#and in one the setting is more realistic

[zara-renata]

in which i'm a lying liar

i said i was taking a break during the holidays and now i have two oneshot WIPs of 9k and 10k words respectively. they each need extensive revisions and several more scenes but they've been so fun to write even though they're each more on the heavy and less humorous side. i am going to try to take my time and work on them slowly now that the bulk is written.

[dailyhatsune]

a short thing, but i just wanted to hear what ado's new song would sound like with maretu's tuning of miku

also the mspaint artwork i put for the audio post because i like it

[fictionadventurer]

Maybe the problem with Christian fiction is that it's non-denominational. People are just "Christian", with no effort put into showing what practicing that religion looks like for them specifically. No indication that there are other Christians who could have different beliefs. No wrestling with differing ideas and the struggle of how one should live out their Christian faith. And that makes it unrealistic and unrelatable.

[kinnbig]

imagine jumping in front of a bullet for someone but it’s for nothing cause the person you tried to save still immediately gets shot and also dies. sorry Great but you’ll never be Big KinnPorsche

[fullscoreshenanigans]

The little bow of reflection and smile Ray makes as he briefly soaks in the last morning Emma and Norman will be able to carry out their routine as usual knowing the horror they'll endure before night's end.

He knows they'd both prefer the harsh truth over a pretty lie, would hate to think about other siblings suffering the same fate as Conny, Hao, Sadie, Susan, and so many more before them if there was even the slightest chance of being able to do something about it. It's part of what he loves about them; where he had the tendency to give up after years of learned helplessness and self-loathing, they would resolutely say "no" and escape the system they had been born into.

(they are better, they are deserving, unlike him)

He loves them so much he can't help but let some of his fondness show on his face as he savors Emma's reaction to seeing him and Norman, because if that isn't so incredibly her, to love so effortlessly and uninhibited, to live so unabashedly authentic.

It's part of what got him through a life he cursed and part of why he has faith if anyone will be able to do this, it'll be them.

[lokh]

if laios was a monster obsessed hunter in the monster hunter universe (maybe mhw:i specifically becos thats what im familiar with lmao). what do you think his favorite monster would be

[autistic-katara]

icl i would be at least a little happy with almost any ending for stranger things but one thing that would ruin all of it would be an epilogue (of a decade or more later)

[sharper-than-a-serpents-tooth]

honestly I think Claude and lp Jennette's relationship was nearly not as a bad as wmmap Athy and Claude's. Do I think there was projection? Of course it's Claude we are talking about. But I don't think Claude had ever troubles differenciating Jennette from Penelope or thought they were the same person. I imagine Jen and Claude's mental illnesses and traumas cancelled each other out and their relationship was weirdly wholesome as a result of that.

[lunar-years]

obviously Jamie not being in season 4 would suck mostly because I simply want Jamie to be there and to get more of his story and get to enjoy more interactions between Jamie and the other characters. At the end of the day though, I can just not watch s4, which I'm perfectly okay with.

what sucks EVEN MORE to me, and is far harder to avoid, is that not having Jamie in the show totally changes the *canon* of the character in a way that will inevitably bleed over into fan spaces, regardless of whether or not I'm actively watching. However they write him out (I assume it would just be having him go to another team) becomes the new "Jamie Tartt canon." And that small thing totally changes his story and we don't even get to see it play out! When i was perfectly happy playing in my sandbox of a million equally valid possibilities.

[thylionheart]

If i can give anyone advice for writing an insanely large cast of minor characters who don’t necessarily need to be fully fleshed out, but have to feel real, is you give each of them 1. a temperment and 2. a hobby.

The hobby gives them something to focus on/a goal to follow that is just running in the background, as well as giving each character something unique to associate them with so the reader doesn’t feel like all theses same-face guys run together. A hobby could be as simple as luxury items and gold baubles to something deeper like trying to become the best athlete to impress their father.

their temperament informs how they approach their hobby, with zeal or reluctance, or whatever. Which translates to how they react to the world and actions around them.

The vengeful athlete character resents the main character brother who will always be the better athlete than him. And the easy-going bauble-collecting brother encourages his athlete brother’s mischief because it’s funny. Neither of them can capture their father’s attention.

Neither of their stories are necessarily interesting or relevant to the story we’re currently writing, but y’all are going to be so sad when i kill both of them off

[cauldron-burn-and-fire-bubble]

dinosaur au. what else do you want me to say

for anyone who's interested the bachelor is Deinonychus antirrhopus, haruspex is Parasaurolophus walkeri, and changeling is Pachycephalosaurus wyomingensis

[teakoodrawz]

" I'm a Psycho, loving it~ "

[wjbs-bonkle-au]

Metru Nui Archives data log 36012: The Head

Log author: Spiritual Researcher Vizuna

The Head, as it wishes to be called, is, well, a head. Specifically the head of a Class-02 Toa, or maybe Class-03? I'll have to ask Surgical Director Gogot after I've finished writing this, then I'll put it as an addendum.

The Head was... challenging to deal with. It litters its speech with profanity (which, for professionalism purposes, has been expunged from this data log), threatened the lives of both me and my colleagues (though these threats appeared to be empty based on its lack of any limbs or weapons), and claims to have once been one of the few Toa to ever come from Xia, though as my... interview with it (and subsequent research) indicates, it is mostly lying about this.

The following is an audio-to-text transcript of my attempt at inverviewing The Head:

Vizuna: Apologies for taking so long. I couldn't find my archival tablet, so I had to borrow the Chief Archivist's one. Now, how did you get into this state? The Head: Wanna find out, [EXPLETIVE DELETED]? Vizuna: I admire your attempts to threaten me, but they won't work. Answer the question, please. The Head: Ran into an... old friend, see. Tried to kill me, but couldn't finish the [EXPLETIVE DELETED] job, not for lack of trying... Vizuna: I see. What do you mean by that? The Head: Eh, it'd take too [EXPLETIVE DELETED] long to explain, and I'd have to repeat myself. Especially since you [EXPLETIVE DELETED] Le-Matoran don't even seem to remember what [EXPLETIVE DELETED] colours you're meant to have. Vizuna: Why y- [SLOW INHALE] I am not a Le-Matoran. I am a Bo-Matoran. You should know the difference; you are... were a Toa of Air. Right? The Head: What the [EXPLETIVE DELETED] are you talking about? How would you know that? Vizuna: Your eyes are... red, but now I look at them, they're not... they're not the same as... The Head: Yeahhhhhh, now you're starting to [EXPLETIVE DELETED] get it. Vizuna: ... This interview is over. I need to check something.

Now, those who don't know about Matoran mythology may not be aware of Shadow Toa; powerful, illusiory constructs that a Makuta can manifest, though very little is known of them, as they are rarely used.

The only source I have access to that describes a Shadow Toa is an ancient text, written in ancient Matoran, which contains the following passage that I have partially translated into modern Matoran, with any words that have multiple definitions having both listed: "Be Toa's eyes as the setting suns, moreso than capricious Le or [steadfast/durable] Fe, armour dark, then ally is Toa not; for is instead illusion from cruel Kra. Only ceases after confront truest [self/friend]."

Translating this fully into modern Matoran is difficult due to the ambiguity in the grammar and certain words having multiple definitions, but I gave it a try because why not: "If a Toa's eyes are bright red, moreso than the pinkish-red of a Toa of Air or the reddish-orange of a Toa of Iron, with dark armour, then they are not an ally; they are instead an illusion from cruel Shadow." The next section is a bit more ambiguous; it could mean "It immediately ceases to exist when it is confronted by its true self", or "It can only be killed by a close friend", or maybe some combination or rearrangement of those. Maybe something else. Who knows?

But what I want to note is that part about red eyes and dark armour. The Head has eyes that match that description perfectly, and while it lacks any armour or a mask, the metal it is made out of does look darker than usual, at least compared to what I've seen from the few Toa I have met, which makes me wonder if The Head is, in fact, a Toa of Shadow.

Before I move onto the next section, I also need to address something interesting that last line. Both interpretations point to Shadow Toa being based on existing Toa; "truest self" could refer to the one that it was recreated from, while "truest friend" could refer to another Toa who is particularly close to them. Which means that The Head could have been based on an actual Toa from Xia, though I didn't want to deal with the Xian council's excessive bureaucracy just to access a list of registered Toa with no clue which one The Head was copying. This will come up again later.

Getting back on track, since I had an example of a rare phenomenon in my possession, I decided to try giving it a soul-scan to see what I could learn.

Souls are a form of elemental and life essence, generated in the cerebral crystals (also known referred to with the more casual term "brainstalks") of most beings and transported throughout the body via elemental conduits. Souls also what give eyes, cerebral crystals and heartlights their distinctive glow, though the actual colour of said glow comes from the surrounding protodermic biomineral that those components are made out of, which tints the otherwise blindingly white soul-light; even De-Matoran and Toa of Sonics, with their white biominerals, have their soul-light filtered slightly to make their eyes, cerebral crystals and heartlights glow to a lesser degree than if they were isolated.

Souls are comprised of six different "pieces", which affect the shape and appearance of the soul and the being it belongs to; they are Unity, Duty, Destiny, Light, Darkness and Element. The first three obviously relate to the being's connections to the Three Virtues; Light and Shadow have unknown purposes at time of writing, though it appears to have some correlation with the being's personality, as Matoran destined to become Toa usually have higher Light, and Makuta naturally have higher Darkness.

So I put The Head in the soul scanner (it tried to resist, but the most it could do was try to bite my fingers), activated the scanning mode, and went back to my office to water my plants and rearrange my tablets while I waited for the scan to finish.

As soon as I saw the results, I knew that I had to download them to the archival tablet so I could include an image of them here, because they would have been too bizarre to be believable, but it also undoubtably proves my hypothesis of what The Head is.

The Head somehow has 0 Unity, Duty, Destiny or Light, but its Darkness is so high it caused an overflow. This thing is (was?) definitely a Shadow Toa.

Now that I had this evidence at its true origin, I was ready to re-confront it, along with a secret weapon...

The Head: Oh good, the [EXPLETIVE DELETED] finally decided to give me the attention I [EXPLETIVE DELETED] deserve. Vizuna: Yeah, yeah, let's cut to the chase. I know what you are. The Head: [EXAGERRATED GASP] Oh noooooo, you managed to [EXPLETIVE DELETED] figure out "what I really am". You guessed it earlier; I'm a [EXPLETIVE DELETED] Makuta, and I am to be [EXPLETIVE DELETED] feared! Vizuna: You're a Shadow Toa, based on a Toa from the island of Xia. You were struck down in battle, but managed to survive as a damaged head due to not being defeated properly. The Head: Wait, how did you f- Vizuna: A combination of ancient writings, and a summary of your soul's construction. And to further prove it, I brought this. The Head: A [EXPLETIVE DELETED] mask? What's that going to do? Vizuna: It'll let me know who'll get the privilege of shutting you up for good.

At this point, I ran out of audio-recording space on the tablet (sorry about that, Etoku; I replaced the memory module before returning it to you), but when I put the mask on The Head, it turned dark-grey, so I will be requesting access to the Xian council's list of registered Toa and looking for any Toa of Ice or Sonics.

Now, a lot of fellow spiritual researchers might hate me for what I am about to say, but I am going to destroy it, because there's a lot that we're going to learn from how it reacts to being exposed to its original

Artifact information:

Categories: Living, Supernatural

Current location: External Warehouse 7434-B, "To Be Destroyed" section.

End of log.

Addendum by Spiritual Researcher Vizuna: I went to ask Surgical Director Gogot about The Head, but according to the other surgeons in the dissection lab, he's currently busy; some slackers from Le-Metru somehow managed to get into the Mutagenics gallery, and he's taken the sole responsibility of dissecting what's left of them.

Addendum by Spiritual Researcher Vizuna: Ok, so it's been a week, and Gogot still isn't available; according to the off-duty surgeon who answered the door when I went to ask, he won't be available for at least a month, maybe longer, and since I didn't want to subject any... less experienced surgeons to The Head's nonsense, I will just wait until he's finished. In lighter news, I managed to finally get a copy of the Xian council's list of registered Toa, and I've had letters sent to the Toa that The Head was mimicking, as well as what the list claims is their closest ally, so hopefully they'll respond soon to... dispose of it. Also it means I won't need Gogot to ID the type of Toa that The Head came from.

[newtness532]

yes it did take me 3 hours and 5 breaks to write 270 words but! i wrote 270 words and a win is a win

[hwaslayer]

still kinda early to say this but i think .. the next era of fics after wildfire / vivrant thing will be 🥹😭

[nitewrighter]

We all hate when Superman gets taken out by things that Really shouldn’t be Abel to beat him, or as tv tropes says “getting worfed”, especially to prop up Batman, but that’s just how a shared universe works, sometimes you have to take powerful heroes out of the equation for less powerful ones to ever get a chance to shine. Let’s imagine a story without those “worf moments” or “Superman stays out of Gotham”

Batman has to face an alliance of his deadliest foes-

The joker, scarecrow, poison ivy, Mr freeze, bane, clay face and deathstroke, all united under ra’s al ghul in a plot to kill Batman and destroy Gotham city once and for all! The dark knight will have to use all of his strength, wits and skill to save as many people as he can!………

Aaaaaaand Superman swoops in, beating all of them in ten seconds, and since the bad guys thought this would be a purely Batman story, none of them thought to bring kryptonite. And Bruce is left standing there feeling useless.

Awesome for Superman, but bat fans are going to feel cheated, plus it kills all tension

I actually don't really mind when Superman gets his ass kicked in a story where, in other stories he would have been fine. I don't view Superman's power level as static, I see it as something that is really dependent on what story is being told, because power itself and how we use it in the right way can frequently be a very situational thing.

Nor do I have any interest in Superman soloing Batman's Rogue's Gallery. Batman's battles with his rogues are a generally different conflict than the adventures and struggles Superman goes through, and Batman's Rogues are written specifically for Batman. Of course it wouldn't be satisfying for the Reader or Batman (*gasp* Not Batman's feelings!) if Superman soloed the Gotham Rogues. It wouldn't be satisfying for Superman fans or Superman, either, because Superman's conflicts, are, likewise, written for Superman.