#but it's not about the smell itself i just associate it with the character now

[gray-ace-space]

When people talk about scent sexual attraction do they mean natural musk or perfumery? Because I do think I experience attraction to, say, Jo Malone or Lush scents but idk if that's what people mean. Jasmine, for example, is very delicate and sensual to me.

i have no clue, all of this sounds fake to me. *pushes aziraphale themed scented candle out of view* don't look at that it's not relevant

[sambhavami]

Obligatory note: It's been a long time since I read the actual text...and this was originally written for me to hash out some character relationships stuff for my fictional works. :)

Now, welcome to my personal conspiracy-headcanon mashup. To understand Arjun/Bheem's reactions we need to understand Yudi first, right?

During the Dyuta Sabha, the Ps had a lot of things going on. To blame what happened entirely on Yudi's gambling would probably not be fair. As others here have pointed out, they were cornered both physically and politically (especially with Krishna very perfectly, for the Ks, locked in a deadly war).

Many people think (me included, up until a few months back) that Yudi's a weaker character, controlled entirely by Krishna, and that he sort of falls apart when Krishna isn't around. But, that isn't entirely true. Yudhishthir is remarkably smart. His only problem in this regard is that he associates the greatest with Krishna, the record-smashing, powerhouse of a politician, who dwarfs everyone else simply by being in the room.

Hence, the only times we get to see Yudi's strategies playing out independently are during Varnavat, and Dyuta Sabha (Vana Parva shows his standalone intelligence, and Udyoga Parva features his farsightedness).

During Varnavat, when they are leaving...this is a small detail, but Yudhishthir creates a proper ruckus before they leave. He's crying and sobbing, he's falling on everyone's feet- solidly weirding out at least half of the extended family elders...as one writer so eloquently put it: like 'a bride on her bidai'.

Point is, Yudi smells out that something's wrong with this sudden all-expenses-paid trip, even before Vidur gets to him with his hints and stuff. What Yudi is doing here is that he is acting weird (and loud) to the point that even a commoner seeing their chariots from afar would notice something's fishy.

Yudi's style is always to play the long con. And he values the common man. Rather, he knows the value of public support. This is something even Dury values, but his method of securing said support is just to throw money at them mostly.

Yudi always wants to make a more permanent impact in this department.

You remember how in Varnavat, Kunti leaves a nishada mother and her 5 sons to die in the fire? I was thinking, did Yudi not inherit even 1% of that steadfast (cruel?) determination? (I mean Krishna is Kunti's suyogya nephew in this regard!). Yudi sure didn't object to his mother's plan then.

Then, after Draupadi's swayamvar, Yudi is the one to recognize the seeds of discord b/w the brothers, and nips it in the bud by using Kunti's words. Once Krishna is in the picture, we see Yudi kinda sorta let up, he lets Krishna make some executive decisions regarding Indraprastha, and the rajasuya. Obviously, he trusts Krishna fully, and even Krishna gets the time to really recognize Yudi's subtle undercurrent-ish strategies.

So, it's not totally weird that the younglings trust him so much. The dice game might have activated Yudi's gambling issues exacerbated by his somewhat compulsive desire to be polite at all costs, but he wasn't rendered completely senseless.

On IF I saw one member theorizing about how Yudhishthir is phrasing sentences when the guard is sent to Draupadi at first. It's like he's almost sending a message to Draupadi.

Combining the above, with my own little theory here...Yudi realised pretty much immediately that he is walking into a trap, and so walk he did. He had faith that even if his brothers (and wife) were furious with him, they would still not react, and let Yudi play it out first.

The seeds of Kurukshetra were sown generations back. If we want to push it, we can push the origins of this conflict to the very first Deva-Asur war itself!

Even in their generation they had Krishna and Jarasandha, Drupada and Drona, Kauravas and Panchalas, the growing intra-Yadav complications, the Kaurava family matter, and so many other such conflicts. The world was already barrelling towards the mega-war at record speed. With Krishna and Drupada aligning themselves with the Ps, and Duryodhana rapidly filling the vacuum left by Jarasandha, Yudhishthira would also have guess that the war would happen in their lifetime. And in this uber-polarized situation, situated right between Krishna and Duryodhana, Yudhishthira would definitely end up in the middle of all of it.

When Yudi found the war to be inevitable, he gave up trying to really stop it and instead focused on how they could come out of this smelling like roses. In case of war, Yudi was never getting Dury's loyal vassal kingdoms. Obviously! And Krishna had antagonized more that half of the subcontinent while fighting Jarasandha (none of whom would fight on the side of Krishna's friends!), so Yudi wasn't getting them either! Then, the only remaining option was to somehow drag the sort-of neutral kingdoms into this mess.

The neutral kingdoms all had remained neutral for a reason. These people never really got involved in anything. The only thing that would drag them in, would have to be something outrageous. Something, that no conscientious person/kingdom could ignore. Something like a royal woman being assaulted mid-sabha. Something that would hit two birds...force the neutral kingdoms to choose a side, and irrevocably tip the public opinion in the Pandavas' favour.

If Yudi pushed Draupadi into this intentionally, then he was also ensuring that the Kaurava soldiers would fight against, but with a broken heart all that time, just like the elders of the family (and consequently will be about half as effective).

Now obviously, this is just a theory, and I'd be a lot more afraid of Yudi if this were indeed true. However, it is still fun to imagine, and I can't resist that!

But then, when Draupadi asks Yudi directly if what he did was legal or not, he stays silent. See, normally, Yudi LOVES a good debate. If he had genuinely thought he was right (or at least legally in the clear) in doing what he did, he would argue with Draupadi to the end of the world, but he doesn't!

Again, Draupadi is a legal genius herself, there's no doubt about that. So, when Draupadi is asking that question, she isn't actually asking the question. Draupadi is only further appalled when nobody acknowledges that she's right in saying that Yudi had no right to stake her. A law after all, is only a law if the wider society agrees that it is. In Drau's case, no one had the guts (except Vidur and Vikarna) to stand with her and support the law that she cited.

Maybe, Yudi had anticipated this would happen? That the Ks would let their animalistic side win over the logical one, and dig themselves a hole they can't really climb out of? But then again, I would be very scared of the man, then.

Coming to the brothers' loyalty. Obviously, they've (and Draupadi) lived with the intelligent Yudi for a long time. Long enough to know how he plays his game, and even if they don't like his approaches, they know that it will still help them achieve their final goal, which is to obtain and then stay on the throne of Hastinapura (the staying part they can't do without solid public support in the long run).

As for how much they value Draupadi, I think the brothers have proven themselves several times after that. Bheem a little louder, Arjun a little quieter, but they have.

[poorly-written-fiction]

replay (logan howlett x oc) chapter 3 - teenage dream

A/N: hello everyone! chapter 3 is here! this one is obviously inspired by katy perry's "teenage dream" which i started associating with hugh jackman after that one video he did lipsyncing to the song. concept made me giggle. this was actually the very first thing i wrote about logan and inez together, and from there, inez became a character of her own! i hope you all enjoy.

Summary: Kate invites Inez to some "girl time".

word count: 1600

tags: canon x oc, logan howlett x oc, mutant! oc, slow burn, enemies/rivals to lovers, some swearing, inez is "white girl dancing" and logan has A Reaction™, spelling and grammar errors because i didn't proofread too hard, okay bye i hope you enjoy

===============================================================

In the weeks that followed, Inez hadn’t gone to help Logan like she usually would have for his classes in the mornings. As much as she felt guilty for what she said, there was a small part of her that felt spiteful. Despite her anger, she couldn’t escape her helpful and loyal nature. As much as she wanted to jam her claws and teeth into Logan every time he looked at her, there was a small part of her that only felt satisfied by helping him. Maybe it was her pride, knowing that there was something she was good at that he was terrible at. Maybe it was the fact that she was always a team player. She didn’t know, and she didn’t care as long as it kept him from trying to talk to her.

It was early one Monday morning when she had passed by his classroom. He wasn’t there, of course he wouldn’t be there until then minutes before class started. Inez rolled her eyes, and placed a hand on the door. “If the door is unlocked, I’ll just get everything plugged in and turned on so he won’t try to ask me for help. If I can’t get in, then he’s shit out of luck,” she thought bitterly. She took the door’s handle into her hand, and pushed. The door swished open quietly. Inez felt like an inexperienced criminal who hadn’t done anything wrong yet, but it was too late to turn back now. She worked as fast as she could, not wanting anyone to find out what she was doing. It was now her dirty secret. She left almost as quickly as she came in, and she slipped away before anyone knew she had been there.

At 7:45, Logan walked into his classroom, finding already been set up for him. He paused for a moment, trying to think back to last Friday. Had he completely forgotten to shut everything down? He walked over to his desk, checking through his files, making sure nothing had been disturbed. No signs of life anywhere, He took a deep breath, and as he sighed, the realization hit him. He could smell the very faint scent of Inez. He called out to her, but she wasn’t in the room. He shook his head, thinking passively about how kind she had been to help him. There was a slight pang of guilt that hit him, he wasn’t blind to the fact that he had upset her. He sipped his coffee and brushed it off, deciding that dwelling on it wasn’t going to help anything.

================================================

The rest of the week went by quickly and uneventfully. It was one of those rare times of peace and quiet around X Mansion. The world itself was more peaceful than usual, so everyone was able to collectively sigh with relief. It felt like there was no weight of priorities or hell breaking loose in the world. The students were all in relatively good spirits as well, which made work easy for the professors. On Friday evening, Inez found herself sitting at the kitchen counter, organizing some spare electronic pieces she had kept on hand from a few of the previous projects she had worked on. She didn’t want to hold onto any parts if they didn’t work. 

“Hey Wolfy, how’s the project going?” Kate leaned in the doorway, smiling. Inez had been so deep in her thoughts, she didn’t hear Kate in the area. 

“I mean, it’s just a bunch of scraps. I’m mostly checking to make sure I didn’t keep them for no reason.” Inez collected the loose pieces and put them in a small box she kept handy for spare parts.

Kate walked over and sat next to Inez, “Well, if you’re not busy, I was wondering if you’d like to do something. It’s a Friday night, everyone else is either busy or sleeping, and I thought it’d be fun to have some ‘girl time’?”

“It sounds like you already have a plan in mind?” Inez eyed her friend with faux suspicion. Kitty never had bad ideas, just questionable ideas.

================================================

Several hours - and several alcoholic drinks later - the two girls were laughing, dancing, and “living their best lives” as they say. The mansion was still aside from the alcohol-induced joy the girls were radiating. They decided to make the living room their makeshift nightclub. Alcohol wasn’t allowed on the premises, but Kate had learned a thing or two about hiding some cans of seltzer. They mixed the alcohol with some juice to make it go down easier, and before too long, they were having a wonderful time together. The girls had enough wherewithal not to do anything stupid, except maybe play their music a little louder than what was preferred. Thankfully, the mansion was almost empty, which meant no one was really around to scold them.

Except maybe one person.

Logan’s senses were under attack from the girls’ shenanigans. The sound of the music and the smell of the alcohol were the most prominent. He had come downstairs to grab a beer he had hidden himself, and saw the girls dancing and having a great time. Part of him was warmed to see them so happy, and another part of him was annoyed, because of how loud the music was. He decided not to disturb them, and slipped into the kitchen without catching their attention. The Wolverine wasn’t exactly known for liking girly pop music, but he tried to ignore it as much as he could as he drank his beer in the kitchen. He couldn’t lie, it did make him smile to see Kate having fun with friends, even if he and Inez didn’t get along at the best of times. She was just a little too much like him, but in this moment he saw a side of her that she hadn’t shown very much. She actually seemed like fun in this state. The twinge of guilt hit him again.

Maybe things could be different.

Before he could get too lost in his thoughts, the girls were giggling excitedly, “Oh my god, I love this song!” The song playing was “Teenage Dream” by Katy Perry, which in truth wasn’t either of the girls' favorite song, but they knew the words and it was catchy enough that they were having a good time.

“You make me

Feel like I'm livin' a teenage dream

The way you turn me on, I can't sleep

Let's run away and don't ever look back, don't ever look back”

Inez swung her hips to the beat of the song, rolling her shoulders and tossing her hair around. In this moment she was the definition of “dance like no one is watching”. Except Logan had been watching, but she hadn’t noticed him yet, so she had no reason to feel embarrassed. Kate could now see Logan in the kitchen, sipping his beer and smiling at them. She smiled back, but didn’t pay him too much attention, continuing to dance with her friend.

“I'ma get your heart racing in my skin-tight jeans

Be your teenage dream tonight

Let you put your hands on me in my skin-tight jeans

Be your teenage dream tonight”

Inez ran her hands from her chest down to her legs, still swaying and rocking with the beat. Something about that suddenly made Logan inhale sharply, mid-sip, sending him into a coughing fit. Inez whipped around quickly, suddenly feeling very sober, and very mortified. Kate, who had noticed Logan, started laughing. She didn’t know whose reaction was better - Inez's or Logan’s.

“I-I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you I-” Logan was at a loss for words, still trying to clear his airways from the alcohol.

Inez yelled, “How long have you been watching us?!” Her body was hot - she was already warm from the alcohol and the dancing, but now she felt like her body was on fire. She was embarrassed. She barely let anyone see her with her guard down, especially not Logan. She wanted to be her toughest self around him. She didn’t even let him answer before she left the room, leaving quickly to get out of the situation she was now in. She was already up the stairs, heading to her room before Logan could follow her.

“You might want to give her a second,” Kate suggested, a smile still on her face. “It might actually be better if I go talk to her.”

Upstairs, Inez was in the bathroom splashing water on her face, trying to cool down. She was definitely sober now, and kept reliving and replaying the moment in her head. She genuinely wondered how long Logan had been watching. What was he thinking? She didn’t want to think about it for too long. She walked out of the bathroom and straight to her room, silently hoping there was still enough alcohol in her system that maybe she would still forget the events by morning.

Logan wasn’t any better. He couldn’t stop asking himself why he had reacted like that. She wasn’t anyone special to him, she was just Inez, the stupid little pup who would mouth off to him, or side-eye him every chance she got. But in that moment, she was something. She was always fearless and carried herself with a lot of confidence, but when she was dancing in the living room, she was entirely herself. She was radiant. Logan couldn’t think straight for the rest of the night, and questioned himself at every chance he got. It kept him awake for a long while before he could shake the feeling enough to get some sleep.

[astreinomane]

Now I gotta ask back

Elmax headcanons??

Also what song remind you of them that's not "running up the hill" xD

Well, I already made a post about this (here), but I can easily give you new ones.

El is fascinated by Max's red hair. Like, she loves to immerse her face in it, and smell it. Max is flustered, but she lets El do this, because she secretly loves this kind of attention.

At the same time, Max is fascinated by El's powers.

She thinks they are SO cool, and, while El doesn't exactly like her powers, since they remind her of her traumatic childhood at the Lab, she blushes everytime Max defines her as a supergirl.

El is just really flustered by the fact Max sees her powers as something cool, and not as something that makes her a monster, like a lot of other people.

Max obviously reassures El everytime she has those kind of doubts, telling her that she could never see her as a monster.

For Max, El is and always will be the best thing that ever happened in Max's shitty life, with or without powers.

El is shocked, because no one ever said such kind things to her ever, but it makes her at the same time SO glad to have Max in her life.

And, now knowing that Max is impressed and not scared by her powers, El makes sure to never lose occasion to impress the redhead with them.

It works everytime.

(This is Max's reaction everytime she sees what El can do with her powers.

She LOVES her supergirlfriend SO much.)

About the song, I'm not the kind of person who associates characters or ships with song, so I don't have anything in mind, sorry.

But thank you SO SO much for the ask anyway, @broke-art-girl.

(Also, sorry for the problem this post had. This is the version that I wanted to post, but while I was working on it in my drafts, it accidentally posted itself. I don't know how the fuck it happened, since I didn't touched anything, but yeah. Sorry again. Anyway, hope you enjoy these new headcanons!)

[cursedcupcakemaster]

It may be long before October but it is never too early for a Halloween episode so I bring this gift for @melodyseashell22

Warnings:implied deaths, blood, implied child abuse

Notes:I don't own Melody Seashell she belongs to @melodyseashell22 or any of twisted wonderlands characters they belong to Disney and Yana Tobosos wonderful mind, the story is more or less a spin on the creature from the black lagoon idk what else to call it

Type:Poison candy apple

Yandere "sea monster" Floyd Leech x Melody Seashell

If you were to tell Melody what would come of the situation her parents had dragged her into she might have called you crazy, not even she believed this could have happened but unfortunately or perhaps fortunately it did

Her parents were the sort that just adored monetary gain, so when one of their associates let them know there was a sunken shipyard full of valuables no one had managed to pick clean, they were sold.

Melodys parents dragged her onto the boat with them as their servant. They always did like holding it over her head that she owed them for bringing her into the world and she was in no mood to argue as it lessened what would come should she choose to argue. The boat they traveled on was a rather old one, it was clearly used for fishing before it was one for hauling treasure away for her parents to make their profit ,not knowing what or rather who was waiting for them there.

The smell of seawater clung to the air as the family made their journey to the resting place of the many shipwrecks. What could have caused this Melody wasn't sure but what she was sure of was the lining of claw and teeth marks in the holes she saw of the boats that hadn't completely sunk, it gave her an uneasy feeling. A splash was heard that made her turn her head but when she looked there was nothing there save for a few bubbles and ripples from whatever had been there before and her parents were now demanding her to go make their dinner.

The kitchen was nice enough aside from a few things that needed repair but at least there was enough that her parents wouldn't need to shout at her, granted they didn't allow her much to eat to start with but it still put her mind at ease knowing they couldn't turn as much of their wrath to her as usual and once she was done she served them and the captain who had agreed to the voyage, he was one of her fathers associates who she didn't have much doubt was a less than honest man considering the little she saw during the poker nights where she had to stay out of the adults sight, he would cheat each game.

"You know what's out here right? What if they see us" the older man asked before Melodys father scoffed

"Oh please we'd know if they were here" Melodys father said as he downed a third serving of whiskey

Melody couldn't say she knew what they meant but whatever 'they' were, the unknown party certainly seemed to scare the captain enough before he downed his own beer. Sighing to herself she retired to her room and saw a fog rolling in outside the window. That feeling of being watched once more washed over her but she had to ignore it for now if she had a prayer at resting before her parents demands for the next day started so she allowed herself to fall into the darkness of a dreamless sleep.

The next morning was one Melody was accustomed to with her parents laughing about their newest venture and about how easy this one would be with the amounts of shipwrecks they had seen. Melody had been instructed to help them with their equipment but she was not allowed to go too close to the water. She had never been allowed in the sea itself ,whenever she asked why her parents would yell and scream that she shouldn't question them in the first place.

The first thing Melody noticed when she was setting up their equipment was there were no diving suits or oxygen tanks but there were nets and harpoon guns. Melody questioned why they would have those but not the basic safety equipment an experienced treasure diver might have but reminded herself she shouldn't say anything.

Her mother soon approached her

"You stay on this boat and do not touch anything except what you're supposed to got that? " the woman asked in a sickly sweet voice

"Yes ma'am " Melody answered quietly making the woman smile in a way that made Melody uncomfortable before she left.

A few days came to pass and not an inch of sunlight passed through the clouds in the sky. Melody looked out at the murky sea and there was something about the calm lapping of the waves at the ships sides that worried her, it was far too quiet for her liking. Melody heard a splash and turned but she saw no one there. She heard laughing and it was no one she had heard on board before, it sounded like a young man around her age. Melody went to the edge as she heard the laughter again

"Boo~" the voice crooned before Melody saw a rather surprising thing, it was a young man but he had green skin, claws for nails, sharp teeth and fins where his ears should have been, the sight was enough to make her scream and run back inside the ship. This creature whatever it was had to be what was sinking all of those boats. That had to be why none of the crews on those ships were able to come back.

Melody heard something sliding it's way onto the ship and she had no doubt it was the creature coming to play whatever sick game he had before eating her, she hid under the bed shaking as she heard the door creak open and the scratching of nails against the wood

"Come out, come out wherever you are ~" the strange creature cooed looking around but Melody covered her mouth trying not to scream.

She felt a cold clammy hand wrap around her ankle before she was dragged out with the creature snickering "Angelfish is funny~" he laughed

"WHO ARE YOU!?" Melody screamed

"A friend~" he said as if this were just a normal conversation and not frightening the poor girl half to death

"F friend?" She choked out

He nodded "you can call me Floyd~"

"M melody"

"Why are you out in my territory angelfish?~" he asked

" my parents t they came f for a a j job" she said

"Ohhh so they're the ones touching our stuff, that's not very nice ~"

"I i didn't know " she started before Floyd shushed her

"I'm not mad at you angelfish ~ "

Melody was confused before he spoke again

"You didn't come here cause you wanted to~ those guys made you right?~" Floyd questioned

"Y yes" Melody answered

"Then it's not your fault, besides I want to be friends with you angelfish is that okay?~" he asked and hesitantly Melody nodded

A few days passed and a scream from Melodys mother could be heard which shocked poor Melody out of bed. When she saw what happened to cause her mother to shriek, she felt bile rise in her throat. There was one of the men who had been helping her family obtain their wealth, his eyes were torn from his sockets, fingers missing, hands chewed up and his chest torn open with his heart missing.

"I warned you!" The captain shouted at Melodys father

"How was I supposed to know!? they were supposed to be far from here! " he argued back

"It doesn't matter we need to leave! Now! We have more than enough so let's go! " Melodys mother screamed at the men before they dispatched to get the boat moving

Melody ran to her room as the boat began to move again making it's way toward the way they came.

There was an odd sound as they neared the halfway point and Melody heard screaming outside her small room, a small voice in her head warned her not to leave the room. The scent of iron filled her nose as the screams died down but she felt as if the boat was lowering.

Running out of the room she saw the boat was indeed sinking and blood was everywhere on the boat

Melody looked for her parents but what she saw were creatures who resembled Floyd only they were deceased with their corpses in a similar state to the one found earlier

Melody took a step back terrified as she got a good look at their faces and saw the ring her mother wore on her finger on the female creature

Why why did this beast wear her mother's ring she asked herself until a familiar voice chuckled behind her

"Confused huh angelfish? ~" turning she saw Floyd

"It's not surprising they never told her a thing " another creature spoke who looked exactly like him save for the hair parting

"Where are my manners I am Jade Leech , I assume you are the Melody Floyd's been talking so much about "

"W what's happening why why did you guys do this, why are those things wearing my parents stuff?" She asked trembling before the brothers shared a look and Floyd brought Melody to the water making her heart race was he going to kill her after all ?

Melodys heart pounded in her ears as Floyd placed his hand in the water before running it along Melodys arm

Where the sea water touched arose green scales and fins. Melody couldn't believe her eyes, she couldn't believe this was real at all.

"You aren't actually human, those guys who claim to be your parents were merpeople and so are you" Floyd said

"Why do you believe they kept you from the ocean?" Jade mused

"So those things-"

"Your parents, though I'd hardly call them that" Jade spoke

"But...what do I do now...I have nowhere to go...no one" Melody lamented before Floyd smiled

"Of course you do angelfish ~ you'll come with us people you belong with~ " Floyd grinned with sharp teeth holding out his hand to her

Taking in his words filled Melody with a sense of relief , she took his hand before he led her into the sea feeling herself fully transform, and swim beside the boy who had been the first to try making her happy, the one who had saved her from previous nightmare that was her family. For once in her life she felt free.

[novisius]

This video tutorial has a male speaker who shows screen caps numerous times during it...this tutorial was recommended to be watched before you started the game, but man...is this really the best tutorial for the game there is?

[I discovered 54, not actually the name of the game…it’s like twelve digits or something, but it ends and starts with 54, a few months ago.

Rumors about the game followed the release of FDR, Full Dive Rigs, and the legislation around them. This game, which was supposedly on the dark web, ignored the legislation. It gave you the full spectrum of sensations as if it were real and it boasted extremely realistic AI. I was naturally curious about such a thing.

Normally...well...legally, FD games leave out the sense of smell and almost leave out the sense of touch to the point it basically doesn't exist. 54/Eternal Soul/The Game doesn't leave out those senses. It seems almost entirely real, although the game is kind enough to warn you that if you launch the game, you do void the warranty on your FDR.

The NPC AI is advanced, scarily so. When the game launched, things like quests weren't even a thing, it took someone an in-game month to convince the King of the starting area that it was a better idea to keep the eternal souls preoccupied with even menial tasks than it was to just let them have free reign. They have nations, and laws, and politics, and even strange things like plumbing and gardening as options to do. Though a lot of people do complain that the game requires you to learn how to do things...like, there is no 'slash' skill, you have to figure out how to use a sword yourself. There is no 'blacksmithing' talent, you have to know how to do it. It's useful for building real-world skills, but its not the most fun decision. Especially since the languages in the game are likewise something players don't just get translated for them. That is usually was prevents people from playing the game after checking it out. I started this with something in mind...right, the AI is difficult to distinguish. So, the only way to tell a player from an NPC is through an injury. Players, with our characters 'made of stone sculpted by the gods', naturally don't bleed. But the NPCs, being normal Humans, do. Well, that is speaking a real language, logging out, or leveling up. Though some NPC scholars have begun to learn some of the more prevalent languages of the player base: English, Mandarin, Japanese, Korean, German, French, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, and Hindi.

The next thing I guess to mention is that the game has some weird time-dilation thing going on. In-game time is roughly 10 times real-world time. That is to say, for every day that passes for you outside of the game, ten passes inside of the game. The game itself recommends that players stop playing for an hour to three for every 10 hours they are in-game. There have been some rumors of some people who will just keep playing after that and getting some sort of cognitive issues, so I recommend following that advice personally. Besides, who could play a game for that long and not want a break?

Okay, so next on this tutorial, now that we've gotten the weirdness of the game out of the way, is character creation. So, when you login...I forgot something, right, so this is a hardcore game, obviously. If the senses and lack of player-aiding systems were anything to go by, but what I mean is that this game can only be downloaded onto each FDR once, and each character is associated with the FDR (though there is a process to transfer your account to another machine by contacting the game support team, I've never done it personally but they are apparently pretty quick about it), and if your character dies, the game will brick your FDR after safely logging you out. Unless you've got a lot of money, you only have one life in this game.

Okay, now, character creation. So, when you load into the game, it will ask you a bunch of standard settings questions; 'Do you want your vision corrected/normalized?', 'Do you want limbs restored?', 'Would you like to turn off colorblindness?', etc. But it also has a few more unique questions; 'Would you like Anhydrosis repaired?', 'Would you like Ansomia fixed?'. You know, fixing the senses which normally aren't in FD games. I never encountered those, as I don't have those issues, but apparently, it was very interesting for the people who do.

So, then, you sculpt your character! You sort of carve them out of stone or clay, atleast that's what it felt analogous for to me, and there is an option to use your real world face. Which doesn't always seem to work, so interesting theory there, some players did a volunteer study and they think it doesn't create what you look like, but rather how you see yourself. Some people's will look better or worse than they actually are, some will be spot on, others will be minorly off in some way, etc. Others who have played this game with multiple characters, and the 'sculptor', recommends using that as the baseline, since you actually feel your body, it can be majorly disorientating if you aren't actually in something similar to how you are in real life. That and the fact that you have to be human-like. Though, if that is not your cup of tea, you can change colorations; like you can have black sclera with crimson eyes like my edgelord friend. You can change some features; like pointed ears and fangs like my edgelord friend. You can also create more fur if you get cold easily or give yourself claws. Supposedly the 'sculptor', someone who gets paid to make characters for people, they don't play the game to my knowledge, has created characters with extra eyes, fingers, gills, one with a tail, and supposedly one with wings. (They have ignored all of my messages for statements on those allegations)

During this time you will see yourself in a void, in-game, other players and NPCs will see you in front of a stone pillar under the castle of what used to be the capital of Thalassia (They moved because the players were unruly) as a small golden light floating around your pillar. Fun fact, the light roughly corresponds to where your spleen should be, some weird math went on to figure that out.

Anyways, once your character is made, you should see a cutscene, which should show your true environment. Your little light floats into the stone pillar, which then has the parts that are not a part of your avatar disintegrating into dust leaving behind your stony form (which has generously been auto-applied basic clothing) that begins to spread out color and 'not-stoniness' from the point your light entered. As the cutscene ends, you take on the first-person POV, sorta clipping through the back of the head. Your senses will begin to exist properly over the next few minutes.

Now, you get this fantastic HUD, which includes only a timer counting down in the top left (when the game was released, supposedly it started at the time for 30 in-game years) under which is a logout button which you can 'press', and an invisible-to-everyone-else attribute screen. It should have a 1 in everything and you should feel like you are extremely vulnerable, because you are. You can 'touch' that screen to move it, though I recommend getting used to the thought based interactions with it and placing it into your HUD proper. I place mine in the top right.

So, there are a number of HUD settings I recommend changing immediately, but first, exit from the cellar. Find a guard, and then logout in front of them. That is because all of the settings are in the main menu. I personally think that was a god-awful design decision, but I also have not created an FD game with realistic sense, graphics, and AI, so who am I to judge?

I recommend 'thought commands' being toggled on. I bound my logout button to the thought 'logout1' so I don't accidentally do that when I just consider logging out, but you should bind it to whatever you want. Next, I recommend adding in the souls bar (the xp bar) somewhere on your hud as an element, not a display. The floating screens are displays and I just hate having to interact with them.

Anyways, next enabling your health bar is useful, again, I would make it an element. You can, through that setting here, enable various floating numbers. As you can see here, I prefer to just have a number over my entire bar denoting total and max, as well as a warning that I am dealing 0 damage.

Now, you will notice that there are a few locked options for you, this game does have some microtransactions, but they are solidly useful and cheap. 25¢ a pop, the most frustrating thing about the microtransactions is actually paying them. This game is not exactly legal, so you have to pay using some dark web currency bs, but it is worth it.

The options are Clock (Real-World), Clock (In-Game), Clock (Day-Night), Health Bar (Ally), Health Bar (Neutral), Health Bar (Enemy), and Compass. Those are essential, at least in my humble opinion. The Clocks have a variety of customizations to them, you can have them as displays bound to your wrist like a watch, or you can have them as elements. These are the one thing that I think works better as a display than an element (one of the few things that you are given the choice of). The various health bar options will simply just be a health bar, next to, above, or wrapped around their heads. You can have it set so that it only appears based on proximity or if damage was dealt from one to the other. The compass is just useful, being able to walk in a straight line is always nice, it is magnetic north, but it isn't fooled by nearby magnets.

There are a few other options that change the game to a degree; Mini-map, Awareness (Sound), Awareness (Vision), Senses (Visual), Senses (Auditory), Senses (Tactile), Senses (Olfactory). The first one is...well it just disorients me personally, I know others that will swear by its usefulness, just not me. It does allow you to integrate other elements into it, such as wrapping the compass around it or having a clock in its corner. Though I do have to admit, if you don't know where you are going, it can be very useful. It has a maximum range of something like a 110m radius and a minimum of like 15. It does have some weird height settings which I don't get quite yet. As for the awareness ones, they indicate if you are detectable by sound or by sight by anyone around you. It has a number of ways of doing that, such as showing lines of sight (a bad idea in cities) or by a simple little element on your HUD. I haven't tried playing stealth enough to regularly use this, one element at a time you know? Senses, I've avoided using actively, it feels like my real-world life would be affected a little in a jarring way. But, they enhance your senses, it can either be an element or a data-stream. This is the only one which has the 'data-stream' option. Apparently, the data-stream does something similar to 'correcting colorblindness' in that it just changes how you are processing the sense in the game. The elements can get a little confusing...overwhelming, at times. But they basically allow you to see better (for visual (more lets you mitigate bright lights and darkness on your vision)) and to 'see without seeing' for the others. Each with its own unique brands of limitations.

And there are two that I don't really get why you would want to access them regularly; Level and Self-Portrait. Trust me, level is not useful to know for yourself and it is either visible as an element or display, or it isn't. This is closer to throwing away a quarter to the devs more than something useful. The Self-Portrait is apparently very good for people who need to look at themselves in the mirror to display proper facial expressions since all it does is show your face as if you were looking at it through a camera. There is a way to make it function more as a camera than as a Self-Portrait, which requires using the only exploit I've heard of besides whatever the 'sculptor' is doing. I could see that being useful, but the exploit requires many hours to do properly per portrait…I guess I should mention, you can have up to twelve of them, normally they would only display another angle of your head/bust, but as mentioned, the exploit would do something different. I'm not sure I could go through that exploit more than once honestly.]

[acourtofthought]

People on tiktok are saying that azriel and elain are living in the townhouse together at the end of hosab because it smells like bread and roses, and because azriel could’ve taken Bryce to the river house instead

Honestly, I can understand why their minds would initially jump to that conclusion. Bread and roses does seem like a possible nod to Elain and I think SJM placing a hint like that is entirely within the realm of possibility. She could have chosen any other scents but chose two that are strongly associated with her (because she has multiple mentions of being likened to a rose and baking is a pretty big hobby for her right now).

But it's one of those things that after thinking on it for a few moments you should realize why E/riel living there together is unlikely.

When SF ended, it had been months since E/riels last confirmed interaction (December) and the book itself left us near the start of Spring (March / April). CC3 is to take place 6-9 months after that so that means September to December would be likely.

Couples don't just start playing house in SJMs books unless we see how it got to that point. Whether it's because they were kidnapped from their home in the human lands then fell in love or fleeing a problematic ex then fell in love or beginning to train while making access to bars impossible then fell in love, we always see the events leading up to cohabitation.

If Az and Elain are living together at the start of CC3 than......HOW? WHEN??

Why would SJM decide to completely sidestep them announcing their relationship to Feyre and Rhys (after what happened on Solstice)? How did we completely miss them confessing having feelings for one another and deciding to take the next step by moving in? If they're living together as in they're "together" that has to mean they started having sex but we never read about their first time.

SJM has never started any novel with two characters living together without us knowing how it came about and without us witnessing their firsts together.

I think there is a chance someone is or was recently living in the townhouse because in SF SJM makes it a point to address that it's sitting vacant for anyone who needed it. And a townhome that's vacant shouldn't smell like bread (I don't buy the theory that it smells like bread because Velaris smells like bread, Bryce is noting the inside of the house specifically) and there shouldn't be a fire burning.

I could see that person being Elain. Just as Nesta chose an apartment for herself prior to her story, it would make sense if Elain wanted a little independence of her own before hers (not to mention Feyre and Rhys may want to spend time alone as a new family in their house and she may have wanted to avoid seeing Az when he showed up for IC business). And just as the HOW is still used for more formal business though it belongs to Nesta, it's possible they have a similar arrangement to use the townhouse for business when necessary. Then the scents would make sense in relation to her.

Or maybe the scents were not meant to indicate that Elain is living there at all but to draw attention to her absence. It's kind of a big deal that neither she or Mor were part of the group that went to investigate Bryce's arrival and seeing two things associated with her while not actually seeing her makes you question why she's not there. Maybe the townhouse is where Mor stays when she's not in the continent and it's hinting that she and Elain are off in the continent together.

Or maybe Az is the one staying there as Nessian are now mated in the HOW and again, the bread and roses is simply a clue leading us to question "Where is Elain?"

But it does not make sense to think that SJM completely skipped over the fact that Elain and Az did not end on good terms in SF, months went by where they didn't talk, but suddenly they're happy and living together at the start of another series. There is no point in a romance book where we completely missed experiencing the romance and excitement of a couples firsts especially when the female returned the males necklace and walked away. In the off chance that E/riel does end up together, there is no way SJM is going to just gloss over that. Where they wouldn't first have a good old fashioned fight over Az's rejection and idiocy in turning around and giving the necklace to someone else. And there's no way we wouldn't first need him to explain why the thought of another females happiness sparked something in his chest.

If I were an E/riel who thought they were already together, I'd be pretty pissed that once again, Elain is absent from that very major crossover scene just as she was absent from so many scenes in SF. Nesta and Cassian entered the room together as did Feyre and Rhys. Yet somehow Elain is once again nowhere to be found as her "love" just realized something pretty major about TT after he blindfolded and carried some random chick into her home.

[damienthepious]

would you be up for a bit of commentary on chap 25 of beast? Maybe something from Arum’s section? hi I am very normal about this fic couldn’t you tell

i am ALWAYS up for commentary, even if it sometimes takes me a few days to find time to get to it. unforch i can't just write fanfic full time, alas. BUT YES. the new (it WAS new when i STARTED writing this commentary!!! BUT) chapter 25 :3c I did the whole fcking section, oops.

[Perhaps it is only natural, the associations Arum's humans have begun to take on in his mind.]

it's amazing the weird ways that Arum's captivity has scrambled his usual characterization for me. He still has SO much pride but he also KNOWS that it's kinda bullshit, and he also feels like such an enormous, world-ending fuckup that the pride seems ridiculous. hence:

he's a lot more easily able to admit to himself his own affections, thought processes, feelings in general. They just seem like part of the unsatisfactory whole of who he is.

[That first: the idea of Amaryllis and Sir Damien as Arum's humans.]

................ ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

[Possession, he supposes, does not come into it, as such. He is not in a state to possess anything at all. A scrap of charcoal and a hidden drawing that has been unfolded and refolded so many times that it has begun to fray at the edges- that amounts for about as much as he can boast to possess.]

a lot of the way i think about a character calling another character theirs or stuff like that has been intensely reframed by the way it's described in Dal's fics, which... and i'm not going to describe this well, i don't think, but it's sort of... possession in reverse? like... you call a place Your home, not because it's land that you own, but because it is a place that You belong to. Arum is a shriveled houseplant. They are HIS humans because they're the ones who watered him, cared for him, treated him like something that was still alive. They're His because they're the only ones who matter, so far as he's concerned. They may as well be the only humans that exist, really.

So, ACTUAL possession- that's not really part of it. He's not trying to claim them, not really.

[Nevertheless.

Amaryllis and Sir Damien are his. If only to differentiate them from the entire rest of their species. If only in that they are the only extant creatures save his Keep that Arum would rather have at his side than not, even in his shame, and failure, and despair. Perhaps the more so even in such.]

he wants them around. He's not really in a position to think of himself outside of his current situation, so he can't say how he'd feel about them if he were free, but... but...

He's also aligning them with the Keep in his head, which maybe isn't a surprise at this point.

[But-

Associations. Yes.]

AND HE GETS DISTRACTED BY HIS OWN THOUGHTS ABOUT THEM.

[He still smells honeysuckle on Sir Damien, now and again. Arum knows, now, that it grows at the edge of Amaryllis' garden, in the clearing beside her hut. She's drawn it for him in a few of her letters, sketches that carry the delicate golden weight of the flowers even in their simple black lines.]

physical reality, nature, communication. the association of honeysuckle=damien is obvious, of course, but it carries more than itself. yellow, sweetness, sunshine, hazy air, buzzing insects. Rilla reveals windows through which he can actually see something besides his own horrible surroundings. Damien is the details, Rilla is the whole wide picture.

[He wishes she had drawn Sir Damien there, calm amongst the flora, pollen and sunlight seeping into his skin, the curls of his hair. Arum can't quite imagine it properly in his own head. Damien would be out of his armor, for one. Arum has never seen him like that. He can't bring himself to try to picture some facsimile of the true shape of Damien's shoulders, without the chitin, or the trim of his waist.]

an extremely, extremely physical, visceral, sensual image that doesn't actually exist. and so terribly simple, too. Arum appreciates beauty, generally, in canon and in all my verses, and here... he's been so deprived for so long, an idea THAT pretty is fairly well overwhelming.

[He does not think, truly, that he'll ever witness such a sight, but... he would prefer not to sully the chance with some false imagining, anyway.]

Still fatalistic, alas. He can't FORCE himself to believe that he'll escape, let alone that he'll escape and survive and damien will also survive AND he'll ever have a reason to see him sans armor. But also, he clearly wants that. All of it. He actually SAYS so! Says he WISHES just for the image!!! which is so much more than most versions of Arum would have done openly, even to himself.

[He has seen Amaryllis so much more rarely, but their correspondence-

Her anger mirrors his own. Her incandescent fury, rage against the injustice, the unfairness. She is clever, perhaps more clever than any other creature he has known. Certainly more clever than any other human he has yet met.]

unequivocal. y'know? Rilla is straight up brilliant, and THIS arum isn't so smug that he resists admitting that. and the anger- Rilla likes when things make sense. in MH, she sounds SO angry when she tells Arum that something isn't fair. Arum's situation rn? REALLY isn't fucking fair, and she's just as angry as Arum is about it, and SHE'S not the one in a cage. Rilla sees something wrong and wants so so so SO badly to FIX it. She fixes things, it's what she does. Not being able to fix THIS quickly and efficiently is distressing as hell for her, and it bleeds through.

[He thinks-

He can't help but think-]

this is a cut-off-and-rephrase because he doesn't WANT to think about this, in his current position.

[Would he enjoy their words, their company, their companionship- would he feel about the pair of them the way he does, if he knew them before? If he knew them, somehow, outside of this wretched captivity?]

He doesn't want to consider this question, really, because he's afraid that the answer could be no. (Obviously, considering me, the answer would always only ever be yes. but Arum doesn't know that) He doesn't want to think about the possibility of despising them outside of this because he wants this to be real, wants the idea of Rilla and Damien and their connection to him to be possible out in the REAL world. He doesn't want this to be pity alone, he doesn't want this to be charity. Because it's more than that for HIM.

[Would Sir Damien seem so much like sunlight and honey and candleflame against his scales? So much like comfort, lyrical lullaby voice and careful cradling palms against his scales?]

And here, finally, are the actual ASSOCIATIONS that Arum was thinking about and indicating in the FIRST FUCKING SENTENCE of this section. Warmth, natural light, song, touch, tenderness.

[Would he meet Amaryllis mind to mind and want with such unspeakable hunger to cultivate the soil side by side with her, some shared garden, some shared growth?]

some shared garden, some shared growth.........

[(Had he not failed so catastrophically, so long ago, he would have finished his weapon. Had he not failed, he would have been the architect of the destruction of every human in the Wilds.)]

Oh, for a shift in perspective, for the context of the real living beings belonging to some abstract "enemy." I love my meow meow dearly, but i certainly never forget the intended warcrimes.

[(He has regretted his incomplete work so deeply, in his captivity.)]

And why WOULDN'T he???? Here, chained, trapped, tortured, starved, alone???? why would he NOT regret failing to kill ALL of these humans? If he succeeded, he wouldn't be HERE.

[(Harder... harder to regret that, now. Amaryllis and Sir Damien, two dead among thousands, never known to him, more blood among the ocean of this terrible war, and Arum-)]

Oh for a shift in perspective. There's a face (or two) on the populace he didn't care about killing, before. Which is maybe ironic, because it's the same shift that Damien had to go through from the other side.

[They both feel so painfully real, here among the sad grey monotonous nothing.]

Back to the moment, back to the feelings. Back to something softer.

[Damien's consistency and warmth, growing among the cracks, bringing his own sunlight; Amaryllis more distant, more free, some passerine creature flitting in and out from the bars that cage him, the both of them messengers of earth and sky and storm, the only proof that the outside world exists.]

Flora and fauna. And maybe, in other circumstances, it would make more sense for Rilla to embody plant life and Damien who i frequently associate with rabbits in particular to be the fauna, but here... Damien is a consistent presence, closer to the constant companionship of his Keep, and Rilla is the songbird, bringing vitality with the words she shares. they ARE the "earth and sky and storm," they ARE the outside world. Between the two of them, sun and moon, earth and sky, hand and hand. it's only natural-

[It should be no surprise at all, he tells himself. The warmth. The fluttering feeling. The pleasure he feels reading Amaryllis' words. The comfort of Damien's touch.]

he shouldn't be surprised, he tells himself. Which, of course, implies that he IS surprised, on some level. And, despite his position, and despite being SOMEWHAT more willing to be honest with himself, there's still a level of abstraction here. Mostly, of course, because he's in such a rotten place physically-emotionally-mentally. And also because he kind of doesn't really know what's going on with himself, either. Why would he?

[It shouldn't be any surprise for Lord Arum, feeling something for his humans. Whatever it is that that something might be.]

And also... it doesn't matter WHAT the feeling is, specifically. It doesn't. Arum knows that he DOES feel something for them. And that's enough. That's more than should be possible.

ANYWAY. THIS IS SO LONG. HOPE IT'S ENJOYABLEEEEE

[chaifootsteps]

Hello, 'tis I, SecretIdentity!Alastor Anon once more:

I didn't realize wendigo weren't closed culture, I was under the impression that they were, my bad, sorry; thanks for telling me. Anyways I agree that interpretations w/ them as spoopy monsters is pretty blargh & that my Secret-ID-AU!Alastor, even canon!Alastor, are as far from wendigo as can be lol.

And yes! I really like Peryton!Alastor as a concept (plus, bird AND deer behaviors! It's got the flavors built in! Either the SecretIdentity!Alastor's wings are too small to fly, or they were injured & rendered flightless some time ago (broken funny? Nerve damage? Amputee? haven't decided). He's been a lot of fights over the years, there's a toll taken there.

And I just had a thought, what if, Alastor's plan to ally with Charlie & support her hotel idea, was a survival-brain, seat of his pants idea? The most recent Cleanse had all of Hell in a huge serious of brawls, duels and turf wars right (tbh I have... issues with Sinners and the Cleanse itself only being confined to the Pride Ring but I haven't decided yet)? Set 'Day in the Life' Alastor comic but a little to the left slightly before the Cleanse, Alastor and Sheep Lady get caught outside during the Cleanse. Eventually leads to Alastor getting into a marathon of close calls both with Exterminator Angels AND Sinners afterwards, he's won in the sense that he's alive, and the Radio Demon's identity is still a mystery as well as his mythos uplifted further. By the start of the AU Pilot time post-Cleanse, all his usual hideyholes (Rosie? Who actually is an Overlord apparently?) are either too far or partially compromised (Vox bothering him, Alastor, as himself, a 'known associate' of the Radio Demon?), so he needs to buy himself some breathing room to recover and figure out his next moves. (Sheep Lady is alive somewhere but nowhere to be seen for now).

Alastor uses some magic he's got to make himself look unruffled/unhurt, can't show weakness after all, wounded prey animals get targeted first. He ends up ducking into the News Studio just in time to see Charlie's broadcast interview live.

Idk I just thought it would be kinda interesting if Alastor allied with Charlie because he was flying by the seat of his pants and too allergic to showing weakness (legitimate concern considering Hell's society) to try coming as a guest, because not only is that an affront to his pride but the lack of control would be scary probably, so he needs to pitch himself (and his true identity, but separately and somehow a reason to also be there bc that's the point but he can't let them know it's the point) as a valuable asset without looking weak. So he calls in a couple of those few ongoing contracts/favors that he's been holding onto for a while, Niffty and Husk, they're the... Safest choices, to contribute something to this allyship support deal he just pantsed himself into. He had a plan the whole time (no he didn't).

Instead of the pilot/ep1 ending with Sir Pentious just showing up, he doesn't, no big powerwank scene, just quiet scenes for each of what is probably going to be (most of?) the main cast ending their day, settling into the hotel. Also I feel that there was some missed opportunity in the pilot canon where Angel mentions that there's no food at the hotel, and Alastor offering to cook jambalaya for everybody (later if he has a more pressing injury to bother with in secret? Could even be a tidbit of Vaggie talking to Charlie about how Alastor [Radio Demon's ambassador] smells like blood, and if Alastor hears he wouldn't correct her) dialogue at the end can stay though, or it get picked up later.

Anyways, thanks for listening to my Alastor blether, I know he's just Viv's edgy karen-hair wasted potential OC but, man I enjoy redesign/rewriting him.

Thank you for sending in your ideas -- it's some truly excellent blether! Characters that are exceedingly powerful but also in survival mode always make for an interesting time.

(Incidentally, you've also got me really invested in the idea of Alastor with stubs of what used to be wings hidden under his clothes.)

[applesandbannas747]

for the ask game: 6 for dead hearts and sinew&bone, 12 (sorry had to), and 17 👀

For this ask game! Thanks so much for playing <3

6. What’s one fact about the universe of a fic that you didn’t get a chance to mention in the fic itself?

Dead Hearts:

oooo probably Warlock stuff. I really love the concept of wizards, witches, and warlocks all being Different, nongendered, things instead of gendered and/or interchangeable names (I blame Septimus Heap for that one). Anyway, warlocks in Dead Hearts have a special connection to magic because while witches' magic connects them to the earth, warlocks are so much a part of the earth that magic flows directly from it through them--it's also what makes them able to read others' magic (like Eugene did to Jesse's) because they're a conduit for magic and connection as much as the earth itself is, so their magic is sort of...everyone's magic. It's a stream always flowing through them as opposed to a witch's bottomless lake. (Wizards might harness magic artificially, though I didn't completely flesh out that thought--a wizard is probably what Nick would have been during his first life, because his magic was being pulled from an outside source, and what Eugene was trying to do--and eventually succeeded in doing was open Nick to the flow of magic warlocks experience).

I wrote up a bunch more lore and realized that it would be a shame to share it in case I ever wanted to write about it, which means my dumb brain has probably decided it does want to write the theoretical eugesse spin-off at some point. so stay tuned for that in like 3 years i guess XD

Sinew & Bone:

So! When Nick sees Jesse in Eugene's room, they immediately recognize each other as pack. Nick had previously commented to Eugene to leave whatever werewolf he's sleeping with because it's obviously he's stressed all the time now and his scent is all mixed with wolf. The reason Nick didn't know then that Eugene's wolf was Jesse is that his brain filtered the possibility out. The scent was Eugene, Family, Wolf, and Nick immediately assigned the family association to Eugene completely on accident and with no recognition that he even smelled that on Eugene because his subconscious sees Eugene as family, so he didn't register anything amiss with Eugene's scent in that regard. So all he picked up from Eugene that was out of place was a random shifter's scent.

12. Are there any tropes you used to dislike but have grown on you?

oh man i fEEEL like there was a specific trope I immediately had in mind for this one but because I waited so long to answer, I literally can't remember anymore.

Perhaps song fics? I hate reading them but have ended up writing several tangential fics that DO quote song lyrics in them jfdsah Really I'm just a hypocrite. I'll come back if i ever remember my real answer??

17. What highly specific AU do you want to read or write even though you might be the only person to appreciate it?

oh man so many honestly. and like. I do it pretty regularly XD but two super specific and indulgent aus that genuinely no one but me and, like, one other specific person would read are:

1) characters somehow getting swapped with older/younger versions of themselves. For example, 25 year old Nick swapping places with 16 year old Nick and remembering what a dick baby Seiji was to him, while 16 year old Nick's trying to fight with a 25 year old Seiji. I like versions where it's just mind swapped and versions where it's whole body as well (those are fun for the oh no he's hot moment they come with). Fun fact, my original idea for the 'childhood' prompt in the 30 Day Fence Challenge was 17 or so Nick swapping out minds with 12 year old Nick but I couldn't make it work the way I wanted it to in the time I had to write it so it got shelved

2) the Ultimate self-indulgence of MAXIMUM cringe level but aus where a pre-get-together ship's future kid somehow gets dumped back in time and seeks out their parent/s and they're like what do you mEAN I married him?!?! and yes i do have a specific scenario for both Eugesse and Nichoji fics of this variety and if I had time to fit them in my writing schedules, y'all would have to suffer months of irrelevant content from me uwu

[grilledkatniss]

What reminds you of home?(not the house, just things that remind you of the feeling) Do you believe in astrology? Now, say three nice things about yourself.

Don't think I have a home or some feeling I associate with home. I have like.. idk a few moments in time when things felt just right and I guess I felt safe and healthy and loved and normal, like a small period of time before middle school, and that's probably why I don't remember much of it but get a sense of comfort and simplicity. Like as if there was a right way to do childhood. Some smells and tastes and sounds take me back there. The summer mostly. But there's no specific place to be reminded of. Come to think of it maybe like summer camp or my aunts house when we'd travel there during most summer vacations, before it got too expensive to afford for 2 grumpy adults and 3 no longer toddlers. Like the smell of gasoline reminds me of being in my aunts car with my sisters and my cousin coming back from the mall where they painted whiskers on our faces bc they were doing promo for some local children's movie we couldn't afford tickets for.

I don't believe in astrology but I love constellations and a clear night sky far away from the city lights. I actually have been sleeping on my parents backyard these last few days just so that I could fall to sleep looking at the stars. There was also supposed to be a meteor shower going on this week but didn't see any meteor showering anywhere. When I was in high school and depression and anxiety weren't real words in anyone's vocabulary in a small conservative town for a lonely awkward mopey girl, there was one star I named Lauren that I'd always be eager to see and talk to. I'd be like "it's the second shiniest star on that side, far removed from the rest and the moon". It didn't occurred to me till years after that like... the earth rotates on itself and also around the sun, and the moon around us as well, while outter space "stays put" (it doesn't either) so of course the star wouldn't be in the same place all year round and couldn't use the moon as a reference point.. and I legit would cry when I couldn't find it. But also like up till the second year of college I thought the moon being right on top of you meant it was midnight, like the same logic as with the sun so feel free to judge my dumb ass.

I'm mostly always well intentioned, and empathetic but in a weird logical way. Like someone having x feelings and x reactions makes sense to me in x context taking into account x precedent and x experience etc, you know what I mean? I don't tend to get caught up in my own feelings anymore.. no one but my ex can really say I'm a mean person and mean it. (But he can go fuck himself, acting like Ryan Gosling's character in the second half of the notebook, absolute victim of neglect and accusing me of breaking his heart for sport, the manipulative lil shit). Let's say those are three different unrelated nice things about me.

[treeofnonsense]

INFODUMP TIME: SINF EDITION

i'm aorry

SO. This is a series of 6 books that I affectionately call the Modern Fantasy Mythological and Historical Real Person Fiction series. And it's accurate. Very accurate.

I'm emo about it every day and I once scared kya by reblogging something from his nlog onto my sinf sideblog and he didn't know it was me. It's such a batshit crazy book I read a lot of batshit books, okay.

But one of the things about it is that people use magic by using their auras, something many folks irl have heard about. Auras and vibes and energies and such. In SINF you have a finite amount of aura you can use before doing magic consumes your physical body instead. Depleting your aura is BAD. You need to rest if you do, or if you get severely injured because your aura automatically tries to heal you regardless of if there's any aura to heal you with.

Auras come in a few different forms and MILLIONS of colors. They also have unique smells, and although you can technically change it, you have an original scent that is yours exclusively. (The bad guys in the series are extra as FUCK and make their auras smell like rotten meat and stuff. Drama queens.)

There are 3 auras that are the most powerful, but one type of aura trumps them all. Those three are Gold, Silver, and Black. Gold and silver are rare as fuck, and the twin teenaged Main Characters of the series have those colors naturally, and in the purest form. But we never quite hear about anyone who has a black aura, and the one time I recall it mentioned (it's been a while since I read them) it's just....implied. And then we NEVER hear about black auras again, despite apparently being a huge cog in the wheel that makes up the magic of this world.

HOWEVER. You know me. You know that if I have wiggle room, then I will ponder. And I don't just have wiggle room with the concept of black auras-- i have a fucking warehouse.

And so, middle school Marcel began to think-thonk. And I've been think-thonking for a decade now.

The legendary twin auras of pure gold and silver are representative of the Sun and the Moon in SINF. They literally ARE those things. Others can have (and have had) pure gold or silver, but they weren't as powerful because they were twins. They weren't the Sun and Moon. So it stands to reason that a black aura would have some celestial symbol as well, yeah?? But what? Now originally I assumed it might be an eclipse. But the black aura is an independent concept, unlike the Sun and Moon auras which depend on each other to keep balance across the multiverse (yes there's a multiverse in SINF. Don't worry about it.) So now what?? What is something in astronomy that is associated with darkness and doesn't necessarily have something else to balance it?

That's right. A black hole.

How would that work, you may ask? How does an aura, which already consumes itself and then its bearer even when it's normal, somehow function efficiently when it mimics a fucking BLACK HOLE. Well boy do I have the answer for you 🫵🏼

It lays dormant, but when ignited, can only take energy from auras around it. This bitch will consume SOMEBODY ELSE in order to power itself. And it's hungry.

What does a black aura look like?? Uh well. I actually headcanon that it's colorless. Invisible, even, except for a faint disruption around its bearer, much like how stuff bends around an actual black hole. Auras can only be used when someone is Awakened, but black auras can Awaken someone nearby who previously was not, just to start sucking up their aura juice for magical purposes.

Really eldritch of me, I think. I definitely have an OC with a black aura and she's everything to me.

I love how middle-schoolcel took the most edgelord of books and made the most edgelord of OCs out of it. Fantastic. Glorious. Sometimes you just need to satiate the inner teenager.

The idea of auras being the source of power is actually really interesting, to be honest. But having the main characters be extra special gold and silver aura teenagers and the bad guys smell like rotten meat and there's an extra-special black aura we never hear about is also hilarious.

[stevethehairington]

4, 19 and 39 for weird writers ask 🫶

ty for sending this in friend!! <3

4. What’s a word that makes you go absolutely feral?

okay i know this is asking for specifics but here we have a category 5 "i've been asked to recall something so naturally my brain forgets everything its ever known" moment. soooo, i'm going to be pretty unspecific probably lol buuuut

any word that implies something tender is happening is my jaaaaam. i mean, tender itself is a word i love a lot. but yeah anything that implies something deeply vulnerable and intimate is so so good. i go coo coo for cocoa puffs about it.

i also fucking love space words - nebula, constellation, supernova, cosmic, celestial, anything to do with the stars, the moon, the sun. i eat that shit UP.

also same goes with words about water!!!

also shout out to my homies irrevocably (which i still associate with that one monologue from twilight but like it kind of went off using this words soooo sdflkds), petrichor (bc that's a fun word and i LOVE rain and the smell of rain so), and also freckles and dimples bc i fucking L O V E mentioning those in anything i write so they are favorites too <3

19. Tell me a story about your writing journey. When did you start? Why did you start? Were there bumps along the way? Where are you now and where are you going?

ooh so i started writing like officially the summer before my freshman year of college. i had been apart of fandom before that for a while and had definitely been reading fic for quite some time before, and i'd always sort of wanted to do some writing of my own, but i could never like fully commit to anything. which, in hindsight, i'm very glad i couldn't for that first fandom i was in lmfao. let's just say iykyk.

but then i watched skam and i totally and completely fell in love with that show, with that cast of characters, with the stories they were telling. and i wanted to add to it, i wanted to expand that universe, i wanted to put these characters in my own situations and shows how they'd respond! so i did! and i wrote and i wrote and i wrote. to this day it is still the fandom i have written the most fics for (tied with marvel also lmfao, and honestly stranger things is creeping up there, it's getting close and the brainrot has not died, not even close, so it just might pass it up. but the fact that it's stayed number one for like 6 years? crazy).

it absolutely helped that i found a server to join for fans of the show. that was literally the best thing ever. i made so many connections and so many dear friends and, aside from the brief bumps in the road that came with that server (lmaoo), it was such a good environment and it was SO creatively stimulating and SO motivating and SO inspirational. like i had so many people in my corner rooting me on to actually finish writing that first fic!! and i did!! and their support just kept coming and coming for everything after and that was SO integral to my success and my desire to keep writing. so yeah, shout out to skam international, yall were the real mvps and i wouldnt be where i am today if it werent for you all <3

where am i now and where am i going? well, right now im deeeeep in the st brainrot so im riding that wave as far as it will take me for as long as it will take me. and as for the future? i really have no idea! i have no clue what's going to sink it's claws into me next, but i'm excited to find out!

39. What keeps you writing when you feel like giving up?

really truly it's my friends. whenever i'm feeling down in the dumps about my writing they're always so kind and so nice and so encouraging with me, they know exactly what to say. and a lot of them are writers or artists themselves too so like they understand the feeling too, which makes it easier to like talk about it with them and to take a step back from that ledge.

i also like to look at how much i've done already, and how much i have left that i want to tell and that kind of just helps to put things in perspective. like wow i've done so much, i've made it through so much to get to this point - no way can i give up now.

weird questions for writers

[omegapheromone]

About the Drop thing, from a lifestyler perspective.

It's very similar to hypoarousal fainting/collapse, which is a real response to intense stress and a whole thing with (c-)ptsd and other trauma-related disorders. Where you might think of hyperarousal as the fight/flight/freeze response, hypoarousal is more like the "flop/faint" response, where you become incredibly numb. (Freeze response can actually fall into either hyper- or hypoarousal, as well, since it's about whether you're tensed up and hypervigilant vs limp and numb/unresponsive.) A little graphic via google from sciencedirect.com to explain it;

Now, the reason I bring this up is just because while I personally experience hypoarousal symptoms from previous trauma, the body CAN just respond to extreme distress like that without any prior trauma history. It's a sort of a, "if I play dead and numb myself, then I can't feel any more pain, and maybe the threat will leave me alone if it thinks I'm dead". And I think this is basically the same thing as an Omega Drop as described in this post, it's just not exclusive to a specific group of people. It's literally a remnant from early humans who had to deal with threats in the form of predators often, and playing dead was a way to protect oneself.

Anyway, re: Alpha Guard thing, while I can't speak from personal experience for various reasons, it sounds to me like an extreme fight response of sorts, triggered by an intense protective/territorial instinct- not necessarily any direct threat to the alpha themselves, from what I gathered. It makes sense to me that in omegaverse, Omega responses to extreme stress would lean more to the hypoarousal side while alpha stress responses would probably be on the hyperarousal side, though they're not exclusive. Anxiety is a hyperarousal-related emotion and anyone can feel it, for example, not just Alphas.

I also started wondering about the Betas, of course, because we don't ignore them here. I'd like to think that if Alphas tend to lean towards the more aggressive side of hyperarousal, and Omegas lean towards the shutdown/numb/self-protective responses, maybe for Betas (& any subdynamics!) it'd be more based on their individual character and role in an omegaverse story, especially if packs are involved, although I'd guess Flight and Freeze are common with Betas? Again, not that this is an exclusive thing or even uncommon for responses beyond what your dynamic is more predisposed to having. After all I'm just thinking in the terms of instincts and somewhat associating omegaverse to prey vs predator type animalistic behaviours, since that's what a lot of AUs draw inspiration from anyways.

I think the (observable) symptoms were already described well in the post. I think the weakening of the scent due to body stopping the release of pheromones especially is a big one, and that would likely be what triggers other dynamics the most- because even if the Omega still has their own scent, the pheromones are no longer being emitted and so all that's left is more like the scent that clings to belongings etc, rather than active pheromones- which is exactly what would happen when someone actually dies, at least in my personal canon. Pheromones are a part of the scent being so strong and attractive, but is separate from the scent itself in the sense that the body would still smell the same even without any pheromones present. And since emitting pheromones would be an autonomous nervous system-regulated process that responds to emotional states, if it stopped suddenly, the instinct-based parts of the brain would immediately associate it with death or deadly danger, and this would most likely immediately trigger especially Alphas, because their senses would interpret it as "omega injured/dying, must protect immediately".

Especially A/O mated Alphas would go practically completely feral if their omega experienced this, but even uust sharing a casual friendship bond or a pack bond would likely elicit this response from Alpha(s) familiar enough with the Omega, though not nearly to the same extent. It's probably also why Alphas could end up getting in fights between eachother at times due to an Omega dropping from stress- if they perceive the other is a threat, or if both were close to the omega and both think the other was scaring the omega. The reason Alphas must be approached with extreme caution isn't necessarily that they're trying to fight, but rather, they'll get incredibly agitated and aggressive if anyone approaches the Omega going through the drop, so it's important to be extremely unthreatening and calm when trying to approach.

On a side note, I think just as Omegas can experience the drop for any reason, Alphas could also experience a Guard response for other reasons than JUST an Omega dropping. I think a lot of it would be pack-based protectiveness, or protectiveness over their kids, friends, relatives, etc. I also think that some heavily traumatized Alphas would probably exhibit a guard-type response to more mundane things, like their material belongings, food, or even something they perceive as "theirs", for example a specific seat. You'd probably see this type of behaviour a LOT in orphaned Alpha kids and teens, especially, but it'd likely remain in some ways all the way to adulthood as well.

Lastly, just a personal addition, since I can somewhat give insight. "What does an Omega Drop, or in my case, "flop/faint response" feel like, and how would that look/be different if I was in an actual omegaverse setting?" Basically.

For me, when I get stressed out enough or a trauma-related trigger happens, and I start to go into hypoarousal state, I first notice it from the derealization. It starts to feel like I'm underwater in a way, because people's speech becomes sort of "dull" and feels partially silenced in my ears. Like I'm listening and looking at things from underwater- everything is sort of blurred together and dull, even if my senses work just fine. My brain just isn't processing any of it properly from being too overwhelmed. I start to act on "autopilot" and feel like I'm mostly just watching myself from afar. I don't actually usually faint or completely collapse in public, because I think my brain realizes that would attract even more unwanted attention, and just make things worse. So it usually happens slightly delayed after the initial trigger, when I get to a place where I can be mostly alone. And that feels like... honestly, it feels like nothing, because I quite literally black out so hard that I can't even remember it. I don't even realize time is passing. Coming out of it somewhat feels like waking up from a really long nap at a weird hour, except less "sleep-groggy" and infinitely more stressful and confusing because there's usually almost always some level of dissociative amnesia involved. It feels like I can't fully understand where I am, what happened, or how I even ended up unconscious, because I don't remember "falling asleep" or "going unconscious". I do know it's not actually me being asleep, because in some cases I've been able to maintain a position such as sitting down without completely slumping over, but there's also just absolutely no awareness of my surroundings, my own body, anything. I essentially am completely shut off from my own senses, and I doubt I'd feel much, if any pain, in that state. It's scary and unpleasant, and embarrassing to deal with when people have to witness it. I also know for a fact that my heart rate slows down a lot in this state, and I genuinely come across as fully unconscious and unresponsive to others.

As for, how would it be like in an omegaverse setting for my personal canon? I think there would still be some "warning signs" that a drop is inevitable, however brief they are. It could present as a shock state, if it's a brief and sudden threat similar to the one in the post- you know how babies and young kids, when they hurt themselves, sometimes go quiet in shock for a second before the ear-piercing screaming starts when they "process" the pain and their brain registers it as, "oh, I'm still alive"? Something like that. A moment of silent shock/distress where the brain takes a second to process it before deciding that the threat is bad, still there, and unlikely to go away, and that's when the drop happens, and the Omega goes into that self-imposed comatose state and shuts down- how fast depends on the situation, the person, and obviously, author's preference.

I also think that the type of stress/threat that builds up or just isn't extremely sudden, would result to the drop also sort of "building up" before happening, with similar shutting down and numbing of senses as I experience personally. I think it could also be a combination, for example, an unpredictable and likely ill-intentioned person the Omega feels is a threat to them has been causing experience pre-drop symptoms from the stress, and suddenly that person does something sudden, that normally would maybe startle someone at best, for example, slam a door or shout- and that triggers the shock-then-drop.

I think what would help an Omega to get out of a state like this would be getting them to a quiet and safe space, and lots of calming pheromones/scents. Maybe calm and comforting talking (about any topic, doesn't have to be reassurances only, just a familiar voice and a comforting & calming tone) from someone the Omega considers "safe", because the brain will process the tone and emotion and recognize a familiar person as safe before it'll ever understand what is being said. I also think adjusting light levels to a soft lighting (not dark, nor bright lights- a pleasant dim and warm-toned light would probably be best) could be good. In general a lot of the things you utilize as a way to calm someone who is overstimulated or overwhelmed could be adapted- weighted blankets for example serve the purpose of DPT (deep pressure therapy), and the same could be achieved by just holding the omega tightly, cuddling, or even just leaning on them (although this does require a safe person the omega fully trusts).

Medical aid or monitoring could also be required sometimes to help, and there could be a few abnormal cases where an omega drops so hard they practically end up comatose for a genuinely long period of time, sleeping beauty style. I think it would be commonly recommended by professionals that any Omega experiencing a drop sees a doctor, whether it be after they come out of it, or taken in while still unconscious in which case, if any Alphas were present and triggered to guard, they should be allowed to come along because otherwise it'll cause more distress to both- (Omega brain registers a guarding Alpha's scent as protective nearby even when unconscious so it would also distress the omega if suddenly that scent went away.) This could include extreme measures such as allowing an alpha into the operating room (of course in sterile scrubs etc) if the Omega was indeed physically injured and requires emergency surgery, for example. In fact, it'd probably cause an already injured Omega's vitals to tank if the only source of "protection" their brain perceives suddenly disappeared. It's not always possible, of course, so the Omegas can be fooled with chemicals that simulate the pheromones/scent of a guarding Alpha to keep them stable.

Also, not all Omegas HAVE an Alpha around when they drop, and it doesn't make the Omega's condition any MORE critical than if an Alpha had been present. I like to think of it as a sort of an emergency bond of sorts, one that forms only really with Alphas the Omega already knows and is comfortable enough around.

Alpha Guard could also be triggered later- say an Omega drops while around other omegas and betas only, and a familiar Alpha arrives a lot later when they're already starting to get the Omega to wake up and making them feel safe- just seeing the fact that the Omega they instinctually feel inclined to protect was threatened could trigger a guard response, though probably a bit milder in the sense that if familiar people are around and clearly already taking care of and helping the Omega, the Alpha would probably still become volatile, snappy and suspicious of anyone who approaches, but would probably generally be more okay with anyone who was already clearly helping.

Anyway I'm not entirely qualified to speak on the Alpha side of things to begin with, besides from an Omega's perspective and my own canons, but I'd love to hear the misce alphas weigh in as well.

Also sorry for being so long-winded and scattered. I'm a rambler when I start talking :'/

Hiya, just wondering, what is an omega drop and what causes it? It'd really help me out :)

Okay so. I first read about this in a fic on ao3 called Panta Rhei by @kashoku-sinpai. It’s a Yuuri On Ice fic and it’s written beautifully. I fucking love it. Like even if you aren’t a fan it’s amazing, you should give it a read.

This is what Kashoku mentions in chapter thirteen where they explain the omega drops.:

“From a writer’s perspective I totally forgot that you guys might not be exposed to the Drop/Guard aspects of ABO so here’s a little quick explanation. Omega drops have shown up in a few fics but I think it’s still pretty new!! It’s a self-induced coma-like state that an omega puts themselves in when extremely scared or hurt. It can be life threatening if left alone for too long and usually only a mate or someone very close to the omega can pull them out. Guarding is something I completely made up, but is an alpha trait of extreme protectiveness where they can become very volatile and must be approached with EXTREME caution.”

I love this explanation that they used and the whole Drop/Guard thing that they have created. I have read fic previously about the whole Drop/Guard thing, but it wasn’t explored as best as Kashoku had written it. 

To put it in terms that I know people will get better understand, it’s a form of becoming feral. Though it is still completely different from becoming feral. Where as an Omega would become more animalistic in terms of anger, attack, or even love when they have become feral, this kinda gives us a new state to work with.

The Omega’s body basically shuts down because they are scared or hurt. I’m assuming the reason for this is for an Omega to prevent further harm to themselves. Their body plays dead, is the best way I can describe it. This is done in extreme situations. I look at it as a way to distract or deter enemies and predators into further attacks. So the Omega’s body shuts down things that aren’t important to them, making their body less appeasing to what wants to hurt them. Things like making them have shallow breaths, scent less strong or appeasing, and maybe even nearly shuts down important organs. Just things to make sure they aren’t harmed further.

In the story Yuuri (Omega) gets hurt when he is pushed hard to the ground, he is also pregnant at the time so it makes him more scared and there he drops. Kashoku essentially describes him as catatonic. Though his mate Viktor (Alpha) and another Omega are able to help him get out of this state. Just to add, dropping is bad for pregnant Omegas. 

Guarding for an Alpha is them becoming feral in response to their Omega drops in order to protect them from the thing that is attacking them or scaring them. 

I hope this answers your question! Thank you @kashoku-sinpai for allowing me to mention their fic and explanation. 💕

[nevertheless-moving]

murderbot au where the events of network effect don’t occur, or maybe some version does happen but mb happens to be by itself/away from preservation crew at the time of the kidnapping and keeps the whole thing a secret. Yes, yes we miss out on some fantastic character/relationship building. But consider this—perihelion, still a secret from presaux, pulling into the preservation station.

Naturally, ART pings SecUnit’s special transmitter (that it keeps near it’s heart (I’m never gonna be over the under rib compartment)) once it’s in range. Hell, ART probably manipulated the stop in first place. Naturally, SecUnit is delighted. Naturally, SecUnit would rather jump into a sun than admit that. I mean—does SecUnit even tell anyone that it’s mutual administrative assistant is visiting, or does it just freeze, get suddenly excited and refuse to explain why?

I’m thinking it has a little heads up between ping and ART coming into actualcommunication range for it to display some signs of agitation. Queries about local live performances in case ART wants to watch them through mb’s feed together. Performs some overdue self-maintenance because it doesn’t want ART to worry nag. Gets ruthlessly overinvolved in transit security’s business.

Ohmygosh secunit totally sneaks on board while ART’s humans are gone. Just  vibing. Watching media. Inspecting for damage. Maybe some minor medical adjustments. It’s not quite as secure, since it knows humans are coming, but it’s still safer that it’s felt in—in a while.

Mensah asks what it’s been up to, it’s been quiet in the feed, and SecUnit answers watching media, which is true, but, like, it answers too quickly. Bharadwaj asks if it can come over, she wanted to go over some documentary details in her office, but Murderbot responds that its location is classified. Hangs out with the group but gets twitchy and its face reacts like it’s talking to someone in the feed, or watching something particularly engaging, but when questioned it just. leaves.

Aaah i can totally see the whole book someone write this please

ART wanting to do something it usually can’t [it being a ship and all], at least not with that construct vibrant feed intake, mb grumpily agrees. Sits at the bottom of a lake looking at fish while ART collects data on fluid dynamics. Climbs a tree. Smells a flower. Snarks at an astronavigation professor that the Pansystem University has beef with. Nothing—nothing really stressful for mb, exactly, just not typical murderbot activities, and someone it knows notices its presence, doesn’t even directly question mb, but it still panics because shit i don’t want my friends to suspect i like doing things.

Eventually presaux compares notes like I thought its drones were acting erratically too—wait you saw it at the beach? Maybe it’s trying new hobbies and doesn’t want to tell us? Wait, what do you mean your kids saw it at school? Also did it get a new haircut? Also, I feel like its gun port attachments look serviced and I thought it didn’t trust preservation medical to work on those?

ART leaves port.

Mensah gently presses, observing that mb seems down, and she’s very sorry but it’s friends had noticed it was in a good mood before? With extreme reluctance it confesses that it had an associate visiting, which caused a 5% increase in performance reliability, but now that its associate is gone gone it’s experiencing a 6% decrease in performance reliability for some reason. It’s not a security concern.

Of course Mensah is screaming internally because in secunit terms—actually, Mensah doesn’t even know how to translate that degree of affection, that might be the sweetest thing mb’s ever said about anyone. Whomst the fuck?

[writingwithcolor]

One of my OC is a brown woman (let’s call her Evi, to make things simpler) in a fantasy world. Before the beginning of the story, she is cursed to “loose her colors”: in practice it means her skin, hair and eyes completely loose pigmentation, becoming paper white (literally white, as in #ffffff). Her true aspect is revealed later in the story, but I fear some people might interpret her change as black-facing since her heritage wasn’t manifest at first. There are other BIPOC characters that interact with Evi, however many of them appear when she is still afflicted by the curse. Moreover, the people around Evi can smell something’s off, so the reason behind her unnatural complexion is constantly discussed; discovering why she is so pale is one of the “mysteries” the other characters try to solve. Since I’m not a BIPOC, I am afraid this situation might be perceived as highly problematic. There are of course many reasons why Evi got cursed, and why the curse involved her “colors”, but it would be redundant to explain them now since, by that point, the damage will be already done.

I wrote “brown women”, that was a mistake from my behalf. To be more specific, my OC is coded as a woman with Arabic descent and her culture is inspired by ancient Egypt.

Arab woman with Ancient Egyptian culture cursed to lose skin pigmentation

Before addressing your question, I would like to mention the first thing that jumped out at me about this ask: the nature of your character’s curse.

“her skin, hair and eyes completely lose pigmentation”

This, to me, reads as albinism. You may not know this, but albinism has long been associated with sorcery and evil in many cultures. By making it into a curse in your story, you are directly reinforcing a harmful trope which contributes to prejudices against people with albinism to this day. Mod Brei (a former WWC mod with albinism) touched on it in this post: Representation of Albinism

I recommend checking out the links included there to read up on the persecution of people with albinism and the negative portrayals of albinism in popular culture. You should also read through the albinism tag for more posts on the topic.

But even if you find a way to remove the curse/magic/evil connection, there are more issues with your premise.

“the people around Evi can smell something’s off, so the reason behind her unnatural complexion is constantly discussed”

First of all, calling her complexion “unnatural” is inaccurate and dehumanizing. There is nothing unnatural about having no pigmentation. It is literally a naturally occurring genetic variation within the human population.

Secondly, losing pigmentation doesn’t just have aesthetic consequences. Melanin has a biological function, which is to protect the eyes and skin from sunlight. Without it, your character is likely to experience sun damage and will need to take special precautions to protect herself. She may also experience some degree of visual impairment due to damage to her retina. Albinism is a disability, and that has implications for your character and her portrayal which require a lot more depth than just having her look a little different. You have to be prepared to engage with that and do the tremendous amount of work required to portray a disabled character accurately without falling into ableist tropes. The idea that disability is a curse in need of a cure is one of them.

Finally, as for your main concern:

“I fear some people might interpret her change as black-facing since her heritage wasn’t manifest at first.”

I think you mean brownface, since your character is Arab, not Black (although that in itself raises additional issues, as Colette discusses below). To me, this doesn’t read as brownface at all, because the character was never white to begin with. Skin pigmentation has nothing to do with heritage, and if the loss of pigmentation is enough to obfuscate your character’s heritage, there is probably something missing from the way you’re portraying her.

There are so many ways to indicate a character’s ethnic and cultural background without ever touching on the color of their skin, eyes, or hair. As Mod Brei pointed out in this post, race is not skin color and Black people with albinism still look Black. And then there are all the other aspects of cultural coding that go way beyond physical appearance, and which you need to include if you want your characterization to have depth: language, habits, upbringing, worldview, customs, modes of interacting with others, etc. If your coding is only skin-deep, it’s not enough.

-Niki

I agree with Niki that this curse sounds like albinism, so in this case “magical albinism” and you’re equating it to a curse and punishment, which has ableist implications. 

Include African people in your Ancient Egyptian setting

I’d like to address the Ancient Egyptian portions of your question, though.

“My OC is coded as a woman with Arabic descent and her culture is inspired by ancient Egypt.”

These origins sound like erasure of Black Ancient Egyptians. Egypt is in Africa. Black Egyptians existed and exist. 

The Continent of Africa on a traditional style map.

The Ancient Egyptians were primarily Black until conquest. It was once called Kemet (Kmt), meaning the Black land.

Aggressive anti-Black erasure by the media is why you associate “Arab” and sometimes even white people to Ancient Egypt only. In the same way America is seldom associated with its Indigenous peoples.

Yes, skin color and tones would vary (as it does among Black people) and the Egyptian popular was heavily mixed, particularly upon conquest. Still, there should be African people in your African setting too. Egyptians and Nubians. It feels like erasure to prioritize non-Africans in an Ancient Egyptian (see, African) setting.

Ultimately, it doesn’t matter so much as to what one thinks in regards to who Ancient Egypt “belongs to” or who was there first -- when it comes to writing a story set there, at least. Black people (of various skin tones and mixes) were there and existed in Ancient Egypt, so you should portray that. 

Consider this when you decide to equate Ancient Egypt to the conquerors only over its original people. I suggest researching further into Ancient Egypt.

Several Ancient Egyptian and Nubian images below. Including mummies 

Because it’s always an anti-black battle when once brings up this topic anywhere! 

Evidence from Blood Types

[Senegalese scholar Dr. Cheikh Anta Diop (1923-1986)] found that even after hundreds of years of intermixing with foreign invaders, the blood type of modern Egyptians is the “same group B as the populations of Western Africa on the Atlantic seaboard and not the A2 group characteristic of the white race prior to any crossbreeding.”

Maiherpri’s mummy, Mummy, hair intact, unwrapped in 1901. xxx

“In Maiherperi's tomb, a papyrus was found depicting him with literally "blackish" skin...Maiherperi was an Ancient Egyptian noble of Nubian origin buried in the Valley of the Kings.”

Are Nubians Egyptians?  

Nubians are descendants of an ancient African civilization as old as Egypt itself, which once presided over an empire and even ruled Egypt. Their historical homeland, often referred to as Nubia, stretches along the Nile covering present-day southern Egypt and northern Sudan.

xxx

King Akhenaten, wife to Queen Nefertiti 

He is likened to this person of the African diaspora for visual comparison (whose name I don’t know)

Queen Nefertiti

Somali supermodel Iman beside Queen Nefertiti, as they’re often linkened! This is her in Michael Jackson’s music video, Remember the Time)

Ethiopian supermodel Liya Kebede

Amenhotep III, Wife to Queen Tiye. Father to Akhenaten

Queen Tiye. including a reconstruction and her mummy. Wife to Amenhotep III and mother to King Akhenaten.

~Mod Colette

Ask published Nov 2021