#bro is the reason why i started drawing so much since this october

[alteroreoz]

NO ONE WILL UNDERSTAND MY OBSESSION WITH THIS RED BITCH /AFF

WEEEEE explodes

I lovse him so mxuch

[unlimitedtrees]

the earliest build i have from my very first game, 'Mr. Waffle Lover'

wat da freak ... im about to make Three posts in a row ?? impossible... so Hi. in case u havent seen my Last Big Post, one of my first projects was a game called 'Mr. Waffle Lover'. it started in early 2014 until late 2017 and it went through Tons of wildly different iterations. and also, if u read da last post youd know i lost nearly All of those builds of the game.

Despite losing like, 3 years of my own history, ive managed to find a few builds from multiple iterations of my game, with this one being the earliest iteration i have. this is the Third iteration of the game's development.. and there isnt a whole lot to say about it. it is a Very Basic, Very Primitive platformer made by an 11 year old. this build in particular has only Two levels . i Think more were made at some point, but it's hard to remember. at one point, i made a ""mobile version demo"" of the game for the tablet i had at the time (the game did not work on it), and thats the version u see in the video i posted. For Some Reason, i decided to strip any other level that may have existed in the game and just made it a demo even though i was the Only Person who could play the game.. so i dont have much from this iteration. i Do have an Earlier build that i put on github, but there isnt a whole lot of differences to this demo version.

Anyways, i think, for the rest of this post, imma go a little in depth about the Origins of this game and what it was actually Supposed to be .. click the Read Me thingy if u Dare !!!

So, it all started in 2013 . i was a Bored little creature who liked to draw things and was Deep into Minecraft for the Xbox 360. and one day i created a little comic with a character called 'Mr. Waffle Lover'.. And He Looked Like This:

That's Right , my very first OC is Just a skin from one of the minecraft xbox 360 edition skin packs. this was the skin i played as a lot back then, and 'Mr. Waffle Lover' was my self insert in the comic. why is he called 'Mr. Waffle Lover' you may ask? because i liked to eat waffles a lot. that became his main character trait. Eventually, when the game became A Thing, i would slowly change his design from just a copy of a minecraft skin, first giving him heterochromia and Gloves which spawned TNT, then later giving him a yellow shirt to match with his love for waffles, and then i just make him a Girl (but That is a story for Another Day . .. )

Anyways , on my birthday in 2014 i got a windows 8 laptop, and then in october i learned about construct 2 and decided i Needed to make a video game. ever since i was a fetus ive always wanted to make a video game,, with one of the earliest ideas for a game i remember having is when i was like 5 and wanted to make 'New Sonic the Hedgehog Wii' (a copy of New Super Mario Bros. Wii but featuring multiple colored Sonics).

ANYWAYS , one of the first video games i ever made was Mr. Waffle Lover......... Well Actually, Technically that is not true, as a few months before i tried using some Random in-browser game program that i dont remember the name of to make something called the 'Egg Game'... but it never went anywhere beyond me putting a stock Egg image into the program and then giving up.

my initial inspiration for making a game about the Mr. Waffle Lover character was when i played a game called 'Ms. Splosion Man' on the xbox 360. i thought the game play was interesting but i got stuck at one of the puzzles so i was like 'I Want to make this game but Better and with MY character !'. And So, i thought of the idea of Waffle Lover having Gloves that spawn TNT that he uses to jump high like in Ms. Splosion Man....... but i never got to actually implement it until the 'mid 2015' build that i posted earlier... and i removed it entirely afterwards and just made the game a Basic 2D Platformer for awhile.

so yea. this game was supposed to be just a simple 2d platformer featuring my sort of self insert OC based off a minecraft skin. there wasnt really much to it conceptually... just wanted to make a video game! that's all my ideas were at the time.. the only "Story" this game has is 'Waffle Lover gets his Waffles stolen by some Scientist People and he needs to Stop Them !!!!'. the game eventually got some sort of story over time... but for now all u need to know is that this game is A Game that I Wanted To Make. it doesnt get purer than that.

with the first iteration of my game being my first game Ever, i had No Idea how to do things. all of the small sprites were stretched out to fit the HD screen resolution, making everything blurry. the gameplay was Very Basic and the levels were simple. the HUD didnt even stay centered on the screen... instead it used the 'pin behavior' to be pinned on the player object (which did not work and the HUD would move around the object). And the worst aspect of it was that i did Not know how to make layouts in construct 2 use other event sheets or Objects from other layouts..... meaning every layout (meaning every level) uses Completely Different programming And objects .... Not Only That , but i only had the Trial version of construct 2 at that time.... so i could only use 100 'events'... meaning i could only put So Much code in the game before i reached the limit (and with every level using its own separate events for everything, i ran out of events Pretty Quickly and couldnt make any more levels.

I So Desperately Wish i could show that first iteration of the game with you. it was Very Weird and Bad but it was so Lovely. to say the least.. it was quite the learning experience ! I can Vividly remember me making the very first layout in the game,, with it just being the Waffle Lover sprite moving around a white background and a bunch of badly placed collision objects. it was a Sight to Behold . But Sadly... when i decided to completely redo the game, i deleted the whole project file for it, and its pretty much Lost forever now. the only remains are some random sprites from it i still have... other than that there Was a trailer i made for it once and i Think i released a demo for it once... but both of those are Long gone now.

anyways. for the second iteration of the game i decided to make it an ""HD"" version of the game, using higher resolution sprites and a 3d animated version of Waffle Lover.... However this 3d version is Actually just a minecraft skin of him made in Mine-imator, an Old 3D animating software Exclusively made for making minecraft animations. So , the game had a bunch of bad tilesets and a badly animated prerendered sprite of a minecraft skin for its player character. i dont remember much from that point of the game's development other than it did not last very long and it looked Funny. i dont even think it got past one level... as i struggled with making high resolution art (i only had ms paint and construct 2's built in image editor, so, yea). i Think everything from that era of the game's development is Gone, HOWEVER i THINK i might have the files for the Mine-imator animations Somewhere... maybe. i Think i saw the files on my old laptop for some mine-imator project but i was unable to open them and i dont know if i saved them anywhere so. Idk.

and now, this leads us to the Third iteration of the game... which is the one i showed in this post. as you can see in the video, i finally figured out how to make pixel art look not blurry. i also figured out how to make different layouts use the same event sheets. i even figured out how to make a HUD... incredible ! other than all of that, there's not much to say about it. it's just not as silly looking as the earlier iterations were... and its not really Fun to play. its not even all that janky.. its just basic. i worked on it for awhile, but then i gave up on it and moved onto the mid 2015 iteration.. and the rest of the game's history is a story for Another Time..

if there's anything i can say about this old game.. it's that you can Definitely see how much ive grown since then. whoever is reading this, i Really hope this is not your first introduction to my work.... cus my stuff nowadays is Insane compared to this... a lot has happened in the like, 8 years since ive started game development. and i have so much stories i want to share,,, i hope i can keep sharing those stories with you. oh and also, if you Really have never heard of my work before... um.... Play UNITRES Dreams on Newgrounds dot com. LOL!!!!!!

That is All i want to talk about for today i think. I Think. hope my posts are comprehensible to u ! Oh , And Before i forget , the build of the game in the video i posted is in the ProjectWaffle google doc archive ... and the Earliest Build i have is on github. check it out If U Wish !

[ask-luigi-balloogi]

Going on Hiatus

Finally got around to addressing this. As you can see the blog isn’t as active as how it used to be. This blog has been around since October 5th 2018 and over time I’ve gotten less active due to many reasons.

Read below if you wanna know why it hadn’t been as lively as it was before, but in short, this blog will go on Hiatus until I feel like picking it up again, or will be left here as a little memo of when I made my first ever ask blog and how it has progressed.

The ask box and submission box will be closed and cleared, but I have read all the asks and I’m very thankful of the kind messages sent in there!

Please take care while we are away. Thank you for all the good memories, friends made, and for all the love, support and care surrounding this place!

- Vinny 

This blog was made when I was super invested in the Mario bros fandom (I still am in the fandom, just not as actively doing any content on it as of current), so as time went on, It has been difficult to keep myself interested in drawing and answering asks due to lack of interest. I’ve seen all the asks and I’ve read all the nice messages you’ve all sent! I still want to thank you all for the little bit of joy me and my friends were able to bring during our time here.

Since starting university, I’ve been having trouble managing my time and had to put most my focus on doing assignments and tests. It’s hard juggling between work, answering asks and keeping this blog active.

After not answering asks in so long, I find myself a little anxious coming back to answer them since like... its been a long LONG time and I feel bad answering them super late. It also takes so much time now to even answer or come up with responses, even with the icons I made I still struggle.

There’s also burnout as well since irl I’ve gotten so busy. Mostly with life in general and managing online presence with my real life isn’t my forte.

[phoenotopia]

2020 October Update

So... we've launched. And our launch was... actually kind of... bad...

This is a dev blog, so I'll speak on it. But before that, we do have the game's steam page up. If you're anticipating the PC release, please do visit the steam page and add it to your wish list. It would help us a lot.

VISIT STEAM LINK

...

So what didn't go so well?

1. We launched in Nintendo's Americas and Europe territory. If you've been following the release, you'd know that America got the game first. We didn't move to launch in Europe at all since I thought the EFIGS languages (English, French, Italian, German, Spanish) were pre-requisites for Europe. By the time I learned that this wasn't necessarily the case, and attempted to course correct, the damage was done. We had half the allotment of keys to do outreach, and maybe some European outlets that would've covered us, did not.

2. When the game launched, rather than a victory lap, what we experienced was more of a public lashing. We did get some reviews that praised the game highly, but just as many reviews lampooned the game for its high difficulty or other failings. I've since released two patches (or 3, depending on how you count it) to address the difficulty. A lot of overnighters. If you recall in the last blog post, I thought it'd be a good start if we got 20 or so reviews on Open Critic. But we've only 8 as of this writing, and the aggregate score isn't so hot. So that's a fail by my metric.

3. A publisher reached out to us because they were interested in physically printing the game! Yay! But... to advance our talks, they wanted to see the game's sales numbers to ensure that there's a good chance their investment could be recouped. And unfortunately, the game's sales numbers are pretty low. They backed out :(

Some hard lessons were learned. The biggest lesson for me concerns how well we playtested the game. Looking at the original playtester list, it's a short list. You may recall from a previous blog post that our ability to test was severely hampered by technical limitations. Add to that, a lot of people on this list are objectively really achieved players. We're talking power ranked in Smash Bros, regular tournament goers, and people who've played and bested every Souls game. And as the maker of the game, I am most blind to the game's challenges.

Now, I'm definitely more of the opinion that you prioritize PC development first. I still have some reservations about some stages of PC development. But if you do PC/Steam first, you have the great benefit of being able to do Early Access, which gives you access to a greater testing pool. I now view it as an invaluable part of the equation. If we had been able to do Early Access for 1 or 2 months before release, we probably could have ironed out most of the game's difficulty and balance problems. Hard lessons, indeed.

There were a lot of other notable events that occurred over the past 2 months - the travails of press outreach, realizing my own limits as a developer, feeling defeated and getting back up again, etc. There's too much stuff to chronicle or go into detail. But it wasn't all bad.

Some good things did happen...

We got a publisher to publish for Japan! It came as a huge relief, because clearly, we don't know what the heck we're doing.

The publisher has been an invaluable source of information and feedback. They've recommended some changes to the game to improve user experience. Some of these changes I was hesitant to do at first because they concerned systems I thought integral to the identity of the game. But after trying it, I have to admit, they're good changes.

So a Japanese version of the game was moving ahead. And it looked like that'd be it. I wasn't planning to move forward with any other language translations due to the game's low sales and our funds being depleted. 

But, I was approached by a translator who urged me to move ahead with translations. He told me he was willing to work for only a small price initially and then be paid the rest after from a percentage of the game's sales until the cost of the translation was paid in full.

I was surprised translators were willing to work under such a model since it's entirely likely the game's current low sales trajectory would continue and they wouldn't earn back the full cost of translation. But I was also flattered they were willing to take a risk with me. After that, I approached some others with the same hypothetical deal, and long story short, we're now moving forward with French, German, Spanish, Portuguese and Russian translations. As for why these languages in particular, they were languages for whom I had contacts (because they reached out to me at some point in the past). And also because they were deemed more likely to be profitable based on their home country's gaming market/buying habits. I'd be personally happy to have my native language be represented, but it's not expected to be a profitable territory. But if the game does better in the future, it may justify the costs of translation. There could be a chance!

The plan right now is to get the game supporting these first round of languages and then to patch that into the Switch version as well as launch the PC version with these languages - all in December. A lot of things need to align for this to occur, so a delay isn't out of the question. It'll be busy... I'll update the blog again in latter half of December, probably near the game's PC launch date... OR to announce a delay. Let's hope it doesn't come to that.

Fan Support

While the past two months have been grueling, one good thing remains constant - fan art! Thank you everyone who submitted. It means a lot to me and the team!

Big thanks to Pimez who's taken on watching over the reddit community as moderator. He also combs the other communities and makes sure I see every new art piece. Despite juggling his own life and all these tasks, he still found some time to draw.

Pimez's piece reminds us that just because the new game's out doesn't mean we can't still celebrate the original flash game. The jail dog is a dog found only in jail and only in the flash game. I imagine Gail is just tossing a stick, and they're playing fetch.

A new artist to this scene æv draws both the Phoenix logo AND a super cute picture of Gail playing the flute. So precious, you want to pinch her cheek. Even the Sand Drake is enthralled!

Another new artist, beet4ppy arrives on the scene with two pictures! One features a no-nonsense battle-hardened Gail looking stoic and tough! Kinda reminds me of Vinland Saga actually. The other, a more cheerful group composition - I must say I'm a big fan of Fran's classic anime-style eye!

A returning artist, Cody G, returns with a picture depicting the tribulations of cooking. Gotta love Gail's frantic expression! I've heard the complaints, which is why we've added an option to slow the cooking mini-game down. An improved button font is also on the way.

Gamesing with two undertale x phoenotopia crossovers. Thomas being a robot builder makes sense taking a role similar to Alphys. But why is Alex dressed like a clown? Perhaps there is a hidden meaning here... 

A new artist, Warotar, draws both a pooki wearing Gail's clothes and Gail wearing pooki clothes. Awww. The pooki is a bit scary - it kinda reminds me of a tragic event in a certain anime. But the Gail is adorable!

POL#5655 submitted this one to KM's discord which made its way to me. Here, a stylized Gail appears unnerved by the dark red eyes stalking her in the background. Are they bats or something more sinister?

A new artist, MilesCPW, arrives on the scene with three rare well-vectorized arts! Love it! One scene depicts Gail balancing a bomb on her head - that's a speedrunning trick I only learned about recently after someone emailed me a video O_O

The other drawing gives us new insight into Katash - he could actually look cute if he wasn't trying to kill you.

And the bees... Okay, this one got a chuckle from me :D

A returning artist roccy_chair draws this heart-warming scene from the beginning of the new game. Aww. Mika doesn't get much screen time for story reasons, so it's nice to see her represented.

UnrealWorld_32 returns with another drawing of Gail in Panselo, this time capturing a more idyllic time. I like the tranquil nature of this piece. And Gail does in fact play the guitar, denoted by the guitar in her room.

Returning artist shafiyahh draws a nice portrait of Prince Leo - looking regal and princely. I like the storybook art style of this piece. It made me immediately think of "the Little Prince" - one of my favorite books actually!

Negativus Core returns with a beautiful group composition of Gail and the gang - flying from a Switch shaped window - totally sensible considering the game is only Switch right now. As usual, I'm impressed by Negativus Core's use of challenging angles to frame a more dynamic shot of the characters. Great job!

And it wasn't only artists bearing the banner. I'd like to give a big shoutout to everyone in all the game's little communities (from the reddit to the discords to this tumblr). I've seen this community help newcomers with gameplay and walkthrough advice, discussions, updating the wiki, and so on. It does bring a smile to my face. Thank you everyone!

[devourer--of--books]

I’m mad about Hunter being written off and here’s why you should be too

You: wasted potential.

Me, an intellectual: ah, Hunter and Nicola’s friendship

I have strong opinions about Hunter.

Yeah, you heard me right.

Look, I have strong opinions about many, many, things. Today, we are taking a dive on Hunter and Nicola. First I’d like to blame this post on Kate, as I decided to make it after I tried to articulate why Hunter being written off TCY makes me so angry in a huge comment under her latest OTK post but it ended up being too big and messy so I deleted it. I don’t think I’ve seen anyone elaborate on it, so if you were also mad about this, bro, not to be intense, but like, are we soulmates or...??

Before anything else, as I usually do with my text posts (which I haven’t done in a while, opsies), I shall provide you with arguably unnecessary context. Sit down, grab yourself some snacks, make yourself at home, I’m about to rant you into oblivion.

Since I know many accounts weren’t around back then, I’ll also give you the socio-political vibes of the time period, as any self-respecting half-baked essay written last minute should.

POV, you’re 14/15 year-old me. You flat iron your hair, you don’t use sunscreen, you think you’re straight and your school makes you wear those horrid low rise uniform pants, but at least you can somewhat do your make-up decently now that you grew out of your emo phase.

The year was 2016. The Ever Never Handbook has just come out. You re-watch the handbook trailer on youtube for the fifteenth time. Everyone is losing their minds over OcTObeR 14tH and “a student named Agatha ~ now Agatha of Camelot~”, as well as the portraits and the teasing for a new SGE book. Quests For Glory is announced just a few days later. 2016 tagatha ship week happens a few months down the line. 

This is the SGE Tumblr Fandom Peak.

Now, let’s start right there, two-ish weeks after the release of the Handbook, right as the QFG announcement comes out.

We all knew Soman wasn’t done with SGE after TLEA. He definitely had been teasing something in his weekly blogs (lol, remember when I used to check the blog, what a time to be alive) and once we got the ENH, we got quite lot of info to theorize. Here’s some that I can think off the top of my head: 

- The coven was going on a mission to find a new School Master.

- Tedros and Agatha were struggling financially in Camelot but were going to get married soon (even if Sophie doubted Tedros would have asked Agatha yet, as of the time of the Ever Never RoundTable, but we’re taking that with a grain of salt, because she was written to sound jealous here, and I won’t acknowledge that kinda of bs, she is happy for her friends okay, we’ve been though this-)

- Sophie had completely remodeled the School For Evil and was getting on Dovey and the rest of the faculty’s nerves (except for newly hired history teacher, Hort).

- The rest of the supporting cast had just graduated third year and was to be off in quests soon.

- The School was now accepting applications, and two of those applicants are Nicola and Bogden.

Now, I’m not even gonna bring up how it was mentioned in a video in EverNeverTv that Bogden would be an important character in TCY, and yet, I can’t think of anything relevant about him other than the fact that he knew tarot apparently, or how his application had more personality than him in the entire series, or how he was basically there so we could look at him and Willam and be like “oh, representation”, or how he’d be a good insight on how Galvadon perceives Sophie and Agatha post-TLEA, or- I’m just not gonna.

Oh, no. Instead, we are here to discuss Nicola’s application.

If your memory is foggy, let me remind you:

Nicola’s application is submitted, according to the Handbook, by her friend, Hunter. For convenience sake, we’ll assume Hunter is a guy (I’ll tell you why Hunter being a guy works better for me in a bit), but his gender is not mentioned anywhere in the ENH. I don’t think he has been gendered in any version (correct me if I’m wrong) or if there are any pronouns for him during TCY, but I’m fairly confident he isn’t mentioned at all.

Hunter tells us he is applying on Nic’s behalf, as she’d never apply for herself. He mentions that she is more or less the Galvadon equivalent of an activist for women’s rights, founding a rugby unisex team and campaigning for pants instead of skirts for the local school uniform, as well as having a feminist sounding book as her favorite book. It’s heavily implied that she is a jock, as he lists that, if marooned on a desert island, Nicola would want to have a soccer ball, a hockey stick and a set of dumbbells (“and none of this 5-lb nonsense”) with her.

Upon asked why Nicola should go to the school, his answer is: “because there’s a greater place for her in the world, where she can learn a girl’s true worth, and I don’t think it’s here.”

Then you have a note from (*rolls eyes* *suppresses a gag* *tears hair out*) the very late, long, long gone, absolutely dead, August Sader, telling the Deans to accept her application, despite having no reason to do so, as Nicola was to “play a crucial role in it’s [the school’s] survival.” Dovey and Sophie agree to flip a coin to decide which school will take her, which Sophie must have lost, as Nicola is accepted into the School For Evil.

By now, I think we all agree that Nicola was done dirty. If you check my QFG re-read you’ll notice that I complained about her there. As I had to go though her introduction chapter again to make this post, let me tell you why: Nicola wasn’t written to be likeable.

She simply wasn’t. That’s the one conclusion I can draw. Whether that’s intentional or not, I can’t tell, but the backlash she received was fairly useful, as it meant Soman could write her off the main story without much backlash from his target audience (aka, not us, pesky pretentious older readers).

The Nicola I was introduced to, not only in the Handbook but on her trailer for QFG was not the girl on QFG. 

Nic is there to be the smart  girl™, and while I do appreciate having a character who is a bit cocky about their brains, it just doesn’t work well there. Because her bond to other characters and the way she earns their respect feels so weak, she just comes across as pretentious. Characters like Hester and Agatha, who are supposed to be smart, feel dumbed down to show us how clever Nicola is. Agatha is supposed to be the resourceful thinker and Hester wanted to be class captain, you bet she studied like crazy, she probs knows every fairytale in existence. 

Then you add that to the (*rolls eyes* *suppresses a gag* *tears hair out*) Nicola and Hort fiasco and Nic feels like a weirdly written OC insert.

Handbook!Nicola sounded like a smart jock kind of character (read, more Gryffindor than Ravenclaw). Handbook!Nic was a Reader who read the tales as a hobby, but her favorite book is not a tale, it’s a non-fiction book (as far as I can tell). She might not be the fairytale expert, but she sounds like a practical thinker, as sport requires strategy, which is not Hester’s strong suit, given she is rather impulsive, or Agatha’s, given she is often unwilling to make hard decisions due to her Good nature and her own insecurities. C’mon, Handbook!Nic would have taken one look at Hort and sent him running to hills, because she would be able to smell his bs three miles away. She’s no one’s replacement, least of all Sophie’s (whom she probably would not have gotten along with (at least they got this part right) given Sophie’s “my prince will sweep me away from an ordinary life” phylosophy). To be honest she doesn’t sound like she’d be interested in dating at all.

But this post is about Hunter right? Let me remind you, Hunter is not mentioned in Nicola’s introduction, when she talks about her life in Galvadon. Canon!Nicola tells us that she has two brothers who want to inherit her father’s pub in order to sell the place, but Nicola is close with her father and likes working there to some extent, even if she has bigger ambitions. She believes her brothers sent her application as a way to get rid of her.

Back when I still had some faith that Soman had an arc for Nicola that included resolution, I had my theories as to why she wouldn’t mention Hunter: maybe he was to appear in later books and they’d have a huge backstory explaining their friendship, as well as a dramatic confession that Hunter sent her application because he felt Nicola deserved to live an adventure, and Nicola would either realize that she was meant for something more or that she wanted to live a quiet life, honestly either would be nice. I would have taken anything. Truly, if Nicola’s k-pop boyfriend in the OTK epilogue had been replaced with Hunter, I might be able to hate it less.

Especially if they came to the (*rolls eyes* *suppresses a gag* *tears hair out*) school wedding as friends. Because you know what?

We are starved for male-female friendships in the SGE universe.

Tedros’s only female friends (all his friends in general) are Agatha’s friends (who all tried to get rid of him at some point, save for maybe Dot) and his actual friends are all dead (Bettina/Chaddick). Hort could be counted as Agatha’s friend, if only he didn’t bash her every five seconds like a moron (he literally pitched the idea that Agatha should be executed by Tedros in OTK, just because he was envious or her relationship with Sophie (not jealous, envious, because Sophie wasn’t his to begin with)) over his delusional sense entitlement of Sophie’s affections (which I hate, but as this is not a Hort-bashing post, I won’t get too much into), but the coven, Beatrix, Renna and co. would not touch him with a stick. Merlin’s friendship with Lady Of The Lake is gone, and Dovey is dead. Rhian and Kei both had that frenemies thing with Sophie in ACOT/beggining of OTK, but I think it was supposed to be romantic? It wasn’t ew (I hate Rhian but he’s also wasted potential, and so was Kei, whom I liked, rest in peace). Japeth hates women for??? Whatever. Willam and Bodgen are such background characters I could not care less about them. The new students weren’t memorable enough for me to remember their names. I think this about covers the main male cast.

There’s a lack of male friendships too, but we kinda have (*rolls eyes* *suppresses a gag* *tears hair out*) Tort and whatever was that rushed Tedros/Chaddick friendship.  Rhian and Kei were gay friends (yeah, right, sure, very platonic). Tedros and Rhian could have been friends if Rhian redeemed himself, but otherwise no. Tedros and Filip… gay. Japeth literally killed Rhian, so also not very good friendship between brothers. Hort has no friends, because Ravan would so not be here for his bs. Willam and Bogden are a couple and (*rolls eyes* *suppresses a gag* *tears hair out*) so were Aric and Japeth, I guess.

Still don’t believe Hunter was wasted potential? Okay, let me tell you what my ideal Nicola arc would be, mixing Handbook!Nicola with some canon!Nicola and including Hunter.

- Nicola is the one inheriting the pub (once she gets married), despite Galvadon’s pre-TLEA sexism and conservative views, because she is her father’s only child and her brothers are actually her older half-siblings from her mother’s previous marriage.

- Her mom died at some point early in her childhood. Not a childbirth tho, because Callis, local witch gynecologist (have you checked my post on this yet? no? you should) was there for her, even if it was a high risk pregnancy because the mom was already older.

- Because of that, Nicola’s father actually sells bread to Callis for cheaper prizes, but don’t tell the elders, shhh

- Anyway, because her mom was gone so early, Nicola was raised by her dad, brothers and by the employees (mostly men, as I don’t think it was all that common for women to work jobs in Galvadon) of her father’s pub. Due to being a girl, most guys weren’t willing to befriend her (sexism, am I right), but because she was a tomboy she had difficulty bonding with the other girls at school, even when they weren’t outright hostile (cof cof Sophie). 

- Example: she and Belle had a tentative bond over their love of cooking, but often ran out of things to talk about and the conversation fell flat.

- Which is how she ends up befriending Hunter. 

- Hunter is the only boy in a family of many girls and his father works all day. He has a good heart and is rather emotional, but he always feels like he has something to prove, which leads him to being rather impulsive. Both Nicola and Hunter love sports and are very competitive people. Once Nicola gains his respect, he feels very protective of her and often feels the need to stand up for her, even if she doesn’t need it.

- Nicola knows Hunter feels overlooked in his family, so she is always inviting him over and taking care of him, keeping him out of trouble. Her father begins to see him as his own son, and soon he spends more time at Nicola’s house than at his own.

- Everyone thinks they’ll get married some day. His sisters tease him mercilessly about it, and so does Nic’s father, but frankly, Nic and Hunter see each other as family.

- You can bet Hunter is the one teaching Nic about periods after asking his sisters, so she wouldn’t have to suffer with Galvadon’s horrid Sex Ed. (go check the Callis headcanon’s okay, give me clout, that it my favorite post I’ve ever made)

- They tried to kiss once. Nicola vomited and Hunter gaged.

- Hunter is Nicola’s number one supporter and fan, 100% had those gender-equality pins she made for her campaigns all over his bags and jackets.

- Since most wedding matches are arranged by the elders before girls even graduate, it was settled that Nic and Hunter would get married to each other and then inherit the pub. It would of course, be a secretly platonic match and they would suspiciously have no children (Nicola even had a plan to visit Callis to get a potion for infertility, just in case the elders wanted to check on her... okay, I’ll stop).

- Hunter doesn’t tell her, but Nicola knows he wants to marry for love and have a family of his own. She tries to talk him out of marrying her, but he insists that he would be doing it out of love for her, even if not romantic, because Nic didn’t deserve to be matched up with some stranger she barely knows who would no doubt be less tolerant of her more radical views.

- She tells him it’d be fine for him to have a affairs then, but he insists he would never do that to her, because people would talk about Nic if that was the case and her reputation would be ruined.

- The night of Sophie and Agatha kidnapping Nicola tells him she would rather be taken to the School than to stay there and make him live an unhappy life.

- Hunter is horrified (remember, everyone thought going to the school was a fate worse than death) and makes her promise to never treat her life so fickly.

- Sophie and Agatha get taken, come back, but during Tedros’ reign of terror in Galvadon, right before they return to the Woods, Nicola’s father grows very very sick.

- Nic thinks he’s going to die, and she frets, not only because they’re close but also because she can’t inherit the place if she doesn’t marry Hunter. But, well, she sort of always knew, but now that feels very real, she thought she had some more time before that.

- They set a date for the wedding, but thankfully, Tedros and Agatha’s escape ends up causing the ceremony to be delayed.

- By the time the new date is set, there’s no more elders and Stefan is now mayor.

- But just because he is the mayor doesn’t mean the law and the sexism is gone overnight.

- Nic’s father is getting somewhat better, but she is still very worried about him, because of his old age.

- Once SGE starts having applications and has been proved to be, well, somewhat safe, Hunter suggests that Nicola applies, but after the scare that she might lose her father sooner rather than later, she tells him she can’t bring herself to leave him.

- Hunter doesn’t want her to throw her life away, specially now knowing that in the Endless Woods there were people like her and that progress would get there before it ever got to Galvadon 

- (He also wants to not marry someone he views as a sister, pls).

- So he files her application in secret.

- Nicola gets accepted, upon Sader’s request and Sophie’s bad luck, into the School For Evil. She and Sophie still don’t get along, the Evil castle rejects her and she gets pushed to Good, becoming an Ever, but she’s only staying until Christmas, because she is worried sick about her father.

- She thinks the application was a plot from her brothers because she doesnt think Hunter would ever betray her trust like that, after she specifically told him she wouldn't go.

- There’s no Hicola, instead, she and Hort become friends and she talks him out of his delusions with Sophie, because as much as Nicola dislikes her, Sophie was a girl too, and deserved to have her feelings respected. 

- She also punches Hort into giving up his envy of Tedros and Agatha while at it, because she is just that efficient.

- Everything else up to OTK can be pretty much the same because I can’t remember what happens, other than everytime Nicola is smart girl™, it’s not “because she reads”, but because she is practical. 

- Example: on the boat scene where she very pretentiously sasses Agatha for not saying hello to her (canon!Nicola, girl, she just suffered six months of loneliness at Camelot because Tedros shut her out and is now on a quest to save her happy ending, probs didn’t get much sleep, maybe cut her some slack) and then tells her how to sail a boat (despite the fact that there are no boats in Galvadon and I’m sure you can’t just read Peter Pan and learn to sail a boat, unless I did it wrong or something, maybe the storian version comes with a crash course). Here, instead, Nicola presses Hort (who is a pirate’s son) to remember literally anything to help them (therefore making him not completely useless on this quest), and he does and they tell Agatha and she’s like sure and does it.

- Now, in OTK, I literally can’t remember where Nicola was for most of it and I read that book not too long ago, so I’m worried. 

- Okay, so, have the Knights Of Eleven actually serve some purpose, include a scene where Tedros and Nicola stress-play rugby and get her some internal conflict.

- Nic now loves this world. She just spent the last few weeks fighting to protect it. She is now a Knight, and she loves the adventures and the new friends she made. Can she really go back to Gavaldon to take care of a pub? Well, she needs to, doesn’t she? That’s what a good daughter would do.

- After Japeth’s execution, Nic goes straight home.

- Her father’s condition is stable, as he is being treated by Hunter and his new wife.

- Oh boy, Hunter has some explaining to do.

- Nicola is furious that he broke her trust, but at the same time, she’s happy he’s happy and well, Hunter what do you have to say for yourself?

- “Damn, Nic, nice armour- ouch, my arm!”

- Apparently, since Nicola was taken, Stefan approved a law for people to be able to leave their inheritance to whomever they wanted. And since Nic was gonna be at the Woods, her father was more than happy to leave it to Hunter. Of course, unless Nicola wanted to stay at Gavaldon. 

- Does she? She’s not sure.

- Hunter and Nicola attend the tagatha wedding at Camelot (what, like I wasn’t gonna fix this part?), Hunter is Nic’s plus one.

- There, Hester, Anadil and Dot show her Sader’s note, and ask her, not to become School Master, but to become Dean Of Good, because she would be perfect for the new brand of Good to match Sophie’s Evil. You know, since she is all for gender-equality, good manners, practicality and was particularly good at dealing with Sophie’s bs.

- Since Tedros has the Storian Ring, the pen doesn’t need actual protection, well, not more than it can get from Nic and Sophie.

- Sophie herself insists that Nicola accept the position, not because she doesn’t want to be alone at the school now that Hort and Dovey are dead, no, of course not, since when did Sophie ever need anyone, she was just asking cause… cause Nicola looked lonely. The pretty boy who came with her was not her boyfriend, was he? Sophie was prettier than him anyway. Who needs a boy when they can have her?

- Whether they become a couple or not, I’ll let you decide.

- Bonus: years later, Hunter’s eldest daughter is accepted at the School for Good. Nicola is her godmother, and her favoritism shows.

There, if nothing else, the reason you should be mad about Hunter and the Handbook in general is because this didn’t happen.

[thecrenellations]

Return of the Thief Notes, Part One: The Book of Pheris, Volume I

Notes from my first read, October 2020. (Part Two | Part Three | TaT)

Contents:  "So, so, so” watch, Costis watch, swearing, trashing the king’s attendants, being objectively wrong, boundless enthusiasm and love 

I promise I’ve had more developed thoughts since these often incoherent ones, but I’ve enjoyed having these notes to refer to - for sentimental reasons and for  entertainment, so here they are, for others who enjoy liveblogs and/or being whisked back in time to their first read of this wonderful book.

Format: Page number. My thoughts (Context?)

Dedication, Table of Contents, Exordium:

There it is – to Sounis

Exordium – vocab #1

Interregnum?!? Alyta?

Pheris!!!

Yeah I love him from the first page

MOIRA

MOCKING COMMENTS HELP! Gen lives!

A new level of unreliable narrator

Moira, messages of Gods, Pheris, messages of __

Wtf is going on in this study? A zoo?

high king vs great king vs annux?

okie dokie dude

Chapter 1

1. Susa – Costis

2. Infirmity – who gets to be hero/tell story (I started reading right after the book launch, in which mwt spent some time talking about her writing influences and decisions connect to this question - Pheris isn’t her first disabled protagonist and storyteller, of course, but it was lovely to meet him properly directly after hearing her talk about it. Book launch foreshadowing part 1...)

Melisande?

Is this why he wasn’t taught to read?

3. Always the summer

Bees!

4. Hunting cat… hm…

Ok … shrine … 😬

5. Once again we start with a disaster or having to flee

Which Eugenides precipitated

Bite!

Little monster :(

6. Falling…

:(

7. :( :( :(

His purpose? D:

8. YIKES

Chapter 2

9. Hello there! (Gen!)

Massive chair?

10. CRACKED WATER JUG (amphora motif???)

11. Triangle from seal!

Gen that’s rude to Pheris :( (“He will fit in very well with my attendants”)

Wait. This must have happened before ACoK! (nope)

12. :(

Xikander … never made an impression before

How old is Pheris? (lol)

13. Philologos come thru!

Royal closet reappears!

14. Hello weird secondhand scene!

He is Eugenides

Marina…

15. Petrus? GALEN? OH SHIT! 

Is this why Galen was called? (nope)

16. Hell yea Petrus

Miras’ golden balls oh no

All these previously unnamed sucky attendants!

17. Ula – goddess of hearth and healing

Ok … Galen … or a god? Eugenides????? (why did these options occur to me before Mr. Shows Up At Your Bedside At Night himself)

18. Finally the attendant floor plans I crave + hunting scenes!

19. EXCUSE ME he slept through Sounis + Eddis wedding!!!

Again – high king!

20. So Ion is beautiful … hmm.

Yeah … Sejanus has facets. I like it.

21. Clearly no one would know what king would do … lol

Don’t mind me just sorting the attendants on a spectrum of awfulness!!!

22. SO SO SO – ION!!!!!

How many fucking attendants are there and how many are on my hit list!

Is “the necessaries” bathrooms or like … him stealing? (just the bathrooms ... the Gen-Pheris parallels were really getting to me at this point)

:(

23. OH MY GOD THE UNIFIED CREST

Also … frogs. Frogs.

24. Big day for Gen huh

Definitely an aura of Something as he writes about Gen

25. HELLO EVERYONE

26. Sorry Kamet, Pheris does the physical descriptions better. They’re beautiful

I’m blacking out at Eddis and Sounis

27. Jesus Christ. The bear.

Cousin time!

Under the table is the new up on the roof!

Uh… twin imagery ….

Gen’s feet!

Jesus. The matching

28. Cleon … wtf? A cousin?

A trial for Sophos?

Show! Us! Sophos’s! Shoes!

29. If u throw things out the air shaft you might hit the king

Was it a chicken?

Lol nvm the guy at night is Gen. That is … very sweet

- Showing up at night

- Accent

- Complaining about Petrus

- Swearing

- One hand

I am judging Costis and Sophos for not describing the paneling in Gen’s room!

Chapter 3

30. Was it a chicken?

An earring huh, good hand huh

31. Literally screaming “NO!” at Gen. Don’t joke about dying! I am killed by Gen on annux day. This is. My boy. Yes he is perfect. Yes he will refuse to get up. I love him. I died on page 31

Philologos is still the best of them

32. Dancing bear indeed

Always the powdered gold

Ruby!!!!! <3

Aww a smile!!! <3

Pheris he likes you!

33. They both love invisibility and lost it … I cry

Erupt like the sacred mountain excuse me!

OR WORSE return to bed! Lol

34. He’s Eugenides when he’s talking to Attolia

Ouch hero talk

! from Irene!

My queen!

Hey Phresine!

They way we do <3 he’s hating it but he’s so comfortable with her

Sister and bro mention! C’mon!

I love them

EYEBROW

35. Honestly that’s a yes (“I have no idea what you mean, my queen”)

It’s so cute they hang out in the morning … like how long was it even since they’ve seen each other lol

:( tough walk for Pheris

Is it prophecy time?

Lol how long does this construction take?!

Also … she’s pregnant, huh? but no one knows (nope)

Is befriending someone weaponized as a prank count for Gen’s enemies to friends list?

Also SHOW ME the magus. I know he’s here!

36. Pheris excuse me, why not recreate this!

Lol cast off language of history indeed

Feel the thrum of the goddess!

EXCUSE ME… a minor goddess? Mystery goddess? Or Philia?

Oh Gen

37. Well, Gen, someone is having a worse day than you.

Damn, how far we come.

Aww Sounis, babe, I love you and so does Gen

[drawing of the four of them sitting in a row]

38. Artadorus???? Pomegranate?

39. HEIRO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! A friend! Also lol. Two smiles, for Pheris and Heiro..

40. Yesss Melheret joke in action.

Costis has left tho right?

Jesus, Melheret

SHE GAVE HIM A HORSE (I COULD NOT DEAL with this entire conversation, but then again I could not deal with this whole book.)

41. I love them all so much

“on that horse, you will look like a king” I can’t with her sense of humor

He sure did say that

I feel like I’m missing something with the fight on foot thing … remembering battles?

Helen called him Gen!

Sophos stop talking about yourself and bringing apricots into everything lol

Lol these bystanders don’t know how lucky they are. Nor does Pheris, yet

42. She’s protecting him

Also … Gen … you didn’t want to be a soldier.

43. Guards have capes

2 startled men … hm …

Oh Gen. The fucking brutal echoes…

44. :( :( :(

Gen tell your wife you’re sick!

The attendants are so dumb

45. So, so, so :(

Tell who? Petrus?

Wink!

Yes?

46. Bleeding! Salt! Lemon! Heck no! What is he, a piece of meat?

Oranges?

47. “savoring each bite as if it were my last” ... Same … but with this book

Hmm… Alyta! Goddess of the gentle rain! (despite this “hmm,” I did not put the pieces together)

48. Oh no Teleus! And someone?

Aw he realized <3 lemon water

49. Gen eat your broth lol

50. I love them.

Ion’s really trying to make up for what he did that one time

51. Without the approval of the great goddess HAHAHA

I love them. Cousin time! Growl?

Idk whether or not to be reassured, Gen.

Wow Cleon I do not like that. Also didn’t he die? (...)

Comma (“I am not, Eddis”)

Go smack him!

52. Gen I love you.

Helen I love you.

He’s so bad at self care but I love him

Chapter 4

55. love that our narrator just disappears and reappears

56. Attolia’s brother’s bedroom? Yikes. Ominous. A detail in a story we’ve already gotten, different every time <3

57. fucking attendants. 3 good ones. Medander you were beneath Costis’s notice before but I hate you. Costis didn’t have time for you or Xikos or Xikander and nor do I

58. interesting pawn talk!!!

59. <3 Pheris :(

The Gen comparisons though

:( :( :( :(

60. flamboyance <3

Cemphora bush

Bees

61. I love him

62. I love them

Also lol “Your majesty?”

63. Name … hm … (“I have deliberately omitted [my tutor’s] name here”)

64. more twin imagery I swear

WAIT … it was his birthday! Not just Annux day?!! Gen was born in late summer???

Attendant list thank you

65. laying it all out there, huh … (that one Gen quote)

Lol they’re the same but Pheris likes horses

66. Insellia! Hello nice to meet you

67. Gen that’s mean. (“He is hardly even half of one.”)

68. Coleus leves???

“I am Eugenides.” <3

Gen why

69. Gold cups???? Hmmmmm. Also lioness. Def invoking Costis. (they’re probably not the cups, but STILL)

Earth….

70. Moira! Hi!!! Rainbow shawl!

Like a rabbit!

Pester!

I’m … very sad he uses his Attolian accent with Helen

71. Aaah so good

Mortals

Moira knows another messenger?

Does he think he can’t die in battle?

72. hmm are they WRANGLING?! (Galen and Petrus and my Fire and Hemlock word association)

Kill that pastry Irene I love you

morning training with his … guard? (Is that the whole guard or a guard? Costis senses tingling once again.)

73. Oh gen.

Ouch! (“to send people to their deaths and not risk my own is contemptible”)

Is she implying he’s paying Therespides?

74. Interesting Cleon plan. So many doubles

OUCH. (“Only if he comes back from the dead.” I assumed Lader had died in the war; it’s a different ouch now. I love that they both accidentally say things to each other that poke old wounds, and it’s not a big deal but it’s also not dismissed! Their relationship has come so far, and I love them so much.)

75. Verimius – Lavia – Celia??? Somebody is queer in there!

A GUARD

This scene confuses me. Xortix? Layteres? Aris! but dice thing is less political … so maybe? (just wait....)

76. So many reasons to hate Medander

Hey Costis! You exist! KoA happened!

Gen is just … still so uncomfortable and miserable. He chose, he has people, but still.

RIP Clopius also WHAT

77. Lol Hilarion’s grand statements

78. Yorn Fordad Hello!

Luxurious mustache

The mighty Pents?

Besin Quedue – she’s coming 4 you watch out

79. RIP Baron Hippias

Chapter 5

80. Spring! Plays! Cenna!

81. Oh dear

Oh dear

At least they said he was pretty

83. ?!? :( wine

Uh oh. Stockpiling

85. What even.

AAAAAAAAAH COSTIS

86. Omg Irene. Hissing. I love her.

Also … Gen’s the viper

Also this scene was written by Pheris.

Damn.

87. oh no.

What better man

She fucking quoted Howl. I love them.

Also, bees (this scene killed me)

90. Falling?

Oh shit

Also … Juridius and Pheris, Susa and Costis (comparing demands for information)

93. oh my god (IT’S THE WINDOW SCENE)

Oh my god

Uh

94. She! Called! Him! Gen!

I love this and it scares me

Lol Chloe

Irene you learned from her though

95. D:

96. :(

97. water stuff

98. what the heck

OH NO (Quedue scene)

Hm

100. yikes

Omg

Wow.

102. yikes yikes YIKES

103. a blade has protruded from his chest (tbt to The Thief)

jesus

106. shit

Did Gen hit him?

108. lol Phresine

109. lol

I want genuinely every character’s reaction to this shit

Chapter 6

111. what the heck Gen.

112. like a god [crown doodle]

114. Perma?

116. Gen. Gen. Gen. Do not.

117. AAAA (god intervention)

122. Juridius to Dite

124. bye Iolanthe and Ileia! Tell us about Caeta and Silla.

125. did not expect so much Ion

Chapter 7

127. Fryst god of winter

She laughed!

They’re so married

128. OH SHIT (Costis ship is sighted and I remember what’s about to happen next)

Interesting timing

He rode the horse home?

131. Beauty and good, beauty and kind

134. The gods’ goodwill

Keep them safe <3

135. Is that his MOM?!! Wtf (it was!)

Pheris steal those earrings!!!

RING! SMASH BOX!

137. AMPHORA EARRINGS (and flowers)

138. I love Phresine

139. Why do I feel like all the game birds are pigeons

140. meanwhile Gen’s been hanging out with Kamet. Shit. I cannot.

WELCOME HOME BOYS!

HELL YEAH KAMET ATTEND THOSE MEETINGS!

RELIUS COME THRU

141. lethium soup! The reversal

Safe for you

142. of course he knew <3

143. Kamet time! I love him. We get to see Kamet!!!

Also … echo of Gen’s notes on Mede

145. very handsome. … gaycostis vindication (referring to @costis’s url at the time and this post. Little did I know what else was to come in the next chapter and then a few months later with the adaptation news...)

Do you know who I am?

Chapter 8

147. Of course he’s a cartographer

A favorite huh

148. of course she didn’t tell us his age!

149. the angsty window staring I crave

Music!

151. adventure, huh

I do have a soft spot for Melheret

152. concerned about amphora gift

153. Glad they can be well and united in spite!! (Gen and Melheret)

154. Pheris loves math and I love him

155. Hello Teleus. Hello olives

Lol Relius is not into math

156. pigeons. Inkpot!

157. yeah honestly. He tortures people. He was NOT tortured by the king

159. lol (“I have noted the elective nature of certain behaviors” ... I love Relius and Pheris.)

160. The Invitation! I <3 it

161. EXCUSE ME WHO

Legarus!

FOLKS HERE WE ARE (I cannot overstate how wonderful it was to read this page. I did not know who the poem was from, and “Someone loves me very much, even with all my faults” is even sweeter to reread, but it’s just ... his confidence is so different from the tentative consideration of a new philosophy of trust and love we see in KoA. And there is subtextual queerness in the books before this one, some more apparent and some more subtle (and what is obvious to one reader may be subtle or invisible to another, in these books especially), and there is the attendant love triangle a few chapters back, but HERE - here, Pheris acknowledges the real feeling and love in Legarus’s disastrous relationship and tells us directly that his lover was a man, here he seamlessly makes it clear how bi and poly Relius is, and he quietly ties these relationships and realities to his growing understanding of the world. It’s not subtext. And there’s a lot more to come, but this page really hit me, and sort of promised the “more to come” while assuring me that what had come before, more subtly, was there. I used to have heteronormative readings of both these books and myself, and when Thick as Thieves brought them crashing back into my heart after years away, I knew better about myself, and I saw that - or the possibility of that reading -  reflected in the new book, and it was such a good surprise. It meant a lot, and this page meant a lot, and that is why I’m writing a small essay to accompany this note.) 

Lol wow

162. Where are you traveling, man (this question remains)

163. Fuck you, Orutus

164. Stole an inkpot!

165. the map!!! (Kamet’s)

166. I love them!

167. The Math Master hmm

Am I an oracle (Nope! :) )

[ghostwoo]

“We Scare”

Mentions  →  AJ Siciliani

Date → Saturday October 17, 2020 — 3:43 PM

Setting → Santa Monica Pier

Synopsis  → ( Part 1 / 3 ) — Sunwoo scopes a target.

— october 17, 2020 - 3:43 PM

“Chy! C’mere girl! C’mere!” Sunwoo pats their thigh enthusiastically, gaining quick attention of the large black lab mix who races back to the heels of their feet. They lean down to promptly reward the dog with a scratch between her perky ears. Chy was a little nosy—like just now poking her nose a bit further from their spot on the bench than Sunwoo preferred—but she was a good girl who listened always. It was why Sunwoo didn’t mind dog-sitting ginormus Chy for their neighbor when the time came for her owner to travel. Sunwoo was a cat person, but Chy was probably the only dog that made them reconsider their stance. 

Plus, Chy wouldn’t question why they had paused at this exact spot for the fourth time on their walk this week. 

Leash in one hand and a Capri-Sun pouch in the other, Sunwoo lazed back while taking a bored sip through the thin yellow straw, comfortable with their chosen spot. The juice made them look a bit adolescent, but otherwise gave no other impression than a guy on the pier taking a break with his dog. Sunwoo was completely immersed in the role. 

Remember that one cakepop shop that tasted like shit on the pier? They're putting it right there, right next to the route 66 sign.

Their eyes drift over to find the marker, the Route 66 sign. It was a staple of the pier for families and photos. At first, Sunwoo entertained the sign as part of their upcoming display— it really  could use a burst of color across the black and white lettering. But the more they visited the spot the more Sunwoo realized how much of a hotspot, and a waste of time, coloring over it would be. Right now Sol didn’t want to make any statements, Sol simply wanted to have a little fun.Tagging the pride and joy of the pier would start something Sunwoo didn’t have much of an interest in continuing. It just had been some time since they had left art along the pier, and figured for all the people the bar would bring in, something new would be fun to entertain the masses. 

Then, they drift their eyes to their spotlight target—the glimmering, three story high bar so lovingly named “Monsters Inc.”. 

Sunwoo doesn’t stare at it for too long, attention pulled downward when quick flashes of brown catch in the corner of his eye. Chy’s tail was whirling like a mini helicopter propeller, excited to see the few people who were passing by them. Amused, Sunwoo laughs to himself quietly. He too liked this hour of the day to be on the pier. Lunch rush had long ended, the sun was in the limbo between afternoon and evening, and the crowds were more scarce than a weekend or weekday after 5 PM. Shaking their head at Chy’s antics, they reach down into the pocket of their jacket to pull out a miniature sketchbook. It was time to get to work.

Camera, camera, blindspot, camera—blindspot. Sunwoo didn’t directly look at the cameras they knew were loyally stationed around the businesses of the pier, but he knew where they were. On his first visit to the pier he took a route to note each. The second, he took a longer trail to gauge the scope of the area they surveillance, and on the third he surveyed the spots one last time to be sure of their blind spots. Now, finally, on the fourth visit he could iron out his plans. How big could he make his hit? Would he have much room to move or would he have to kiss the wall as he worked?

We’re working for a better tomorrow...today! — We’re Monsters Incorporated!

Monsters Inc. wasn’t a movie Sunwoo would’ve watched by themselves, but watching it the first time alongside AJ made it a bit more appealing. Colorful characters, dialogue that actually made them laugh, and an engaging storyline within a world vastly different from the  norm was the recipe for Disney charm. In their first watch, Sunwoo watched with appreciative skepticism. They weren’t able to take too many notes then because of their company ( ‘—bro why are you taking notes during a Disney movie??’ ) but that was probably the best thing. On Sunwoo’s second watch ( after quietly checking it out from the library ) they were able to make their notes. Lightly teasing the now empty Capri-Sun pouch with blows into the packet, Sunwoo flipped through their sketchbook that was filled with different types of lettering, sketches, and practice drills of stylized handwriting. Toward the back were the sketches they’d made during their own movie watch. Notes and arrows pointing around exaggerated caricatures of the movie’s main characters Mike and Sulley. Sunwoo had even done quick sketches of the villain, Randall, who he admittedly liked seeing the most. They glanced up from the sketchbook to take a look around and spot the area.

The three story building surprisingly fit in well with the other buildings along the pier. It looked new, but it also looked like it had stood a part of the piers kaleidoscope of businesses forever. How obnoxious. Still, Sunwoo realized that as of today no cameras had been installed on the side of the building that had this pale bare wall. It was a bar, surely it would have cameras at some point, but right now Sunwoo welcomed the invite. Maybe Santa Monica neglected the area for him to come make it prettier.  

Sunwoo squinted at his sketches, now lightly chewing on the straw in his mouth. If they were honest with themselves, their personal favorite were the more grotesque sketches they had done. Mike and Sulley looked terrifying, as they should be for monsters, than Disney’s quirky and cute designs. But, Sunwoo had a little fun too with a more cute design inspired by the prequel that Sunwoo too had watched with AJ. The Bar Crawl was a family-friendly event. Sol could show their nicer side. Hit the bar with their cutesy design to entice families and kids to scramble to the building for pictures and completely defeat the purpose of an adult oriented bar. Sunwoo put a hand over their mouth to cover their suddenly tickled smile at the thought. How frustrating would that be? Kids crying because they can’t understand why sweet Mike and Sulley were on the side of a building they couldn’t get into, parents irritated that they have to explain to their kids suddenly what a bar is, and the business owners becoming frustrated because all of these families are hiving around their Very Adult bar and deterring actual of age customers who probably would stroll in for business if not for the sight of babies and children. It was painfully tempting. 

Suddenly a bark from Chy bark jolts Sunwoo from their deep meditations. Eyes wide, they look to see what’s startled Chy to uncharacteristically open her mouth, only to see two security guards zip by on their bicycles. Maybe a bit too close to both he and Chy’s comfort. 

“God Chy, you scared the hell out of me. I wasn’t expecting that.” Sunwoo put their hand on their chest taking a deep breath. They looked in the direction the two guards went, Chy still unsettled and barking to make sure they’re long gone off. Sunwoo watches her for a moment, settling down from the jump but then the idea hits.

We scare —

Chy’s still barking, and though the reason why is long gone she continues. It’s something she wasn’t expecting, something that she’s not happy with, something discomforting. But her barking got his attention. It was sudden, it was jarring, it made him aware.

With the thought, Sunwoo flips back to their harsher drawings, and how out of element they were to the eye. Their eyes follow the lines of their work a number of times before looking back off to the empty bar.

—because we care.

They still had some time to figure it out.

[srprincess]

Hey look, it’s me! Still on my bullshit!

Chapter 18 of the Spookydoo Au

Fictober (Hahaha remember October? We used to leave our houses back then) Prompt 20 - “you could talk about it, you know”

Shitty breathlessly made his way back to the group and handed the, now handily dog attached, leash over to Lardo. “Haven’t fuckin’ run like that in years,” he managed to huff out as he leaned against the building, hunched over.

She smirked, “Maybe next time you'll go running with me when I ask.”

“Not likely,” Shitty told her with a wheezing laugh. He tilted his head toward the dog. “Next time he bolts I’ll let you can chase after him though.”

“You’re too kind.”

“I assume this is Sammy?” Will squatted down to dog level and held out his hand for inspection before giving the wild haired dog some pats, and getting an enthusiastic face lick in return. Laughing he told the dog, “nice to meet you, little fella.” He wasn’t sure, but he thought he might have heard Nursey mutter about it being a nicer welcome than the one he had gotten.

“That's what we're calling him right now,” Lardo told Will, while she gave the dog a couple of scritches behind the neck. “Had to call him something, and he didn’t have any tags, so-”

“-Figured, Samwell crew trip- Sammy,” Shitty explained, breath thankfully returned.

“I like it,” Nursey said, sneaking his hands in for a couple of pets of his own and asking the happy dog, “Is Sammy a good boy? Oh yes, he is.”

“You and your nicknames.” Will shook his head fondly. “So you just got him? Unconventional souvenir, I’d say.”

“Well, he’s not actually, technically, ours,” Shitty admitted.

Will looked from the dog, with his shiny new collar and leash, back to Shitty and Lardo. He pulled himself back upright, suddenly suspicious. “You didn't steal him, did you? Please tell me you didn’t just make me an accomplice to dognapping.”

“No! Not stolen, found,” Lardo rushed to assure him.

“Rescued even,” Shitty insisted.

“When did you two have time to rescue a dog? We just saw you last night.”

“You know how we were at the cemetery, right? Well, we weren’t getting anything there, even looking in the right spot, so we wandered around a little more and there he was. Hanging around to edges of the trees, a little spooked but I think he was hungry enough not to run. We stayed longer to lure him out-“

“-earn his trust!”

“Yeah, Shitty, earn his trust,” Lardo agreed. “And then this morning we took him into-“

“-Petcetera.” Will finished, as things clicked into place. “I did hear something about you two being over there earlier.”

Of course. That explained the phone call that morning. He had been fishing, Will frowned at the pun even though it was hidden silent in his own head, to see if he could take off and leave the dog handling situation to someone else. At least he had called before taking off for his own fun, but still. He couldn't have just been upfront about it? Said why exactly he was calling? Maybe ask if he'd mind handling this for him? Ugh.  

It was probably for the best he didn't hang around that guy much anymore because the next time he saw him he was going to have to murder him.

Okay, maybe not murder. Murder was messy. Also incredibly illegal.

Sink his boat? Hmmm. No. Less messy, slightly, but still illegal.

Let it drop to his mother about how he heard her son was sneaking around with that girl from the island again? Oh. Yes. That would do. Almost guarantee a talking to at their next family dinner. Sweet revenge for duty shirking.

Will knew that his own mother would have said eavesdropping wasn't something to be proud of, but damned if it didn't come in handy on occasion.

Oblivious to the vengeful thoughts racing through Will’s mind, Lardo went on, “Yeah, Petcetera, you know it? The waitress when we stopped for breakfast said it was the best place to try and find his owner.”

“The only place really.” Will told her. “That's our vet, animal control, adoption, and pet supply store all in one. Used to be run by Old Owen, but he passed it on to the younger a few years back.”

“Makes it easy I guess, keeping everything together. Anyway, no chip but he was going to check around. See if anyone is missing him or find him a family. Owen’s supposed to get back to us in a couple hours so we can drop him off either way.”

Will blew out a breath as he pulled himself back to standing. “About that...I can almost guarantee he’d already run through all his guesses about who this little guy belonged to before you even left the shop. He is animal central after all.”

“Maybe he was just waiting to find a place for him then?”

“Or he already found one.”

“Then why-” She looked at him with confusion, and checked her phone screen. “He hasn't called yet. You think we should go back over there?”

“No point, he was headed out fishing.” Will sighed, “probably can’t even see him from shore by now.”

“But if he found a place-” he could see when it clicked in her head, even before Lardo said, “Oh. You’re saying us. He found us.”

“Yep.”

“So he just fucked off?!” Shitty asked. “Who does that?”

“Owen.” Will deadpanned.

 “Look, in general, he means well. He cares about the animals. Tries his best, usually. If he didn’t, then the business wouldn't have been passed to him. It's just, sometimes,” Will shrugged, “I don't like to be mean or speak ill, but-”

“Really,” Nursey scoffed, “you don’t like to ’speak ill’? Huh, could have fooled me.”

“Ha-ha funny.” At least Will hoped he was joking. Regardless he had to admit facts. “Fine, Owen’s kind of a flake. He’s been an expert at accomplishing the most while doing the least ever since we were in school. He is good people though. He wouldn't have left the dog if he wasn't sure that he would be taken care of. Assuming that's the reason for the call to me.”

“So, just like that, we have a dog now?”

Shitty looked at her, seeming excited at the possibility of them keeping the dog. Lardo didn't seem entirely against it, as evidenced by the frequent pats and scratches, but did have a look of someone on the edge of overwhelmed at the idea. Not quite sold. Yet.

“You could talk about it, you know?” Will told them. “You’ve still got, what, another day or two here? Take some time to think about it, talk it over. Either way, it’s up to you. And don’t worry, even if you want to leave Sammy here when you go, I’ll make sure he finds a home and is taken care of.”

 Shitty and Lardo looked at each other.

“It’s not like we planned on getting a dog anytime soon-”

“But we didn't plan not to either-”

“You did spend all that time earning drawing him in last night-”

“And you always say it gets lonely at the house when I'm working so long.”

As if he knew they were talking about him, Sammy sat back and wagged his tail. Like he was trying to look his absolute cutest, turning his head back and forth and panting, as they discussed his fate.

“We do have a decent size yard-”

“Big empty yard, that we're doing fuck all with.”

“Truth. Could be nice-”

“Coming home to this cute little happy face?“ Shitty stooped down to the dog’s level and looked up at her hopefully.

“Yours or the dogs?”

Shitty smiled wide up at her, “Both, of course!”

 “I meant what I said, don't let this pressure you. Either way, I’m going to have some words with Owen. If you need longer to think about it, I can-” Will started to offer again.

He wasn’t particularly looking for a pet, content to throw the odd stick across the beach for any loose dogs that escaped for a run. All the fun, none of the responsibility. He just wanted to make sure they didn't take on something they'd regret, most people had more time to work up to and decide on this kind of commitment. Then he saw Lardo and Shitty look down at Sammy one more time before smiling at each other, and he knew the decision was made.

“You want to come home with us little dude?”

Sammy hopped eagerly between them, and just like that it was settled.

“Congrats,” Will told them, “looks like you two just got a new dog.”

“For better or worse,” Lardo laughed out.

 She made sure Shitty had hold of the leash and then turned to Nursey. “Need to borrow you real quick.”

“Oh. Just let me-”

“Now.” She dragged a wide eyed Nursey away by the arm. She started before they were quite out of earshot, “You two? That looked very, well, I hope I didn't interrupt anything.”

Nursey ducked his head down before answering, which had the unfortunate side effect of muffling his voice, and then they were too far for eavesdropping.  

Will sighed, hoping he wasn't in for an interrogation of his own, but Shitty seemed happy to go on about the dog. How the pup had been shivering and scared when they found it, but a bag of his favorite jerky - a worthy sacrifice - was enough to bring him in.

“Think the tent might be lost cause though, some things you just can't clean out. Bitty’s gonna freak. Thing’s green couch bad, bro.”

Will nodded, like he had any idea what Shitty meant by that.

 A few minutes had passed and then Nursey walked back with Lardo, Will tried to catch his eye. He wished for the psychic ability to find out what she had asked him. And know what the reply had been. But he wasn't a mind reader and all Nursey did was smile. Well, at least he still looked happy, not any worse for the wear, so that was likely good. Almost reassuring, he told himself.

 “You tell him?” Shitty asked Lardo. She looked back, lost, and he added, “About Chow?”

“Nah,” Nursey answered for her. “Holster called earlier though. Said Chowder, ummm, got called into work early. Jack and Bits running them to the airport?”

“Yeah, Chowder and Farmer said to give their goodbyes and they'd see everyone at the-” Shitty faltered, “uh, conference? In October. You're still planning on going, right?”

“Course I’m going. Cait’ll be there too?”

“Should be, said she'd try her best at least.”

“Nice,” Nursey said. “So, no car?”

“Not for a couple hours, after lunch at earliest.” Lardo told him.

Will pushed back his questions about what sort of conference would have all their varying jobs called together, and instead offered up his truck to run them wherever.

“Your place again?” she asked. “Ransom said he had somethings to show you. Could get him and Holster over too.”

“Yeah? Sure, why not.” Will told her as she was already dialing.

“Tell them to grab Sammy’s food from the room,” Shitty said, leaning over her. “And us food. Sandwiches!”

“From that place by the pier!” Nurse loudly added. “With the peppers and-”

“Could you let me-” Lardo huffed, as she shoved them aside to get some quiet to finish the call.

Will looked at Nursey in disbelief. “Hungry already? You, literally, just rejected muffins.” He gestured at their, now cleared, table.

“Wasn’t muffin hungry. But sandwiches though.”

“Whatever.” Will rolled his eyes. “Think they could grab a club for me too then?”

“Hmmm maybe. I don't know if they should. You literally just rejected a muffin.”

“Oh, fuck you.” Will shoved him lightly. “Shut up and get in the truck.”  

To Lardo, Shitty, and by extension Sammy, he said “You guys-”

“In the back, got it.” Shitty offered Lardo a hand, but she had hung up and was pulling herself up and over the gate already. Sammy quickly followed over with an excited bark and a leap, and they were off.

[demaury]

Only You (chap.1)

For Lucas, life has always been rather bittersweet, between shitty family situations and crappy self-esteem overall, but his eighteenth birthday marks yet another dramatic turn that no amount of cynicism could have prepared him for. (ao3 link)

February 2019

Scrap, scrap, scrap.

The pencil was grazing the paper sheet with so much precision and regularity that Lucas had no trouble supplying the missing sound of the lead. His eyes were focused on the hands of the customer sitting outside, only tearing away when the guy set the pencil down to roll himself a cigarette. Of course he was a smoker. February had been relatively lenient so far, but it was a bit too early in the year to spend more time outside than necessary, unless you were a smoker. He didn’t know how long he had been looking, but a lifetime of noisy canteen tables had given him the ability to tune his loud friends out whenever he wanted to — perhaps too effectively, because now he had three pairs of eyes on him.

He was forced to refocus his attention on his own table, tearing his eyes away from the street. Last time he had tried to find interest in the conversation, it had been about some party the guys wanted to go, since apparently Arthur had game with a friend of Marine’s, his platonic soulmate. Nothing that called for his contribution, from what he knew, but maybe he had missed the part where it got interesting.  

“What?”, he asked blankly.

“He’s hot,” Yann simply commented with an approving nod.

Lucas followed his gesture, directed towards the guy sitting outside.

“Super hot,” Basile confirmed, pausing from slaughtering a viennoiserie to spare a glance.

“I was looking at the drawings,” Lucas said, eyes falling onto his now lucky-warm cup of coffee.

“So you can actually see anything from here?” Arthur deadpanned.

Lucas’ eyes travelled between the three of them, but the insistence they had to look outside made him turn back one more time. It was the worst idea he probably ever had. Because yes, the guy was beautiful, but he was also staring right the fuck back at him from the other side of the glass. Lucas was sure he could feel his eyes burning holes into his skin — not in a bad way, but in a totally, a 100% fucked up way.

Lucas’ head snapped back the other way, so fast he nearly broke his neck in the process. Smooth, Lallemant, real smooth, he thought sarcastically.

“He’s looking at you,” Basile remarked unhelpfully and far, far too eagerly to Lucas’ taste.

“No he’s not,” he gritted out, scowling. “He’s looking at us, because you are fucking creeps. Stop staring!”

“Says the one who was staring first,” Arthur snorted. “Bro, you weren’t even blinking.”

“I was looking at the drawings,” Lucas hammered, whisper-screaming. “Can we just collectively ignore him now and drop the subject?”

It could have come in handy for him to know what the conversation was about before it came to this, maybe he would have had higher chances to redirect it on safer grounds, but as it was what were the odds that they had changed subject since the last time he tried to care?

Yann quirked a brow, apparently far from being done. “So you’d just pass on him?”

“I’m not passing on anything, he’s just a guy,” Lucas retorted.

“Right,” Arthur drawled, extending the ‘i’ obnoxiously. “Just a guy. Staring the fuck at you. Plus, our love lives are a lot less miserable than yours.”

“I just got out of a relationship, I’ll let you know,” Basile retorted haughtily.

“And I’m not interested in dating these days,” Yann shrugged.

“Then why can’t you just understand that I’m not interested either?” Lucas huffed, ignoring Basile’s intervention to focus on Yann.

He profoundly hated the sudden tone of the conversation, all too aware where this was going. He wished he was wrong, but as soon as Yann sighed and leaned forward to rest his elbows on the table, Lucas knew it wasn’t the case.

“Because it’s about your soulmate,” he said, “not about you not wanting to date.”

“It always is,” Arthur quipped in his cup of coffee.

Lucas’ stomach tightened, and he instinctively averted his eyes.

Today had been an empty day. Not bad, not good. Just empty, an hour carrying him here and the other carrying there. It wasn’t all that bad, it was even days like these that Lucas craved the most — those where he was just feeling numb enough not to care. Of course now it was a lot more difficult not to care when his three (supposedly) best friends had decided to meddle in, especially when he had asked them not to.

“Look, we just don’t want you to keep moping forever,” Basile added.

Arthur nodded, shifting towards Lucas who was sitting next to him. “He’s right. When a cute guy looks at you, you just go for it, that’s how it works,” he completed with a casual shrug.

“Yeah, just go talk to him.”

“I’m not going to do that,” Lucas retorted coolly, feeling his calm crumble with each passing second. “I’m not going to talk to a guy who looked at the four of us once, and I certainly don’t need your fucked up advices because you’ve got no idea what I’m going through!”

“Because you never let anything out,” Yann protested.

“Why should I?” Lucas exclaimed. “So you can tell me to forget about it and just move on?”

“Well, I don’t know,” Basile admitted, looking rather embarrassed, and Lucas’ eyes jumped on him. “It’s been what, five months, now? Maybe- Maybe that’s what you should do?”

Arthur and Yann both glanced at him, mouthing a quiet ‘dude’ with a shake of their head. Lucas opened his mouth and closed it, nothing coming out at first. “How about you start shutting up about your damn soulmate, Baz?”, he snapped. “’When am I going to meet her’, ‘what does she look like’, ‘what if I never see her’-”

“Lucas–,” Arthur tried, but Lucas snatched his arm away when he squeezed it lightly to distract him.

“No, I’m fucking done hearing you all complain,” Lucas protested, perhaps louder than he should have judging by the embarrassed looks of the guys. He shook his head and stood up abruptly, grabbing his backpack and making the cups on the table tinkle together. “‘Oh no, my soulmate’s Emma’, ‘oh no my soulmate’s a platonic one’, ‘oh when am I gonna find her’, but mine is fucking dead, so excuse me for making a big deal out of it!”, he exclaimed bitterly, throwing the last words behind his shoulder as he was already on his way out.

*

4 months and a half, 21 hours and 36 minutes.

138 days. Over 3334 hours.

That’s how long he had been miserable. Ever since that horrible evening, last October. He and the boys were having predrinks at the flatshare, before hitting a college party organized by PACES students, and the memory of his own laughter made it all the more painful in retrospect. They were not quite a month into their first year at uni, and Lucas was still buzzing with the excitement of it all. In complete honesty he couldn’t have cared less about his studies; the major he had picked after his BAC, economics, was far from being his thing, but the silver lining had been his soulmate. As Yann had pointed out to him shortly after getting his soulmark last summer, new faces all around at uni meant more chances to meet his ‘Eliott guy’. And Lucas? Well, Lucas couldn’t decently argue with that logic, really. Every new party was another occasion to casually hope for something to happen — he had just never thought that ‘something’ happening would be so fucking painful.

“What are you looking at?” he remembered laughing in-between two rounds of video games and his second beer, after spotting Arthur’s eyes on him for quite some time now.

Arthur had barely looked up, frowning behind his glasses instead. “Dude, I think… I think your soulmark’s fading.”

Lucas had glanced down at his arm, exposed by the tee-shirt he was wearing, heartbeat rising as he jumped up from the couch to the closest source of light in the room to get a better view. A rush of adrenaline after that, and Lucas’ brain a mess of emotions making his head spin. He remembered clutching at his own arm, as he could do nothing but stare at the six letter name growing fainter and fainter despite his pleas, until it was barely noticeable at all and that the guys had no more comforting things to come up with. No one went to the party that night. Instead, Lucas found himself cradling his arm most of the night, hoping and begging for it to be just a mistake. For Eliott’s name to come back, thick and black and bold letters all over again — but it never did. His soulmark had remained the same, a faint scar in the shape of a name.

He hadn’t sought other testimonies online this time. He hadn’t felt the need to. Soulmarks fading was about a soulmate dying, everybody knew that. He didn’t need people recounting tearful stories, nor did he need anyone to instill hope where it had no place to be. Whoever Eliott was, whoever he had once been, it was over for him — for them. It had been terrible from there, and he wasn’t going to pretend otherwise just to make his friends feel better about it. They were still at an age where these kind of things were a big deal, for better or for worse, and he knew he’d still be looking out for Eliott everywhere he went just like Basile did with his soulmate, if it weren’t for a fucked up destiny taking too much pride in screwing him over.

“Excuse me?” tentatively called a voice next to him.

“What?” Lucas answered sharply, head snapping to the side.

The scowl on his face turned into a sarcastic twist of his lips accompanied by a dry snort. Of fucking course. The artsy customer from the café was standing here, roughly two meters away from him. There was only one fucking reason he’d be here, and this fucking reason in particular was a three-headed dumbass he had known since high school and was now dying to throw under the next bus.

“They are assholes, alright?” he spat. “I don’t know what they fucking told you and I don’t fucking care. I’m not interested, period.”

“You’re not interested,” the guy repeated, slightly cocking an eyebrow. Lucas thought he was on the verge of exploding if he was so much as trying to insist. But instead, the guy reached for a rolled-up cigarette he had tucked behind his ear. “I was just gonna ask for a lighter, but it’s always nice to know where everybody stands I guess.”

He was smiling.

Lucas’ cheeks heated up from crushing embarrassment and he cast his eyes away, staring at his hands and deflating instantly. It was definitely not the worst day of his life, but he could feel it make a solid entry in the top 5.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled. “I’m not smoking.”

The guy shrugged. “Alright.”

Please, leave. He was the only one beside him waiting at the bus stop, if he really needed a lighter it wouldn’t magically appear in Lucas’ pocket. Just leave. Fighting with the guys had sucked the last bit of energy he had left in his body, he didn’t have any more left. But instead the guy sat on the metallic bench. Ultimate fuckery if there was one. He didn’t have any idea what he had done in a past life, but he could only guess it was bad. Lucas tried to look away and absorb himself in the silent contemplation of the sidewalk, but all he could think about was that he wanted to come home and crawl under the covers and forget that day even happened at all. It wasn’t easy when the guy sitting next to him was a constant reminder of the shitty afternoon he had just spent, between boring classes he didn’t give a fuck about, friends who had forgotten the basic meaning of ‘supportive’ and, of course, last but not least, lashing out to a complete stranger for trying to hit on him and who happened to be so far out of his league that they didn’t even play the same sport.

A metallic flick drove his attention toward the lighter the guy was currently trying to make work, with a concentrated frown on his face and the cigarette now tucked between his lips. He kept flicking, once, twice, ten times, until Lucas couldn’t take it anymore.

“Usually when they don’t work the first five times, they rarely work the ten other times after that,” he said.

The guy glanced at him, then shrugged. “I guess I’m a dreamer then, uh?”

He put the cigarette back behind his ear and pocketed the uncooperative lighter in his brown jacket. Lucas took his eyes away and glanced at the other end of their street, where his bus was slowly (but hopefully steadily) making its way in their direction.

“Rough day?”

Lucas risked an eye in the guy’s direction. “You don’t have to do that, you know. It’s fine.”

He shrugged one more time. “I don’t mind,” he said, smiling a little even.

Is he fucking kidding me? Lucas thought instantly, taken aback. He found himself staring, blatantly, unapologetically, as if he was seeing him for the first time. He studied his insanely intense grey eyes, and the messy but effortlessly good-looking brown hair making wonders to his sharp cheekbones. He’s hot, he was forced to admit to himself, just when the bus reached their stop in a concert of screeching and hissing sounds. But somehow, his inner voice suddenly sounded a lot like Yann’s, and it made him angry.

Angry and upset and fucking outraged.

“Well, I do mind,” he articulated.

Before the guy could even say something, Lucas snatched his backpack from the bench and strode towards the entrance of his bus without a glance back.

[buoyantsaturn]

I’m in Hell (8/?)

summary: Halloween is the ONLY thing that happens in this chapter

word count: 5,571 (104,865 total) ((finally broke 100k!!!))

read on ao3

It was Reyna’s last day in New York, though rather than going out and doing as many touristy things as possible, Nico and Reyna stayed back at the Solace household for the day. She had all of her belongings packed up just after lunch, which left her and Nico sprawled out on the couch for the next few hours until she had to leave to catch her flight.

“Is this what you do all day?” Reyna asked.

“Not usually,” Nico replied, and then tipped his head back in thought. “Well, I don’t know what I usually do anymore, not since I graduated and now that Bi’s back in school. And Will’s back to work. God, I’m going to be so bored when you leave.”

A moment passed between them until Reyna said, “Do you think you would want to have another kid?”

Nico frowned. “What? No, why?”

She shrugged. “Another kid would definitely keep you busy. Have you talked to Will about it?”

“About what, being bored? He’s got plenty to worry about besides me being bored.”

Reyna rolled her eyes. “No, you idiot, about having another kid. Does he know you don’t want another one?”

Nico sat up a little straighter. “No, we haven’t talked about it. Do you think he wants another kid?”

“You’ll have to ask him.”

“What do I do if he does want another kid?” Nico continued, already starting to spiral. “What if that’s some kind of a dealbreaker for him?”

Reyna sighed. “He would have told you already if it was that big of a deal. Just talk to him when he gets home - he loves you, and he’s going to support your choices. You have got to stop spiraling so fast, you know? Especially when everything can be solved with a quick conversation.”

Nico huffed. “I know, I just-- I don’t want to ruin this, you know? This is the best relationship I’ve ever been in, and I want to hold on to him for as long as I can.”

Shortly after Will and Bianca returned home from work and school respectively, Reyna packed her bags into her rental car and drove herself back to the airport. Bianca was sent to bed sometime after dinner, and as soon as Will had finished tucking her in, he grabbed his fiance by the hand and dragged Nico into their bedroom.

“What are you doing?” Nico asked with a laugh as he watched Will flop back onto the bed.

“Trying to cuddle with my fiance,” Will told him, pouting and reaching his hands out for Nico. “Babe, come on!”

Nico snorted and grabbed Will’s hand, only to get pulled off his feet and onto the bed. Will rolled himself halfway on top of Nico and buried his face in Nico’s neck, sighing contentedly and wrapping his arms around him as best he could in that position.

“I feel like I haven’t had any alone time with you in so long,” Will complained. “I’ve missed this.

“It’s been a week, maybe,” Nico pointed out, running a hand through Will’s hair.

“Feels longer,” Will muttered. “Did you have a nice time with Reyna before she left?”

Nico hummed noncommittally.

Will lifted his head and looked at Nico with a furrowed brow. “Did something happen?”

“No, we just sort of talked about...stuff.”

“Are you being intentionally vague because you think it’ll get me to drop this?” Will asked. “Because you should know by now that that won’t work.”

Nico sighed. He patted Will’s shoulder and shifted slightly until Will moved off of him enough that he could sit up and hug his knees to his chest. “I don’t think I ever told you that I never wanted kids.” He ran a hand through his hair, his eyes dropping to the sheets between them. “Don’t get me wrong, I love Bianca more than I ever thought it would be possible for me to love a kid, but the thought of having my own kid--” He shook his head. “I don’t know how you did it. Even with your help, I just… I don’t think I could.”

“Did you think I wanted another kid?” Will asked gently. Nico shrugged, and so Will sat up to wrap an arm around Nico’s shoulders. “I don’t. I never really wanted kids either, to be honest. Bi ended up as more of a...pleasant surprise, you could say.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, she’s technically my sister, you know?” Will reminded him. “I didn’t even know she existed until my dad showed up at my mom’s house one day when I was in med school, and he asked me to babysit for a few hours. I should’ve realized he wasn’t coming back, considering I don’t even think he gave me an excuse for why he couldn’t take Bi with him wherever he was going. I took Bi to the police station to get somebody to find my dad so he could take her back, but the police officer said she would’ve ended up in foster care until they found him. Honestly, I didn’t want anything to do with her, but I wasn’t going to force her into foster care either, and then soon enough...she just felt like she was mine, you know?”

Nico finally looked up at his fiance. “Apollo didn’t fight back when you adopted her?”

“He never even showed up to court,” Will replied, shaking his head. “I think Bi was probably a year and a half, maybe two years old at that point, and the judge decided that since I’d been taking care of her for so long already, and since Apollo couldn’t even bother to show up, that all of her parental rights should be transferred to me.” He sighed, leaning against Nico heavily and pressing a kiss to the side of his head. “I guess everything happens for a reason, right? If I didn’t have Bianca, then I never would have met you.”

“I’m sure we would have found each other,” Nico said softly, leaning back against Will just as much. “True love always finds a way, right?” Even as he said it, Nico couldn’t keep a straight face at the cheesiness of his words.

Will snorted unattractively in Nico’s ear. “That was so dumb.”

Nico pouted up at him. “I thought you loved me.”

“Of course I do, but that doesn’t change the fact that you just said a very silly thing.”

Nico turned himself to face Will fully, though Will’s arm around him didn’t allow Nico to go very far, which left Nico kneeling at Will’s side. “Oh, so now I’m dumb and silly?”

Will tugged him forward until Nico fell against his chest. “I love you so much. It’s dumb how much I love you. My love for you makes me silly.”

Nico rolled his eyes and tried to shove himself away from Will. “Oh, god, okay! I get it, now get off of me--”

“Get on top of you?” Will grinned at Nico’s loud complaints, and tipped them to the side until Will was laying on top of his fiance once more.

“No, you’re crushing me!” Nico moaned, tossing his head from side to side as Will tried to pepper his face and neck with kisses.

When Nico finally settled down, Will set his forehead against Nico’s and smiled down at him. “I think I’m going to change my name.”

“Huh?”

“When we get married,” Will clarified, “I want to change my name. I just haven’t decided which I like better: Solace-di Angelo or di Angelo-Solace.”

Nico’s breath caught in his throat. His mouth went dry and he felt a sting behind his eyes. He croaked out, “I guess we’ll each have to pick one, then.”

Will beamed, and pressed his lips to Nico’s once more.

Will didn’t remember the last time he heard from his sister Kayla, but, to be fair, he didn’t remember what day of the week it was half of the time, either. He got a text from her one day in October - really? Was it October already? That couldn’t be right, could it? - which made Will realize that he really should be making more of an effort to get into contact with his siblings.

From: Kayla; hey, bro! long time no see. I’m throwing a halloween party next weekend and you should totally come! costumes aren’t mandatory but I’ll have to disown you if you show up in normal people clothes.

To: Kayla; Sounds great! Mind if I bring a date?

From: Kayla; well now you HAVE TO!

Will tried to bring it up to Nico as soon as he got home, after spending the rest of the day trying to think up any decent Halloween costume he could craft for himself in the next week - he was not a store-bought costume kind of man.

He entered the kitchen where Nico and Bianca were sitting at the table while Bianca did her homework, and he walked up behind them to press a kiss to the top of Bianca’s head.

Nico tipped his head back to accept his own kiss on the lips. “Hey, Sunshine.”

“Hey, did you two know that Halloween is only two weeks away?” Will asked.

Will took Nico’s wide-eyed stare as a no.

“Yep!” Bianca replied.

Will and Nico exchanged a look. “Uh, Bi, do you know what you want to dress up as?” Will asked.

“I wanna be a pikachu,” she replied without looking up from her homework.

Will frowned. He had no idea that Bianca even knew what a pikachu was. “Like, the pokemon?”

“Yeah!”

Nico smiled, glancing between the two of them. “We’ve been watching Pokemon before dinner most days.”

“That show’s still on?”

“Please,” Nico scoffed, “we’ve been watching it from the beginning.”

Will smiled fondly at his fiance. Of course Nico would get defensive over something like that. “Alright, Bi, we’ll go out sometime soon to get your costume, because I’ll need to get one anyway.”

“What do you need a costume for?” Nico asked.

“Halloween. What else? You’re going to need one, too, by the way. I hope you don’t think you can get away with a skeleton t-shirt and devil horns two years in a row.”

Nico narrowed his eyes. “Yeah, alright, I’ve got something in mind.”

“Just going to keep it a secret?”

Nico winked up at him before Bianca drew his attention to her homework.

Once her homework was finished, Bianca went to the living room to watch another episode of Pokemon while Nico started making dinner - Will offered his help a few times, though Nico shut him down each time. Out of love, of course.

Since he couldn’t help, Will leaned against the counter, resting on his elbows as he watched Nico work.

“So…” Will started, drawing out the word. “Gonna tell me what you’re dressing up as?”

“Depends. Are you going to tell me why I need a costume in the first place?”

Will tapped his fingers on the counter. “Well, uh, you know how I’ve met like, all of your friends and family? How do you feel about meeting my siblings at Kayla’s Halloween party next weekend?”

“The same siblings that threw that Christmas party last year?” Nico asked innocently, though he snorted when he looked over his shoulder to see the look of realization on Will’s face. “Forgot about that, didn’t you?”

“Not...entirely,” Will replied, then groaned, dropping his head. “Nico, do you think Austin and Kayla remember me making an ass out of myself last year? I made such a horrible first impression - I can’t let something like that happen again!”

“Not to mention how you came back here and hit on me while I was emotionally vulnerable,” Nico reminded him.

“Yes, thank you for that reminder.” Will lowering his head onto the counter. “Maybe I can get away with it if I just don’t drink. That’ll work, right?”

“Depends on how pushy Kayla is, I guess,” Nico replied with a shrug. “If anything you should probably be more worried about finding a costume than getting drunk.”

Will sighed, and straightened back upright. “Yeah. What are you thinking about doing? Maybe we can do some kind of couple’s costume or something.”

“Oh, no, no. I’ve already got mine, and it’s a surprise. You’ll have to come up with something on your own.”

Will pouted. “Don’t you want to do a couple’s costume with me?”

Nico glanced at him over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow. “Do I look like the couple’s costume type?”

“No,” Will huffed. “Alright. I’m done a little early tomorrow, so I can pick Bi up from school, and I’ll take her costume shopping. Hopefully I can find something for myself while we’re out.”

It took Will about an hour to put on his Frankenstein monster makeup. It probably would’ve been easier to just ask for Nico’s help, but if Nico was keeping his costume a secret, then so would Will. He probably didn’t need to be quite so detailed with his stitches and skin discoloration, but he was a doctor, what else would he do?

When Will finally left the bathroom, he called out, “Hey, babe, are you gonna be ready to go soon?”

Their bedroom door swung open, and Nico stepped out, wearing familiar blue scrubs and a long white coat. Will’s heart leapt into his throat as he felt himself falling in love with his fiance all over again at the sight of Nico in Will’s scrubs.

Will took a hesitant step forward, as though his movement might break whatever spell had made Nico look so unreasonably perfect, then rushed forward to drag Nico back into their bedroom and press him against the closed door.

“I’ll take that to mean you like my costume,” Nico said as Will raked his eyes up and down Nico’s form again and again.

“You look too good,” Will told him. “I can’t let the world see you like this. You’re too good looking for any eyes that aren’t mine.”

Nico laughed breathily. “Is it better or worse that I had to roll up the cuffs on the pants, like, three times?”

Will dropped his forehead to rest against Nico’s as he failed to contain his own laughter. “Worse! That’s adorable!”

“Alright, what about this?” Nico reached for the pocket of his - Will’s - lab coat, and unclipped the name badge to show Will.

Will recognized it as his own ID badge, though Nico had taped a piece of paper over it so that it looked identical to the real badge aside from the picture and name - Nico’s picture replaced Will’s, and the name beside the photo read Nico Solace.

Will’s eyes widened at the sight and his heart started to pound in his chest. Was he sure he wasn’t dreaming?

“Nico Solace,” he whispered, his voice shaking, and he felt tears pricking at the backs of his eyes as he felt himself flooding with emotion. Will wrapped his arms around Nico’s waist and hid his face in his shoulder before the tears could start to fall. “You’re going to be a Solace.”

Nico rubbed his hands soothingly up and down Will’s back. “Hey, you’d better not be crying on me, di Angelo,” he teased. “You’re going to smudge your makeup.”

Will tugged Nico toward the bed, sitting on the edge of the mattress and pulling Nico down beside him. Nico lifted Will’s head and held his face in his hands.

“Are you going to cry like this at the wedding?” Nico asked gently.

“Probably! Like you’re not going to cry when we’re getting married?” Will argued, and then a moment later, realization hit. “Oh my god, we’re getting married in, like, two months.”

Nico tipped his head to the side. “More like one month, at this point. A month and a half, maybe.”

Will darted forward for a kiss. “I love you so much.” He kissed him again and again, and pressed him back onto the bed, kissing all over his face and down his neck as he hands traveled underneath Nico’s - Will’s - scrub shirt.

“Hey, you’re gonna rub all your makeup off on me!” Nico laughed.

He expected to touch skin underneath Nico’s shirt, though all he noticed was more fabric, so Will pushed himself back and pulled Nico’s shirt up to see that Nico had pulled the waistband of the scrub pants up nearly to his ribs.

Will started laughing so hard that he couldn’t speak, just dropping himself onto Nico’s stomach.

Nico shoved him away, rolling him onto his back on the bed beside him. “Shut up, it’s not my fault you’re a tree!”

They dropped Bianca off with Hazel and Frank on their way to Kayla’s, who threw the door to her apartment open only seconds after they knocked.

“Will, you’re here!” she exclaimed, and threw her arms around her brother. Then she pulled back and turned to Nico, throwing her arms up but holding back from hugging him. “And you must be his date!”

“Fiance. Nico, nice to meet you,” Nico replied.

“Fiance?” Kayla repeated, then grabbed Nico’s hand and dragged him into the apartment, up to the island that appeared to be the bar for the night. “Austin! Will brought his fiance!”

A man popped up from behind the island - Will’s brother Austin, Nico presumed - and said, “Oh! You must be Nico, right?”

Will followed behind them and took Nico’s free hand. “Have I told you about Nico?”

“Yeah, at the Christmas party, remember?” Austin answered. “You wouldn’t shut up about him.”

Will looked away in an attempt to hide his blush, but Nico saw right through him. He squeezed his hand and grinned. “You had such a crush on me.”

“Yeah, well, it paid off, didn’t it?” Will muttered.

“We should do celebratory shots!” Kayla exclaimed, already pouring out four shots. She handed one to Will, slid one over to Austin, and then held one out for Nico, though he held up his hands and shook his head.

“Oh, no thanks, I have to drive home later,” he said calmly.

Kayla and Austin downed their shots, though Will hesitated, shooting a look at Nico.

“Go on, one shot isn’t going to kill you,” Nico told him, and Will took another second or two before he drank his own shot.

Nico didn’t make it further than the kitchen for a while, though it was probably for the best that he could keep an eye on how much Will was drinking - he’d counted four shots in total, plus most of two mixed drinks that Austin made for him. Austin was a pretty good person to stand around and chat with, too.

Eventually, Nico ventured into the rest of the apartment in search of Will, and found himself pushed down onto a couch with his fiance dropping into his lap.

“God, you’re heavy,” Nico groaned, though he wrapped his arms around Will’s waist rather than pushing him away.

“Babe,” Will said, his face pink and warm from the alcohol, “Nico, babe, we have to invite everybody here to the wedding!”

Nico cocked an eyebrow. “Did you already invite everyone?”

Will pouted. “No, I didn’t! Of course not! I had to ask you first, but we have to, okay?”

“We only brought two invites, you know that,” Nico reminded him. “Do you really want to invite some people you just met over your own brother and sister?”

Will turned himself sideways in Nico’s lap and held himself directly in front of him, nose-to-nose. “Just think about it.”

Nico snorted. “Okay, sure.”

Will hummed and tipped forward, leaning heavier against Nico. “You look so pretty right now. And all the time, but especially right now.”

“You’re just saying that because you think I look hot in your clothes,” Nico replied.

“That’s true, too.” Will pressed his lips to Nico’s sweetly, though as his kisses trailed down toward Nico’s neck, they grew progressively sloppier.

Nico pushed him back before Will could go too much further, and said, “Do you need to go home?”

Will pressed himself closer once again to whisper into Nico’s ear. “Or we could just find a dark corner and see what happens.”

“Nope,” Nico said, loud and clear, and shoved Will off of his lap. He stood before Will could return to his seat, and said to him, “Start saying your goodbyes. I’m going to get Austin and Kayla’s invites from the car.”

Will pouted as Nico walked away, fully leaving the apartment and running down to the car for the invites. They fit perfectly in the deep pockets of the lab coat Nico was wearing - why hadn’t he thought to just stuff them in there hours ago?

When he made his way back into the apartment, he found Austin before he found either Will or Kayla. “Hey,” Nico said when he walked up to him, “have you seen Will?”

Austin nodded. “Yeah, he was just over here. He said something about inviting people to your wedding, and, I mean, I doubt you guys have my address, but--”

“Yeah, I have an invite for you,” Nico cut in, fishing the two envelopes out of his pocket. “Actually, could you take Kayla’s, too? I really have to find Will.”

Austin smiled the same sunshiney smile as Will always did - it was the first thing that really convinced Nico that Austin and Will were brothers. He took the invitations with a thank you, and promised that Kayla would get her invitation.

Nico wandered further into the apartment where he finally found both Will and Kayla, standing in the hallway outside the bathroom, hugging like they would never see each other again. When Will finally noticed Nico, he practically shoved his sister away, and he threw his arms around Nico instead.

“Nico! Nico, babe, Nico, Kayla has this friend who’s an ordained minister, and he’s here! RIght now!” Will exclaimed. “He could marry us right now! Let’s do it as, like, a practice wedding!” Will was practically bouncing in place, so Nico set his hands on Will’s shoulders to hold him still.

“You’re the one that wanted to get married in a church, remember?” Nico reminded him. “And it won’t be a practice wedding if the guy’s ordained. That’s just a wedding.”

Will pouted again, and Nico was starting to think that he looked like a kicked puppy when he did that. “Okay. Kayla can come to the real wedding still, right?”

“Yeah, I just gave her invite to Austin.”

“But if Austin has Kayla’s invite, then who has Austin’s invite?”

“Austin does. He has both of them.”

“Why does he get two invites?”

Nico sighed, dropping his head against Will’s chest. “Babe, please. Have you said goodbye to everyone yet?”

“Everyone but Austin,” he answered.

“Go say goodbye, then,” he said, and then turned around to talk to Kayla once Will had walked away. “Thanks for having us, Kayla, I--”

She threw her arms around him, nearly knocking him over. Yeah, she was definitely Will’s sister. “Of course! We have to hang out more, okay? I’m gonna have another Christmas party this year, and you and Will have to come, okay?”

“We’ll try to make it,” Nico told her, patting her back awkwardly until she released him. “And hopefully you can come to our wedding in a couple of months.”

“Hell yeah, I’ll be there! I’ll see you then! Drive safe!” Kayla bounced into the living room as she waved back at Nico. He really was curious to see what she was like sober.

He turned back toward the kitchen, and found Will giving Austin the same bear hug treatment that he’d given to Kayla.

“You’re my favorite brother, you know?” Nico heard Will saying as he approached the two.

“I think I’m your only brother,” Austin replied, laughing.

“We need to hang out more than once a year. I’ll see you again this year, right?”

“I hope so, man.”

“Our wedding is in December,” Nico cut in, drawing both of their attention and causing them to break the hug. “So, as long as you come to that, you’ll see each other again before the end of the year.”

Will draped an arm around Nico’s shoulders and pulled him close enough to press a kiss to the side of his head. “You’re so smart, babe.”

Nico smiled up at him. “Go find your coat, Sunshine.”

As Will stepped away, Nico turned to Austin. “Could you, uh, do me a favor and not mention tonight to Will the next time you see him? He was so worried about making a fool of himself in front of you again, and I don’t want him to get bummed out the next time we see you.”

“What?” Austin asked, his head tilting in confusion. “My cool older brother the doctor was worried about what I think of him? Dude, tell him that he can act like as much of a fool as he wants, and I’ll always be impressed by him.”

Will started getting handsy again as soon as they were alone again, and kept trying to touch Nico while he was driving. After Will’s hand found its way to Nico’s lap for the third time, Nico grabbed his hand and held it tight in his own, telling him, “You either hold my hand, or you keep your hands to yourself while I’m driving, got it?”

“Sorry, Darlin’,” Will replied, and pressed a kiss to Nico’s knuckles. Then another. And another. He untangled their fingers and pressed a kiss to Nico’s open palm, then a few more down his wrist before moving back up. He hummed against Nico’s hand for a moment before he stuck out his tongue and licked the length of Nico’s middle finger.

He ripped his hand away. “Will, I swear, if you don’t stop, then I’m going to make you sit in the backseat for the rest of the drive.”

“Sorry,” Will said again, and folded his hands on his lap, this time keeping them there until they arrived at home.

As soon as they were out of the car, Will was on Nico once again, pressing himself against Nico’s back and kissing up and down his neck as Nico tried to unlock the front door. Once they had made it inside, Will spun him around and pulled Nico in for a kiss, though Nico recoiled at the taste of alcohol on Will’s tongue.

Will had that kicked puppy look one his face once again when Nico pushed him back. “What’s wrong?” Will asked.

“You taste like alcohol,” Nico answered. “You know how I am about alcohol.”

Will’s shoulders slumped. “You still love me, though, right?”

“Of course I do,” Nico assured him, and then got an idea. “Maybe if you drink a bunch of water, then the alcohol taste will go away, and I’ll kiss you again.”

“Okay!” In his haste to get to the sink, Will nearly knocked Nico over when he rushed past him. He pulled a glass from the cabinet and held it under the faucet, chugging two full glasses before he turned back to Nico. “Can I kiss you now?”

Nico tapped a finger to his lips in thought. “Let’s find out.”

Will moved toward him again, wrapping an arm around Nico’s waist while he leaned in for a kiss. The taste of alcohol was diluted, but it was still there, and Nico pulled back once again. Will frowned. “Still there?”

Nico nodded. “Maybe it’ll help if you brush your teeth.”

“Good idea,” Will replied, and took off down the hallway, tripping over something in the dark before he managed to find his way into the bathroom. Nico followed after him, much slower than Will had gone, and found Will already brushing furiously at his tongue.

Nico grabbed his own toothbrush and bumped Will aside with his hip before he started brushing his own teeth. Approximately two minutes later, after Will had gargled with mouthwash, he dragged Nico out of the bathroom and across the hall to their bedroom. When he kissed him again, all Nico tasted was mint, but he still pushed Will back gently.

“Noooo,” Will groaned, wrapping his arms around Nico and holding him close, “c’mon, babe, I just wanna kiss you.”

“I know, Sunshine, but I want to change out of my costume first,” Nico told him. “And you should probably wipe that makeup off your face.”

“Then I can kiss you?”

“Yes.”

Will left the room, and while he was gone, Nico shed the coat and scrubs he had been wearing, and changed into the pajamas he’d been wearing the night before - which also just so happened to be Will’s clothes. He climbed into bed once he was changed, and was just plugging his phone in for the night when Will returned. He shed the sweater he was wearing and crawled on top of Nico on the bed, resting his full weight on top of him and guiding their lips together.

“Don’t you want to change into pajamas?” Nico asked when Will broke the kiss to breathe.

Will licked the side of Nico’s neck. “I’d rather we both get naked.”

Nico rolled Will off of him and laid him on his side. “Well, that’s not going to happen, because I’m already in my pajamas. I know what you’re trying to do, Will, but I’m not having sex with you until tomorrow morning at the earliest.”

Will pressed himself up against Nico, draping an arm around Nico’s waist to tug him even closer, and said, “Oh, I’m going to blow your mind tomorrow morning, babe.”

He pressed a forceful kiss to Nico’s lips, then dropped his head onto the pillow and fell asleep instantly. Nico snorted, and drifted off to sleep to the sound of Will’s quiet snores.

In the morning, Will woke up with a pounding headache and a weight across his hips. He cracked his eyes open, squinting against the glaring light, and saw Nico straddling his lap.

“Good morning, Sunshine,” Nico said, grinning down at him and laughing at Will’s groan in return. “I’m ready for you to blow my mind.”

Will’s groan was ten times louder than before as he reached for Nico’s pillow, hitting him with it once before pressing it over his own face. Will complained, his voice muffled by the pillow, “You’re the worst!”

Bianca dressed in her new pikachu onesie for school on Halloween, and Nico wore another borrowed pair of Will’s scrubs - without the name badge, unfortunately, since Will needed that to get around the hospital. Nico accompanied Bianca to school, just like he had the year before, and made sure to take as many pictures as he could of Bianca, her friends, and the costume parade.

Will managed to get off of work just in time to join Nico and Bianca for trick-or-treating, though he didn’t have time to change into his Frankenstein monster costume before they left. That just made Will and Nico’s matching scrubs look like a couple’s costume, though, so Will finally got his Halloween wish.

As they waited on the sidewalk while Bianca ran up to a house for candy, Nico grabbed Will’s hand and laced their fingers together. “I’m glad you’re here this year,” he said, squeezing Will’s hand. “I felt so weird last year, just loitering on the sidewalk for an hour or two.”

“I’m glad I’m here, too,” Will said with a soft smile. “It’s always better to loiter in pairs, after all.”

Nico snorted and leaned against Will’s chest until Bianca returned to the sidewalk.

After another hour of wandering through the neighborhood, the three returned home. Bianca was sent off to get ready for bed while Will dumped out her bag of candy onto the living room floor to start sorting through it all. Once Bianca was all tucked into bed, Nico put on whatever Halloween movie just happened to be on TV, then joined Will on the living room floor.

Will cracked open an Almond Joy and took a bite out of it. He leaned back against the front of the couch, draped and arm around Nico’s shoulders, and said, “Do you want to show me the pictures you took at the costume parade?”

Nico pulled his phone out of his pocket and settled against Will’s side. Before he opened up his gallery, though, he looked up at Will - still in his scrubs, backlit by a single lamp in the corner of the room, and eating a piece of his daughter’s candy. This was shaping up to be a lot like last Halloween - only so much better.

“You know, I think it was this time last year that I realized how much I liked you,” Nico whispered. “I mean, I knew I liked you for a little while before then, but right around Halloween was when it really hit.”

Will pressed a kiss to his forehead. “I think I was already a little bit in love with you by then.”

Nico rolled his eyes. “Alright, fine. I’m trying to have a nice moment here, but if you’re just going to one-up me, then whatever.”

Will wound his other arm around Nico’s chest and pulled him close, kissing all over the side of his face. “A lot sure can change in a year, huh?”

thanks for reading!

buy me a coffee | more auctober stuff

[eggoreviews]

Smash Bros. Ultimate  FINAL ROSTER PREDICTIONS (Redux)

I already did this, but loadsss of stuff changed since then. As release day draws closer, I thought I’d sift through my predictions for characters. Have a read if u want, then if you disagree lemme know bc my hype hasn’t died down since it was announced i need help (and hey if u look at my old prediction post, I already predicted Simon, K. Rool and Dark Samus so I can’t be the worst, right?)

Okay so my predictions have changed A LOT since I started this blog a few months ago and I think I’ve narrowed it down a lil now. So to put it simply, I think we’re definitely getting one more Smash based direct in October/November. Considering the fact that they’ve got the Mystery Mode™, online play and a whole load of other modes/assists/a few characters we aren’t aware of yet, I reckon they’ll have plenty to talk about in it. My other prediction is that we’re getting 2 newcomers and 1 more echo MINIMUM. Could get maybe a couple more echoes or 1 or 2 standalone character reveals as a stretch but I think we can at least expect that much.

Characters (Base Roster)

Geno (Super Mario RPG)

This wooden eggo has been the only character that’s been a constant in my predictions since the get go, despite the fact that I know basically nothing about him. But he’s the character I’m most confident about getting in.

This newcomer cycle has had a big ol focus on fan appeal this time, most likely stemming from the ballot. This was kind of clear from the Ridley reveal, but the addition of King K. Rool kind of made this a lot more likely. And I would go as far as to say that Geno is probably the most highly requested Smash character since ever.

Sakurai has stated multiple times that he wanted Geno in Brawl and then in Smash 4, but the best he could get was a mii costume. But yeah, not a lot of characters can say that they not only have long standing fan demand, but also are wanted by Sakurai himself.

Considering that Square Enix were previously unwilling to play ball with Nintendo on Geno, but then they went and put arguably their most lucrative character in Cloud as DLC for Smash 4, I don’t think Square’s gonna be too bothered about handing over this character, especially since it’s a character they’re never going to do anything with (Don’t know about you but I’m not seeing a Mario RPG sequel in the pipeline)

And as much as I hate to allude to leakers in my predictions, you can’t deny the fact that Vergeben has not gotten a single thing wrong regarding Smash so far. And he has mentioned a new Square rep and I honestly don’t know who else that could be. Chrono? Lara Croft? But then there’s no way either of those beat Geno in the ballot.

Incineroar (Pokemon)

We’ve yet to receive a Pokemon in this game and really that’s reason enough in itself. Considering that we’ve had at least one new Pokemon rep in every game, I v much doubt they’ll break that tradition now

The two Big Guesses that everyone has been throwing out since day 1 have been Incineroar and Decidueye, both from Gen 7, as we know from Smash 4′s Greninja inclusion that Pokemon is the only franchise with the power to get a rep in before their game releases. And because of this, Pokemon reps are the only ones that are exceptions of my usual rule to discount any characters that released after the time Sakurai has stated he locked in the roster for this game in 2015/16 (looking at Spring Man and Rex & Pyra here, but I’m almost certain they will be DLC)

Yet again, calling on Vergeben here. He has explicitly said Incineroar is in over Decidueye. But hey, he’s not god so he could be wrong eventually. I’m still fairly convinced of Incineroar’s inclusion tho (as much as I’d prefer Decidueye)

Ken as a Ryu echo (Street Fighter)

Ken is the only echo I’m convinced is getting in. A lot of this is honestly, again, down to Vergeben’s leaks and a screenshot of Ken in a Smash Ultimate stage that has yet to be debunked. I don’t have a lot to say on this character purely because I don’t think there are many more people that need convincing.

Shadow the Hedgehog (Sonic series)

Shadow’s assist is missing and has been replaced out of nowhere with Knuckles, as you probably know. This is a huge notch in his favour, especially if you consider that Isabelle’s assist was replaced with Kapp’n in the August direct and now ta dah here she is. Honestly, with Shadow I think it’s only a matter of time, whether they release him as an echo alongside Ken in the final direct in the same way they did with Dark Samus and Chrom or they save him for DLC as a unique fighter (if Isabelle can be unique, Shadow definitely can).

These four are my picks for the most likely characters left to be revealed, but hey there’s some Hot Picks™  that I left out that u may be curious about so here’s why they’re not here. I guess you could call these my back ups, but they all have too much doubt around them for me to place them in my main predictions (a lot of this is pure speculation so I’m probably wrong but what the hell):

Isaac (Golden Sun) - Now don’t get me wrong, I know Isaac has his fans and he genuinely has a good shot of getting in to Ultimate, especially if you consider that the only new first party franchise we’ve had so far is Splatoon. But what’s holding him back in my mind is that the likes of Ridley and K. Rool are in, villains from huge franchises that have had endless support since forever. And while Isaac has some sense of seniority, I don’t think his place on the ballot matched that of those particular characters. And if the likes of Ashley and Shovel Knight have been assist’d, I can’t see Isaac placing any higher than them if you think about how niche Golden Sun is (but u know, look how ‘niche’ Mario RPG is and Geno’s way up on my list so don’t listen to me). The other thing is that, in the E3 presentation, it was revealed that there are ‘over 50′ assist trophies in this game. We’re currently aware of 40, a fair majority of which have returned from previous games. That doesn’t look good for characters like Isaac if we’re looking at another 12-15 assists to pop up in the next direct. So all I’m saying is, don’t be surprised if that happens. But I definitely think he’ll pop up in some form, whether that be assist or playable.

Skull Kid (Zelda series) - This is one I was uncertain about for a long while, as the fact that his assist is missing and replaced with the Moon from Majora’s Mask is a notch in his favour but I think I’ve settled on the idea that they may be saving Skull Kid for something else: Boss character. We’re all pretty much thinking that mysterious mode is probably gonna be a story mode by now and Ultimate is already filling its boots with iconic characters fitting in as bosses with the likes of Dracula and Rathalos being announced. And as much as I want Skull Kid in, I would say that he is the most iconic Zelda villain besides Ganondorf, which places him in a weird position where he would be v much suited to a character slot but would also make for a viable boss addition. So yeah, could go either way but for me, there’s too much doubt around him to count him as a dead cert for the roster.

Bandana Waddle Dee (Kirby series) - Another very very likely candidate for the roster, this cute lil squishball would complete the Kirby set™ and he’s v popular in Japan. But he’s in the same position as Isaac where I’m not sure he got as much attention as peeps like Ridley and K. Rool. But hey, with Kirby and this character being Sakurai’s babies, this could sway him otherwise (I rlly hope so, can u tell I want him in)

Chorus Kids (Rhythm Heaven) - As my final back up/unsure pick, the Chorus Kids take their spot alongside Isaac in the ‘first party franchises that really need Smash attention’ category. The other things that make me pick the Chorus Kids over others is the fact that people doin’ some digging a while back revealed that the Chorus Kids were a scrapped character from Smash 4 so it isn’t a stretch to say that Sakurai could’ve gone back to that idea and make it work. Plus, the Chorus Kids would tick another box we’ve yet to account for; this game’s ‘weird’ rep. Much like Pokemon, it’s pretty much tradition at this point for each Smash game to contain a newcomer or two from odd franchises that not many would expect (Ice Climbers and Game & Watch in Melee, R.O.B. in Brawl, Wii Fit Trainer and Duck Hunt in Smash 4) and this is yet another tradition I don’t see them abandoning for Ultimate. As well as ticking this box, Chorus Kids are also a v popular pick so I have them in mind as the most likely pick if Sakurai is keeping the usual ‘weird’ rep tradition alive. But really what’s keeping Chorus Kids out of my main predictions is the fact that we have no idea if we’ll even get a rep in that vein this time, especially since competition for roster slots is so intense this time around.

OKAY so that’s all my dudes. If u happened to read my last post, you will notice that my number 1 fave pick ever Rayman is now gone from my predictions. But that’s bc I think he’ll be DLC now. So there you go. Tune in at some point when I’ll probably do a DLC posty boi. Have a good day.

[nadia-guerreiro]

Annotated Bibliography

Spark, A. 2016. Andi Spark – Pursuing the Animatrix: Musings on Defining a Term to Describe Woman-Centered Animation – Animation Studies. [Online]. [Accessed 25 October 2019]. Available from: https://journal.animationstudies.org/andi-spark-pursuing-the-animatrix-musings-on-defining-a-term-to-describe-woman-centered-animation/.

The writer grabs the topic of “female workers in animation” to describe the changes that have happened over the years. Up till the day this was written, woman were able to gather some significant roles (mainly going for storyboard artists, and some for animators), but most of the self found conceptions still apply, studios would still choose a man over a woman for a creative roll. For me, as a woman in the field, this kind of exclusion is not understandable. Woman can be as creative as man, and the only explanation provided is that woman tend to bring their own feelings for animation, while man do the most creative out of the box ideas.

Herhuth, E. (2019). Eric Herhuth – The Animated Will: Intelligent Movement and Embodied Intentionality in Character Animation. – Animation Studies. [Online]. [Accessed 22 Oct. 2019]. Available from: https://journal.animationstudies.org/eric-herhuth-the-animated-will-intelligent-movement-and-embodied-intentionality-in-character-animation/

During his journal entry, the author explains the importance and evolution of the technic for the character’s will. The was used to show that a character could do any actions without thinking, that it was free to choose whatever it was meant to do, nonetheless, it was only an illusory freedom (or as he would call it “insincere promise of freedom”), as the choices that they go though have been meed previously made. Personally reading this text was really important for me since I tend to concentrate on character performance, posing, movement and acting takes a great part in this relationship with the creation of freedom.

Martin, B., Yecies, B. (2004). First Monday: Peer-reviewed Journal on the Internet, [online] 9(6). Available at: https://documents.uow.edu.au/~bmartin/pubs/04firstmonday.html [Accessed 28 Oct. 2019].

This journal entry shows a variety of titles a corporation may have to battle while climbing the ladder to success, and analyses the variety of changes the company itself had to grow from, especially with the rise of the internet and NET communication technology. The author goes through an analysis to understand each site’s reason to take an anti-Disney approach and question each of them creating a table of sites, reasons, goals, methods and their strategies. I feel lithe this article is a good approach for everyone to understand what a rising company such as Disney can go through the years, while they gain more fame, their actions will be more criticized and noticed, so more and more of this sites will appear. It’s good to understand that any animator might be on their shoes one of these days.

Berney, S. (2016). Does animation enhance learning? A meta-analysis. Computers & Education, [online] 101, pp.150-167. Available at: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0360131516301336?via%3Dihub [Accessed 25 Nov. 2019].

The author took this journal to analyse whenever would be easier to learn from graphics or animated videos. They tested both methods in various forms consecutively with different studies, such as pure animation, animation with sound and animation with no explanatory text, they grew in results substantially, understanding that the most efficient method would be the animation with sound a no explanatory text. This induct to a transition of the media, that implies great research in the animation field, with more development, this kind of animation could bust the way people study. This topic was particularly interesting from my point of view since I can give more time of my attention to video lessons other than reading, this method could prove really useful in various fields of study.

Telotte, J. (2019). Letting Go: Representation, Presentation, and Disney’s Art of Animation. Animation, [online] 14(2), pp.132-148. Available at: https://doi-org.ezproxy.herts.ac.uk/10.1177/1746847719858159 [Accessed 18 Nov. 2019].

This article shows how Walt Disney was able to present both sides of animation while developing his drawing to tv, he made a series of behind the scenes so he would be able to let people understand when and how their favourite films were being made. This was a way to show various differences in the animation studied by the studio, as for example, from the realistic style Pinocchio (1940) to a more fantasy/cartoony one as in Lady and the Tramp (1955). This source was relevant from the point of evolution, as a person and a company leader, how to develop a whole variety of shows that appeal to your work and are able to demonstrate your development.

Neuman, R. (2019). Disney’s Final Package Film: The Making and Marketing of The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad (1949). Animation, [online] 14(2), pp.149-163. Available at: https://doi-org.ezproxy.herts.ac.uk/10.1177/1746847719858678 [Accessed 21 Nov. 2019].

During this journal, it is analysed the conception of the film The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr Toad (1949), how it was developed even in times of war, how it took eight years to assemble and how the conjunction of two different origin stories gave birth to this final script. A great point made by the author is that film shows the division they had in subtle ways, like for example having one character more cartoony and other more realistic. Unfortunately, this movie wasn't a big hit for Disney but was good for many experimentations and answers. I particularly like this journal entry as a form of making movies as a research method, a way of understanding the public needs and likes, and as a proof that no matter how much a movie can fail, it does not mean the next one will follow the same path.

Death and Coping Mechanisms in Animated Disney Movies: A Content Analysis of Disney Films (1937–2003) and Disney/Pixar Films (2003–2016). (2019). The Psychosocial Implications of Disney Movies, [online] pp.17-30. Available at: https://doi.org/10.3390/books978-3-03897-849-7 [Accessed 29 Nov. 2019].

During this chapter, the author decided to examine how Disney has portraited death over the years, what were the differences from the old traditional movies to the newer versions, and how children are dealing with the concept of death transmitted by it. It’s referred that some stories are supposed to help the children deal and learn the state of grief. During the studies, it was noticeable that protagonists were the ones who die the most, and that normally it had negative emotion embed with the feeling (and was unjustified), while when an antagonist died it was a positive emotion (and was justified). In a personal analysis, the recent movies made the grief make more sense, and developing the stages of character and having it pass the same stages of grief is something that, in my opinion, will help children understand such a complicated topic.

Pluralsight (2014). Animation for Games vs Animation for Movies. [online] Pluralsight.com.  Available at: https://www.pluralsight.com/blog/film-games/how-animation-for-games-is-different-from-animation-for-movies [Accessed 1 Dec. 2019].

In this article, it was pointed out the main differences between working as an animator for movies or for the games industries. The author argues that while movies only have to worry about the shot they're working at, and have a wider amount of time to develop it, relying mostly in acting, in games, the industry demands good and fast animation, it needs to be ready for every camera angle (since it’s interactively based) and relies mostly in character performance and body mechanics. This was a great article for me as since the beginning of this course I was trying to explain what I pretended to do, this helped me decide that developing character performance and acting is my main focus.

Neistadt, W. (2018). From School to Studio: Sir Wade Neistadt’s Journey to DreamWorks Animation. [online] Animation Mentor Blog. Available at: https://blog.animationmentor.com/from-school-to-studio-sir-wade-neistadts-journey-to-dreamworks-animation/ [Accessed 3 Dec. 2019].

During this blog post, the author explains his own experience developing himself to enter the world of an animator’s career. From starting in a subject he didn't enjoy, to learning what animation could bring to his life until he learned of an online animator’s school, this opened his eyes for software and prepared him for future opportunities. He started in a studio, but not directly as an animator, he does believe that being inside the studio and getting to know people is already a major first step. This blog was a major help for me, as I was lost in whatever way a student could even be able to approach or even enter a studio by himself.

Barnes, B. and Sperling, N. (2019). Why the ‘Joker’ Movie Was a Risk Warner Bros. Wanted to Take. New York Times, [online] p.1. Available at: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/03/movies/joker-movie.html [Accessed 10 Dec. 2019].

This newspaper article main focus point was how everyone, including some Warner Bros. employees were worried how the film would be received by the audience. Since it tackled such violent issues and gave the main character a “reason” to justify his action, they worried it could have a negative impact on the already occurring disasters. The author says that “This was a risk Warner Bros. wanted to take” and I totally agree, as films should not be considered documentaries of real life, but imaginary worlds we create to live their stories, making that separation was what made this topic so important, it was a risk worth taking.

[nora-reads-homestuck]

"Fan" Album, old archived posts by Hussie, some videos, and two actual Fanworks!

(SkaiaMechanic) Another Fanfest Post! What Nora responded to here was actually done back in December. However, various parts were incomplete (for reasons you’ll see) so this just sat around in the Google Doc for months. It’s getting to a point where it’s just clogging up the shared document, so I’m posting what’s here and will make additional posts based on the rest of the content when/if she gets to them. Enjoy!

brrrrrrrrd submitted to nora-reads-homestuck:

Visual art has never really been my thing, and other people have been far better at sharing pre-Act 6 art than I could be, but I can submit a few things you may have missed.  They’re all somewhat dubiously labeled “fanwork” being that most of them made by either members of the music team or Hussie himself, but I don’t know of any better time to post them.  

———————————————————————————

Before we get into the meat of this post, there is one more “fan” album you are current on.  It came out just a week after Act 6 began and has no songs about anything from it.  It’s called Tomb of the Ancestors and is by Kalibration (aka Robert Blaker) who also wrote Upward Movement (Dave Owns), Skaian Flight, Play the Wind, and Ira Quod Angelus, among other things.  https://homestuckgaiden.bandcamp.com/album/tomb-of-the-ancestors-unofficial-album 

There’s nothing more recent than Nov. 17th, 2011 on that page.

(Past!Skaia) As a single person fan-album, it’s not necessary to review this, at least not now. If you were going to, I would suggest holding onto it for later, when the amount of music albums in the story dramatically drops off.

(Nora) I agree, and will hold off for now! Album reviews actually take me a while to get finished because I can only listen to things at certain times, and I want to save my steam for meatier posts right now.

———————————————————————————

Most of this stuff is stuff that has previously been deleted by Hussie or hidden by the original poster, so if that’s not kosher then feel free to skip down to the section below this one.  A little background:  Hussie at previous points in time had both a Formspring and a Tumblr on which he would talk about various things Homestuck, and other various things.  He also has a nasty habit of deleting old things, meaning a LOT of his old posts are gone and most of them only exist as archives.  Here’s some of that stuff, most which was posted before Act 6 or if it was posted during only very early on and not referencing events of Act 6.

To start things off, the origin story of Hussie’s horse painting.  This one actually still exists, but the images are broken:  https://web.archive.org/web/20140408053025/http://andrewhussie.blogspot.com/2009/01/need-for-steed.html

(Nora) I’ve seen this one before, but I read it again and I think I guffawed just as hard, if not harder. Hussie has quite the way with words… and homoeroticism.

Hussie’s infamous trip to Olive Garden: https://web.archive.org/web/20130312060633/http://mspandrew.tumblr.com/post/12963616983/land-of-souls-and-olives-a-conclusion-pasta-la-vista

Olive Garden part 2: https://web.archive.org/web/20130312060012/http://mspandrew.tumblr.com/post/13585722775/land-of-souls-and-olives-a-conclusion-plmfers-part

(Nora) Trix once suggested I audio react to these. Would that be a good idea?

(Past!Skaia) Nah, just read them through. It’s definitely worth a read, but nothing more than that. (Current!Skaia: As of 3/5/17, there’s no indication whether she’s gone through it or not. I’ll keep it in the GoogleDoc just in case though.)

The post-Cascade recap part 1, in which he talks about the the process of creating it and then the content of it.  Really great insight into his creation process:  http://web.archive.org/web/20111028175330/http://mspandrew.tumblr.com/post/11938555890/about-eoa5-part-1

Cascade recap part 2: http://web.archive.org/web/20111028222551/http://mspandrew.tumblr.com/post/11941710181/about-eoa5-part-2

Recap part 3: http://web.archive.org/web/20120801112223/http://mspandrew.tumblr.com/post/11960418585/about-eoa5-part-3

Recap part 4: http://web.archive.org/web/20111029142442/http://mspandrew.tumblr.com/post/11975241895/about-eoa5-part-4

There are more posts on his tumblr if you go to the archive and and mess around with the Wayback Machines captures, including a reddit AMA that for some reason only collected the questions from reddit and answered them on tumblr.  But that’s for a point much later in the comic.

(Nora) Huh! Fascinating read-through. I enjoyed him talking about the process in particular (he makes it seem deceptively simple, doesn’t he, considering the lion’s share of the comic was a completely solo project banged out at a nearly inhuman pace). It hadn’t occurred to me that [S] Descend was actually scored, as opposed to simply animated to existing music, which is a bit embarrassing since it is obviously a medley. I also like what he says when he clarifies Doc Scratch’s means and motive—it’s basically exactly what I’d surmised from reading all his conversations. That tricky, tricky bastard. I am however still mystified by the Horrorterrors, and neither does Hussie seem keen to provide a real explanation for their actions:

The dark gods helped chart their course through this spacetime maze to deliver them to this location, at this time. Take that for what you will

(Nora) Also… why the hell did I not ever realize that Lord English is literally a giant green space pimp??? He’s got the gold tooth, the horrible gaudy coat, the pimp cane cue stick peg leg…

First of all, [Jade] didn’t actually conjure the 4th wall out of thin air. Remember when Karkat told her to turn the wall off, and then draw it? He was asking her to captchalogue an undamaged copy using her Pictionary modus, for this exact purpose. The eventual getaway. So she had it on standby, waiting for the right time to use it.

(Nora) Ohhhhh. OHHHHHHHH. Wow, this whole plan was even more convoluted than I thought, and with the whole password system and all, it was already pretty damn convoluted.

What’s waiting for them on the other side, beside a big ugly coat? Recall the setup I had with the two 4th walls facing each other, separated by one yard. They will break through the wall on the right, traveling nearly the speed of light, and presumably, break through the wall on the left to enter another reality. If you were thorough during Seer: Descend, you might have caught this excerpt on a bookshelf. “Though we adore Him we shall never enjoy His beauteous Croak. We spill our blood on acres of black and white so they may cross the yellow yard. At last in Skaia’s reflection through broken glass He may find the pond in which He’s meant to squat.”

(Nora)You may recall that when I played through the minigame, upon coming across that excerpt I said the following:

(PastPast!Nora) ….’They’ may cross the ‘yellow yard’? This must be referring to Hussie’s aforementioned interference with the story. It’s pretty abstruse, but I feel like it’s telling me something that I’m going to come back and go ‘OHHHH’ over, when I’ve seen more of the story.

(Nora) Consider me motherfuckin’ OHHHH’ed.

However, speaking of AMAs, Hussie’s Formspring was essentially a year and a half long AMA and most if not all of the questions answered there have been compiled here:  http://irratio.org/andrew_hussie_formspring_archives.html

Most of the early questions are inane, but after a while (after he stops answering everything that comes across his message box) there’s some really great responses in there (and some really funny jokes.)  Only thing is, it is *LONG* and will take a really long time to get through.  It went on from late February of 2010 to early October of 2011, with the last responses being around the beginning of the pause during work on Cascade.

(Past!Skaia) It truly is long. Kinda worth it though, and amusing to see Hussie’s actual trolling. 

(Nora) Hahahaha, Hussie is a troll and I love him.

Who do you think should be the next president of the United States?

dumb

(Nora) Welp, consider that one prophetic.

Once there is a reasonable number of strips, is there any chance of a Sweet Bro and Hella Jeff book with commentary by Dave Strider?

yeah

(Nora) That one too, I guess.

When do you think HS will be over?

ive been considering ending it on 8/26/10.

but who the hell knows if that’ll pan out.

(Nora) AHAHAHAHA. HAHAHAHA. AHAHA. HA.

(Nora) I’m going to leave it here for now, as there are SO MANY DAMN QUESTIONS and I really ought to finish my text post.

(Past!Skaia)Sounds good. Once you finish the post above I’ll set up a queue for your responses to the messages above.

(Current!Skaia) This was the main reason I held onto this post. It’s no telling when she’ll get back to this though, so I’m posting what I have. I’ll keep the link in the document, and if she ever does go back to read and comment more I’ll make some more posts!

———————————————————————————

Enough decidedly *not* fanworks, here’s some things you might possibly call fanworks!  If you can call things made by Bowman or Toby Fox fanworks.  And bonus actual fanworks!

(Current!Skaia) I have not shown Nora any of the below. I think…they’re not really necessary? Except Savior of the Slamming Jam, obviously, but that’s also in a submission she hasn’t gotten to yet. If enough people think she “needs” to see them I’ll pass it along but otherwise I’m just leaving it here.

A concert in someone’s front yard!  http://www.nospoiler.com/y/HRT758PTmpw

Toby Fox’s Homestuck Abridged!  [Removed for Giant Spoilers!]

An actual fanwork, Savior of the Slamming Jam! http://www.nospoiler.com/y/CKrO8kS8D6g

Chorale for Jaspers & Pony Chorale, Live! http://www.nospoiler.com/y/o0Z0oopPGpM

I’m a Member of the Midnight Crew, Live! http://www.nospoiler.com/y/xR5vN0ve4lY

How Do I Live, live! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDSEXd4KyO8

Actual fanwork, Club’s Deuce’s Homework! http://www.nospoiler.com/y/dLo22lvynNg

And two shitpost videos by Bowman:

1) Cascade announcement (can’t no spoiler link to this one, but comments are disabled: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3o4NvBz8xac

2) “Toby Fox” is now on YouTube (can’t no spoiler link to this one either, unfortunately.  Still, comments disabled):  https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=WL&v=pA9uy3KdeEU

———————————————————————————

I don’t think I have anything else at this time that either definitely has spoilers or possibly does due to having come out squarely in 2012 or later.