#blah idk what to write

[zwampp]

art😋 im not the biggest fan of the actual drawing but i think i like the colouring :3

[aerithisms]

i think my problem with this dw season arc accusing the audience of fanbrain for theorising about ruby is that it both feels deceitful and isn't actually that compelling from a character perspective. the season goes out of its way to build up supernatural mystery around ruby and even invokes susan more heavily than ever before in a way that is deliberately trying to get the audience to make those connections. and then it turns around and says you stupid idiot why would you ever try to connect these dots i have deliberately tried to get you to connect.

building up a mystery only for the character to be ordinary is an impossible girl arc redux only this time accusing the viewer of failing to see the humanity of the companion, whereas the impossible girl arc was turning that accusation on the doctor. 7b didn't really blame the audience for viewing clara as a puzzle and in fact several times spells out the fact that clara is perfectly ordinary before the big reveal to give the audience a chance to catch on. as 7b goes on, instead of laying the mystery on thicker, the audience just gets more and more affirmations that clara is a normal human being (rings of akhaten, journey to the centre of the tardis, hide). i found this approach compelling because it was rooted in character, focusing on the doctor's disconnection from humanity/the gendered dynamic of a man treating a woman as his manic pixie mystery to pull him out of grief. s14's meta approach of accusing the viewer feels both unfair, given it has deliberately led the viewer towards theorising, and personally less compelling to me because it wasn't tied into character in any way.

the thing about rey's parentage in tlj is that the reason rian johnson chose to go for that reveal was that it was the only answer that was interesting. none of the theories - rey is a skywalker, rey is a kenobi, and even the eventually canonical rey is a palpatine - were interesting or satisfying because they brought nothing compelling to the table for the story being told. the only satisfaction to be gained from those answers was a fanbrained "omg rey is important because she's related to that guy from the other movie." on top of that, rey desperately wants her parents to have been important, to give her life and her abandonment some kind of significance. so them being ordinary provided the most compelling trajectory for her character because it was the thing she least wanted to hear. it forced her to do the most introspection and growth, as well as tying into the film's themes about the capacity of ordinary people to be special. it wasn't just a choice made to "gotcha" the viewer, it was rooted in character.

i don't think ruby's mother being ordinary accomplishes the same thing. by invoking susan, s14 is engaging with the most egregious example of the doctor's streak of abandonment, which has potential to be very compelling in relation to ruby (and now also the doctor's) own abandonment issues. theories that ruby might be susan, or be somehow related to susan, or somehow related to the doctor, weren't just fanbrained "omg she's related to that guy i know from the classic series." they were theories genuinely rooted in character and the potential to explore both the doctor and ruby's issues with abandonment. and this is something the show willingly led fans towards by invoking susan so much in the first place. so for the show to turn around and act like they were shallow out of nowhere ideas when they were not shallow and were based on potential character conflicts the show itself deliberately invoked, feels misguided.

as well as that, ruby's mother being ordinary does not require that same growth from ruby as it did for rey because it is exactly what ruby wanted to hear. she never wanted her mother to be important, she just wanted to know who her mother was and have a connection with her. so finding out she was a normal woman who still loves her and wants to be a part of her life is everything she's ever wanted. it doesn't introduce interesting conflict for her the way rey's parents being ordinary did for her, because they were written as different characters with different hangups over their abandonment.

tl;dr i don't necessarily dislike ruby's mother being ordinary as an idea but compared to the things it was inspired by - 7b and star wars - it is not nearly as compelling in terms of how it relates to the characters or themes. and the meta angle, while conceptually interesting, doesn't quite work for me because it feels a little manipulative of the audience.

[screechingfromthevoid]

I think the kids are waiting at the sun tree. They've never really done that before. Sleeping by the sun tree. But as they watched their parents and their friends disappear, with fear in their eyes, it was a day full of firsts.

Wolfe ends up running off in a sort of fit. Leona runs after him. They both feel more at home in the woods. They probably went there to calm down. Vesper, as the oldest, decided she needed to get some things in order. Just in case.

And Gwen was going to leave, sneak into her father's office, past all his traps and rigging, until she notices Vax just standing there. Staring at the seams in the bark that aren't really there. She watched him collapse, sitting crisscross on the roots.

So she stayed. She sat next to her big brother, close and leaning on him. Though, she wasn't there looking for support. She had watched his cocky, teenage attitude melt away into a panic. Vax'ildan was panicking.

"They'll be okay," she told him. "They're the heros of the realm. They'll save uncle Vax and the world and come home." She sounded so sure. He had to believe she was right.

They stay there though. For hours. It might have been the most time the pair ever spent with each other. The sun starts wane and their home turns golden and their parents aren't back yet.

Leona and Wolfe come back, their faces red and a little dirty. They hadn't even taken their leathers off. Like they were going home when they saw their siblings still waiting. They flank their siblings, Leona wrapping an arm around Vax's shoulder and Wolfe taking Gwen's hand. Also contented to wait.

The sky is purple by the time Vesper came with blankets, pillows, and large boxes from The Slayer's Cakes. She had all of her siblings favorites picked out. Trinket 's bear claws for Leona. Sun treats for Gwendolyn. Trayon's Blondies for Vax. Keyleth 's almond bark for Wolfe. And her own personal favorite Everlight-as-Air Scones. She brought enough to count as dinner. She wasn't their head of household. She was their big sister. She didn't need to make sure they ate well or went to bed on time. That wasn't her job. Not yet.

The stars were out that night for them, granting them the family time that they desperately needed. They laughed and stole each other's pastries. They danced around any subject related to parents or their aunts and uncles away. Hunting and tinkering and spying were all fair game. The twins fought, Vax'ildan rolled his eyes and they got him to smile. Gwen listened carefully. Vesper counted the hours since their parents left.

She thought the sun might rise and they'd never see them again. She thought they would have to gather their things in the morning sun and start their new lives emerging from the roots on the sun trees. She thought-

The bark of the sun tree cracked and groaned as it split. All of the De Rolo children held their breaths. Aunt Pike, Uncle Scanlan (in centaur form?), the ashari man, Uncle Grog, a very beautiful and very scary elf woman.

Then father. Then mother hanging on the arm of a strange man they recognized immediately.

[ohno-the-sun]

boopidy doo its a miracle I completed another chapter

finally properly getting Moon

[sfblah]

The Cleanup Crew - Tactical Maid Service

[Next Chapter]

A while back I was waffling on about how I finally wrote something again, and so here it is. I was holding out cuz I wanted to have more of the next chapter(s) finished first, but I figured I should just go ahead and post this before a million years go by. As usual it's a send up of various anime tropes, as well as my inner repressed 16 year old that never stopped playing too many first person shooters.

Female sneezes - Dust

Operation "Hurry"

A spotlight switches on with a sharp kcham, illuminating a circle on the warehouse’s concrete floor. In its center stands a young woman clad in a black and white maid’s uniform, the cloth slightly wrinkled, but hardly noticeable at a distance. She holds her hands together calmly in front of her waist, though only for a moment before she caves to the urge to visor her eyes from the blinding light.

“Alright, last one for today,” grumbles an unseen voice from somewhere up above. After a brief pause, the maid fidgets and points to herself.

“Um, me?” she asks, looking at where she assumes her proctor must be.

“No, behind you.”

The maid turns around, and an incredulous groan immediately follows.

“Yes, you. Jesus, how’d a bucket like you pass selection? Ugh, forget it. Step forward.”

A series of overhead lights activate in sequence, revealing the entrance to the examination course. Still fidgeting, the maid approaches.

“Grab one of the weapons from the table.”

She hadn’t even noticed the table until the proctor pointed it out. Atop the rough wooden surface sits a sawed-off double barrel shotgun, a half-empty box of shells, and absolutely nothing else.

“This is the only one here,” observes the maid.

“You want it or not!?” snaps the voice from on high, startling the trainee half a foot into the air.

“Alright, alright, jeez,” the maid replies, retrieving the weapon. She breaks it open, loads two of her meager collection of shells, and after a brief struggle, slips it into the concealed holster under the back of her skirt.

“Okay, moving right along,” the proctor continues. “Yadda yadda, complete the course as quickly as you can, yadda yadda. By beginning the examination you consent to hrmm meh meh, you waive your right to blah, blah, blah… Look, this is the fiftieth time I’ve read this today. You know what to do, right? Just go through the thing.”

The maid blinks, glancing back and forth between the door and the still-obscured source of the voice.

“Uh. Yeah, totally. For sure.”

A single clap echoes in the rafters.

“Okay, great, great. Start whenever you’re ready. I’m gonna go grab a ham sandwich.”

Footsteps on the catwalk above fade into the distance, leaving the maid to shrug and shake her head.

“Yeah, okay. Rude?” she mumbles to herself, turning to face the entrance to her final test. A plywood facsimile of a foyer is visible through the open door, decorated with a few plastic houseplants. The maid cautiously sticks her head through the threshold, half expecting to be hit in the face by some manner of contraption. To her amazement, nothing happens. Suspiciously so, in fact. She proceeds to creep across the room, eyeing the doors on either side of the far wall, but she slows to a stop when something else catches her attention.

A metal grate is set into the wall. Neither near the ceiling nor the floor, it seems oddly out of place even in the industrial approximation of a manor. Almost as if it isn’t supposed to be there. Looking back over her shoulder, the maid approaches and discovers all but one of the screws meant to hold the grate in place are missing. After one more glance up at the vacant walkways above, she simply swings the grate aside and hauls herself through the opening.

Perhaps a more seasoned operator might have thought to look through the grate at some point before opening it. The unlucky maid assumed she was about to skip ahead in the exam course, but instead she finds herself wedged into a cramped metal duct, arms pinned to her sides and feet kicking uselessly in the air. Before even opening her eyes to take stock of her new surroundings, she stubbornly wiggles herself deeper into the vent.

“Well, this was a stupid idea…”

The test proctor may not have been watching, but the fates were certainly listening. When the maid took a deep breath to gather her strength, she instead succeeded only in filling her big, clumsy nose with dust. Her flailing legs go limp, and the warehouse hangs in silence for a moment before…

“ah-ahh-ahhh-CHOOOO!!!”

The maid’s loud, powerful sneeze did nothing to clear her sinuses. On the contrary, the remaining dust that had settled in the vent was scattered into the air, only exacerbating her need to sneeze again.

“ah-ahh-CHOO!!”

And again.

“haa-CHOO!”

And again…

“ah-ahh… AHH-CHHOOOOOOO!!!”

Her frantic wiggling resumes, adding a chorus of popping and straining sheet metal to the cacophony. Mercifully the duct isn’t especially long, and eventually the maid manages to shimmy and sneeze herself far enough along to free her arms and fully push herself out the other side. She lands upside down in a heap, legs kicking one more time as she gives another “ah-CHOOO!”

The maid rolls herself upright, sitting on the floor of an unexplored part of the test. Instead of reorienting herself, she shakes her head and begins to rub her tickly nose up, down, and all around with the palm of her hand. Finally she cracks one eye open with a thick, wet sniff. The room is dark, but it again appears to be plywood construction with more fake plants.

“Hey, Bucket? Where’d you go?” calls the proctor through a mouthful of food. The maid just manages to register their footsteps approaching from somewhere behind before she folds over with a screamed “HA-CHOOOO!!”

The footsteps quicken to an awkward jog, soon arriving overhead.

“Oh, shit! I didn’t think you’d get this far already. Let me just…”

The room lights up, and the maid has no time at all to absorb her surroundings before cardboard targets burst out of every nook and cranny, and the deafening sounds of recorded gunfire fill the air. If the maid had bothered to stand, imaginary bullets would have already torn her to shreds. Instead she sits in dubious comfort behind a couch, desperately rubbing her nose.

“Intruders! Shoot the targets!” shouts the proctor, scarcely audible over the chaos. The maid fumbles for her shotgun, nearly pulling her skirt down to her ankles before she manages to retrieve it from its holster. Then, barely able to keep her eyes open, she peeks over the back of the couch, points her weapon roughly in the direction of one of the cardboard cutouts, and pulls the trigger.

The recoil sends the maid falling back to the ground, where she remains for a moment as she gasps and heaves forth a strained “ah-ahh-CHHOOO!” She shakily returns to her feet and repeats the process, shooting, falling, and sneezing all over again. This time she doesn’t stand, deciding to reload first. She opens her shotgun and dumps out the two empty shells, then begins to feel around under her skirt for more.

“Remember, switching to your pistol is always faster than reloading!” the proctor advises.

“I don’t have a pistol!” shrieks the maid, kicking her feet up and down.

“Shit, uh, sorry…”

Just as the maid finally manages to fumble a shell into one of her shotgun’s barrels, a falling hunk of metal hits her right on the nose. She screams and covers her face, rolling onto her side and unknowingly kicking her shotgun across the floor. What the hell even was this test? If she’d known she was going to be treated like this, she would have just stayed home and stuck to video games.

Her right hand finds the dropped pistol after a few aimless slaps on the floor. Knuckles white on the grip and breathing heavily through clenched teeth, the maid rises to her feet, takes what she assumes is a shooting stance of some kind, and fires wildly at the remaining targets. She continues pulling the trigger even after she expends her last bullet and the pistol’s slide locks back, only coming down from her rage when the simulated gunfire stops.

Somehow, against all odds, each of the cardboard targets have been neatly punctured. Well, maybe not neatly, but good enough. The maid lets her arms fall to her sides, and soon her jaw and eyelids begin to droop in turn. Her head tips back, her large, teardrop-shaped nostrils flare, and…

“AAHHH-CHHHOOOOOOOO!!!”

And she doesn’t stop sneezing for the next… She doesn’t even know how long. Somebody takes her by the shoulders, leads her somewhere, and someone else begins to address her, all while she continues to sneeze.

“Hello, and allow me to congratulate you on passing your final assessment.” This new voice is lower and softer, not that the maid is able to pay any attention.

“ah-CHOO!”

“Your form says your callsign is ‘Bucket’? Is that right?”

“Aaah-CHOOO!!”

“Wonderful. Let me be the first to welcome you to The Cleanup Crew.”

[soupmanspeaks]

the topic of Helpy makes me go insane /pos like I have this headcanon that William/Springtrap just, DESPISED Helpy because William took heaps of pride from the Funtime line of Animatronics, he saw it as his son's crude mocking of HIS creations, when in reality its just Michaelangelo S Afton trying to use humor to once again cope with the horrors™️ Like I've probably said this here before but I headcanon that Helpy found his way into the PizzaPlex's marketing is because after the FNAF6 fire he just was under the rubble remarkably preserved or something and instead of going into the RockStarRow Museum, the FazExecs had dollar signs in their eyes and were like "yeah, that one will make us bank, ong" Ive also probably said this (bad memory sozzz) but a headcanon to go in tandem with that headcanon, is that Glamfreddy sighs in resignation whenever he passes by one of those Helpy monitors (he wasn't paid royaltys <//3 ) AND LIKE I GOTTA KNOW WHAT (glam)MIKE WOULD THINK OF THE ENTITY THAT IS SATAN DISGUISING HIMSELF AS AN AGENT OF LIGHT (Helpi) WOULD HE FEEL SAD? ANGRY? AT THE MIMIC? THE COMPANY?! please the topic of helpy is so interesting PLEAs-

[ssreeder]

Hi! I have read a lot of LIAB and I loved it but it was honestly getting a bit too much for me and I had to stop reading cuz I was way too lost in the depressive feels. Your writing is so brilliant though!

I was just wondering how you think Azula would feel if she saw Zuko’s scars? I’m not even sure if you’ve already written this as the story continued or if you plan to soon and so won’t be able to answer, but the thought intrigues me!

haha yeah I have had NUMEROUS people say they started LIAB & couldn’t finish because it got to be too much, which is totally fine!! That’s why I love fanfic because there’s so many options for what different people wanna read. When I started liab I wanted to write a really dramatic emotionally dark and tragic love story - which I know some people aren’t into haha especially with how it’s written. (It was my first time writing ive learned a lot haha)

Seriously though! Thank you so much for complimenting my writing!!<3

ok that’s so crazy you asked this because we’re just at the part in the story where azula will be in the same city as zuko. But in ANY liab situation, I do think her initial reaction would depend on if she was prepared to see zuko or not and how much she knows about where he’s been.

Azula doesn’t enjoy not having control over people and situations- and we all know that when azulas not having a good time no one else is either. So if zuko pops up alive and she’s not expecting it I’m sure she’s going to be annoyed

But no matter what, I do think seeing his scars would surprise her, whether she expected them or not the sheer destruction that was done to zukos body would shock anyone. That’s also her brother, like she knows him he’s not just some extra in the background. she grow up with him and watched him throw tantrums and whine about his mommy and they played in the garden sometimes - & yeah she was prepared to see the SCAR but not all the Scars.

Since she’s rarely caught off guard I think her initial response would be to say something mean and clever to try and overcompensate for the shake in her voice and tremble in her hands. I’m sure she’d have a physical reaction - elevated heartbeat wandering eyes increased breathing but she wouldn’t wanna give zuko the satisfaction of catching her off guard (especially not if she thinks he’s working with his uncle to overthrow her)

she’d play it off but I think it’d haunt her, even if she had zuko in her clutches as a prisoner or ally his scars would stick with her. she’d see them in her dreams and when she closed her eyes, they’d burrow into her consciousness and if she starts to mentally unravel in liab like she did in canon and I’m sure zukos scars would be a significant part of pushing her into that insanity. Especially if she doesn’t know what the fuck happened to her brother lol. sorry I started rambling! I hope I answered the question lol! Thanks for the ask!!

[lixies-favorite-cookie]

Sometimes i don't know if i want to stay true to myself or stay true to the masses

if I put my soul out there and people don't like it what does that say about me? But what if I blend in with the crowd and become nothing great? What if it works? What if as I grow and evolve in my writing I change the world? What if I become the next Jane Austin? What if I create a whole new brand of writing all together? What if I succeeded?

But what if I fail?

[bedforddanes75]

? next chapter of guess what is horny ? i don't remember writing this

[disruptivevoib]

Minute drought of CJ art that may be to come isn't cause I don't have interest anymore btw. I simply want to draw pretty women for a bit too FGGFD

And I do have a LOT of art planned, I just need to gear my motivation back up around all of it sometimes!

[transformers-why]

hi yeah yes this blog is dead buts the only one that still has reader insert content on it and I just gotta say like

What the fuck is up the with exclusivity of reader insert shit these days? If it's about a marginally attractive man all of a sudden its f!reader afab!reader (which should NOT BE INDICATIVE OF PRONOUNS????????? YOURE NAMING THEIR SEX, AND LABELING THE PHYSICAL SEX IF IT HAS EXPLICIT CONTENT LIKE THAT IMPLIES ITS GOING TO BE GENDER NEUTRAL AND THEN ITS NOT AND ITS IMMEDIATELY TRIGGERING FOR A LOT OF TRANS PPL LIKE MYSELF??)

Like it was very very common that reader insert content baseline be gender neutral unless requested otherwise that way everyone who finds the character attractive can enjoy it?? SOOOOO fucking fed up with this smh

Fandom space is supposed to be inclusive and ngl like. when you cater specifically and only to one set of pronouns with this kind of stuff its soo deterring to so many queer people

[justablah56]

Davion you fucking faggot ....

[aerithisms]

i think maybe i need to replay rebirth some time to look at this diplomatically because aerith is My Favourite and i might be biased but i think my biggest story critique of rebirth is that i wish they'd done a little more with her. given that this is the game she dies in i found it strange that they didn't push her into the foreground a little more since this is their last real chance to do that with her as a living member of the party (i'm sure she'll show up in some limited capacity in part 3 but dead lifestream!aerith is pretty different to alive!aerith i think).

i know that sounds like a weird thing to say when you consider stuff like them giving her the game's theme song to sing during loveless and the fact that the last chapter is basically The Aerith Movie but there is a strange lack of focus on her in moments where it feels like we should get more from her throughout the narrative. this game pushes tifa and cloud's relationship more in the mandatory story segments, and i LOVED what they did with that relationship in this game, but it felt odd that the same focus was not given to cloud's relationship with aerith throughout the story given that the ending hinges on him being so devastated by her death that he enters a delusional state of grief. and this isn't even a shipping thing bc as far as shipping goes i'm an aerti truther and i feel pretty equally neutral about both cloti and clerith as romances (if anything i prefer cloti!). it's about giving proper narrative buildup to the relationship that the game's tragic ending hinges on - a lot of aerith's most interesting scenes with cloud in the bulk of the game are optional, which i think is a weird thing to do given what the game is building to.

i also wish they did more with her being a cetra! again, the last couple chapters put focus on this but prior to that aerith is weirdly quiet about it. particularly in cosmo canyon, while we do get the lovely bonfire scene, aerith otherwise has a weird lack of dialogue when it comes to the lore dump scenes with the gi and bugenhagen. i expected her to feel some type of way about these revelations but any indication of that is at best subtext and she doesn't really say a lot about it. and for all that they emphasise aerith and nanaki's connection early on as beings closer to the planet, once you get to cosmo canyon there's a weird lack of payoff for it. same with tifa's dunk in the lifestream - i kinda thought aerith might have something to say about it as a cetra, and in fairness i think it's possible she did and the game is withholding some of aerith and tifa's offscreen interactions for part 3 (i swear this isn't even just an aerti cope lol i think the fact that they deliberately show them talking without us getting to hear it might be something they come back to), but i also wish we got to connect with this part of aerith's character more NOW, while she's still here, so it can inform our understanding of her choices and feelings at the end. i just find it kind of a bummer because aerith's complicated relationship to her heritage is a fascinating aspect of her character and her tragedy that i think goes a little untapped in this game, which means it's likely to go untapped in the story as a whole since she's. you know. dead.

[icewindandboringhorror]

The evil slow creep of it being like "haha these will just be quick little side quests, not much effort at all!" and then noticing each one is getting progressively longer than the last, thus no longer being minimal effort.. auGh....

[thismission]

major ofmd s2 spoilers but it’s kind of beautiful in a way to see the youngins call That character dying a “typical” bury your gays trope, in a show that is specifically about queer love filled with queer characters who have happy endings, where both casual and passionate gay affection is shown again and again, and always portrayed as something beautiful and tender and good to be embraced

[beliscary]

need to see pre-confession pining mess dion intensely & obliviously mooning after terence arghhhh