#been real punchy lately

[devon-the-wanderer]

The reason is it sucks

do people hate on the show Friends for no reason?

[superhoeva]

𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐞𝐬𝐜𝐚𝐩𝐞 (𝐨𝐧𝐞)

prisoners!ghoap x civilian!reader x ex-cons!pricegaz | your small sleepy town has never been enough for you. maybe that’s what makes it so easy for inmate soap, his cellmate ghost, ad their friends on the outside to convince you to help sneak them out of prison. (w/c: 1.2k)

warnings include language, dark themes, prisoners!ghoap, unprotected sex (wrap it in real life), bit of an age gap between reader and 141 (late 20s/30s and 40s), bodily fluids (mentioned), soap and ghost work in the tailoring room, improper/taboo relationships (prisoner/worker), cheating, manipulative!ghoap, submissive!f!em!reader, loser boyfriend behaviors (you'll see), illegal activities, violence (mentioned). +18/mdni

full masterlist

The claps are almost loud enough to creep under the crack in the door. Almost… thankfully Soap has perfected the art of fucking you in the back of the sewing room closet. Quick, punchy thrusts at just the right angle to yank an orgasm from the both of you. He pierces himself inside you, and your pussy pulses hard around his thick member that spurts out spells of cum that you’ll hold onto for the rest of the day.

You barely contain the whimpers that want to spill from you.

“Oh, whit I wouldn’t give tae hear those bonny sounds out loud, little miss,” Johnny whisper hot, lips brushing the back of your ear messily. He kisses the spot before pulling out of you with a grunt he has to cover with a cough.

He gives your bare hip one more pat, squeezing the skin for a quick moment before hurrying to raise his pants. You feel a heated gaze on your backside as you bend to pull your panties and pants back into place. A rush of heat rewires you once again, as you can feel the load attempt to seep from your whole. You squeeze with a bitten lip and slight shudder, turning to face Soap but able to meet his eyes. The man puffs his chest in a stretch, smirking at you with a smug rub of his stomach.

You sure are something, aren’t you? Letting him fuck you raw in the place he’s supposed to spend the rest of his life, and you can’t even look that sweet gaze at him. The inmate knows the two of you don’t have much time left but takes a few long seconds to up-and-down you anyways.

Finally, Soap steps forward. Swaying in his stand, his pointer finger coming to lull your gaze to him while the rough pad of his thumb drags just across your chin. He makes sure not to speak until you’re really looking at him.

“See ye out there, huh?”

Soap’s tongue dips from his mouth, wetting his lip with a pretty shine. He has to hold back a chuckle at how slow you nod for him.

“Stay sweet, hen,” he sniffs, and you almost flinch at how fast the cool air returns to you at the removal of his hand. You clear your throat, gathering yourself as you grab your clipboard and  follow him back into the tailoring room.

Ignoring whatever eyes are on you, your legs are still a little shaky when you walk yourself back to your seat at the front of the room. You fail in your attempt to not let your eyes glaze back over to Soap, who’s also just making it back to his assigned chair. He collapses in the seat with a breath, scratching the back of his head.

It’s when your stare floats to the man next to him–a mass of muscles and a hard face that you don’t think you’ve seen crack anything close to a smile–that you pause. You’re stuck in a stupid stare, watching and squirming in your seat when they catch eyes with each other. Their silent conversation is loud. It screams right into your face, and you wonder so hard what they could possibly be talking about that it makes your head hurt.

Is it bad you want it to be you?

~

“Grape or blue raspberry? Or cherry, maybe?”

Soap. An odd name you’ve wondered about since he was placed in your section. And his mohawk. Does he cut it himself? Or get another inmate to do it?

Ghost. A mystery in a half, you’ve found. Never speaks. Looks at you funny… a different kind of funny than Soap but still funny.

“Hey.”

A blink of your stinging eyes brings you right back to the gas station dining room booth. He’s sitting in front of you, forgetting about the different options of flavored ice on the laminated menu before him. The stare he places on you is hard to sit with, and you feel the guilt working its way up your throat in the form of bile.

Rocky’s eyebrows do his speaking for him when they pinch together as he leans toward you.

“Don’t want an icee,” you finally mumble, a little rude. Rocky seems more concerned than offended, nodding with visible hesitation. He stays in his quiet while you slide away the menu to rub at your eyes. “Not that thirsty anymore, actually.”

“Oh. That’s fine.” your fiance blinks, pausing for a moment. “Did… did something happen at work?”

“Something always happens at work, it’s a fucking correctional facility.”

Rocky blinks again, trying not to brisk at the harshness of your voice. Swallowing, he shifts. “You know, I still don’t like you working there. In that place. With all those jerks.”

Jerks. That’s the best he can come up with?

“So you’ve said,” you sass back, wishing it was morning already. Morning means that Rocky’s already out of the house before you’re waking up. Morning means you start a new day of work and get to see the way Inmate Soap’s chest and biceps bulge in his prison uniform. Morning means another chance that Inmate Simon might speak to you. “Can we go home now?”

Rocky throws his head to the side in dissapointment, pouting childishly. “We didn’t even get anything yet.”

“Get it to-go, then,” you instruct him, yanking yourself from the booth to make a b-line to the truck with a dissatisfied shake of your head.

Inmate Soap would treat you better than this. Take you somewhere nicer than a goddamn gas station dining room for your anniversary. And you know what? So would Inmate Ghost. Even if he doesn’t speak…

~

Dinner is the usual. Sloppy but edible.

“Same sad meal,” Soap sighs, dropping his spoon so that it crashes into his tray of half-eaten food. He stares at Ghost through his eyelashes before his face brightens with a smirk. Voice lowering, Soap leans. “Wish I was eatin’ her, instead.”

Ghost has to pause in his chewing of the mushy carrots they were served this evening. It’s a miracle the fork in his hand doesn’t break at how hard he comes to clench it.

“‘M tellin’ you, Si,” Soap shakes his head with a rub of his chin, face hazy. “Pussy’s hotter than th’ sun. Would live inside there, ‘f I could…”

“Stop speakin’,” Simon rumbles out, and Soap shakes with a delighted giggle.

“Jus’ sayin’,” Soap shrugs, gathering his spoon back up to pick at the leftover food. “Bet she’d, ah, let ye have a taste, too. Sweet thing… even got those sad eyes ye like. Which you would notice if you’d speak to the lass–”

“Shut the fuck up, Mactavish.”

Simon’s voice catches the attention of a few surrounding inmates, who know not to question what’s wrong. Not if they want to get their head bashed in by an angry Simon Riley. If they only knew it wasn’t anger coursing through his vein, but a healthy dose of blood running down to his cock that’s making him like this. He resettles in his seat, ignoring the way Johnny’s looking at him, and giving a good palm to readjust his now-leaking cock. Biting his tongue, he can’t help but clench all his muscles at how right Johnny is.

You would taste a hell of a lot better than this sad excuse of a meal.

(next part) - © 𝐬𝐮𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐡𝐨𝐞𝐯𝐚

[seat-safety-switch]

"So you're telling me that these, these heroes... they fight the evil Bourgeoisie, who want to enslave all humanity?"

"The Proletarians, yes."

I was starting to get a little punchy after so many hours of meeting with the funders, but I had to hold out. The fate of the worker-owned action figure toy line was depending on me. For weeks, talented artists, writers, designers, animators, and sculptors had been working night and day on these figurines. They needed someone who could lie in order to extract the maximum amount of money from capital. They picked the right guy.

Soon, we had millions of dollars in funding, and a Saturday morning cartoon show. Children of all ages would thrill to real-world heroes like mailmen, machinists, and pizza chefs fighting off the indulgent extractive financial warfare of landlords, bankers, and oil-company executives.

We had a really cool thing going for the big villain, too. If you pushed the button on his back, the little voice chip would tell you how much he loves workers and wants to protect their rights. And when you moved the figurine close to the little bag of money, he would turn evil and change his mind about everything he had just said. Kids love that kind of double-play feature.

Ultimately, we were defeated at the last minute. One of the interns in the company had googled some of the words I was using, and told me someone already had a trademark on several of the economic philosopher figurines. It was too late for them to slam the brakes on all of it, though, and if you go into any dollar store in the country, you can pick up a five-pack of our Brave Worker-Owned Utopia playsets for like thirty bucks tops. You'll have to reuse a Paw Patrol dog as Karl Marx, though. Just so long as it's not that class traitor cop.

[bleachbleachbleach]

On the topic of wheels, what do you think of Akon's giant cart? It was really funny to me that it only appears in two panels of the manga, but because of the nature of animation, they had to show him pushing that thing around for like 3 solid minutes. I'm a little disappointed they couldn't have come up with something to put in it, some writhing tentacles or something. Do you think the Squad 12ers ever push each other around in these things when it gets real late in the lab and they're feeling punchy? Has Rin ever napped in one?

There probably aren't more wheels in Soul Society because they are simply too powerful. Plus, too many simple machines and the physics of the place becomes just a little *too* legible and other things start breaking down. It's a delicate trade-off, and there's a faction of the 12th that privately believes that although the headliner balance that always gets talked about in Soul Society is the souls (it being the eponymous balance, and the one most directly related to the present shinigami mandate), it's actually the wheels you need to watch out for. (It's worth noting that, yes, of course this 12th faction is related to the Train Guys underground, being that the train 1) has wheels, and 2) is a Very Important thing in Soul Society that almost no one else thinks about regularly.)

Indeed, the train and these carts share some phylogenetic relation, though of course it's quite distant. But not so distant that most shinigami in the 12th aren't careful about how they comport themselves around the carts, as rumor has it they sometimes exhibit a mind of their own and a few of them can be very persuasive. (It's not unusual to push an empty cart around for three whole minutes with seemingly not ask or destination in mind, just to diffuse some of the animacy of the damn thing. Akon usually tries not to take the carts for a walk without some other express purpose, for efficiency's sake, but Nemu's needs don't often align with efficiency's sake, so they walk. They talk. They push an empty cart nowhere.)

Rin's heard all the warnings. He is also friends with most of the cart-walking shinigami (who are usually not Akon, and tend to have fairly high turnover because sometimes they just *disappear* and it's never been proven whether they were called to volunteer for what is listed in the budget as "other experiments" or whether the carts took them for a walk), because he is generally pretty excited about the carts, given his interest in Little Guys:

[Bleach e134]

One day he hopped in one, and was suddenly overtaken by the feeling that he should nap in it, as in a rowboat headed for a waterfall (according to the cart, this was a good thing).

When he woke up, he wasn't anywhere he recognized, though the tracks in the dirt (and even the hard stone--grooves worn into it as though wheels had been tracing this place for a long, long time) suggest he was not the first to find himself there. It was cold, but surprisingly dry, with a brine to the air like a sea without water. As his eyes adjusted to the dark and the rest of his sensorium to the nature of the reishi here, he realized he was in some kind of cavern. It felt a little like the walls of the Seireitei, the seki-sekki they were made from. Perhaps that was what made this place, too.

Whether he was there for a few hours or a week or several years, he's not sure, but at some point he fell asleep again and when he woke, he was back in the lab. Based on the date on the calendar, it had in fact been months, but no one could remember missing him, or else were playing a very elaborate game where they pretended not to for the sake of the bit; and Rin can't begin to guess which was more likely, because that commitment to indeterminacy is the nature of the 12th. All his work was... done... He wasn't behind on anything. But that only meant either his colleagues had done his work for the sake of the bit (less unlikely than it sounds--if there's one thing that truly unites the Gotei, it's not duty to serve but duty to the bit), or he'd managed to be in two places, two states, at once. He'd been in the cart and not in the cart. Naturally.

After his return, a bulletin did go out, though. A revision to the guest rules, which outside visitors to the 12th would all now need to sign:

Don't touch anything.

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 5/21/2024

get a load of this cat

listening

one of my favorite bands, Joywave, dropped a new album last week! it is not my favorite album of theirs but so it goes. perhaps it needs more time to grow on me. Sleepytime Fantasy kicks off my favorite section of the album. video game enchanted ice cave dream sequence music.

i must stay true to my own rules for this series (not a rec series, genuinely what i've been into the most this week) and the song that's been on loop all week is a genshin impact character's theme music (punchy wolf-coded ice cop who is the duke of the prison he. runs? administers? don't worry about it). unfortunately a bop. the character music lately has been a lot more modern and experimental than i expected? this one has a police siren drop

-

reading

thank you mackintosh.

i really, really enjoyed Trouble And Her Friends by Melissa Scott (LAMBDA award winner 1995)! @delta-orionis and i frequently ask ourselves "what if neuromancer was good?" and this scratches that itch for me. it is often difficult for me to take neuromancer's protagonist henry seriously, but this book features a pair of extremely practical dykes. it opens on the passing of a new american law criminalizing big swathes of online activity, passed despite a presidential veto. description from amazon

Less than a hundred years from now, the forces of law and order crack down on the world of the computer nets. The hip, noir adventurers who get by on wit, bravado, and drugs, and haunt the virtual worlds of the Shadows of cyberspace, are up against the encroachments of civilization. It's time to adapt or die. India Carless, alias Trouble, got out ahead of the feds and settled down to run a small network for an artist's co-op. Now someone has taken her name and begun to use it for criminal hacking. So Trouble returns. Once the fastest gun on the electronic frontier, she had tried to retire-but has been called out for one last fight. And it's a killer.

this startled me by how fun and competent it is! i tried reading one of the author's books last year (Dreamships) and had a miserable time with the pacing and flow of information. there are echoes of the pacing issues i had with the last book-- this is a nearly four hundred page hardcover, we have a lot of Next Locations to go to, and we are going to take our fucking time getting there. a road trip book, rather than a destination book. Scott has gotten way way better at fleshing out those locations— an artists' co-op has their skylights set to amber to hide the wear and tear on everything in their central hangout space when the feds show up. i also connected with the inciting incident way more-- someone stealing a female hacker’s name and style is instantly relatable. i am riding shotgun with Trouble. i am ready to throw down with her.

it's a very physical book in many ways, bc it has three brief sex scenes, is very concerned with sensuality in both senses of the word, and overall it's like the background in an anime that’s full of dials and buttons and little blinky lights. written in 1994, fascjnating how much concepts of VR and sensory inputs have not changed, but everyone still has the equivalent of an enormous old school desktop and giant CRT monitors set up. everyone is constantly lugging around so much physical tech. the stuff that makes you better at hacking in the net is quick reactions to VR sensations, the only way to get that cutting edge sensation is to get a physical chip or “worm” in your head, and the only people who do that are the core outcasts and freaks of the internet (the gays, the women, the people of color, the all three, presumably the furries as well). from that day to this…

there's an interesting contrast between Trouble and her old partner Cerise stalking the virtual reality bazaars/being queens of the BBS undergrounds, and the danger they feel and face when moving about in the real world. some reviewers are very cranky about how negotiations on and offline feel the same but i did not feel this particular quibble. communication is communication. it is known both on and offline that they're 1) women and 2) lesbians. they're in less physical danger online but slurs can still happen no matter where they are. also, i am well used to the necessity of having to posture and peacock and be kind of a bitch to establish myself in order to get anything done in coding/hardware scenes, which is something i don't think any of the male reviewers of the day ever had to think about.

some cowboy shit goes down at the end that had me hooting and hollering, and Scott handled the hacking scenes in an interesting way-- a sort of abstracted duel? terrific "fight" scenes. very interesting at how she will move things around in order to treat scenes in ways she's good at-- like establishing very grounded locations that feel real, physical sensations, and fight scenes-- instead of just kind of slogging through a very surface level high-overview travelogue like in her last book. ive been stuck on a fic chapter for like four years and this is making me think about doing it the fun way instead of the way i thought it should be done. this may be obvious but i am an amateur and more importantly an idiot.

this was a $6/1 book special last year at one of my favorite thrift stores, a religious shop with the absolute worst vibes in the greater houston area but some of the best stuff

-

watching

Five Dolls For An August Moon (1970, dir. Brava). sometimes you see a cool title on kanopy and you don't have a better way to kill an hour and a half. plus it had some guys i know from cowboys. tw for a suicide's body in the first fucking ten seconds of the trailer, which is a weird trailer choice bc u don't actually see most of the murders in the movie.

ive watched a fuck of a lot of spaghetti westerns so i feel i am somewhat qualified to tell you this is one of the worst dubs ive ever seen. the lines actors are quarter-heartedly delivering do not always make a lot of sense and only occasionally match the subtitles. i am assuming this is the original dub, bc kino lorber generally does a pretty okay job restoring things?

this is not a good movie (extremely troubled production, director swap three days before filming, made on a shoestring budget, the actors mostly wore their own clothes, etc). it is not very good at maintaining tension, because it is a film that first and foremost Looks. beautiful fucking sets, beautifully decorated. the exterior is a matte painting, a sort of frothy dream-bubble of sixties architecture. most of the interiors are apparently a real house. incredible experimental burbling soundtrack full of Weird Sounds.

sorry about the tubi interface and our old friend the activate windows logo.

there are so many fun directorial flourishes and staging, but it does get a little wrapped up in itself. this made me think of The Secret of NIMH, a beautifully animated talking-animal film that gave me nightmares as a child, where the animation tricks and sparkles and moving parts sort of all get in each other's way to produce something less than the sum of its parts. this sort of happens here. i'm going to yoink this from a review:

Bava’s eye for exquisite compositions is equally evident. One scene in particular stands out in this regard: The filmmaker shoots an otherwise humdrum fistfight through wooden latticework that breaks the action up into an abstracted mosaic effect. The fight culminates with a table being upended, which in turn unleashes a myriad crystal spheres. The camera follows along as the spheres tumble and cascade down a spiral staircase and roll across a tiled floor before plopping like so many bath bubbles into a tub. The scene concludes with the revelation of a recently deceased character caught in what you’d have to call a tableau morte. It’s a dazzlingly orchestrated sequence, easily on par with more famous Bava set pieces.

it's gorgeous! there's also So Much going on. another lovely bit of business: as each person dies they get wrapped in plastic sheeting and put in the walkin freezer. next to slabs of beef. not a subtle film, and i don't mean it as a diss, bc where's the fuckin fun in that?

-

playing

i have not been doing much of anything here except listen to podcasts and work toward the two-thousand-fish-caught achievement in genshin. impatiently waiting for Clorinde to be released in several weeks. that one button needs a raise. it is So funny to see genshin characters with fucking guns. very sword and pike based societies so far

-

making

every time i have tried to make one of these samplers for Me it's gone horribly wrong or been somehow destroyed so i'm making this one for my brother's upcoming birthday, bc he will have off-campus housing next academic year, in an attempt to peacefully do some fucking cross stitch and get something out at the end of it. pattern here on etsy

[quijabored]

OKAY SO I JUST FINISHED WATCHING LIKE THE ENTIRETY OF S3 FOR BSD SO UH SPOILERS FOR A LOT OF IT BUT ESPECIALLY THE ENDING CUZ HOOOLYYY SHIIITTTTT

I JUST

I CANT PUT MY THOUGHTS DOWN INTO COHERANT SENTANCES SO LIVE LAUGH BULLETPOINTS ((o(^∇^)o))

OKAY SO AKUTAGAWA AND ATSUSHI???

THEYRE GONNA WORK TOGETHER ARENT THEY I JUST KNOW DAMN WELL DAZAIS GONNA LIKE MAKE IT SO THEYRE COINCIDENTALLY PAIRED UP TO BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF A GUY

ALSO THE PROMISE ATSUSHI HAD AKUTAGAWA MAKE??? FYM AKUTAGAWA CANT KILL PEOPLE HES IN THE *PORT MAFIA.*

Just realizing I don't know how to do the whole colored text or different font thingy BUT ANYWAYS

STILL I LOVE ATSUSHI FOR THAT AND SINCE IT WAS MADE WITH A GOAL IN MIND, I REALLY HOPE I GET TO SEE AKUTAGAWA DEVELOPMENT

AAAAHHHH HES SO SILLY I LOVE AKUTAGAWA HES MY SON

SPEAKING OF SONS

IVAN??? HES SO ME LIKE HE IS SO ME????

ASAGIRI WAS SPYING ON ME WHEN MAKING IVAN FR

Funny thing when I first started getting into the fandom bit for bsd and I saw Fyodor being simped on I was like "eeehh I mean I guess hes cool but I dont really get it. Like sure hes an interesting character but..." AND THEN I SLOWLY STARTED BECOMING A FYODOR SIMP AND I JUST SKDHKSJD I HATE THAT MAN I HATE THAT MAN HES SUCH AN ASSHOLE

please I love him so much hes such a bitch I hate him I love him so much

"If Fyodor told me to cut my skin off I would" FUCKING SAME

ALSO AAAAAA THE ENTIRE TIME LIKE I WAS JUST STIMMING LIKE IM TELLING YOU IT WAS AJSHSKDJSJ

I HAVENT HYPERFIXATED ON A SERIES LIKE THIS SINCE THE PROMISED NEVERLAND (Specifically the manga. Miss you Yuugo)

AAAAAA ALSO THE FACT THAT CHUUYAS JUST STUCK IN POES STORY??

AND POE BEING LIKE "But if Ranpo were to die what would be my reason for living..." LIKE HELLO??? I LOVE MY OTHER SON (Poe)

AND AND AND FYODOR???? AHHHHHH HES SUCH A BITCH I LOVE HIM

THIS MOTHERFUCKER WAS REALLY COMMUNICATING QITH MUSIC??? ALSO THE SURPRISED AND SHOCKED LOOK AT THE END WHEN DAZAI FOUND HIM??

I KNOW WE SEE MORE OF HIM LATE BUT FUCK

ALSO FYODORS ABILITY?? From what I saw it seems that it's just kill by touch but if Dazais like "welp, idk" then I'm guessing it's a bit more complicated than that AND I AM SO EXCITED TO SEE WHAT HAPPENS AAAA

Also Mori and Fukuzawa did the sskk punchy thingy they did in the end of S2!! I'm not sure if people ship them (I refuse to take in any content about Mori) but if people do then win for them :D

Also Im extremely excited to see Nikolai cuz hes me minus the Ukrainian terrorist bit BUT AAAA I HOPE I GET TO SEE HIM SOON

JUST SEARCHED IT UP ITS S4 EP 5 AND AAAAAA

I can't watch BSD until tommorow now cuz I wanna have a minute to process everything BUT AAAA I CANT WAIT TO WATCH S4

Fyodor made me feel so many ways I love him

AAAAAAA OKAY SO MY FAVORITE BOY (Akutagawa) IS ALSO SUPER SILLY THOUGHOUT THIS WHOLE THING LIKE

THE SCENE WHERE ITS LIKE "Are you sure youre the real Akutagawa?"

"Yeah."

"...And youre not gonna try and kill me?"

"Yeah."

"What did you have for breakfast?"

"Yeah."

LIKE I LOVE HIM SO MUCH

Live laugh love Dazai but FUCK MAN AKUTAGAWAS TRAUMATIZED

Like don't get me wrong I love Aku how he is and I'm gonna love him more when I learn more about his character, but god damn it hurts to watch him seem so reliant on Dazais praise and Dazais approval like akdjkajsdj Ive been there my boy :(

ALSO I FEEL SO BAD FOR KUNIKIDA LIKE HE HAD TO GO THROUGH SO MUCH THIS SEASON

I PROBABLY HAVE OTHER THINGS TO SAY BUT AHDKSJDKWBD I LOVE BSD AND I CANT REMEMBER WHAT ELSE I WANTED TO YAP ABOUT BUT AAAAHHH ASAGIRI WHEN I CATCH YOU ASAGIRI- ASAGIRI WHEN I CATCH YOU-

Twas talking about this scene earlier btw :3

AH ALSO WHEN FYODOR GOT SMASHED WITH A WINE BOTTLE??? HELLO??? I LOVE HIM BUT I STARTED LAUGJING AT THE SCENE

[doggernaut]

5, 9, 17!

Thank you for these asks!

5. What's something you learned while researching a fic?

Good question! I'm always looking up little random things, like flight times and locations of things. But big things I've learned? I wouldn't say I have any special knowledge I can pull out about a specific topic due to fic research. Not in the way I remember random details from old New Yorker articles about the history of the disposable diaper, for instance. Huh. I did do a some research about East Coast surfing and tides when I was writing we'll make out and take a mouthful of the summer time, since I'm only familiar with West Coast beaches. But I avoided going into too much surfing detail in that fic.

9. How did you get into writing fanfiction?

I mean, if you want the real answer, it's when I was seven and was mad because I'd finished reading all of Beverly Cleary's Ramona books and my dad suggested I write my own Ramona stories. But I didn't really get into it until like 2006, when a group from the old Fametracker boards decided to write a round robin Baby-Sitters Club fic and I signed up to write a chapter. I took a long break and then wrote a few vey short Parks and Rec fics in 2011 or so, then took another long break before I fell headfirst into the Check, Please fandom. With both Parks and Rec and Check, Please, it was simply because I had ideas that I couldn't stop thinking about. (RIP to the super angsty Parks longfic I never ended up writing but still lives rent free in my head.)

17. What is something you recently felt proud of in your writing?

This is a hard one because writing has been hard lately and I haven't felt like I've written much to be proud of. But I really like this banter from my most recently posted chapter of If I'm not too much for you, then sign me up. (Which ... I really need to buckle down and finish the next chapter...)

Jack raised an eyebrow and Eric knew a chirp was coming. Was it possible for an eyebrow to smirk? Because that was definitely what Jack’s eyebrow was doing. “Didn’t take you for the type to stress about carbs, Bittle. You know, since you’ve written multiple books devoted to dessert.” “I don’t, usually,” Eric said. “But two weeks of nonstop travel does have a way of bringing out my worst habits, and I think it’s safe to say that some things need to change in the new year. I don’t need grilled cheese from the late night room service menu as a late night snack every night.” But grilled cheese was always better when you didn’t have to make it yourself, and it had been so easy to fall into that habit. “Probably not,” Jack agreed, “but don’t go too crazy. You probably should figure out a better balance of carbs and protein, but if I hear that you’re working on a salad cookbook I’m going to start to worry.” “No need to worry, I just realized I can’t remember the last time I ate a green vegetable. Don’t tell my kids; they’ll be thrilled if this becomes a trend.” “I don’t know, I think it would be kind of fun to let them know the truth about their dad,” Jack chirped. “I don’t think Sam and Lizzie would mind eating grilled cheese every night. I could totally sabotage your efforts to ever get them to eat a vegetable again.” “You wouldn’t!” Eric gasped in mock horror.  “Nah,” Jack said. “But I do have some extra tubs of protein shake mix from one of my sponsors. I’ll bring one over when we’re both back in town.” “Oh my god, what did I do to deserve this?” Eric said with a laugh. “You know what? Fine. Bring all the protein powder. Maybe it’ll inspire my next dessert. I’ll call it the Zimmermann Special.” Jack bumped Eric with his shoulder. “You’re punchy tonight. I like it.” “Well, somebody ordered dessert drinks after we drank that bottle of wine,” Eric retorted.  “Somebody demanded a taste of my drink with the excuse of quality control.” “Oh, hush. I told you when we ordered that I couldn’t decide. You said I could try yours,” Eric reminded Jack. Then, realizing they’d walked several blocks and he hadn’t been really been paying attention to where they were, he glanced at the map on his phone. “I think I’m this way,” he said, nodding in the direction of his hotel. Jack’s was two blocks over. “I’ll walk you the rest of the way,” Jack said. 

[wexhappyxfew]

Oooh, those prompts sure do look amazing… the touch one??? I’m so unsure on which one I might be in a crisis….

Soo… after muuuch deliberation, may ask about nr. 17 (holding the other’s chin up) with my girl Carrie? (I have to stay loyal to her, though I love all the other Silver Bullets girls equally)

Thank you 💖

- Carrie anon

carrie anon my apologies for how incredibly late this is (along with the other prompts sitting in the askbox lol) finals season will forever be a struggle lmao. BUT! i'm taking a mental break and here we are with a piece for my beans, carrie x dougie, carrie anon!! :D VERY excited to post this, we get a bit more with carrie's feelings as she's pretty good at hiding them (but not great with hiding them lol). so please enjoy!!

bergie doesn't strike out

(a/n): for the carrie x dougie girlies because this prompt i enjoyed and i figured i'd add some more to carrie's background - a struggle to fit in, to feel wanted, in a time of war. yeah, she's going through it to say the least and in some way, we all can get why :'( please enjoy!

Carrie watched from behind her shot glass as James Douglass waltzed over to the congregating group of Clubmobile girls and talked his talk, pulling out his lighter and offering to light up cigarettes, only before making quite the show of winking and meandering away back towards where he had been previously stood with Hambone and Murphy. She watched him let out a barking laugh before pointing to their cups and nodding to the bar. And that's when he started waltzing over to the bar, where she was stood, rather enjoying her stare-down with her shot glass instead of having to focus on him.

"Carrie Achterbeg, haven't seen you in a minute." she heard him say as he approached - which albeit was the truth. She hadn't come out to one of these in a couple of weeks. After that awkward misunderstanding with one of the guys from the 418th - radio operator, kind eyes, but horrible ego - after he had tried to plant one on her, she didn't want anything to do with the flying club, drinks and pilots. Tonight though was different. And after those last few missions, she needed some sort of melancholy distraction, even if it were a shot or two stood alone at the bar.

"Aren't you a sight for sore ey-" Carrie glanced over at James Douglass and shoved him in the shoulder roughly before throwing back her shot and sighing.

"Don't finish that sentence." she managed out, coughing briefly and then looked at him.

"Dually noted." Dougie said, before leaning up on the bar next to her and watching the side of her face, "What's eating you?" Carrie let out a dry laugh and looked over at him.

"I should be asking you the same thing," she said, before lowering your voice, "struck out, huh?" Dougie raised a brow in her direction and she nodded over his shoulder.

"Tatty, Helen, Virginia…." Carrie said, "Christ, Dougie, you struck out and you struck out hard." Dougie rolled his eyes and leaned more against the bar and nodded to the tender.

"Struck out is a strong word to use in that sense-"

"Sure as hell is currently the right word-"

"There's other words-"

"Struck out is as good as it comes." Carrie said to him and he took the beer from the tender and sighed, before taking a long sip. She watched him for a moment, biting the inside of her lip and then glanced back at her empty shot glass.

She was just punchy, she wasn't in the best of moods, and James Douglass was beginning to grow on her in ways she hadn't expected nor entirely wanted. And her mind was trying to ignore it.

"Why haven't you been coming recently?" Dougie asked her as he casually sipped on his beer, eyes wandering out to the dance floor and then back to her, before grinning wide, "Hambone's been missing ya." Carrie sighed and then stood up straighter and pushed her hair behind her ears and glanced at him.

"Personal choice." she said and then shrugged as she looked out towards the dance floor again, "You missing me, too? You seemed real tangled up with those guys over there. Surprised you came over to say hello." She raised a brow at him and he shrugged her off. Watching him, she then turned, only to be stopped by his arm jutting out.

"Where you going?"

"Just taking a lap around," she said with a shrug, "talk to some people I haven't seen before, ya know, get eyes on everyone." He watched her, a mixture of adornment it seemed and surprise, as she straightened her jacket and then looked at him.

"Everything look good?" she asked him, holding out her arms like she was about to go off on her first day at school and wanted her uniform in check. Dougie held her gaze for a moment before he let his eyes wash down her form and then back up to her face again. Carrie watched him, her collar turning hot as he took a slow sip and let his eyes rest on hers again, that lazy smile growing on his face as he nodded.

"Good is a strong word-"

"Dougie, don't you dare." Carrie muttered, a small smile growing on her face as she shoved at his shoulder, and repositioned herself, hands on her hips and sighed, "Seriously." For a moment, they just watched each other and it should've felt awkward, but in all actuality - it wasn't. And knowing that he was looking at her that fondly almost made her want to stay and talk to him more. But she wasn't like that it seemed.

"You look great," Dougie said, his voice strained as he nodded, "don't let none of those fools do anything funny, alright?" Now, it was Carrie's turn to let out a laugh and raise her brow.

"Since when did you care?" she asked quickly, crossing her arms, "'Cause three weeks ago, I had that stupid radio operator from the 418th practically down my throat and you barely batted an eye." A few onlookers glanced towards the two and it took Carrie a few moments to recognize how loud she had gotten and suddenly emotional in her words. And why did she care if Dougie had barely batted an eye? He shouldn't have needed to. They weren't technically even friends, just a joke or two here and there, some teasing and good-natured tomfoolery, but nothing more. Why did she care that he should care? Carrie sighed. Dougie looked up at her with those big, slightly worried eyes and bit back his lip before nodding.

"Well, now that you've made me aware of that, maybe I will bat an eye next time." Dougie said, looking up at her as his fingers danced against the cool mug of beer, "Who the hell was it?" Carrie stared at him and then blinked slowly.

"It doesn't matter-"

"That's why you didn't come-"

"Dougie-"

"Because he had-"

"Dougie." Carrie said, stepping closer to him, and holding his gaze right in her own, her hand ghosting over his arm as if to latch onto him, but failing to do so, "Let it go. It's over now."

"You brought it up." Dougie said back quickly, but she stopped him with a shake of the head. But then she stood quiet for a moment and let her thoughts grow. She had brought it up. Almost as if she had wanted him to know. Because no one had known. Because she'd been embarrassed that she let herself think that maybe that was a good guy, someone she could live a life with and all he had wanted was a kiss. It was a stupid thought.

"Who was it, Carrie, seriously?" Dougie asked her as she balled up her fists and looked anywhere but his face, which she knew had a look on it that would make her lose it, "A guy from the 418th, huh? He ever heard about a thing called messing with the bull, you damn well be getting the horns-"

"Shh, keep your voice down!" Carrie muttered, bringing a finger in front of her mouth and looking at him with wide eyes, "He was just some jackass that thought I was there to have a good time and that was it." Dougie grew quiet as he watched her. Whatever it was between them seemed to simmer and they both seemed to understand in that minute what she meant. But she wouldn't dare actually say why she had even bothered kissing the guy, or why Dougie was looking at her like that.

"He didn't do anything to you, did he?" Dougie said, his voice softer than it normally was, that look in his eye deeper and darker, "I know a guy-"

"No." Carrie said, her cheeks scarlet, "It was just a stupid kiss, that's it. It's over. I just….I was trying to avoid the situation again and…." She trailed off. She was over talking about it to be completely honest. She looked up at him.

"I'm fine." she said with an honest nod, "Thank you for your…..concern." Dougie watched her, with a slow nod and licked his lips, like he was still digesting her words in their entirety. He didn't say much, he just watched her and she didn't entirely want to complain about that because for one, his eyes were some of the kindness she'd probably seen on this side of the world. And for once, they were eyes that looked at her in a way other guys didn't.

"Just…go have some fun," Dougie said quietly, "give me a look if a guy does something stupid, alright?" And she nodded and looked up at him, as he smiled softly at her, his eyes darting over her own endless blue ones, an abyss of dampened sea and darkened souls. Lost and harrowing. He leaned forward a bit and lowered his voice.

"Don't strike out." he said with a small chuckle and she looked up at him and brought her pointer finger underneath his chin and prodded him lightly to meet her gaze, before whispering back just as quietly.

"Bergie doesn't strike out."

[ficyorick]

[BE] deleted scenes clean-up :) - ch3

i always put scenes im cutting out into a separate file, just in case i get to reuse them but these r definitely goners so i can share

Originally, the trip back from Pennsylvania to the cabin was a bit longer. I sort of cannibalized that moment to make the transition from Billy's being mad at Kessler to Billy taking it out on HL more of a punchy moment:

"Get the fuck out of my car." Billy turned towards the road and flipped the headlight control, switching to low beam. 

"I'm not in your car, buckaroo. I'm inside you." Kessler smiled his wide grin.

"Where were you taking me?" Butcher didn't acknowledge anything his dying brain was saying to him. "Where are we?" 

Kessler sighed like a parent who knew they just weren't getting through to their moody teen. He closed the glove compartment with a click, but not before dropping a pack of wet wipes on Butcher's knees. "On the way back. Figured you needed a distraction. We just got on 219, keep going straight and we'll be out of Pennsylvania soon."  

Butcher reached into the packet he himself dropped in his lap. He wordlessly wiped at his face and his hands, getting most of the already crusting blood off. The rest would have to wait till the cabin. Slowly, he released the handbrake and let the van start properly. Kessler leaned back in his seat, getting comfortable. 

"I could drive for you." He offered casually.

"No. I need to think." Butcher squeezed the gas pedal, eyes glued to the road. 

Kessler made a doubting noise in response but didn't press. 

It took them another day to get back where the cabin was. At some point, Butcher had to pull over and catch some shuteye in the back of the van. Kessler stayed in the passenger's seat while Billy changed his clothes to slightly less bloody and rolled a makeshift pillow from his jacket. He closed his eyes and saw only red, the bright red of the bunker corridor and the dark red of the blood from the Supes he ripped apart. Supes and whoever else was down there. 

Becca. Becca was down there too. 

Was she hoping to stop him? Stop Kessler? It was way too late now, she had to have known that. And even though she also was just a byproduct of his neurons dying off one by one, Butcher was mad that it was Kessler who got to see her. She wasn't real, she wasn't his Becca, she was just a hallucination. She was just him. Like Kessler. 

But he still wanted to hear her voice again.

When Billy woke up, he was in the driver's seat again and it was night already. This time, the control was given to him carefully, sensation by sensation, not all at once like after the bunker. 

"Oi, you twat." Butcher gripped the steering wheel again, feeling his hands as his again. 

Kessler was sitting back in the passenger's seat. "We're almost at the cabin. You're welcome." 

"I said I wanted to drive." Billy very quickly realized they were about to arrive at the very familiar driveway into the forest. He added more gas as soon as the surroundings began to make sense. 

"No, I know what you want." Kessler said and didn't elaborate, but the way Butcher sped up was enough of an answer for both of them. "You’ve been thinking about it ever since that gas station."

___________________

and if ur still reading... the original ending to the ch3 looked like this. before the very painstaking edit process the whole HL-on-Butchers-lap scene was WAY more... you know. more handsy. i decided to downplay it considerably bc I felt i was jumping the gun too early and im glad i did, i prefer butcher more tortured about the whole thing. this ending is like. its rly good but its basically the same moment from ch5 when homelander leans into the touch and calls butcher scared. i had to choose which one of these moments i get to keep and i went with the one in ch5 bc its one of the first scenes i ever wrote for this fic haha:

Homelander convulsed a few more times underneath his palm, groaning and half-sobbing violently. Butcher managed to start and flick away another cigarette before the body underneath his palm finally grew still. He realized he still hadn't taken his hand away. Homelander made another pathetic noise and spat loudly into the bowl, before shakily lifting himself away. He could barely hold his head up and had to immediately rest it on the toilet seat, pressing his cheek against it. His face was red, completely exhausted. Skin covered in sweat, both his eyes and his nose leaking fluids, a thread of drool on his lips. He looked completely devoid of coherent thoughts in his head, just complete blankness. Until he finally regained some focus in those wet, blue eyes. Homelander sluggishly blinked at Butcher. His eyes squinted, flicking downwards. And suddenly Homelander was smiling at him. A small, sleepy smile. 

"Are you hard right now?" He asked him, already knowing the answer.

Butcher looked down. And stormed out of the bathroom.

[ceilingfan5]

4, 7, 37, 56, and 73!

4. Where do you find inspiration for new ideas? to be too honest with you it is often a matter more of curating what inspires me, because it is in fact too easy to get a larger than life idea and wanna run with it before realizing it would take fucking 80 thousand words to come to life. sometimes you simply must chatter about it w/ your beloved(s) and then. this is the hard part. release it to the wind.

but! i love truly Too Real scenarios and ridiculous but not fully unbelievable bullshit and i especially love makin' an au out of absolutely a piece of gum and two rubber bands (or a radioactive ingot, fantasy in the complete other direction, a juicy setting, and a button)

like, that's my favorite. aus esp. i have to keep a fucking leash on my what-if-inator because the second i let it start running i will be whisked off my feet and i simply have only so many hours in the day. and they must be shared between hobbies and things like taking vitamins and building shelves and doing laundry and crafting beasties and changing the world and keeping it good and remembering to take my meds

7. How do you choose which POV to write from? almost entirely on vibes. in some fics i've done back and forth equally, or, more likely, from the pov of the one im chewing at the moment, defaulting to krav, but with my taste for dialogue and especially like, mental processing self-dialogue? ykwim? it's all about the vibe that started it all, or like, what serves the beast at the moment. this super au, i've really let the characters drive, and i actually charted it out, mostly from curiosity, i've been letting it roll as it needed, where it felt good

37. How do you choose where to end a chapter? it's kind of on comic rules? it has to be punchy, if not a punchline. it has to Feel Right and conclude the scene, enough of a button to satisfy without going over? practice mostly? it's nice though when it gives a bit of a vector for the next one to shoot off from. rubber band to launch us over the time hump 56. What’s something about your writing that you pride yourself on? i usually say dialogue and characterization so hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm (not outlining) but. hm. having fun with it? or like, thie and i have been discussing again lately, like, balance? the ability to pair the goof shit and the gut-hurtin' feelings without seeming incongruous? you need both, is the secret, and both can do both, and even more complex, something you thought was one can become the other when you read further/reread. and that rules, and is SOOOO consistent with TAZ (esp but not limited to of course, balance) and i love it. oh and granular details that make things feel real and alive and connected. love that shit. there's layers don't you want to hear about the layers i thought about it at length and- 73. What do you think makes your writing stand out from other works?

namely the above but if i had to say it in one, Voice? like. you could probably pick my shit out of a lineup, lbr. it's alive, it's juicy, it's sort of weird, the phrasing is both comedic and bonkers as well as emotionally present, it's alive, they feel like people, maybe even you, and love is real even besides the romantic, like. they're going to be friends. not just make out. both matter. it adds up. it feels lived in and floating but tethered. and alive. maybe you left it out too long, themes crawled up in there and now it's teeming and the letters and punctuation have a stoplight and a mayor, and you really ought to wash your water bottle, bbut heck it's so familiar-

i've been doing this for a while now, and i do it for fun. i believe in fun, i swear by it, and i make time for it, and i share it. Not only does it matter, it makes the meaning and the growing stick. i think you can feel it.

anyway, i sure hope so!

[poppetsisters]

4, 9 and 17.

4. It took a lot of wordsmithing. - Penelope can be shortened to Pen, like what I use to write and draw. - It is quite literally a pen name - It can also be shortened to Penny, from which several word plays can be derived (I'd offer my two cents, but I'm only one) - A Poppet is a type of doll used by witches to represent other people (think a voodoo doll but less racially charged). Eve had a theory a long time ago that we were all the puppets of some meta consciousness that was so bloated and shifting in its multitudes that it had to create us to represent all its facets in a non-overwhelming way. She'll say this is the reason Poppet is our last name, but to be quite honest, I just think replacing the U in Puppet makes it sound more dynamic and fun. - The first and last name were chosen in tandem to go together: the four syllable first name followed up with a two syllable last name gives it a punchy rhythm thanks to the four P sounds needed to pronounce it in full. - Adding onto this, Penelope Poppet as written invoke a consistent motif of roundness and tall lines, and I'd even go as far as to say the letters themselves paired with their sounds invoke a colour palette (I always think of yellow and green when I hear my name).

Alice gets her name from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, but lately she's been wanting to go by Mittens. Why? because it "sounds more like her"

Eve chose her name because she knew I hated shallow bible references and wanted to piss me off. She later retconned it to be short for Everything and I think that is very funny.

9. My favourite part is allowing myself to succumb to madness. I already decided gender is a construct! What else is a construct I wonder? We can't prove that God exists, but we can prove that she unambiguously exists in our minds! Superman is more real than I am because he will outlive me in the minds of millions. Our perception of the world is based on meat mechanisms called our five senses. Who's to say actual real things are real? Ayn Rand has nightmares about me!

This may sound like a psychotic break, but that's only because I'm writing this as 2am. The point I'm trying to make is that my life became way more fun once I realized that transformation and magic were real.

17. It hurts, but you can't be reborn without first dying. Can't rise from the ashes without first burning up. Can't climb out of a grave and take back your beating heart without first burying yourself. Do you understand?

[eorzeanflowers]

11) What was your inspiration for your OC?

(( A fun one! Ty Rayn <3))

There is always a catalyst for when I make a new character. Some drive, or some impetus. I'll try to remember the main catalyst for each character of mine, let's start from the top!

The Lily - Lily was inspired by Kugane at large and Historical Japanese Fiction. I had already long shifted to Au Ra at the beginning of HW, but when I dipped my toes in the water of RP during the Stormblood lulls, i settled on the exiled Shinobi background, wanting to not make a WoL.

The Azalea - Archie's main inspiration is and will always be, the Tenth Doctor. Its my favorite few seasons of New Who and I wanted an old character that was reborn multiple times. Hence my looks at Dr. Who. XD

The Rose - Benoit is not actually my creation! He is my wife's first and foremost, but she let me play him as her first mate. He's mine now though. :3 General pirate things are his inspiration.

The Sunflower - A'tyla was my thoughts on if a Hyur was raised by Miqo'te. That's it. XD She's long grown past that.

The Gardenia - Yasha is inspired by none other than her namesake, Yasha Nydoorin of the Might Nein. The sapphic nature, falling for a punchy punch girl, her quieter nature with some silly jokes. Yasha was actually a run off of when I made Tatiava. I wanted a Garlean character and couldn't decide between Highlander or Midlander, so I said, Por que no los dos?

The Snapdragon - Tatiava was a direct response to people making villainous Garlean characters. I wanted a double agent who could dip in both crowds. Did I ever actually get a chance? NOPE. XD It is what it is.

The Dahlia - Lhei was made from what little we knew of Old Sharlayan at the time of her creation, late shadowbringers. I was just getting back into RP again after losing the drive in late Stormblood.

The Strelitzia - Beatrice is from my dnd game! A character I've got the chance to properly play. I think when I made her I just needed the sapphic goodness of her and her partner. T.T Speaking of...

The Tulip - Mai is also from my dnd game! Mai was an npc my players got real attached to and well, she evolved from there. She's always been mute tho.

The Triteleia - Myste just formed fully into my consciousness one day and well, there he is! He is inspired by Dynamis and its crazy applications tho.

The Gladiolus - Jana is near and dear to my heart. I wanted to revisit an old echo idea I had for Lily that had got cut late in her development. And I ran with it. Now Jana is my weird future child that doesn't care about where she is from.

The Linnaeas - Pola and Deta are the easiest to spot the inspiration. They are based off of Popola and Devola from the Nier Francise. Specifically the Automata ones. Later they've been heavily influenced by Ianthe and Coronabeth of the Locked Tomb series.

The Hyacinth - Eulanne is inspired by the Dark Urge of Baldur's Gate 3. I just wanted to remake my sorta good guy Durge (i raided the grove my darling Minthara in that run, but she's been trying to do better since!) and I thought it would be cool to tie it to Reaper/Voidsent lore.

The Amaryllis - Marisol was spawned from the Viper reveals at the first DT fanfest. Nothing more influenced her original development.

The Lewisia - Glifet is anther Dr. Who inspired character, this time based off of a Cyberman. A what if you could say, a rehabilitated Cyberman.

The Iris - Lucca is just Lucca from Chrono Trigger with a bisexual streak. Chronic inventor, not much works right the first few times. Super smart. Those glasses.

The Aconite - Tista-Moa came to me in a work haze. I just had the idea, i wrote down what i thought about her and her very strange journey, came home and made her! I don't have enough villains to scratch that itch so she was a delight to make.

The Dicentra - Cissnei came about cause I am/was interested in playing as a Zenos-like character. Cissnei has evolved past that by now, but that is her start! I got so attached to her I finished the EW story in a single weekend with her. XD

That's all my debuted flowers... now for the few undebuted ones.

The Celosia - Sarel is my main dnd PC right now, and I saw the Celosia flower at the local green house and I wanted to make a character based on it. So I ported her over (somewhat, she is more different than the other dnd based ones) and she has been patiently waiting for months to be debuted. One day I'll that up. XD

The Nerine - Hinoka is Lily's rival from waaaaay back. I just felt like putting a name and face to the standin I had been using for Lily's story. Oh, and a nerine is a Spider Lily. :3

The Jasmine - Kokolai came about because I wanted an RP character to manage my submarines for me. He's just a merchant that loves his surrogate daughter. ^_^

The Protea - Tanzanite is a direct response to Solution 9 and its inhabitants. How fun it would be to have a scientist from there. She also just spawned from me messing with hair on Lily's fromer lady. >.>;

The Snowdrop - Agate just willed themself into existance. Also inspired by the DT story, they were the product of me sitting down to make a Sol 9 character and failing, making a Yyasulani native the wished to return to the sunlit world.

The Belladonna - Jane is, with no shame, directly inspired by Jane Doe of Zenless Zone Zero. That character has me by the throat. XD Add in a mix of Agent 47 and you get my Jane!

And that's everyone! A bit long, but I was on a roll if I'm being honest.

[adam-sadmon]

So this is gonna be for a very niche intersection of people who follow me but I've been sinking my teeth into Armored Core 6 lately and I thought it'd be fun (since I spend 90% of the game in the garage anyway) to build some AC's around the Thieves, sorta taking notes from their fighting style, their Personas, aesthetics etc.

So to kick us off is a rough draft that's actually become my go-to, main AC for my current NG+ build, High Priestess:

This is a MEAN fucking machine. Taking cues both from Makoto's Fist of the Northstar-style punch rushing in the Metaverse and her real world affinity for Aikido I set out to make an AC that just PUNCHES.

Obviously there's a bit more to it, it's wrll spec'd to with a focus on energy efficiency, recharge and weapon damage so that the dual Wuegers can basically one tap any non boss/AC in a single shot of its primary fire and quickly build up stagger against tougher opponents before overheating, I also threw in the Bullet Orbit to further increase our frankly ridiculous stagger buildup and to supplement our admittedly lacking ammo count and crowd control.

See, thing is, any grunt we touch dies, but they also ear up our ammo which we much through using the charged punch attack on the Wuegers. This, predominantly, is a boss/AC fight build (though I've refused to switch off of it and have cleared a lot of missions on little to no ammo just punching my way through with the laser lance).

SPEAKING OF, the laser lance. I originally wanted this build to be a lot more lightweight and speedy to mirror Johanna but the long and the short of it is having to be up close to land your shots and having to stand still when using your charged Wuegers results in a pretty quick death, and while the more medium-weight build we ended up with is by no means slow adding in the laser lance worked both to add to our punchiness and provide us an alternative means of catching up with our enemies.

That's about all there is to tell on the build front, even beyond being happy to have recreated a good few aspects of the Queen herself this build sorta took on a life of its own, it does more than slap, it PUNCHES.

I went for a colour scheme that's trying (and failing) to evoke the colour scheme of Johanna and I have an alternate colour scheme saved resembling Agnes' if I'm feeling spicy, as for decals I was going to make one of Johanna's face but basically any design not entirely made out of straight lines is a liiiiiiittle bit beyond me.

So yeah, if you are one of the two people interested in this stick around for if I ever make another one, if there's any interest I'll probably put a share code in the comments.

[numetaljackdog]

what i'm listening to 3/2024

spot.//yt

Limp Bizkit - Pollution: got this played on my local radio station bc i got connections

DC Talk - Jesus Freak: i have become OBSESSED with this christian rap rock (kind of) band. couldn't explain it very well myself but i think they're really fun and super silly. i've been listening to this particular song for quite some time now but it's only recently that my full obsession has developed and i've been getting other people roped into it too..... i'm just spreading the good word 😁

Whitechapel - The Saw Is the Law: had this one stuck in my head something FIERCE these past few weeks. just that crusher chorus line is so fucking good, I never was a huge whitechapel fan but they go hard when the mood is right. played it at work and everything

The Smiths - Bigmouth Strikes Again: cumming all over myself i love the riff and the melodies and there are some real good lines despite very few lyrics overall... admittedly that squeaky chipmunk harmony is pretty goofy but when the rest of it is so good who even care.

Faith No More - Midlife Crisis: i like this one more and more every time i hear it. a friend of mine introduced me to this and it's been stuck in my head relentlessly ever since. also definitely goofy as fuck but i love the kinda hardcore-type vocals mike patton throws into the verses, especially in the live version and the big swelling bridge. a song like this makes me get why people talk about faith no more as "proto-nu metal" or whatever..... fred durst would do some shit like this <3 also got this played on the radio station

Butthole Surfers - Cough Syrup: i don't like this band as much as i wish i did, though i've certainly got plenty more listening to do. def some stupid lyrics here bc it's the butthole surfers but i actually really really like "i can't talk so i guess i got nothing to say." something about that one

Third Eye Blind - Jumper: it's back! i think i've expended all the words i have about this already but man what a good little pop song

Breaking Benjamin - Skin: great example of how enjoying breaking benjamin is more about hearing the loud guitars and the unique syllabic experience of ben's weird as hell enunciation than it is about anything original or lyrical. what the hell is this song about i don't know. but it bangeth mightily. this also stands to represent that i and mine have been listening to a fuckton of bb lately

Elliott Smith - Cupids Trick: a dear friend of mine has put me on that elliott smith shit fairly recently and i think this is my fav from either/or... the riff so good and it's catchy and has a really dark punchy sound compared to the rest of the record (which is also real good! but just different)

Gorillaz - Cracker Island: heard this on the radio a ways back and instantly came all over myself and said "omg who is this is this the new sound of the summer????" and then looked it up and saw that it was a band i already know that's been around for decades ^_^ but it's just a banger and they found one good hook and punched it up to 11!!

Kittie - Eyes Wide Open: KITTIE BACK???? and with a rager O_O <me when my eyes are wide open. lol. not much further commentary here i'm just excited for the new record and i hope it's good and not bad

Enon - Window Display: my experience continues of getting into this band at the pace of a tortoise or perhaps a snail. p sure this is like the biggest song from them and. it good! they just have a tastey sound and i like the vocalist's delivery

Lamb Of God - Redneck: been on some metalcore shit too and like groove metal and shit and it hardly gets better than lamb of god. i feel like i haven't often properly appreciated them but what a consistently banger band. and this one just has some cool catchy parts that have been in my head since like high school. JUST! ONE! TIME!!!!!

Insane Clown Posse - Halls Of Illusions: my friends and i have been indulging in what we're calling "fucked up friday" which sometimes includes icp as a soundtrack. still want to listen to the full album with people at some point. but anyway i never took too too much notice of this track until a friend put it on and i realized how good it is. and frankly kind of saw-coded w it

Drowning Pool - Tear Away: kind of not great but the chorus glued itself to me. sort of the death toll of nu metal giving in to the way of the post-grunge ballad but man this vocalist was damn solid!

Victoria Monét - On My Mama: proof that i haven't completely exited the pop listening sphere. i still got todd. go watch the top ten of 2023 for a review

Rai Panesar - I Don't Give a Shet (IDGAS): okay this is a stupid joke song. i think. but i like to imagine it's sincere. like i like to imagine the dude that made this thought it was actually pretty cool and had fun making it. i'm scared to find anything else out about him bc it might ruin this hope that i have

Theory of a Deadman - Rx (Medicate): SUCKS. but kind of fascinating. how the fuck did theory have a hit in like 2017 or whenever this came out. by making a hip hop country rock song about doing drugs. oh okay

The Revivalists - Wish I Knew You: adding this alongside cigarette daydream in the canon of "indie band has relentlessly catchy pop hit that i listen to a bunch and attach memories to but actually think kind of sucks ass." i heard this in a restaurant a while back and went omg it's crazy by gnarls barkley i love crazy by gnarls barkley despite not really having very strong feelings about crazy by gnarls barkley but well these are the things we think to ourselves. so i kept waiting for the part where he goes does that make me craaaaazayyyyyy.... but it never came!!!! every chorus would just end on nothing and then move on to the next verse. i got edged by this song until almost the very end where i finally figured out what song it actually was and then got that stuck in my head but i'm still bitter! motherfucker! and also i don't like their band name. what exactly are you reviving 🤨

[thesinglesjukebox]

BONNIE MCKEE - "SLAY"

Will Adams unearths a pop time capsule and presents his findings to the rest of us...

[5.20]

Will Adams: I was aware of "Slay" ten years ago, even if it wasn't on iTunes. Through truncated live performances and interview snippets, I got the concept instantly: a big silly pop song that co-opted common Stan Twitter parlance of the time into a motivational anthem. But despite a stellar previous single that showed great promise and an impressive CV of hits penned for other artists, McKee's solo career seemed doomed to fizzle. With each passing month it became clearer that "Slay" would never see the light of day, so I couldn't fully embrace the song. I didn't believe I, myself, could slay. (Put less cornily and more accurately: McKee's label Epic didn't believe she could slay.) But ten years later, she announced her project to re-record her shelved album and release it independently, and the promise reignited. Then "Slay" dropped, and "reignite" felt less appropriate a descriptor than "exploded." Over a bombastic arrangement with a cadence and chord progression that recalls Hoku, the song is quintessential McKee: inspirational rallying cries ("come on, everybody, let's go!", "we can do anything!"); imagery that's punchy at first and confusing if given more than one second of thought ("flyer than firebirds"; "shine like razorblades"; "slaying like 1999"); a colossal bridge where she launches into the stratosphere and makes the song even bigger. And on top of that, spelling out the title in a pep rally affect. It's unashamed to be big, be dumb, be earnest, which makes listening to it in 2023 that much more impactful. It would be easy to cast "Slay" off as naïve yearning for the Obama-era college years, our wasted youth that might not even have been as carefree as we thought. But in spite of it all -- being hardened by a decade of Real Adult Life, of the awful shit that keeps on happening around us and to us, of the increased feeling of being unmoored from any sense of purpose -- I want to embrace it. You see, Dorothy, you've always had the power to slay. Before the 2023 release, I wouldn't have believed that. [10]

Joshua Minsoo Kim: ...iconic? [2]

Taylor Alatorre: As an incurable fan of the might-have-beens on the left of the proverbial dial, the impulse to stan a theoretical pop star is one that I empathize with. It can lead to some weird places, though, like pretending that this rewrite of Katy Perry's "Roar," shorn of its indie pop pretenses and with a muddier zero-to-hero narrative, would've lit up the charts as intended back in 2014. As with the hipster run-off of that era, maybe the wishfulness is part of the appeal. To the subset of the population for whom Bonnie McKee's unreleased album is their Dear Tommy, I'm sincerely glad you're getting what you wished for. [4]

Jeffrey Brister: We really need a critical reappraisal of Trouble, so we'll get less of this. [5]

Micha Cavaseno: The closest parallel I have to Bonnie McKee's musical career is actually the directorial career of Elizabeth Banks. Everything about it is perfectly functional but burdened with a trite and immensely DOA sense of humor that maybe had a chance to thrive 8 or 9 years ago but now just completely misses the mark. (If you overextend the narrative here, this makes the Pitch Perfects and Katy Perry stuff a kind of perfect parallel because they both thrive off the weird see-saw between conservatism and quasi-quirkiness. But I digress!) "Slay" is essentially a Cocaine Bear, because even if the punchline feels like a decades old meme, it's also slapped together in a kitsch from several decades ago. "Slay like 1999" while sounding like late '00s/early '10s pop nostalgia is a triple-double of identity crisis (made all the weirder by those subtle happy hardcore breaks at the bridge). It's so perfectly amorphous and logically commercial, yet also missing every possible mark? I'm not even mad it exists, I'm just more concerned how we justified it needed to exist now? [3]

Dorian Sinclair: Bonnie McKee has had a hell of a career and, in the process, been a writer on multiple all-time great songs ("Teenage Dream" is probably the crowning glory here, but let's give a shout out to Britney's "How I Roll" and CRJ's "Turn Me Up", two deeply underrated album cuts). I don't know that "Slay" is going to join that pantheon, and it's showing its age a bit after its release was deferred for a decade...but it's a solid song from a solid writer, and it gets me looking forward to her long-delayed second album, which is enough to be counted as a win. [6]

Ian Mathers: On the one hand, this really makes me wonder why McKee didn't just get to have Katy Perry's career directly instead of writing a lot for her. On the other... I don't actually like those Katy Perry singles that much, and all the goodwill towards McKee in the world doesn't change that this sounds a lot like them. [6]

Michael Hong: The further we get from "Teenage Dream," the less the American dream seems viable, the more it seems unattractive -- unfortunate for Bonnie McKee, whose music sounds like sparklers and stars and stripes all written in glowing neon letters. This version is just too theatrical; the way she sings the word "technicolor" is far too excessive. [4]

Daniel Montesinos-Donaghy: I naively thought we were doing away with this sort of label-mandated Search Engine Poptimisation, where keywords are stuffed into a song and its title, ensuring that it shows up at the top of confused uncles' Google searches until the end of time. Brazen, yes, but if you can give this songwriting prompt some heft, the shortcut is forgiven. Nope! "SLAY" (even the try-hard all-caps!) is engineered to make you think of different better songs you've heard in different better places, a cynical DayGlo casing that sounds like it was destined for a Buffalo Wild Wings Pride commercial instead of a major label release. Screw the SEO and dig deeper; there is better, organic, REAL affirma-pop out there, and you know it. [2]

Brad Shoup: Will this be the last pop song to reference Technicolor? "Slay" is out of step in so many ways: a widescreen arena-pop yearner in a time of grim partying, with a title that would have been in the pop vanguard when McKee originally wrote it. (In the video, she pulls the song from a synthwave vault -- door code 2013 -- and it's on a VHS tape.) It's really moving to see that McKee still believes in these big gestures, in the goofy metaphor that ushers you to the towering bridge. [8]

Nortey Dowuona: "Welcome to the part of the show / where we fake it 'til we make it." That's an irritating thing to say on a pop song. First, it's giving the game away. All pop is fake. It's the amalgamation of every genre, flattened until acceptable and accessible to anyone who would turn their nose up at the depths of it. Why let anyone know that you fake it? Second, it's an awkward line. The drum patter is kick snare kick-kick snare, and it lands so clumsily on that patter that it jars you either awake into "what, what does that even mean" or "oh ok, fine." It's not a sudden spark of wit, just a jarring reminder of the actual project here -- allowing you a peek into a swelling bubble of confidence. Thirdly, each lyric after and at the beginning of the second verse is as clumsily sung, as is the chant, but it feels right to have them in that way, and they turn to mush the way pop song lyrics should. They're not itchy and scratchy the way that first line is. Finally, because it's so revealing, awkward and jarring, the rest of the song fades once you hear it, since the hook, the drums and even the seething synth line jumping up and down the chorus, all melt into each other since they all cancel each other out. It don't slay, it just swipes. [5]

Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: OMG it's got a "spell out a word" hook I'm in love

Tara Hillegeist: Oh, so that's what Dua Lipa was missing. [7]

Alfred Soto: MARGO CHANNING: A mass of music and fire. That's me. An old kazoo and some sparkles. [3]

Katherine St Asaph: I got into an argument the other day with someone else my age about whether millennials are middle-aged yet -- they thought no, I think yes. My argument is admittedly vibes-based, swayed less by historical context than how many gray hairs I eradicated on that particular morning. But it's hard not to declare that you're in your midlife crisis era when you hear millennial Don Quixote-core like "Slay," which is only 10 years old but feels like an artifact from an ancient era with an equally ancient worldview. We all hear Katy Perry and "Halo"; what truly marks this as a genuine 2010s production rather than zoomer retromania is how many of the era's minor artists you hear. Specifically, I hear Catcall in the shouts, and MS MR in the way Bonnie McKee clips notes short. McKee's songwriting stakes out her usual turf, a lightly subversive yet unironically inspirational underdog anthem -- think the midpoint of Grease, Tank Girl, and Ready Player One, for those who too were raised by the television. Ultimately, though, "Slay" is a Bonnie McKee song that wasn't given to Katy Perry (or whomever); it's too easy to devise just-so explanations for why. Were the hooks too dulled, too inconsistent? Maybe, but so were the ones in "Part of Me." Were the lyrics miscalibrated -- too razor-blade explicit, or conversely too earnest and uncool? We have pejoratives for this sort of thing now: girlboss, Disney adult, Marvel fan. (Whether someone actually likes Disney or Marvel or has a managerial job is irrelevant to the online gaze.) But for every "Fight Song" and "Roar" on the charts, there was a "Government Hooker" or "Cannibal" in the album tracks that got even bloodier. The most likely explanation is luck: someone woke up too hungover to send an email, too sick for the earworm to take, too grumpy to want to reach for glory from the gutter. Whatever the reason, the song's nonexistence as an actual 2013 single adds another layer of subtext. Not only is "Slay" about seizing at a dream that's a decade dead, it's about seizing at a dream that maybe wasn't even alive at the time either. McKee deploys the firebirds and pop hooks regardless, and they roar to life oblivious but loud. We slay on, us aging diamonds. [6]

[Read, comment and vote on The Singles Jukebox ]

[gerogerigaogaigar]

Curtis Mayfield - Curtis

The sprawling funk/soul explorations of Curtis Mayfield display a masterful talent for bombastic arrangements and biting political commentary. The calls for unity are par for the course when it comes to 70s funk, but rather than the both sides-ism of Sly And The Family Stone, Mayfield would like to remind us that we're all gonna fucking die if we don't work together. As for the music, the lush horns, frenetic percussion, frequent harp parts, and aspects of psychedelia make for an incredibly unique album, especially for it's time.

The Byrds - Sweetheart Of The Rodeo

Gram Parsons wanted country rock to be a thing so bad. He was willing to completely overhaul half the personnel of his band and tank their careers just so he could have his country album. Sweetheart Of The Rodeo has been severely vindicated by history considering how big of a genre country rock wound up being in the 70s and all the conservatives who got mad that long haired hippies were ruining their music can suck it. The album consists almost entirely of covers including artists like The Louvin Brothers, Merle Haggard, and Woody Guthrie. It feels very authentic. Acoustic guitar, fiddle, pedal steel, and honky tonk piano abound as Parsons croons over some decidedly non hippie country songs. It's clear they're being a little cheeky when they do The Louvin Brothers' song The Christian Life after all.

Gang Of Four - Entertainment!

What's better than angular, funky, post punk? Angular, funk, Communist post punk obviously! Frustrations about commodity fetishism make up like half of this albums lyrical content. But beyond just the politics the music is also revolutionary. The jittery guitars are matched by punchy drums and staccato singing. It's disorienting, it's angry, it's hugely influential. Come join the proletariat dance party.

Velvet Underground - White Light/White Heat

This album is completely feral. Half the songs are about people dying horrifically and there's a seventeen minute jam describing an orgy. No joke for real content warning ⚠️ this album features a very stark and realistic portrayal of how trans people were treated back in the 60s. We have to talk about Lady Godiva's Operation. It's a song about a transgender woman dying in the operating table due to a botched lobotomy. It's brutal and has always been one of the only songs that really scares me. The song's attitude is intensely sympathetic to it's subject, the only hint of Lady Godiva's trans status is one line were a doctor misgenders her and the fact that she was going in for a lobotomy at all (by the 60s they were mainly reserved for gay men and trans women). The humanity of the character in the first half of the song versus the indifference of the doctors in the latter half is an incredibly succinct condemnation of how society treated queer people at the time. ⚠️ Ok content warning over y'all can open your eyes again. Putting the subject matter aside White Light/White Heat is musically unhinged. The guitars are so scrungy and fuzzed out that it can be hard to understand what's going on. Songs like Here She Comes Now and the title track are basically 50s rock and roll with the most fucked up guitars imaginable. The Gift, Lady Godiva's Operation, and Sister Ray are weird droning things with mostly spoken word lyrics. And the guitar solos on Sister Ray are beyond punk and more like noise rock or even just noise. This album is not for everyone, hell it might not be for anyone, but I really like it. I have a soft spot for weird anomalies.

Mary J. Blige - What's The 411?

I'm usually pretty harsh on lengthy 90s R&B fuck jams, but this album is really good at being that thing. 92 was probably the exact time for a funky Hip hop influenced R&B album to be really good by my standards specifically. The beats, produced by Puff Daddy, are very reminiscent of late 80s style hip hop and the vocals are spaced out, very echoey. They combine nicely to create an effect where the vocals encompass you while the beats hit you in the face. A lot of the songs structure are more focused on layering vocals to create a sound more similar to P-Funk than soul, it stops the longer tracks from being boring since they need the four to five minutes length to explore those layers.

Kacey Musgraves - The Golden Hour

Unbelievably boring. I don't care at all about this album. Did you know that Weird Al also has a song called Velvet Elvis? It's basically the exact same song but it's a joke and it came out in the 80s.