#at this point i know that no matter what little variations they add，i'm still not gonna like it

[rubys-domain]

i cannot even begin to express my disappointment at how chongyun's likeness is used as cover art for the combat event. i know it makes sense, but i don't like it.

[hyunjilicious]

[bang chan x reader] // [minho x reader]

Summary: this started out as a "how would bf!skz react to you saying 'it hurts' (or any variation of) during sex" but I got carried away and it turned into just plotless filth.. + writing this for more than 2 members in one night felt like cheating lol (SMUT) ~1k each

Warnings: unprotected sex, oral (m receiving)... face fucking basically, slapping, spanking, name calling (whore, slut..) + plus lowkey degradation, cum play/swallowing, tying ppl up (??? idk how else to say it sksksk), lowkey mean!Chan but like consensually lowkey mean!Chan, pain in the ass!Minho... I think this is everything? I don't know. Please let me know if I missed anything!! Also 18+ PLS!!! DNI OTHERWISE!!!!

Chan: 

I'm sorry, but you two already have a safe word so whatever you say besides that, is only going to be used against you. 

He'd have you pinned down into the mattress with only a pillow under your hips as he fucks himself relentlessly into you. Beads of sweat are rolling off his temples, the bed is shaking, the neighbors can definitely hear everything but still, he shows no signs of slowing down. His thighs are burning and he's almost out of breath, but with every thrust, he goes harder, deeper inside of you and very few things could make him stop at this point.

You don't even know anymore what it is - pain or pleasure, but taking into consideration your trembling legs and the way your cunt greedily swallows him whole every time he forces his cock inside, all you know is that you love it. Still, you're numb and overly stimulated at the same time, making that burning feeling between your legs, no matter how good, a little bit too much.

So you squint your eyes and hide your face down against the bed, scrunching the sheets into your fists as your moans turn into a cry. "Fuck-" you pant, "Fuck, it hurts, ah-"

Chan's thrusts slow down, but he's going just as hard and deep as he leans down to grab a fistful of your hair and pull you up with your back against his chest. "What was that?" he asks directly against your ear, "It hurts?"

Your back arches against him as you cry. "Yes.."

"Good" he breathes against your skin before pushing you back down against the mattress. "It's supposed to" 

This time, he lowers himself too so that you're now trapped between him and the bed, with no way to escape, and he thrives on knowing just how much you love that.

"Chan baby, please" you cry, your cheek pressed into the pillow as you have your head turned to the side.

His panting right above you, his face inches away from yours as his rugged and hot breath fans the side of your neck. "What is it, hm? Tell me, baby girl" he grins. 

"Please…"

"Please what?" he rasps as one of his arms snakes around your body to reach your clit. "Talk to me" he adds, placing a kiss on your shoulder before sinking his teeth into your skin.

Your eyes shut with an overwhelming mixture of pain and pleasure, but you manage to take a deep breath and open your mouth, however not much comes out. "Baby…" you cry.

"What is it, angel?" he chuckles, "Did I fuck you dumb already? Can't even form a sentence for me, my baby?"

You'd say something, the words are there, inside your head, but they're messy, flying around and neither of them agrees to go past your lips. So you just nod. Pathetically.

"My dumb, little girl" he coos while thrusting into you. "So drunk for my cock, aren't you? But you like it like that, just laying there while I have my way with you? Tell me"

Again, all you can do is nod. 

"Good, baby" he says and pushes the hair away from the back of your neck so he can kiss you, right before pushing himself back up again. "Make me cum, doll, come on" 

Not that you could answer, let alone actually move a muscle, but Chan doesn't care. He digs his fingers into your hips and guides your entire body up and down on his cock, all your weight as if nothing in his arms. He'll feel the burn tomorrow because right now, he can't stop for the world. 

Once he resumes his pace, hitting all the right spots at just the right angle, you barely manage to give him a warning before your legs start to shake. "God, I'm so close, so-" you pant, "Fuck"

"Cum for me" he urges you, "make a mess on my cock, princess, come on"

So intoxicated for him, from the way he held you to the literal feeling of every vein of his cock against your walls, your orgasm comes crashing down on you in waves. And yet, somehow, it wakes you up a bit.

"Chan" you extend an arm back towards him, "Stop, stop, stop, please!" Normally, those words wouldn't deter him, but your voice sounds serious enough for him to quirk an eyebrow. "Stop, please"

"What's-"

"Pull out please, I want you to cum in my mouth"

As if he wasn't close enough anyway, he had to take a moment to contain himself. His movements halt, for just a second, before he slowly and painfully pulls out. "Fuck, I thought something happened, but you're just a fucking slut for me"

You proudly nod and then feel yourself get yanked to the side, falling back onto your back, as Chan settles with his knees on either side of your head.

He's pumping himself into his hand, and you take that as the biggest insult in the world - when your perfectly good mouth is just inches away? Without hesitation, you swat his hands away and push yourself up just enough to wrap your lips around his head. 

A hiss of relief breaks from his throat before he fists your roots into his own hand. He's guiding your movements, fast and shallow, until he looks down to meet your eyes and knows he can push further. Next thing you know, he's leaning forward, prompting his weight on his free hand as his cock goes all the way down your throat, completely cutting off your air supply. 

Your arms are around his clenched thighs, your legs flailing around as you struggle against the tears in the back of your eyes, but it is very clear to the both of you who's going to win this competition. 

"Fucking made to take my cock down your throat, princess" he breathes, pulling out of your mouth and finishing himself off with his hand.

In a second, his cum lands on your tongue, your eyes on his' the entire time. He's all red, his hair is a mess - wet and curly, he can barely breathe and all the air in his lungs comes only in the form of the sweetest, most perfect moans. 

"Fuck, fuck-" he cries again as the last drops leak out of his tip. 

When he looks down, you're already swallowing his cum, and gathering with your fingers the mess he made on your cheeks, on your chin and on your neck. 

"Jesus-" Chan breathes out as he falls down next to you. With the last ounces of energy left in his body, he pulls you against him, his lips instantly finding yours. 

Earlier, you could taste yourself on his cock. Now, he can taste himself on your lips. And neither of you wants to stop. 

Minho:

This man is kinky. He knows everything and owns every sex toy. Every other week he comes up with new things to try, he's extremely careful, incredibly good with communication and always knows what he's doing. Despite all of this, pain is never the focus. He doesn't get off on pain, it doesn't matter that it's a completely safe and controlled environment, pain - in whatever shape or form, has no place during sex. He'd much rather over-stimulate you, not let you cum, hear you cry and beg for him, and every time you do something that could potentially hurt, like slapping or pulling your hair, he knows your limit very well and never crosses it. HOWEVER. However, everything adjacent to actual sex, is a whole different story. He'll take advantage of your low pain threshold and just use it in his favor. 

One day, he's on top of you, working his expert knots around your wrists as he ties your arms to the bedpost. "Ouch-" you flinch, "That hurts a bit"

"What?" he looks down at you, faux worry on his features. He knows very well what you're doing. "Is it too tight, doll?"

You just nod.

"I'm sorry" he grins and pulls on the rope, harshly securing your hands into place. "Nothing I can do about that"

Or. He's sitting at the edge of the bed, with you sprawled across his lap. He's still fully clothed while you're completely naked, ass already red and covered in his hand prints. 

"God, Minho, it hurts!" you whine, turning around to grab his hand and stop him from continuing.

"Well, it hurt me too" he swats your hand away and leans down on his elbow to be at the same level with you. "How do you think I felt when you came from that vibrator only? My dick wasn't even out of my pants yet. It hurt me, doll"

"You put the vibrator there!" you try to counter but he settles back into his spot and shuts you up with another rough slap against your already sore buttcheek. "Fuck!" you cry out in defeat, little giggles escaping your lips before you manage to hide your face into the sheets.

"You promised you wouldn't cum. It's not my fault"

"I promised I'd try!"

"You're a strong woman, Y/n, you can do anything you set your mind to" he chuckles as he spanks you again, taking the time to enjoy your whimpers before continuing. "I think you just didn't try hard enough. Or maybe you did it on purpose"

"Oh, for fuck's sake" you cry, but the simple fact that you can't manage to hide your amusement makes your words mean absolutely nothing to him. So he goes again, slapping your ass and also sinking his fingers into your already traumatized flesh. "Fuck, Minho, it hurts so bad!"

"What? This?" he laughs and spanks you again.

At this point, you're kicking your feet and hiding your face into the nearest pillow, yet still wiggling your ass in his face, clearly letting him know you haven't had enough yet.

"It's ok, doll" he cooes, and rubs his hand up and down your back. "I don't want to do this, you're making me do it. You just need to apologize to me"

"I'm sorry…"

"Look at me while you're saying it, baby" he demands.

You turn around a bit, just so you can see his face, but while you're almost entirely successful in hiding your amusement, Minho doesn't even seem to be trying. He's all a smile, very clearly enjoying this a bit too much. "I'm sorry, Minho, can you please forgive me?" you pout.

He thinks about it for a second and then grins, "No"

You're about to comment, but he spanks you again, so all you can do is whimper and rub your thighs together. "Please, I'm begging you!"

"If you so badly want me to stop, why is your cunt so wet, hm?" he asks, trailing his fingers up and down your opening a few times before shoving his fingers inside you with absolutely no warning.

Moaning, and trying to grind your pussy back against his hand, you hide your face into your shoulder and mumble "From the vibrator"

You have no idea if he heard you or not, but you know damn well he'd never let that kind of sarcasm pass. 

"Y/n?" he calls, twisting his fingers inside of you and stretching your walls.

"Yes"

"Are you going to be whore for me and cum on my fingers, baby?"

"Can I?"

"Of course you can" he nods and picks up his pace, knowing very well how close you were to a second orgasm. "But I hope you know that I'm still going to fuck you afterwards, will you be able to take it?"

You try to whimper something, but all that comes out is just a little moan.

"You sure, doll?" he asks, pressing his thumb against your clit as he starts pumping his fingers into you harder and faster. "Three rounds? Isn't that too much for your little cunt?"

"Nuh-uh"

"Nuh-uh, what? Use your words, baby"

"No," you swallow, "It's not too much… please"

"Please? Please what?"

"Please fuck me, Minho"

"Well if you ask so nicely…"

[mybg3notebook]

I know you have not uploaded in several years and might not even see this, but I wanted to say thank you SO much for your amazing explorations of Gale. He is a very complex and often misunderstood character and I think your meta posts on him hit the mark perfectly. If the spark arises I hope you will return after the full release :) Thank you again for all your wonderful posts! Have a nice day!

Hello!

Thank you very much. I am still around, it's simply work and other games have got my attention, and after playing EA so many times, I am already burnt out to the bones. I am also deeply disappointed with Larian's latest changes.

Hopefully, after release, I will continue with more analysis if the game is worthy of that. Unfortunately, I'm not sure how well these analysis of Gale will hold with the apparent rewrite of his character. If the new description of him ends up being true and it's not a terrible lie to the player, since nothing of that was shown or hinted in EA, these analysis will fall apart. In fact, if he ends up being another boring, overused, cliche wizard who wants power because he wants to be the biggest wizard of Toril :rolling eyes:.... I may lose any interest in him. All what made him interesting and a bit "original" within the context of Forgotten Realms has been erased completely with that new description.

I'm also disappointed with Larian in general, because it's obvious their two fave chars are forced through the player's throat like Liara was in Bioware's case. You don't care about them? It doesn't matter, they will always take priority in conversation and scenes, they will be key in showing another side of the main plot (as it was Fane in DOS2) and the rest of the companions become secondary or forgettable.

And Karlach's final face is a horror. It's a variation of Shadowheart's face, a barby-Karlach, because clearly Larian feeds bro gamers who want yet another doll-faced woman. I find annoying that nobody complained for this change: her first potential face (not the placeholder), with half face burnt and scarred, hard eyes, and a longer and pronounced nose, was the face of a warrior who went to hell and back... now you have the baby-doll face, Red!Shadowheart, almost, lol. It's a bit unsettling. It reminds me when Larian made their big-boobs lizard women in DOS1.

At least they did what I thought it was a must: to truly write Wyll, because that char was inconsistent, lacked of depth in comparison with the rest of the other companions, and was, basically, a future Beast (dos2) in BG3. That's why I didn't even bother to write a general overall analysis of his character. I suspected he had to be written at some point because it's was a cardboard character in there, just there to be your black char token. You know, the black char we add to a game so we look "progressive" but still has bad development as a char or it's simply shallow when compared with the depth of the other chars. Pretty much like Larian does with their lgbt representation too.

Larian's lgbt representation also bothers me. It is mostly hidden in books and lines of text in this world (yes, yes, Astarion is the only char shown and written lgbt openly, but the rest of the world has no lgbt integrated chars, or the few two couples we saw in EA are unhealthy and horrible-the gnome lesbian-or absolutely hidden in one single line that, if you miss it, you can confuse them as brothers -the husband gnomes-). We can have a long discussion about how Larian does playersexual characters that are not any representation of lgbt, because they are not written like bi but hetero, and their "bisexuality" only appears when you romance them (and this was done in DOS2 too, with barely a line or two hidden in Lohse's origin to show some potential, little bi inclination). It's so strong how they write their characters as hetero, that even in several parts of the romances of DOS2 you have descriptions where it shows that the default was clearly "man tall and woman smaller", even when in DOS2 world that may not apply to some hetero couples (elves and lizards). But all this discussion about playersexuality is a long one I'm not even sure the fandom can have at this point. I wish to be wrong and see more lgbt characters naturally integrated to the world, and not reduced to short stories in books or to whom you romance with your Tav. But I doubt it. Larian follows the masses. And Masses care nothing about this. Thank you for the ask, and have a nice day too!

[ofmermaidstories]

Hello!! Not so controversial, but personally, I think the wave of villain!Deku absolutely ridiculous. Sure, the story might be good and I'm not saying these authors are doing a bad job, it's just that Izuku as a character would never think of becoming a villain, despite his quirklessness. His whole character revolves around helping people and being kind, especially because he knows how cruel the world can be. So, those villain origin stories will never make sense, unless you practically strip him of his core and beliefs in the first place. Considering that, the vigilante!Deku fics make much more sense, especially if you want him to be morally ambigious but still Izuku at his core, helping people despite going against the law.

And tbh, I understand that fanfics are supposed to show an alternative to multiple situations, but I think there's a boundary within that, because getting rid of what makes that particular character interesting/special is just taking that character wholly out of the equation, and rather making an OC with the same name.

To add to that, someone should absolutely change the plot or minor characterizations to fit into whatever you got planned, this is why AU's are popular. And as long these variations stay true to the core of that character, it only can turn out amazing!! Sadly, that's what a lot of villain!Deku fics miss, and in turn I never can enjoy them without feeling the sense of grief and wrongness.

Man, I'm sorry for this, it turned out longer than I wanted it to be hahaha

No! I love it! And I agree. 🥺 Like, I can appreciate a Villain!Deku AU as something fun to explore a really popular what-if—but how they handle Izuku in general will make or break it for me. 😕 What I have always liked about Deku is his selfishness, when it comes him wanting to be a hero—he wants to be a hero! Quirkless or no! He wants to be like All Might—to reassure people and tell them he’s here, that he’s reaching out to them! Vigilante!Deku honours that a little, like you say, because he’s still Izuku at his core. But I think Villain!Deku fics tend to fall under the same umbrella that any kind of revenge (bakugou/consequences for example) fic does, for me; in that it’s kind of missing the point, LOL.

I will fight tooth and nail for people to be allowed to write or characterise whatever and however they want; but I agree with you in that at a certain point you, as a reader, will come to a threshold that you have to decide if are you reading fanfiction, still, or just fiction (that’s vaguely familiar)? And!! Here’s the thing!!! Humans are pretty forgiving readers, I reckon. And we also like things to be familiar to us (like tropes! cliches! fanfiction in general!!!). Villain!Deku is fun in his own way—all that violence and anger, packaged up in a character that otherwise would be repulsed by it. I can see how he’d be popular for like, yandere tropes, or other dark content.

I just—I like it when Deku has his goodness. 🥺 His self-sacrificing need to help others. Villain!Deku inherently involves a lot of sadness—being cast aside, neglected, hurt, whatever is used to push him there. 🥺 And I think it’s very much a matter of, “your mileage may very” when it comes to wanting to read/engage/write that, and what that does to his characterisation.

[ellie-bygrave]

Current Relevant Developments - 5

I wanted to look into methods that can be used for optimising a game whilst still maintaining a high level of detail. One method that I was interested in is using parallax interior mapping to create the illusion of a building interior. This was used extensively in Spider-Man (2018) for the interiors of the skyscraper buildings.

Joost van Dongen created one tequnique for using parallax interior mapping in 2008. He wrote a paper describing how and why it works, as well as a recent article on 80.lvl. Though the technique has been tweaked and changed since by others, he was the first to publish any documentation or research into this method.

The paper and article go into lots of detail about the technique, including some of the benefits of this. For example, if, like in Spider-Man, there are lots of buildings with windows, interior mapping can essentially fake their interiors. Although this isn't essential for the gameplay, it adds a nice visual detail and helps bring the world to life. It is also a much simpler and less expensive method than actually creating room with geometry for every single building, especially for a game as large as Spider-Man.

In a project like mine, it wouldn't really make sense to use interior mapping. Firstly, if I were to just make a cinematic, the performance doesn't matter as much as if it were a game. Additionally, the scale of my project is a lot smaller than anything like Spider-Man, with hardly any windows to look into so there's not much reason to use it. However, as I think the technique is really interesting I wanted to have a go at using it and I think it will be useful to know about when working on larger projects in the future.

I began with making a blueprint of a short corridor in UE5 using the modular building assets I've already made for my project. I kept the corridor square, as that's what works best for producing a cubemap.

I then used the Scene Capture Component Cube to create a cubemap of the interior.

This is the material I made using that cubemap. There are 2 controls for the X and Y tiling in case that needs to be adjusted and I used a StaticBool that can be turned on or off to affect any rotation issues with the material, although that can also be corrected by simply rotating the plane that the material will be placed on. Van Dongen talks about using the parallax material with another

Next I added a plane to the blueprint of my main room and scaled it so the corridor interior map would fit the scale of the rest of the room. As the pieces are modular and are based on a 2x2 grid it meant I only had to scale the 1x1 plane up by 2. I then positioned the plane in the doorway.

Here is a video showing the room with the lighting from the scene and the interior mapping effect.

Something that van Dongen talked about in his paper is the sweet spot to swap from doing full interiors to using interior mapping. He calculated that it is better in terms of framerate to use real interiors until you reach about 100 buildings using interior mapping. After that point, the framerate can be maintained at a much higher level if interior mapping is used instead. As I said before, I wouldn't plan to use interior mapping in this project as it really isn't necessary, but I'm glad I know how simple it can be.

He also discusses using a noise function to choose between a lit and unlit version of a room. This way there can be variation in the rooms from a distance in a large building or city environment. The technique can also utilise a texture atlas to change between multiple room interiors. This would be great for adding variation to rooms if they might be seen up close, like in Spider-Man.

I'm pleased with what I've learned about this process and some of the principles behind it. It made me realise that sometime the most simple way of doing something (in this case using a real room) can be better and optimisation techniques aren't always actually the most optimal way of doing something. However, it's definitely worth looking into different methods during the research stages of a project as there may be new techniques that can be of use.

References

Kotaku. (2018). "Spider-Man's Windows Are Amazing". YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQVHtlVEirs. Accessed 25/04/2024

van Dongen, J. (2008). "Interior Mapping". CGI 2008 Conference Proceedings manuscript No. CGI Conference.

van Dongen, J. (2018). "Interior Mapping: Rendering Real Rooms Without Geometry". 80.lv. https://80.lv/articles/interior-mapping-rendering-real-rooms-without-geometry/. Accessed 25/04/2024.

[mothwithapencil]

Can you explain how Ghetsis shows autistic traits

Somehow I get the feeling that this ask is coming from a place of doubt rather than genuine interest, which makes me tempted to just say "He told me himself. Goodbye." But sure!

Ghetsis is Autistic: Evidence because some people dont like the idea of autistics projecting on characters they like without 16lbs of proof

My personal favorite of his traits: His pacing. Almost every time Ghetsis is seen in the games, he's pacing around as he talks— a common autistic trait. This is seen both in BW and BW2. Very rarely can he be seen rambling and standing still simultaneously.

Repeated speech patterns. Autistic people who have trouble with social interaction frequently repeat certain words/phrases. With Ghetsis this is most notably the "freak without a human heart" thing, for better or worse. He repeats several other things throughout the games with little variations, such as "the look on (someone's/your) face when (they've/you've) lost all hope" "random/unknown/ordinary trainer from who knows where" "no matter who does what" "I am perfect! I am perfection! I'm the perfect new ruler of a perfect new world!" "I was expecting exactly that kind of move!" etc.

As a bit of an add-on: Ghetsis shows repeated actions as well— shaking his fist in BW and slamming his cane in BW2.

Scripting. Once again, autistics who have trouble socializing often have premade scripts to use when conversating. Although Ghetsis prides himself in his "public speech skills," they're all just about the same script. Of which he fumbles and stutters over multiple times. As soon as he has to go off script, nothing he says correlates to the task at hand. He may even respond with another scripted response, even if it's not appropriate for what he's responding to. (Example: Castelia City, BW. Burgh asks why Ghetsis plans to "liberate" pokemon, to which Ghetsis responds by saying he hired knowledgeable people from around the world to teach his son. Ghetsis that is literally not what he asked)

Special interests and devotion. Paying attention to Ghetsis' dialogue and actions, it's clear he has a special interest in Unovan history and legends. He frequently and without prompt goes out of his way to explain the founding of the Unova region and the story of the two brothers. In BW2 he is revealed to have been researching the Abyssal Ruins and attempting to find the Relic Crown. He even put in the work to translate the writing in the Ruins BY HIMSELF. it's highly implied that Ghetsis and N are direct descendants of the ancient Unovan king, meaning Ghetsis likely wanted the Relic Crown not to sell, but to keep safe and cherish. This seems to be one of the few things Ghetsis wanted out of genuine passion rather than out of a desire for power. Furthermore, the Entire plot about Ghetsis not being able to become the hero of legend himself, crowning N the "king" of Team Plasma so he could become the hero instead, building a castle around the pokemon league, etc points very heavily towards just how passionate Ghetsis is about Unovan history. Not to mention that he had this passion, this dream, this "beautiful ideal," for DECADES. He centered his whole life around becoming the new Unovan King, to the point where he tries again and again, giving his everything until he both physically and mentally cannot continue. If that's not autistic dedication, I don't know what is.

There is DEFINITELY more I could add, such as sensory issues and comorbid disorders, but the rest is a little less obvious and borders more on headcanon and more personal analysis/interpretation. But to wrap this up: MANY of the autistic traits seen in N are also observable in Ghetsis, just in different subjects. They share absolute, burning passion to achieve their dreams. They're passionate about a certain subject. They have unique speech patterns. They have trouble interacting normally with others. It's very likely N's autism is genetic, passed down from Ghetsis. (And don't come here and say they're not blood related. Just look at them. You're gonna believe Ghetsis when he says N isn't his actual son? The guy renowned for lying and manipulating, who has a strong desire to disassociate himself from N by any means possible? Of all his lies, THAT'S the one you chooe to believe? Okay.)

In conclusion, Ghetsis has super mega autism just like his son.

[screenshot courtesy of my good friend @ieetbugs ]

Thank you for listening. Feel free to add on if you have any more evidence towards his autistic swag

And once again fuck off if you're only going to argue about how he's not autistic or something. Who gave you the right to dictate who we see ourselves in lol

[221bshrlocked]

A Sky Full of Stars

Pairing: The Mandalorian (Din Djarin) x Fem!Reader

Words: 11340 (I know I say this all the time but this really was supposed to be a short one-shot but it got away from me because I just loved this idea so so much. Sorry not sorry.)

Warning: Nothing but fluff. Some kissing that turns into a heated make-out session that turns into a cuddling session.

Inspired by this tiktok by the lovely ameliagonzales who was gracious enough to allow me to use her idea and write this.

A/N: It's been a while since I wrote something that's fluffy slightly angsty and dialogue-centered. I'm not going to lie, this took longer than usual because of the lovely anon that decided to tell me my characterization of Din is hella off and I realized I don't care if it is because it's my writing and I get to do whatever I want with it. Let me know how I'm doing in the comments and reblogs are always always appreciated. You can add yourself to the taglist here. This is not beta'd btw.

“No silly this isn’t green, it’s blue.” The little girl put her toy away and brought out a new one, giggling at your faux pout as she shoves the new object in your hand and asks you what color you thought it was. You turn it around in your hands, trying your hardest to hide the hurt growing in your chest at not knowing what color it is. You think it’s closer to the first toy she gave you but you’re not sure. You’re never sure. You look at the girl and smile at her before setting the toy aside and wiggling your hands at her. She immediately stands up and screams as you run after her, laughing along with her giggles as you chase her around and watch as more kids join in and run away from you.

You’re not sure how long you’re chasing the little ones and you hear some of them gasp and ‘oooh’ when your young friend runs into a solid figure. You stand up and watch as the girl tears up as she apologizes to the man she just ran into. You’re immediately hugging her and assuring her that everything is okay, turning to the side and narrowing your eyes at the man that scared her half to death.

“Shame on you Mando,” you pretend to smack his shoulder three times and watch as the child in your arms sniffles between laughs when the Mandalorian tries to hide away from you.

“I’m sorry little flower, I didn’t mean to scare you.” You watch as the man reaches for a small bottle in his pocket and slowly hands it to the girl. “Here you go, a token of my apology.”

“It’s okay sweetheart, he’s a nice man...even though he doesn’t look it.” You wink at Boba Fett and giggle along with her when he sighs heavily and pushes the flask into her hand. She takes it and shakes it around, her eyes lighting up when the bottle shimmers at her ministrations and illuminates her hands.

“It’s so pretty! How did you know orange is my favorite color?” The girl slides down your arms and quickly hugs the hunter in front of you before running away and showing her friends. You look at her with longing in your eyes, wishing with all your heart that you saw the gift the same way she saw it.

“Still no color princess?” Fett questions and you shrug your shoulders as you make your way towards Slave I and sit on the ramp.

“Yup, same old same old. Who knows if I’ll ever see color.” There is a hint of hurt in your tone but Fett says nothing as he approaches you and stands to the side. He pats your shoulder once as he takes his helmet off and softly wipes at the visor to clean it.

“Don’t give up, kid. You’re still young...you’ve got all the time in the galaxy and you travel everywhere. You’ll meet them when you least expect it.”

“In this line of work? Yeah, I don’t think so Fett. But at least one of us didn’t lose the positive attitude. If I’m being honest, I was hoping to see color before the next supply run. The chances that I’ll live to go to Pasaana during another Festival of the Ancestors are practically non-existent. I heard they wear so many variations of the same color...maker, it would have been nice to experience that.” You pick up a rock and throw it away as you nervously ring your fingers and brush the conversation aside, not wanting to start the journey with a sour mood.

“Well, lucky for us, we have extra help on this run so it should be quicker. Maybe you’ll see color before you go?” Fett looks up and you follow his line of sight as another ship slowly lands just behind Slave I. You stand up and walk behind your old friend, looking back at the crates to ensure they’re still there before you approach the landing ship.

“Oh no, what poor soul did you manage to rope in this time?” You eye the ship and swear there is something familiar about it but you pay it no mind as Fett puts his helmet back on.

“Hey, I don’t always bend people to my will you know. He volunteered actually...he knows his way around the Narvath Sector and he might even tag along with us to the Forbidden Valley. So, be nice and don’t flirt with him.” Fett warns and you throw your hands up in defeat, failing to hide your smile as you respond with feigned offense.

“I’m not going to flirt with him.” You raise an eyebrow when Fett snorts at your high-pitched voice as he makes his way to the landing ship, and mutters something beneath his breath. The ship powers down after a couple of moments and you take a deep breath when the doors to the docking ramp slide and a figure appears at the corner.

“There he is...took you longer to land this time.” Fett yells to the other Mandalorian, not noticing how you take a few steps back as the man walks down towards the two of you.

“Oh well things just got a little more interesting now.” You break the silence and cringe when the Mandalorian struts past your friend and takes out his blaster. You hold your hands up when he points the weapon at your head and you watch as Fett strides to the two of you and stands in between your body and his brother’s weapon.

“You?” The Mandalorian growls and he tries to step aside and Fett holds his chest and pushes him back.

“Me!” You smile nervously and gulp when Fett turns around and looks at you. You swear you can almost see the look he’s giving you but you say nothing and hope that he can handle this situation for you.

“Oh.” You would have laughed at Fett’s response if there wasn’t a bounty hunter standing not five feet away from you and killing you a thousand different ways.

“You two know each other?” Fett breaks the silence and continues to stand between the two of you, knowing his friend’s short temper and your dumb comments might escalate this situation.

“I wouldn’t say we know each other. I’d say we met very briefly on-” You try to explain what happened the last time you saw the Mandalorian but he cuts you off. He pushes his blaster into its holster and you sigh heavily but keep your hands raised, afraid he'll change his mind any second and try to shoot you again.

“You almost blew up my ship!” The Mandalorian yells and you jump at his exclamation. His irritation seeps into your skin and you narrow your eyes at him as you walk around Fett and begin to nudge at the beskar armor with one finger. Your anger at his unfairness outgrows your fear of what he can do to you and you continue to push on his chest plate as you talk back at him and ignore Fett’s whispers to let it go.

“I did no such thing. I merely tried to fix your shitty cooling radiator panels but you scared the fuck out of me when you came up behind me and suggested I switch the parts, hence why I dropped the cauterizer and burned through the wires. So technically, you almost blew up your ship.” You’re breathing heavily and you’re sure your nose is flaring from how annoyed you are by the man in front of you. A few seconds pass between the two of you and it’s not until the Mandalorian tilts his head that you realize what you’ve just said and done. You take your hands away and swallow the growing lump in your throat as you step back and apologize a few times before you walk to the crates.

The Mandalorian stands there in silence, never once looking away from you retreating form, even when Boba Fett comes and stands him.

He’s missed this, and more than he preferred to admit.

“Little princess is fiery today.” Fett comments and notices when his friend turns and stares at him through the visor. The Mandalorian says nothing as he walks away from Fett and follows you. You’re in the middle of counting the supplies in the crates when you hear the crunching of footsteps approaching you. Thinking it’s Fett that’s come to help you move the supplies, you roll up your sleeves and ask him to take the opposite side.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to yell at your brother. I was just annoyed because I was only trying to help and he scared me.” When you look up and see that it was the Mandalorian and not your friend, you drop the crate and stare at him. He says nothing as he picks up his end of the large box and waits for you to mirror his actions before he begins to walk back to his ship. Neither of you say anything as you go back and forth until all the crates are on his ship. You walk out and stand next to Fett, waiting for his instructions to see whether you were going to go with him or with the new member of the crew.

“So what’s the plan?” You avoid the Mandalorian standing next to you and turn your body towards Fett, hoping that he’d say that you were tagging along with him.

“You’re going to go with him.” You cease to breathe at his command and clench your fists when you recognize his tone. He’s not leaving room for negotiation.

“W-why?” The Mandalorian walks back to his ship at your question and you pout when you realize that he may have misunderstood your inquiry. Not that it mattered whether or not he misunderstood...

“Fennec...we’ll meet you at Iktotchon.” You look to the ground and shuffle your feet against the sand, turning back to him and nodding quietly as you follow behind the Mandalorian.

“And princess!” Fett calls for you and you glance at him when you reach the top of the ramp.

“Hmm?”

“Try not to get into too much trouble.” You look at him with annoyance and shake your head when you realize he’s just teasing you. Standing at the large doors of the ship, you glimpse one last time at Mos Eisley before you make your way into the heart of the ship. A few moments later, the ship powers up and you watch as the barrier raises and locks just as light filters through the area. You’re not sure what you’re supposed to do or where you’re allowed to go so you remain standing where you are. Not a minute later, you jump when a voice breaks the silence and booms through the ship.

“Come up to the cockpit.”

You take a deep, calming breath as you set your things to the side and ascend the ladder to the cockpit. You come face to face with a door and you’re about to knock when it slides open and reveals the Mandalorian sitting in the pilot chair.

“Sit down and buckle up.” He says as he flicks on buttons across the board. He turns his head towards you to make sure that you’re buckled in before he raises the throttle levers and begins to take off. You hold back from saying something snarky as the turbulence gets worse, only shutting your eyes when it gets to be too much. You’re not sure how long you’re sitting there with your hands clasping the leather of the chair but it’s only when you hear the seat in front of you turning that you realize you were already in space.

You frown when you open your eyes and see the Mandalorian already looking at you, the tilt of his helmet letting you know that he was silently mocking you.

“What?” You break the silence and watch as he rights himself before he turns around and pushes the auto-pilot button.

“You’re a supply dealer who hates flying.” It’s more of a question than a comment and you can’t help but narrow your eyes when he stands up and continues to stare at you.

“So?”

“Not a good quality of life.” If you’re surprised by his response, you try not to show it as you stand up and face him defensively like before.

“Says the man who wears beskar armor every minute of the day.” It’s a low blow and you know you have no right involving his religion. But you’re fed up with his passive aggressiveness and you want to make sure he knows that he can’t talk down to you.

The Mandalorian turns away and looks at the passing stars of the galaxy, softly whispering for you to follow him as he exits the cockpit. You want to apologize for what you said but you hold back instead, following him down the ladder and standing to the side when you see him moving things around.

“This is my cot, and that right there is yours.” He points to two doors across from each other at the end of the hallway and waits for your confirmation before he walks past them and shows you the refresher.

“Help yourself to any of the rations. We’ll arrive at Iktotchon in four sleeping cycles so there should be enough food for the two of us until we get there.” You’re not sure what makes you reach for his wrist when he turns around to walk away. He stands still and looks down at the hand grasping his beskar before he looks at you.

“S-sorry...I- umm, are you coming to Pasaana?” You ring your fingers nervously as you look at yourself in his visor, taking two steps back when he straightens up and looks down at your hands.

“You’re going to the Festival of the Ancestors.”

“Yes. Well, it’s me, Mando, and Fennec. So I was just wondering, you know, if there was...if you had anything lined up after this supply run. Because if not, you can tag along...it only happens every-”

“42 years. I know.” He cuts you off and you’re not sure if his body-language seems more open or not but within a few seconds of chatting with him, he’s suddenly relaxing and leaning back against the metal wall. He’s silent for longer than you prefer so you force a smile and rub the back of your neck awkwardly as you prepare to tell him to forget that you asked since he probably has more important matters to handle.

“Ok.” It’s a simple response yet you feel your skin heat up as he nods at you and walks to his quarters. He hesitates at the door for a moment before he pushes the button and steps into the privacy of his room.

You let out a deep breath and stand in your spot for a few minutes before you slip back to the docking space to bring your belongings to the room. The ship is surprisingly more quiet than others you’ve been on and you remember what he told you about it the last time you saw him. A faint memory of how he defended the size of his ship makes you giggle. Then again, you’ve heard from Peli about the piece of junk he had before this and knew that it was barely considered as machinery.

“Maker, how am I going to make it four days on this ship with him?” You shake your head as you prepare to go to bed. The twin suns were just setting on Tatooine when you were leaving and you knew it was better to get as much sleep in as possible considering how quickly things sometimes escalated on these kinds of runs.

Surprisingly, things weren’t too bad when you left your sleeping cot the following day. The Mandalorian was already awake and cleaning his weapons. You bid him a quick good morning as you moved past him and looked for some snacks. He didn’t seem like he wanted to converse with you so you opted to stay in your room for the remainder of your waking hours. A voice in your head told you to keep the door open in case he did want to chat eventually but as you thought, he never once disturbed you.

The second day on the ship was perhaps slightly more eventful. Although he continued to pass his time in silence, he did manage to ask you to help him fix something in the cockpit. You were shocked he requested your services with ease and said nothing as he stood aside and watched you tinker away with the radar display screen. He thanked you twice when you finished and told you that he’d let you know if he needed your help with anything else.

The third day, however, made you wish you could open the docking doors and throw yourself out in space. You hadn’t seen him all morning long and you thought it was probably because he wanted some privacy in the cockpit. By the middle of the day, you jumped out of your cot and grabbed some spare clothes as you headed to the refresher, wanting to shower once before you landed on the sand-filled planet the following. As you walked to the door and pushed the button, you were met with a heavy fog escaping the room. When the fog cleared, you dropped your clothes and slammed your hands on your eyes, immediately backing away from the room as the Mandalorian scrambled to wrap something around his waist. You weren’t sure how many times you apologized in the span of one minute but when you heard the familiar sound of a blaster turning on, you stood in silence and waited for him to say something.

“Pfassk, do you have no kriffing regard for privacy?” He growled through the vocoder and you shook your head to try and explain to him that you saw nothing but his back.

“I- maker, I’m so sorry. I swear on my life I didn’t see anything except your back. I didn’t know you were in there...I really didn’t or else I wouldn't have gone in.” You sigh in relief when you hear him murmur to himself as he sets down the blaster and shuffles around in search of his clothes.

“What do you mean you didn’t know I was in there? The red light was on, which usually means someone is in the fucking refresher using it.” Hearing him swear shouldn’t make you shiver and yet you do. When you notice that he’s gone still, you assume it’s safe to look at him again. Taking a deep breath, you turn around and lower your hands as you muster up the courage to try and explain to him why you couldn’t see the red light.

And boy was that a mistake. You regret removing your hands from your eyes as soon as you take a good look at him. Turns out, the beskar armor only made him look more intimidating. The man was large, made to be a hunter. He was broad-shouldered, muscular in all the right places and soft in others. You unintentionally frown when you see his bronze skin littered with scars of all shapes and sizes. Maker, the life he led was worse than you thought.

“I- uhh, I don’t...I couldn’t see it.” You hated how much your voice broke when you tried to explain yourself. As much as you wanted to blame it on being afraid of him, you knew it was less about the danger he exuded and more about the fact that you could see more of his skin than you thought you ever would.

“Excuse me?”

“I didn’t know it was red.” You knew none of what you were saying was making sense but this wasn’t exactly a situation that you thought you’d find yourself having to deal with, and with the Mandalorian of all people.

“Are you fucking with me?” He was less hostile than earlier but his words were still spoken aggressively. You couldn’t blame him really, especially when you knew how strict his religion was.

“N-no. I- my species doesn’t see color until- well, it doesn’t matter. My species doesn’t see color. We just see grays. I’m sorry...I should have asked before if there was anything I needed to learn about the ship that required me seeing colors. It escaped me. I’ll try to pay more attention...I promise you I saw nothing.” You take one last glance at the heaving, glistening body in front of you before you turn around and walk in your room. You shut the door behind you this time, knowing that he probably wanted some of his privacy back and that he would need to limit himself should you keep it open.

It’s not until a few hours later that you sit up when you hear a soft knock on your door. You stand up and push open the barrier, finding the Mandalorian standing in front of you with his helmet looking straight at your reluctant expression. You wait for him to say something and when he doesn’t, you raise your eyebrows and silently ask him if he needs anything.

“I didn’t know about your...I didn’t know. And I didn’t mean to scare you with the blaster either, it’s a reflex to- umm.” You nod at him and look down to see what he’s holding in his hands. “You left your clothes lying on the floor.” He pushes the fabric towards you and averts his eyes when he sees your undergarments peaking through the shirt. You thank him as you set them down on your bag and look into his visor again.

“Ad'ika?”

“Hmm?”

“I’m sorry.” The whispered exclamation does little to calm your nerves and you’re not sure what to say to him so you nod and awkwardly smile into the shiny beskar helmet. The Mandalorian murmurs a quick ‘good night’ before he makes his way to the cockpit, leaving you as confused as ever.

You don’t get an ounce of sleep that night, the image of him in nothing but a helmet and some flimsy pants making you wish he had shot you with his blaster instead. You refuse to admit the rising emotions you’re beginning to feel towards him, mostly because it didn’t matter whether or not he reciprocated them.

You still couldn’t see color.

He wasn’t your soulmate.

You’re afraid to leave the room the next morning, not sure which version of the Mandalorian you were going to have to deal with. It turns out, there was nothing to worry about because not surprisingly, you got the quiet, slightly shy man chatting with you. He pretends nothing happened the previous day and you go along with it. You’re just about to enter the atmosphere of Iktotchon when you receive a hologram from Fett telling the two of you of the sandstorm passing through the meeting point.

As you buckle into the seat behind the Mandalorian, he takes a moment to turn around and call for you.

“There’s going to be turbulence.”

“I- I know.” You barely hold back from furrowing your eyebrows at his comment but then he turns around to face you completely and you narrow your eyes at him with suspicion.

“I’ve landed on worse planets.” It takes you a few extra seconds to realize what he’s attempting to do and you can’t help but laugh and break the moment. You quiet down when he turns around and begins to descend to the planet.

“Are you worried about little old me Mandalorian?” You try to distract yourself from the sudden, harsh shaking of the ship but the teasing does little to calm your nerves when you realize that the sandstorm was as bad as Fett made it sound. You shut your eyes and try to picture the calm nights you’re so used to on Tatooine.

“You know, you can just call me Mando.” His voice breaks you out of your haze and you growl in response when you hear a few sounds go off above you.

“No, I- I can’t call you that. I reserved it for the other guy already!”

“You mean the Mandalorian who already told you his name?” He claps back and chuckles when you sigh in irritation at his question.

“Fine okay you’re right. How about this? Can you land this fucking ship without killing the two of us Mando?” You’re screaming at the top of your lungs and grasp the belt around your torso harder when you don’t hear back from him.

“Mando?”

“You mean the ship I already landed ad’ika?” Your eyes shoot wide open and you look around frantically, only to see that most of the turbulence you experienced was due to the sand and gravel hitting the metal of the ship.

“Oh...that was- not as bad as I thought it would be.”

“Anything beats Maldo Kreis.” Mando says as he stands there across from you and the slight tilt of his helmet at your confused expression makes you realize he may not have meant to say that out loud.

“We need to go. The storm will only get worse if we wait until night.” You nod in agreement and follow him out of the cockpit to the docking station. Mando instantly regrets lowering the docking ramp when he sees gravel quickly entering the ship. You run to your room to grab the helmet you brought with you and lock it in as you return to help him with the crates.

It’s a difficult few hours on the planet, and you grow more irritated when the Ikotchi threatens you with less supply exchanges. When his demeanor suddenly changes and he asks you to take the crates and leave, you thank him and quickly take the crates up the ramp with Fennec before he changes his mind. You never once notice both Mandalorians as they subtly push their blasters back into their holsters.

You’re leaving Iktotchon later than you prefer, mostly because both bounty hunters find themselves in a heated argument that Fennec has to end not-so-gently. You don’t bother asking Mando what the issue was when you see him strutting into the cockpit, quickly strapping yourself in when he glances at you to make sure you’re safe.

It’s a rough take off for both his ship and Slave I, but you say nothing of it, knowing that he might not appreciate any light teasing at the moment. Once you’re out of the planet’s atmosphere, Mando puts in the coordinates for Pasaana and sends a hologram to Fett, letting him know that you would be reaching the planet in less than a day.

You want to ask him if you could help in any way but you decide against it and leave him to his thoughts. You want nothing more than to take a long, hot shower to rid yourself of all the sand that managed to seep into your clothes. But then you notice the state of the docking area and before you can talk yourself out of it, you look around for anything that resembles a sweeper and clean as much of the floor as you can. You’re thankful that Mando doesn’t leave the cockpit and when you’re done, you go back into your room to grab a change of clothes so you could use the refresher.

You think you hear Mando passing by your room but you say nothing and make your way to the refresher, halting in your steps when you look at the light and find it turned off.

Great.

“Mando? Are you in there?” You’re not sure if he can hear you or not so you try to ask him again a little louder.

“Mando!? Are you i-”

“No.” You jump as soon as you hear him respond from behind you. Turning around, you clutch at your chest when you see him standing in front of his door without the beskar armor.

“I- uhh, t-there’s no light. And I wasn’t sure what that meant really.” You’re ringing your fingers again, and hope that he doesn’t notice just how nervous you are in his presence.

“Well I- I rewired the electrical circuits of the refresher so you know when it’s occupied and when it isn’t. If the light is on, it means I’m in there, and if it isn’t, then it’s free for use. No more colores.”

You look at him as if he took off his helmet, trying to wrap your mind around the fact that he went out of his way to accommodate you when you’re only on his ship for another few days.

“Thank you,” is all you manage to say before you push the door and scramble in. Mando looks at the door for another few minutes before he remembers that he hasn’t eaten in a while. He cooks up a meal for two quickly and eats his share before you finish your shower. When he hears you walking out, he sits in his usual corner and brings out his weapons to polish them.

You smell food as soon as you walk out of the refresher and you throw your clothes on your cot before you make your way to the large space across the hallway. You’re about to ask Mando about the food situation when you see a plate opposite of him on the table.

“It’s yours.” Mando breaks the silence as he wipes in between the crevasses of his blaster, nodding towards the space in front of him to let you know that you could join him,

“Thank you Mando.”

Neither of you say anything as you inhale your dinner and it’s not until you’ve washed your plates and set them aside that Mando decides to break the silence.

“Can I ask you something?”

“S-sure.” You think he’s going to ask you what it’s like to not see colors and to only see gradations of gray but his question catches you off guard.

“When can your species see color?” If you were uncomfortable by his question, you did a good job hiding it from him. Mando watches as you push off the wall and return to sit in front of him, lazily pushing around the towel he was holding as you answer him.

“This might sound stupid and I’m usually told that it’s not real but I’ve seen those of my kind experience the second they could see color so I know it’s not just a fable we’re told when we’re young. Basically, we see color when we meet our soulmates.” Mando’s heart breaks when you throw him a forced smile, one he’s seen a million times looking back at him in the mirror.

“Your soulmate?”

“Yup, the person I’m destined to be with. My other half. The one that will belong to me and I to him.” Mando nods along with you as he stands up and hangs up his weapons one by one.

“I know what you’re thinking. What’s someone like me going to do at the Festival of the Ancestors? Honestly, I think it’ll be fun to attend it whether or not I can see the colors. It’s a rich culture so I’m sure I’ll enjoy it either way.”

“I can always walk around with you and describe to you the colors, t-the patterns even. If...if you want.” His suggestion throws you off guard and as earlier, you gape at him as you try to figure out what he was playing at. You think he’s pulling your leg and will laugh at you at any moment, but when he doesn’t, you realize that he’s being dead serious.

“That would be nice Mando. I might not see the colors but I could always imagine what they look like next to each other.”

And just like that, the conversation is over as quickly as it begins.

“Good night mesh’la.” Mando murmurs as he makes his way to his quarters, leaving you more hopeful than you’ve felt in a long while.

It’s a weird thing to admit but for the first time in years, you don’t go to sleep wishing you could wake up and see colors. No. You doze off wondering what it would feel like to hold his hand and maybe, just maybe, kiss it. You think of how soft his untouched skin must feel like and how calloused his scarred muscles would look.

When you dream that night, you see faint images of his lips caressing yours and his firm arms bringing you into his embrace.

And you wake up with a lazy smile etched on your face because those dreams, those sweet, lovely memories your brain conjured up during the night, felt as good as seeing color.

You can’t look at him for the duration of the morning, constantly pretending that you’re doing something or other so he doesn’t think you’re avoiding him because the last thing you wanted was to make him think you didn’t want to talk to him. But you just can’t find it in yourself to look into his visor. Every time you so much as glance at the beskar helmet, you remember what your subconscious conjured up and you stutter out a response to whatever he says.

Not surprisingly, Mando notices the shift in your behavior and he waits until you finish fixing the crates’ locks, which were clearly not broken, before he approaches you.

“Mesh’la.”

“Yes Mando?” You’re still not looking at him and Mando starts to genuinely believe that he’s done something wrong. When you try to walk past him to place the tool back in your room, Mando reaches out and takes hold of your wrist before you’re out of reach. You look at his gloved hand wrapped around your skin before you meet his eyes past his visor and Mando holds his breath because for a moment, he thinks you can see straight through him.

“You’re angry with me.”

You never realize until this moment that Mando tends to ask most of his questions in the form of a statement and it’s strange. It’s strange because it never occurred to you that he’s the type to perhaps jump to conclusions when he can’t read the situation. Setting the tool box down, you stand up and fix your shirt as you muster up the courage to respond to him.

“I’m not. I’m not angry with you. I’m- it’s...difficult to explain.” His hold loosens but he’s standing in your space and you think it’s because he’s not totally convinced by your answer and won’t let it go until you give him a proper explanation for the sudden change in your treatment.

“It’s difficult to explain why you’re not angry with me.”

There it goes again, that weird phrasing of his inner thoughts. You huff in irritation and Mando misunderstands your annoyed expression so he steps away and turns to look everywhere else but you.

“No, Mando...maker- yes it’s difficult to explain because you’re- no, not you. It’s not your fault it’s mine. I’m just not used to- gods why is this so hard?” You’re visibly stressed and it must be a sight because Mando comes back to stand in front of you and he rests one hand on your shoulder, waiting until you turn to look at him before he tries to break the anxiety-inducing silence.

“You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to. I- I shouldn’t have offered to walk through the festival with you. I should have thought of how uncomfortable you’d feel before I selfishly asked t-” You perk up at his choice in words and you’re about to ask him what he meant by what he said but he doesn’t give you a chance. “Please believe me when I tell you I only wanted to...I thought it might help.”

“You see, this is exactly why I’m avoiding you.” You’re not sure who’s more surprised by your little outburst but when his hold tightens around your shoulder, you think maybe it’s him.

“So you are avoiding me.”

“Yes okay? I am, I’m avoiding you because the last few days felt like a whiplash of emotions and I don’t know what I’m feeling right now. One minute you’re angry and quiet and it’s as if I’m not in the same space as you, and the next thing I know, you’re rewiring your damn ship so I know how to use it and then offering to pretty much waste your time during one of the most beautiful festivals in the galaxy just to make sure I’m enjoying myself. And...and it’s difficult because I feel myself falling but I don’t want to because I’m afraid...I’m afraid you won’t be there to catch me...because you don’t have to. Because why would you when-”

You’re not sure how you got to this moment but all you know is that you're’ suddenly surrounded by Mando and the cold beskar armor and his natural musk and this unique woodsy scent and it’s-

It’s breathtaking.

“Cyar’ika, I didn’t know...I didn’t know I was causing you this much distress. It’s difficult for me to- to speak my he- to speak at times. I wasn’t thinking of how I’m coming off and I was so busy trying to figure out my- my own feelings...that I didn’t stop and think of what you must be going through.” His voice is low and you think perhaps that it’s breaking with every word he whispers through the vocoder, so you do the only thing you think of at the moment. Reluctantly, you wrap as much of your arms around him as physically possible, hoping he’d understand that you were listening to him and no longer trying to ignore him.

“Mando-”

“I- I volunteered for this supply run.” You’re not sure how this relates to this current affair but you sink further into his embrace, hoping that he wouldn’t shy away from explaining why he’s bringing this up now.

“I know. Fett told me.”

“Did he tell you why?” Mando replies instantly and you furrow your eyebrows even though you know he can’t see you.

“N-no.”

“I- I couldn’t stop thinking of you. Ever since the last time I saw you, I’ve been at war with myself, with what I was allowing to happen. I knew you weren’t to blame with the cauterizer but I couldn’t accept my heart letting you...maker, I can see why you said this is difficult.” He chuckles nervously and you hold your breath in anticipation because he isn’t, he can’t be admitting what you think he is.

“W-what’re you saying Mando?”

“I’m saying I need you cyar’ika. I’m saying, I’ve been dreaming of you for the past 53 sleeping cycles. I’m saying, I can’t bear the thought of not seeing you after Pasaana.” You don’t realize how long you’ve been holding your breath until you exhale against him and Mando pulls away, keeping his helmet aimed to the floor as he continues. “And if- if you can give me a chance, I’d like to- I’d like to...well, I’m not exactly sure what you enjoy doing but I’d like to do it with you. You don't have to give me an answer now. I know I’m being selfish and I know that I- I don’t belong with you because you haven't seen color yet. But please, please consider this. Consider me.” His voice is much more reserved, lower even, than before and you realize it’s because he was probably considering not telling you up until now.

Your heart breaks at his last words because this was never something you thought you’d have to deal with. But looking back at the last few days, no matter how confusing or strange they were, you can’t help but admit how alive you’ve felt.

You know he doesn’t expect you to answer him right away and you know you should take some time to think over what he’s asking of you.

So when you lay both of your hands on his chest and ask him to look at you, Mando thinks you’re going to reject him and you feel his muscles tense when you step closer to him.

“I do...I- I am considering this Mando, I have been for the past few nights if I’m being honest...it’s actually part of the reason why I couldn’t look at you today. I woke up with this unusual thought, well, unusual to me. It’s been so long since I stopped thinking about seeing color and directed all of my attention to something, or rather, someone else.” You smile up into the visor and slowly reach to rest your hand on the space between his helmet and his cowl. The mere touch of your skin shakes him to his core and Mando has to clench his fists so he doesn’t lose control over himself.

“Today was the first time I woke up not caring if I hadn’t seen color because- because being with you, and- and talking with you and staying on this ship with you felt like I’ve already seen color. I don’t know what’s going to happen when I do...if I do, but I know that I’d like to give this, us, a shot.”

“You...you do mesh’la?” He almost sounds like a young child asking his parents for permission to have something and when you nod at him, Mando can’t hold back anymore. He wraps his arms around you once more, and carries you off the ground, smiling to himself when he hears you giggling at his dramatic display of affection.

He pulls away and you think he’s about to say something but a message comes through to the ship and Mando apologizes quickly before he ascends to the cockpit. You stay planted in your spot for what feels like hours before you hear Mando telling you that you’re nearing Pasaana. When you get to the cockpit and take your usual seat, Mando rises from his chair and approaches you, kneeling down at your feet to buckle your belt easier and ensure that you’re safe. It’s a small gesture but you know he’s conveying a thousand emotions in that little tap to make sure that you’re buckled in properly and when you smile at him, he reaches over and pushes a stray hair behind your ears before he returns to his pilot chair.

You don’t feel the turbulence once, mostly because you’re too busy replaying the brief moment over and over again in your mind until you’re sure you’ve committed it to memory.

Mando has to tap on your shoulder twice once he lands, and you nod in affirmation when he asks if you were feeling alright. The two of you make your way out of the ship just as Slave I lands. When you glance at Mando to ask him about the argument between him and Fett, you find him already staring at you. You smile at him and watch as he looks away apologetically. Maybe he really was as nervous as you.

“You’re coming along then?” Fett says to Mando as you make your way towards the desert and you pretend to focus on the dozens of kites flying in the air, unsure whether you were meant to be a part of this conversation or not.

Mando replies in Mando’a and you look to Fennec to ask her something about the kites to try and ignore the two men who may or may not have been talking about you. You’re about to ask Fennec about the colors of the flying toys when Mando steps in between the two of you and takes hold of your upper arm, pushing you ahead of the others so he could get a private moment with you.

“Is- are you okay?”

“Fine. He’s being difficult.” His curt answer lets you know that he wasn’t going to reveal what that whole ordeal was about so you nod and try to fall in step with him. You’re about to ask him about the colors of the kites when Mando leans over and whispers in your ears.

“Those two over there are red, like the color of the twin suns on Tatooine when they’re just setting. And, that one over there, the large one flying higher than the rest, it’s a dark blue...like the night sky.” You try to not let the proximity of his body affect you but the more he tells you of the colors, the closer you want him to get to you.

“That smaller one is light green, like many of the plants on Felucia.”

“I’ve never been to Felucia.” You admit to him as you keep your gaze on the kites, trying to differentiate between the colors but barely noticing a difference between the grays.

“I can take you there.” He offers with ease and you look into the visor and smile at him. “I’d like that.”

You can vaguely feel their eyes on you but you don’t bother to pay attention to them, wanting to spend as much time with Mando as you could. Once you reach the edge of the festival, you thank the Aki-Aki that approach you and wrap a necklace of flowers around you. You laugh when they reluctantly look at Mando and he sighs heavily at your death stare before he leans down and allows one of them to place a necklace around his cowl as well.

“Hey Mando?”

“Hmm.”

“Do the necklaces look the same?” Mando turns around and sees Fett and Fennec look away from the two of you. He waits until they walk the opposite direction before he looks at you and takes hold of your necklace.

“Yours have lighter colors...yellow, orange, white, pink and a few light greens here and there. Mine is darker. This is purple, and these are blue...and all of these are dark red and brown.” He points to each of the flowers and tells you its color, never once noticing the way you’re looking at him and hanging onto every single word he says.

When you hear the sound of distant music playing, you take Mando’s hand and make your way through the crowd, telling him that you want to see what they’re doing on the other side of the festival. Mando says nothing as you pull him through, only responding when you directly ask him about the color of the caravan fabrics and laughing when you joke about how he technically blends into the surroundings. And when you come across a large crate that you can vaguely see some designs on, Mando offers to make room for it on his ship so you can get it. It’s a long argument between the two of you but he wins in the end, telling you that he genuinely wanted to gift you something that you can remember him with and might enjoy some day. You almost cry at the unspoken implications of his words but when he shrugs his shoulders and hands over the credits, you quietly thank him and let the seller know that you’ll be taking it before you leave.

Over the next few hours, Mando never leaves your side once, even when you tell him that he should enjoy his time as well. You notice how he changes the subject every time you ask him to explore by himself and giggle when he responds with an opinion on some of the color combinations. It’s quite comical to be in the presence of such an intimidating individual who’s complaining about how ‘that blue doesn’t go too well with this red.’

As you’re making your way through the different caravans, you notice a table displaying a dozen large cloaks. Turning to Mando, you see that he’s busy asking one of the sellers if they have similar shirts but in darker colors. You walk to the table on the other side and look through the capes to try and differentiate between them. When you realize that it’s of no use, you hold one up and call for him to ask if he should buy a new one.

“Hey Mando, maybe you should get this instead of-”

The question dies in your throat when Mando glances away from the vendor and holds your gaze. Your brain refuses to catch up with what your eyes are seeing for what feels like an eternity and your hand flies to your chest and clench it tightly as your heart skips a beat at the sight in front of you. It takes a few seconds for you to inhale deeply when you realize that you aren’t breathing and you feel your heart skip a beat when you watch Mando strut towards you. He drops what he’s holding in his hands and takes a few strides in your way, not caring to hold back as he wraps one arm around your waist while the other rests on your neck and tilts your head so he could take a better look at you. You still can’t wrap your mind around what just happened and you’re not sure what he’s saying until he lightly shakes you in his arms and raises his voice to grab your attention.

Maker, his voice was unlike anything you’ve ever heard. It was hoarse yet calming, the kind of calming that one could only dream of feeling.

“Mesh’la, what’s wrong? Are you okay?” His voice shakes you to your core and your eyes shift down to his lips, tilting your head to the side when you follow the scruff peppering his handsome features and memorize the different colors of his hair. Gods, you couldn’t put a name to any of them but you knew you liked the combination of the light and dark outlining his sharp jaw.

“I- I don’t...maker. You’re...you’re-” You’re unable to form a coherent thought and as you reach out to touch his cheeks, Mando clenches his jaw but doesn’t dare to move a muscle. He realizes that this is the first time you see him without his helmet and he finds himself praying that you find him, at the very least, okay to look at. His hold on you eases when he feels the palm of your hand caress the side of his face before you push his hair aside. Mando nuzzles into your touch and he shuts his eyes to commit this moment to memory. The last time someone was this gentle with him broke his heart, but he found himself longing for a similar feeling with you. Only if it was you.

“N-no...please. Look at me.” Your whispered request drowns out the music of the festival and Mando’s eyes flutter open immediately. He looks down at you and can’t help but shift his focus to your parted lips as you try to speak again.

“Mando? What...what color are your eyes?” You hold your breath as Mando’s gaze softens when he meets your eyes again. He doesn’t know why you’re asking but he answers you anyway.

“Brown.” His voice breaks but then you’re smiling up at him as you reach for his cheek with your other hand and rest it on his heated skin. He’s not sure what brought about any of this but he can’t care less, not when you were here, in his arms, touching him so gently and looking at him like he was the only one that mattered across the galaxy.

“Hmm...they’re a beautiful color.” The admission sends a shiver down his spine and he doesn’t register the meaning behind your words until he sees your expression change to one of panicked shock.

Oh.

“You can see color?” Mando doesn’t intend to sound so accusative but his tone must have been harsh because you nod and snatch your hands away from him as if he’s burned you. You don’t dare look anywhere else as the reality of the situation settles in your mind.

It’s him. It’s been him all along.

“I- I can see color.”

Mando watches as you blink in confusion before you look to the side. You do a double-take when you see the vibrant colors of the festival and Mando steps away as you walk around him and approach a caravan hanging clothing of all color gradations. You ignore everything else as you softly trace the different colors and patterns on the garments before you walk over to the next little cart and stare at the vibrant jewelry. There’s so much to take in and you forget for a moment where you are. When you look away and turn your eyes to the sky, you can’t help but smile at seeing the kites gliding through the air. You don’t know which one you want to focus on because they’re all so pretty so you stand in there for a few moments to take it all in.

It’s not until you feel a presence next to you that you remember how you came to see this new world. When you begin to ring your fingers anxiously, Mando takes a step towards you and takes your hands in his palms.

“Cyar’ika, do you need anything?” He doesn’t know what to say and your lungs refuse to expand when you finally look at him again.

You spent years conjuring up different scenarios in your head to try and anticipate what to expect when you finally meet your soulmate. But standing here, in front of Mando, in the middle of the Festival of the Ancestors, you realize that this compares to nothing.

“I- I don’t…”

“If you want me to go-”

“No! N-no, please. Stay here with me. Stay here with...me.” Y

ou tighten your hold around his hands to prevent him from leaving. Mando nods and turns back to the caravan he was standing by to grab his helmet. You say nothing as he carries it and looks at you, but your eyes must give you away because Mando throws you a quick smile as he keeps it on his side and leads you through the festival.

Neither of you discuss the new development but you don’t ignore it either. You continue to steal glances from each other every now and then, especially when Mando leans over and tells you about each of the colors. Except this time, he doesn’t tell you so you could imagine what they look like. He tells you so you could memorize what each pigment is and begin to recognize them on your own. It’s almost as if nothing changed with how often Mando describes to you the gradations and patterns, but you know that this was far from the truth. And with the way Mando breathes softly against your forehead when he leans down to talk to you, you sense that he knows this as well.

He’s much more forward with his touches now, perhaps even a little shameless too. Hours ago, he would apologize if he pushed you by accident or shifted closer to you. But now, he was walking with you with one hand on your lower back and he would stand longer behind you as you asked about a new color shade.

As the sun slowly sets across the sky, you turn to Mando and wait for him to finish his drink before you ask him about the others.

“Do you mind if we don’t tell the others just yet?” You watch as Mando’s expression falls and you shake your head immediately so he doesn’t misunderstand the reason behind your request.

“Not because I don’t want them to know about us, I- maker, it’s just that I’ve experienced so many changes in the span of a few days and I want to make sense of things without...without someone asking me too many questions about what I’m feeling. I want to let this sink in? And- and I’d like it if it’s just you and me. Please.” Mando is quiet for a while and you think that maybe it was the wrong thing to say to him.

“Us?”

You can’t hold back your laughter at the soft question and you almost fall over from how hard you’re giggling at him.

“That’s what you took away from everything I just said?” You sigh in relief when he mirrors you and chuckles in return.

“I’m sorry cyar’ika, I- of course. Whatever you need from me.” He’s a man of few words but he somehow knows what to say to calm your nerves.

“Thank you Mando.” You say as you turn your attention back to the setting sun to watch the colors change across the sky.

“Din Djarin.” He whispers to you after a long while, and you meet his eyes briefly, your furrowed eyebrows silently asking him what he was referring to.

“My name is Din Djarin.” His gaze is piercing and you find it much more intense now that you know for a fact that they’re your favorite color. “So you can start calling the other guy Mando again.” Your heart skips a beat when you see dimples appear on his cheeks as he grins at his own joke, and nudges your shoulder so you could relax into him again. You say nothing and lean against his shoulder, resting your head on his beskar armor and enjoying the cold sensation against your heated skin.

You’re not sure how long the two of you sit there in your bubble and watch the festival as it continues on for, but you’re interrupted when Fett approaches you and clears his throat to catch your attention.

“We’re leaving.” The Mandalorian says as he watches you closely. You think you’re being subtle studying his armor but Fett notices how you continue to look between him and Din’s and he tilts his head to the side as he turns to his friend and barely holds back from smirking at him.

Din nods and lets them know that you would be returning with him back to Mos Eisley. Fennec is about to ask why the two of you are acting differently when Fett shakes his head as he looks at you.

“Until next time princess,” Din’s posture straightens when he hears the nickname and narrows his eyes at the man trying to get a rise out of him.

“Usenye.” You snap out of your haze when you hear Din growl at his brother and wave goodbye to him and Fennec as they walk away from you.

“Is everything okay between the two of you?”

“Yes sweet girl, don’t worry about it.” You flush at the pet name and Din notices how you shiver at his touch when he raises your chin to take a better look at you. He slowly leans towards you, never once breaking eye contact as he grows closer to your lips. “Is- is this okay?” He asks and refuses to move a muscle until you respond to him. You’re already breathless and he has barely touched you but you muster up the courage to answer him.

“Y-yes.”

He smirks when your hoarse voice fans over his cheeks and as much as you wish for him to take whatever he wants, you’re thankful that he’s being patient with you and ensuring that you’re comfortable.

“Sweet girl,” Din whispers as he finally captures your lips in a chaste kiss. It’s at this precise moment that the festivities begin to pick up but you don’t notice the fireworks filling the skies or the music growing louder. You shut your eyes and hold onto Din’s wrists as he moves against you and deepens the kiss. When you gasp at his ministrations, Din’s hold on your neck tightens and he pushes you back until you lay on the blanket he set down for you. You moan as he slips his tongue past your lips and swirls his tongue across yours. Fisting your hands into his cowl, you try to pull him closer but cry out in pain when the beskar armor digs into your hips.

“I’m- I’m sorry mesh’la. I didn’t mean to-”

“No no it’s...it’s just your armor. I promise, I- I liked this.” You gulp nervously when you see an amused expression take over his handsome features.

“Is that so?” You don’t have time to react to his question, squealing in surprise when he suddenly stands up and pulls you along with him.

“What- where are we going?” You ask him as he pulls you through the multitude of visitors and Aki-Aki. He stops abruptly and speaks to one of the natives before he pushes you into the caravan standing behind him.

“Din, we can’t just-”

“I asked for his permission. Don’t you know, all of these are for visitors who want to stay the night.” You’re about to ask him why you’re staying the night out here instead of his ship but you can’t seem to form the question because you see Din taking his armor off.

It’s mesmerizing watching him take each beskar piece apart but when he’s down to just his clothes, it occurs to you that this night might be going somewhere else. Your nervousness must show on your face because Din walks towards you slowly and takes your hands in his. He kisses your wrists before leans over and rests his forehead against yours.

“Don’t worry cyar’ika, I’m not… I won’t- we’re not here to do anything other than talk. I didn’t feel comfortable taking my beskar off out there so-”

“I trust you Din.” You interrupt his word-vomit and lead him to one of the corners of the tent so you could lay down next to each other. When you rest your head on the pillow and finally look up, you’re met with a small opening in the ceiling of the caravan that gives you a perfect view of the blue night sky lighting up with fireworks.

When Din finally seats himself next to you, you whine in irritation and pull him down until he’s on his back next to you. Din never once lets go of your hand and he occasionally raises the palm of your hand to his lips to kiss across the skin.

“Can I ask you something?” You don’t look away from the fireworks when you speak, not wanting to miss seeing any of the vibrant shades of reds and yellows as they broke through the clouds.

“Anything sweet girl.”

“Why did you take off your helmet? I thought your Creed prevented you from showing your face.” You hope the question isn’t too insensitive or private, and when Din takes longer than you like to respond, you finally turn to him to apologize. But Din cuts you off before you can even say anything, keeping his focus on your wrist to distract him long enough so he could respond.

“I had a son once, well, he wasn’t mine physically but, he was mine. He was a foundling by Creed and I was tasked with bringing him back to his kind. It’s a long story that I could tell you another time but...when I had to give him up, I couldn’t bear the thought of him never seeing me without the helmet. I needed him to see me, to know what I willingly gave up and what I had to do to ensure his safety. I’d taken off my helmet once before and even thought it was my choice, I didn’t want to. But in that moment, before I watched him go, I decided that he was more important than my Creed. He was...he was everything to me. And it took a long time to realize that personal connections and relationships weren’t a weakness, they were a strength. My strength.” You’re not sure when you turned to your side and nuzzled into his embrace. But you couldn’t focus on anything else but him and the way his eyes twinkled in sadness when he mentioned his kid. It was a shocking admission and you never once thought of him in such a role but looking back at the last few days, you didn’t find it impossible. He was kind, quiet, sweet, adn patient.

“I keep my helmet on almost all the time but I only take it off around people I trust. I’m telling you this because- because I trust you. I trust you cyar’ika. I took it off earlier today because I wanted you to see me...and also because I was trying to pick out a gift for you. I figured if I didn’t preface it with anything that it would be less dramatic but- little did I know.” The indirect mention of the not-so-little change you experienced earlier today makes you smile.

“If I knew you needed to look into my eyes for you to see color, I would have taken off the helmet the first time I saw you.” He trails his nose across your cheek before he kisses your eyes and your forehead, smiling down at you when he sees how relaxed you feel in his arms.

“It wouldn’t have mattered.” Your response surprises him and he pulls away and looks at you quizzically.

“I- I saw you before my eyes saw you, Din. My heart chose you before my soul did. I...I think I knew when I saw you again…I think a part of me knew that you were it for me and that it didn’t matter if I didn’t see color with you because- because you were...you’re perfect.” You feel a weight lift off of your chest when you finally confess to him what you’ve been feeling for the past few days and you shift impossibly closer to him to let him know that you were telling the truth.

“I’m not perfect mesh’la.” His laugh is self-deprecating and he only stops when he feels your hand slip around his back and hold onto his shirt like your life depended on it.

“You are to me.” It’s perhaps too forward for him and Din doesn’t know how to react or respond to your confession so he nods at you and nuzzles into your neck to avoid any more of your intense emotions.

“You haven’t told me yet what your favorite color is.” He tries to change the topic, not expecting your response to shoot through his chest and into his heart like a blaster.

“Brown obviously.” You answer instantly and without hesitation.

“Why ‘obviously’?”

“Well, it’s-it’s your eye-color Din. What other color could be my favorite?”

His heart ceases to beat at your adamant reply and he pulls away again to look into your eyes to see if you were teasing him. Instead, he finds something swimming in your eyes that would have terrified his soul had he met you years ago.

“Ner kar’ta,” Din moans into your ear as he rests up on his elbow before molding his lips with yours again. You don't know what any of the Mando’a means but you have a pretty good idea of what he’s trying to convey in that moment and you wrap your arms around his neck and bring him closer to you. When he lays back down and pulls you into his side, you can’t help but take one last look at the night sky, finding the stars shimmering behind the multitude of fireworks. You watch the different colors blend with each other, and you almost cry when you see the yellows and greens and blues mixing so beautifully together to create new gradients across the galaxy.

But none of them compared to the color of Din’s eyes. And you go to sleep dreaming of the moment those kind, dark, brown orbs captured your soul and whispered affections into your heart.

Translations

Mesh’la - beautiful Cyar’ika - beloved/darling Ad’ika - little one Usenye - go away Ner kar’ta - my heart

Pedro Pascal (and any of his characters):

@pastel-0-princess @feelmyroarrrr @libbymouse @its--fandom--darling @spideysimpossiblegirl @princess76179 @cheekygeek05 @miraclesoflove @purple-mango @freeshavocadoooo @metalarmsandmanbuns @acthenerd @greeneyedblondie44 @cannedsoupsucks @purplepascal042 @talesfromtheguild @f0rever15elf @vibin-hippie @onesmokinbabe @leaiorganas @words-way-of-life @kideyz @lovesickmadsadpoet @niall7inches @rosiefridayrogersunday @tati-adventures @sleep-tight1 @itsfreeekinbats @cybergroupie @vibin-hippie @marsplsstop @mouthymandalorian @diogodxlot @janebby @juletheghoul

Din Djarin: @a--1--1--3 @tanzthompson

[pinkandgreenarepurpleandyellow]

WIP WIP WIP WIP!

Early Concept

Some doodles/mockups

Current progress and some details.

My major plan for the moment is to find my brown markers (seriously, how do those things keep disappearing) and figure out what my background for the teeth/grin is gonna look like.

Ngl, I'm really proud of this one! kinda annoyed that the 1 in 2013 is a little too close to the 0, but I think I did some nice work on the nectars and blood splatters. (More details/breakdown below cut).

Escape From Furnace was one of the first books that I was super-passionate about, even though I wasn't online for the first while. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of stuff I loved and wanted to do bigger deep-dives into, but it was a kinda interesting perspective for me since I'm Jewish and the main villain is, y'know, a fucking Nazi.

It's kind of a weird feeling where on the one hand, watching the fandom was what actually shoved me online and on to Tumblr. Otoh, the obsession w/Warden Cross was kinda creepy to me, and it felt like almost everyone conveniently pushed to the side that he wasn't just a Nazi in the past, but kept up the ideals, modeled a prison on them, and constantly talks about "superior races" and "wiping out the inferior scum" and such.

Seeing the rest of the fandom, especially the headcanon that Zee is Jewish, resonated a lot more, and kept my head on this vague idea of breaking down how much that would change the narrative of the story (consider that Zee is the only person we know for sure is immune to the nectar, add that the version of nectar used in the Furnace is Cross's variation, multiply by how both Cross and nectarized Alex talk about Zee in Death Sentence and Fugitives. There's also the whole 'blondes w/blue eyes who keep responding esp well to the nectar' shtick with Alex and Gary).

So this idea's been rattling around in my head for a while, obviously! I initially wanted to do two triangles with the three circles, superimposing an upside version of the Furnace's logo over itself to create the Star of David, but it looked kind of weird so I might come back to it later. For now, each triangle has it's own mini-scene or element starring. breakdown, top to bottom, left to right:

I initially wanted to draw the dog's face/jaws but it just wouldn't look right no matter what I did. It was switched out for the three different nectar strains we see in canon: The silver syringe full of Cross's blend, the berserker blood with specs of red, and the mostly black that's running through the tubes connecting Alfred Furnace to the machine.

Teeth: I'm honestly not quite sure where I'm going with this in the final draft, but teeth stick out to me throughout the book as one of those details we get to see characters more clearly. Donovan's smile, Kevin missing two front teeth, the berserkers, Bodie's grin, Cross's teeth like crooked tombstones, y'all get my point. But yeah, teeth.

Hands: Donovan's hand (bathed in gold, currently yellow because I don't have any gold markers rn), and Alex's reaching out to Donovan. The big scene, but also all of the smaller ones that came earlier, like in Lockdown.

Prison bars: There's something that sticks in my head about the bars and all of the numbers used, for the inmates and the cells and the three chipping rooms and the blacksuits and how I imagine at some point, you only remember yourself as a number. I'd hope that with his memories back, Alex wouldn't forget his name, but I'd argue that 2013834 (inmate number) still holds better memories than 208 (blacksuit number).

Eye: Another big motif. So many blue eyes, so many silver ones. I've kinda been sticking to only 4 colors for all of these except the panel with the hands, we're doing something with emotions and colors and the way the Furnace saps all hope here. Again, can't quite decide on a background yet.

Gas mask: A rough redraw of the one in Lockdown, the very first book of the series and, again, that little connection of Zee with the idea of him being Jewish and the canon detail that he would have been made into a wheezer if not for Cross.

The center: Their motto is nine words, two phrases. It looks somewhat awkward, but I think it works.

So yeah. I'm planning on finishing the colors and then seeing if I can figure out how to turn this into a patch on fabric or embroidery or something, but this is one of my favorite concepts and I'm glad I can finally bring it to life!

[eijispumpkin]

good lord this is long i apologize, but hi hello, lovely human with a heart of gold, sweet creature who's full of love, i cannot thank u enough for being u! for sharing your amazing works and bringing comfort to so many people, everything u write is so magical and re-reading your stuff always makes me feel like i'm receiving a warm hug it's the best feeling out there, ik u're taking a break rn and i'm glad to see u taking time for urself, as cool as the internet is it can also be very shitty at times unf, pls take care of urself nd ur health qt ! plus ik we r going thru some rly scary times this year with the pandemic and all that too, ik it's rough, but i hope u're okay, and i wish u loots of happiness mwahh

if u're not accepting asks right now i'm rly sry! pls ignore this i hope u have an amazing day ♡ but if it's not too much trouble, how did u start posting online? bc god, the way my brain keeps convincing me it's stupid even tho ik it would bring me joy :c i see all the drafts and ideas i've had for years now but never got the courage to post or develop bc i always convinced myself that it's too late now, or like it only works if u've already done it for at least a couple years? and that i suck anw and "wanting to write what i'd like to see/read" doesnt really work when i haven't practiced much, sigh even if i gather enough courage smhow, idk wut i'd have to tackle first

you never have to apologize to me for saying long things, no worries my friend!! i am long-winded and rambly by nature, so i totally get it <3 and ahh thank you so much for your kind and lovely words, i appreciate it a lot!!!! i'm very glad to hear that you like my writing so much ♥

how i started posting... man, honestly? i first started posting fic on a tumblr account whose password i have long since forgotten, like eight or nine years ago at this point. it was an rp blog for a very obscure tolkien elf, and i was lucky enough as a young teen to find people who were really kind and encouraging about my writing, both in rp and as little side-ficlets and whatnot! that's how i first got into actual writing at all. tiny ficlets prompted by rp stuff were the first things i ever posted at all - in fact, my first fic posted on ff.net way back when was just one of those lil tumblr rp ficlets i crossposted!

as for your conundrum, i def hear you :( insecurity and anxiety brain can be a HUGE bitch, and i know it's easy to tell yourself that numbers like comments and kudos don't matter, but it still feels really bad when you really want validation and you don't get any. (though i will say, it is true that the numbers don't matter! it's totally a game of luck. some of my favorites of my own fics don't have nearly as many kudos or comments as the ones i personally didn't even like as much/didn't put as much work into. it's not that those fics aren't as good; it's just that popularity is kind of a roulette wheel. it's easy to internalize it as being your fault if something doesn't fly, but it honestly really isn't in your control at all.)

but heres the thing! everyone starts somewhere. when i first started posting fics, i can promise you i was nowhere near as good as i am today! i didn't pay attention to sentence variation, i hardly ever used any imagery, my character voices were underdeveloped, etc etc etc. that doesn't mean that no one liked to see my post, or that i shouldn't have posted! it just means that i was a beginner. and so are you! there's no shame in being new at something. it just means you have a lot to learn, and there's nothing wrong with that at all! in fact i would say there's a lot of joy in discovering your voice and how you like to write. the fear of peoples expectations can weigh you down, but you should write for yourself first, not for others, or else you'll just burn out, you know?

as for what you'd have to tackle first: i could give you a bunch of technical mumbo jumbo if you wanted, but really i think it is about writing what you'd like to see! not in the way that you seem to mean here though (and forgive me if i misinterpreted! i don't mean to put words in your mouth). i first started writing just by describing little daydreams i had about the characters. first and foremost, your creation process should be fun for you!! if you enjoy writing something, your readers will be able to tell, and it adds to the piece. but more important than that is the fact that you'll have had fun creating something. finding what makes writing fun for you is, in my opinion, the most important place to start!!

[spanishskulduggery]

i don't know if you have a post about it but can you explain, dumb down if i'm being honestly, the uses/etc for the different pronouns: indirect object, direct object, etc?

Direct objects are basically what amounts to the accusative case for languages with case systems.

Basically it works like this: Subject verbs an object

The object that is “verbed” is the direct object; it receives the action and is directly acted upon.

So in a sentence like “I kick the ball”, the “I” is the subject, “kick” is the verb, and “the ball” is the object.

The pronouns are:

me = yo

te = tú

lo/la = 3ra persona singular / usted

los/las = 3ra persona plural / ustedes

nos = nosotros

os* = vosotros

*if you’re in Spain

Direct objects are most common with inanimate objects, so you need to know the gender of the object.

If it’s “I kick the ball” it would be pateo la pelota and so la pelota “the ball” is feminine… so la pateo “I kick it”, where “it” is the pronoun for “the ball” which is implied.

But you could say compro el libro “I buy the book”, or lo compro “I buy it”, and it’s masculine because el libro is masculine.

Same general idea exists for plural.

Indirect objects are the dative case for languages with case systems.

These mark “to whom” or “for whom” an action is done, and many times indirect object pronouns are used for people, animals, or personified objects.

The pronouns here are:

me = yo

te = tú

le = 3ra persona singular / usted

les = 3ra persona plural / ustedes

nos = nosotros

os* = vosotros

*again for Spain

You get introduced to indirect objects first with gustar

me gusta el libro = I like the book [lit. “the book pleases me”]me gustan los libros = I like the books [lit. “the books please me”]

Again, this is normally a person who receives the action of a verb… but not directly.

In other words… “I send the letter” is mando la carta and in here, la carta is the direct object. 

The person who receives the action of “sending the letter” is its recipient… so te mando la carta “I send the letter to you”, or le mando la carta “I send the letter to him/her”

Direct and indirect objects do show up together, just like in English.

Luckily, as you’ve probably noticed it’s only 3rd person singular and plural that change, so even if you don’t totally know whether the me is technically direct or indirect, it doesn’t change the fact that it’s still me

But for other sentences it’s more particular.

Because Spanish is a little more vague with the pronouns, it’s more based on implied knowledge. Like if I say “it”, it should be obvious what I’m referring to or the pronoun kind of feels weird in Spanish.

In general, if you don’t know what it should be, you tend to say lo but if you have the noun already at hand, you need to know its gender.

Te mando la carta. = I send you the letter.Te la mando. = I send it to you.

Te mando el paquete. = I send you the package.Te lo mando. = I send it to you.

Te mando las flores. = I send you the flowers.Te las mando. = I send them (f) to you.

Te mando los chocolates. = I send you the chocolates.Te los mando. = I send them (m) to you. 

Where it gets a little more confusing is that when 3rd person meets 3rd person for indirect + direct, the indirect objects [le/les] change into se

This is because if you had le/les + lo/la/los/las it would sound really weird and trip you up when you speak.

The se here serves no grammatical purpose other than just to replace the le/les so it’s not super awkward:

Le mando la carta. = I send him/her the letter.Se la mando. = I send it to him/her.Les mando la carta. = I send them the letter.Se la mando. = I send it to them.

Le mando el paquete. = I send him/her the package.Se lo mando. = I send it to him/her.Les mando el paquete. = I send them the package.Se lo mando. = I send it to them.

Le mando las flores. = I send him/her the flowers.Se las mando. = I send them to him/her.Les mando las flores. = I send them the flowers.Se las mando. = I send them to them.

Le mando los chocolates. = I send him/her the chocolates.Se los mando. = I send them to him/her.Les mando los chocolates. = I send them the chocolates.Se los mando. = I send them to them.

*Note: Because se here could be le or les, it’s sometimes common to write a (sujeto) to make it clear who you’re talking about.

That’s common with indirect objects just in general. When it’s obvious like me gusta, saying a mí me gusta comes off as very emphatic “I’m the one who likes it” or “well, I like it [implying someone else didn’t]”

With le and les it could refer to “him”, “her”, “You”,“them”, “You all”…  and “them” could be masculine or feminine.

So when it’s ambiguous and hasn’t been stated, sometimes people will just add the a to make it clear:

Se lo mando (a él). = I’m sending it to him.

Se los mando (a ella). = I’m sending them to her.

Se la mando (a usted). = I’m sending it to you.

Se la mando (a ellos). = I’m sending it to them (m+m, m+f)Se la mando (a ellas). = I’m sending it to them (f+f)

Se las mando (a ustedes). = I’m sending them to you guys.

And really you could have the direct object [lo/la/los/las] be anything.

When the direct object is a person, it can be a little weird. 

In Latin America it’s more common to say something like:

Lo conozco (a él). = I know him.La conozco (a ella). = I know her.

in Spain, it depends on the region, but most places will say le conozco instead. Though some regions in Spain use the direct objects. There are other regional variations, but Spain typically favors the use of indirect objects when it’s a person or animate object to denote personhood or life.

There’s some debate over how active the object is… Like a verb like ayudar could be interpreted with direct or indirect objects. And based on this reasoning, le ayudo is like “I help him/her” but in the sense that they’re accepting help… and lo/la ayudo “I help him/her” makes the object more passive.

I find people will understand you regardless so don’t worry about it too much. Latin America favors the direct objects for people, but will use the indirect objects for people in very formal situations.

In my textbooks it used to say: es un placer conocerle “it’s nice to meet you”, and I also have some where it’s like es un placer conocerLa a usted, señora “it’s a pleasure to meet you, madam”

In general, I’d be using lo/la people, even if they were usted. But I think es un placer conocerte is pretty commonplace. And conocerle sounds real formal to me.

Verbs that typically use direct objects with people (to the best of my knowledge)

golpear = to hit

castigar = to punish

querer = to love [more Latin America]

amar = to love (passionately) [more Latin America]

juzgar = to judge

lastimar = to hurt, to injure

olvidar = to forget

perdonar = to forgive

llevar = to carry / to bring

tomar = to take

ayudar = to help [sometimes indirect objects are used]

mirar = to watch / to stare at [sometimes indirect objects are used]

llamar = to call

conocer = to know (someone/a place)

encontrar = to find

buscar = to look for

tener = to have

ver = to see

Verbs that typically use indirect objects (with a person)

dar = to give

enviar = to send

mandar = to send

culpar / echar la culpa = to blame

sugerir = to suggest

ofrecer = to offer

enseñar = to teach / to show, to point out

servir = to serve

traer = to bring

pedir = to request

decir = to say

contar = to tell

hacer daño = to harm, to do harm

hacer caso = to pay attention to, to mind, to heed

prometer = to promise

jurar = to swear

echar de menos = to miss (someone) [Spain]extrañar = to miss (someone) [Lat Am]

…also the gustar verbs, though some gustar verbs work in different applications:

gustar = to like

encantar = to really like[encantar can also take direct objects but it means “to enchant” or “to bewitch” in this case, as in using magic on an object]

sorprender = to surprise

fascinar = to fascinate

quedar bien/mal = to fit well/poorly (said of clothes)

doler = to hurt, to ache

parecer = to seem

resultar[used like… me resulta familiar “it seems familiar to me”, or me resulta curioso “I find it strange”]

extrañar = to find strange, to seem odd [when it isn’t “to miss someone”]

costar = to be difficult for someone

molestar = to annoy

interesar = to interest

importar = to matter, to care about

I would also recommend:

Anatomy of Spanish: Direct Objects

Anatomy of Spanish: Indirect Objects

That’s a more quick and easy explanation of them.

Also, reflexive verbs are a thing but they’re easier.

Reflexive verbs are part of a subset of things known as “pronomial verbs”, which for your purposes means “they use the reflexive pronouns but might not always be reflexive in the traditional sense”

…So that’s a thing I’ll explain briefly later on.

me = yo

te = tú

se = 3ra persona singular y plural / usted y ustedes

nos = nosotros

os = vosotros

The se is the one to watch here because all of 3rd person and usted and ustedes use that se. They’re usually easier to spot though because of how reflexive verbs conjugate. More on that in a minute.

But reflexives in their truest sense are divided into regular reflexives and reciprocal reflexives.

The basic definition of reflexives are “verbs where the subject and the object are the same”… meaning “I do something to myself”, “you do something to yourself”…

A lot of reflexives show up in your daily routine, and also apply to you doing things to your own body parts… me lavo la cara reads literally as “I wash myself the face” but it means “I wash my face”… or me lavo las manos “I wash my hands”

A reflexive needs the pronoun to match with the subject… in other words me refers to yo, and lavo only conjugates as yo… so me lavo is “I wash myself”

If you mixed up one or the other, you’d end up with a different sentence and a direct/indirect meaning… me lavas “you wash me” or te lavo “I wash you”… are not reflexive.

Because reflexive pronouns need to match the conjugations, you can usually tell who it applies to pretty easily, except in third person where it could be ambiguous:

Me pongo la ropa. = I put on clothes.

Te pones la ropa. = You put on clothes

(Él) se pone la ropa. = He puts on clothes.(Ella) se pone la ropa. = She puts on clothes.(Usted) se pone la ropa. = You put on clothes.

(Ellos) se ponen la ropa. = They (m+m, m+f) put on clothes.(Ellas) se ponen la ropa. = They (f+f) put on clothes.(Ustedes) se ponen la ropa. = You all put on clothes.

Nos ponemos la ropa. = We put on clothes.

In the same vein, a “reciprocal reflexive” is where two or more subjects do something to one another.

Nos conocemos. = We know each other.Nos conocimos. = We met each other.Nos conocíamos. = We used to know each other.

Se conocen. = They know each other.Se conocieron. = They met each other.Se conocían. = They used to know each other.

Sometimes it’s potentially ambiguous, but when it could be you normally see el uno al otro, el uno del otro, or el uno con el otro depending on the verb in question. And that just means “one another”.

That formation is more uncommon but it has happened. Normally it’s just phrased as reflexive and you understand it by context.

abrazar a alguien = to hug someoneSe abrazaron. = They hugged. / They hugged one another.Se abrazaron el uno al otro. = They hugged one another.

enamorarse de alguien = to fall in love with someoneSe enamoraron. = They fell in love.Se enamoraron el uno del otro. = They fell in love with each other.casarse con alguien = to get married to someoneSe casaron. = They got married.Se casaron el uno con el otro. = They got married to each other.

Other ones would be like besarse “to kiss / to make out”, or divorciarse “to get divorced”, or reunirse “to meet up / to join together”

And then there are the other pronomial verbs that use reflexive but you can’t exactly say they translate very reflexively.

Like dormir is “to sleep” but dormirse means “to fall asleep”. It’s not like “one sleeps themselves”…

This is part of something called dativo ético which is a whole big thing that is kind of a lot, but basically it used a reflexive marker to show there’s something significant for the person it refers to, and it’s usually translated into English with some kind of additional word or preposition

Like mudar is “to mutate/change/molt”, and mudarse is “to move away (residences)”, or ir is “to go” and irse is “to go away/to leave”, or quedar is “to remain” and quedarse is “to stay behind”

So if you see a thing that looks reflexive but it doesn’t make sense reflexively, chances are you found dativo ético 

[autokratorissa]

Considering that civilizational collapse may happen within 100 years, do you think people can justify having children? I've seen some people get upset and call anti-natalists 'post-modern christians' but they never clearly answer why we should keep having children. Never mind that "be fruitful and multiply" is a central tenet of Christianity. Anyways, I'm curious about your thoughts on this matter.

While procreation is obviously very proactively encouraged—arguably even demanded depending on the denomination and period one’s talking about—in Christianity, it’s not exactly unique in that regard; all religions tend to have a pro-reproduction (a ‘natalist,’ you could say) message somewhere in their canon. Many early Christian heresies, though, especially those influenced by the Gnostics and Hellenistic schools like the Platonists and Pythagoreans, did ascribe some kind of negative value to birth owing to their identification of God/Yahweh as the demiurge, and so his creation—the world—being inherently imperfect and flawed, so, even though Gnosticism can hardly be considered the flourishing worldview it once was, “be fruitful and multiply” cannot, in good faith, be considered the final word in Christian attitudes to reproduction. And antinatalists are not ‘post-modern Christians’ (what would that even mean? It’s a patently ridiculous term); anyone saying that is operating under precisely the kind of Christian-dominated thinking they’re accusing antinatalists of. Early manifestations of philosophical antinatalism were predominantly Buddhist (in India and China) and secular (in the Hellenistic world), and from a time before Christianity existed at all, all of which clearly refutes that kind of criticism, at the very least in a strictly historical sense. We should always be mindful of the cultures we exist within, however, and certainly for those in Europe and the Americas, the hegemonic power of the Church and Christian ideology cannot be ignored, even if it is seemingly less powerful and all-encompassing now than it once was.

What are my thoughts on the matter? I think people who don’t know better think antinatalism would consider them as somehow morally wrong—evil, even—for having children, but that this just isn’t true. Similar to a lot of the common responses to nihilism, these people have a knee-jerk reaction based on very little actual knowledge but plenty of emotional baggage, and in this case literally millions of years of biological and social pressures making them view childbirth positively. They think the antinatalist would consider them, individually and as a person, to be bad for having a child, and even that that child itself would represent a moral evil, and not that it is the act, the process, the socio-cultural and biological urge, that is being critiqued. There are also obviously degrees and variations to all things; antinatalism is not a position which can typically be considered to paint in absolutes and categorical imperatives for moral action. Antinatalism isn’t even a doctrine that necessarily seeks to stop all procreation; it simply applies negative value to the act of creating life. On one level, the consequences of such a philosophy are radical and perhaps difficult for many people to stomach, but more often than not it leads to undeniably rational ideas that benefit us all. A good example of this is the very simple and quite common (see, for example: Vetter, The production of children as a problem for utilitarian ethics, de Giraud, “Mobiles et Mécanismes réels de la Procréation,” c. Narcissisme, L’art de guillotinerles procréateurs: manifeste anti-nataliste, and Rulli, The Ethics of Procreation and Adoption) antinatalist observation that, while there exist children without parents but who do want them (those in foster care; orphans, those unwanted by their biological parents, etc.), for people to make the active decision to have a biological child of their own and not adopt is simply unjustifiable under any ethical framework: the act of adoption reduces the amount of misery in the world; childbirth, adds to it.

The creation of sentient, self-aware beings is cruel, unnecessary, and fundamentally and irrevocably based on a complete disregard for the interests and autonomy (see: Shiffrin, Wrongful Life, Procreative Responsibility, and the Significance of Harm, and Singh, “Shiffrin’s (Reluctant) “Anti-natalism”” and “Objections to Shiffrin,” Assessing anti-natalism: a philosophical examination of the morality of procreation)—which has often been considered the basis of all morality (cf. Christman, “Autonomy in Moral and Political Philosophy,” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)—of the hypothetical, unborn child. There is no way to avoid any of this. The world is a bad place, we know this to be so. By having children, we condemn them—by force, by an act of violence against them—to a life that knows some quantity of misery, suffering, angst, pain, and all the other things we think best to avoid. Therefore the unavoidable truth is that we are knowingly causing a suffering being to know misery and pain, when we very easily could have not. It’s extremely hard to even attempt to justify that kind of relationship and act.

As with pretty much anything in pessimist and other allied philosophies, I think Schopenhauer represents an excellent starting point—though by no means end point—for someone interested in antinatalism. It should be stressed that, as a Kantian (more specifically as a transcendental idealist), Schopenhauer thought that the creation and destruction of life was mere phenomena, not Ding-an-Sich [thing-in-itself; noumenon, that is, what exists independent of perception], and so did not place as much of an emphasis on actually avoiding and stopping procreation as an act as other, non-idealist antinatalists may advocate, but nevertheless I do think he does, in his typical style, express the kind of reserved whimper of philosophy that I can’t help but feel belongs to antinatalism:

“If you try to imagine, as nearly as you can, what an amount of misery, pain and suffering of every kind the sun shines upon in its course, you will admit that it would be much better if, on the earth as little as on the moon, the sun were able to call forth the phenomena of life; and if, here as there, the surface were still in a crystalline state.

[…]

“If children were brought into the world by an act of pure reason alone, would the human race continue to exist? Would not a man rather have so much sympathy with the coming generation as to spare it the burden of existence? or at any rate not take it upon himself to impose that burden upon it in cold blood.”

Schopenhaur, qtd in “On the Sufferings of the World,” Studies in Pessimism

Schopenhauer saw procreation as a weakness; not an evil thing, it should be stressed, but a weakness, brought about by the cravings of the flesh. The urge to have children and likewise the way in which we all too easily create pregnancies without even planning them results from our being, in effect, tricked by the Wille zum Leben [will to life; the thing-in-itself]. As I say though, Schopenhauer was working in the Kantian tradition, and so all life as we understand it, in his philosophy, is simply appearance; true freedom, that is, the only escape from not just procreation but most suffering of any kind, can only come from a rejection and overcoming of the Will. Poetically beautiful as this line of thinking may be, suffice to say few of us are committed Kantians today.

To specifically answer your question about whether it’s possible to justify having children now, in 2019, as the very world burns around us, yes, of course it’s justifiable. We as a species can consistently find justifications to support whatever we want. Only rarely does justification proceed action. Personally, however, I cannot justify it. No amount of logical contortions or moral arguing seems to affect that. But will people have children, and not simply as sporadic accidents and in unavoidable situations, but by the millions and through predetermined planning? Of course they will. And would I give a different answer if I were alive at any other point in history? Unlikely. All we can do is try and make life as pleasant as possible for those of us that are here, and, yes, to try and stop those that come after us from making the same mistakes we have, the first and most significant of which always necessarily being our creation itself.

[rpbetter]

hello! so... i'm mutuals with this person who writes the same muse as i do. they don't roleplay with my version, because i haven't told them about my multimuse, so i don't think they even realize we write the same muse in the first place. lately, i've noticed them calling their muse "my son", and saying things like "i own him now, everyone else go home", and it hurts my feelings. but i don't know how to bring this up without sounding bitter, possessive, or competitive. can you help me?

Oh, no...

First, let me point out the irony of you being concerned about coming off as bitter, possessive, or competitive while they're saying that kind of thing as a RPer.

Because those are all, unfortunately, normalized things to say from fandom, a lot of people who write fic, do art, write a lot of meta, or just really vibe with a character say these things regularly. It can be funny there, but ultimately, it does actually express those things. It is a statement made humorously to convey bitterness about the way a character has been treated in canon, possessiveness because you're so annoyed with canon and/or fandom's treatment of a character that's important to you, and even competitiveness - your take on this character, even feelings about them or similarities to them, is better than the shit that annoys so terribly.

The difference in venue is extremely important, though. All of those things can be pretty damn valid in non-RP fandom, even when they annoy the hell out of us coming from fans we feel are the ones mucking up the character. It's ultimately that it's valid because it's a way of expressing ourselves, and our frustrations, without being nasty to the creators.

But in RP, you're talking about other RPers when you say this, too. Not just canon content creators, not just fans out in fandom who might express the same things. No, other people who are also engaged in portraying this character as their muse. That makes it hostile, no matter how much joking is wrapped around it. Especially with the prevalence of RPers being intolerant of "duplicates."

Secondly, I'd like to assure you that you're not being any of those things! Furthermore, that it's incredibly valid to feel hurt by this. If it was a random RPer you ran across, it might be a non-issue or an eye roll, but when it comes from someone you interact with, it's hurtful. In a way, especially when they do not know you write that muse. If they knew, would they simply feel this way without expressing it? Would they continue to express it? Is their point the usual, normalized behavior and reasons for it, or do they actually have a case of "duplicate anxiety?"

(Which, for the record, I hate both the word "duplicates" and the phrase "duplicate anxiety." No one's muse is a duplicate, they're the same canon character with different portrayals. They're variations on a common theme, not identical sets. I think where actual anxiety over portrayals of the same canon character exists, this sort of thinking helps that along. But my experience with "duplicate anxiety" is hostility, and not just anxiety-born hostility as a defense either. In most cases I've seen and directly experienced with my own canon muses any of the following would be better descriptors: "duplicate jealousy," "duplicate intolerance," "duplicate hatred." However, they're familiar terms, so that's what I used.)

But yes, unfortunately, it is likely to come off as such, particularly as this person does seem pretty possessive of the muse. And I'm not saying that nastily, we're all kind of possessive, in some way or another, most of us have had negative things with our muses' canon or fanon. It's just when you're being nastily possessive and defensive toward other RPers that this is an issue. If they're inclined to be defensive like that, it's very possible that anything you say is going to come off badly.

All you can do is try your best and remember that it isn't actually about you as a person or your portrayal. It's about them. It doesn't say anything real about you. If it happens, please, don't let it make you feel bad about yourself!

Are you writing-mutuals or just mutuals?

If you write together, this is almost certainly going to be easier. There's an established connection with you that is positive. If you are mutuals who do not write together, it might be a little more difficult. I know that I feel positively about my non-writing mutuals, I enjoy them so much on my dash and in OOC conversations, but for some people, there is a sort of distance that exists there.

I think in either case, bringing it up is the most difficult part. I mean that as in...sending a message in general. If you're writing partners, you've already spoken, maybe you even speak fairly regularly, and it's not going to feel fully out of nowhere to come to them with a concern.

If that is the case, try something like:

Hey! I hope this doesn't stress you or anything, and you don't need to rush to get back to me, I just want to talk to you about it whenever you have time. I know you're not meaning it hatefully, but when you say things about owning -muse name- it's kind of hurtful to me because I write him as well on another blog. It's maybe silly, but I think you'll understand because you do love -muse name- so much too!

If you've seen them post specific problems they have with the way the muse was done in canon or addressed by fandom that you agree with, it could be a great idea to add that. You want to show that you understand where they're coming from and do care about the muse, too. Think of it like bonding. It's hard to be irrationally angry with people when we're forced to see the ways that we're similar.

I can feel the same way. Every time I see them being -referred to in a negative way, made wildly OOC in these ways, etc. just be specific- it goes all over me! I'm like, no, no, no, I've kidnapped him, he's mine now! It's just that as someone writing a portrayal of the same muse, it can feel aimed at me.

Either way, revisit the issue and how you feel.

Like I said, I'm sure you're not meaning it like that and you were unaware that I write him too, but I know that I wouldn't want to make someone feel hurt expressing it that way, so, I wanted to talk to you about it. It can make me feel like, if you knew I wrote him as well, you might not want to write with me anymore or would feel negatively about my portrayal. I really enjoy your portrayal and writing with you, obviously, so, it's more hurtful than just some rando out in fandom saying that kind of thing. I hope you understand!

If you don't write together:

Honestly, about the same thing without the familiarity.

Either way, what you're going for here is understanding. You want them to understand that you don't mean this hatefully, you're not trying to tell them what to do or anything, but these things are hurtful to you. Getting them to understand why it is hurtful to you without seeming accusatory.

And some really careful phrasing can go a long way. Instead of "you make me feel" make it an impersonal "this/it makes me feel" or even an "I feel." They're not directly being hateful to you by intent, they're just kind of oblivious to how saying things this way could be hurtful to someone else. So, you want to make them aware while not feeling attacked over it.

Do not give them ideas of you being possessive etc. by stating any such words! I know the inclination can be to attempt covering bases by saying things like, "I don't mean this possessively" or "I'm not trying to come off as" or "sorry if this sounds like x, I don't mean it that way or feel like that!" But those inclinations imply the opposite, even if unconsciously so. Don't put the words there to bring up that association.

Keep the tone honest but kind. Let them know how you feel without putting that emotion into what you're saying. Tell them that it is hurtful, you might feel judged or suddenly disliked, without coming off as defensive, angry, or incredibly sad. It's probably better if you stay away from being too descriptive about what "hurt" means to you for this reason, or anything you've done when feeling particularly hurt, like having to avoid your dash on this blog. These things can trigger reactions of defense or guilt.

Things you're not saying are pretty important here. Don't try to give suggestions as to how to resolve it, for example. While that is often a great idea when we discuss problems with each other, in this case, it's going to sound controlling. Don't offer suggestions as to what they could say instead, or even state that they need to stop saying these things. That needs to be the natural take away from you telling them that this is hurtful to you!

If it isn't the natural take away and they continue to do it after this conversation (especially if they've expressed being upset about unintentionally hurting you and a desire to not do so going forward), then, this is not a good partnership. That might be really disappointing and even more hurtful, but if they don't care when you've expressed that something they're doing has hurt you, they're someone you shouldn't keep interacting with. Again, especially if they've said they wouldn't keep doing it and that they cared! That means that they're willing to express care and interest only as far as smoothing over a problem goes while continuing the problem itself, and likely, because they don't feel it's a big deal.

And speaking of that...

If they literally do tell you that it isn't a big deal? This is a good time to terminate the relationship with them, too. Maybe it isn't, but when someone tells you that you've upset them, it's a big deal to them. Coming to someone to tell them that they've hurt you is a big deal, it's not easily done. We all have had something that we genuinely feel is not a big deal that has hurt someone, and you know what? That's fine, things can be a non-issue for us but still hurt someone else...it's how we respond to being told that matters. So, if their response is telling you this (aggressively or passive-aggressively, as in "it's not a big deal but ok if it makes you feel that way") sort of thing, you're seriously better off getting away from them now, not later.

Should that happen, or the conversation otherwise become nasty? It's absolutely alright to say, "Alright, well, I don't think we need to keep discussing this, it isn't benefiting either of us. I'm going to just unfollow, but I hope you keep having a great time in RP!" And do that. Stop the conversation, go unfollow, don't interact anymore.

Just because you brought up an issue does not mean you're obliged to be treated badly until they're done with it. Let them respond, and if it's hateful, you only owe the respect that you've been shown. Try to end it on a polite note for yourself - the way we feel about and engage with our muses is a touchy subject (reasonably), it's not ridiculous to assume that it could cause some drama addressing this, so, don't give them anything that feels like justification to proceed with that kind of thing. You'll at least know that you behaved like a respectful adult person.

I really do not envy you, Anon! This is a tricky situation! But I do applaud your maturity in wanting to talk to them about it. A lot of muns out there would just silently stew in their hurt until it became something aggressive, or would just block them. Though difficult, I think this is the right thing to do, and I wish you all the luck in the world!

Hopefully, they'll be like I would be...a bit mortified that I'd made someone feel hurt with commentary I felt was merely throw away statements.

[seenashwrite]

Hey! I was wondering if you could help me out a bit? I'm about to post a one shot, as I was wondering what I put st the top other then how many words and such? I'm just beginning to actually post stories and I want to get things right haha. Sorry if I'm disturbing you or anything!

Oh lovely @spookyphsyco - you have come to the right type-A advice-giver. And you have graciously made this about me, so that I don’t have to. [wink]

Legit apologias if any of what’s below the cut seems patronizing. I’ve tried to inject snark to make it an easier read. I also say sh*t, possibly other blah-blah of a potty-mouthed nature. 

Short version:

Status: Word Count: Category: Rating: Character(s): Pairing(s):Warnings: Author’s Note(s):Overall Summary:

Essentially I put what I like to see, with ever-so-slight, atypical tweaks. Long version/breakdown is after the jump. The ones with stars I think should be exactly where I put them, with the others shuffled however you’d prefer.

* Status:

Complete 

Part ___ of ____

for multi-parts (a.k.a., a mini-series) 

IMO, the ones around 2 or 3 parts; for me, it’s treading on “series” territory after 3

I just stick a ____ after “of” til I’m sure about how many parts

In-Progress 

could stick this after “part __ of ___” thought I find that redundant - this is definitely to be used for series, and which part you’re on should’ve already been noted above, a la “Title: Part __”  

* Word Count:  

I just round up the decimal point if it’s close to/over halfway to the next number, so…. 3,422 could be ”3.4K” or “3.5K”, whatever you like

If you put 3,422 it scares the shit out of people, even though that’ll maybe take 15 minutes to read. Maybe.

* Category: 

A.K.A. - what’s the genre?

The top ones you’ll see are “angst”, “fluff”, “smut”, “crack”, “real person fic/RP/RPF” - confusingly, I also see RPF = “role play fic - advise just type out “real person” and “role play”

I also see “series”, which, whatever - I’d prefer knowing that right off the bat at a glance, hence “status”, that’s up to your pref  

I mostly see Category kick off with either that, or something indicating what’s to come in terms of the life expectancy of your story line, followed with the above genres

Others by life expectancy would/could include:

drabble

imagine

request/”ask”

head canon

Side note: “cannon” = big boom, artillery-style; “canon” is short for canonical, a.k.a. - the official last word on fill-in-the-blank, so for us - the scripts/what we see on the show, Kripke, the writers, the actors, etc.

multi-part

one-shot

alternate universe/AU (which could branch into “AU: Historical”, “AU: Fantasy, “AU: Science Fiction”, etc.)

cross-over

Now, if it’s a cross-over that I want to be a surprise? I don’t mention the title of the movie/book/show If it doesn’t matter? Stick it in the Category (so “Crossover: Brooklyn 99″) plus it’ll also be made clear via the Character(s) category by listing them after the SPN peeps & before the O.C.

I personally don’t use those main five (see above, RE: anal-retentive stubborn mule) as they are too vague for my taste. 

When peeps pass my stuff along or in the rare instances they put me on a rec list, I couldn’t care less when they whip me under one of those or tag it as such, because that’s common parlance that I’m willfully eschewing. I sleep just fine on my fanfic pillow at night.

I use words like “behind-the-scenes canon-compliant”, “mystery”, “introspective”, “melancholia”, “friends-maybe-more”, “family”, “canon-compliant”, “friendship”, “adventure”, “humor”, “parody”, “spoof” - all [IMO] give a clearer idea without spoiling the plot

Special Nash Note regarding a specific pet peeve of mine that you can certainly take or leave, I won’t adore you any less:

Regarding Real Person Fic - the authors who disclaimer the tar out of these Wear. Me. Out. Just own it if you’re gonna do it, no caveats. I more-than-snark/borderline ranted about this here - surprisingly succinctly - should you want to see why

Take home: I find being really specific in your category helps keep your warnings/author’s notes blessedly tight & trimmed, more on that below. 

Rating: 

On this, I essentially use what I see around town, which is “Any”, “Teen & Up” and “18+” - or variations on this.

Nine outta ten, I’m going with “Teen & Up”, because I most always have dense, meaty plots or dry humor that require a fairly well-read person - I’m not being an asshole, it’s for their benefit. They’ll find it boring and/or too complex, it’s not their fault, they just haven’t had enough years on the planet to knock out a lot of books, y’know? 

Character(s): 

I list the not-mines first, and shut it down after maybe three or four, then cap it off with O.C. mention(s)

Sometimes I’ll do a parenthetical - like “Castiel (mentioned)” or “Crowley (briefly)” - because some people hate certain characters but love you or love the plot in general, so if they know someone they don’t like is only gonna be there vaguely, they’ll likely still give it a go

If there’s more - the minor not-yours or minor O.C.s - just put “various” at the end & and move on 

Also nice on multi-parters/series for you to only list the characters that appear in that specific post

I phrase the primary O.C.(s) like: “Female O.C./Reader/You”, something of that ilk.

Negates the need for “Reader Insert” in the categorization, because… well, it’s not how books are arranged online or in stores or in libraries. Perspectives [1st/2nd/3rd] are just that - perspectives - they aren’t genres.

Pairing(s): 

N/A if none, of course

This is one I am completely leaving up to you.

Having said that - dig through other folks’, see what tickles your fancy.

If you dig through mine - I think one I straight up said “Sam x Reader/Female O.C.” because it was an Ask, so the end result was pretty much out there, and on another I put something cheeky like “Endings are better when you don’t know what’s coming.”

And really, aren’t they?  Lookit, I figure if back on your Master Page/Master Post, you’re gonna end up categorizing them by “Angst” with sub-cats a la “Dean x Reader”, etc., may as well blow your wad from the get-go. 

Also remember this is coming from someone who keeps their O.C.s as vague as possible, so that anyone can imagine themselves in the character’s shoes. That’s for reader satisfaction. 

The selfish reason is because I want “Y/N” to die in a horrific fire where it is alive for >65% of the charring. It is so distracting. I’ve now digressed, tangent-style.

Warnings: 

Writing detailed canon? Or an AU that’s cribbing on canon? Whip a little “Spoilers up to Season _″ or what-have-you right out of the gate. 

Otherwise…. okay, biggest over-arching tip:

Things either ARE or they ARE NOT - refrain from going down a huge explanatory road here, a la “Could be considered this, but also could be looked at as that, and there’s sometimes….”

Oh. Sweet. Lord. Bring the chariots & take me now.

There’s a word for this, and it is “dubious”.  

So: “dubious non-consensual situation(s)”; “dubious incestual situation(s)”; etc. 

It’s the formal way of saying “YMMV”, a.k.a. “Your Mileage May Vary”.  I am likely not going to read into the threat of fill-in-the-blank if I’ve not experienced fill-in-the-blank. That’s why it is an “in the eye of the beholder” sort of jam - it’s open to interpretation….

…..but you gotta make sure it is - if Dean and Sam kiss each other with tongue, even once? That is incest. Not dubious. Nope. 

If there’s stuff possibly of concern that you’re not balls-out detailing, the tidy word for that is “allusion”. 

So: “allusion to past sexual trauma”; “allusion to past physical assault”; “allusion to sexual encounters”,etc.

On that last one: again, meaning off-handed comments about rolls-in-the-hay, not anything specific with vivid detailing.

Might want to tack “eventual” in front of these in certain circumstances - more on that in a sec. 

(PS: Writing tip? Shit in the past that made the characters who they are? Leave it there. Allude to it. Unless it is actually happening, no one caaaaaares - we only care about any ripple effects potentially impacting the current story.)

Language - again, things either ARE or they ARE NOT. 

I don’t care if it’s twice or every-other-piece-of-dialogue, or only in a couple of chapters - “mature language” or “coarse language”. Boom. You’re done. Covers cursing and dirty talk and the lot.

Sexy Times - yeah, it may say “smut” under your category/genre, but it doesn’t hurt to toss a clarification or two  

Some folks consider smut “he touched me here” and some folks don’t consider it smut til “he ran his tongue here”. 

I’d go with “graphic sex” or “explicit sex” if you have any wavering on the issue of what to put. But, again: it either is, or it isn’t - if it’s not allusion, then it’s graphic/explicit

Some folks tack on really, really, really specific facets here, where I think a parenthetical would do, and one that covers a gamut, so:

Graphic Sex (anal) this covers digital penetration & toys

Graphic Sex (multiple partners) this covers three-ways and four-ways and… and…. and….

Graphic Sex (kinks) this covers role-playing and toys and voyeurism and… and… and…

Side note: I have noticed that dog-in-heat genre - A/B/O, right? - is listed separately from kinks. Not my jam, so ya got me, I ain’t your gal to consult on this area

I’m not going on - you catch my drift. People who list every type of toy and kink baffle me. Cover the spread, move on, you can always put an asterisk and stick it below the “read more” to be as specific as you like. 

I say this because if a person’s not into “toys” in general? Why on earth would they read on after that warning above.  Also plays into my whole “stories are often better when you don’t know the end” stance. Because they are, dagnabbit. 

Some folks tack on “unprotected sex”, and fine, okay. Would suggest that if you want to add on some sort of advisement of “don’t do that”, “glove up”, “be safe” and what not, you whip an asterisk on there - “unprotected sex*” - and stick it in an Author’s Note post-story, more on those in a sec.

Violence - go with “graphic violence” and “mild-to-moderate violence”

The latter implies TV-level gore/horror, and the former implies movie/cable TV-level. 

If you want, you could quantify it that way - like “show-level violence” or “movie-level violence” (if doing Avengers or Star Trek or whatnot)

Side note: if you’re going for no-holds-barred, Ash Vs. Evil Dead-level action?  Go on & stick “horror” in your category/genre, methinks

Character Death / Major Character Death  

I have never understood this as a warning, seek advisement from someone else on this point. Legit.

That is a major plot point. Why in this world people would want to spoil themselves on major plot points is beyond me. 

Besides, can we stop treating readers like infants? You’ve given an age range/rating. You’ve said there’s violence. You’ve categorized it as angst (or “sorrow” or “mourning” or WHATEVER) and that paints the picture for me, an over-18 adult, one who has heeded the violence and sorrow alerts and has chosen to proceed. YMMV. Nash don’t get it. I’ve gone all tangent-y again. 

Warnings, Part Two - Stories With Two Or More Parts:

So let’s say there’s a kidnap-and-ransom that involves the villain making a threat of raping the captive. But it happens in Chapter Five. 

That “allusion to non-consensual situation” is, of course, told to the reader up front, and here’s the times when you may wanna tack “eventual” on it. 

Then have an “Additional Warnings” or “Chapter Warnings” section on just this chapter post. They chose to read the thing after seeing that broad warning, I know, but it’s still nice to warn them so they aren’t reading it on lunch break at the office or something.

Side note: when doing multi-parters/series, just copy/paste all this stuff on top of each post, then tuck this “extra” note below the overall warning items

Author’s Note(s):   

N/A 

Use this liberally. There should not be a ton to say after you’ve done all that’s above.

The exception here - as in, a “regular appearance” kind of Author’s Note since it doesn’t really fit anywhere else, is an acknowledgment of any editor(s) who may have assisted.

Another to file under “common parlance” - they are called “Beta(s)”/”Beta Reader(s)” around here, even though technically a beta would be someone who’d be your first reader of the final product, post-edit, and pre-publish. [shrugs]

Advise you not wax poetic on their awesomeness - takes up too much space - do your gushing privately, no one cares about your excited feels for that person [sorry-not-sorry] 

Plus it’s kind’ve bizarre - for me, at least - to see effusive praise heaped upon an editor should I read on and find myriad mistakes I’d naturally assume they missed, which brings me to an example of another unneeded note….

…the one post-beta acknowledgment that goes “…so any mistakes below are all mine”.  ????  What, so you had ‘em do all that for you, followed by ignoring the errors they pointed out? Error’s an error. I suspect they mean not altering verbiage or flow or a suggestion of that ilk, but still. Just acknowledge them by their “@” and move on. I digressed.

Regarding challenges - and this is a “Nash Thing” - I advise you don’t put the challenge info here, above the story. 

All it does it lengthen your top note and keep people from the story once they’ve decided to read. I actually went back & re-formatted for this on a lot of my stuff because it made the top part way too long. 

I suggest you put “Author’s Note(s):Post-Story” and lay it out there - the challenge name, whose challenge it is and the prompt. Why?

If you tell readers the prompt - and another “Nash Thing” is that I don’t bold mine - they will subconsciously be on the lookout for it, which takes away the point of the challenge - to seamlessly integrate a random thing

Other “post-story” can be any inspiration you may’ve used - like songs or the details on a cross-over piece. 

For cross-overs, this is a nice place to do a little “Various characters/settings used, verbiage style and minor plot points inspired by Joss Whedon’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer”. 

Plus, you can put links to vid clips or pics of the cast or links to the song or c&p lyrics of the song - whatever. Point is, it doesn’t take up story space so readers can pass it by if they so choose

* Overall Summary: 

My preference is that this is the last thing I see before I start the story, because I’ve seen all the details above, I’m almost sold, and this is what’s going to get me to scroll. Well, initially. First-scroll page-closers are another topic. 

“idk, i’m not good at these/i suck at these/omg these are so hard/i can’t really say”   –  No, no, no, you said plenty. You just told me you write garbage & that I shouldn’t waste my time.

Sometimes these will be a handful of sentences, and I’ve found that when I’m being cheeky on a parody/humorous story, that’s when they tend to be longer - mainly because I’m really trying to drive home that this is not merely “fluff” or “crack”. It’s what I said it was in “Category” - it’s “humor” and/or “parody”. 

Normally: one-to-two short-ish sentences or three quick sentences. 

No really. 

No, really. I don’t care how long the story is. 

Now, the novel-length ones? Maaaaybe a quickie paragraph of, say,4-to-5 brief - BRIEF - sentences for the umbrella. Then - like we were talking about with the chapter specific warnings? - you can delete the “overall” summary or tack on underneath a sentence about the chapter below IF something pertinent should be noted/you’d want to know it if you were the reader.

Am I an asshole if I put examples of mine? Eh. Here you go, and I stuck an example of an atypical A/N below, as well as what my longest looks like. The Mobile Master has pretty much the same descriptors as the story post itself, but none of the rest of this stuff - if the summation grabs ‘em, then they’ll click through for more of the scoop.

A Delicate Desiccation - they’re told about melancholy, but my stories had been out for awhile, so I *did* pop an atypical A/N (because it wasn’t really a warning, per se) on there to tell the regulars that this was a darker piece than they’d be used to; if I told more than I did in that summary - and shit, I give a big ass breadcrumb via the title card, not to mention the wording of the summary - it would wreck the ending.

Top of the World - novel-length, and readers get blips of a summary for each chapter (at least, on AO3, as FFnet doesn’t allow for it). The chapters average 10K. I did not come to play. It’s structured to read like you’re watching a season of behind-the-scenes-canon SPN, I’ve been clear I’m doing it in tandem with the active season(s), so I’m not gonna warn them “SPOILERS!” every chapter. I’m tired. I’m old. My fingers hurt, Spooks. My keyboard’s angry with me.  

Hope this helps! Or at least didn’t give you a headache. You’re ahead of the game already, just by asking the question. I think you rock. And I’m always right about knowing these sorts of things about people.

So sayeth the Nash, so say we all. 

[stimtoybox]

Hiya! I've got a friend I'm trying to help out. He stims by pulling the hoods of his hoodies over his shoulder and chewing on them. I'm not sure how hard he chews but I do know he does it almost constantly (If we're not talking, he's calmly chewing away). I've seen so many of his hoods fall apart in just a matter of weeks. I've offered to buy him chewelery in the past but he says he prefers fabric textures. Any stim ideas?

I do have a few, anon, with the proviso that we’re merely exchanging the hoodie hoods for something else chewable. If he’s chewing that much, that fast, I think just about anything else fabric will be chewed up as often, if not sooner. So you might have to teach him how to make these chewables, or make a lot yourself on a regular basis, and you’ll have to put some thought into the materials from which you make them, particularly with regards cost and toughness.

I wear men’s winter-weight hoodies when I’m not dressed up (bigger, warmer, less dysphoria-triggering) and most of mine are made from a thick one-sided fleece. Some hoods have an additional knit lining, making a two-layer hood, but the cheaper hoodies or the non-fleece hoodies (also usually made from a thin knit) often have only one. Unless he’s chewing through light knit or summer-weight hoodies, it’s not a super fragile material. It’s also not cheap to buy off the bolt.

(Fabric is expensive. Sometimes you luck into cheap bits second hand at markets, and most fabric stores have a remnants or offcuts bin where you can find good discounts, but many fabrics bought off the bolt cost more than buying the same thing as clothing.)

For sourcing materials, I’d be looking at op/thrift/second hand shops for old hoodies and, if he doesn’t mind chewing on denim, jeans. (Otherwise: outlet stores, sales at department stores.) Also things like workwear-weight shirts and cargo pants, usually made from a tough cotton drill. (Clothes like Hard Yakka workwear, for example.) Men’s clothes are generally thicker and sturdier than women’s clothes, so I’d direct tough chewers wanting fabric chews towards them regardless of their gender, and I think this is, honestly, your best bet for finding affordable, sturdy material. Note that you’ll need to be a little careful: don’t buy clothes with paint marks, for example, or anything that smells of chemicals or must, or is more than very lightly surface dirty/dusty. Holes don’t matter, but cleanliness does! Wash thoroughly before handling - I’d be using the least-chemical detergents possible and wash the garments a couple of times.

Once you’ve sourced and washed your bait garments, you can look at how you want to construct your chewables. If there’s any buttons, press studs, buckles, zippers, clothing tags or other plastic/metal attachments, cut them off. You can then cut the items up in strips (either across the torso of the shirt/hoodie or up the leg of jeans/trousers) and start braiding/plaiting.

I’ve got a few different collections tutorials for braided cloth chewables you might want to check out for detailed instructions. This ask has a few links I’ve gathered from various parents-of-autistic-kids websites and this link submission from @thepre-raphaelitesisterhood goes to few different DIY household chewable tutorials. All of them use cut-up garments or fabric (usually T-shirts) and some options have the addition of wooden pieces (either unvarnished wooden beads or a cut-up wooden spoon). You can make bracelets, bangles or even just long lengths of braid to chew on, if your friend isn’t comfortable wearing the chewable.

I will note that I don’t actually like the look of most fabric chewables. They’re acceptable for kids, but most adults, I suspect, won’t be able to get away with wearing these in school or office settings. I cut up one of my own T-shirts a while back and started experimenting, and I ended up with a variation on the necklace by making a braid, knotting both ends, folding the braid with the knotted ends together and then tying a knot part way up the length, forming a loop to go over the head with two dangling knots at the bottom:

[image description: two plaited fabric chewable necklaces made from lengths of purple and grey T-shirt knit braided into a long rope, knotted at both ends and then tied with a large knot a few centimetres above the ends, forming a loop large enough to fit over the head. The necklaces sit on a red and green circular watermelon slice pillow.]

Because this one is getting long, anon, I continue under the read more cut:

I consider this approach to be a little nicer than just a hanging loop of braid around my neck: the knot at the bottom looks more like a pendant and it looks somewhat like a scarf when worn. (Sorry, no photo.) If you cut wider strips (mine were approximately 5 cm wide, cut from a very thin/cheap K-Mart T-shirt) it should look even more scarf-like. This still might not work for some guys/masc folks, though, no matter the colours you use. You do get the overlocked seams at the tops of the braided loops, but I’ve been able to tuck those behind my neck and into the collar of my shirt.

If you want to avoid those seams altogether, cut your strips in half, cut out those seams and sew them back together, one short edge to the next, using an over stitch. Your join will be much less visible than the overlocked seams joining the sides of the T-shirt. I was experimenting with these above, so I didn’t bother, but it’s an easy thing to fix if wanted.

(Handling tip for light, stretchy knit fabrics, like T-shirt material: cut your strip and stretch it out in your hands before braiding/plaiting. The ends curl inwards, forming a tube. The braid will look as neat as if you sewed the edges into a tube, like mine above, and it only takes a few seconds to stretch each strip out before plaiting.)

For a strong chewer, I would recommend plaiting a long length of fabric, tying knots in regular intervals (perhaps as close as half an inch apart) and then knotting or stitching the loop closed, large enough to be pulled over the head. The knots provide tougher sections of the fabric for chewing on. An alternative approach, for toughness, would be to make three braided lengths and then braid those three pieces together, making a double braid. (You might need to sew several strips of cloth together, one short end to the next, to make your strips long enough for the double braid.) It will be thicker to bite on, but it should hold up better. You can even knot that, too, if your friend doesn’t mind larger wads of fabric in his mouth or likes chunkier bits to chew on or tease at.

I will observe that if you’re using denim or drill, you may have issues with fraying over time. (T-shirt knit won’t fray enough to matter, and neither will fleece.) If you have access to a sewing machine, you can solve this by cutting the long strips for your braid, pinning the two long ends together, sewing a seam down the long end and then turning the tube you’ve made inside out, putting the cut edges on the inside.

Wash the chewable after you’ve made it; this gets rid of any loose fleece fragments clinging onto the newly-cut edge.

I think, anon, that it would be easier for you to start out with cutting up an old fleece hoodie (your friend might still have a ruined one to donate) because the fleece is a more forgiving fabric for experimenting. I’d start off with a single braid, perhaps with knots, and then see how long it takes for him to chew through it. If he goes through it too fast, try the double braid and see if that’s any sturdier. Then, if that isn’t working, move on to denim and drill.

Unfortunately, anon, this is the sort of thing that takes experimentation - what fabric works best, how wide the strips you cut, whether to add knots or not, how long each design lasts. Know that it might take you a while to hit on the right combination of design, thickness and material to make the sturdiest chewable. That’s frustrating in terms of time and expense, but there isn’t a nice, simple shortcut answer!

I’m very aware that this post has become a wall of words, so I’m going to end it here. Please ask away if I’m unclear on any point or you want something elaborated on. I’ll probably do a proper tutorial for my fabric chewable design at some point, because I know this isn’t the best explanation.

I hope this gives you some ideas, but please, ask away if needed: I’ve packed a lot of information into one post, and if it overwhelms me a little, I’m sure it’s absolutely overwhelming for everyone else.

- Mod K.A.

[darapnerd]

G33k HQ Presents: MC Front-A-Lot Interview

Interview Questions From G33K-HQ & Darealwordsound (Wordy): Nerdcore Interview Collaboration Questions

MC Front: Thank you for bearing with me! So sorry to continually drop the ball on this. Here you go.

Wordy: What was your first creative outlet? MC Front: I seem to remember kindergarten involving a lot of drawing. First and second grade had poetry exercises sometimes. But the way we played D&D between 2nd and 6th grades was how my imagination really got fired up. We didn\'t like dice and maps that much. We\'d take turns DMing and just sort of freestyle the stories to each other at recess. Wordy:  What was the first rap album you ever purchased? MC Front: It was also my first CD. DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, He\'s the DJ, I\'m the Rapper. Wordy: Who are your biggest music inspirations?

  MC Front: Tom Waits, Public Enemy, Bjork

Wordy: Describe your studio to us.

  MC Front: I have an Ikea desk that\'s been out of print for 10 years so I get fussy when anyone leans on it. Creaky, cheap old thing. It\'s the only one where you can bolt the rotating side shelves at any height. Perfect for the near-field monitors and re-aiming them for any version of the stereo field. I mix there in my bedroom which isn\'t treated, but I\'ve been in there so long that I can work around most of the room effects. I have a coat closet fully treated, very dead and dry, for vocals. I keep some buttons in there to engineer myself, but everything\'s still happening on the studio computer. My pre-amp and mics and monitors are satisfactory. I could use a better ADC/DAC.

  I will record occasional hand percussion, etc, in that closet booth, but very little fits in there. For other acoustic capture, I\'ll rent time at a real studio (any time I\'m tracking my drummers) or I\'ll go field-record strings at someone\'s apartment.

  A solid two thirds of the non-vocal sound on the albums is electronic, and I can get keyboard performances or work on drum machine material in the project studio without worrying about the ambient noises of Brooklyn.

  Wordy: Describe your ideal home studio if money wasn\'t a problem.

  MC Front: A proper treatment of the mixing room would be great. I guess I\'d have twenty of these Avalon pre-amps and a little drum room, as well as a booth big enough for upright bass or cello. There is almost unlimited fanciness available in the hardware market... I guess I\'d have to make a hobby out of shopping. I\'d still use Reaper as my DAW, though -- the least expensive version of that kind of software, and also the best. I could probably spend sixty grand on plugins.

Wordy: What is your creative process for writing and or producing a song?

MC Front: Baddd Spellah, my Canadian beatsmithing partner, has been kind enough to work on grooves with me for the last fifteen years. Usually I will start with something he\'s been kicking around, or he\'ll take a pass at some live drum that I\'ve been chopping up, and we\'ll add keyboard material from Gm7 (Gaby Alter), my longtime music co-writer. When there is a verse-appropriate groove that is in pretty good shape, I\'ll leave it on loop and write. Once in a while, I\'ll write a hook over a groove that feels like a chorus, and start from there. After I\'ve got most of a lyric, I\'ll put down a scratch vocal so that Spellah and I can build a full song arrangement. Then I\'ll record too many takes of the final vocal, and spend too many months dicking around with the comp, the mix, and all the instrumental details. Finally I\'ll listen to it on as many different devices as I can, fine-tune the mix, and stay up for a week and a half making increasingly bad decisions about everything on the album, leading up to the mastering appointment I foolishly committed to several months prior.

  Wordy: What is your happiest On-Stage Moment?

  MC Front: I think a PAX crowd demanded a second encore once. That makes you feel like a superstar.

Wordy: What was your favorite song to write or record?

  MC Front: Maybe Stoop Sale? But that might be because the video came out so well. For the most part, my happiness with the process relies entirely on the result: it makes me happy to listen to a track if I don\'t just hear a barrage of fuckups that it\'s too late to go back and fix. But there aren\'t very many of those. Of all my lyrics, I\'m probably proudest of Two Dreamers from the Question Bedtime album. I feel like I worked out every bit of the story and then obscured it just enough that the listener\'s careful attention is rewarded.

Wordy: What advice do you have for aspiring artists?

  MC Front: Practice a lot, develop your talent. Get the skills you need to properly communicate with whoever your creative partners are. Take the craft seriously but give yourself a break for not having mastered it -- that is a lifelong process with no actual end goal.

Wordy: What project do you feel best describes you as an artist?

  MC Front: The Nerdcore Rising documentary probably says more about me and the band than I\'d ever be able to, and in kinder words. Of my own projects, I like the Zero Day and Solved albums as a window into whatever it is I\'m trying to say about nerdcore.

Wordy: How do you feel about the disconnect between \"Nerdcore\" and \"HipHop\"?

  MC Front: Well, hip-hop is a cultural movement with very specific origins and elements. Rap is a formal music style that emerged from hip-hop. Any \'variation\' or \'new perspective\' that someone brings to rap is fine -- if meaningless. It might matter that you came up with a new thing to say, but the fact that you chose an unusual form for your expression should be the least interesting thing about it. You can write a march for your peace movement, even if marches come from military music, because the march itself is just a formal style of composition. You\'d be smart to note the ironic relationship there, or you\'d be dumb to suggest that there isn\'t one, or that your choice to use a march as an expression of pacifism somehow reaches backward and affects the origin of the form. Anyone who thinks they\'re \'expanding\' or \'liberating\' hip-hop from its roots by rapping about things that haven\'t been rapped about traditionally is probably an idiot. 

  My idea about hip-hop was only to observe that it was cool. Like, it was the coolest thing happening in American culture when I was a kid, and it probably still is. Breakdancers were the coolest kids on the playground. Graffiti kids were the coolest outlaws in fourth grade. And rappers were the coolest possible composers of verse.

  To want to compose and perform verse in that formal style without having any direct connection to hip-hop, and without being cool, is the sort of desire nerd kids might express by themselves, away from arbiters of hipness, and share only with other uncool kids. The idea of nerdcore went no deeper than that, originally. I\'m glad that a lot of other DIY rappers have found that resonant enough to expand upon.

  Wordy: Do you feel more \"Nerdcore\" rappers should know about its roots in \"HipHop\"?

  MC Front: Definitely. I remember trying to write a Villanelle in a college poetry class. First, we had to read and dissect a sheaf of them. The professor was of the opinion that we would all flounder in the assignment, because there had been only a handful of good Villanelles ever written. I\'m sure none of us wrote one of lasting value. The point was to learn how formal composition connects works, and to appreciate the complications. You can always just do it anyway. But knowing where it comes from and how it\'s been attempted before teaches you how to try to do it well. I think anyone who wants to compose lyrics within the rap genre should know all they can about how raps have been composed so far.

  That doesn\'t even begin to address the cultural issue. Some artists misidentify nerdcore as comedy music, and worse yet, think the joke is \"it\'s rap, but white kids are doing it.\" I think that outlook leads to the weakest possible songs, and is generally disrespectful of hip-hop in a way that concerns me and offends anyone who cares about American culture. Of course, not all of the nerdcore rappers are white, but all of the schticky ones are. I wonder if a delve into hip-hop\'s history would cure them of that impulse, or at least afford them the humility to hush it up.

Wordy: Are you involved in any philanthropy in your local communities or abroad?

  MC Front: I try to do something in support of Child\'s Play every year. I\'m going to contribute to the upcoming Worldbuilders album project.

Wordy: Can you freestyle? Meaning rap off the top of the head? If so, can we see you drop a few bars next time live?

  MC Front: I never do this! I think I\'ve conditioned myself into a certain kind of vanity. Almost everything on the albums is rapped in complete sentences, with rhymes that I\'ve never used previously. Freestyling doesn\'t work that way. I\'m too ashamed to let anyone see me freestyling about the frog, on a log, in a bog, who got sog-gy.

Wordy: Do you consider yourself a “GEEK”?

  MC Front: Of course.

Wordy: In your own words, describe what the word “GEEK” means to you?

MC Front: I decided at some point a long time ago that geeks are all direct descendants of the side-show geek, whose job was biting heads off of chickens. They weren\'t special in any way, except that they were willing and able to do that thing, and it was a fairly extreme thing to do. But because nobody else at the carnival was willing to go to that extreme, the geekery came to seem like a highly specialized skill.

  That\'s why you can be a geek about anything. You just need a topic where your knowledge or expertise is so specialized that it seems distastefully extreme to non-geeks. You can geek out about fantasy novels or about robot AIs. But you can also geek out about car engines or cooking. You don\'t have to be a nerd to geek out.

  Nerds are almost always geeks, and their subjects of geekery are often recognizably nerdy. But a nerd is something else, a person who was already too weird or too smart, and felt alienated, and embraced geekery as an alternative to whatever broader pursuits the cool kids enjoyed.

  Wordy: What is your earliest geek memory?

  MC Front: I was a Star Wars geek starting at age three and a half when the first one came out. It was the only thing I wanted to do. I made adults take me to see it 11 times before Empire came out (I kept careful count). I collected the Kenner figures obsessively until they stopped making new ones a year or two after Jedi.

  Wordy: What is your \"Geek\" hobby? Do you collect comic books? Anime? Video games?

  MC Front: I do still love comics, but I own too many. Video games take up less space. I spend more time gaming than I do working on music, occasionally 70 or 80 hours in a week. It\'s as much an emotional self-medication as it is a hobby.

Wordy: Who are your Top 5 emcees dead or alive?

  MC Front: In no order: Busdriver, MF Doom, Del, Q-Tip, Chuck D

Wordy: When is your next show or tour?

  MC Front: When I get the dang old album done! Maybe spring 2017 for tour. PAX South is the soonest lone show.

Wordy: Do you have a new album coming out?

  MC Front: It\'s called INTERNET SUCKS, and it is going to have a heavy \'get off my lawn\' vibe. Everyone will be mad at me, yet secretly agree with every word on the record. Watch for it to take your feeds by storm.

  http://frontalot.com

more at darealwordsound