#and tumblr has for 6 years given me somewhere to put it. a nice little constant corner in my life for my nonsense. thank you.

[black-rose-writings]

I read Ruin and Rising because I’m bored

And I also hate myself

Like with the last book, I have a vague idea of the plot and stuff from tumblr and fanfics. I will also be refering to Darkling as Sasha for most of this.

I am still Darklina trash and don’t particularly like Mal.

On a different note, I’ve finally moved for college, but the internet here is trash, so I’ll probably have a lot more reading time now, since most games I play are online and will crash without internet.

Before

Cool story. Let’s hope Alina stays a badass.

Who am I joking, I know how this ends.

Chapter 1

So far so good. I hate the Apparat, per usual. Alina’s there basically dying and that bitch can’t wait to see her do so.

Cult leader to the core this one. He probably hates that his figurehead is alive and also not brainwashed.

Cult leader doesn’t like swearing. How surprising.

My boy David is completely right. What kind of irresponsible dingus keeps centuries old books in a fucking wet-ass cave? (Or a tree for that matter *cough cough* The Last Jedi *cough, cough*).

Genya is fun to be around.

Oh, shit, let’s go.

Chapter 2

Jesus Christ, Alina, Zoya isn’t that bad.

This is one hell of a shitshow.

I live for this version of Alina. Badass. Scary. I want more of this Alina.

Chapter 3

Out of all the random little details from crappy smut fics, I did not expect Oncat to be from the books, lol.

Mal actually has a supernatural tracking ability. Like, literally, they put a bug into the pouch with gunpowder so he could make the shot. I guess this was kinda said before, but never this directly, right?

Alina’s merzost-skyping Sasha now, yay.

Alina is horny for Sasha boy. Yay.

Alina canonically has a praise kink. Nice.

I hate LB with all of my heart at this very moment. How dare she bait us Darklina people like this? How DARE she? (Shipbaiting is the worst, seriously.)

Yes, yes, yes. These two lines. That’s what their relationship is all about. They’re each others foils, the yin to the other’s yang and... ugh. I am Darklina trash to the core and this hurts.

Darklina: You have a terrible taste in men.

Alina: I liked you once.

My boy Sasha walked into that one.

Chapter 4

Alina is a Queen. And we love her.

David, my beloved, my spirit animal.

It’s surprising they can read it at all, given it’s been centuries. Have you ever tried reading medieval manuscripts?

Honestly, with a father that crazy, it’s no wonder Baghra’s a bitch. And I’ve seen it said somewhere that the books imply Ilya’s experiments are what caused Baghra to be a shadow summoner and you know what? I can see how you’d make that connection.

Why is there so few Tidemakers in the books? Waterbenders are useful. I want more waterbenders.

Alina picking up some habits from Baghra I see.

Ah, yes, we love an educated giant.

I’m starting to think Harshaw is a bit nuts.

Shut up, Hershey. Or at least share the weed with the class. I’m not here for this “He’s mean to you because he likes you”. I might believe that in like, elementary school, but yall are (more or less) adults. Jesus.

Well, that was a bombshell of a twist.

Chapter 5

Oh boy, we’ve got some trauma bonding for out merry band of misfits. Yay.

Adrik has a crush on Zoya. And she hates it, lol. Cut the kid some slack, he’s like 15 or something.

That reminds me, I have a four-leaf clover pressed in books from close to year and a half ago. Time flies.

They’re really diving into the Mal has supernatural powers, huh?

Ghosts, let’s go.

Alina “I’m so happy to be outside I start to shine like a fucking fairy” Starkov and Mal is entranced. He’s definitelly nicer now. I’m not forgiving him for all the shit he’s pulled before and for using the silent treatment way too much, but hey, at least he’s improving.

I am not a Zoyalina person, but like... gay? Please? Rivals to grudging allies to friends to lovers, 300k slowburn? Sounds more fun than whatever Mala dn Alina have going on, lol.

(I’m starting to realize I’m not as much a Darklina person as I am anti-Malina person, lol. Like, literally everyone has a more interesting dynamic with Alina than tracker boy over there. Malina is at best boring AF and at worst toxic, codependent and emotionally abusive, while also being boring AF at the same time. It has literally nothing going for it except God herself liking it).

I can see why Nadia is gay in the show. The book version of her definitelly has a crush on Tamar. Homegirl likes a woman, who can murder her with the flick of her wrist and honestly? Same.

Alina has some big “coming out of lockdown after a year” energy atm.

The cat is one of the most realistic characters in this thing, lol.

And since Tamar is also heavily queercoded, our lovely ladies make off into the night, flirting. Or maybe not. Let me dream, though.

At least Blade Boy is aware that his tattoo is stupid. To quote someone ranting about him on tumblr: He’s embracing his identity as a tool.

Oh, boy, this will be fun.

Evil soldier is horny for Mal. Saints, is there a woman in this book who isn’t horny for Blade Boy?

And here comes Niki to save the day.

Chapter 6

Niki saved the day.

Fiberglass? And David being David. Genya being in love with her nerd of a boyfriend.

Jesus Christ, this one crazy kid has moved the technology in this universe a whole century on his own. So, when is David going to propose to him?

Baghra hasn’t changed much I see.

Baghra’s about to drop some truthbombs, but no, we have to be rudely interupted because Genya’s rapist is throwing a fit.

Chapter 7

How does Mal sound? Is she gonna say the Blade boy sounds like her dad? I mean, I know voices are partially genetic, but it has been tens of generations between them, probably.

So, we’re finally taking Genya’s trauma seriously after all this time? Good. Better late than never, I guess.

I wish that regicide was already finished and I’m pretty sure that Genya does, too. Stop defending the fucking king, narrative.

David’s a nerd in all things I see.

Someone please just kill the king already. And the queen, too, for good measure.

Now that’s a romance.

Infodumping and listening to said infodumps is a legitimate love language, Alina. Let them nerd out over poisons.

Wait, has Alina never directly killed anyone before? I thought she did... hmmm.

And just like that, it should have been over. Ugh.

Somehow, Baghra is a better teacher now than she was before. She half feels like a completely different character.

Nevermind, she’s back at it.

Chapter 8

Holy shit, Nadia and Tamar are canon. They have canon gays here.

So, which one of them is gonna die?

Chapter 9

We arrive at that scene. The one, where they should have fucked.

Jeez, girl, get a hold of yourself. Life is short, fuck a villain.

In other news, Genya and David definitelly fucked.

Chapter 10

Poor David. He just wanted to know.

Damn... I never realized just how young Baghra was, when she killed her sister.

I’ve already made a post about this, but it really does strike me like Baghra has already decided to end her life at this point in the book.

Why is that whole “but what if we’re related” thing even in there?

Chapter 11

We love a suprise attack.

When did Sasha boy learn that trick?

Baghra really just did that. Oh boy.

Chapter 12

No, don’t kill the kid... ugh.

Emotiona support cat. She should be friends with Milo.

Porrige for brains. Oof.

So Nadia was the one, who got bees set on her in the book. Cool.

That’s a good question. Why was it never brought up to Alina, that other Grisha get blocks, too?

David already thinking of steampunk prosthetic for Adrik is honestly kinda sweet.

Chapter 13

Back home... kinda.

Is that really... you really care about Mal bonking the Grisha school mean girl over a year ago? Okay.

Chapter 14

Angst! Yay!

And more angst.

Chapter 15

Sasha really went “My mom killed herself to save you? Well, I’ll kill the closest thing to parents you have.”

Chapter 16

Nikolai’s alive. Kinda.

And these two have such a sibling energy, I can’t.

And then they fuck. Ew.

Chapter 17

Wait, wait wait... so Alina isn’t even the one to destroy the Fold?

Okay. That’s... weird.

Holy shit. That was...

So, Aleksander is dead. Mal isn’t. Someone else destroyed the Fold for Alina and now she has no powers.

Okay.

That’s a weird-ass ending.

Chapter 18

The gays survived, so that’s nice.

Genya made good on her promise of making Alina a ginger, lol.

After

What emotion is this supposed to give me? Cause all I feel is kinda sad.

[youngbugandtonystank]

I’m confused about Tony’s relationship with Harley. The boy clearly saw Tony as a dad figure. But how did Tony feel? Did he think of Harley as a son the way he thought of Peter as a son? I wonder just how deep their relationship was compared to Peter. Thanks for explaining

Hi!

My answer is no. Tony didn’t feel the same way about Harley as he did for Peter. The trope is cute, that Tony has two sons but in canon-verse, Tony loved Peter as a son and thought of him like that.

Back in 2013, when Iron Man 3 came out, Tony was a little different than the Tony we saw in 2017 in Homecoming. Tony didn’t have the same mindset, he even flinched at the thought of having a kid:

Here are some examples of how different he was in IM3 and how different is his treatment with the kids:

Harley:

Tony: Move out of the way or I’m gonna run you over.

Harley Keener: I'm cold

Tony: Yeah, I can tell. You know how I can tell?

Peter:

Peter: How'd you find me? Did you put a tracker in my suit or something?

Tony: I put everything in your suit. Including this heater.

Peter: Whew, that’s better. Thanks.

Harley:

Harley Keener: When can we talk about New York?Tony: Maybe never, relax about it.Harley Keener: What about The Avengers, can you talk about them?Tony: I don't know, later. Hey kid, give me a little space.

Peter:

Tony: Nice work in D.C. Peter: Okay. Tony: My dad never really gave me a lot of support... And I’m just trying to break the cycle of shame.

He even implied he’s Peter's dad at this point lmao.

You know what gets me? How fast Tony freaked out at the thought of Peter being in danger of dying. Like the mere thought of it would destroy him. He felt himself getting attached to the kid but actually forming a relationship with him was something that he knew was gonna kill him. And that’s the truth, it killed him:

Loving Peter killed him. Basically.

lmao i’m a bad bitch, i’m not gonna cry...

--

I think I’ve talked about this before but the real reason Tony took Peter’s suit is that he was preventing Peter from killing himself. 

They already treated each other as father and son in the first stages of their relationship, it’s crazy LOL. The way they behaved in HOCO in general. How Tony kept trying to connect with Peter and how Peter already accused Tony of things only a kid would accuse their own father of doing, ‘If you even cared, you’d actually be here!’ and Tony responding just like any dad would: ‘No, this is where you zip it, all right? The adult is talking. What if somebody had died tonight? Different story, right? ‘Cause that’s on you. And if you died, I feel like that’s on me’ 

Tony wanted this. This is something he went after. The whole father figure thing is something he was prepared and wanted to do. He didn’t have that mindset in IM3 and maybe that’s the reason he didn’t get into that role with Harley. 

And I want to clarify that he is like that because he didn’t have any desire for kids back then and not because he hates Harley or because he likes to mistreat kids or something bizarre like that. He was busy with other things in his life to even think about kids. He was dealing with anxiety, PTSD, NY just happened, etc. He didn’t have the time to sit down and think about having children. 

There are other factors about this that can explain the lack of Harley in Tony’s life in a better way:

The superhero life.

Harley is not a superhero or an enhanced individual. At least not for now and he definitely wasn’t back then so Tony doesn’t need to be there for him 24/7. Yes, the kid was bullied at school but after the events of IM3, I think Tony figured Harley could handle himself. Peter DOES have powers and he’s an active superhero so someone needs to keep an eye on him. Tony always felt responsible for Peter and it’s not only because he feels like he ‘dragged’ him into the superhero life but because he actually sees himself in him. He thinks Peter is going to make the same mistakes he did and feels like he needs to protect the kid from that. Harley doesn’t have those problems.

Timing and Family.

Tony arrived at the right time. Peter just lost his uncle in HOCO and was in need of guidance and Harley didn’t need that as much as Peter did. Harley has a family, he has a sister and a mother. He probably has other family members too. Peter has May but the kid lost almost everything at the age of 14. He lost his parents and his second father figure by the time Tony came to his life. Harley mentioned that his dad left 6 years ago in IM3. I discussed this with a friend here on Tumblr and they made a great point about this subject: Tony doesn’t need to be a father figure for every kid he meets. It’s a cute concept but it’s not a necessity for some of them because it’s not like they can’t find happiness somewhere else. My friend mentioned how Harley's mother must’ve already found a boyfriend or husband who is a good person. Someone Harley grew to love. Someone Harley’s mom is happy with. It’s not always going to be the ‘bad boyfriends or bad stepparents’ trope, it may be possible that Harley has already found his father figure in someone else. It’s been like 6 or more years since Tony saw Harley, many things change in a couple of years and maybe this is what happened with the kid. 

Their introductions.

Here’s where the real difference lies. The writers and directors left it very clear what kind of relationship Tony was going to have with each kid. 

Both kids talked about their families with Tony and Tony’s reaction to each of them si very important:

Harley

Tony: So, uh, who's home?

Harley Keener: Well, my mom already left for the diner and dad went to 7-Eleven to get scratchers. I guess he won, 'cause that was six years ago.

Tony: Mm. Which happens, dads leave. No need to be a pussy about it. Here's what I need.

Peter

Tony: That's why I'm here. Why you doing this? I gotta know. What's your MO? What gets you outta that twin bed in the morning?

Peter: Because- because I've been me my whole life, and I've had these powers for 6 months- [more explanation]-- When you can do the things that I can, but you don't... and then the bad things happen... they happen because of you.

Tony:

Tony not only felt connected to the kid but he sympathized with him. He understands what Peter is saying. Just look at the way Peter talks at 14, at that age I was watching Full Metal Alchemist lmao. Peter talks like an adult. He talks like he already experienced a lot. Tony recognizes that there’s something deeper to this kid than just the nerdy kid he sees. He even offered comfort in that same scene:

I think I explained this before but Harley is part of Tony’s legacy. He’s one of the many people who helped Tony shaped himself in the amazing hero he IS today *He’s no dead, what are you talking about?*

Now, even if this is the case, that doesn’t mean that the relationship couldn’t have progressed to something more have they given them more time but unfortunately, they decided to kill him. 

Thank you!♥

[yeoldontknow]

❧ check in tag

tagged by the sweetest angel @propinqxity to do this little tag. this is such a cute list of questions, and some of these i dont think ive been asked before. thank you so much for the tag and the tumblr crush mention lovely. you truly are a bright spot on this website and i mean that sincerely <333

going under a cut because im certain i will ramble ~

1. Why did you choose this url?

its sort of like a pun between yall dont know and the fact that, hopefully, sincerely, chanyeol does not in fact know that i run this blog lmao i changed to this after a long time of being bread-jinie and i wanted to rebrand. i will, however, do my best to never change URLs again because the masterlist switch over was a complete hassle

2. Any sideblogs? If you have them, name them and why you have them

i have a fic recs blog called @yeoldontknowiread. as to why i have it, i know it hasnt been updated in ages since ive been kind of on hiatus, but i think reading and sharing work on this platform is immensely important. i actually read quite a lot of fanfiction, and i try my best to share the things i read. im very very behind on recs at the moment cause i try my best to write something substantial for every recommendation i make. as a writer, i know exactly the kinds of thoughts and feedback on fics that make my heart soar so i try to put in the same energy to my recs. community is only fostered when there is reciprocation

3. How long have you been on Tumblr?

hmmm since april 2017. i actually had my 4 year anniversary this year and i did have plans for things but i got roped into real life things and couldnt celebrate the way i truly wanted to :(

4. Do you have a queue tag?

no but sometimes i think i should. i view tags as a library on top of my knee jerk response to things. most of my tags are just my initial thoughts or feelings at any given moment, so those take precedence over a specific queue tag

5. Why did you start your blog in the first place?

when i was getting into exo, i was reading fanfiction like crazy. i used to write fanfic quite a lot in other fandoms, but at that time i hadnt written anything in about 2.5 years. exo was the first re-introduction to that feeling of excitement and inspiration. after about 3 weeks of straight reading, i decided i wanted to write again. i wrote the prologue to hero in about two hours and tried logging into AO3 to post it. sadly i forgot all of my log in information because it had been years, and was getting frustrated. i really wanted to put it somewhere out of fear that id lose interest if i didnt do something with it, and everything id read had been on tumblr. so i made a tumblr just to put hero lmao i didnt have any mutuals. it was a blog with straight 0. i hadnt even created an account to interact with writers before that moment, i really thought id be a silent reader forever. but exo woke me back up and for that i am eternally grateful.

6. Why did you choose your icon?

the yours music video is...so stunning? like the colour theory throughout the whole thing is truly so inspiring and gorgeous. and this shot of chanyeol looking at the painting took my breath away, truly. tulips and the color of peach, like do you know how evocative that is? ugh

7. Why did you choose your header

my header was made by @jamaisjoons for my birthday this year because shes literally the most talented person when it comes to graphics. and this was so kind of her to do, i cried a lot

8. What's your post with the most notes?

uhm....either the body through time or truth i cant remember which but i checked recently and its one of those

9. How many mutuals do you have?

honestly at this point im not even sure. i know ive lost a bunch while i was on hiatus because i was basically a dead blog, and some people do dash cleanses. and im certain others have left, too, for their own reasons. still, i have a good core of friends though who are active and that is enough for me

10. How many followers do you have?

more than i probably deserve

11. How many people do you follow?

399

12. Have you ever made a shitpost?

uhm i guess? there was a time when nng was not updated and every wednesday id post the days go by music video in sadness and grief but im not a big shitposter. if i make a text post its usually a life update or me crying about chanyeol, theres no inbetween lmao

13. How often do you use Tumblr every day?

tbh i havent used tumblr that often, not since march i think. i used to use it many times a day, checking in on friends and stuff, but once i started focusing on my phd applications i was only here sporadically. i didnt make an announcement either, just let my blog run on queue so i wasnt totally gone. i think i was checking in twice a week or maybe once every two weeks to refill my queue and check mentions etc. but now that my interviews are done im trying to get back on here daily to reconnect

14. Did you have a fight/argument with another blog once? Who won?

ive had my share of disagreements with people and any details about those situations shall remain as they are meant to: private

15. How do you feel about "you need to reblog this" posts?

in what context? like, you need to reblog this or your wish wont come true? or like, please reblog this to spread the word/spread awareness, etc? in the case for the former, i scroll right by. in the case of the latter, if im around and see someone raising a go fund me or some major event is occurring and i find a post with good sources or charities i will reblog. mostly though, the full extent my activism isnt really on this blog. its my escape from reality. my activism is usually placed on other platforms.

16. Do you like tag games?

i doooo!!! theyre so fun i love learning about my friends

17. do you like ask games?

i love those too! theyre so cute and usually a nice way to have interaction immediacy with people in the community

18. Which of your mutuals do you think is Tumblr famous?

no one. can we please abandon this notion of fame on tumblr? arent we all here to write about some dick and some smut and some fluff and then hang out together and log off? lmao tumblr isnt reality and followers/fame is so arbitrary on this platform, no one has any control over any of it

19. Do you have a crush on a mutual?

i am in love with so many people here. let me name a few:

@yehet-me-up @kyungseokie @jenmyeons @j-pping @jamaisjoons @inkedtae @kookdiaries @yoonia @dulcetvk @kithtaehyung @imdifferentshadesofpurple @ditzymax @sugaurora @sahmbtsficrecs @junghelioseok @yeojaa @augustbutwinter @joonscore @btssavedmylifeblr @cutechim @sunshinekims @kimtaehyunq @ouvuo @delhyun @exo-stentialism @sooibian @softyoongiionly @jinseunie @zibermuda @bratkook @1kook @luffles424 @xjoonchildx

and so many other people and mutuals that i am certainly forgetting. love is such an expansive feeling, and it encompasses platonic ardor and creative desire. i admire every single person listed for so many different reasons, and cherish and treasure them or what they provide to the community. love is such an important and broad experience. truly, i hope they feel adored every single day x

[teamsarawatshusband]

Word Of Honor - 1st watch insta thoughts - Episode 1

K, before I get started, here's what I know about "Word of Honor" prior to watching it, based on random unexplained gifsets on my dash: Not much tbh. I know there's this one guy that is a bit more tanned and has a beard. And there's some smirky guy. No idea what else he does, but he seems important. There's also swords cutting fabric, i'm thinking sleeves, because cut-sleeve? Way to be subtle. Oh, and there's two girl assassins. I have no idea who they kill or what their motives are. But they look fierce. That's literally all. Oh, and it's on my dash so much that I just HAVE TO assume it's BL. Because... my dash has tendencies.

Okay, here we go.

Episode 1

I'm skipping the intro, because I don't wanna be spoilered.

Oh, somebody explains the background story. That's nice. I have no idea, because the subtitles are going by so fast, but something about 5 lakes and an armory which is like a treasure. K, Glazed armor is important for... whatever reason.

Wow, they have nice trees.

Ninja people on roofs. Magic lanterns. Oh no, they broke the paper windows :( Lots of fighting. Why on earth are they going back and forth between fast movements and slow-mo? That looks so weird. Ah, yes, fighting on rooftops. I've seen better. Just saying. Probably gonna make so many enemies saying that. Oh, already the first fabric cutting. Was it a sleeve?

K, so the one guy is the leader of the window of heaven, whatever that is. And people are shocked to see him. Is he a good guy or a bad guy?

He looks sad. Does he even wanna be there? Oh, he's helping the bad guys? Is he our tragic hero? Now I didn't catch his name.

Oh, girl, there is no way you sat down alone in that room and your robe fell all pretty around you like that.

She brought back somebody's body to tragic hero roof guy. And now he wants her to kill herself. This makes no sense, wth. And she actually goes and drinks the poison. Hm, and now they're talking about the dead guy, so he must have been important too. He's burried at the Four Seasons.... Hotel? Probably not hotel, I didn't catch that right, I guess.

She has some wooded thing in her hand.

Oh, flashback to a pretty guy carving it. Is he the dead guy?

And the other guy in the flashback is tragic hero guy, just younger. Are they the lovers??? :O Wait, was the dead guy in love with poison girl?

Tragic hero guy is visiting some older guy at some place. Ah it's four seasons MANOR. Ok. And tragic hero guy is some sort of lord. WTH is this window of heaven thing? Is it like a magical place? Is tragic hero lord poisoned or something? Oh, and the old guy is kinda pissed at him for some reason, they don't say why. He wants his nails done or something. That's... probably not right.

Eww, no, he wants nails stuck into him. And they’re not nails, they’re actually screws, but okay. Anyway, weird. I really don't get it. Were they friends before? But then why does the old guy not wanna serve tragic hero lord guy anymore? And why is tragic hero lord guy going around dooming everybody to die?

K, so the nails make you lose your senses and mind and then kill you after 3 years. Got it. I like how they give little explanations in between the story.

Everybody's dead except for tragic hero lord guy. Is he staying alive to suffer on purpose or something?

Some palace, looks a bit like Koi Tower to me. Some guys talking about somebody spitting blood. Tragic hero lord guy maybe? (who else is left alive anyway?)

:O He's got the nails himself? WHY??? Ok, he's definitely a masochist. Who on earth puts nails in sloooooowly in order to not lose all their senses at once?!

Wait who's the mirror guy? Was that pretty flashback guy? Seems like it. (Sorry, I'm faceblind - not even joking, I really am and utterly bad at recognizing people) Oh no, and now tragic hero lord guy is crying. We're only in episode 1... why are there tears already?

And why are they all talking about 7 nails, and he only has 6 nails showing. Where on earth did he put the 7th nail? Do I even wanna know?

It's constantly snowing in the outdoor scenes, that must have been annoying. At least all the extras get to wear hats or helmets.

Okay, tragic hero guy goes to the palace. Talks to the... guy there. Whoever he is. Ooh. Tragic hero lord guy is getting naked. In front of... ah just to show off the nails. And palace guy is shocked. Oh, tragic hero lord guy gave himself ONLY SIX nails. K, no search party needed, whew. And now palace guy is super pissed. Because he... doesn't want him to die? So... he threatens to kill him? What?

Does tragic hero lord guy want to be killed right away or want to be given that 7th nail? I don't understand. Also, side note, what's up with those other scars that he has?

Now that other random side guy gets promoted and gets to take tragic hero lord guy's job. Did tragic hero lord guy get the 7th nail or not? What? None of this makes any sense.

Oh, it stopped snowing.

And he went... somewhere.

And is doing arts and crafts.

Oh, he's putting on a mask. Wait, is he the tanned beard guy? :O Oh. But why? He’s going into hiding?

Whoa, those statue mountains look AWESOME. 10/10 for scenery!

Wait, who are all those people fighting now? Some red guys with masks. And they're falling off the edge like lemmings. And some giggly guy on wires.

He's a ghost? What? And he stole something.

If he's a ghost, why is he bleeding?

WHOAH, what a cool film set with the stone statues holding up the stone ceiling. Is this a cave? or just a valley? Is this some magical place? Anyway 10/10 again!

Some guy playing with nuts. Hehe.

And lots of people with lots of make-up. Ah, more ghosts, okay. Why is nut guy in red not showing his face to the camera?

Oh, they're talking about glazed armor again. Like in the intro story. Did they steal it? Who are the ten devils? Are they all ghosts? I'm so confused.

Okay, new location.

Wait, did they film this at The Untamed's Caiyi Town? :o Sure looks just like it.

(not my gif, I googled and found this on @elvencantation​’s tumblr.)

Ok, tanned tragic hero lord guy is an alcoholic. Seems faintly familiar.

Oh, and there's smirky guy that I know from the gifs on my dash. With a very prejudiced and talkative purple girl.

Everybody who's wearing white also carries a fan. Both smirky guy and the kid that just walked in. Who is he?

Ooooh, purple girl can fly jump. Is she a cultivator? ARE there cultivators in this series? So far, nobody has flown on any swords.

And how did smirky fan guy know that tanned tragic hero lord guy is not a beggar? Does he know him? Does he recognize him? I bet he gets a kick out of being so mysterious.

Oh no, purple girl broke the rice sack. What a waste. :( And now she kicked tanned tragic hero lord guy right into the salad bar.

At least the kid is trying to stop her. Yeah, somebody has to. Ooooh, she's got a whip. Niiiiiiice! But now she BROKE the salad bar, that is just WRONG!

Ok, so... if alcoholic tanned tragic hero lord guy made that mask in order to go into hiding, he maaaaybe shouldn't be fighting so well in front of EVERYBODY to see. Just saying. :O Somebody stopped the whip before it hit alcoholic tanned tragic hero lord guy.

Oh, end of episode. Ok. So what have I learned? I still don't know who is who. Or why they do the things they do. I don't know how they're connected either. Hmm. But I wanna know who stopped the whip. Probably smirky guy, I guess. But, in any case, the last shot makes me wanna continue watching. Cheap trick, but it works. Yes, definitely gonna keep watching!

[recurring-polynya]

I’m a huge RenRuki fan so I’m stoked to find this page of glorious work and active engagement relating to this topic I could go on about! I was wondering... during their separation, do you think Renji and Rukia slept with/dated other people? One more than the other? Just wanna know your insight since you put so much depth into their relationship. I love it. (I personally like to think that Renji had a bit of a “hoe phase” especially while he was in the 11th)

Tumblr is so great, I can’t believe people actually value my opinion on this stuff (this is absolutely one of my favorite topics). Thank you so much for your kind words, and I am ecstatic for the opportunity to pontificate on this topic.

Just to clarify, if you were asking for my opinion on the source material, and I had to “support my opinion” or “cite references”, my actual interpretation of canon is that no, they were absolutely celibate during this time. Rukia had a cute li’l crush on her vice-captain and Renji probably went on one very heterosexual date with a girl once and felt bad about it for a year.

When I am being generous and world-buildy, I like to consider the fact that shinigami are souls. They do not have bodies or hormones and so I can get behind the idea that bonds of family and friendship are far more important than sex and attraction, because those are fundamentally earthly concerns. In the hands of a thoughtful, talented, preferably ace writer, this could be an incredibly interesting setting but that is, uh, not consistent with any other aspect of Soul Society, including the fact that they sell sexy calendars of the captains, plus Kubo took the time out to canonically remind us that Soul Reapers poop and have babies.

So, instead, here is the horny Polynya headcanon version, which is what you probably wanted anyway. I’m putting it under a cut because it gets a little R-rated, and also it’s hella long, but the short answer is Renji absolutely had a slutty phase.

Some people headcanon that Rukia and Renji were actually in a romantic relationship at the time of her adoption, and if that’s your reading of it, and you want to believe that they waited for each other out of loyalty, I suppose I can get behind that.

I don’t think they were together, though. I waver from time to time about how physical their affection got in Rukongai, but I think they fell in love and never admitted it. When their last friend died, they both became absolutely terrified of losing the other, so they came to the Seireitei in order to get strong and not die. I don’t think Rukia ever wanted to be Soul Reaper, to be honest. Given the strength of her principles and her particular moral code, I do think she is a great one, in the style of “I would never want to be in a club that would have me in it.” Consistent with Oetsu’s trial in the Royal Realm, I think Renji was born (died?) to be a Soul Reaper and Rukia knew this and also that he would never go unless she went with him. She absolutely regarded getting him into Shin’ou as saving his life and getting him where he belonged.

Once they were in school, I think they had to keep their distance socially if they wanted to succeed. The Gotei runs entirely on nepotism, and Rukongai kids who don’t adapt are looking at Squad 11 or 4, best case scenario. Even if they were aware of their feelings for each other, they had to play it cool for now. Renji is a long-term planner, and I think he set his sights on pass tests -> graduate -> get Gotei position -> live happily ever after with Rukia. Rukia is not so good at long term planning, and also not so good at formal education and I think she just got depressed and salty, especially because she was never sure if he actually returned her feelings or not. I absolutely think that when she accepted the adoption, she assumed she was leaving Renji to his live his best life, and at least going somewhere she was wanted.

Even though we, the reader, are presented this story as a tragedy, in many ways, this is exactly what they had hoped for. They lived. That’s it. That’s all they ever wanted. Renji got to have his perfect job and Rukia got to live in indescribable luxury. They are both so, so happy about this and have no idea why their faces are so wet right now.

The last thing either of them wants, to be honest, is the other one pining after them. They have each accepted trudging through their life in misery because they think they have made the other happy. There’s a scene were Byakuya shows up to the Squad 6 holding cells to announce to Rukia that he has no plans to save her, and Renji looks just devastated, not just because Rukia’s gonna die, but because he thought he was sending her to happiness.

Also, on a meta level, I am middle aged, and for me, the romance of only ever being with one person is boring as hell. The idea that they would get together and lose their virginity to each other just makes me indescribably tired. Childhood-friends-to-lovers isn’t actually that interesting to me-- it is the separation itself that makes it spicy-- that they went off and had other life experiences-- and sexual experiences, and came back found that they loved this person even more now.

I headcanon Rukia as very horny and pro-sex in theory, but has is a big problem of opportunity. On one hand, I think she and Byakuya have a firm don’t-ask-don’t-tell policy, where as long as she stays out of the gossip columns, he doesn’t care what she does. On the other hand, though, I feel like secret affairs are kinda hard to manage, especially since she entered the noble network late in life. Anyway, I figure she’s had a number of casual affairs, mostly with other nobles who are invested in not getting caught, and also do not have any interest in any sort of emotional attachment. I think Rukia is absolutely bi, and mostly slept with ladies because they were more likely to be discreet, although there was probably a dude or two in there somewhere. Rukia only has two relatinship modes-- detached and ride-or-die, and she was very careful to keep everything in category 1, because she had no expectation of ever having a functional relationship that would go anywhere; no one she was actually interesting in being with would ever pass Kuchiki muster. I think she tried dating a nice boy from Squad 8 once, and everyone in Squad 13 thought it was the cutest thing they had ever seen. They went on three dates and never kissed and Rukia hated it and never did it again. She let herself have a huge crush on both Kaien and Miyako Shiba, because she was absolutely sure it could never go anywhere, and that definitely played into her devastation at their death. She may have had some Bad Decisions Sex in the wake of that, but I think for the most part, the affairs became more trouble than they were worth, and she’s been on a pretty long dry spell around the time we meet her.

That being said, I think Rukia is a lady who takes care of herself, if you get my drift. I think she has an extensive collection of erotic romance novels, a good imagination, and Kuchiki money worth of self-service sex toys. I think by the time she and Renji actually hook up, she has decades worth of pent up fantasies, and fortunately for her, he is intrigued by her ideas and would like to sign up for her newsletter, please and thank you.

Speaking of Renji, let’s talk about Renji! After Rukia left, I think Renji Made Some Plans and buckled down into a long, hard haul of Making Himself Worthy of Seeing Rukia Again. He made it through school, he went into Squad 5 with Izuru and Momo and... lost 90% of his momentum. This is exactly the scenario of the kid who busts ass through college to follow their dream, and then two years into their dream job, realizes that they are going to be formatting pivot tables in Excel for the next 15 years before they get to do anything remotely interesting. At this point, Renji is young, hot, bisexual, inked, and not very satisfied with his day job, and Thus Began the Ho Period.

Momo and Izuru hate this. They hate it so much. They have both had big crushes on Renji since school and they are right there. It wouldn’t be so bad if he would find a nice sweet partner that they like, but no, he just goes off on weeknights and comes home reeking of alcohol and covered in hickeys and ruining his career even though his job performance is actually fine. The fact is, even though he has always acted like he doesn’t know, of course he knows they like him, he’s not dumb, but Izuru and Momo are the type of people who mate for life, and Renji absolutely knows how badly he would break their hearts. He can’t even talk about it with them, all he can do it pretend like he doesn’t notice and hope they’ll realize what trash he is. He still loves Rukia and will always love Rukia and has made peace with the idea that he will likely never get to be with her-- he’s still working towards it because he must, because it would kill him to give up, but he knows that he’s only good for a fight or a fuck and not much else. Their friendship gets increasingly strained until Momo and Izuru can’t understand anything he does and he can’t stand them caring so damn much.

Anyway, this escalates in deciding to leave Nice, Respectable Squad 5 entirely, and joining the French Foreign Legion Squad 11. Squad 11 respects a man’s right to wallow, and Renji takes a swan dive to rock bottom. His only saving grace is his training with Ikkaku, which he takes absolutely seriously. Yumichika eventually takes interest in Renji, and teaches him how to take care of his hair and have standards. Yumichika and Ikkaku realize that if they can make him Functional, they can get him to do paperwork, so they help him beat the Sixth Seat and let him start hanging out with their friends.

Renji is still sleeping around at this point, but at least he’s sleeping around with a better class of people. I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking, Polynya, has Matsumoto ever pegged Renji? (You probably weren’t actually thinking that) The answer is yes, Matsumoto has absolutely pegged Renji, and she was utterly delighted to give Rukia tips later on. Rukia does not begrudge Renji his slutty period in the least, because she knows that, given the opportunity, she probably would have been Worse, and also, he’s slept with 3/4 of the Gotei and picked her out of all of them, and also, he’s just incredible at oral.

The slutty phase tapered off when Renji had a bit of an actual relationship with Shuuhei. First of all, they are absolutely each other’s types, physically. Secondly, Shuuhei (whom I headcanon as significantly less pathetic and more bisexual than in canon) would be able to handle being in a relationship that is fun and supportive, even if it’s not destined to last. He is well aware that Renji is devoted to beating Captain Kuchiki and that he’s never going to truly be able to be in love with anyone until he gets some closure with Rukia, but that’s a long way off, and Shuuhei’s got his own baggage, who doesn’t have baggage? So they sleep together and go to the bar together and hold hands sometimes and tool around on the motorbike and wear a lot of leather and Hisagi cooks Renji food and Renji eats it and they’re pretty happy for a few years.

Eventually, around the time he gets serious about trying to make vice-captain, Renji starts to hang out with Izuru and Momo again, who have recently made vice-captain themselves, and are really happy to see that he’s gotten himself back on the wagon. He’s started thinking about Rukia a lot again, and he’s feeling a little bad because he loves Shuuhei, but he’s not in love with Shuuhei, and also, Shuuhei and Izuru have started looking at each other when they go out drinking, so Renji claims he needs to concentrate on the vice-captain’s exam and they have some nice breakup sex and then he sliiiiiides on outta there like a good bro and is very happy for his friends when they start hooking up.

Did that cover it? Boy, I had a lot of thoughts on that, huh? To summarize: They both saw other people. Renji had way more sex, just a tremendous amount of sex, but always carried a torch for Rukia (not really intentionally, I think he would have liked to be able to get over her, he just couldn’t), whereas I think she really did give up on him for a while.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk, please read my fanfiction, where I am constantly hinting at all this stuff, I swear I will eventually finish that Squad 11 story.

[noctisfishing]

2020 Wrap-Up and 2021 Wishes

I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to do this or not, but I decided, why not? Even though this year was pretty wild for everyone in various ways, I want to celebrate my writing progress and accomplishments, and share with you what I wish for in 2021.

I’ve already posted a similar post on Reddit, although this one has a more detailed breakdown and includes my fic titles! I won’t link any of the fics mentioned, but you can visit my FFN or AO3 pages to find them. You can also click through my Welcome Post or find them all listed here (if you’re on desktop) (*every project I talk about can be found somewhere on my Tumblr :D)

Click below for some nice Fic Stats!! (mostly wordcounts and rambling!!)

Preview: I wrote a good amount of words, got some nice progress on some long fics, churned out dozens of ficlets!! Plus: What’s on my fic mind for 2021, and a short bit about other personal wins.

Before I ramble with numbers, I think we can all agree that we should say goodbye to 2020 this way:

Now, the numbers you’ll see are close approximations to how much I’ve written this year. I’m including works that I’ve published on AO3, FFN, Tumblr, and Reddit, and also works unpublished (and will post probably next year).

So, here it is:

Total Wordcount: 107,662 words!

Dang, I wrote a lot more than I thought. I think there was one year that I wrote 200,000 in a year and I’ve always set that number as my standard. But I’m still pretty happy with this year’s number! I think I’ll make 100K my “soft goal” for 2021 given how topsy-turvy life can go but it would be awesome to hit 200K again :)

And now, we break it down:

Completed Works (54,432 words)

2 Multi-Chaptered Fics (10,353 words) 

Both happen to be Sorato! I posted the last chapter of The Sound of His Goodbye back in March (I started the fic late 2019), and I posted all of The Last One Wins towards the end of November. Both gave me reminders earlier and later on in the year that I can complete fics, haha! It’s possible!!! \o/

38 Ficlets/Scenes (19,667 words) 

“Ficlets” don’t typically have a wordcount but are generally less than 1,000 words. I’d have to say that the impact of quitting my job, moving back home, and the pandemic brought on major changes and responsibilities that I had to adapt to. Simpler, smaller scale ideas were easier on my basket case of a mind and kept me writing, and that is most likely why for most of the year my inspiration was more drawn toward different little scenes. I got to write for and explore six new fandoms outside of Digimon which is cool!

When I say “scenes,” I mean those that either didn’t fit in the (slightly) larger works I’ve published, or those for future projects (which technically shouldn’t be counted as “complete” but I had to stick them somewhere :P).

9 One-Shots (24,412 words)

Day 6 Prompt of Takari Week just barely made it to be counted as a One-Shot, but the rest in this category are all Taiora: six for Taiora Week, as well as The Princess and the Dragon, and Colors in Distance. The Color Shot was actually sitting unfinished in my drafts for a few months so I’m glad I found the motivation to finish it before the year’s end. The other fics were inspired by prompts with deadlines - this was the first year I’ve participated and completed those and I’m happy I did them! 

Works in Progress (53,230 words)

I’ve posted one new chapter each for Digital Recovery (4,770 words) and  Tsukiakari (2,292 words) and I had the hope of working more on both of these this year! But you know, this year was tough (see also why I threw so many ficlets at my readers). I had three huge ongoing longfics and I made the decision to set these aside and put my main focus on one of those so as not to overwhelm myself. These fics are mostly planned out. They just need to be written more! We’ve got a long way to go with both of these.

Just One Drink (10,131 words) was.. probably my most popular fic this year, lol. I don’t see this one being too long (I would be surprised if it goes past 50K) but I see myself continue to update this next year. ;) 

And let’s talk about The Spark of Dawn (DoreDore Adventure Part II) (24,316 words). This was my chosen longfic to focus on this year, as evidenced by the wordcount, and even the number of chapters I’ve posted - three with 10,659 words total. This fic also carried me through July’s Camp NaNoWriMo where I reached my word count goal of 12,000 words. I think two chapters from that event ended up being posted, and there are still 13,657 words’ worth of content yet to be published. Overall, I think half of this story has been written out (including the content I haven’t posted yet) but that being said, this fic remains as one of my priorities to finish before moving along to my other WIPs!

Here’s a list of the rest of my unpublished works:

Untitled Taiorato Fic (1,433 words)

More Taiora Snapshots (2,454 words)

The Girl Who Stands Out (7,834 words) - This one is a Mimato, and should show up really soon. ;)

2021 Wishes: My main wish is for me to *keep writing*!

I’m already making some pretty elaborate spreadsheets for myself to help track my personal writing and reader stats. Hopefully they help motivate me in my writing progress in 2021! 

Toward the end of the year, I felt the need to “clear out” my plot bunnies folder and realized that fics from few ideas weren’t going to be as long as I initially thought. That’s where The Last One Wins came from, as well as The Girl Who Stands Out. I think once the latter is all written out, I will work more on DoreDore and see where it goes.

I want to tackle my “Write Your Melody” prompts, because since I’ve written them I feel obligated to. XD I’m sure there will be room for more ficlets and one-shots in next year’s endeavors; while it’s ideal to work on one big longfic until it’s done, I know for a fact that I’ll need writing breaks along the way.

Other Personal Wins (Not Writing-Related): This year, left a job and living situation that took a toll on my mental health. I also started to learn R and SQL programming languages. I was asked to be a moderator of one of my favorite communities! I made new friendships and a few of my friendships grew. And I found joy and comfort in things I hadn’t been able to in years’ past. I had a fair share of rough moments this year, but looking back at my small wins gave me reminders of the good I have. <3 

If you made it to the end of this post, GO YOU. I’m optimistic that next year will bring more good things. I hope to continue remembering to take time to breathe and rest, and keep talking to my friends and loved ones. Many of my wishes are for long-term goals/projects in general, but rather than setting year-end deadlines, I want to focus on just working on them, my efforts varying between chipping away at them little by little, or hardcore-drop-everything-and-spend-the-weekend.

Anyway, thank you for reading! I wish you all the best as we head toward a new year. <3

[ckret2]

y’all can we spend a minute thinking about the logistics of celebrating Christmas in Hell

Dozens of posts I've seen cheerily discussing/writing/illustrating all the cute ways Hazbin Hotel characters would celebrate Christmas and absolutely zero have I noticed so far that mention the fact that characters who are literally in Hell would have a really really fucking complicated relationship with Christianity & Christmas.

Long examination of this under the cut. If the cut doesn’t work, blame tumblr, merry crimmus.

What if they're not even allowed to celebrate Christmas? We're told that Hazbin Hotel takes place in the America-ish portion of Hell, where the folks who die in the U.S. tend to plop down; nearly everyone there who's died in the last couple hundred odd years would be used to Christmas being a big public holiday as the default, even if how & how much it was celebrated has radically changed. Imagine going from Americanized Christmas Mania straight to Lucifer being like "EXCUSE me, you are NOT throwing a birthday party for my ex-boss's son, don't be stupid! That's not even when his birthday is?? By royal decree the next person who attempts to go caroling is getting a pine tree shoved up their ass, don't test me. I'll give you a better birthday to celebrate, it's called Charliemas and it's on June 6, you're welcome." What a shift, from oppressively aggressive Christmasing to Christmas itself being completely oppressed. Anybody who wants to celebrate Christmas would have to be really determined and really secretive.

What if he doesn't care, though? Even at that, everyone’s still going to have to heavily rethink their relationship with Christmas.

Like, no small part of the bargain at the base of Christianity is “if you worship this dude we say is God’s kid, do the things we tell you are good, and apologize very sincerely when you do the things we tell you are unacceptable, you get to go to heaven.” If you are a Christian in Hell—and, being in Hell, with Lucifer strutting around looking like he’s ready to lead a marching band, sort of implies that your religious belief was at least partially correct—then that means somebody didn’t hold up their bargain. Is it God & Jesus, not letting you into Heaven when you did everything you believe you were SUPPOSED to be doing? Or is it you: did you fail to be the good person you were supposed to be and/or did you misunderstand what the requirements were? Those are the only two options if you’re a Christian in Hell. Either Jesus failed you or you failed Jesus.

Say you went to Hell because you were a self-righteous hypocritical douchebag who violently misinterpreted the Bible to suit your own needs and confirm your own biases, and your Christianity is fanatical but predicated on the belief that it's shaped to accommodate you. You're probably going to be absolutely furious that you're in Hell. You might blame your position on The Bad People Whom Jesus Definitely Doesn't Love, if you can find a way to twist that logic around in your head—but then, seeing you weren't rewarded for your faith like you were promised, and now that you're in a place where there are no more future rewards promised to good little Christians maybe you turn your resentment against the faith itself and the figures worshipped by this faith. Maybe you have a personal grudge against Jesus Christ himself.

On the other hand, maybe you're still a cruel person but you genuinely do believe, in your heart of hearts, that your cruelty is in line and in service to Jesus. Or maybe you compartmentalize the parts of your life where you're hurtful and spiteful from the parts of your life where you're devout and loving. Maybe you are 100% zealous worshipper—but nevertheless, the second you realize you're in Hell, you know EXACTLY what you did to end up there, and you believe heart and soul that you deserve it. You still worship Jesus because you think it's good and right and he deserves it and he's still going to save the worthy... it's just that you aren't worthy.

And then there are the "doomsday cultists." Lots of times, when people are in a "the world will end on X date" doomsday cult and that day comes and goes with nothing happening, they don't realize they were wrong and go home—they double down on their beliefs. The psychological mechanism behind this is that basically, people in a cult like that have given up their lives, families, friends, jobs, everything to serve this cult; when it looks like they gave up everything for NOTHING, they go "I can't afford to be wrong, I gave up my entire life on this belief.” For a lot of Christians who end up in Hell, they’ll probably double down on their beliefs, too—telling themselves that they didn’t spend their lives following this religion just to fail and end up damned for all time. Maybe they’ll tell themselves that if they’re good enough Christians in Hell they’ll be forgiven and allowed upstairs. Maybe once they’ve tallied up enough goodness points, maybe during the second coming, whichever. Eventually.

Or say the criteria for getting into Heaven are actually incredibly strenuous and almost everybody goes to Hell—if you say "oh my god" one time then you took the Lord's name in vain, no take backs, no second chances, no repenting undoes it, you're damned for all time. (We know so little about what gets people damned in this series that that might well be the case, it all remains to be seen.) Most people might not even know what specifically they did to end up in Hell. Some of these confused people might just exist with a vague sense of guilt, some might resent the powers that be that sent them to the shittier afterlife for seemingly no reason.

So, conclusion: if you're Christian and you're in Hell? Being in Hell is going to force you to completely reevaluate your relationship with your faith—and you’ve gotta do all that reevaluating in in a place NOT designed for healthy self-reflecton and growth! The disillusioned bigots are going to be pissed off at Jesus, the guilt-stricken zealots are going to feel ashamed to face the concept of Jesus, the “doomsday cultists” are going to be twice as intensely Christian as they ever were in life. And then there are going to be all the normal non-extremists who have to grapple with the uneasy knowledge that if they’d done things right they wouldn’t be here but here they are and now they’ve got to redefine their beliefs—or perhaps abandon them—based on the knowledge that they’re now beyond Jesus’s salvation.

AND THEN JESUS’S BIRTHDAY ROLLS AROUND HAPPY FUCKING BIRTHDAY JESUS CHRIST OH MY GOD IT’S CHRISTMAS.

There are going to be riots started by the people who feel like they shouldn’t be in Hell and are righteously infuriated by the idea of celebrating the birth of the guy they personally blame for putting them there. There are going to be riots started by the people who think they need to be as religious as possible and go into a red haze at the sight of anyone who they think isn’t living up to those standards. There are going to be broken sobbing wrecks overcome with guilt and shame at this reminder of the dude they let down. So, you know... all the usual ways people have breakdowns around Christmas, except it’s everyone having them, and it’s ten times more intense.

Even the relatively normal, well-adjusted people are going to feel kind of uneasy trying to celebrate. Like, the fact that they’re in Hell means they’re permanently on God’s naughty list. Is it, like... inappropriate to celebrate the birthday of God’s son when you’re on God’s naughty list? Like is Jesus gonna be glaring down accusatorially at them for celebrating Christmas in Hell? Christmas is supposed to be jolly, are the damned allowed to be jolly?

What about the raised-culturally-Christian atheists in Hell who, before dying, celebrated Christmas because they always had, because their family did, because their friends did, and they decided long ago that it was nice to just keep going along with it for the tree and lights and food and gifts and general goodwill-toward-man feeling even if they didn’t believe in Jesus. Being in Hell, where actual honest-to-God angels swoop down once a year and actual Lucifer is married to actual Adam’s actual first girlfriend, kind of implies that all the things they didn’t believe in are at least partially true. (And for all we know somewhere off screen Lucifer is going “oh, yeah, Jesus, met him couple times, watched him do some miracles, he’s real, look I got a photo of him here”—so it might be confirmed-confirmed, not just strongly implied, in universe. We just don’t know yet how much of Christianity is gonna be canon to Hazbin.)

So suddenly Christmas can’t really be a Santa-and-reindeer “I leave out the Jesus stuff because I don’t believe in it” celebration, because hey what do you know it looks like the Jesus stuff was probably true, so what are the atheists gonna do? Are they going to be, like, super sheepish about celebrating Christmas? Do they have to decide grimacingly whether they’re gonna start doing nativity decorations instead of Santa decorations if all that nativity shit is actually historically accurate? They lived their lives not worshipping Jesus because they didn’t believe in him, does the fact that it seems like he really is real and really is the son of God mean they’ve got to start worshipping him now, or can they just... keep not doing that? Can they keep ignoring Jesus and focusing on Santa instead? Is it okay to keep celebrating Christmas without Christ if it turns out he’s real? Even if they decide that is what they’re gonna do, boy, they’re sure gonna have to put some thought into it first.

And that's not even including the possibility that not all the characters are Christian or raised-culturally-Christian. (I say "possibility" because we know so little about the logic/mechanics/rules behind the worldbuilding in Hazbin—for all we know, people in this setting are judged only by the standards of their own religions/cultures and go to their own religions'/cultures’ respective afterlives, making everyone we see in Hell either Christian or Christian-adjacent; if that turns out NOT to be the case, then ABSOLUTELY there are going to be characters of other faiths down there somewhere.) If there are people of other faiths down there can you imagine how fucking exhausting it would be to spend your entire life having Christmas shoved in your face, dying, going to an alarmingly Christian-looking hell, and these fuckers are still shoving Christmas in your face, like “holy shit y’all are in HELL jesus is not going to be your friend if you throw him a birthday party can you shut up about christmas for five minutes I’m so tired—”

What about the imps, the demons, the ones for whom Christmas is yet another foreign cultural artifact the silly little dead humans brought in with them, the ones for whom God and all his family have always been the enemy, the ones who predate Jesus Christ himself? What’s it gonna be like being a human-loving princess of hell who might adore the fur-trimmed red robes and the bright colorful lights but who knows that this is a celebration for the son/avatar of the guy who kicked her dad out of Heaven and annually sends down exterminators to slaughter her citizens? She’s not even Christian but would she not have the most complicated emotions of anyone if she attempted to celebrate Christmas?

And sure, there’s going to be some dead humans who just, celebrate Christmas because they’ve always celebrated Christmas even if they don’t consider themselves Christian specifically because they have never put an ounce of critical thought into it, the kind of people who unironically say “but EVERYONE celebrates Christmas”/“but Christmas is basically a secular holiday now” and genuinely believe it. You know—the people who do, like, zero self-examination of their culture and are completely oblivious to how much of their moral & ethical system and understanding of how religion works on a fundamental level comes from Christianity even if they do not literally believe in God and Jesus and thus don’t consider themselves actually Christian. Those people are going to be celebrating Christmas in Hell with just as much blithe self-unawareness as they ever celebrated it in life. And those people with their complete lack of deeper meditation on the implications of their own actions, going around cheerily wishing everyone a merry merry Christmas hey it’s coming up soon aren’t you excited of course you're excited everyone’s excited for Christmas there’s nobody that doesn’t celebrate Christmas—are going to be making things very uncomfortable for everyone else, including even a great many of the hardcore religious types who persisted celebrating in Hell. That tension is going to haunt them no matter how oblivious they are.

So, basically? Absolutely nobody in Hell is going to have a normal relationship with Christmas. Nobody. Nobody. Nobody. Christmas is a reminder that either you let down your God or your God let you down; or Christmas is a reminder that all the things you never believed in were actually true all along; or Christmas is a reminder you’ve been judged unworthy.

Every single candy cane, ugly holiday sweater, and wrapped gift is laden with an implicit reminder of eternal damnation.

Christmas is going to be a weird time.

It’s going to be an extremely fucking weird time.

Let’s mix a little of that theological existential horror into our Christmas headcanons, yeah?

[purplesurveys]

1055

surveys by lets-make-surveys

1 - Surveys aside, do you use Tumblr for any other reason? Not anymore. I used to have a main blog, but it’s been years since I opened it; this is it (excuse the bad word in the URL lol, I thought it made me look like an edgy teen) but as I got older I used it less and less frequently until I no longer remember the password to log back in. These days I stay on Tumblr precisely because no one really uses it anymore, so it’s the perfect spot to hide this blog in.

2 - Do you have a lot of social media accounts? Do you update them all regularly? Depends on what you mean by a lot; I have all the basic ones - Twitter, IG, Facebook, YouTube, hell I still even have my Snapchat alive lol but I haven’t used it in like three years. I use YouTube the most but I don’t update it per se, like I just use it to watch videos. Facebook I’ve used a lot less often since the breakup, but I’ve shared a handful of posts since September. I’m probably on Twitter the most, but even then my usage hasn’t been the same.

3 - Does it bother you when your socks don’t match? What about your underwear? I don’t care for either situation, especially for underwear. Why would I care about something no one is ever going to see and even think about?

4 - How many times a year do you go on vacation? Do you tend to go to the same places each time? My family plans at least two trips, at least in non-Covid circumstances. We will sometimes repeat provinces but we never repeat hotels or sites, and we seldom repeat cities. The only places I remember visiting more than once are Baguio, Tagaytay, Albay, Subic, and Baler.

5 - How many times did it take you to pass your driving test? Just one. I could not afford to fuck it up; I was at the LTO for 8 hours and was not willing to go through that shitty long wait, so I absolutely had to pass that exam and do my best with the shitty car I had to work with.

6 - When you’re in trouble, do your parents ever “middle name” you? Nah they never used my whole name. My mom’s trademark is to add an -ah sound to my name when I’ve done something wrong though, as in Robina lol. That’s a sign I should know I shouldn’t have done what I did, whatever it is.

7 - Which family member do you look like the most? Which one do you resemble the most in terms of personality? People are always shocked to hear my mom is actually my mom and not my sister, because 1) we look very much alike, and 2) she looks young for her age. As for my personality, I’d say I’m a perfect split of my mom and dad. I exhibit an equal amount of traits they both have and I can’t tell which one I act like more.

8 - Have you ever been arrested? Never.

9 - Do you prefer Apple or Android? Apple. Would rather pay more than be stuck with an interface, camera, and emojis that I personally don’t like.

10 - Does getting sweaty or dirty bother you at all? If so, has it ever put you off doing exercise? I don’t sweat a lot, so I really do hate it when I feel beads of sweat on my temples or when the back of my shirt starts to feel damp. It doesn’t have anything to do with my feelings about exercising; I don’t like working out, period.

11 - Have you ever broken a bone? What were the circumstances that led to this happening? Never happened, hope it never happens.

12 - If you could change one thing about your appearance, what would it be? I wish I didn’t get the hairy gene so that I didn’t have to shave too much; my hair to be a little livelier and bouncier; and my front teeth to be straighter.

13 - When was the last time your computer crashed or froze? is this something that happens often? It must’ve been around a month ago. It just got too busy, so it froze for a few seconds. My laptop’s a trooper and doesn’t crash/freeze a lot.

14 - Do you ever have problems with your sleep? It’s mid-sleep I’ve been having issues with; I get nightmares almost every night. I don’t have a problem falling asleep as I’m able to do so pretty quickly.

15 - What was the last thing you ate for breakfast? Is this a normal breakfast meal for you? Angel sent over a small box of chocolate chip cookies as a Christmas gift so I’ve been enjoying that :) I’m currently having it with warm coffee. My normal breakfast is no breakfast, so this is a treat for me. Before this I also had to eat my leftover Chapaghetti that I couldn’t finish last night.

16 -  Have you ever thought about how you want to spend your retirement? That has not come to mind a lot, actually. I think more about death than I do my retirement...but this question tells me I should probably take a few steps back. I’d simply love to live in comfort with the person I end up growing old with. For now, that’s all I see myself wanting.

17 - When was the last time you got a new tattoo or piercing? Do you have any plans to get either in the future? A little less than 22 years ago; my mom had my ears pierced when I was a few months old. Haven’t gotten any new ones, nor tattoos, since. I’d love to have a couple of tattoos. Some of my ideas are two pawprints for each of my dogs, a plate of nachos, and lyrics that are personally meaningful.

18 - How would you describe your personality? Oof, what a loaded question. Hmm, I guess I’d generally label myself as hardened until I get close with someone? I’ve always kept a wall up and as friendly and extroverted as I can be, I don’t enjoy letting just anyone in. I value my personal and private space, and it’s important that I don’t lose it. 

From another angle, I also like to keep doing nice things for other people, even at the expense of my own happiness and comfort. I have to keep making people happy to keep me pleased with myself and the world. Maybe it’s rooted in the fact that I’m the eldest daughter in an Asian family? Idrk, but all I know is that I’ve never had a problem putting other people first.

19 - Have you ever heard of “hygge”? is this something you enjoy or participate in at all? I have no idea what this is and I’ve never come across this word before.

20 - What colour was the last vehicle you travelled in? Does this vehicle belong to you or someone else? White. It’s the car that was given to me for college, but when all is said and done it’s not mine.

21 - Would you describe yourself as healthy? Why or why not? In some senses yes, in other senses no. I don’t exercise or actively watch my diet, and I certainly eat too much junk; so proactively speaking, I’m not super healthy. But generally, my gene pool has been pretty fortunate with health. Other than heart conditions that run in certain branches of the family, we’re relatively a healthy bunch.

22 - Would you describe yourself as messy or organised? Is this something you would like to change? It’s a balance of both. I’m very organized at work so I allow myself to let go in my personal space, like my closet and car. I do clean up from time to time and I still like my space to be neat, but I’m not as neurotic as I normally would be with my workspace.

23 - Do you miss anything about being a teenager? If you are a teenager, what’s your favourite thing about it? The innocence. It was a period of being ideal, being a dreamer, being as romantic about life as I wanted to be. It was also a period where you were allowed to make mistakes, because fucking up when you’re younger lets you off the hook. These are the biggest things I miss, but I don’t really find myself pining for my teenage days. I still like where I am, even if things are realistically a little duller in adulthood.

24 - Are you patriotic at all? Why/why not? No. It’s hard to be when your country is shit.

25 - Have you ever had to wear a white lab coat before? Was this in school or for a job? Yeah we had lab coats in Lab class in high school, but they were green. We also needed safety goggles, and if I remember correctly if we had neither of these things we had to sit outside and skip out on the session.

26 - Would you ever want to do the same career(s) as your parents? I can see myself going down somewhere in the secretarial path like my mom as I’m good at organizing things and keeping internal affairs in order, but I don’t know if I would find it fulfilling. But in general, I wouldn’t want to be in the hotel and restaurant industry. I don’t have any attachments to it and I’ve always felt like I belonged in media and communications.

27 - Do you believe in aliens? Is there a reason why (or why not)? Yes. For the most part, it’s more comforting to think and believe that we’re not the only beings around.

28 - Which animated film would you most like to live in? Does it have to be a film? I’d love to be in the Fairly OddParents universe and have fairy godparents of my own.

29 - When was the last time you got into an argument? Have you made up with that person yet? Gab. I don’t know. She’s ignoring me.

30 - What are you going to do now this survey is over? Take another one.

--

1 - Have you ever had your computer or e-mail hacked? Did anything bad happen as a result? No but I had bad viruses on all of my Windows laptops before. The worst virus I got involved my laptop typing out some long-ass Vietnamese paragraphs for me at the most random times. It was like a horror movie lmao. Every time I Googled the text I never got any leads from it, so I never knew what it meant or what the virus was. 

2 - Do you prefer the company of people or animals? I don’t really have a preference when it comes to these two because their companionships are individually different. I like that animals can be playful and sweet; but I also like cracking jokes and having meaningful conversations with people.

3 - Are you a religious person? Were you raised in that faith or did you discover it a later date in life? I was born and raised Catholic, and still legally am. I never saw the appeal of the idea of being saved or of reading the Bible or anything that has to do with Christianity; and the idea of praying was weird to me even from childhood. A lot of Christians/Catholics I know are hypocrites anyway, and to me that says a lot about their mindset when it comes to religion.

4 - When was the last time you went to the beach? What did you do there? August 2019. My friends and I had a day trip to Nasugbu so we could have some fun before the semester started; we mostly swam and caught up with one another. August is a low season so we literally had the beach, the pool, and the poolside bar to ourselves.

5 - With all the COVID restrictions in place, would you feel happy/comfortable travelling abroad right now? Why/why not? I’d be happy, but not comfortable because of the swab test I would have to take hahaha. The selfish part of me is itching to go to other places already. I know my parents would put a million roadblocks to keep me from getting on a plane though, so me traveling is purely theoretical.

6 - How would you describe your dress sense? I like wearing flattering pieces but nothing too flashy or bright. I get items that are currently in style and make sure they match with the rest of my wardrobe, but at the end of the day I still like to blend in with the crowd and avoid neon colors, flashy labels, or whatever it is that would make me stand out.

7 - Do you wait until the sales start before you buy non-essential items? I never really pay attention to sales. It’s led to some pleasant surprises, like the other day when I was looking for a gift for my aunt. There was an H&M purse that caught my eye and it was so pretty, but way above my budget. I decided to get it anyway because that aunt throws amazing Christmas parties over the years and gives us lots of money, so I thought it could would be my way of giving back (especially since her company got hit hard by Covid). Once I got to the cashier the register showed it was like 60% off, even though there were no stickers on it and there was zero promotion anywhere in the store.

8 - What kind of milk do you prefer to drink (if you drink it at all)? I don’t drink milk, but I’m able to consume it in other dishes. I haven’t tried any types other than whole milk.

9 - Do you prefer blonde hair or brunette hair on your preferred sex? I don’t have preferences when it comes to hair color. We’re not really conditioned to consider this factor, since Filipinos have black hair.

10 - Would you be embarrassed to own the same clothing as one of your parents? No. I borrow stuff from my mom all the time. My sister also borrows some of my dad’s t-shirts, at least the ones that can fit her.

11 - When was the last time you wore some kind of fancy dress? Like...a gown? I’m not too sure. It must’ve been Alena’s debut three years ago since that’s the last fancy party I went to.

12 - Do you enjoy dressing up (ie. in suits or smart clothing)? When was the last time you did so? I like dressing up and making myself look cute, but dressing up formally not so much.

13 - What’s worse - being overdressed or underdressed? Personally, underdressed. I’d rather look too prepared than looking as if I didn’t care to look decent for whatever event I’m headed to.

14 - What do you think would be the worst thing about being stuck in solitary confinement? Not having any options or activities to do.

15 -  Have you ever owned an unusual or exotic pet? Would you want to? Nope. I would not want to have one. Unusual pet is just a euphemism for animals that shouldn’t be pets.

16 - How old were you when you learned to tie your shoelaces? I was 5 and had to learn it for a test in kindergarten.

17 - Do you enjoy decorating for the holidays? Sure, it makes me feel festive :)

18 - Would you rather go into a restaurant or just go via the drive-through? These days it’s more wise to use the drive-thru, but to be frank I’ve missed dining in. I would opt for the restaurant but make sure to follow safety protocols in the area.

19 - Do you like having your teeth cleaned at the dentist? I’ve actually always found trips to the dentist soothing, even as a kid. The only time I ever really freaked out was when I went last year to have a tooth removed and I was told that I needed an anaesthesia shot on my gums; even then, I didn’t even feel anything when it finally happened.

20 - Have you ever had a gun drawn on you before? Maybe? My cousins and friends and I doodled on each other a lot as kids.

21 - When was the last time you went to a petting zoo? I’ve never been to one and idk if I can go to one.

22 - Do you bite your nails? Could you physically bite your toenails if you stretched enough? Sometimes I’ll gnaw at my nails and then scrape them off. I’ve found it more satisfying than biting them all the way off. I could definitely bite my toenails, but I choose not to.

23 - How old were you when you first started using Tumblr? Have you had the same blog all that time? It wasssssss 2010, so I was 11 at the time. Nah, I deactivated that blog only after a year of using it and then I shifted to a wrestling blog.

24 - Are you a fan of practical jokes? If I’m watching celebrities pull it on another celebrities, yeah. Most of the time I get anxious that the recipient would react negatively, so I don’t watch a lot of pranks.

25 - How many years older and younger than you would you consider dating? Is this a concrete thing or would you make an exception for the right person? It will still depend on the latter condition, of course; but theoretically I would like to keep seeing people my exact age. No more and no less than the year 1998. Growing up with relatives in such close age to me makes me feel like I’d be dating an older cousin if it was someone a year older, and my sister if it was someone a year younger.

26 - Who did you vote for in the last US elections? If you’re not in the US, who would you have voted for? I don’t live in the US; I would have voted for Biden.

27 - Are you a fan of reddit? What are some of your favourite subreddits? Sure. I don’t visit it as much as I used to, but I still go on there when I’m bored and in need of entertaining or educational content. r/AskReddit is a classic fave of mine, but I also go on r/interestingasfuck, r/todayilearned, r/mildlyinteresting, r/dataisbeautiful, r/SquaredCircle, and r/goodmythicalmorning. Sometimes I’ll visit the r/AmItheAsshole sub as well to have some fun lol.

28 - Have you ever watched those YouTube videos of people popping their own spots or zits? Do you find them gross or fascinating? Not those, but I’ve looked up earwax extractions and blackhead removals before.

29 - What’s a food you hated as a kid but love now? How about vice versa? Chicken curry is probably my best example because I’m obsessed with all kinds of curry now, whether it’s Indian butter chicken, Thai green curry, or Japanese curry. I didn’t understand the complex flavors as a kid, but I’m got to appreciate more and more as I got older.

30 - Do you prefer socks, shoes or going bare foot? Idk, I feel like all these choices are useful and convenient in their own different situations? I’m barefoot when I’m at home but put on socks when it’s chilly, and I wear shoes when I’m outdoors.

[bladekindeyewear]

HS^2 bloggin’ mainline 2020-03-12

I have been told only a few things about the upd8 that just landed, over Discord by two people:

upd19 feat. 4,901,157 read it. now. note: the featuring note is accurate if in a different base than what you might be expecting

What the fuck does that even mean.

Okay Pretty good chapter.

...from another friend who VERY dislikes HS^2?  Oh shit.

I also glimpsed a post that may or may not have been about Homestuck at all at the top of my Tumblr feed for an instant that said “YES YES YES YES YES” in huge bold print.  I have no idea whether to be excited or nervous.

Okay, it’s not a Bonus update... let me comb through from an earlier page to be careful not to get a spoilerlook at the pagecount...

...huh.  That seems... like a conversation that would be up my alley, but not necessarily unique so far or worth all this crowing about.  I thought we were about to get Dirk-aliens with a full Horschestra backing... are we getting something else?

> CHAPTER 6. A Conversation Regarding Relevance

Hmmmmmmmm.  With the contrast between their reactions and this ominous buildup, there’s got to be a serious fun-twist coming.  Right?  --I’ll stop with that talk for the moment though.

space is vast. an unproductive statement, almost a tautology. [...]

Alright, that and the starry background are riffing the fuck off Star Trek.  Nice homage to Andrew’s roots.

the lives of the many are far too volatile and instinct-driven

Alt!Callie what the fuck are you doing.  This is intentional now.  You can’t play this off as “what’s a Star Trek”.

tautologies are, in general, reserved for stories. for narrative device. for finding new and inventive ways to tell an audience that which they already know.

God damnit she’s still doing it

neither of us ever able to convince the other of the righteousness of our stance. we were never meant to agree. it isn’t in our blood.

Blah blah overanalyzing classpect blah

when they scoff at my tautology ‘space is vast’, what do they really know? nothing. as far as any of them have experienced, space does not exist.

It’s still nice to see some real personality leak through on Alt!Callie.  We definitely know from her other self that she can develop quite a relatable and colorful one.  Have the years helped?

> ==>

dramantic pouse... ........

Also,

-look at that collar.  Damn, Callie, that is a collar

very few have stood and looked into the abyss, the true gulf of nothingness that spreads out around the single point of consciousness adrift in a constellation. all the combined weight of sentient endeavour would quail underneath that sheer, irresistible truth. the realization that they are so small, that the universe cares about their puny lives so very little. sitting in the glowing light of the stars this becomes even more apparent

In the official aspect quiz I never took the time to analyze, the aspects were put on a wheel where Space was a neighbor to Void, if I recall correctly.  I wonder how much those aspects engender feelings of goddamnit I’m doing it again aren’t I

...

are we out of orange juice?

Yesss let more personality Alt!Callie bleed through, more of it~

Wait, does Alt!Callie even taste through Jade?  Isn’t this remote control?  Is she vicariously drawing pleasure from Jade’s not-just-meat-or-candy mostly-human taste buds or?

> ==>

JADE: are you talking to me? JADE: because if you are i would like to remind you that i hate!! orange juice!!

OH FUCK YES!!! SHE’S IN THERE AND AWAKE!!! SHE STILL HAS AT LEAST ENOUGH AGENCY TO BE PRESENT AND ARGUE WITH CALLIE! YESSSSSS

no you don’t.

JADE: well i guess i never really had a strong opinion on it before JADE: but now i cant stand it!! JADE: its all you drink!

i like the pulp.

QUIT INADVERTANTLY FORCING SHIT ON JADE WITH NARRATIVESPEAK GIVE HER A BIT OF LEEWAY ALT!CALLIE YOU CONTROLLING--

JADE: its my body and i dont want orange juice! JADE: i hate pulp, and i didnt just make that up to spite you JADE: who wants strings in their juice?

i do.

JADE: ughhhhhhhhh

I have had friends hopefully fantasize about and/or therapeutically roleplay this exact situation with Jade breaking through and arguing with Alt!Callie’s control to make this all a fair bit more palatable but I didn’t dare to hope we’d get even THIS much

Maybe the HS^2 authors DO care about not leaving us wallowing in hopeless witness to the characters’ constant torture and existential turbosuffering!!!! :#D

i realize that jade’s situation is less than ideal from a characterization perspective, but i still politely point out that nobody likes a whiner.

Fuck you, this isn’t CALIBORN you’re trying to repress you asshole!  Leave Jade some AGENCY!!!!!  She deserves it!!

JADE: fuck you rude calliope inside my head!

YES EXACTLY

JADE: why dont you try being possessed by the spirit of some other version of a good friend of yours, and floated around a spaceship full of people you love JADE: unable to affect anything or say hello to anyone! JADE: then tell me about whiners!

i killed my brother and consumed him.

JADE: sounds like a you problem

Compromise and give her some agency finally come on compromise and give her some agency you red-text twatwaffle

i suggest to the witch that i have spent untold eons in the void between universes, waiting for the moment i would be needed to prevent the dissipation of reality as we know it. her appeals to emotion will not help her. i will remain unmoved.

Oh god damnit.

JADE: well i had to watch my boyfriend and my brother die in front of me on a tiny scaled version of a world that i shrunk for them! JADE: and then spend the next three years talking to myself, wracked with guilt that id killed them!

Oh. God. Damnit.  This had better not be where the Suicide trigger warning was coming from.  Are there going to be any characters left who DIDN’T emerge from this mess feeling suicidal?!?  (I mean if there were any understandable case it would be three years alone on the golden ship Jade but-- I mean COME ON, we have to discuss that in our FIRST GLIMPSE at her since the epilogues?!?)

> ==>

i remind the witch that my time was in the void, which is far darker and lonelier [...]

Oh fuck you don’t compare suffering as an excuse to COMPLETELY body-enslave and squash the agency of someone when you probably don’t have to.  You’re just doing what’s COMFORTABLE alt!Callie admit it.  There’s a way you could give her some leeway, I’m almost positive.

JADE: even if i had the powers of a first guardian, my brain still worked in modules of human pattern recognition! JADE: three years is a long time for a human teenager, i dont care how many of her molecules are made of a god!

(i love it when jade talks smart, that bit of the epilogues was a treat too, plz reveal more of the big brain on jade)

It seems Jade can’t see or quite understand the full import of there being a “narrative”.  Or THINKS she cant, because she still says:

JADE: your voice is impossible to read and i cant see your face

If she’s “reading” alt!Callie’s remarks, that means she’s breaking through to understand the narrative to SOME extent.  She might be one of the ones who learns to do that a little more and better in the future, especially with alt!Callie almost unintentionally training her to see it.

> ==>

Oh, good.  So A!C’s not above being considerate.  That’s a step in the right direction.

> ==>

D’aww, Jade conceding and trying to empathize like her usual self.  I appreciate it.  :)  --but Alt!Callie’s definitely in the wrong here.

JADE: but i think it is a very natural thing to be silly when you are used to being able to control your own body, but now cant

i will allow that, yes.

Thanks.  Learn some damned reason.

jade smiles. dave and karkat will always be a source of pain for her, a low ache somewhere in her center of gravity, but she is happy for them. she knows that there is really no other alternative for how to be. they chose each other over her, and they always will. they are the two people who matter to her the most in every universe, and that will not change, no matter how much she wishes it would, no matter how--

JADE: do you actually know that?

pardon me?

Oh, shit.

JADE: do you actually know that im doomed to pine over dave and karkat across every iteration of reality? JADE: like, can you actually see that? JADE: because youre a space player, like i am. JADE: i know that you are more powerful than me, but i dont think you can see other timelines any better than i can JADE: so i think you are just being dramatic JADE: for the “audience”, whatever the heck that means

i experience a moment of unease as jade looks at me. keeping her out of my thoughts is proving to be more difficult than i had first assumed it would be.

That’s a damned interesting question.  I was giving the narrative the benefit of the doubt, but given everything the Epilogues warned us about when it came to the narrators and alt!Callie’s occasional slips into her own bias, I really should have known better.

i had begun confident that i could keep her consciousness sleeping peacefully inside the shell of her body, tamed and quiescent, but she has proved to be more irascible than i initially gave her credit for.

JADE: heheh JADE: i have never been particularly tamable, and my consciousness is huge!

This might end up playing out more like my friend’s Jade-breaks-out roleplays than I initially assumed.  (What does she mean “huge consciousness” though?  Superpowered due to part-First-Guardian, like she alluded earlier in the conversation?  That never got much play before, so it’s great to see that potential realized here a bit...)

> ==>

...I’m a fucking idiot.  Of COURSE “huge consciousness” and the whole line around it was just an unsubtle double-entendre.  A small part of me actually wondered if it was and dismissed it as a clumsy reading in an instant.  How stupid am I?  Jade is the best.

If only this sort of thing worked on Cherubs.

> ==>

Yeah.  It really doesn’t.

...Alt!Callie, you are a fucking war-criminal for bottling all these double-entendres up where none of the others can appreciate them.

> ==>

JADE: you are a pretty tough crowd, evil callie JADE: but yes, i can hear most of what you are thinking to yourself JADE: it took a little while to separate it from my own thoughts, just like it did with dirk JADE: because thats what he was doing the whole time, wasnt it? JADE: controlling our thoughts JADE: making us believe things we never would, things he thought we SHOULD believe

Fucking excellent.  She’s definitely training herself on this shit.  The more people who have a harder time getting fooled by this nonsense the better.

jade knows all of this, i don’t have to tell her. she is a very bright girl, and even if she didn’t have partial access to my thoughts, she is good at compiling data and using it to fill in gaps. as she herself had rather licentiously mentioned, her brain is quite large.

C:

and all of these reasons are why i know i can count on her to be reasonable and realistic about her situation. i need a body to continue interfacing with this timeline, and her body is the only one that will do.

Dammit.  Trying to get her to logic her way back into keeping Alt!Callie in complete control.  That’s a tactic that will probably work.  :(

what about [kanaya], jade? she is a space player, it is true, but her powers are nothing compared to yours. for one, she isn’t god tier, and for two, she is dead. a living dead, but dead nonetheless.

Hm.  Are you saying she maybe has less relevance, less of an effect on her surroundings because she spent some of her “cred” on unconventional partial resurrection?  To the extent where she’d make a less influential vessel?  Hmm.

For that to even matter, you have to be planning to use Jade’s Space powers too.  Taking a far more active role in things than narrative beacon.

and a sylph’s specializations lie on a different end of the spectrum from my own. a witch is a far closer match.

!!!!!

Sounds like details of the classpect system that we don’t know will have relevance in HS^2, and we’re indeed gonna possibly get some actual new, clearer details about the system Andrew invented unlike the dearth of new info the Epilogues brought us.  That is... promising.

no, jade understands and sympathizes with my assurance that her body, and her body alone, will do for my purposes.

JADE: um...no i dont!

YES.  Jade is now officially immune to absolute command! :D :D :D

she does. after all, she would not wish this sort of state of being on anyone else, and especially not on one of her friends. jade may have undergone a lopsided number of narrative hardships in her life, but at least she is used to them. why spread that suffering to another?

What the fucking shit???  You’re using that on her?  You think it’ll WORK?!

jade understands and accepts her place in the story, which has always been to enable events to play out around her, just as it has been mine.

..........yeah Jade’s gonna bust the fuck out on the very next page, isn’t she.

What the fuck is Alt!Callie thinking, here?  Wasn’t the other Calliope the one to let us know that the Witch is one of the most active classes there is??  ...what exactly does a Witch officially do anyway, for Alt!Callie to think saying such a thing wasn’t dead wrong?  This sounds MUCH more like the sort of statement someone might make after breezing through Homestuck and confusing the old Jade (cough) for the person she grew up into.

And the fact that you’re phrasing this as a narrative command to try and make her forcibly THINK this way deserves you a smack in the non-literal depictive face.  Let’s see if you get one:

> ==>

Oh wow, no smack yet?!  That’s some restraint!

because what is a story, truly? nothing but a series of misadventures and connections, actions spurring reactions, tumbling into one another, over and over and over. with so many competing interests, clearly the story cannot account for all perspectives, for all threads? it would be laughable, childish, even selfish, to demand that they do.

in other words, not everyone will achieve a happy ending. this is a truth that jade had come to grips with a long time ago.

JADE: wait. JADE: stop. JADE: why are you saying all of this?

Ohh.  Because she still had even MORE smackworthy stuff left to say, to make the smack even SMACKIER, didn’t she.  Alt!Callie you asshole.  If this gets you kicked out of her almost entirely and jeopardizes the crew as Jade struggles to combat Dirk’s narrative influence on her OWN, then I’m fucking blaming YOU!  Do you realize how horrible it’ll be if Dirk gets to almost singlehandedly write the whole story around her and the others for the first section of HS^2 with only one or two characters aware and trying to mentally avert it??  We already TRIED that in the Epilogues!  It was awful!

jade’s body is my vessel, and it is through this realization that she will understand her true role in the story. her true relevance.

Go fuck yourself, Alt!Callie.  Read the audience a bit!

if i released my hold on her consciousness, there would be no guarantee that i would be allowed in again. therefore i cannot permit her the control of herself that she so desperately craves, and she understands that.

THAT’S your reasoning your used-to-surpressing-Caliborn ignorant--!??

JADE: wait. so...you could give me my body back, and then just hop back in when you need to?

in theory, yes.

JADE: then what the hell callie!

because i don’t trust you to cooperate when the time comes.

MotherfuckerTheMusical.mp4

(or real existing equivalent that’s just off the top of my head)

JADE: why not? JADE: i thought you said i was a reasonable girl with a huge brain!

you are, to an extent.

she is. but the truth of the matter remains that humans are capricious and emotional. and even jade herself can admit that she hasn’t been the most...committed example of her species in the last few years.

Oh my fucking god.  I know they’re trying to make this more satisfying when she actually DOES take control in a few panels, but, Alt!Callie, seriously, get more on your other self’s level!!!

> ==>

Yes, please >:O some more

moving from lover to lover, job to job, interest to interest. over the last few years jade had found herself listless, unable to settle and unwilling to commit to anything or anyone. she knows there’s nothing wrong with that on a moral level, but on a personal level she’s always believed that she could be more, could do better. be better. and now, because of this, she realizes that sacrifices must be made.

and that she, as a space player, is uniquely built for sacrifice.

JADE: yeah JADE: i guess youre right JADE: i have been such a silly little slut! JADE: hey callie

yes, jade?

JADE: oh my god, whats that!!!!

You are so fucking screwed Alt!Callie.

this space is utterly under my control. jade could control it too, if she had any access to her own powers. but with my grip around her cortex, there is no chance of that.

(Wait, there’s an extent to which this space is “real” and not imaginary?  Or does holding her space powers in check also mean keeping her imaginary space powers in check?)

Anyway, here comes the smack.  And, though Alt!Callie deserves this, I hope Dirk isn’t let in too often amidst the others as a result.

> ==>

Yup, poising to pounce...

> ==>

I thought there was a weird infinity symbol underneath them but it’s just two spotlights and a shadow cast by her head.

and here i make my first mistake.

No you made your first mistakes WAAAY earlier in this conversation.  And what you did to Jade in general.  She’s a hero/player for a reason, she doesn’t take stuff lying down forever.

but bringing her into a place where we can both physically manifest has left me, foolishly, vulnerable.

First, physically manifest?  This isn’t pure imaginationspace?  And second, she’s going to blame her polite concession to Jade for this and hold on even tighter the next time, isn’t she.  God damnit, not looking forward to that.  Alt!Callie won’t learn her lesson til the end, will she?  :(

her fingers tear at my throat, trying to find purchase. she won’t be able to kill me here, but it is certainly unpleasant, and not to mention slightly repetitive. we just saw this in the previous chapter, although this particular fight will not end as amorously as the last one did. so don’t get your hopes up.

JADE: who! JADE: are you talking to!

I really hope Jade ends up with full narrative powerOOOOOHHHH FUCK THEY COULD GO FOR THAT HUH

Dirk was able to become an Ultimate Self in his own body because it was the uniting of an irrepressible “self” that he always unbreakably represented.  The others had more trouble.

But Jade

has a BIG PART-GOD BRAIN as reinforced in the narrative repeatedly!!

Meaning that later, SHE could Ultimate Self without ANY PHYSICAL CONSEQUENCE.  :D

I was hoping Jade would end up with full narrative-dictating-and-reading power when she wants to use it, at some point, but I might’ve been aiming too low! :D :D :D

Yaaaaaaaaaaaay

Now all the playfully-horny omnipotent Jade fanfics are true, what that totally isn’t part of why I love this go ahead and admit she doesn’t deserve it

> ==>

Yesss flashy gif struggle against control!  (Though, not as elegant as one of Andrew’s might’ve been. Gotta say.)

> ==>

Blinky-eyes about to resolve normal-Jade-colored....!

> ==>

Wait, what?  I thought Jade was about to snap in and--

during the ship’s trip through space, there have been numerous experiments; modifications to the nutrition output of the various machines designed to create sustenance for the various species on board. i myself have been content with orange juice and synthetic proteins, but dave and roxy have both expressed longing for various ‘earth snacks’, and so the trials and errors began.

What the fuck?  I don’t even know where this is going if it’s punways.

Is there like a dog treat somewhere that’s gonna push her over the edge?  Where is this headed even.

> ==>

Wh...

WHa??????

the results were mixed. as roxy told us in a previous chapter, alchemized food all sort of tastes the same, although the visuals really help to bring about the flavor. and at the end of the day, isn’t it the journey that is more important than the destination? the stories you tell as you create the strangely flavored nutritional paste?

JADE: ????????????

Um??  What’s even going on.

so far, everyone’s favorite attempt has been a vaguely peanut-butter and chocolate flavored creation called "Rices'". nobody eats them really. they just sit in a bowl on the counter.

i’m not actually sure what the witch is trying to accomplish here.

Is Jade trying to humorously gross Alt!Callie out of her body with a candy she doesn’t like or?  But, “suicide threat”? Why joke--

JADE: you dont? JADE: really?

i don’t know what she is trying to accomplish, because surely she would not be doing what it appears she is trying to do. making such a meaningless threat.

JADE: meaningless? JADE: do you even know anything about the body you stole? JADE: shouldnt you have run some sort of psychic physical before you possessed it? JADE: its definitely what i would have done!

Oh SHIT.  You mean Jade has the same peanut allergy JOHN does?!?

> ==>

jade must know that i am well-aware of her family-wide peanut allergy. a story thread that has been extremely important and weighed in on in multiple parts of the narrative. how could i have forgotten such a key detail?

...yes, she totally forgot, but more than that.

I’m betting John is the ONLY one with a peanut allergy.  That Jade is USING that fact to bluff like hell.  :D

(Allergies aren’t usually inherited that way you alien!)

there is nothing remotely just or heroic about dying from self-imposed anaphylactic shock in the throes of a childish tantrum. at the most i’ll get a relaxing few minutes of sleep.

Is Alt!Callie bluffing now?  Even a resurrecting death could throw her off.

> ==>

FUCK YES JADE.

JADE: do you really want to risk it?

what are you talking about, jade? i just said--

FUCK YES JADE, BE A HUGE WITCH

(i say in the most witch-connotatively and non-classpect-related way)

JADE: i dont know, callie JADE: ive never really understood the rules that govern the death of a god tier, have you? JADE: it seems pretty arbitrary from where im standing JADE: who makes the decision whether or not something is heroic or just?

...that’s unclear. but it certainly isn’t you.

JADE: right, of course not JADE: but are you so confident that youre a good guy? JADE: are you sure that the alpha timeline WANTS you to be here?

...what.

JADE: youve done some stuff, callie JADE: im only saying you shouldnt be so quick to assume that me killing you wouldnt be just JADE: and that taking my own life to do it wouldnt be heroic

Even with JUST this one fucking situation Alt!Callie put her in, throwing off her control forever by dying would be shortsighted but HELLA JUST.  What Alt!Callie is doing to her is a crime.

Oh shit!?!?

> [S] ==>

What is this, HTML5?  *clicks play*

...for a second, I thought this was gonna launch into a huge thing with that clock ticking song from the Felt album.

Having Rose and Dirk’s colors competing here really reinforces that... Prospit vs Derse vibe that was feeding the whole this-is-the-basis-for-the-game’s-structure-and-the-birth-of-Paradox-Space theory more earlier.

> ==>

i don’t let the witch manipulate me. i refuse to falter in the face of her whispers. without my careful planning and swift action, the prince would have taken full control over this timeline. none of my friends could even begin to imagine the turmoil.

In the end, you’re ignoring what’s right and brave in this instance to instead do something EXPEDIENT, to the exclusion of trust and compassion when things COULD work out just as well without taking the worst actions -- which is textbook villainous.

> ==>

JADE: they arent your friends!! JADE: you took them from me!

Now isn’t THAT a way to put it. :D :D :D

Alt!Callie is sinning almost as badly as Dirk, here.  Viewing everyone else as characters in a story, the only way she’s ever viewed “friends”, and her as the not-so-humble narrator doing what’s best for all of them.  If she’s going to win against Dirk -- or if that victory is going to MEAN anything -- she will HAVE to realize that she needs to be different.

JADE: you keep saying that youre doing all of this for my own good, but youre just lonely! JADE: i know you are, because so am i!

Ouch.

Will Alt!Callie force her to swallow it?

JADE: you said that being a space player is all about sacrifice JADE: well

> ==>

JADE: bet

...I guess she really might have an allergy.

> ==>

Aaaand the candy drops.  A W A K E ! ! ! !

Yaaaaay Jade is BACK and we’ll get to see even more of her!!!

...please tell me on the next page she grabs the candy, noms it, and mentions she doesn’t have a peanut allergy after all.  That would be sweet.

> ==>

...

Nope, you just leave us on a sad.  Dammit, why do you gotta be all adult and showin’ us both sides in a moment of triumph, HS^2.  Shucks.

Anyway, YAY JADE!  C:

I am happy by this, if slightly too emotionally-rollercoastered by the past 24-hours to give this the full-rejoicing it deserves.  That, and worried about the openings Dirk will get because of this... joy now for potential frustration later, even if Jade tries her best to let Alt!Callie back in in-time.

See y’all next time!  And, uhm.  I guess I’ll comment on whatever other asks I promised to comment on another less-eventful day.  Keep reminding me and holding me to it though!

[maybemarvelbaby]

Freckle

A/N: So, this is my first work on tumblr, I hope you enjoy it! <3

Paring: soulmate!Peter Parker x Reader

Warnings: Strong Language, Angst, Fluff

AU: Soulmate (tattoo)

Notice:

(Y/N) = Your Name

(Y/H/T) = Your Hometown

(Y/H/C) (Y/E/C) = Your Hair/Eye Colour

Everyone has a tattoo that they are born with, well almost everyone. There are a few unlucky souls who are born without the privledge of the universe giving them a permanent marking. ‘What is the importance of a silly tattoo?’ You may be asking, well it’s a lot more important than you might think.

In this world, people are born with two halves. One is you and the other, your soulmate. If you are fortunate enough to be given a soulmate (although it is more uncommon to not have one) you will bear a unique tattoo somewhere on your body. The only copy of said tattoo with be on the body of your soulmate in the same place that it is on you.

You’ve lived your whole life wondering where your tattoo was, that was until your parents broke the news to you. You didn’t have one.

Needless to say, you were devastated. You had spent almost 15 years of your life assuming your tattoo was somewhere you couldn’t see it, but it wasn’t anywhere on you. It crushed you to know that all of the fantasies you had about meeting your soulmate would never come true. But, as time went on, you learned that it was okay. That there are other people without a soulmate that still need love, so you decided that the universe had actually blessed you, instead of giving you a curse.

Three years after you discovered you had no soulmate, you had finally accepted it, and decided to find someone like you.

“(Y/N)!! Come sit over here!!” The calls from your best friend, Michelle Jones (though everyone called her MJ), echoed across the cafeteria, snapping you from your thoughts. You quickly made your way across the cafeteria to sit next to her.

You and MJ had been friends since diapers, until in the third grade when she moved from (Y/H/T) to Queens. You two still communicated often and your parents set up countless play dates.

Needless to say, you were estastic when your father landed a new job in Queens and received the news that your little family of four would be moving there. Your little sister, on the other hand, was not as excited. She had just found her soulmate, they had a matching set of white daisies tattooed on the back of their right hands, and she was not too keen on leaving her. Though family came first, and she had to leave her love behind.

“Hey MJ! It’s been what, like, 6 months since we last hung out?” You asked, easily striking up a conversation.

“Yeah, now that you live here though, hanging out won’t be as expensive.” She laughed at her own joke, the laughter soon doubling as you remembered how expensive it was to get plane tickets once a month.

“I’m so glad I’m here.” You smiled.

“Me too, oh! By the way, I want you to meet a few people.” Her eyebrows lifted and her eyes grew wide as a big smile etched across her face. She turned your attention to the three boys that sat across you.

“Hey there! I’m Jason. MJ has told us a lot about you, it’s good to finally put a face to the name.” The first boy said, his blonde hair and blue eyes barely catching your attention as soon as he stuck his hand out. You noticed a small rose tattooed across his upper arm. You gasped when you noticed the familiar sight.

“Oh my god! MJ! You didn’t tell me you found your soulmate!” You exclaimed, faking frustration with your friend. She scoffed and rolled her eyes affectionately.

“Yeah that’s him, now hurry up and meet the other two.” She replied.

The second boy perked his head up and smiled widely in your direction, the outline of a thin heart, full of complex designs was located right below his jaw.

“Hi! I’m Ned.” He said extending his hand like the boy before him did. You shook it smiling.

“(Y/N), nice to meet you.”

The last boy was seemingly distracted by whatever he was writing in his little notebook. A small, black spider marking sat on his left thumb. Ned noticed the boy’s lack of attention to the current situation and nudged his friend in the side, before nodding his head in your direction.

“O-oh, sorry. Hey, umm, I’m Peter. You must be (Y/N). MJ has been crazy about you moving here all week.” He chuckled nervously, scratching the back of his neck. You smiled at him warmly and his anxiety seemed to fade.

The five of you spent the rest of lunch together, talking about god knows what and making the stupidest jokes. MJ seemed to notice the quick friendship that you and Peter managed to form, smirking lightly to herself.

Soon, the bell rang, signalling it was time to head back to classes. You stood up and walked out with MJ, the boys insisting that you two go ahead and that they will clean up the table, allowing you to get a much needed five minutes of girl time.

“So...” MJ started, “No tattoo still?”

You shook your head scoffing to yourself. “Nope.”

“I’m sorry, (Y/N)... I know how bad you wanted a soulmate.” MJ said sighing.

“It’s okay, MJ. There are other people like me who don’t have one, I’m just gonna do my best to make do with what I got.”

MJ nodded, before leaning in to whisper in your ear, “Word of warning, you might wanna tattoo something on yourself with a pen or something because Flash Thompson loves to pick on people who don’t have soulmates. He’s pretty brutal about it too.”

You nodded in agreement as the two of you walked into your shared chemistry classroom, sitting at the same lab table. You pulled out a pen before quickly drawing two lines encircling the ring finger of your left hand. You showed it off the MJ.

“That’s kinda cute, honestly. Simple, but cute.” She said taking yo ur hand to admire it. Peter soon walked in and noticed the two of you, walking over to stand in front of your lab table.

“No soulmate?” He asked, “Don’t worry, I won’t tell.” He mimicked a sipping motion across his lips and you chuckled, muttering a quiet ‘thanks’ as he left to go sit at the table behind you.

Before you knew it, school was already over. It was faster than you originally thought, and you assumed it has to do something with how much fun the people you made friends with were.

Everyday you were in school for seemed to go by in the blink of an eye, and before you knew it, it was already the end of the second quarter. You and Peter’s friendship had grown fast. You learned about how he had no idea who his soulmate was, and he often seemed uncomfortable talking about soulmate business, so you often did your best to not bring it up.

Because it was almost the end of the first semester, midterms were coming up. You were a straight A student, with over a 95 in every class, except for one, Spanish. In said class, you had a 90, and it was killing you. You weren’t bad at Spanish, in fact, the language came almost naturally to you. You could write and understand it with ease. The part you had trouble with was speech. You knew how to pronounce each word and how to properly for sentences, but your teacher was a little bit over enthusiastic. He made it a point to give you a partner each week, and the two of you would have to present a little skit (spoken in Spanish of course) in front of the rest of the class. The stage-fright that you got was almost ridiculous. You would freeze up and stumble over your words, often throwing your partner off course and ending things badly for the both of you. The midterm assignment was no different.

Instead of a test, your Spanish teacher decided to pair everyone up and have them prepare a 15 minute conversation that each group would present privately to the teacher. Luckily, you managed to get the one person you trusted most in your Spanish class, Peter. He was practically fluent in the language and he didn’t give you the same anxious feeling when he was around you.

The two of you decided that it may be a good idea to head to his apartment after school and begin working on the project. So, that’s exactly what you did.

The two of you raced to his apartment complex, and you beat his to the elevator, holding onto the wall so you could steady yourself and catch your breathe. No less than three seconds later, Peter was in the elevator, hand on the opposite wall and chest heaving. He glanced at you and the two of you make eye contact. A light laugh erupted from the both of you as you humoured yourselves at your shared childishness. The elevator opened as soon as your heart finally stopped racing, and you two went down the hall and into his apartment. A young looking woman stood in the kitchen, scraping burnt food off of a nonstick cooking pan.

“Hey Aunt May! This is (Y/N), we’re gonna be in my room practicing for our Spanish assignment.” Peter called out. Aunt May whipped her head around and a wide smile spread across her face.

“Hello, it’s nice to meet you, I’m Peter’s Aunt May.” She greeted.

“Hello ma’am, it’s nice to meet you. Peter talks very affectionately about you.” You replied with a polite smile, extending your hand. She blushed and chuckled.

“Honey, please. Call me May.” She chuckled, ignoring your request for a hand shake and wrapped her arms around you instead. “We don’t do handshakes, we give hugs.”

You stiffened for only a moment before relaxing and accepting the hug.

“Dinner will be ready soon, if I don’t burn it again.” She said, drawing back from the hug and allowing you and Peter to go back to his room and get to work.

“Sorry about her, she kinda touchy.” Peter chuckled nervously.

“It’s alright Peter, I don’t mind.” You replied comfortingly, a small sigh of relief escaped his lips, and you giggled.

“Let’s get to work. Shall we?” He asked, clasping his hands together.

“Sure,” you nodded, “where do you want to start?”

“Umm... I’m not sure. Why don’t we just say whatever comes to our minds in Spanish.” Peter suggested.

“Alright sure ummm.....” you tapped your index finger on your chin, thinking of what to say, “Mi pelo es (Y/H/C) y mis ojos son (Y/E/C)?”

“That’s works okay, umm... Me gustan tus ojos. Son muy bonitos.” You blushed at his words.

“Gracias. Me gusts tu cabello rizado, es muy lindo.” His cheeks flushed with pink when you spoke and he cleared his throat.

“Me gustan muchos tus labios.”

“Me gustan tus labios también.”

Peter face grew hot and he shifted nervously before speaking his next words. “¿Puedo besarte?”

Your face flushed bright red. The quiet ‘sí’ you tried to say barely left your mouth before his lips were on yours. For a moment, it felt right, until you realised that it wasn’t. You suddenly pushed his off of you. He looked back at you, eyes wide in shock.

“What the hell are we doing Peter?!” You squeaked, “What the fuck was that?! I don’t know what you’re doing but you need to cut it out, now!”

“(Y/N)... what are you talking abou-”

“No, shut it, Parker,” You snapped, regretting it slightly as he winced at the way his name left you lips. “You know I don’t have a soulmate! We both know that you do! What kind of friend are you that you lead me on like that?!”

“(Y/N)... I-I ne-”

“I don’t care Peter. I’m going to talk to Mr. Valdes tomorrow and ask to switch partners. I can’t work with you if your gonna do that shit... I’m sorry Peter. I don’t belong to you...” You grabbed your bag and grabbed te handle of the door, but before you could turn the knob, a sticky string stopped you. You whipped your head around to see Peter, looking at you determined and hopeful.

“(Y/N)... there are a couple things I have to tell you.”

You sigh, and decide maybe it was in the moment and that he just wanted to apologize or something, so you stopped fighting the web on your hand and nodding, signaling him to go on.

“Okay uh... the first one is that I uh... I am... umm...”

“Spit it out Parker!” You said, frustrated.

“I don’t have a soulmate.”

Your eyes grew wide, “W-what?”

“This isn’t my tattoo...” he stated as he grabbed a tissue and wiped the small spider tattoo off of his thumb. “I don’t have a soulmate either.”

“P-Peter... I am so sorry... I didn’t know.”

“It’s okay. I was kinda happy that you didn’t have one either... I kinda like you a lot.”

“I like you too Peter. Now, care to explain what this is?” You asked motioning to the web with your free hand.

“Oh yeah, I’m also kinda Spider-Man.”

“You’re just full of surprises aren’t you Peter Parker?” You asked affectionately. He chuckled before grabbing you left hand, since it wasn’t glued to the door knob. You looked down at them and suddenly another surprised gasp left you lips.

“Peter? What is that?” You asked, pointing to a small dot on his left thumb, under where the spider was.

“Oh, that? It’s just a freckle in think. I was born with it.” He shrugged.

“Peter... I don’t thinks that’s a freckle.” You smiled, shaking your head. His eyebrows creased in confusion.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, I think that’s your tattoo.”

“Why would you say that?”

“Because Peter,” you looked up again, catching his eyes in an affectionate gaze, “I have the same ‘freckle’ on my hand as well.”

An excited gasp left his lips.

“Y-you mean?”

“Yes, Peter, we are soulmates.” You laughed and his smile grew wider and he hugged you tight. He pulled back from the hug before capturing your lips in a loving kiss.

The next day at school, you told MJ all about the previous night’s events.

“Well, show me the tattoo then.” She said. You lifted up your left hand and pointed to the little black dot on your finger. She scoffed lightly and rolled her eyes affectionately.

“That is the dumbest tattoo I’ve ever seen.” She teased and you just laughed with her.

“The universe works in mysterious ways.”

[thewebcomicsreview]

Homestuck 2 Liveblog, Part 3 

(See older parts here or on Tumblr here)

Chapter 3: How Are your feelings

We’ve got a new ship, which appears to have sails for some reason, and it’s either rocketing forward with determination, or crashing. Presumably, this is the ship containing the Meatworld Crew, who set out to rescue Rose from Dirk’s mind control. God, this plot is so complicated.

In anyone else’s hands, this is just a microphone. In my hands it’s a pipe boat. 

The one spoiler I had for this chapter was that the ship design was stupid, and...yes. That says “Grandpa Harley” a lot more than the Theseus did, though I don’t think Canon Jake ever smoked.

Oh boy, the narration text is in the first person. It’s also lowercase, so one presumes this is Calliope, in Jade’s body? I thought Calliope was trying to maintain the role of invisible narrator, though, and she’s calling attention to herself more obviously than any of the other narrators.

Me on my way to steal your girl by possessing her and floating around all creepy for three years

JADE: the prince’s power grows.

KARKAT: JESUS CHRIST!

Heh. This art is really nice. Jade’s speaking in Calliope’s red text, so she is indeed possessed by Calliope. Poor Jade. Homestuck proper is 8,192 pages. The epilogue is 100,000 words, and we’re 100 pages into Homestuck 2. Jade has been stuck on a boat, possessed, unconscious, dead,possessed again, or otherwise out of the story since Cascade, all the way back on page 4,109. No wonder she became a hedonist. Of course, who’s fault is it that Jade missed the final battle.

(From Homestuck 1). 

I always read this as foreshadowing that Jade would get a big moment, and it never happened. Hopefully someone on the writing team remembers that Jade is supposed to roar to life and show everyone who’s the real master. But for now, alas, the real master is Calliope, hypocritically fighting for the free will of all by taking Jade out of the story again. Anyway, that was a long tangent and a lot of search (give me back the .txt file of the whole comic, Viz!) back to Homestuck 2.

Oh hey, DaveKat is canon now, I forgot. It’s mildly annoying that Dave and Calliope are in the same scene with the same text color, but whatev.

Aww, Karkat’s wearing Dave’s shirt. How cute. Less cute: Calliope’s added her red to Jade’s outfit, including her logo. She’s really just as evil as Dirk, isn’t she?

Also, I don’t know if this sprite style quite works for a “leaning up in bed pose”

This just looks odd. Probably doesn’t help that we’re see Dave without shades for I believe the first time ever.

KARKAT: OH, PARDON THE FUCK OUT OF ME FOR OVERREACTING A LITTLE WHEN MY GOOD FRIEND "POSSESSED JADE" BUSTS INTO MY RESPITEBLOCK AT 5 AM!

Aw, I missed this, a Karkat tantrum.

I like this dynamic. But if they’ve been on this boat as long as Dirk has been on his, Jade’s been possessed for three years.

Why are Dirk and Calliope’s powers growing, though? Especially Calliope, shouldn’t she be maxed out by now? She literally ate Lord Engl-

....

Oh

Calliope is powerful enough to escape Candyland because she ate Lord English, and Lord English is partially comprised of Dirk, so there’s quite literally a little bit of Dirk inside Calliope right now. That’s maybe something to keep in the back of our minds, but now I’m theorycrafting. 

The only way twenty-somethings can afford an apartment this night is if they live somewhere with a killer commute, which is why it takes three years to get anywhere

Okay, phew. So this Roxy is trans, but the Roxy on Candyland isn’t. That’s something I’m going to have to be careful to remember lest I use the wrong pronoun for the wrong one and everyone gets mad at me.

Dirk, like the coffee, getting roasted here

So, has this crew not been chasing Dirk for three years, or has Dave just been all “I sure am comfortable with you being trans now” incessantly from age 23 to age 26? I guess that’s pretty in-character for him. Everyone seems to not be used to a situation they should be used to be now so far, but maybe that’s just for our benefit as readers who can’t remember all this nonsense? 

I love how Kanaya the Fashion Troll is basically the only character in the entire franchise to go “Fuck I haven’t been onscreen in over ten years I should change my look”. The big bow is Rose’s from way back when her and Kanaya first met, which is a cute nod. 

Okay I get that they want to remind these things to the reader, but Dave. Dude. She’s your sister-in-law. She’s been your sister-in-law for 7 to 10 years depending on how long you’ve been on that boat and she’s been a vampire that whole time. Someone give this boy a set of flash cards, Jesus Christ! 

OBVIOUS FORESHADOWING ALERT: This story is about a “young prince”, and this is going to be a metaphor. The young prince is Dirk, the Prince of Time, and the Rose is....Rose. 

Aww, this is cute. I should have put on Kanaya’s Theme while reading this, it fits the mood of the scene really well.

Oh man, none of these people know John’s dead

fffffffffffffffff

Okay, so that’s 7 years between the end of Homestuck 1 and the Homestuck Epilogues. Dirk’s been on his boat for three years, but we’re with the Meat Crew at the start of their journey, (which means Roxy only recently came out as trans, which I guess makes it less weird that Dave is still processing it).

But god, this is a lot of timelines to keep track of. I guess it’s fun in a way, being intensely convoluted was part of the fun of trying to piece together Homestuck 1′s plot, but I think I’m this close to busting out a white board where and how old everyone is actually fuck it

God as my witness, I will one day have a vague understanding of what the fuck is going on in Homestuck and I will die trying! 

This seems metatextual, in that the characters are more complete when they have like a goal and stuff. Or it might be the Homestuck 2 writers taking a subtle jab at the Epilogue writers, that everyone’s better off having left the epilogues behind and moving on to Homestuck 2. That might be reading too much into it. 

Of course, as soon as I say that we cut from Dave talking about how everything’s better to Karkat talking about how everything’s worse.

Wait, non-god Calliope is on the ship? UGH, the whiteboard already needs to be updated! The epilogues implied she was too scared of god-Calliope to leave her room, so I’d assumed she’d stayed behind. Damn it.

Heh. Also: Huh? Karkat is making a lot of assumptions here, given that Terezi, Sollux, and Aradia are all alive, he never saw Gamzee die, and Vriska dying just made her more powerful.

And that’s the update! I like these character interactions, even though they’re mostly just sitting around and naval-gazing like in Act 6 and the epilogues, because at least it’s got some jokes it feels like it’s all going somewhere. And starting next month, it’s going to be going there twice as fast

[and-i-uh]

6? 22? Any other number you wanted to answer?

6- i dont have any stim toys, ive never really delved into that stuff, i was never really given the chance to explore stuff that would help me out with stimming and such. I also dont think i would like stim toys? Maybe i just have to try some but idk.

22- idk any specific songs i stim to. But ive stimmed while listening to mcr, and honestly i just stim to alot of the general songs i listen to. I really like singing along, i think thats a stim of mine, and some songs just listening to them is like stimming (anything with drums and/or guitars)

2- i like blankets a lot. Even if im hot and dont really need one, ill subconsciously grab the blanket on the couch and put it on my lap, and on my bed. There was one day i grabbed a pocket-sized beanie baby and put itin my hoodie pocket, and just knowing it was there made me happy. Also when i was with my friends one of them stuck their hands in my pocket and i panicked and like moved it out of their reach bc i was scared to get made fun of lol, it ended up being fine. I sleep with stuffed animals a lot. I think thats it

3- my school experiences were,,, not fun at all. Theres a lot to unpack there. My schools all had this thing called a “504 plan” or whatever. And it’s supposed to help people with certain disorders/disabilities. Mine only acknowledged my adhd as far as i know. Maybe my anxiety too. Some of the things that were supposed to ‘help’ were moving me to the front of the room, i got extended time to complete stuff (supposedly), extended time on certain tests (which i only saw on the act, literally i got no other extended time to do anything else. And after i got extended time on the act my scores shot up. Imagine the potential if i was given my actual extended time shit) and the meetings were hell. They started to have meetings with me in middle school, sixth grade i think. Having an administrator there, and my parents, and at least one teacher was terrifying to me. I think i cried every meeting. Honestly it felt like an interrogation to me, esp with all the damn eye contact and shit. My dad asked me if i wanted to continue it this year and i was immediately like fuck no nuh uh not happening. And whether or not I actually needed to be in the front of the room depended on the class, teacher, the people in there, but a lot of the time i would just be moved to the front and i would hate it. In eighth grade my math teacher moved me from the back of the room (a favorite seat in that class) to the front of the room in the middle of class for like a week. It was honestly humiliating and the only time i was eventually able to express my opinion on the 504 shit. Actually my freshman math teacher did that too. Ahaha moving on now before this gets too long.

4/5- three negative and positive things about being autistic.

Pros-

(1) i dont really have a chance to not have a hobby. Ive always got an interest to keep me entertained and i like that.

(2) stimming is nice, i like it, im not afraid to let myself stim. Makes me feel better.

(3) im unique and shit. I have a different pov than other people and that allows me to have different ways of thinking. I think outside the box ig. I also have this weird version of confidence and objectivity that I appreciate in myself

Cons-

(1) its hard to feel like i belong somewhere, bc im so different. Im getting better at it but im not good at getting close to people.

(2) i also like,, dont have certain permanence? Like object permanence? A lot of the time i dont really miss things/people unless im somewhere that reminds me of them. Idk if it’s negative really but its something,, even a spin, like bts, i dont really miss them that much until i do. Theyre still very important to me but yeah

(3) people dont really get me the same way other people get other people. And its hard for me to explain it to people. And theres certain people i get more than others. Its weird.

7- people need to give autistics a chance to be heard. Apply the accommodations you “give” them. Dont put them in the spotlight and give them space when needed. We are what you might call “picky” too. Eating, learning, socializing, we have our own things we need to be able to do shit. Learn them. Let us stim. Encourage us to learn about ourselves and remind us that youre there for us. But dont try to help us unless we ask or we actually need help. Dont trigger meltdowns on purpose, stop using the r word even in passing like its not a big deal. Be more than aware of us, accept us, appreciate us. Dont be a bystander.

8- i dont have much experience with meltdowns? I think? If i have i didnt have chances to recover. I had to go back to class or something. Idk how to recognize them in me either.

10- showering. Thats a big thing that even though i kinda need i forget to do. Except during school. I had a whole routine in the morning and i was super punctual. If i didnt shower i would be late, miss the bus, forget something.

12- meat. The way it feels. Disgusting. How do people eat it and not feel like dying? Same with lettuce. Spinach is fine but every time i try to eat lettuce I almost throw up. Bell peppers, pickles, vinegar, mayo, eggs usually, cheese sometimes. Just off the top of my head. One time i tried putting lettuce on my burger, was feeling adventurous, and after biting down i had to just take the lettuce off. Another time, my stepmom (newly married to my dad) made slads for us, and i was skeptical. There was white stuff all over the salad and she wouldnt tell me what it was. I tried eating a little carrot stick thing and almost vomited. Thats when she learned I cannot eat mayo. Even if idk that its mayo i still cant fuckin eat it. She forced me to eat bell peppers one time. Didnt go well at all. At all.

(Not gonna do the spin one bc ive already talked about them and if i do again itll be too long)

15- yes! I only do big stuff(?)(like yelling n shit) when im completely alone. Like if im home alone. Bc i get so loud. Sometimes ill hum in my room or sing to myself in my room though. Its so fun. As for phrases i repeat, ill repeat anything i find interesting. In a movie or song, or even something a friend said. One time my mom said the phrase “tough titty said the kitty but the milks still good” and i went around the kitchen repeating it until she got annoyed. Also sometimes something in the room will have a constant sound and ill like think a phrase to that sound repeatedly. Idk how to explain it lol. Idk if thats echolalia either

16- rocks. Typical i know, collecting rocks. But i just cant help it. I see a rock i like, i pick it up, take it home. I used to collect sticks. And when i was in elementary school, i used to pick shit up off the playground. Beer bottle caps was a favorite. Apparently the school called my mom about it bc they found my stash and thought it was from home and my parents were drinking excessively. 😬 oops

18- introverted?

19- kinda depends. Idk. I really cant tell wow. I would probably say hypersensitive. Just cause i have a ton of sensory issues and a lot of stuff bothers me. Like types of clothes. And how things are resting on my body. Yeah i guess i am hypersensitive.

20- i used to struggle with self love a lot. And sometimes i still kinda do. But in the past few years ive really started appreciating myself and trying to learn a lot about myself. Its going well id say.

21- empathy. Hmm. I think im very empathetic, actually. I can always tell when someone is feeling uncomfortable in a situation. And when i should tell people to back off of them if they wont say it themselves. And im very uncomfortable when theres secondhand embarrassment. And bullying, in something im watching or reading. Yknow, I actually cant watch mean girls. I just. I tried, i had to walk away bc I couldn’t take it. It also kinda triggers me so theres that. Bc of the bullying. But yeah im very empathetic. Otherwise socially im not good at that.

23- nope. Ive got like no support system other than tumblr and online friends. Apparently my dad refused to acknowledge im autistic and hes my favorite parent. Thats his big flaw though. And if i “came out” to him and said it myself he would probably come around. I know hes not completely nt either. My Opa has ocd, so nuerodiversity runs in the family ig.

While making this i got distracted and went on insta for like an hour oops lol

24- steampunk cosplay? Or college dorm tips? The steampunk one was freshman year, and the college dorm one was fifth grade. It lasted well into sixth grade and seventh grade.

[margridarnauds]

for the otp meme: number 6 for d'aramis, peyronan and any character you wish richard to be with please~ 💕

So.........guess who just discovered this in my drafts, uncompleted. Also I’m tagging you @odachans just in case Tumblr is predictable and bungles the notification process. 

1. Who cuddles up to the other when they are cold?

D’Artagnan is a natural cuddler. This sent Aramis into multiple Gay Panics (or, rather, bi/pan panics) before they actually got together. 2. What do they depend on each other for?

2. What do they depend on each other for?   

I feel like Aramis depends on D’Artagnan for motivation and inspiration. Aramis is a brilliant Musketeer in his own right, he’s obviously successful as a priest, but the second D’Artagnan comes, he gets onboard. Why? Because even if D’Artagnan isn’t his lover (yet), he’s a genuinely good, charismatic leader, and THAT is enough to get Aramis back in the game. I feel like he might become a little....complacent, over time, but D’Artagnan would make it very hard for someone to be complacent while also not going TOO hard down their throats. 

D’Artagnan relies on Aramis for loyalty. Not necessarily blind loyalty; he doesn’t WANT anyone to, say, risk their lives for him. He doesn’t leverage loyalty like, say, Artois would. But he knows that, if he shows up to Aramis, Aramis would be the first one to hear him out, and he WANTS his right hand man back anyway, because it probably doesn’t feel RIGHT without him there anyway. 

3. Who forgets everything so the other leaves notes all around the house?

D’Artagnan forgets, Aramis leaves notes, as the Confirmed Moronsexual™ in their relationship.

4. Who tells the other they look beautiful everyday?

D’Artagnan. Aramis thought that it wouldn’t matter, given how often he’s been complimented on his looks, but with D’Artagnan it’s….different. It means more. 

5. Who gets stressed out and the other has to calm them down?

I feel like D’Artagnan, even though in general he’s very easy going, might get a little too caught up in his Gascon pride and wanting to do right, which subsequently makes any failure CRUSHING. (Though I also think that Aramis might not be quite as cool as he projects, which means that by the time he cracks, he CRACKS.)

6. What makes them a good couple?

They mutually respect and admire one another; they would be fine either as friends or as lovers, and, tbh, even if they were to split up, I don’t see a huge DRAMA over it. It would just be like….okay. Yeah, it would hurt them and there might be a tiny bit of tension for a little while, but I think that, in the end, they would still be friends who had one another’s backs. 

7. Who takes pictures of random dogs and sends them to the other person?

GENERALLY D’Artagnan, but Aramis has, at least on one occasion, seen a golden retriever, taken a picture of it, and put in a caption that just said, “This reminded me of you.” And then D’Artagnan responded with a heart emoji and he nearly felt himself die from how much he loved him. 

8. Who laughs at the lamest of jokes?

D’Artagnan. Aramis thinks that he’s faking at first, but no, D’Artagnan considers them genuinely hilarious. 

9. Who likes to drive at night?

D’Artagnan, particularly if it’s along old country roads. (Aramis would never say that he’s mildly freaked out by the deers’ eyes glinting along the sides of the road, in the woods.)

10. What does their bedroom look like?

Aramis is used to slightly more lavish arrangements, but he can settle for a golden cross above the bed and a few nice pillows. After all, he was a musketeer before he became a wildly successful priest/love expert, so like. He has to have roughed it at least a LITTLE. D’Artagnan isn’t quite at “hurricane” levels of organization, but you do have the occasional bit of training equipment scattered around the floor, with the notable exception of the sword, which he treats like his actual CHILD. There isn’t all that much in the way of furniture, you have a bed, you have two night tables, Aramis’ tends to be stocked with a copy of the Bible, which D’Artagnan routinely tries to distract him from reading from, usually causing Aramis to actually FREEZE out of sheer bi panic. (Yes, they’re basically married. No, that doesn’t mean that he still doesn’t occasionally just freeze at something D’Artagnan does because HOW is he so attractive? HOW?) 

Peyronan

1. Who cuddles up to the other when they are cold?

Ronan. He’s used to living in a situation where he shares a bed with Solène and his father anyway, and, since he moved away, he’s really missed having that added warmth. I think that it was actually one of the harder adjustments he had to make when he abandoned Solène went to Paris. So, actually SHARING a bed with someone again, he’s going to want that connection, he’s going to want that warmth, and it’s kind of instinctual to him. Lazare isn’t used to having contact AT ALL, he’s never really had to share a bed to the same degree (he might have when he was still a young officer/possibly aide de campe to one of The Big Boys because space was limited, especially if we accept that he MIGHT have been the right age to fight in the American Revolution, but, now, as at LEAST a colonel of a regiment? He isn’t going to go for it.) So….it just isn’t INSTINCTUAL for him. He isn’t really used to being touched or having any degree of warmth, and he’s genuinely shocked when he finds himself leaning into Ronan when he cuddles with him. 

2. What do they depend on each other for?  

They both depend on one another for stability as the tension in the streets escalates. Had Ronan survived, they would have relied on one another increasingly for that. (Especially if both had survived past 1794 and the downfall of Danton, Desmoulins, and Robespierre. Ronan would have needed SOMEONE to cling to, and Lazare would have been mourning the Ancien Régime.

Lazare relies on Ronan for affection and emotional intelligence, Ronan relies on Lazare for having someone to pull him back when he threatens to go overboard. 

3. Who forgets everything so the other leaves notes all around the house?

Ronan forgets, Lazare leaves notes, though they don’t really do any good. 

4. Who tells the other they look beautiful everyday?

Both of them routinely go “…whoa,” at times when they see each other. Neither one of them has really LOST that novelty, and there’s very much this sense of “This is my person, I am with them, HOW?” That being said, Lazare tends to keep his admiration for Ronan to quiet moments, generally when he wakes up before Ronan or Ronan falls asleep before him (which is often), and he gets to stroke Ronan’s hair and back while he sleeps, or when he catches Ronan in another rare quiet moment (he would think, years later, how stunning he had been on the Bastille, that last day, sun-glinting off his rifle). He doesn’t outwardly EXPRESS it, not in words or really in any way that is tangible, though Ronan still knows. Ronan’s stupid, yes, but emotionally, of the two of them, he’s smarter, and in some ways, I think he knows Lazare’s emotions better than Lazare does. (And in other ways, he doesn’t, especially relating to Lazare’s complex relationship with the Army/Royal Family.) 

Ronan, though….he KNOWS he married up. Not just in terms of a peasant being with a count (that…doesn’t really compute to Ronan in terms of their relationship. Not that it doesn’t IMPACT them, but in the sense that Ronan doesn’t feel unequal or like he should necessarily be grateful to The Count de Peyrol for “choosing” him. Other people would be flattering, fawning over Lazare and doing everything to stay in his good graces. Ronan doesn’t. Which is exactly why Laz chose him in the first place), but in terms of “Holy *Hell* he’s hot. And smart. And capable. HOW?” It’s like…he thinks of everyone that he could have been with, had he stayed in the Beauce or if he’d gone for someone Camille in Paris, and Lazare is just…several steps above, even if he’s stuffy and formal and emotionally constipated and anal about everything being in order. And he has no restraint telling Lazare what a handsome officer he nabbed for a lover. (Lazare is kind of ???? because…it isn’t necessarily that he has low self esteem, re: his looks, just that they’ve literally never mattered to him before. His main concern has always been “How intimidating can I be?”)

5. Who get stressed out and the other has to calm them down?

Lazare doesn’t SHOW his stress, in the sense that he doesn’t have a paper bag that he huffs into, but he gets much more disturbed when things move outside of what he considers normal. He gets very irritable and stressed if things don’t fit into his special place for them, and he has the tendency to become absorbed in his job. Ronan tends to be the one to bring him down. Generally via what he considers “subtle” seduction. (It is not subtle. At all.) Though a lot of the time, really, that seduction is just wandering over to Lazare’s desk, putting his arms around his midsection, burying his face in his neck, and groaning “Come to bed” like a recently re-animated zombie. After which, barring a national emergency, Lazare will eventually put down his pen and dutifully cuddle with Ronan until he goes to sleep. Ronan’s actually picked up the habit of playing with Lazare’s hair/scratching his head when he’s stressed, which generally does wonders for relaxing him. 

6. What makes them a good couple?

In some core areas, they actually are very compatible. Both of them are in a relationship for the long run. The initial execution might be brief, but when it comes to “Do we actually want a relationship? Or are we going to change our minds a month in?” the answer is yes for both of them (and a “no” to the last question). They’re both committed, like that. Regardless of their arguments, at the end of the day, they are each other’s significant other. Ronan gets into a fight with Lazare, yeah, he might scowl, get drunk, and sleep in a drain somewhere, but he isn’t going to cheat on him out of revenge, and Lazare, at an absolute low, might bluster about how it was a mistake to go for a peasant who couldn’t understand, but he isn’t going to bring someone new in, either. After they’ve both slept on it, they’ll be back in the same room, patch things up, and they’ll be fine. (And Lazare will spend some time making up for the mistake comment.) 

Lazare is high intelligence, in terms of things like common sense and caution, along with more conventional markers like math, geometry, history, etc. (though he isn’t as well education as people, especially Ronan, tend to assume). That being said, he’s stunted in terms of his socialization and has never really LIVED outside of his career. He’s numbed emotionally, and sometimes, I think he doesn’t really know what he’s feeling. I think he knew he felt SOMETHING for Ronan from the beginning, but I’m not sure that he was really, concretely aware that it was attraction and then love until Ronan more or less jumped on him. Ronan is….well, low intelligence in just about…everything, he’s impulsive, but he gets Lazare out of his shell, and he is, generally speaking, more emotionally intelligent than most people give him credit for, and he’s quick at making connections. (Remember how he was able to guess that Olympe worked for the Queen and that the guy he dueled was Fersen, even after about a week of torture? Yeah, he’s not smart, but he’s QUICK.) And Ronan is very, very affectionate, which…for someone as touch starved as Lazare…on one hand, it can definitely be overwhelming and Ronan doesn’t always know his boundaries, but on the other hand…it can be exactly what he needs. He has, basically, a lifetime of touch to make up for. 

Ronan livens Lazare up and can make him act when he would have otherwise been cautious (for better or worse), while Lazare can hold Ronan back; they balance one another out. 

7. Who takes pictures of random dogs and sends them to the other person?

Ronan sends them to Lazare, probably in a not-so subtle attempt to get Laz to adopt one for the two of them. (In the end, he does, and despite claiming that it’s “Your dog,” guess who the dog insists on sleeping with every night? And who can be found stroking it in his lap as he does his morning coffee + newspaper reading. It ain’t Ronan.)  

8. Who laughs at the lamest of jokes?

Ronan. RonanRonanRonanRonan. He both tells the bad jokes and laughs at them. Sometimes, he gets Lazare to quirk a smile, and every single time, it feels like his heart’s going to explode. (It’s an ongoing quest of his: Make Lazare smile.) 

9. Who likes to drive at night?

Lazare. It’s calm at night, less traffic, less noise. It’s easier to concentrate, and it’s easy to simply exist when it’s just him and his meticulously chosen driving playlist. (Depending on whether or not Ronan’s collapsed in his seat yet. Ronan has two modes: “Off” and “On.”)

10. What does their bedroom look like?

Lazare’s own style is naturally very austere and dark. He can survive with a bed, endtable, writing desk, and some place to store his (very limited, for an aristocrat) clothes, and his color scheme tends towards dark blues and silvers, very cold colors. But, once Ronan moves in, things start changing, since Ronan’s style starts coming into play. So, you get that odd mix of those austere colors and then BOOM a vibrant orange chair by the fireplace. Lazare actually had to buy a new bed when he moved Ronan in, since before that, he’d been perfectly content to sleep in a single bed, so they ended up with a four poster, canopy style bed (Laz does like the canopy, because it gives him some privacy). 

Ronan, of course, wanted one like this:

He was, tragically, vetoed, though the lining to the bed IS a vibrant yellow, and the blue is much, much brighter than you’d generally expect from Laz, even if it still looks like something you’d find in Elsa’s ice castle. 

Also, even though they’re very little used, they do both have their own beds. Lazare’s experience of domesticity, as much as he’s ever known it, has been that aristocratic model of the married couple having their own rooms, and it isn’t something he’s REALLY given up for Ronan. Lazare loves Ronan very, very much, but sometimes, he needs his own space.

Ronan doesn’t really understand it, himself, since…again, he’s used to being with his family CONSTANTLY in their old home, but…there is Something in knowing that his relationship with Lazare doesn’t just depend on him being ready and available every night. Like, I think that his worst nightmare, relationship wise, would be turning out to be an expendable toy that Lazare only spends time and money on for a little while after everything Ronan’s kind of put in and sacrificed to be with him (namely, his ongoing guilt at being with the man who killed his father + betraying the revolution by being with him), and this is very clear evidence that, regardless of whether Ronan wants to sleep with him on a given night, they’re together. It isn’t Lazare playing with him, he isn’t a momentary distraction that’s only good for a few nights, they’re living together, and he has this space that’s His that’s totally separate from his relationship with Laz. It’s also where, had Ronan lived, he would have gone every July 24th, when he felt the anniversary of his father’s death hit him head on. For a week or two leading up to that…he loves Lazare, he DOES, he’s utterly devoted to him, but he can’t be around him constantly when his father’s so heavily on his mind, when there will always be those thoughts of “If it hadn’t happened, he would have been 45-50-55-60, he would have been happy” and the loss hits him square in the chest. When he has to reconcile the man he adores with the man he left for Paris to take his revenge on.

Richard/Emma

Because motherfucking Tango Korrupti

1. Who cuddles up to the other when they are cold?

My mind says Emma, because it seems like it’s been ages since her last relationship and she’s probably starved for any real, genuine touch she can get, but my heart says Richard, even if he’d deny it. He just....moves towards her while he’s sleeping until his head is tucked into her neck. 

2. What do they depend on each other for?  

Emma does need Richard to make the cut throat career decisions that she normally wouldn’t make but that are necessary to survive in Hollywood. Also, you can bet that when she’s sick, when she’s on her period, when she’s just in one of those moods that are less than glamorous, less than Star-Like™, Richard’s right there to cover up any tiny smudges and make it seem like everything’s normal. And Richard, for better or worse, is FIERCELY protective of her. And yes, this often goes to extremes, but he does protect her from some of her more adrenaline seeker tendencies, and in an ideal world, that would be toned down to him making her rethink it without necessarily trying to control her. And if a director ever tried to use the casting couch on her or, for example, DO a Quentin Tarantino and force her into an unsafe working condition, I do think Richard would go down their throats. Yes, he wants the money and the prestige, but he can’t get that if Emma’s hurt or traumatized. (Or, at least, that might be what he tells himself at first.) 

In short, Richard can use his innate Karen powers for the cause of good. 

I discuss it a little below, but, Richard can naturally get carried away and become....well, a miniature, American Napoleon. And when he does, Emma’s there to bring him down. He needs her for her star power and her glamor, yes, but he does need her to keep him in line as well. And, it’s odd, but I do feel like Richard himself might need a little bit of a break from Hollywood himself. And he wouldn’t REALIZE it like Emma would, because he’s normalized it. I don’t necessarily want Emma saving him, and I’m not sure that there IS a way to “save” Richard without utterly destroying him as a character, or whether I would be interested in Fully Normal Richard. I do suspect that he could do with some loosening up, if he was willing to take it, and if, while Emma’s trying to find that compromise between Emma Carter™ and Adele Waldvogel, she drags Richard into eating pizza on the living room floor cross-legged, that’s fine with me. 

3. Who forgets everything so the other leaves notes all around the house?

They both leave notes. When they’re having an argument, they can get VERY passive aggressive. 

4. Who tells the other they look beautiful everyday?

Richard. At first, Emma thinks it’s professional (Hell, RICHARD thinks it’s professional, because Richard is an utter MASTER at self deception, see: Macho Macho’s entire existence.) But then as time goes on, it’s like “....Oh, he actually. Does.” Rochard gets PERSONALLY offended if anyone suggests that Emma’s lost it as a star or that there’s anyone else that can take a role. Emma has actually gotten him to change his mind a few times by saying “Yeah, and they said that if they couldn’t get me, they would go for Florence Pugh or Charlize Theron” and Richard just goes into “How DARE they?” mode. 

5. Who gets stressed out and the other has to calm them down?

They both have various ways of getting stressed out, but Richard is canonically always around one step away from an outright panic attack. She keeps a stock of paper bags on hand. 

If they ever have a child....Richard outside the waiting room would be...

6. What makes them a good couple?

This is actually I struggled with, because in canon, as they’re presented, they distinctly WOULDN’T be. Or, rather, at least, not necessarily a healthy one, which doesn’t mean they can’t be entertaining to watch. Richard’s too controlling, while Emma is feeling increasingly disconnected from HER, which Richard has every interest in destroying in favor of her embracing a superficial life, even to the extent of hurting her to do it. 

Now, I’m not saying this in order to ravage it, because I chose this ship for this ask BECAUSE I love it. Simply laying out why it’s difficult to pinpoint why I think that they could actually work, if you rearrange a few things. 

In a world where Emma accepted the Tango Korrupti, where she didn’t get warm and fuzzy feelings awakened by the promise of brown bread and an alps skiing trip, it would be the kind of relationship where they both WORK with one another and what they want. 

Maybe Emma would still fall in love with Josi in this timeline, but they would simply be incompatible, because Emma likes Hollywood, the glitz and the glam, and she can’t manage a long distance relationship with Josi at the same time. So, it comes to her career or him. And she loves him, yeah, but she doesn’t love Adele Waldvogel, or the situation that she left behind, and even though her relationship with Hollywood is complicated, that doesn’t mean she inherently wants to leave it ALL behind. 

Richard’s controlling, and that’s something that would need to be discussed as far as “If I take you back on, I do my own thing. I’ll listen to your advice, but I’m my own person. Take it or leave it.” And there would be quarrels over it, when Emma wants to do something risky (Disneyland nearly gives Richard a HEART ATTACK), but they could reach an agreement. And, in that scenario, it would work, because Richard is cut-throat, he can be ruthless, and he would look out for Emma’s best interests. It would be a case of “us against the world” or, at least “us against Hollywood.” Sure, Emma could become engaged to Pablo, maybe even have a few more relationships on page after the inevitable divorce (though they remain good friends), but in the end, the one who she could really trust would be Richard. Emma herself has a sardonic edge to her, as shown in “Bussi, bussi,” where she freely takes the piss out of LA society, so I can see her and Richard standing on the sidelines to some party, making catty comments. 

And Richard....I actually don’t see that he would necessarily WANT to fall in love with Emma, because she’s a client. That’s bad for business, especially when he needs to advise her on the best relationships to bring in the cash. And Richard’s top priority has always been his money. (Also, I feel like before this, Richard 100% believed he was gay and then it was like “......Bisexuality is an OPTION?”) But Emma’s smart, she’s funny, she’s stunning, and she puts up with no bullshit, and on some level, he HAS to know her better than anyone else does. (He was obviously there for her first breakup, and even though I’m not going to sanctify Richard, because he’s, canonically, a prick...I do like to think that at least a PART of his concern over her being with someone new wasn’t just jealousy or a concern over his money, but him genuinely seeing how much she was hurt.) And Richard probably has seen Emma at some of her least glamorous as well, because his job is really to invent the glamor when it’s not naturally there. 

7. Who takes pictures of random dogs and sends them to the other person?

Emma sends them to Richard, who at first is concerned because what if she’s allergic? What if she wants to get one now? Where would they GET one? What about the mess? And who will let the dog out? After all, if she goes out walking with it, that gives the paparazzi a chance to swarm. Emma points out that dogs are EXCELLENT publicity. 

It’s an Austrian Pinscher, though Richard would SWEAR it bore an uncanny resemblance to Josi. Emma’s thrilled because it’s just like one she used to have as a child. 

8. Who laughs at the lamest of jokes?

I started off leaning towards Richard and ended up on Emma. I feel that when Emma is more relaxed, she has a much, much dorkier sense of humor, it’s just that Emma Carter™ the brand can’t really be seen laughing at lame jokes, she has to laugh at the right ones, usually said by powerful people, and not too long or too hard. I think that the sound of her own, genuine laugh actually surprises her because it’s been so long since she’s heard it. 

9. Who likes to drive at night?

Richard gets very antsy when Emma drives at the best of times, though Emma will point out that people have gotten into car crashes with chauffeurs just as easily as if they’d been driving themselves. LA is hypnotic at night, lit up by all the billboards and late night places still open, palm trees dotting the roads, and it’s easy to think about how far she’s come. When SOMEONE isn’t being a backseat driver.

10. What does their bedroom look like?

For some reason, judging from what I’ve seen of Emma’s design choices as far as her clothing in the musical, I kind of like the thought of her going for black and white designs, with the black serving as a lining to the white. A FEW geometric designs, but nothing over the top. 

Basically, like this, but I do see Emma having a few pink accents in there, possibly swapping out those white pillows for something in hot pink. (The poster would, obviously, be a Quentin Tarantino one.) 

[daily-rayless]

20 Years of Art

2000

(OC / Celes from Final Fantasy 6 / OC / OC)

The influence of Final Fantasy 6, off of the Anthology collection, and Yoshitaka Amano caused a significant shift in my art, leading my human figures to be very slender, graceful, and frequently pale. Most of it was of women, some of it was of horses, and by then I was very self-consciously starting to draw men. I mostly worked in pencils and colored pencils. Faces were oval with high hairlines and long, sharp, narrow noses. Also note my evident fear of mouth-seams and lower eyelids. I was pretty terrible at coloring, often feeling that coloring one of my sketches ruined all the nice linework.

2001

(Quistis from Final Fantasy 8 / Rosa from Final Fantasy 4? / Schala from Chrono Trigger / Dark Knight OC from Final Fantasy 4)

This is where more anime influences came in, and I consciously took on a semi-anime, semi-realistic (in my own mind) style. My ideal of beauty was overbig eyes, overlong nose, and oversmall mouth, and I stuck to it pretty relentlessly. Trying to figure out shadows and face structure. Still bad at coloring. I was incredibly proud of that charcoal picture. Was also going through my mandatory Dark 'n Edgy phase, with a big helping of Phantom of the Opera, Sarah Brightman, and my attempts at designing supercool clothes, many of which I wouldn't have actually worn, even given the opportunity.

2002

(Me trying to recreate “Flaming June” / OC, who incidentally looks almost exactly like Sarah Brightman and whose diadem was bodily lifted from a Jodi Lee painting / angsty symbolic wet chain lady / OC)

Deep in the Dark 'n Edgy. Faces are still very heavily made-up, with big lashes, defined upper eyelids, and dark lips. Trying very hard to be a good artist though, have high expectations for the future. I was so proud of that final pose and worked so hard on it. Lined paper? So not a problem. Besides, how else am I supposed to draw during class? A sketchbook would've been even more obvious than the incredibly obvious I already was. I'm able to listen while drawing pretty reliably, and I did manage to take detailed notes while doodling, so at least I had that going for me.

2003

(Celes / OC / OC / Hermes-inspired wing lady)

I was focusing (at least some of the time) on backgrounds and trying to make my work detailed and polished. Coloring is still hopeless. Often when I colored, I would go super light, even when I was using dark or intense colors. It would give my pictures a sort of faint, half-assed hazy look. I remember an art teacher urging me to use more color, but I probably resisted because I knew that way lay total destruction. I'm sorry, well-meaning art teacher. You are unversed in the ways of my pencils. I have killed too many sketches to take those kinds of risks.

2004

(Rosa? / Meliara from Crown Duel / willow-dress lady / Geddoe and Queen from Suikoden 3)

See the Meliara picture? That's supposed to be a night scene in a forest. Front-lit by blazing firelight. I was too afraid to make the colors darker. This is dark enough, okay? Anyway, this year, along with being utterly obsessed with Suikoden 3 and Crown Duel, I was letting my art head in a more realistic direction...

2005

(OC / Queen / Queen / part of Zetta and Salome from Makai Kingdom; I remember deliberately copying those swoopy Ss from one of my friends’ handwriting. Wishes ended up being the first longform fanfic I posted online.)

...that really flourished this year. It's not actually realism, but I made a point to give my characters, especially the women, more realistic bodies. Faces are very round in this period, often with soft features. Noses are prominent. I'm also, finally, using more vibrant colors. I probably got my first Prismacolor pencils around this time. I also got some really cheap markers, but had no idea how to use them so mostly stuck to pencils.

2006

(All OCs)

I look back on this as a good year. I was learning better coloring techniques. (Bold colors! Press that pencil down! Okay, I still had much to learn.) I got an Elfwood gallery while the site was doing its slow mosey into oblivion. But that was an important step, not just looking at other people's art online, but putting my own up as well. There were downsides though. I began to feel more insecure – or maybe more realistic? – about my art, on this site with so many highly talented artists. Still, 2006 is a good year. It was a lot of fun, and I learned a lot.

2007

(vampire and hunter / Fleur from Harry Potter / OC / Avril from Wild Arms 5)

The year of Fleur Delacour. This is when I was writing Kindred. I think it was because I was trying to depict Fleur as distinctly non-human that my art shifted away from that more realistic style. Fleur, and my other figures, became very tall and slender. The anime DNA is still there though. For a long time, I felt the lying-down picture of Fleur was my best work.

2008

(Revya and Gig from Soul Nomad / my attempts at being “abstract” / OC / OC)

This was the year of Soul Nomad and, towards the end, Tales of the Abyss. Unsurprisingly, the anime influences start moving back to the fore. The eyes are becoming larger again, the features a bit more angular and stylized, mouths are shrinking. I'm still desperately trying to figure out markers and wondering why it's so darn hard (I don't try to educate myself, I just flail), but I was proud of that blue OC picture. It made me feel like I was getting somewhere. 2008 is when I started my deviantART gallery, right when everyone else was moving on to Tumblr.

2009

(teacup lady / Persona 4 noir-style comic / Revya / OC)

Then Persona 4 hit. Shigenori Soejima was a huge influence in this period, especially in eyes and faces. Pupils, chins, and jawlines shrink, eyelashes are sparse and stylized, noses are simplified. 2008 and 2009 are about as pure anime as I've ever gotten. Meanwhile, I'm really exited about my dA gallery and trying lots of different combinations of media. I'm super active on dA and FFN at this point, writing Elysion and then a slew of shorter Persona fics.

2010

(Minako from Persona 3: Portable / concept-art-version Minako / lady with dragon ferret thing / other lady with dragon ferret thing)

I'm still drawing with a lot of Soejima influences. Additionally, bodies are becoming even longer, taller, thinner, and bendier. Some of them look absurd to me now. On the other hand, a lot of pictures from this period have a nice elegance to them. I was still using colored pencils a fair bit, but more clumsy markers are showing up. Persona 3: Portable came out, and this is when I was writing Death and Ker.

2011

(mask lady / hat lady / Archaya, Duphaston, and Iryth from Eternal Poison / symbolic autumn lady and her winter baby)

Midway through this year, I hit a breakthrough when I got my first set of Copics – and skin tones, no less. Even though I was still flailing, I was so thrilled with my results. That Eternal Poison picture left me enormously proud, as did the mother and child one. My style hasn't changed all that much, but it's starting to feel less extreme. The focus on big eyes and tiny little mouths remains.

2012

(Elza from Suikoden 2 / Daryl and Setzer from Final Fantasy 6 / Killey and Lorelai from Suikoden 2 / Lyssa, Greek goddess of madness)

This is the year of Elza. Lots of delicate sketches of this lovely scarred lady, and lots of colored pictures too. I've definitely shifted away from pencils towards markers. The Daryl and Setzer one was an attempt to use both, and I was very happy with it. These pictures show their age, but there's still a lot here I like. Mouths are larger too. However, my online activity was starting to lag.

2013

(Rydia from Final Fantasy 4 / Nia from Infinite Space / the prophet and Schala / Argos and Io from Greek mythology)

The mid-2010s weren't entirely great for me, marked with a lot of frustration and discontent. And that definitely carried over to my art, making me feel very disappointed with myself. There was lots of marker work this year. Probably the standout picture is Argos and Io. This is also when I played through all three routes of Fate/Extra, and my art was suddenly full of Hakuno and Emiya.

2014

(Minako / butterfly lady / Marta and Tenebrae from Tales of Symphonia 2 / Elza)

Looking at it now, this was a good year. Lots of nice marker art. The butterfly one was a big step up for me in terms of coloring. The Marta and Tenebrae has a really cool stylized look to it. But I was becoming less enthusiastic about sharing my art with others. I started to post less and less.

2015

(evil Hakuno and Emiya from the Fate series / Mitsuru from Persona 3 / half moon cookie lady / Hakuno)

I barely posted anything this year, though I was still drawing a ton. As far as making strides, this is one of my better years. Coloring will never be my strong suit, but it's a lot more fun, and it looks a lot better. It's almost entirely marker-work at this point. Despite my, er, angst, a lot of people are smiling this year.

2016

(OC / doodle lady / Luna from Roman mythology / hair bow lady)

At this point, it's feeling too recent for me to really see what's changed. I did a fair bit of eraserless work. One problem I still have – and, yes, it involves coloring my pictures – is losing some of the image's personality after I've inked it and erased the initial pencil work. The picture's still there, but not as nuanced as it originally was. The results often feel stiff to me. Doing the first linework in ink, or not inking at all, allows me to keep that sensitive, spontaneous quality. Luna and the bow and doodle ladies were done without erasers. Another thing I did a lot this year was fill backgrounds with busy shapes and colors, which is a trend I’m still following today.

2017

(flapper and dog / Alcyone and Ceyx from Greek mythology / flower hair lady / Kida from Atlantis)

Not a good year. Not that the art is bad, there just isn't a lot of it, and what there is often isn't very finished. I was still mostly dark online, wondering if I should take down my dA gallery. Drawing and knowing I wasn't going to post something took off some of the pressure of my own expectations, but I was still unhappy.

2018

(Altera from the Fate series / Elizabeth Bathory from the Fate series / OC / Aranea from Final Fantasy 15)

This was a really important year for me. I wrote a novel I'm really proud of, and it's done a lot to give me confidence and a sense of creative direction. I also decided that after New Years, I was going to start a Tumblr gallery...just as everyone who was still on the site was jumping off of it. Much of my 2018 work is still sketchy and unfinished, but I also think it's loosening up some. It feels less stiff than the stuff from the middle of the decade.

2019

(Aloy from Horizon Zero Dawn / medievaly lady / Red from Transistor / Red)

The year of Supergiant Games, which led me to focus more on bright saturated colors. It's really hard for me to analyze these objectively. Coloring is better? I worked more on details? I used my metallic gel pens a ton and did shape-cluttered backgrounds? These aren't new things, but I think they paid off okay. I'm more at peace with my level of ability, I've finished more complicated works, and I crawled out of my den and started posting regularly online again. So that's all good. Curious to see what the art looks like in twenty more years.

[karasunonolibero]

2019 writing self-evaluation

so i did this over on my main last year, and since i had what i felt was a productive year, i wanted to do it here! i’ve included all works, from every fandom i wrote for, so there’s definitely a variety but also a clear distinction of when i stopped writing 1d and started writing for haikyuu, heh. anyway, i’m proud of all the work i’ve done this year, so here’s to 2020!

ALL FICS MUST HAVE POSTED ON AO3 IN 2019

1. Number of stories (including drabbles) posted to AO3: 50

2. Word count posted for the year: 147,038

3. List of works published this year (in order of posting):

two loves have i (5 january)

it’s only your imagination again (25 january)

the pain’s only temporary (8 february)

blow a kiss, fire a gun (9 may)

waiting to be found (14 may)

a swim with a shark (6 june)

sweet and lowdown (19 june)

one more time as if we planned it (24 june)

always be my thunder (23 july)

will your mouth read this truth (30 july)

tumblr drabbles & prompts (last updated 3 august)

I’m on my way up (’cos you make me bliss out) (completed 4 august) (collab with Rider_Of_Spades on ao3)

even mountains crumble into the sea (7 august)

we’re on each other’s team (14 august)

dangerous, tainted, flawed (20 august)

life can do terrible things (25 august)

the night before life goes on (1 september)

when the letter says a soldier’s coming home (17 september)

when the air ran out (19 september)

something missing tonight (21 september)

built castles from sand (26 september)

underneath the stars we came alive (8 october)

sweet talk and sugar (10 october)

got my name on this treasure (11 october)

just a little taste, babe (14 october)

iwaoi horror week drabbles (completed 1 november)

don’t let the tide come (31 october)

daisuga week drabbles (completed 24 november)

how (not) to put on a condom (26 november)

taste the tension, now i’m begging (2 december)

kiss the boy (7 december)

till tonight do us part (11 december)

i wish i could be there now (13 december)

on our way to twenty-seven (15 december)

for the dream far away (24 december)

a collar full of chemistry (25 december)

fall down and commune with me (28 december)

a little of love’s electricity (31 december)

the city is at war (last updated 31 december)

4. Fandoms I wrote for: (stats pulled from the ao3 filter feature on my works)

haikyuu!! (41)

one direction (9)

the legend of zelda: breath of the wild (3)

all time low (1)

crystalline (1)

5. Pairings: (i didn’t count side or past pairings)

iwaizumi hajime/oikawa tooru (14)

sawamura daichi/sugawara koushi (13)

oikawa tooru/sugawara koushi (4)

azumane asahi/nishinoya yuu (3)

kuroo tetsurou/sawamura daichi (2)

kuroo tetsurou/yaku morisuke (1)

akaashi keiji/oikawa tooru (1)

sawamura daichi/sugawara koushi/terushima yuuji (1)

sawamura daichi/terushima yuuji (1)

sugawara koushi/terushima yuuji (1)

link/revali (1)

mipha/zelda (1)

louis tomlinson/harry styles (5)

louis tomlinson/zayn malik (1)

alex gaskarth/louis tomlinson (1)

liam payne/louis tomlinson (1)

zack spade/pixel fade (1)

6. Story with the most:

Kudos: two loves have i (275)

Bookmarks: two loves have i (34)

Comments: two loves have i (25)

9. Work I’m most proud of (and why):

on our way to twenty-seven! i was digging into some identity and sexuality issues that i myself have dealt with in the past and writing about it was the first time i’d really dove into some of that stuff, so i really enjoyed writing it and i think it’s some of my best.

i’m also really proud of i’m taking back the crown and i wish i could say why. i just really like the way it came out. writing oikawa as this desperate dethroned prince trying to reclaim his kingdom at any cost only to be beaten at his own game in his own home was just...ugh. it was so much fun to write.

10. Work I’m least proud of (and why):

one more time as if we planned it, definitely. i just felt super rushed writing it. it was for the one direction rarepair fest, which was super fun, but i had Just finished a longer fic a few days before this one was due and i initially tried to drop out because i thought i wouldn’t be able to finish it, but i did, but i still feel like it’s rushed and just not as good as it could have been if i’d planned better and given it some more time.

11. A favorite excerpt of your writing:

im gonna do what i did last year and post more than one, because 1. i can’t decide and 2. i quite honestly am pretty proud of a lot of what i wrote this year

from when the letter says a soldier’s coming home —

Tooru’s squealing somewhere behind them, and Hajime’s gruffly trying to get out the door, and he’ll have to call the school and make up something about being sick so he can spend the day catching up with Daichi, but it can wait. It can all wait. Because Koushi’s waited long enough. It’s about time the rest of the world waits for him.

from strawberries on a summer evening —

Suga hums against him, licking strawberry seeds from between Daichi’s teeth, like he’s just as intoxicated by Daichi as Daichi is with him. Daichi could live here, in this feeling, ignoring everything except how Suga sounds (like bliss personified), smells (like sunblock and sweat), tastes (like sugar and salt). He’s the hottest part of the summer, high noon in mid-August, just this side of too much to handle, but addicting in how it leaves you at its mercy.

from on our way to twenty-seven —

“Sorry, what was your name again?”

Tetsurou opens his mouth to say his American name, but he catches Daichi and Suga looking at him, and he swallows it down. “My name is Tetsurou. Tetsurou Kuroo.”

“I thought you wanted people to call you Tyler,” Timothy says.

Tetsurou shoots him a glare and says it again, feeling his confidence start to grow. “My name is Tetsurou Kuroo. Tetsu is fine, too, but I don’t go by Tyler anymore.”

12. Share or describe a favorite review you received:

any time tasteofsummersnow left me a comment, it made my heart go doki doki!! her comments are so in depth and so very sweet and it’s so much fun to see her real-time reactions to my writing. i go back and reread them like once a week they’re so nice ;_;

13. A time when writing was really, really hard:

the spring/early summer in general was tough, like from march to june. i didn’t post anything between february and may, and i feel like i was struggling a lot creatively around like may/june of this year. i think it’s because a lot of stuff in the 1d fandom was really turning me off at the time and that’s when the burnout fully hit.

14. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you:

definitely sugawara in the city is at war. i was writing that first chapter and initially i just wanted to see him step up when daichi wasn’t around but he very quickly turned sadistic and ruthless and scarily sharp, which is just so much fun to write him as. and his relationship with daichi is just—ugh. love that violence-fueled romance. they would kill a hundred men for each other and be turned on once they were finished.

honestly, all of the city is at war has surprised me. the idea came to me in a dream on a long bus ride, of all the clan leaders having a meeting and being attacked, and i woke up and banged it out in 36 hours. i meant it to be a oneshot but as i wrote it, i realized i loved the au so much there was no way i could leave it at that. so now it’s got a whole plot and all that. fun!

15. How did you grow as a writer this year:

last year i said i felt i grew writing angst and exploring different emotional themes, and i think i built on that even more this year. i did a bunch of shorter pieces this year and i feel a lot of them really explored emotions and characters more than plot, and that’s been so much fun. and then as well, like i said before, i’ve branched out into the crime-action genre with the yakuza au. and! iwaoi horror week was my first real attempt at spooky/creepy/horror-type writing, and, it was a fun challenge for sure.

i also said i wanted to just keep writing and be spontaneous and i definitely did that this year. i posted so many fics not caring how long it had been since the last one—sometimes it was less a day. numbers stopped mattering to me. i posted just because i wanted to put my writing out there and share it with the world, knowing there had to be someone out there who’d like it.

16. How do you hope to grow next year:

i feel like 2019 was a year of trying a lot of new things, so in 2020 i’m hoping to explore some different ships and tropes. the sheer number of characters and ships in haikyuu means there’s a ship for just about every trope and au out there, and i want to play around with some dynamics i’ve never written before.

17. Who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer or beta or cheerleader or muse etc etc):

as always, a shoutout to the loggies, who have been a fantastic source of inspiration and support all year even after i retired from 1d fic. and i would also like to thank the people i met via various hq discord servers—you know who you are!! thank you for the sprints, the encouragement, the inspiration, and the friendship. as someone brand new to the fandom, the support and sense of community has been nothing short of amazing, and you guys are part of the reason i felt so comfortable in this fandom so quickly.

18. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year:

actually, yeah. even mountains crumble into the sea was written the night before i broke up with my ex. i wrote it as an exercise to get all my feelings out, lay them all on the table where i could see them and pick through them, and then imagine the best possible way the scenario could go.

19. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers:

honestly—just write! write what you’re happy with. write even if you don’t post it. write, because everything you do is practice that’ll help you improve.

and don’t be afraid to write out of order or write more than one project at a time. i know that won’t work for everyone, but for me, if i didn’t immediately write what was on my mind, i probably wouldn’t have posted half of what i did this year.

20. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year:

hey remember last year when i said i was gonna finish the breath of the wild au?? L M A O i’m really gonna finish it next year i swear!!

i have a fic posting in the spring for the nsfw big bang which i’m ALSO very excited about! i’m lucky to be working with such a talented artist and the end result is gonna be amazing and i’m so so excited.

i also want to keep going with the city is at war, because that plot was a pleasant surprise. and there’s an ever-growing list of fic ideas and aus that i’m so excited to write—some of them were originally for larry aus but i’ve repurposed them for haikyuu pairings and that’s helped breathe new life into some old ideas.

21. Tag some writers whose answers you’d like to read.

anyone who sees this and wants to do it! just tag me, i wanna read your answers!

[hd-fan-fair]

[ Fanworks posted in tropes order here ] 

MASTERLIST OF H/D FOOD FAIR 2018 FANWORKS

ART

1. pygmy-puffy drew Meet Me at 6 (PG-13) Summary: Harry owns a food truck. Draco is a grudgingly regular customer. One day, Harry pushes an unsolicited cake pop in his hand; it comes with a little heart-shaped message attached to the stem: “Meet me on the roof at 6.” 2. anokaba drew Cafe, Custard, & Courting (PG-13) Summary: After agreeing to this fake relationship scheme, the boys meet at a cafe to get their stories straight. Of course they can't help but push each other's buttons. 3. epithalamium (art tumblr) drew 4-Ingredient Recipe for a Relationship (PG) Summary: Because of his childhood with the Dursleys, Harry relationship with food is rocky at best. And then he meets Draco, who loves cooking. 4. girl412 (gothzabini) drew Honey and Apples (PG-13) Summary: When Draco’s ability to taste is cursed away, he loses more than just one of his senses. Who can help him, if not Harry Potter? 5. sugareey drew Weekly Cuisine (PG) Summary: It's routine for Harry and Draco to go to a Muggle restaurant every Sunday to try new foods and catch up. During their exciting dim sum experience, they discover something important they should've laid out on the table in the first place. Also, Harry is a (sneaky) idiot. 6. dustmouth drew Draco Malfoy's Reasonably Large Cucumber (PG-13) Summary: After making yet another drunken wager with Malfoy at the pub, Harry finds himself vying for first prize in the Annual Wizarding Vegetable Competition, an average sized pumpkin in tow. 7. citruskk drew Here Comes the D! (G) Summary: Draco loves his soup, especially when he's sick. However, he hates it when he's too shaky to feed himself so he had to rely on Harry to spoon-feed him the soup. Alphabet soup. It's not helping that Harry always, always picks the D letters first and gleefully say, "open up wide, here comes the D!"

 ART & FIC

1. fantom_ftnoise wrote and drew Once Upon a Time (R, 12725, Same Artist & Author) Summary: This is the story of Hansel & Gretel - er, that is, Harry & Draco.  2. writcraft wrote and phoenixacid drew Slice of Life (NC-17, 16314, Artist & Author Collaboration) Summary: Luna and Ginny are worried about Harry, Greg is a very a fine baker, Snape’s portrait has a lot of opinions and Draco Malfoy is (probably) up to something. In which one man’s love for jam tarts blossoms into a different kind of love entirely.

 FIC

1. ICMezzo wrote Passion Cake (PG-13, 19384) Summary: Once more, with passion. Or, Harry orders a magically enhanced cake from a chic London bakery, except Pansy overcharges him, and then Draco Vanishes it entirely, and really, from there it all goes to hell in a cake tin. And will someone please tell Harry what Passion Cake is? 2. xErised wrote Chasing Treacle Tart (and Draco Malfoy) (NC-17, 23141) Summary: Malfoy, who is sentenced to work as a dinner lady in the Ministry canteen, has an annoying habit of withholding desserts from Harry. Harry puts up with it, but when Malfoy stops him from getting his beloved treacle tart, Harry is determined to do something about it. And Ron? He's really just there for the awkward flirting. 3. Razra_Eizel wrote Birthday Bash (PG-13, 3234) Summary: To cheer Draco up during their Eighth Year, Harry decided to throw him a birthday surprise party, no matter what challenges he may face. 4. bafflinghaze wrote Where There Is Tea (PG-13, 12643) Summary: Somewhere in London, overlooking a garden, sits a little tea room. There, Harry finds tea, distraction, books, conversation, inspiration, himself, and Draco Malfoy. 5. enchanted_jae wrote Feluna (PG-13, 2558) Summary: As the owner of a new bakery, Draco can't afford to turn down business, even if it's with Loony Lovegood's cat cafe. 6. AhaMarimbas wrote The Devil's Aphrodisiacs (PG-13, 3097) Summary: Teddy learns a new word, Harry breaks his favourite coffee mug and Draco loves his little family. Not necessarily in that order. Or, Squirt squirt squirt squirt. Squirtsquirtsquirtsquirtsquirtsquirtsquirt. Squirt??? SQUIRT!!!!! 7. MistyDeath wrote Sweet (S)talker (NC-17, 10296) Summary: Merlin, he’d stalked the asshole for almost a year, you think Harry would have noticed him tongue fucking sugar quills on the daily! 8. JGogoboots wrote A Holiday in Provence (NC-17, 32201) Summary: Harry Potter is turning 50 years old and feeling lonelier than ever. Divorced, retired, and learning he’s not quite as straight as he thought he was, Harry reluctantly accepts a birthday gift from his friends for a week’s stay at an idyllic French vineyard. Too bad Hermione and Ron neglected to mention that the owner of the winery happens to be a certain quick-witted blond Slytherin… 9. maraudersaffair wrote Paidi's Proper Shag (NC-17, 10531) Summary: Draco works at a fast food restaurant. Harry is his worst customer. 10. simplylegilimenss wrote grant that we may feast (in fellowship) (NC-17, 20388) Summary: When the house elves are on strike given Sundays off, a cooking competition ensues in the Hogwarts kitchens every Sunday. Passionate rivalries turn to passionate friendships. Or could it be something more? Or: Draco can’t cook for shit even though he says he can, Pansy and Blaise are also little shits, Hermione Granger is downright scary, Ronald Weasley totally called it, and Draco really needs to stop checking Harry Potter out every chance he gets. 11. lokiperfect wrote There Used To Be A Lightness (PG-13, 3598) Summary: Down on his luck, Draco Malfoy is trying to find a job. It proves more than unsuccessful. Molly Weasley, with all kids now grown up, is trying to start a restaurant. That proves more successful, and makes them cross paths. Harry Potter, running away from memories of the war, returns to London three years later to discover exactly how things have changed. 12. cubedcoffeecake wrote What Happens at the Milk Bar (doesn’t stay there) (R, 10133) Summary: "Draco, look at me. You talk about Potter all the time. Your complaints about him usually just sound like… Well, you tend to give the impression that you don’t like Potter because you find him distractingly attractive and don’t like that you can’t touch.” Meg and Art nodded sagely as Draco’s jaw dropped. “I—what?” “You’re attracted to Potter, Dray,” Meg helpfully supplied. 13. Bangyababy wrote Promising Produce (NC-17, 3068) Summary: Harry knew it was a stupid idea, but Harry'd never been one for listening, even to himself. Now he's standing in Exam Room 3 trying to explain to Draco Malfoy why there's a carrot stuck up his bum. 14. harryromper wrote Let him lead me to the banquet (PG-13, 16066) Summary: The worst part is Harry’s got no idea why Malfoy keeps sending him invites. He’s never replied to a single one. And if the whole dinner is as exclusive and sought-after as the Prophet keeps breathlessly reporting, then presumably the only reason Malfoy wants him there is in his capacity as the Chosen One. So, really, he can fuck right off. Harry doesn’t care about Draco Malfoy’s redemption tour. And he’s certainly not going to help him with it. 15. AhaMarimbas wrote The Godric's Hollow Wizarding Parents Association (NC-17, 26298) Summary: When Draco decided to move his small family to Godric’s Hollow, little did he know he’d have to deal with misleading television programs, some surprisingly friendly neighbours and a bit of peanut butter. Okay, lots of peanut butter. 16. Ingi wrote haunt yourself and refuse to be buried (G, 3354) Summary: Harry Potter is eighteen years old and he is not okay. 17. whiskyandwildflowers wrote Feeling Rough, Feeling Raw (In the Prime of My Life) (NC-17, 7570) Summary: In which Harry has a quarter-life crisis and winds up at a health spa, Malfoy dresses like a cult leader, and everyone consumes a lot of raw greenery. 18. Goldentruth813 wrote Boiling Point (R, 42882) Summary: Ferveret - n. boiling point After an Auror raid gone wrong, Draco ends up trapped in a dodgy safehouse with nothing but Harry Potter’s dubious company and a dwindling supply of food. With only each other and the walls surrounding them, they're forced to confront their past and their feelings which have long been threatening to boil over. 19. PollyWeasley wrote Potter’s Delicacies (NC-17, 4823) Summary: Draco thinks a quiet life is just what he ever needed in his life. He’s got good friends, a nice independent job as an artist, and an exclusive pâtissier just for himself. He doesn’t think much of why Potter likes to feed him treats so often, he’s just that weird. Even if Draco wants to have something with him, Potter is just a nice, good friend who likes to see him enjoying fancy treats. Right? 20. parkkate wrote A picture of ricecake (NC-17, 7030) Summary: After a night of hot sex, Draco wakes up to the smell of Harry cooking. When he eats his food Draco vows that's it, Harry's making him breakfast forever. 21. crazyparakiss wrote Sweet Relief (NC-17, 1708) Summary: It happens on a Tuesday. The most boring, innocuous day of the week. That’s the day when Draco discovers something delectable, something devious...something fun. 22. DoubleAppled wrote Harry Potter and the Showstopper of Doom (R, 11528) Summary: In which Harry’s an amateur baker, Draco wants him to go on the Great British Bake-Off, Petunia never misses an episode, Sue is a witch, Paul Hollywood is Paul Hollywood, and everyone eats a lot — like a whole lot — of baked goods. 23. postjentacular wrote Tectonic (PG-13, 3296) Summary: In which Draco is the unnoticed centre of attention, Harry's unobservant and, (eventually) they talk. 24. maesterchill wrote Eat Me (NC-17, 10954) Summary: Harry's having a terrible morning. That is, until he receives a curious package at work. Inside are two things: a chocolate model of an erect penis, and a note simply saying ‘Eat Me’ in an elegant, inviting script. And Merlin, he’s hungry. 25. Synonym4Life and GingerTodgers wrote The Fair of Artful Pleasure (F.A.P.) (R, 7363) Summary: F.A.P or the Fair of Artful Pleasure is going as splendidly as Harry could have imagined. Which is not splendidly at all. Which is, in fact, the complete opposite of splendid. Two steps in and he's already traumatised for life. And yet, it still manages to go downhill from there: Malfoy is at the fair and he's making Harry lick lube from dildos in front of an audience. As if that wasn't terrible enough, Harry has feelings. 26. jeni_andtheafterthought wrote Out of the Frying Pan into the Fire (NC-17, 22238) Summary: The war may have ended, but Draco was never able to move on with his life. Having no access to his vault and cut off from his friends and family, he is forced to support himself by working jobs in muggle restaurants. With his luck in the gutter and his flat up in smoke, Draco thinks things can't possibly get worse. Harry offers to help, convincing Draco that things could, in fact, get worse. 27. gracerene wrote The Hand That Feeds You (NC-17, 17371) Summary: Harry needs something only Draco can provide. 28. squadofcats wrote Soup-pocalypse and The Great Curry Cataclysm (NC-17, 104357) Summary: Eleven years after the war, Draco Malfoy leads a quiet, boring, and perfectly respectable life, thanks very much. Or, at least he does, until a sudden and very unexpected veela awakening causes him to throw soup all over Harry Potter in the middle of the Ministry cafeteria. 29. RuArcher (coriesocks) wrote Anyone But Him (NC-17, 19323) Summary: Harry thought going to a Muggle university would be the perfect opportunity for a new start. He hadn’t counted on having Draco Malfoy as a flatmate. 30. Magnolia822 wrote The Great Magic Sex Mushroom Fiasco (NC-17, 6789) Summary: Lost in the Siberian wilderness without food, Aurors Potter and Malfoy are forced to improvise, with unexpected consequences . . . 31. timothysboxers wrote The Boy Who Licked (R, 4039) Summary: Draco Malfoy is doing well for himself: he has paid his dues, enjoys his work at the Ministry, and has his feelings safely in check regarding a certain Auror Potter, thank you very much. That is, until he bears witness to the obscene things the man can do with his tongue and a custard filled bun... 32. gnarf wrote The Difference Between Dust And Soup (Is You) (PG-13, 17612) Summary: When Harry returned for his eighth year at Hogwarts he had high hopes that he'd have a normal and quiet year for once—he had earned it after all! But when he found Malfoy starving and unconscious in the Astronomy Tower one night, it all started over again. He had to figure out what happened to him. After Harry started to cook for Malfoy, and while sharing their secret dinner night after night, he couldn't help but wonder if there was a possibility of them becoming more. 33. Blowfish_Diaries wrote How to Handle a Matzo Ball Soup Emergency (R, 22028) Summary: Harry, having left the Wizarding World after his divorce, inherits a deli in a trendy part of London. Draco wanders in and falls in love - with the food. And certainly not with the infuriatingly-fit-father-of-three who runs the place. A tale of growing up and families of choice; of awkward hugs and new best friends. 34. mykesprit wrote Succumb or Retreat (NC-17, 2068) Summary: Draco procures the Forbidden Fruit, and Auror Harry Potter arrives to take it from him. 35. lyonessheart wrote Melange a deux (PG-13, 10006) Summary: This is the story of two men finding love in unexpected places. And lots of delicious food. 36. oldenuf2nb wrote The Chains of Memory (NC-17, 14417) Summary: Harry is growing sicker by the day and Draco wants to know why. 37. Fantasyfiend09 wrote Popular Appetite (G, 16735) Summary: Bad press is destroying Draco’s hotel. There is only one person who can create enough good press to save it. 38. firethesound wrote The Way These Days Seem to Go (And Go) (PG-13, 15112) Summary: Stress baking isn’t a hobby Harry ever thought he’d pick up, but he’s surprised to find how much it helps him to get through those long months post-war. It keeps his hands busy, it keeps his mind occupied, and when Draco Malfoy steadily pushes his way back into Harry's life, it helps with that too. 39. LadyOfTheAttic wrote Cooking Mama (PG-13, 5124) Summary: Harry and Draco are roommates and auror partners but there are certain lines Draco doesn't cross-- namely, he won't let Harry cook for him. This would be fine if Draco didn't live off of frozen dinners and sadness. Harry decides to help with lessons! 40. TheKnitterati wrote The Finest Ingredient (PG-13, 4474) Summary: The Weasley family is in need of help. Help that comes in the form of a rare plant, grown only on the grounds of Malfoy Manor. In order to save the day, Harry might have to flirt with Draco Malfoy. Or worse...they both might have to face up to the reality that they fancy each other. 41. giraffeminion wrote A Hint of Spice (G, 6787) Summary: After the war, Draco breaks ties with the wizarding world to lead a quiet and uneventful life as a financial advisor on the outskirts of Muggle London. His peaceable existence is broken, however, when a damnable food truck sets up shop right outside his front door. 42. groundbreaking wrote Order To Go (R, 17645) Summary: Draco Malfoy opens a new pâtisserie in Diagon Alley, his pastries and desserts are to die for. Harry is the coffee shop owner next door who wants to take Draco home for dessert. Ron is just there for the bread. - in which harry has a sweet tooth, but it isn't for anything on the menu.  43. Sw33tCh377yPi3 wrote Ice Cream (G, 7508) Summary: Sometimes the critical moment passes us by. If we’re fortunate, we get a second—or third—chance. 44. epsilonargus wrote The Right Question (PG-13, 4652) Summary: Harry is having dinner every week with Malfoy - but no, Ernie, they are not bloody dates! 45. Femmequixotic and Noeon wrote Ynys Afallach (I Will Give My Love An Apple) (NC-17, 42472) Summary: Professor Waverley Root's tutorial in the history of magical food is something of a legend at Flamel College. Draco Malfoy wants to apply it to his work in sustainable wizarding agriculture. Harry Potter's taking it for his interest in historical overlap between the magical and Muggle worlds in the West Country. When Root pairs them together, the fireworks (and the apples!) fly. Now if only they can find something original, perhaps they'll make it through to complete their degrees on time. 46. Drarryismymuse wrote The Way to a Man’s Heart (NC-17, 16390) Summary: Draco is released from Azkaban and given one week to find gainful employment...or else. A chance encounter with the ever-meddling Harry Potter changes the course of his week, and ultimately his life. This is a story of mistakes, burnt toast, awkward encounters, rude employees, bold gestures, and a bit of anal. :D 47. milkandhoney wrote Squill & Spoon (R, 19169) Summary: In order to complete the terms of his probation, Draco's mind healer must deem Draco reformed enough to re-enter wizarding society. Squill & Spoon, a new wizarding supper club could be the perfect opportunity — that is, if Harry Potter would stop showing up at his table every. Single. Time. 48. brightowl wrote The Dinner (NC-17, 7795) Summary: Draco had been trying to beat the sunset, walking along the cobblestone road to the Chateau where he would be staying that night, when he saw the door. Le Billet Doux, said a painted red sign. Below it, réservations non requises: ‘no reservations required.’ 49. Wonders wrote The One Where Harry is a Prat (Not Really) (PG-13, 5941) Summary: The one where Harry is a prat, a pig, an incompetent wazzock, an imbecile and ridiculous. Harry hears Draco talking about his favourite flower and buys him a bouquet full of them. Why, then, does he think Harry’s trying to kill him? 50. tigersilver wrote Eighteen Kisses (PG-13, 9436) Summary: Harry is being targeted by a very determined and wily Malfoy, a Malfoy with sly hands and a sweet, sweet mouth. 51. germankitty wrote The Best of Food (PG-13, 16884) Summary: It all started at the Hogsmeade Food Fayre. If some people those idiots Smith and McLaggen hadn't tried to sabotage a few participants, Draco would never have had to put up with having Potter's bread stall jammed in next to his. (And no, that wasn't a pun, thanks ever so.) Because then nobody could have claimed they'd seen him nibble morsels of tasty, delicious home-baked bread directly from Potter's fingers. Or let Potter lick spoonsful of Draco’s exquisite, scrumptious gourmet preserves directly from the jar. Clearly, Pansy, Blaise and Granger those people were quite delusional. At least that's Draco's story and he's sticking to it. 52. potteresque_ire wrote The Kitchen Thieves (and the Kitchen Herself) (NC-17, 67053) Summary: In a deserted cottage miles away from Hogsmeade, a pair of young spirits waited for a new owner to call the place home. One day, Auror Harry Potter bought the cottage. One evening, farm wizard Draco Malfoy showed up to spend the night with Harry… and steal from the kitchen. Why don’t we let Kate tell you their story? She’s the spirit who looks after the kitchen, and she’s got quite a bit to say… 53. sassy_cissa wrote Three Months, Eleven Days and Nine Hours (PG-13, 11029) Summary: Broke and living in a one room hovel in Knockturn Alley, Draco hunts in rubbish bins for food. Nothing could be more humiliating, right? Unless you're Draco Malfoy...

PODFIC

1. semperfiona read Pomegranate (NC-17) Summary: Podfic of "Pomegranate" by treacle_tartlet. More than a decade after the War, Draco makes a triumphant return to the wizarding world as the successful chef/owner of Pomegranate, only to have his world thrown into disorder when Harry arrives unexpectedly in the dining room.