#ask me how my novel is going

[trillgutterbug]

title: coefficient of variation fandom: succession pairing: ken/stewy tags: cock warming, hand jobs, making out, harvard era, pre-canon wc: ~3k rating: e summary:

"No, it's not—I just want to. It's not like, a thing, you know?" "You want to lie here slobbering on my limp dick while I read forty-seven thrilling pages of Macroprudential Policy Regulation, but it's 'not a thing.'" Kendall's face, already hot, pulsed feverish with a livid mix of embarrassment and arousal. He shut his eyes. "Something like that, yeah."

[milkbreadtoast]

idk how i want to draw him yet and not ready to make a srs attempt but here's a bad kdj phone doodle lol🚶🏻

[silverwhittlingknife]

So you're a go to source for all things Dick&Tim bros and you tend to write primarily from Dick's POV. So, odd question, but if you were to summarize their relationship from his POV in FIVE panels which panels would you pick? Keeping in mind that one specific aspect of their relationship that you love needs to be clearly represented by each panel (loyalty, trust etc). I hope this is a fun challenge and not an annoying question so if you don't want to answer that's cool! Have a wonderful day!

No more talk. The same thoughts run through two minds... (SotB 29) / You're my equal. My closest ally. (RR 1) / I can't stop thinking how much I rely on him. (GoG 3)

25 Feelings Dick Has About Tim

This was such a kind ask & a cool challenge which I totally failed; here are TWENTY-five panels of Dick's POV on Tim sdfdsfds Look, I got carried away! Marcia and Cindy! The boys!!

OKAY SO BEFORE I GET TO THE PANELS A FEW NOTES:

WARNING THAT THERE ARE SOME NEGATIVE EMOTIONS IN HERE because I love conflict but but but you gotta remember those are not the final word!! They are complicated people and sometimes they get mad at each other BUT ultimately their relationship is so hugely important in both their lives & they love each other and rely on each other so much -!!! <3

Also I have CONCLUDING THOUGHTS at the end about what Dick's POV leaves out (mostly: a lot of Dick defending & protecting & supporting Tim, which Dick does instinctively but isn't very self-aware about most of the time)

I have loosely organized my list into 5^5 format (5 categories with 5 examples each!), so if you want to skip to a relevant one, here are the categories!!

Below the cut:

I hate him and find him infuriating (#1-5)

On second thought, he's endearing & fun (#6-10)

Grief is complicated & he's all tangled up in mine (#11-15)

I love him & think highly of him (#16-20)

I rely on him & though it's hard for me, I trust him (#21-25)

I hate him and find him infuriating (#1 - 5)

1) He thinks he’s so smart and can psychoanalyze me and Bruce, but he doesn’t know me at all, he should get lost (New Titans 61)

2) He thinks he’s so smart and can psychoanalyze Bruce but he doesn’t know Bruce at all, he should get lost (Gotham Knights 26)

3) He is so nosy about stuff that is MY business (Robin 0)

4) He sounds like an insincere suck-up half the time... but okay, fine, if you push him he's got a sense of humor about it (New Titans 65)

5) I'm sure he's a better vigilante than me. It's my fault for being a failure, but I resent him anyway. (Nightwing 9 - Dick's having a nightmare)

On second thought, he's kinda endearing (#6-10)

6) He worries too much and gets anxious so easily, but it makes him fun to tease (Robin 67)

7) I'm not that competitive - okay, so maybe I'm a little competitive, I gotta make sure he doesn't get a swelled head (Prodigal)

8) I'm supposed to be his favorite! It is not cool for him to be fanboying over my not-girlfriend's not-boyfriend!! (Birds of Prey 19)

9) We have fun together. I can kick back and relax when it's just the two of us. Plus I get to boss him around a bit. (Prodigal)

10) He’s always trying to reassure me, and I guess it's a little comforting, but also he doesn’t really get it. Or me. He makes excuses that he shouldn't, because he doesn't understand that I suck. (Nightwing 64)

Grief is complicated and he's all tangled up in mine (#11 - 15)

11) He reminds me of everything I try not to think about. Sometimes the memories are so strong it hurts to look at him. (Batman 441)

12) WHY IS HE BEING IMPOSSIBLE ALL OF A SUDDEN??? THIS IS SO FRUSTRATING (Nightwing 139)

13) We're the same. He says all the things I don't let myself think about. It's like arguing with myself. (Nightwing 139)

14) He thinks he gets to tell me what to do but he doesn’t, fuck him (Battle for the Cowl)

15) Life sucks, so what. I sucked it up so he should too (RR 1)

I love him and think highly of him (#16 - 20)

16) He’s the closest thing to a brother I’ll ever have.  If someone hurts him I will hurt them harder. (Nightwing 6)

17) I can't handle the idea of losing him. (Nightwing 97)

17) He’s so good and I’m not. I'm afraid I’m bad for him. (Nightwing 110)

18) He’s better than me, and it’s kind of a relief because I know no matter what he’ll be okay. (Gates of Gotham 3)

19) In my head he’s the responsible one.  (Gotham Knights 10)

I rely on him, and though it's hard for me, I trust him (#20-25)

20) I know I have to trust him but I'm afraid he'll make the wrong choices and get hurt (Nightwing 139)

21) I'm sure I know what he should do because I see myself in him - not that I can take my own advice, but he should (Blackest Night 3)

22) I trust him.  When I’m losing my grip on things, he pulls me back. (Gotham Knights 10)

23) I want him to trust me (Red Robin 12)

24) He can tell when I'm lying. Sometimes he sees my weaknesses better than I wish he did. (Detective Comics 874)

25) He’s always there when I need him. (Teen Titans / Outsiders Secret Files)

Final rambling thoughts:

TIM: Uhh, okay, so I'm just skimming this list - do you really trust me? you're not just saying that? - but anyway, I'm confused because you left some stuff out? Like some stuff that's kinda important? DICK: No? I think I got everything? TIM (starts counting on his fingers): The time I was having a bad day but then I called you. The time I got captured by Two-Face but then you saved me. The time I fell off a train but then you saved me. The time I fell off a building but then you saved me. The time I fell off a different building - DICK: I feel like you're trying to make some kind of point but I'm not sure what it could be.

SO THE THING IS, I put 25 panels in here and not a single one has Dick catching Tim when he’s falling!!! But I think that's a central motif of their relationship from Tim’s POV, not Dick’s. I love Dick, but in some ways I think he is spectacularly un-self-aware.

And I think he especially has a lot of blind spots about Tim. He kinda intermittently gets that Tim admires him, and he enjoys it in a playful I-get-to-boss-you-around way. But Dick tends to consistently underestimate all of his own good qualities & skills, and he meets Tim at a point in his life when he's especially down on himself & his abilities. And so he's unable to see his own influence on Tim, & therefore unable to fully understand a lot of Tim's priorities and loyalties and motivations, because you can't actually understand Tim without understanding Dick's impact on him. There's a fascinating moment in Bruce Wayne: Murderer when Dick's completely blindsided & upset to discover that Tim doesn't entirely trust Bruce, even though this has been a definitive fact of Tim's whole thing ever since he showed up with his Batman needs Robin theory, and Barbara has to actively remind Dick of the obvious-to-everyone-except-Dick fact that a lot of Tim's loyalty is to Dick, and Tim loves Bruce but feels free to be more wary of him. (And to give Bruce credit: this is not something he ever begrudges.) But anyway Babs points this out, and Dick manages to sorta process it for about five seconds, but he cannot actually accept it into his worldview so instead he discards it at the speed of light and goes off and has an argument with Tim instead sdfsfdsf

All of Dick's virtues - Dick's kindness at the circus and Dick's determination to fight through grief and Dick's rigid sense of morals and Dick's vigilante skills and every time Dick has ever backed Tim up or listened to him or protected him or saved him from something or just been casually kind to a stranger in Tim's presence etc etc etc - all these things loom really large in Tim's mental story of Who Dick Is, and What Dick And Tim's Relationship Is. Tim meets Dick before he meets Bruce, trusts Dick more than Bruce, aspires to be Robin instead of Batman. And so in Tim's default version of the story, Dick is the super-special and admirable hero and Tim is... nobody in particular, a tagalong outsider who's barely managing to be a hero, not part of Dick and Bruce's family and not part of their story, who, if he's VERY LUCKY and tries REALLY HARD, might be able to fight his way to proving himself and offering something to Dick that Dick will value, if Dick doesn't get fed up with him first.

But that's not Dick's version of the story!!!

Dick's version of the story is almost the exact opposite, a story where Dick's an outcast failure black sheep who's screwing up everything he tries, and meanwhile Tim is The Sudden New Perfect Robin Who's Better Than Me And Probably Bruce Loves Him More And Probably They Gossip About What A Loser I Am, mixed with a complicated edge of Tim Thinks He's So Smart But He Doesn't Know Me/Us At All. Dick gets much more attached to Tim over time, and Tim gets unnervingly better at the know-it-all psychoanalysis so then Dick gets to have complicated feelings about him being right instead of just annoyance at him for being wrong, plus Dick's relationship with Bruce improves a lot, so Tim stops feeling so threatening. But Dick never fundamentally changes his basic theory of their relationship in which Tim is highly impressive and capable, and Dick is not so much.

And so asking Dick about Tim is kinda like if you asked George Bailey to tell you about Harry Bailey in It's A Wonderful Life; like, you'll be there for five hours while he tells you how great Harry is, and how accomplished Harry is, and how he doesn't really get how or why Harry does the things he does, and maybe George does feel a little resentful or jealous sometimes, but that pales in comparison to all his admiration and trust for Harry who he loves so much, who's better than him in so many ways, and he's not gonna openly gripe but secretly he can't help but feel sometimes like he's such a failure in comparison to Harry, a perfect person who emerged fully formed from Zeus's head with all the virtues and also all the accomplishments, etc. etc. etc. --

-- and he will not actually remember the part where he changed and saved Harry's whole entire life unless you literally send him to an alternate timeline in order to force him to remember it. <3

[pinkd3mon]

Kirby deals with existential crisis and Bandana is a good friend

[deus-ex-mona]

when the slowburn makes the ship extra cute~~~

[crybaby-bkg]

the way I panic every time someone asks me what my book is about bc even tho I’ve been writing it over four + years now I literally have no idea who these people are

[tecchous-thicc-buttocks]

stormbringer scenes that deserve recognition (mostly an adam appreciation post ngl) pt 1

albatross making it sound like chuuya's on his period

every single one of doc's fufu i live for his fufu

adam being best boi for a solid two hours

ADAM SAYING WOAH :0000

this dinosaur scene because d i n o

this himbo

UWAH??????

carry-on chuuya

hahahahaha

HE👏 IS👏 A👏 PIGEON👏

android joke.

chuuya using gah and what excessively for two pages

HIMMMMMM>>>>

adam x gum forbidden otp

notice 😍 me 🥺 chuuya 😩 sama 😘

HAAAAAAAAAA

STOP IT THAT'S DIRTY

BONUS:

without any context it's just SO FUNNY (me explaining to sigma what i did to his mom last night but he doesn't even have a mom)

[pennedinblood]

as of ten minutes ago we are officially Jobless™️. my sign to retire early and devote the remainder of my existence to writing toxic old man yaoi

[toddtakefive]

btw todd’s reluctance to join the dps because he doesn’t want to read (which is then accommodated for) and is scared to put himself out there (which is also worked through) being read as todd not wanting to go AT ALL, and thus neil making the proper accommodations (“todd anderson, who prefers not to read, will keep the minutes of the meetings”) and encouraging him to step out of the box that stifles him being seen as ‘forceful’ or like he can’t take no for an answer makes me insane with rage

[fisheito]

did you hear about yakumo's new rooms yet? or seen it?

sir i just got here please have mercy

[pets-will-play-ask-blog]

lore drop

In highschool I self published a book through Amazon Kindle and I have two different books on Amazon you can buy and I won't link them here haha

[altruistic-meme]

at least 4 people have now asked in the notes of my post for someone to talk theories/ideas about how the ada would react to actually seeing skk's dynamic in canon so now i have to go rewatch and take notes to fulfill these requests. im probably not going to rewatch the WHOLE show for it but i will be watching the first few episodes as well as every episode with chuuya and especially all of the skk interactions.

[icewindandboringhorror]

Lineup of all of the characters that appear long enough to need a visual representation of them in the game lol

[im-a-king-baby]

Hi!

I'm done with my re-reading of ELYN, and THE line I will keep with me is this one :

“I don’t want anything from you.”

Simon pulls back to look at him. He’s applied concealer to the bags under his eyes, this close Wilhelm can see the streaks of it on his skin as he gives a weak smile. “You want the most of anyone.” Which isn’t fair and isn’t true. Except that it is. “I just want you to be happy.”

“Yeah,” Simon says. “That.”

This is sooo powerful ! The weight of the expectations of your loved one... 😭❤😭❤

And I would love to know why Simon gave Wille a key for his room... What was he expecting ?

And if it's not too much, what do you think made August get clean and turn his back to royalty ?

Again, thank you so much for this story ! ❤

Hiii, sorry this took so long. Can't believe I am expected to work a job instead of just having fanfic related feelings on tumblr all day every day. Very rude. None stars.

(if your ask is in my inbox I promise I am getting to it! If you still want to submit questions for any of the memes I reblogged, I will happily ramble all day every day so the ask box is always open <3 )

"I just want you to be happy."

(I need you all to know that doing this meme is really reinforcing the 'a first draft does not have to be perfect or even good' mantra because guess what was also not in draft 1! All of this!)

There is a side of Simon's character that I think is justified in canon which is that he doesn't like letting people down. He switches schools to support Sara, he agrees to date Marcus even though he clearly doesn't want to because Marcus asks. So this moment starts with Simon talking about how he started on coke because he didn't want to let the fans down by being exhausted. Originally there was another step in the middle where he talks about how Candace wanted him to get clean but also be the superstar (and do a documentary!) and he couldn't see a way to have both. And then that his breakthrough was hiring Joseph, and Keira and realising that having money means you can pay people to care about you in very specific ways.

Wilhelm swallows. “Sometimes people help you just because they want to.” Simon’s mouth quirks slightly off to the side, like Wilhelm’s said something amusing. “That’s what they tell you. But they always want something from you, you just don’t realise what until it’s too late.” “I don’t want anything.”

Wilhelm I think genuinely believes that he's telling the truth here, but Simon has had to become a lot more aware of how he is perceived and the expectations of him from having this very public career. Like, for all Wilhelm saying 'you can take time, the fans won't disappear if it takes you more than 2 months to make an album', Simon has also seen the fan tweets complaining when the tour skips certain cities/countries, when they have to wait for the album, when they don't release a tour vlog. (One of the big reasons he doesn't have a phone is to stop him from reading all of that because at a certain point you can't satisfy everyone and Candace is like 'this is not helping you so let's put a stop to it.')

So in this moment Wilhelm is saying 'I don't want anything' but also he wants them to be together and happy and Simon is very aware that the easiest way for him to be happy is by drinking and taking the drugs. He's spent the last week and a half in coke withdrawal which is basically just being miserable all the time and going into rehab is going to be more of that. And then, the Simon who comes out of rehab is going to be very different from Simme-the-popstar and different to Simon-from-high-school and current-Simon has no idea what that person will look like or if it will even be someone Wilhelm likes.

So for Simon getting clean means getting away from anyone else's idea of who he should be. And that's hard. And sometimes you hit on the perfect line to articulate what would otherwise be 5 paragraphs of rambling tumblr post and those moments are the best part of writing for all that they come so rarely <3 (and also they do not always come in draft 1 and that's okay)

2. Why does Simon invite Wilhelm to the hotel room

I think SImon's base logic is the same as why Wilhelm went, this sense of 'if we can get away from the cameras we can be Us instead of Simme and Crown Prince Wilhelm and things will make sense again.' But on top of that is this thing that Simon is doing where he is attempting to use sex to solve his problems (arguably this desire is coming from the same place as the drinking and the coke. It's the 'I don't know how to feel good when I'm not performing, but if I invite someone up they'll tell me I'm amazing and then we can have orgasms and that'll feel good for a little while').

So Simon is thinking 'I need to see him in private' but then he doesn't have any plan beyond that so it's back to the usual plan of sex=feeling good, with a side line in 'if I give him a good enough time he won't notice anything weird or ask any questions and everything will be fine.'

(I do have a while Simon POV scene of the hotel after Wilhelm leaves that will probably be posted somewhere at some point so here is a teaser:

Wilhelm must have left by now. And if part of Simon was hoping that he’d still be there when Simon opened the door - so SImon could say what, he doesn’t know - that part is quiet enough not to show surprise when there’s just Gareth in the hallway in his perfectly pressed suit with his perfectly neutral gaze. Does Gareth feel emotion? Nobody knows. He has all of one facial expression so if he’s judging Simon for bringing the prince of Sweden up to his rooms or judging him for failing to keep the prince of Sweden there for longer than an hour, or not judging him at all because he has full respect for the whore lifestyle, Simon never has to know.

3. August

Oh hey! I thought this choice might get me more hate so thanks to everyone for coming on board with me for the off-screen August redemption arc 😅

So fundamentally ELYN (and, yknow, YR) is a story about legacy and inheritance. Both the big glaringly obvious thing of the crown, but also the other things: the secrets, the class culture, and the genetic predisposition to addiction. (I can't remember right now if August's father's suicide was drug-related in the show, but for the fic I definitely had that in my mind).

So August functions as a parallel for both Simon and Wilhelm. The obvious 'was taking drugs to cope with stress, stress kept increasing, ultimately broke under it' . But also on Wilhelm's side, August is desperately trying to live up to the legacy of a dead man. He's idolising his father, wanting to make him proud and unable to acknowledge that this culture of appearing perfect and not talking about problems is what killed him.

The way I always pictured August's arc was that he hit rock bottom somewhere in the military - he'd been relying on pills to get him through stress, this was infinitely more stress than high school, plus the fallout from Sara's confession (which had been covered up by the court, but was still impacting him). I never had a concrete idea of what the exact rock bottom was (maybe stealing pills?), but he was dishonorably discharged and checked himself into rehab where he basically got a big dose of Welcome to Real Life. Meeting normal people. Realising they're not so different. 'There's a whole world out there that's not our careful circle of cultivated Heirs and Heiresses and people have problems but they also have whole entire lives where none of these things you're so worried about matter at all.'

And he did the work. He re-evaluated his biases. He grew up. He met a girl, who I think was class-adjacent but more practical than the Hillerska-royalty types (I like to think she was maybe an art assessor who came to help him auction off large parts of the estate holdings) and they got talking. Their relationship seems to have moved pretty fast, but hey August took some pride in the elements of being prefect that involved taking care of people so maybe he's ready for a family. (Originally there were going to be 8 years between the show and the fic so I gave him 3 kids, and then when I cut it down to 6years it felt mean to delete a baby so that's why he has twins.)

The 12 step program has a step for 'making amends', I think August probably got in touch with Wilhelm and was like 'I owe you an apology and amends, and I understand if you don't want to talk to me but if I can ever help you or Simon, I'm here.' And that went ignored until Wilhelm called him from basic training, and then five years later when he got a call from Simon in hospital like 'So Malin gave me your number...'

One other bonus August ELYN headcanon I have is that Wilhelm phoned August from the car on his way to the debate and was like:

"I think if I do it now I can bring it all down, but if I can't they're going to come after you, and then the children. I'm sorry I can't protect them anymore." "It's my job to look after my family," August says. "And I promise I will not let any of this shit touch them. You have my full support, go do what you have to do."

(there is a whole other tumblr post about how I don't believe in writing bad people just people who sometimes make bad choices but this is already Very Long and I'm not sure if I actually answered the questions so we'll leave it there 😅)

[vulpinesaint]

Hi your patron saint quiz still lives rent free in my brain, your prose was so stunning to read!!! Do you have a book or any books that’re similar to your writing? It’s so evocative and scratches my brain just right!!

hi darling! thank you so much! i answered a similar question on inspo for my writing style a few days back (link here) and there should be some authors that are really wonderful on there, if not similar. i have to admit that i don't have anything that's distinctly similar to my writing, at least not that i'm aware of... if anyone can think of anything though. let me know. sounds like something i would want to read too :)

if you wanted more of my writing in a slightly longer form, i can gently hold out my twine project aromanticism. not quite the same vibes, but it is notably longer than my usual poems and interactive like a quiz <3

[kyouka-supremacy]

sskk is such a perfect ship you can do everything with them

Pure angst, hurt/comfort, fluff, smut - they pull it off perfectly. the only ship ever truly

I knowwwwwwww enemies to rivals to friends to lovers, friends to enemies to lovers, detective x mafioso, complementary designs, soulmates, mythological juxtaposition, black and white, star crossed lovers, moon and sun, vampire x were-something, enemies that constantly motivate each other to be better, coffee shop dates, prep x jock, nerd x goth, “I could have been you”, cat and dog, team ups, giving your life for your loved one, strongest when together, unrequited love, and most recently, “I know you're still in there”.

But even then there's so much more to them than all the tropes they fit in!!! It's about the symbolism and love and the way they can't exist without each other. It's about the violence and pain and death and the way love can born in the most hopeless place. It's about the person you've hated the most becoming the person you're the most afraid to lose. It's about knowing even the most heartless of people has it within themselves to love someone else. It's about holding bloodstained hands. It's about them!!!!! Ship Of All Time in every sense