not going to find some trash you forgot about when I try to put somebody else at your desk?" Jack asked, hands on his hips. I rolled my eyes and sighed, responding without missing a beat.

"Of course not, Jack. You're not going to find any forgotten trash in my desk. Come on."

All true, technically. Peggy grinned at me, but I managed to keep a straight face as Jack put his hands on his hips and sighed.

"...I guess this is it, then, huh?"

"I guess it is."

I sighed, looking around at the empty bullpen one last time. I hadn't been working out of this office for a while now, and it's not like I'd never be back. But something about having my desk packed, ready to head out the door with the last of my roots pulled up still hit me a bit.

"I'm... gonna miss you guys," I said, shaking my head as I turned back to my two friends. Jack rolled his eyes, since we'd already exhausted his reserve of sincerity for the day, but Peggy gave me a soft smile.

"We'll miss you too. And you can expect regular visits from us in the winter, when we're sick of the snow and need to use our friends for access to the sunshine in Los Angeles."

I grinned. "As long as you promise to bring real pizza with you whenever you visit."

"Deal."

We shared a smile, and thankfully, before any of us could get any sappier, Daniel walked through the door, his meeting with his contact apparently over with.

"Hey," he said, giviing me a smile as he walked over to join us. He leaned in to give me a quick kiss, then pulled back with a smile. "You ready to go? Our favorite breakfast place is waiting for us."

I smiled, then gave Daniel a nod. We were technically on vacation, so we'd planned to spend the rest of our day on a tour of all of our favorite places in New York city.

"We'll see you guys for dinner tonight, right?" Daniel asked as he took my hand, the two of us taking a few steps towards the door.

"As long as you're buying," called Jack, and Peggy nodded. Daniel shot him a thumbs up as I rolled my eyes, and just like that, Daniel and I were standing on the threshold of the New York SSR.

"You ready?" Daniel asked, leaning in to whisper to me. I took a deep breath, sparing one last moment of reminiscing for the place I'd spent so much of my life in over the last few years, then turned to Daniel with a smile.

"Yeah. I'm ready."

He smiled back at me, giving my hand a quick squeeze before we turned our backs on the office, officially and completely moving forward together. It still stung a little to be leaving, but not nearly as badly as it could've, since I knew and loved where I was heading.

****************

Everything Taglist: @rosecentury @kmc1989 @space-helen

Marvel Taglist: @valkyriepirate @infinetlyforgotten @sagesmelts @gaychaosgremlin

[angelxd-3303]

Tw: kind of a vent, mention of depression and anxiety.

I'm sure you've all noticed by now that I haven't been posting a whole lot as of late. To be honest, I've kind of been avoiding this blog, not because of anything my followers did, but mainly because I kind of lost the meaning of my art.

I started using Tumblr exclusively to use the messaging feature to chat with my partner four years ago, but decided to share some of my art, just for fun. I wanted to make people happy, wanted to use my art and writing to not only convey how I felt and what I was experiencing, but to help those going through something similar feel heard and seen. I feel like I have achieved that, in some cases, and it makes me feel good to know that I've made someone's day, or that my writing made them feel understood.

As time progressed though, I began to feel like I had an obligation. Art and writing began to feel more like a chore, and that combined with my resurfacing depression and anxiety made it nearly impossible to even pick up the pencil. It seemed more draining than anything, and the art I did make I didn't share because it reflected my mental state in a deep and personal way.

Tldr, I'm sorry to all the people who have been waiting for updates to my stories, or more Mario content in general, or answers to their asks. It's not that I don't want to finish them, or make more content. It's just that I've realized that my lack of motivation is coming from the fact that I'm making art that I think others want, and not art that I want.

I've been rediscovering Undertale lately, reminded of how amazing the game is and how deep the storyline is, and I want to make more content for that. I'm big into weirdcore and would like to explore it as a style. I want to revisit Dhmis and expand on their story. There's so much I wanna do, but I've been holding myself back and trying to make myself as enthusiastic about Mario as I was before. The truth is, hyperfixations come and go for me, and that's ok. Mario will probably come back here and there, but I'm gonna try to focus on the stuff that I wanna do, because that's when my art is best, and when I feel the best making it. I can't tell you how satisfying it was to draw that piece with Asriel and his parents! I was into Undertale when it first blew up, my friend and I, but left when the fandom began to get toxic. It's so sad to me how disturbed it was, but now I'm much wiser with regards to internet safety, and I know to avoid certain things.

It's very nostalgic for me to rediscover the game, the music I listened to on loop years ago, the amazing artists who had a pure and genuine love for the characters, all of it.

In short, Mario isn't gone, they're just off enjoying their happy ending for awhile before they feel like visiting again. Again, I hope you all understand, and can find content you love from my blog! From now on though, I'm gonna try to avoid forcing myself to make content I don't love. Because from the beginning my art has been an escape that made me happy. If it doesn't make me happy, what's the point lol?

I love and appreciate you all so much,and I hope you can understand this word vomit. Hope you all have a lovely day.

[ilovecoelacanths]

This is a story about a book that changed my life.

It's also about how amazing libraries and authors and people who care about sharing cool things with curious kids are. Also, fish (especially fish). It's kind of different than what I usually post but it's been bouncing around in my head basically since I started this blog so here you go, I hope you like it. This is the reason I love coelacanths so much, and why I think everyone should know about how amazing they are.

When I was little, I loved going to the library. My little brother and I would pick out way too many books and the librarians always had to come over to override the 30 book limit at the checkout stand (they pretty much knew us on sight and were ready to override it as soon as we started heading over to check out). After we finished getting our library books, our mom also let us look through the free pile that was in the foyer on the way out. It was mostly old library books that the librarians just needed to clean out, but there were a lot of books that people brought when they cleaned out their personal collections too (especially teachers, and there were a bunch of books with old school library stamps inside). The free pile didn't usually have a lot of things that interested me, but one day when I was poking through it I found a book called Fossil Fish Found Alive: Discovering the Coelacanth, by Sally M. Walker.

I loved it. I had never even heard of coelacanths before, but this book fascinated me. It told the story of an incredible animal, long thought to be extinct, that had somehow survived for millions of years! It was nothing like any fish I had ever learned about before. I already had a casual interest in marine biology that I can thank PBS Kids and Wild Kratts for (particularly their episode on sperm whales and giant squid, I loved that episode), but this book took it to a new level. I wanted to be a marine biologist so I could learn more about coelacanths.

Like a lot of things when you're 7, that was a phase. Unlike a lot of phases, this one I came back to. After taking a break from my dreams of being a marine biologist to experience the hell that is middle school, one day I pulled a book off my shelf. I hadn't read it in a while. When I picked it up again, I remembered how incredible this animal was, and how much it had inspired me when I was younger, and those thoughts of becoming a marine biologist started to return. I'm in college now studying marine science, and I brought the book with me to school, where it sits next to two other science books that have inspired me (My Friends the Wild Chimpanzees by Jane Goodall and The Sea Around Us by Rachel Carson).

Earlier this year, I was thinking about how much this one book had changed my life and I wondered if I could find Ms. Walker and thank her. I knew she had many other science books for younger audiences, and even another book about coelacanths, so I was sure she had a website of some kind, and I was right. So I found her contact page and wrote her an email explaining the impact her book had had on my life, and thanking her for it. And to my surprise, she responded! She was very kind and we sent a few emails back and forth. She gave me some excellent advice and even told me about some of the people she contacted while researching her book, including Marjorie Courtenay-Latimer herself, the person who rediscovered the coelacanth when it was thought to be extinct! I'll never forget how she took the time to respond to me and how encouraging she was.

But Ms. Walker isn't the only one I have to thank for pointing me toward the path I'm on right now. If I hadn't already loved reading, if I hadn't seen any show or video to make me interested in marine biology, if the library didn't have a pile of books for anyone to take home, if I had lost that book during one of our many moves as a kid, I don't know what I'd be doing right now. There were a lot of things that happened to make it so that I found this book, but I'm glad for every single one of them. They led to me learning about an incredible animal and changed the course of my life. And now, I love coelacanths.

[btr-rewatch]

Big Time Rush Song Rankings (+ commentary nobody asked for): "BTR"

I was bored. Decided to go through their albums and put them into a list from favorite to least favorite.

"Worldwide": Is it possible this song is overrated and hyped too much? No. This song was on heavy rotation for me from the moment I heard it. Wonderful song, 10/10. Full of love and yearning. Their all white outfits in the music video? Iconic. My mom's friend's daughter went to one of their shows and was picked as the Worldwide Girl, and young me didn't handle that well (I wasn't even AT the concert, so not like I had a chance, but still). I'm almost over it.

"Til I Forget About You": When they would show the music video for this during commercial breaks on Nick, I would leap from the couch and do the dance along with them. There used to be a good analysis post breaking down each of the boys' sections in the song and how it correlates with their personalities in the show and how they deal with heartbreak (there's also one for "Famous" that does the same).

"Big Time Rush": I used to sit on the school bus and stare blankly out the window listening to this one on repeat at like 7:45 in the morning. Just...not even awake yet but psyching myself up to live it big time.

"Famous": This one is pretty much tied with "Big Time Rush" in my head, and I'm tempted to bump it to 3, but the song's theme ultimately wins out. Love this song. Can't help but see it in a weirdly haunting light due to the above mentioned "Famous Analysis" post that I read over and over when I was younger and changed the way I saw the song from that point on. Thank you to Swedish girl-group Play for giving us this song. (I assume most people in the fandom have seen or heard the Play version already but if not, check it out)

"Halfway There": Ok, so. I love this song, but EVERY TIME I listen to it, I'm filled with slight annoyance over the fact that it's the "different" version than was originally released. When this single was released, it was KENDALL who sang the opening lines ("When the chips are down, back against the wall" etc) and then James who did his part later. That's the version I listened to for months before they got rid of it and replaced it with the version that appeared on their album. It was a jarring experience for me, and I've never quite fully recovered. The song will forever sound slightly wrong to me because of it.

"Stuck": Prior to starting this blog and doing the rewatch, I hadn't heard a lot of their songs for years, and I had completely forgotten this one existed. Like, it had been wiped from my brain. Rediscovering it was fun.

"City is Ours": Fun fact-my sister is scarred for life from this song and can no longer listen to it because when she was younger, she used it as her alarm tone to get up for school. It's forever associated with waking up in a panic early in the morning and has been ruined for her since the show's original run.

"This is Our Someday": I feel like this song is one of those forgotten ones. I don't remember it being big either in the show or outside of it back in the day (and it has the second lowest listens on Spotify). I do like it, though. Such a hopeful tune, and the line, "One is good, but four is better?" That's a good one. So true, guys.

"Count on You": This is a sweet one. I LOVE the music video for it in the Jordin Sparks episode. It's just. It's smooth. It feels like silk in my brain, though it's not one of my faves. I especially like how Logan's part, "What would I wanna do that for?" comes right at the "four" mark in their counting. Very nice.

"Big Night": Was never really a fan of this one because something about the way the music is structured bothers me but it's super sing-able, so it gets some props for that.

"I Know You Know": This one was going to be number 12, but it gets a bump up due to the acoustic version from '22 giving me slightly more appreciation for it. My original list didn't even include this song because I totally forgot about it until just now when I was going through the album.

"Oh Yeah": Not much to say about this one. I didn't really listen to it when I was younger because it was a "James song" and he was my least favorite of the guys singing-wise. (I am SORRY James stans) Love the spinning Logan head in the music video, though. I remember the fandom really enjoying that part.

"Nothing Even Matters": I simply don't have feelings about this song one way or another. It's just there.

"Any Kind of Guy": I have bizarre issues with this song. Gives me sensations of unpleasant colors and patterns. Zig-zaggy and burnt orange and brown. Bleh. Last place for "Any Kind of Guy." I think the silly music video with all the costumes didn't help.

[cannibalsforbreakfast]

Cruel Summer - Chapter 1

Pairing: Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader

Summary: The "Eddie Munson is a speedway racer" high school AU no one asked for, but you're getting it anyways. Enemies to friends to lovers | No-Upsidedown AU | Fast cars, fast times | Reader moved from "the city" to Hawkins

Tags [will be updated as things progress]: swearing, underage drinking, dangerous driving, Jason sucks as usual, mentions of weed, light angst, misunderstandings, reader is afab, not sure if I'll have smut yet or not

A/N: Chapter 1 is already on Ao3 but here's the Tumblr version! New chapters will always be posted on Ao3 first, with a week or so delay to here.

CH1: 3,780w

-- -- --

“Hot summer streets and the pavements are burning, I sit around / Trying to smile, but the air is so heavy and dry”

If anyone had asked, you wouldn’t have said car racing was something you’d be interested in. Watching hunks of metal speeding around in circles always seemed pretty pointless to you. When combined with the auditory chaos of engines and screaming crowds, and nauseating smell of gasoline and burning rubber, it had never been high on your bucket list.

Then again, neither had moving to Hawkins, Indiana. And yet, here you were: stuck in small-town nowhere for (just, you hoped) the summer. But a summer practically felt like forever to you.

And so you were at the speedway car races with your cousin, Robin. Because apparently, she said, it would “be fun” and “social” and “lots of people went.” 

You supposed you should be lucky Robin was pretty chill about hanging out with you. After all, having your city-slicker cousin practically dumped on your doorstep without so much as a “by your leave” by your parents — who had gone off to “rediscover themselves” and hopefully salvage five years of impending divorce — probably wasn’t high on HER bucket list, either. She and her parents had been more than welcoming, sticking you and your five overstuffed suitcases in the spare room on the second floor, just next door to Robin, without hesitation and urging you to make yourself at home.

If you saw Robin and her parents exchange some pointed and pitying glances, well, you’d just try and ignore them. Because they were right. Your parents clearly didn’t care enough about you to take you with them on their wild second-honeymoon or whatever, so they’d abandoned you without looking back, saying they’d pick you up in a couple months before school started up again. They thought. Maybe homeschooling had been implied as a possibility if they happened to return a bit later than assumed from…Panama? Costa Rica? Whatever warm, probably tropical, place they’d gone to. Without their only daughter. 

Honestly, sometimes you just felt the truth of it in your bones when, at the height of their marital Cold War, they’d each called the other some variant of “frigid bitch.” Only the coldest of the cold would up and abandon their offspring like that, without any evident desire to really take responsibility for them ever again. If you just wandered off at the end of the summer, got a job waiting tables in the nearest big city, didn’t bother to send a forwarding address, you didn’t think they’d be too fussed. Depressing.

The frozen atmosphere at home had gone on so long, you’d practically adopted aloofness yourself as a survival mode. What you didn’t feel, couldn’t hurt. Didn’t help you with making any friends once you’d entered high school, but it kept anyone from really bothering you for three years. The summer before your senior year was supposed to be this golden eternity of afternoons at the pool, perfecting your tan, or giggling at the local mall while licking ice creams and debating who-liked-who-liked-who. 

Not wasting away in Hawkins, a town small enough you bet you could count all of the stoplights on one hand. 

You missed the city so much it ached . Missed the dizzying heights of the buildings towering above you, missed the way the very air seemed to thrum with an energy, a beat that got into your pulse and made you feel alive. Missed the hole-in-the-wall restaurants on every street and the used bookstores piled high with more volumes than you could read in a lifetime. Hawkins was…quaint, but inside you worried if you stayed here long enough it would drain the life out of you until you couldn’t make it anywhere else. 

Not that you’d say any of that to Robin, who was babbling cheerfully away at your side as you strolled up to the local speedway just out of town. She was wearing a loose striped men’s shirt with the cuffs rolled up and jeans, despite the lingering heat of the evening. Robin, you’d come to learn, was pretty much always babbling about something or another, a natural condition that tended to get even worse whenever she was flustered or nervous. Given your tendency to listen, rather than speak, you actually balanced each other out rather well. With her, surprisingly, you felt you could be…yourself…that little bit more. Felt a bit of that icy shell melt away. 

You tuned back in to hear her say, “We’re going to meet up with Steve, he’s gotten there early to stake us out a spot. You wouldn’t think it but it can get really crowded and picking the right spot out of the sun and the dust and on the right side of the track is, like, crucial to the enjoyment factor. Steve’s a boy, by the way. He’s not my boyfriend – well, he’s a boy who’s a friend, but we’re not like that, actually he’s more like an annoying brother. But he’s not annoying, I promise!”

You smiled to yourself as Robin rambled on. Truly, you found it more endearing than not. 

“I’m sure he’s nice,” you said, cutting in so Robin could actually take a full breath. She smiled back at you.

“Yeah, he’s great. But don’t tell him I said that, I swear his hair grows an inch every time someone says something nice about him.”

You smiled and promised that, of course, you wouldn’t breathe a word. 

The two of you step up to the bored-looking teenager taking tickets, and you passed over your paper stub, slightly sweaty from being clutched in your hand. Stepping through the entrance gate, you’re immediately assaulted with the smell of deep-fried foods mixed with beer, the raucous laughter of crowds of families and teens here for an evening out. A fine dust permeated the air, making your eyes water. The track, a packed dirt oval that was both bigger and smaller than you imagined, spread out before you, bordered by some haphazardly stacked rectangle bales of hay you assumed were there for the “safety” of the crowd, though they looked anything but. You imagined any car crashing into those at serious speed would take them out easily…as well as the onlookers setting up their camp chairs frighteningly close to the barrier. 

Across the track, a small elevated building rigged with wires and a mounted loudspeaker was clearly where the announcers were situated. Tinny commentary was blaring from the PA system, but it was almost impossible to hear above the general din. 

There were mullets and wife-beaters on display everywhere. As you looked around, you noted that everyone – and you mean everyone – seemed to be dressed in nothing more formal than jeans and a shirt. You hadn’t batted an eye when Robin left the house like that, because that’s what your cousin always wore. And she’d told you to dress casual but…

“Robin,” you asked, “am I overdressed?”

She’d been herding you along the track toward one end, but at your question she glanced over at you and winced, which you supposed was answer enough. 

“Robinnnnn,” you whined. 

“What?” she protested. “I said ‘casual,’ that’s what you came out in, so I figured it was fine!”

Up until you saw the sea of daisy dukes before you, you’d thought what you were wearing was casual. It certainly was back in the city. The simple, white-and-red polkadot dress you were wearing, cinched at the waist with a plain wide belt you’d dug out the bottom of your suitcase, cute frilly sleeves sitting just below your tanned shoulders, wouldn’t have been anything your classmates back home blinked at. You hadn’t even done your makeup, besides a swipe of lip gloss! But you were rapidly getting the sense you’d have to redefine your expectations here in Hawkins. And with the swirls of rust-colored dust almost constantly permeating the air, you could already tell white was a particularly bad choice.

Oh well, you’d just have to make the best of it. And get the dress in the wash sooner rather than later. 

“It’s alright, Robin,” you reassured your cousin, who’d been worrying at her lip while you thought. “It’s just a dress. Plus, it’s not like I’ll be in any of the cars,” you joked.

“Steve’ll probably have a blanket or something you can use anyways,” she said. “He’s a dad like that. Oh look, there he is. Steve! Steeeeve! Ugh, he isn’t listening. OI, DINGUS!”

Robin waved frantically at a boy a bit ahead of you, who’d staked out a pretty prime spot on the hillside around the middle of the straightaway, complete with camping chairs, picnic blanket and cooler of what you desperately hoped was something cold. Now this is what you’d imagined when Robin said “races.” And it was comfortingly far away from the hay barrier.

The boy – Steve – raked his hands through his already artfully disheveled mop of hair and rolled his eyes at Robin. 

“Could you shout any louder?” he grumbled. “Jesus, I think the whole crowd heard you.”

“Oh don’t be such a wuss. Hey, this is my cousin. She’s cool. Cousin, meet Steve. He’s a dweeb.”

“A dweeb with charm, also known as the best kind,” Steve said with a smile, reaching out to shake your hand. “I heard you’re in town for the summer. Welcome to Hawkins – guessing it’s a pretty big change from where you’re from.”

“Um, yeah, wasn’t sure what to expect, but it’s better than I thought. Lots of nice people,” you offered him a small smile in return, a bit taken aback by the easy way he folded you into the dynamic. 

“I’ll bet,” he agreed. “First time at a speedway?”

“First time at any kind of races,” you admitted. “I have no idea what’s going on.”

“Not much too it really,” Robin said around a mouthful of beer. Clearly, she’d helped herself to Steve’s stash, but by the way he just shook his head, you got the sense this was basically normal. He silently offered you a bottle, but you shook your head – maybe in a bit. Steve did seem nice, but you weren’t quite ready to be under the influence under someone new just yet. Robin kept talking: “Cars go zoom zoom, and the one that goes zoom zoom the fastest wins. We mostly just come here to support Eddie.”

You cocked your head. “Who’s Eddie?”

“Friend from school. He’s been working extra shifts all summer, which is why you haven’t met him yet. He works down at the local body shop, races on the side. We’ll point his car out when he’s up.”

You nodded, sure he’d be nice too, if Robin’s taste in friends so far was anything to go by. 

The three of you sat, chatting amiably for a few minutes, and you felt yourself relaxing into Robin and Steve’s easy, familiar banter. They traded well-worn jabs back and forth, but there’s no heat behind them. You settled yourself on the blanket between them, tucking your skirt beneath your legs and mostly enjoying the vibe, only chiming in when you had something to say, like when Steve started to say “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” was supposedly underrated (he was wrong, and both you and Robin soundly told him so). 

As the sun finally started to go down – days were still long and hot, and all three of you were peevishly slapping at overly familiar mosquitos – the track lights finally flickered into life and it seemed like things were about to start. Robin let out a squeal, wiggling her knees in excitement. 

You were all ready for – you didn’t know, monster trucks or something? – when, to your surprise, the first line of cars that raced onto the track looked more like glorified go karts than anything else. Seeing your confusion, Steve leaned over and murmured, “They do the kiddie stuff first,” and you then saw that the drivers did seem awfully young. Fortunately they were wearing helmets.

The announcer counted down the start, and at the waving of the first green flag they tore around the track, kicking up immense clouds of gasoline-scented dust that settled over everything – your hair, your clothes, you could even see it coating the fine hairs on your arm. Gross. 

And these little kids were vicious. Not crashing directly into each other, but drifting aggressively around the turns and cutting each other off within what looked like inches to spare between bumpers. Everyone was cheering on individual numbers, and you, Steve and Robin got into it by picking your favorite car and rooting for them at the top of your lungs. After a few heats you felt your throat dry up, and gratefully accepted one of the cooling bottles of beer Steve offered. 

Beer with friends on a Friday night. Weirdly, this felt more like how you thought summer was supposed to go than you figured you’d get in Hawkins. Or anywhere. 

As the night wore on, the races of the small and mid-sized cars started to blur into each other, and you started idly wondering when you’d be able to go home. Well. To Robin’s home. 

“And nowwwww, the event you’ve all been waiting forrrrr!” shrilled the announcer.

From the back paddock where all the cars were parked, there came a grunty rumble. A vibration that made its way into your bones, your veins, the thump-thump of your heart. This was the rhythm you’d been missing, filling you up from the inside out. 

And then, the first line of proper-sized cars ripped their way onto the track, to a massive cheer from the crowd. But you weren’t even sure you could call them “cars.” Dinged, dented, and beaten back into shape, these were machines reduced to the essence of speed. Any extra baggage had clearly been ripped out – seats, radio, even the entire bottom half of the trunk was gone. What was left was the engines, the driver’s seat, and anything essential to make them go. 

They ran a few menacing laps around the track, jostling for position on the grid. 

“Look, there’s Eddie!” Robin pointed.

“Which one is he?” you asked.

“The black one, with the red bat on the hood.”

“Eddie’s always had a flair for the dramatic,” Steve clarified. 

Your eyes traced the black car as Eddie maneuvered it into the inside of the track, on the front row – “That’s a good position,” Steve clarified again. Unlike most of the other cars, which had paint jobs in varying states of peeling off, Eddie clearly kept his car freshly painted despite the risk of damage – it gleamed, pitch blank, with just the blood red of the bat leaping out of the design. From what you could see of Eddie, as he was mostly shielded by a helmet, he was also in all black. 

“I’m sensing a theme,” you muttered dryly. 

Like horses jostling for position, the cars – there must have been a dozen or so – revved their engines just behind the starting line. There was an agonizing moment of tension, where everyone stared at the red stoplight holding them in place. 

Then it winked green, the flag was waved, and the race began. 

You watched as Eddie’s car and the one on his right, painted a chipped red-white-and-blue roared to the front like bats of out hell. They gunned it down the straightaway before whipping into a drift around the curve that was so aggressive, their cars yawing onto two wheels so hard, your hands flew to your mouth to swallow a gasp despite yourself, sure they’d tip over or spin out. Magically Eddie’s car righted itself as he came out of the turn and he gunned it down the next straight, neck and neck with the other vehicle. 

The laps went by in what felt to you like seconds, a frenetic dance conducted at speed. With the razor-thin margins the two cars took the turns, you knew that if Eddie lost concentration for a nanosecond, he’d be out of the race. You blinked dust out of your eyes furiously, loath to miss a single second. Next to you, Robin and Steve were yelling – you were pretty sure Robin was just repeating profanities at this point – but you could hardly make yourself breathe normally, let alone cheer. 

There were only a few laps to go and the other car had stolen the lead from Eddie. Though Eddie was keeping the black monstrosity right on his tail, pushing himself right into the rear bumper to try and throw the other driver off. 

They made another sharp drift around a corner and, as they came off the curve, Eddie made his move, pushing the throttle to take his car around the outside of the red-and-white leader. He took the turn, hard, trying to get his nose in front of the other car’s, and this time you did let out a whimper of concern. Your heart thumped in time with the roar of the crowd, and when Eddie made it, slipping in front of his rival to cross the finish line first, you couldn’t help but sigh in relief. 

Steve and Robin were now jumping up and down and hugging each other, and you smiled at their infectious joy. 

The other cars coasted to a stop in the middle of the track while Eddie took his victory lap, waving the checkered flag from out the driver’s window. He must have spotted the two maniacs next to you, because the car rolled to a stop on the track in front of you, and Eddie stepped out from the car. 

You knew he drove like a devil, but you weren’t expecting him to look like a fallen angel. 

A strange shiver ran through you as you watched him pull off his black helmet. Long, dark curls spilled out, framing his sharp, sculpted face. Even with his bangs sweat-soaked and disheveled, he was capital H-O-T. Dark hair, dark eyes, with a plush mouth you knew was made for sin. He was everything your parents would have warned you away from, and everything you – or your body, at least – immediately wanted. 

“Be normal,” you thought to yourself. “This is Robin’s friend .”

Robin and Steve trotted down to the side of the track, and you trailed behind them, a little unsure. It was the last race of the evening, and with the entertainment over, the crowds were starting to melt away. It didn’t escape your notice that while all the other drivers were getting handshakes and back-slaps galore from their fellow racers and even some officials, no one had come over to congratulate the actual winner, Eddie, except for the three of you.

“Edieeeeee, you won!” Robin shrieked at her usual top-volume. “But also, ugh, you smell like fumes, ew no, don’t hug me.” She wiggled away from his playful attempt at a hug, wrinkling your nose. 

“Comes with the territory, Robin, you’re just gonna have to get used to it. You certainly don’t mind when I’m fixing your car for free, again . Hey, Steve, nice of the King to make an appearance.” The two boys traded fist bumps, Steve rolling his eyes at his high school nickname. You broke into a wide smile at their antics. 

Eddie’s eyes met yours, where you lingered behind, and he arched one eyebrow, his previously warm and open expression becoming more guarded, scanning you from the top of your windswept hair to the bottom of your now quite dusty flats. Your smile faded, and you resisted the urge to brush yourself off in the face of his gaze.

“Who’s this?” he asked. “Wasn’t aware we had a third cheerleader on the squad. Does little miss Dots like what she has to see so far?”

You find yourself bristling at his presumptuous tone. “I don’t quite take your meaning,” you respond stiffly. 

Eddie laughed, an open, easy sound you could have loved – except for the sharp edge to his voice. He straddled the hay bale, spreading his hands open. You tried not to look at how his black racing uniform stretched tight over his thighs. Really, you tried. 

“Come on, guys, this is a joke, right? Ha, ha, Eddie’s first race of the season, let’s get a cute little cupcake of a girl to come along, flirt a little, string lil ’ol Eddie along? Give the girl a ride to remember?”

He fixed his molten brown eyes on you. “Did someone put you up to it, Dots? Patrick? Jason? It’s the sort of shit thing Jason would do.”

By this point, both Steve and Robin were exchanging a confused glance that clearly conveyed their shared sense of, “uh, what?” But you knew exactly what. 

Eddie had taken one look at you – at your too-much dress, too-much smile, maybe something else you didn’t even know in your demeanor – and concluded that the only possible explanation for your presence was that you were a…paid escort? Hooker? Someone bribed to come watch his race and flutter your eyelashes at him, spread her legs?

You felt the usual protection of your ice queen reputation from back home freezing off any earlier warmth from your expression. 

“Someone clearly has a high opinion of himself. I’m not going to cream just because you’ve got half skills with half a car. Get over yourself. Robin,” you turn to your cousin, “I’m going back to the house.”

“It’s miles to the house,” Robin protested, nervous gaze flicking between you – fuming – and Eddie – nonchalantly picking at his cuticles, not sparing you another glance. 

“I’ll walk.” It was only a mile or so to Robin’s, and you didn’t want to spend a single second more in his company, friends with your cousin or not. Eddie’d done a spectacular job of reminding you why you usually didn’t do things that were “fun” or “social” or that “lots of people” went to. You didn’t need another asshole man in your life, your father was doing a bang-up job of that by himself. 

“I’d give you a ride, Dots, but as you can see,” Eddie gestured to the literally empty passenger seat in the stock car next to him, “I can’t.”

“Fuck you,” you hissed, whirling around and stomping off before reaching a hand up to swipe angrily at the tears pooling in the corners of your eyes. 

You heard Robin run after you. “She’s my cousin you MORON,” she called back to Eddie. When she caught up to you, you gave her a watery smile in thanks, and she reached over to squeeze your shoulders. 

New item for your summer bucket list: Never, ever see Eddie again.

-- -- --

Chapter 2

Lae's Masterlist

[lower-mkdr]

Just a personal rambling about Adela's skin

Just as a heads up, I'm not spoiler free when it comes to Adela so I hope you can bear with me today since her new skin has me totally in love even if the showcase isn't out yet, the Adela brainrot is real and it's always there, but I've been taking my time to let it out. Going to the point, GOD, I LOVE HER SO MUCH.

I like the way it's something elegant yet quite simple, since it fits her style really well. I often think about how Adela is so complex yet she keeps trying to be pretty simple for the sake of her own view of "a perfect and relaxing life", but it's the details what makes the difference, she's still pretty elegant and has a lot of style.

Regarding what we know by the tranlations, the name is "tower candlelight". The first thing I thought about was the "Tower" mentioned in Phantom of the Mist, the clock tower where everything changes, where Letta warns us to no get close to, but it ends being what connects every piece of information together with Adela guiding us to learn the story about Mad Shears.

I'm not really surprised by the idea of a concept similar to Rapunzel, but I absolutely adore it. It's the way she's trapped by her own hair, in a tower the same description calls "My heart shall become a tall tower, and I shall sit at its precipice. There, there is nothing but silence and sorrow." (Just in case, I'm using the tranlation provided by Jiu Jiu subs).

It explains itself pretty well, right? She's been trapped for a long time by her own worries, her way to escape? "let's cut the worries away", but she's still there, her heart still is there. Same as the story in her interrogation, no matter how much Adela wants to avoid it, she knows there's something she's missing. It's just a "Let's think I'm out" but she's not, she's just there, imagining she's out.

I like how there's many candles around here, even birdcages and their surrounded by flowers (I'll do another post later if I find them or have an idea about it, flower language it's really interesting). I would love to say that she's another flower between those cages, there's even vines around.

The hairstyle is something so personal that the second I saw it I felt like crying while saying to my friends "I love how she has long hair, but I don't know how to feel about it in her case". For Adela, long hair represents worries that suffocate the owner of said hair, so being able to see her with pretty long hair, despite being something that I love and adore in a personal way, it really got me thinking "Is she okay????" (baby, do you want a hug and some tea?)

All the context so far left me really intrigued, but it also means that this is a part of herself, an important one. Probably this is how Adela felt for many years since she was young, she always was bound to something, until she decided to cut it away herself in search of her own happiness (Her relationship with her mother, the connection with Chief, the multiple times she tried to find a place she could call "home", but never found one), and in the end, it was all a part of her that she neglected, her own memories, in search for some stability. Here she looks so far quite calm, I guess it would be related/explain later to have some connection with Chief?

It reminds her of her 100% compliance line "People tend to bury themselves with old troubling memories, overburdened and suffocated, so I cut it away from me. But little did I know that I also cut away something that allowed my heart to sing. It's you who helped me rediscover that something".

She's no longer waiting for a home, nor searching for one, she's no longer suffocating herself constantly with feelings she can't comprehend (see the Mother's pendant interaction, It keeps hurting me), she's just here, looking at you with a smile, knowing things can change, but change doesn't really mean something bad. Her hearth is free now, she is free now

[cocozydiaries]

Hi! Please answer im very curious. When you shift, why would you come back? Anybody can have a much better life in a better and more healthy reality than this one, so why not permashift? Sorry if it came out rude, i just really wanna know

dwww you didn’t sound rude at all. Also i just like to put it out there i am not an expert on this and haven't even shifted yet so take this with a grain of salt. Personally i do think a lot of people have already permashifted and plan on doing so. Like a lot more than you might think.

kinda long post

People who have permashifted here:

I’m not sure about you all but i've already seen plenty of people talk about how they’ve shifted to this reality.

A lot of people for some reason seem to find this really weird. Why shift here of all places? But it makes sense to me. My life can always be completely different to someone else’s. So to you it might seem like this reality isn’t all that great but to someone else their situation in this reality could be completely different to their old one. So it makes sense they shift somewhere where their own life is different.

Future plans?:

I think for most people they plan on permashifting at some point in the future. I know i plan on doing that too! Although i honestly think i’ll probably live a lot of different lives in all sorts of different places without any understanding of shifting just so i can rediscover it. Seems fun and all🤭

Manifesting:

Tbh i’m not sure if people agree with this but i’ve always considered manifesting is a type of shifting.

The way i think about it people shift to a reality where they have whatever it is they manifested. And so with that logic i think that would mean they permashifted to a reality where they have what they manifested, right?

Honestly like i said i haven’t shifted YET so i’m not an expert on it or anything and this is my own person opinion so anyone can definitely add onto this if they do or don’t agree! I’m totally open to hearing other opinions and whatnot.

also i’m so sorry i probably could've phrased this better but still i hope this helps!

[alexanderlightweight]

Hi, hope both of you are doing great. This is for Writing Wednesday. Can you write where Alec is the Trueblood heir because he has some sort of Family gift, like sentient hadow wielding? Sentient shadows that are VERY attached to Magnus because they feel safe around him or something? Always felt that it was a damn shame the series never delved more into this other than the Fairchild's

Also because I forgot in my effort to post before I ran out of energy but you’re so sweet so an answer!

We are both doing good! Just tired and a little sore from keeping up with a puppy. Nightshade is very uh… emotional and he punished @saeths because I woke up to give the puppy kisses when Nightshade asked and saeth pushed him away so we have a very grumpy pup that is only angry with saeth. So when saeth woke up to take meds, Nightshade decided to tap dance on their body and then try and eat their toes in revenge for being ignored. Mind you, he’s ten months so he’s still learning manners but boy his little toe beans know exactly where to poke to cause the most pain.

And then Saeth crashed again and Nightshade went into the bathroom to cry in the tub and now he’s outside ‘guarding the house with his favorite stuffie’ and sulking.

(Btw, Nightshades preferred method of waking someone up is getting on the bed and staring at them until the sheer panic of being stared at hits your instincts and you wake up… though that might just be me since it never works on saeth, they just push him away while I give Nightshade kisses and end up getting my face washed)

okay so this might be my last fill for the night because this was quite a bit heavier than i expected to go but like. it went far different than what i'd planned so i hope you like it and uh. warning for shitty lightwood parenting (child abuse)

this is gonna need a second or third and possibly fourth chapter and i love your prompt anon, i really do. but everyone keeps giving me these glorious ideas that turn into wips and i just. you all are on point with the prompts. this is like the 10th one thats turned into a two shot or more

oh also baby alec

-

Alec knows he’s the Lightwood heir. It’s why his parents married, to bring new blood into the Lightwood lineage and while the Trueblood’s had once been just as powerful, their powers had faded through the centuries.

Alec is supposed to be the culmination of two ancient bloodlines. Born of a bridal sacrifice from a marriage between an already diminished bloodline to the fading Lightwood house.

And it works. 

Just not in the way anyone thinks of hopes.

Alec is seven the first time he’s struck for no reason. It’s not training, it’s not sparring, it’s not anything except he disappointed his parents.

He feels cold after, the pain fading but the betrayal lingering and the next day, he feels dazed. Like the world is a new place and he is rediscovering it. 

Alec doesn’t show his face all day. Not to anyone, even Izzy and especially not to his parents.

He ignores when they finally notice he’s missing, screaming and calling him until they upgrade to threats. He doesn’t notice the disturbed looks being sent at his parents, or the concern that is growing as Alec continues not to be found.

Alec stays hidden, alone and sustained by the shadows until he feels strong enough to face them. He doesn’t know what he looks like, when he crawls out of a hidden alcove and takes the shadows to the observation room. 

His mother looks pale, almost frail when he sees her and he doesn’t really get it. She doesn’t look as scary now, as when her palm had connected with his cheek. It’s the same with his father, from the glimpses he’s seen, the man looking smaller, not as tall and menacing as he did when he’d cuffed both of Alec’s ears and yelled at him for an over for forgetting an answer the same day mother struck him. 

Of the two, it’s his mother he’s willing to face first because even if she struck first, her blow was the softer of the two so he steps out of the shadows and speaks for the first time in longer than he knows has passed.

“Mother.”

—

Maryse turns, relief flooding her even as anger fights to overwhelm it. 

It’s been nine days.  Nine days since her heir, her son — the very reason for her marriage has been missing — and Maryse doesn’t understand how or why he disappeared.  She turns, ready to berate him, to scold him, to make him understand that whatever happened is unacceptable and can’t happen again. Because she has to make him know he can’t ever disappear like he did again, and then she’ll take him to her private quarters and hold him close in a way she hasn’t allowed herself since Izzy was born.

But when she turns to look at him, words already formed on the tip of her tongue, she can’t.

Because her son is truly her son, she realizes as she shakes and grips the railing and tries not to wail.

The son in front of her is not the heir she birthed, nor the heir she was married to Robert for.

The son that is in front of her is a Trueblood heir, through and through and Maryse’s soul aches with the loss she knows she’s been dealt.

Because Alec doesn’t trust her.

Maryse understands that in an instant. Can tell by the way that shadows flicker around him and dance at his feet, daring her to come close enough for them to strike.

“Alec—” she whispers and ignoring all the shadowhunters watching her, she carefully slips out of her heels and gets on her knees. “Hi baby.” She says, just as quietly but Alec doesn’t react, like he doesn’t understand the meaning of the endearment. In that moment, Maryse feels more hollow than when she realized she wouldn’t survive the Circle, that her heir and unborn baby wouldn’t survive Valentine.

Because Alec is looking at her like she’s the monster he needs to hunt, to watch for, to be wary of, to kill.

And Maryse can’t remember the last time she was soft enough to him for him to trust her, what words or gestures will bring him back to her and not further away.

He tilts his head, beautiful hazel eyes hidden behind the darkness of shadows and watches her like a predator watches a possible opponent. 

“I’ll be in my room, mother,” he says and he nods like he’s a shadowhunter giving a report. Like he’s telling his commander his whereabouts and not his mother who has been missing and grieving him for over a week.

“Alec,” she calls after him hesitantly, forcing herself not to follow him. “Baby—” she tries again to no avail, “have you eaten? Have you drank anything?” 

Because Maryse hasn’t let herself worry about her son, her first baby, and now she sees his wane face and she wonders if it was less because she was focused on finding him, or if it was because it was easier not to care about him. 

“I take care of myself.” Alec says, his little voice too young and high for how cold it is and he refuses to turn his back to her as he walks past. “You taught me that.”

And Maryse barely manages to wait until he leaves hearing range before she’s covering her face with her hands and screaming in anger and rage and pain. When she’s hoarse and exhausted she gets herself up, slips her shoes back on and turns her face as cold as adamas and goes to find her husband.  When she sees Robert and she knows he’s heard that Alec’s reappeared and she notices that just like her, his first reaction is anger, not relief. 

And maybe, it would make her a better wife, to warn him of what he’ll find when he ignores her suggestions to wait until Alec approaches him. But their relationship has never been about spousal support beyond that of respect and politics. So she follows, at a distance and while she’s prepared for a lot when he finally enters Alec’s room and she stays outside, she’s not prepared for Robert’s angry bellow and then a vicious, loud crack.

She runs in, hand on her blade and fearing the worst but it’s both less and more awful than she thought. 

She realizes, as she makes it through the door that she thought it would be Alec, lying on the floor and it sickens her, to realize some part of her had expected and allowed Robert to go after him in violence. 

It’s not though. It’s Robert, eyes dull with pain and his breathing heavy and he’s lying in a broken heap. 

His spine has been shattered, in a multitude of places, Maryse has seen similar injuries during her time in the Circle, but even then she’s never seen any so brutal. 

Alec, her baby is watching her though, eyes just as cold as earlier but something more dangerous in them and she realizes he thinks she’s about to attack him too. She lets go of her hilt and unstraps it’s sheath, letting it fall to the floor and she drops her stele too. Then she takes off her shoes like she did when he reappeared and she realized everything had gone wrong, so she’s closer to him.

“Are you okay, baby?” She asks, soft as she can and then she wails internally when Alec looks at her with even more suspicion. “It’s okay, Alec. You did good okay, you protected yourself and the—” Maryse swallows, her mouth suddenly dry, “the shadows protected you too. Just like a Trueblood, my blood.” Because she needs to connect with him quickly, before she loses him forever.

“If you hit me again.” Alec says and Maryse wants to cry at the fact that it’s again, that she didn’t even realize it had ever happened. “You won’t have a hand to hit me with anymore.” And he shrugs, “they say so.”

Around him the shadows writhe around in possessive, covetous agreement and Maryse remembers the stories of her family. The ones that were spoken of less and less as their powers diminished. 

“I won’t, Alec. I won’t and if I do, then that’s your right. Their right to protect you. Even if it’s from me.” Especially if it’s from her because those shadows recognize blood and they’re furious with her. Maryse can feel it in the slight echo of resonance that if she doesn’t prove herself. They will kill her and raise Alec themselves, like they’ve done for so many Truebloods orphaned by war. 

“You didn’t react like him. When I came back, I thought you would.”

And Maryse wants her little boy back. The one who promised to protect his baby sister and to be a good hunter and who followed Maryse around like a little shadow.

He was always meant to be a Trueblood, she realizes mournfully and she reaches out a hand, letting it be coated by shadows that could rip it off as easily as she breathes. Hesitantly, more for Alec’s sake than her own fear, she presses her fingers to his tiny face and wonders how she ever could have hit him.

“I’m here, okay Alec. I’m here and I’m sorry.” Because she is and it’s not enough, not with the way he still is wary but that’s okay. He doesn’t have to forgive her, ever. He just has to let her stay, let her try. “Come with me, baby?” She begs, “we can light the fire in my room. Give the shadows plenty of room to dance in, you can tell me how they feel and I’ll tell you stories, okay? Of where they’re from—” her lip wobbles as he nods, a little tiny movement she feels against her palm more than sees. 

“Okay, okay. Just, let's go okay? I’ll have someone else deal with your—” and she pauses when Alec bristles, “with Robert. Okay?” 

He relaxes a bit then and when Maryse steps past her shoes and sword and stele and into the hallway and holds out her hand, he follows, the shadows pulling up her stele to drop into his tiny grip.

“We’ll need it. To call for cleanup.” He says, calculated and callous and sounding so much like her and Maryse realizes how blind she’s been. Because becoming like her is never what she wanted for her children, especially not her firstborn who loved so eagerly and trusted so wholly. 

— and she broke that, her and Robert and it may never be fixed and they’ll have to live with that, she’ll have to live with that — 

Alec keeps a hold of it, even as his tiny, too-thin fingers take her hand and Maryse doesn’t care how much pain Robert is in. He can suffer until Maryse first gets Alec secured and fed and if someone hasn’t found him by then, then she’ll call him aid.

He won’t die from a broken spine.

Valentine’s nephilim victims never did, not until he wanted them to.

They walk slowly, and Maryse gives the first shadowhunter she sees a warning look and they nod and it’s the last of her hunters that they see.

Alec seems to relax the further they get from Robert and Izzy is sleeping in Robert’s room and Maryse doesn’t know how Alec will react to going in there, so she leaves Izzy safe where she is.

The fire is easy to light even without a stele, because Alec won’t give it up yet and Maryse doesn’t want him to risk using it so young and with his Trueblood newly awakened. 

The shadows dance and writhe with contentment and Alec relaxes the longer they play.

“I’m not the Lightwood heir anymore, am I?” Alec asks and he sounds less cold and more confused and Maryse watches with her heart in her mouth as he finally picks up a glass and she could weep when he finally, finally takes a sip of water.

He seems surprised by how thirsty he is and Maryse wishes she needed to tell him to drink slowly but it seems he already knows, drinking half the glass with careful sips and then setting it down. Even though it’s clear he wants to pick it back up and finish it off. 

“No, you’re the Trueblood heir, my heir.” She tells him because she needs that claim to him before it rips away.

“But you’re not a Trueblood anymore.” 

And it’s just a statement, but it hits harder than a blow and Maryse takes a deep, centering breath.

“Well, I will be.” Maryse says and she knows it’s true the moment she says it. “You’re father and I are going to break our union. He still has an heir, Izzy and now I have one as well.” And because Alec still looks confused she reaches out and very carefully, brushes his hair out of his eyes. “We didn’t marry for love,” and with a sinking suspiciounn when Alec doesn’t even blink she adds, “but you know that.” 

And he nods and says, “you married and had me because you were told to.”

He says it so matter-of-fact, like he isn’t breaking Maryse’s heart the way she must have broken her son’s. And then a terribly, heart-wrenching thought slithers into her mind.

 “Alec, do you think?” And Maryse’s heart hurts to even voice it aloud, “do you think you were born for duty? And Izzy for love?”

Alec shrugs and in the comfort of his shadows, he gives in and swings his little feet on the too-tall chair.

It’s adorable and Maryse vaguely remembers scolding him the last time she’d seen it.

“You had me for politics. Izzy could’ve been a spare, but you told me I had to protect her. That she was special and precious and needed to be kept safe above all else, including me. So I figured she must have been made for love.”

Maryse is crying, she realizes, silent tears rolling down her cheeks as she wonders how she and Robert broke apart their family so very completely, in that Alec’s original pure devotion to his sister has turned into a self-sacrificial mantra based on her and Robert’s failures. 

Because Izzy was hope and love. She was an attempt to renew a broken relationship and an excuse to leave the Circle and she was so innocent, when Alec was already becoming jaded from the world around him. She wants to deny it but she can’t and she rattles out a shaking breath, because she’s going to fix this.

Somehow, soon, she’s going to fix this. Even if she has to break apart herself, and Robert and her own world.

“I’m going to take care of this, all of it. I’ll fix it okay. What do you want, baby? What do you want me to do?” And Maryse is being cruel, asking Alec to help her help him but she doesn’t know what her son wants, what his dreams are, or if he has any.

“Can we stay here?” He asks finally, “the angelic core is really nice and the shadows like it. I think it likes me too.” And oh, if Maryse doesn’t shudder to hear that, if she doesn’t swear the clave will never know how precious her child is, “I don’t want to leave. I don’t want him here either.”

“Then I’ll make it happen. If, if Robert goes, Izzy might go with him.” Maryse 

“So I’ll be here by myself?” He asks, and he seems a little disappointed but not surprised and MAryse shakes her head fiercely. 

“No, alec. It will be you and me here, and we’ll visit Izzy.”

“You won’t go with Izzy?” He asks, like he’s surprised staying with him is even an option. “No baby, she’s Robert’s heir now and while I love her.” Alec doesn’t seem surprised by that, but his eyes light up in surprise and awe when she says, “but I love you too, baby. And you’re my heir now, that means you’re my priority, and she’s his.”

Because Maryse is the only parent who can protect and love Alec left, Alec has effectively cut himself off from the Lightwood line and disowned Robert as his parent. 

“I’m your priority?” He asks, like he’s never heard anything so wondrous in his life and Maryse leans over and doesn’t care if her bones are broken or her flesh is torn as she carefully, like she’s embracing something as delicate as a butterfly's wing, wraps her arms around her son.

“Yes, Alec. You’re my priority, my Trueblood baby, even the clave won’t argue with your shadows, Alec. I love you and I’m going to keep you safe now.”

Because she hadn’t before. 

[cyle]

Hi Cyle, so Tumblr has something like 600 million blogs in total. I'm wondering whether the costs of hosting so many blogs is an issue & whether it'll systematically delete them like how Flickr was gonna delete a bunch of photos at some point cuz of server costs or something. Because the main reason I use Tumblr is to dig through archives, so that would be a bummer.

I love rediscovering the past here, Tumblr is absolutely teaming with dormant blogs, aesthetics from late 2000s and early 2010s, it's the most wonderful thing to me, rediscovering those ancient posts like I'm wandering through an abandoned library in the middle of a forest. I vaguely remember some talk about a "time machine" feature, so that gives me hope that the dormant blogs are here to stay.

Expanding on the time machine thing, how would that be implemented? Maybe like a date configuration on the dashboard and the ability to see old blogs and posts and hashtags and whatever else as if they were new and active depending on how far back you set your date. Would be great for getting the dormant stuff back into circulation. Maybe if this is well thought through and implemented practically and functionally, Tumblr will become the first platform to not actually be bound by time, by the present moment. So it can exist in any time in history, all the way back till it's inception in 2007. different users interacting in different time periods at the same time.

Maybe that would be confusing but I can sort of see it working, again if it's implemented well. Because there's just so much history on this platform. And it's famous for having old posts circulate now and then with the reblogs.

And another point... It wouldn't be limited to the number of posts today, cuz there would be "new" posts happening in all the other dates too. So there would be way more "new" posts for users to interact with. I think we might need parallel timelines. Or not! Just add more and more new posts to the old time periods when you've set your Tumblr time machine to that date. Ahhh it's a work in progress in my mind but talking about it makes me genuinely excited and hopeful haha.

I'll explain it more comprehensively if it's a point of interest for the team (this is just a 3am brainstorm). Because it could have some genuine benefits in making Tumblr feel more alive and bigger as a platform - like how it used to be. It is very much alive now because it does still have and always has had a great community. but a time machine might blow that up to astronomical proportions. All diff communities from across Tumblr history at the same time. After all "2014 tumblr" is probably the most used phrase that includes Tumblr in it. But Pre 2010 Tumblr was something else altogether.

Would love to hear your thoughts on this and any info u feel like dumping about the whole server cost query for the 600 million-ish blogs and how you manage them. Kind regards ^^

hey, long ask!

we have been experimenting with a new recommendation source of posts we’re calling “evergreen posts” which tries to surface great posts from tumblr’s whole history. you may see some in the For You tab.

having an actual “time machine” to go to specific times at tumblr is kind of already possible as a hack of the max post ID in the dashboard URL if you have “endless scrolling” disabled on web.

we could make that more of an obvious actual feature but i don’t think enough people would want to use it to justify the cost. neat hack day idea tho! someone did make a search time machine once for hack day.

[that-irishman-fan]

anton ego x musician! reader headcanons

So after rediscovering Ratatouille recently, after being relegated to the back of my mind of childhood memories, I've been crushing HARD on Anton Ego. He's definitely one of my forgotten childhood crushes and is most probably one of the reasons I'm so into older men and dilfs. But after scouring the Internet for fanfics of him, I couldn't find anything. So I've taken it upon myself to fill the void of Anton Ego content!

These are some goofy little headcanons I wrote at like two in the morning; of critic era and post-critic Ego with an s/o who's a musician! So I hope these are satisfactory and can help give all my Ego stans a little something!

Quick note that the reader is gender neutral with no specific pronouns, so you don't need to worry about that!

FANDOM: Ratatouille, 2008

GENRE: Headcanons and romantic relationship!

SYNOPSIS: Anton Ego falling in love with and being together with a musician significant other!

TRIGGER WARNINGS: Minor swearing, some spicy but not outright smutty headcanons, and Ego being an asshole for the first bit!

Critic! Ego

• You'd have to be something pretty damn special to catch his eye in the first place. To impress him is an entirely different ballgame. If you do though, you'll get his full attention. It's not often he runs into somebody with so much talent. So expect yourself to be on his radar.

• However, that doesn't mean you'll get preferential treatment. Anton Ego doesn't do favourites right off the bat, it's kind of his thing as a critic.

• He still will catch your shows out of mild interest when he can. He's a very busy man, so him being there is literally a huge compliment in of itself.

• " Going out again, Monsieur Ego? " Ambrose would say to him as he'd pull his coat on. Checking the hallway mirror to be sure he was impeccable. Then glaring down at the assistant, tone sharp.

• " Indeed. I do believe I have somewhere to be. But never you mind that. "

• I see him enjoying classical, opera, and jazz, but in a really snobby sort of way? Like that type of guy that thinks popular music is lesser. But regardless of what genre you are, he's fascinated.

• And if you write and/or play your own stuff? Its kind of a turn-on to him? His respect for you only gets greater the more he sees you in action.

• He knows firsthand how hard it is to navigate any industry as a critic—but especially in the case of the entertainment world. If you play that field well, that's only another point to you from him.

• At the peak of his admiration, he has a fuck-it moment and publishes a slew of rave reviews about you and your musical talents. Eager to highlight what he—in all his stardom—deems as real potential for once.

• Ego finally meets you when you play a show at a restaurant he's reviewing. The food itself is unimpressive, nothing surprising there. What is intriguing is you. He beckons you to his table afterwards. You know him from word on the street, and him from seeing you perform. You get to talking and you both really hit it off. Well past midnight and a few drinks later, you two are dating in all but name. From that point, your lives are entwined.

Post Critic! Ego

• While his professional opinion is now moot since his review of Gusteau's, Ego never stops shouting from the hilltop about how amazing he thinks you are.

• Being together really gives you both a safe space to express yourselves. Sure enough he comes out of his shell. No more coldness, stoicism, arrogance, or pride. You see who he truly is deep down: sentimental, poetic, thoughtful, romantic, and very sensual. And you feel comfy around him too to just be yourself. Flaws and all, he views you as absolute perfection.

• Also gives you a plethora of material to work with now that you're dating and he's your boyfriend. Although his old fashioned ass prefers 'beau' and 'courting you' instead.

• You want to go full La vie en Rose with a sappy love song? He's like putty in your hands, almost like a lovesick puppy.

• Or if you're feeling more charged and want to take it down the sexy avenue? That man is ready to go with a glass of wine in hand like the French love machine he is.

• Ego's always excited to hear and see your new projects period. He'll drop everything just to sit there and watch. Even if it's a draft or not done, he's heaping you in praises.

• Has his head in your lap as you write lyrics on the couch. You play with his hair, stroke his cheek, or let him doze as you put together songs. Or if you're actually playing a piece, he's glued to your side so as not to miss a moment.

• " What a nice melody, mon amour. "

• " Your rhythm is flawless. You never fail to impress me. "

• " As always it is a masterpiece. "

• Funnily enough, it's nearly impossible for him to give you criticism. You're more than open to it and have said so to him. It was his job for decades after all, so who better else to ask?

• But he can't bring himself to do it. Even positive criticism gives him a visceral dread. He's so sensitive to your feelings, knowing full well how personal music and writing is. And the last thing he wants is to hurt you. It takes him a long time before he can actually give you pointers and tips. And you have to be constantly assuring him you aren't taking offense.

• Goes to every single gig you play, no questions asked. He will rearrange his entire schedule without a second thought. Wouldn't dream of doing anything else at that moment but being blown away by you up there on the stage.

• Definitely will ask you to play or sing for him, albeit with a hint of sheepishness. He's so cute, not wanting to put pressure on you.

• It's actually therapeutic for him and becomes one of his emotional release forms. A coping mechanism born from how close your bond is.

• One evening he comes home in a foul mood. Exhausted, sore, and pissed. The second you start to play for him, all those feelings disappear. Melts into the songs, your voice, your instrument, immersed in utter euphoria. Gets goosebumps, his eyes closed and body swaying softly. When you finish, he only pulls you close and kisses you.

• And no, he's not above getting you to recite your lyrics or hum a melody to him as he's making love to you. If you do it in French? Let's just say he'll be a moaning mess. And he'll come undone very quickly.

• " I need not know what Heaven is like. I've heard it right here and now. I've fallen in love with an angel. "

• Lowkey kind of Phantom of the Opera vibes almost for just how devoted and obsessed he is with your music? Maybe I'll write Anton Ego as Erik Destler one day? It kinda fits, though!

Anyhow, here's my attempt at giving my boy the attention and love he deserves! Thank you all so much for reading and please have a fantastic rest of your week! Let me know if you'd like to see more of this type of stuff on my blog, I really do enjoy hearing from my readers and followers!

[ridiasfangirlings]

AU where maybe instead of dying, Niki goes into years long coma and when he wakes up, the damage to his brain alters his personality? Like he becomes this super genuinely kind man who doesn't remember much. The doctors tell him about himself and Niki goes on an adventure to reconnect with his family. Imagine he tries to go to Scepter 4 because, "Oh, I have a son!" Fushimi thinks he's hallucinating again or something but nope they let him waltz right through the gates and the squad is like "it's your dad!" And imagine it's post-ROK so he was just finally feeling stable and comfortable with his life at S4 and with Misaki and this was the last thing he needed! I highly doubt he would want to even reconnect.

This explains that one short story AU with the flower shop and good citizen Niki, he has brain damage is that AU (that’s right, the only thing between us and happy Fushimi married to Yata running a flower shop is Niki getting dropped on his head). Imagine Kisa’s reaction to this whole thing, she suddenly has a loving husband and she doesn’t want him. Say instead of dying Niki’s gone into a coma and it’s likely he won’t wake up, Kisa has him moved to like a long term care facility that’s super exclusive but also way out away from the city so she doesn’t have to think about him. I could actually see that being stressful for Fushimi in this AU at least at first, always the worry that Niki will wake up and come looking for him (the jungle hallucinations would become even more traumatizing in this AU too, now that I think about it). Eventually he reaches a point where he just considers Niki dead though, he’s been told Niki won’t ever wake up and he sincerely hopes that’s the case.

So then many years later Niki defies medical science and does indeed wake up, but he has no memories and his personality is drastically affected due to the traumatic brain injury. Can you imagine the doctors telling Kisa that he may become violent or childish, he may end up someone who has no empathy, and Kisa’s like he didn’t need a traumatic brain injury for that. What happens though is Niki is now a nice, thoughtful, kind man, he doesn’t like seeing others hurt and he even wants to use his intelligence to help people. He’s all nervous and shy meeting his wife and Kisa can’t believe this is really her husband, imagine him taking a sincere interest in her career and she keeps waiting for the other shoe to drop. Niki gets to go home with like a care helper for a while and Kisa still largely avoids him but Niki’s so busy rediscovering his previous life that he barely notices, instead he just wants to reconnect with his whole family — which, of course, is when he learns about his precious son.

Kisa I assume knows Fushimi’s with S4 and even if she didn’t Niki does research until he finds out. He decides to go visit his son, all excited to meet the boy who looks just like him. By this point I assume someone has told him that pre-brain injury he was a piece of trash so he knows he’s a bit estranged from his son but still, he wants to meet Fushimi and apologize for his past self at least. Nobody at S4 knows that Fushimi’s dad is a touchy subject and since they look so alike when Niki shows up at headquarters it’s immediately clear that he isn’t lying about being Fushimi’s dad. Fushimi meanwhile is finishing up some work when Akiyama comes by to say his dad is asking for him and Fushimi just immediately freezes, going deathly pale. Akiyama notices that reaction and wonders if they should tell Niki to come back later when Niki himself walks in and greets Fushimi.

I just imagine Fushimi immediately pulling a knife and Akiyama has to stop him, like Fushimi-san wait this is your dad. Fushimi is breathing hard and his eyes are dilated, snapping at Akiyama to get out and take Niki with him. Niki says he understands Fushimi’s reaction — well, not entirely, he doesn’t remember anything, but he’s sure they can talk this out. I imagine Fushimi would just be entirely disbelieving of the whole ‘traumatic brain injury’ thing, even calling the hospital doesn’t convince him and he has to actually hack into their files before he feels even vaguely calm. Niki is being patient and caring about it too, like he leaves his contact info with Fushimi and says if Fushimi wants to talk he would love to talk. 

Even knowing about the brain injury I think this would be tough on Fushimi, this ghost of his past that he thought he overcame coming back. He feels like everything was just starting to get good again and he was almost starting to believe that things could stay good, and now in waltzes his worst nightmare — and his nightmare doesn’t remember him, and wants to reconnect. Fushimi is like vaguely aware that ‘this’ Niki isn’t really the guy who abused him but at the same time it is, he will never be able to look at Niki’s face and not see the guy who laughed at his pain. Ultimately I think Fushimi wouldn’t want to reconnect and would tell Niki to leave him alone, there’s just too much trauma there for Fushimi to reconcile even if ‘this’ Niki is a kinder person. I think he would maybe want to take this moment to finally get out what he’s always been holding in, I could see Yata or Munakata urging Fushimi to use this moment to say his feelings honestly to Niki just so they won’t continue to haunt him. Fushimi manages to tell Niki at least some of what the old Niki did and makes it clear he doesn’t need a dad now, he doesn’t need this back in his life, he’s trying to move on and he can’t do that if he’s still tied in any way to that man’s ghost.