#complex feelings abt the whole thing. the whole gender thing

[gnc-tits]

ughhhhhh like gender is so. Sooooooo

[cruelsister-moved2]

^above is a sc of someone else^ i really enjoy this book but i cant go in the tag cuz this shit makes me crazyyyyyyyy ace? ACE?? girl there was a whole fisting scene I can't take this why is it literally impossible to beat the ace allegations as a fictional gay character with any complexity at all

[starrylayle]

coming on here to quickly rant abt remadora. Okk yess I know ‘another wolfstar shipper shitting on remadora’ here me out okay!!! Just for a sec!! I read the Harry Potter books for the first time back in 2017 and remadora was my shit. Remus was my second favourite male character and tonks was my second fave female character. (Harry and cho were my first faves — yes I self inserted into Harry and had the biggest crush on cho — yes I cried when they broke up — shut up we all had our embarrassing phases!!)

Anyways back to remadora, I just thought they were so cute together, even tho it felt a little random. But one thing that I remember that really pissed me off was the ship name. I never understood why it was ‘remadora’ and not ‘ronks’. Tonks hated being called Dora!! I remember ranting abt this on my Wattpad acc (yes I know SHHHH) when I was reviewing all the Hp ships.

I don’t ship it anymore (obviously lol) and looking back, I think my issue with the ship name is lowkey symbolic for my key problem with remadora — it basically removes everything that made her interesting in the first place and reduced her to just Another Woman Character in the series. When she got with Remus, she became more mellow, more feminine, more complacent — which are fine traits btw — but that’s not tonks!! Now as I’m older, and re-reading the series, I see a lot of subtext for a gender non-conforming and possibly genderqueer person forced into a heterosexual relationship simply becoz jo didn’t want ppl thinking Remus was gay and coz she had this weird thing abt all ‘good’ women being mothers.

Which brings me to tonk’s pregnancy — I wouldn’t mind a storyline for tonks having a child — I just hate how jkr had to fit it into this whole nuclear family model and get her and Remus to get married. I feel like a more compelling, or at least consistent characterisation would have tonks having a one night stand with Remus after they were both mourning their cousin/uncle/lover’s death. Shit happens sometimes. And it would be interesting to see Tonks and Remus grapple with this and what it means for their child.

Another head cannon I saw on tik tok was that Tonks had a threesome with Fleur and Bill and since polyamory wasn’t socially acceptable she asked Remus to be the stand in legal father — and ofc Remus would say yes coz he’s Remus!! This hc sounded wild to me at first but they all gave me queer vibes and it just makes me happy so now this is the headcanon I stick with lol.

Anyways not every woman has to have a husband and 2-3 kids to be a good person jkr!! Families are complex! Women are complex! And Tonks deserves better imo.

P.s. if you ship remadora that’s completely okay!! This is just my opinion!! I’ve seen remadora shippers who don’t water down tonk’s character/subtextual queerness — I just hate how jkr depicted the ship in canon.

[thatdeadaquarius]

Hallo! You know who is someone I don’t see many people appreciating? Ganyu! Imagine a neurodivergent creator reader who is the one that finds her when she’s going through one of her crises when she doesn’t know if she belongs with the humans or Adepti and reader can understand her because that’s how they feel as well about life?? And about their old world and sometimes this one??

I feel that they could potentially bond over that and maybe even realize Ganyu is also somewhat neurodivergent in some way?? Or she’s very socially inept in some ways and reader can relate and share in those worries so the two just sometimes sit together shoulder to shoulder and just not say anything and just relax and everyone is confused??? Anyways that’s all for me, keep up the great work! :D

-Bonk anon

GOD, NEURODIVERGENT ASKS, JUST HAVE MY WHOLE HEART IN YOUR HANDS 😭😭🤲🤲💙💙

JUST TAKE IT I DONT NEED IT-

ALSO LESSER ASKED FOR/LESS POPULAR CHARACTERS??

SIGN ME TF UP-

Ahhh, look at her... I would die for her, kill for her... either way, what bliss ✨️

also fuCK mihoyo, she’s fat and beautiful and so thats how she gonna be written. 😤

saw this in my mailbox forever ago and as i was workng thru them, was just like, “damn that Ganyu ask is so close im so excited to write abt her <33”

☆

Sun: Neurodivergent!Reader, Gender Neutral (they/them)

Orbit: tiny scenario +headcanons

Stars: Ganyu, my dearest.

Comets & Meteors: Content Warnings: talk of low self-esteem & Trigger Warnings: talk of low self-esteem, neurodivergent struggles, talk of missing meals (ganyu wants to schedule out her lunch-breaks).

when you’d initially explained to the (actually scarily strong irl) genshin characters who’d been claiming all kinds of wild stuff about you (”The Last Descender! The World Player!”)

you’d been in Liyue at the time, and out of everyone, the first you could see believed you were a mortal on Earth before (and not ruling it 💀) was Ganyu.

She’d looked shocked, like the others, but you could quickly see her get more and mire visibly twitchy and excited as you explained further

(rlly unlike the just,, utter confusion on Xiao’s, Zhongli’s, Shenhe’s, and Cloud Retainer’s faces, so convinced of your divinity there’s no way you could be human- even just acting like one-)

but you did, and Ganyu loved it.

you actually didn’t interact much for the first month you were stuck in a gacha video game (the other alloegenes, gods, adepti, and citizens, including international, pulling you around for opinions on this and that)

But one night you couldn’t sleep (the Qixing provided amble spacious housing in a temple already apparently dedicated to you, one you’d never seen in game)

It’d been… a rough day.

Everywhere you went, miscommunications followed, and you still didn’t really know how to mask properly around these just- well, since they were real, aliens

sure, they mimicked stuff about humans, but not the people/culture you’d mostly been around, (and the adepti had their own code of behavior, which was so complex you’re sure they should’ve made an actual social behavior manual by now)

but you just couldn’t escape the endless cycle, not only that, but your executive function had apparently forgotten to keep up with some important appointments or otherwise things you had needed to get done earlier, so you were scrambling to send a late letter to Fontaine inventors who needed to get the project started in 3 days, which is how long the letter takes to get there, oh gods, and you needed to check on Inazuma, apparently Seirai island is getting lightningy again and the Raiden Shogun wants you in person as soon as possible to aid her with it, but you need to attend a Knights of Favonius meeting in 2 days-

Yeah. You were stressed, and honestly? crumbling under the pressure.

So you’d snuck out of your rooms (dodging the patrolling guards) and went to the office of the one person who knew who’d understand

Ganyu. Scribbling and mumbling in her office to herself, late into the night

She’d jumped at you slipping in without knocking (avoid the Milieth at all costs, even tho ur literally god and you’ve been told you can do whatever you want mostly)

and knocked a whooooollleee stack of papers to the floor, scattering it everywhere 😭

you’d scrambled to start picking them up,, but then she stops you frantically saying “No, no, it’s okay, it’s not a big deal I promise, there’s no need to cry over these silly papers, heaven-sent!”

what??

oh.

oh no.

it’d just been one more thing you’d messed up on top of all of today (and tbh this whole month whirlwind of becoming some kind of god of the continent)

and Ganyu was, Ganyu <3

she was sweet and kind and so overwhelmingly helpful, how could you make a mess of her life too-

“Emperor? Huangdi?”

you’re just sitting on the floor now, but you startle when she gently holds your upper arms, calling your name very softly, so soft if she wasn’t saying you actual name you’d think she was talking to something else, something precious to her

the qilin guides you up, easily supporting your weight, she directs you to her couch, and manuvers you into laying your head across her plush thighs, the half-adepti’s pants aren’t as skin-tight like in-game, they’re actually the cosiest fabric you’ve ever laid on (or maybe that’s just a combination of your fragileness and her thick thighs)

she rubs your shoulder and back, offering a tissue (when did she get that-)

and that’s when you know you’ve chosen your first friend in Teyvat perfectly :)

◇

you sneak out nearly every night for those first few months in Liyue (not including travel, which you tried to limit or you’d both make an excuse why she needed to come with lol)

just to sneak into her office, and you’d nearly cried a second time on her when she offered some notes about both standard human and adepti behaviors (after all, she’s had to study them both to fit into both)

Ganyu learns to do your hair and you do hers 🥺 she can’t bring herself to trust anyone to cut her hair but you, and you always try to do styles that don’t get in her way <3

like buns with a braid wrapped around it, or two space buns (Keqing didn’t say anything but Ganyu gossiped to you about how she could see a little smile on her face whenever she ran into Ganyu that week, obviously cutely thinking how they matched)

While of course the first thing Ganyu did was propose to help you schedule/manage your time so you wouldn’t have to rely on your non-existent executive function-

you’d also made sure to literally plop ur chin over her shoulder to make sure you saw “break” AT LEAST once a day, now that she was incorporating herself a little into ur schedule too (Ganyu fought tooth and nail to get rid of that lunch-break, but then you threatened to also not eat, and she caved so fast LMAO)

(bc she’s a die-hard workaholic ofc she wants this, after you heard abt her schedule in-game you’d thought it was lucky she was not fully human or she would’ve dropped dead, but now even moreso watching that horror in real time 💀)

which!! she!! is so!! (at this point you usually just squeeze her round cheeks a little too hard before then wrapping your arms as far as they can go around her torso and squeezing even harder-)

After a couple of “your trauma 🤝 my trauma” nights, she honestly understood really well where your limits were so to speak, what you could and simply couldn’t do

and was the first one willing to explain to people you have executive dysfunction (and was quick to cut off any “just try harder/pull yourself up by your bootstraps/just believe in yourself” nonsense when if came to your disabilities, even tho those were few and far between moments if any)

afterall, people had expected the same from her, and she frequently fell into that thinking herself (it also didn’t help that as you tried to give her a normal schedule at first, which benefitted her human side more, it felt like the Qixing was stumbling to keep up with the supernatural workload now being distributed)

Ganyu knew it had been your influence originally that helped her when she’d had her workload lightened/then followed by the traveler when she ran off

(and regardless of the truth too, when you’d finally gotten the courage to tell her how you actually interacted with Teyvat, unable to steer actions from what the plot dictated)

she’d still attributed it to you, (”well, you could’ve always just picked up your things and left, yes? But even if it was ‘pre-planned’ like you say, you still wanted to follow through and were… ahem, h-happy for m-me, right?” you’d smacked right into her you stimmed so relieved)

You didn’t exactly know how to explain it, bc everyone was really accepting,

from citizens to nobles, officials and guards, to vision-users, gods and other supernatural beings that inhabited Teyvat

no one judged you for unmasking/stimming, but in that way that meant they didn’t really understand what was different about you, they just knew you were and they’d still decided to treat you with the same adoration anyway

but Ganyu,

she treated you the same but knew what stims you did when you were happy or excited, what ones comforted you, what your latest verbal stims were, and what your “classics” were (u never had to tell her, she just learned them quick and all on her own, bless this woman 🛐 )

Ganyu understood all the good and all the bad and saw you unmasked and still laughed so hard at your jokes she fell into your side and always asked another question about your hyperfixations/interests

you’d quickly realized there were a lot of neurodivergent overlaps between stuff Ganyu did and what you did

(whether or not she herself was, you just assumed yes based on what you researched, but there wasn’t any official testing in teyvat)

it makes more sense to you after applying the neurospicy filter to all her actions why she’s so obsessed with work (she hyperfixates on certain projects the Qixing has going, and has a long-term passive fixation on scheduling/stationary/related office work stuff)

but this also meant you understood why she was always asking for more about you, your mortal world, your time here, where you wanted to go in teyvat, what you wanted to do, how’d you feel when the game did this to someone, what about-?

needless to say you couldn’t (and didn’t have to 🥲) contain your stims at knowing you became a slight hyperfixation for her

she got all embarassed and blushy about it!!! <333😩 (and did that cute thing where she just kinda sways in place holding her hands together when bashful or nervous ✨💔✨)

unrelated to above, but your favorite thing (besides sightseeing or eating at yet another new restaurant in liyue) to do together is go do something childish

like playing children’s games (hopscotch, or hill sliding in ganyus case) from both ur childhoods

u thought itd be a good idea to get Ganyu to relax a little more and have more fun outside her job!

(again, unrelated bc idk im scattered with these headcanons, the cryo user loves when you help her pick new outfits at stores not bc she wants to impress u what)

ok last unrelated headcanon i promise,

Ganyu wasn’t overly affectionate before, honestly she was always going too fast to stop for those kind of casual touches (and when was there time in her old scedule)

but after a month of getting comfortable around each other, she subconciously gets up from her desk (mid-reading a file/carrying it with her lmao)

and sits on her office couch, making room for you to lay on her (and she is the perfect pillow)

(you dont point it out, you know she’ll get too embarassed, and you refuse to lose Ganyu cuddles <3)

☆

im so glad im not the only one who took one look at Ganyu’s problems in life and was like, “damn im neurospicy, ur so right, blue-frosty-magical-half-deer-secretary-woman”

btw it’s on the masterlist “turn on the background music?” but here’s really long playlist I made for sagau stuff!

mostly game music but also other fun songs i hope fit, mostly based of my blog so it’s not dark (as the other playlists under SAGAU search on spotify looked dark too lmao)

Safe Travels Bonk Anon,

💀♒

I mentioned making a kofi before, but I think I’ll start including it in posts too if u guys dont mind!

An iced coffee? For me?? :O

☆

♡the beloveds♡

@karmawonders / @0rah-s / @randomnatics / @glxssynarvi / @nexylaza / @genshin-impacts-me / @wholesomey-artist / @thedevioussmirk / @the-dumber-scaramouche / @chocogi / @fallen-starr / @areaderofbooks

[umalvie]

out of curiosity, what would it mean to you for fiction to replicate the maizula dynamic? like what features are most salient?

the heart of their relationship i think is replicable to an extent in that it's this sort of rotted love where you have known each other so long and so well that you couldn't not love each other but you have known each other so long and so well that you couldn't not hate each other as well. so that integral piece is absolutely something we can find in other relationship dynamics. like the rich girl/weird friend dynamic absolutely exists.

the sibling love triangle aspect with maiko's existence is also a hugely important and compelling aspect of maizula! this is techniaclly replicable in theory in terms of you can absolutely do love triangles where two members are related, but also it's so hard to duplicate the maizula-maiko triangle because mai is supposed to love zuko, and you can interpret her as actually loving him, and he feels like he's supposed to love her too, but they don't work fundamentally because he doesn't want to understand the worst parts of her, doesn't even want to admit that they exist, and she is so horribly caught up in azula who makes her feel so alive by acknowledging and knowing and seeing all these parts of her and bringing them out even more that she could say she chooses zuko because it's the right thing to do in terms of both heteronormativity and what choosing zuko represents, but i don't think realistically mai can actually turn away from azula and everything she's ever known and hated and loved and wanted to leave her alone and not known how to live without. not without regrets.

i think it's also so hard to replicate the way that their individual characters are and come together in the ship as a whole. like azula being a prodigious princess with such an insane relationship with gender and having such a tragic domestic origin and mai being a noblegirl who is so sullen and depressed and dead inside and has such an awful domestic life as well and who has to obey azula's orders but also absolutely doesn't do that because the power dynamic of their relationship is so complex by complete accident that while azula is higher ranking than mai socially and financially and in the military sense, mai absolutely has more power on an interpersonal level. that's something that you see a lot in lesser degrees in media with toxic female friendships sure, but never to the extent that one of the parties can literally have the other executed if she wants to, but she chooses not to do so even when she imprisons her former friend.

i wrote a mini essay on this here, but the way in which they play with the rich girl/weird friend dynamic is also INSANE on a level i have yet to see anyone else touch really except maybe rhaenicent.

speaking of other posts i've made abt their dynamic being so fascinating, this one about the "i love zuko more than i fear you" line vs what atla's show canon actually demonstrates is something i think is vital to understanding what makes them so insane. and i do think it's unique, if only because of what the narrative wants to tell you vs what it actually shows you.

also, one of the most important things which i touched a little on earlier is just... the politics of atla as a setting for their relationship. that makes it 10x more compelling that azula is this tragic figure who is on the completely wrong side of history, a child soldier who fights for imperialism and racism and xenophobia because she has been indoctrinated and abused and made into a weapon, and mai is someone who fought alongside with her until it inconvenienced her to do so, then switched sides in the name of love without ever actually analyzing or critiquing her own beliefs about what her country was doing. mai chooses the good and moral side by choosing zuko (who also doesn't actually reflect internally and... gets to kind of just keep doing a friendlier imperialism when we look at the comics and lok, but that's another topic), but does she actually want that? does she actually believe in that? has she actually let azula go? the comics can try to whitewash her morality more by pretending she cares abt tom-tom and she's totally reformed, but the show doesn't actually support that, and with no material in-between to show us mai's redemption beyond her betraying azula, not because she cares abt what's good and right but because she cares abt zuko, we as an audience have no real reason to believe that.

so yeah, maizula is endlessly fascinating to me, and i wish a ship would be more interesting than them

[dykeyote]

ok my dndads queer hc post randomly gets notes but i disagree w many of the takes now so im updating it . spoiler warning theres a WHOLE lot of lezzies . just doing the dads kiddads and teens HOWEVER i will say that mark likely is for sure a lezzer

darryl: bisexual and probably the most cisgender one here but he's actually SO cis that it becomes almost gnc . he/him

ron: transhet guy but he thinks his transition is like very unique to him and everyone else is doing it the exact same as each other so he doesnt really get that hes Transgender bc he thinks everyone else is doing it in a really different way than him all together . not in an angsty way hes perfectly okay w that . he/him

henry: trans bi guy we know this to be true . he/him but if you called him they/them prns he would be like well yknow ive never thought about that before but you know what go right ahead (: he doesnt exactly enjoy it but he appreciates just how gosh-darn nonbinary positive you are that he'd still encourage it

glenn: bisexual and like .... hes cis he doesnt really care abt gender much but when nick came out as trans he definitely said something about like . "dude if i was trans? id totally use they/them pronouns thats sick as fuck" and then moved on and this sort of haunted nick for a while . he/him but again he doesnt really care

jodie: cis and bisexual but in such a boring way that he might as well be straight

sparrow: tgirl lesbian who was out at one point but is not now for Normalcy Reasons . she/her in theory

lark: transneu nonbinary and aroace . not out about either of these things but not really as a like Actively Closeted thing they just dont really think abt it . they/he in theory

terry jr: tgirl lesbian also but this time out AND butch . she/he

grant: gay of course . and like .... he is cis and this wont change but he'd be a good deal happier if he was more gnc i think

nick: tguy butch lesbian . he mostly but he doesnt really care that much

link: kinda-stealth tboy (not really intentionally or anything he just doesnt really see it as relevant that often so most people dk) and gay . he/him but he doesnt really care that much

taylor: honestly idk what i think is going on w his gender but i DO know hes aro and bi . give me some time to think on that ok

scary: out nonbinary tfem lesbian!!!!! we know this!!!!!! she/it and when she writes her pronouns down she always writes the it in VERY BIG AGGRESSIVE HANDWRITING to make it clear that its SUBVERSIVE AND WEIRD

normal: bisexual tgirl . currently in a like . Questioning Phase in s2 i feel like ..... her turmoil abt being a Normal Son is tied to that . any pronouns but she primarily

hermie: bigender (girl + boy) gaybian :3 was an open bisexual tguy originally but around the poison ivy era had some Gender Complexity . he/she but certain Method Personas have diff pronoun leans whereas normal herm is pretty 50/50

[nomsfaultau]

Alright guess I’ll actually make a post abt it. Warnings for Fault spoilers for sections that wound even be released for years. Not really plot spoilers tho. But I figured I’m probably going to make memes referencing it so might as well.

Anyway scp Wilbur is now trans. He/it. Or like will be, its egg is still hella thick mostly bc Wilbur does very little internal reflection, has slightly bigger problems, and has very little understanding of how human society and gender work enough to figure out he doesn’t have one.

Reasonings: 1. I legit feel like Wilbur’s alienation from society means it doesn’t understand gender as a performance, and it’s only ever gone along with he/him since that’s what everyone but the Foundation uses for it. And I think exploring Wilbur’s reclamation of it/its pronouns after the abuse of the Foundation would be an interesting narrative with Wilbur, especially since he already struggles with his relationship to humanity. I think Wilbur will really have to grapple with the fact he isn’t human and never will be, its envy of humanity, and how to find self acceptance.

2. I want more distance from the content creator. I’d already been thinking about Wilbur’s funky gender before hand but wasn’t going to add it to Fault, but now they’re fully severed in my head.

3. Fault already has an…interesting relationship to it/its pronouns, and I want to show a side to them other than dehumanization. I know it’s scary, since there’s never been nuance or complexity in Fault before, but hold my hand and trust me it’ll be ok. We’ll get through this together.

4. I just know all the other characters would react really badly and I love a messy drama. Except Phil. Phil would be really casual about the whole thing.

5. Crazy plot stuff that causes its egg to crack in the first place. It’s gonna be so sick y’all.

6. I’m gay and do what I want.

[aeide-thea]

have been reading fic & thinking abt my relationship to fic, which is of course also among other things a mirror of my relationship to my own psyche, and like—i think all the discourse abt its being ~internalized misogyny~ to mostly/entirely read m/m is not ultimately, whatever the truth of it, all that helpful, either to readers or to Women! but of course that doesn't stop me from feeling weird guilt abt the fact that i don't read more f/f than i do, because if there's anything i love to do, it's feel unhelpfully bad abt myself on the slimmest of pretexts…

however! i did end up reading some f/f earlier, specifically transfem f/f, and it got me thinking—basically what i'm usually mostly reading fic for is the romance/sex, right? like, don't get me wrong, i love when a fic gives me a gorgeous double helix of, like, casefic and romance twisted together, that's ideal, but fundamentally most of the time the feeling up is what i sat down at the table to eat. so in a complex aegosexual way it's a fantasy i'm—not projecting onto, exactly, i don't want to be one of the people in it; but, like, lurking in the wings of with eyes big love-crumbs, to steal a phrase from a relevantly-named poet. :) and so it's no wonder that mostly i don't want to read cisfemme4cisfemme stuff, because that's not a dynamic that feels like it has any room for me, or even like i'm particularly welcome in the room. but like. if it's trans women? i'm there, i love that for them and for me. if there's a butch? i might get tripped up by our differing lenses on gender feelings and stub my toe a little but even so i'm probably here for it. (thinking here abt that one butch/femme geraskier ~cisswap which is, like, a gorgeous bruise i keep periodically pressing. <3)

so really it's just like. shocker: i'm not personally moved by fantasies abt romance which feature conventionally feminine cis women whom i don't personally find relatable or sexually desirable! and when i put it like that, it really instantly dissolves the weird useless discourse-induced guiltgunk. like. give me a woman who's, idk, tall and charismatic and strong and clever and talented at something (though honestly it's like that siken revised tweet, a lot of those characteristics are ultimately negotiable!), like women i've historically crushed on irl, and then give me a pairing for her that's like. another woman who's also enough of those things, or a man who's—honestly the kind of m/f i'm open to would be its own whole post bc holy shit am i fussy, it very much does exist but for now let's just stick a pin in that one—or somebody nonbinary, which… idk that i've ever actually seen nb/f in fic? i'm sure it exists! but i'm not sure it exists in any fandoms i've been into. pondering the question did get me really thirsty for a good 'farmgirl (of the luke skywalker variety) is absolutely stunned-and-ringing-like-a-struck-bell captivated by confident flamboyantly genderqueer love interest (example wanted)' dynamic, though…

[autistic-sidestep]

questions about suranga ! why did they pick their name / do you think it fits them ? what is their gender & sexuality ? what are their (romantic) relationships like ? what is their motivation, either in general and/or to pursue villainy ?

alright let's go!

The name ‘Suranga’ when i originally looked it up while trying to name him meant something like divine? It apparently also means orange, which is funny cos of his arrogance and daring stats lol, though he was more of a bluestep when i first made him, so yeah, oddly fitting. As for why he picked his name, I think I decided it was a name someone he almost came to see as a parental figure in his pre-vigilante days would’ve given their kid, if they’d been able to have one. In some ways, that was his way of honoring them and it was the first thing that could be his (if also something residual from farm training and people-pleasing to need someone else to pick).

he could’ve gone for something more common but then again, it wasn’t a name he was intending to share with anyone else until ortega, otherwise, he was always giving fake names. whether suranga actually believes he still deserves his name, though, honestly varies with his self-loathing levels. this guy has so many complexes lmao.

Genderwise, it’s kinda a mess? At first seeing ricardo on the news gave him some gender revelations, starting to id as a binary trans guy and staying stealth with the rangers (and it was def comforting to know there was a fellow trans man on the team, even if he and sentinel were never close) but it didn’t fully feel right? Then post second escape and through puppeting yasmin he gradually realizes oh, the whole girl thing isn’t so bad when it’s on his terms (or close enough), yoink, my gender now. As yasmin he’s a lot more confident, so he basically trials things he’d never be able to do as himself through her and post-debut, he gets a little bit bolder with his own body.

i’m ultimately imagining whatever mess in books 3 or 4 happens if ace gets their body back like this:

suranga: sorry abt the whole bodystealing thing thanks for the gender tho

ace: ???

Obv with the whole maintaining two different identities thing (without even factoring in argos post-debut), the Autism™, and never really having a stable sense of self thanks to cuckoo training (plus SO MUCH TRAUMA), it’s hard to actually pinpoint what his gender is, at best i’d say something like uh, genderqueer/genderfluid?

Sexuality is similarly a very big mess. He’s definitely aspec/some kind of aroflux, and his ongoing secret crush on ricardo is a jumble of ortega being his first real friend (and not letting anyone else close enough to have other points of reference), and being a simultaneously touch averse AND touch starved mf, and also the gender confusion triggered by ric before even meeting him (‘do i want to be him or be friends with him??’) so suranga’s whole ability to determine if it’s romantic/sexual attraction or platonic feelings is very very fucked. With ortega specifically they used to be very close (he thought the world of him tbh), but with ricardo hovering since their reunion he’s trying to keep him at arms length, because he’s very aware how well ortega can read him. He can’t help but go back to ortega in spite of his efforts to stay away, partly because he wants ortega to stop and/or help him but doesn’t know how to ask, or if he can.

He’s honestly very clueless on the chen attraction thing. There’s the baggage from having known eachother back before, but also post-heartbreak he can better relate to chen (which includes a mutual hatred of stairs!) because of the chronic pain/fatigue problems he’s had to deal with, and spoon is also a big factor - he does prefer cats, and his own cat Fred in particular that stayed with elena after HB,, but getting to hang out with spoon is pretty good too.

As yasmin, he becomes very fond of mortum, but he’s not sure he’d call it romantic attraction, though they might’ve flirted a bit at the start. Suranga really enjoys the doctor’s company and respects her a lot, in part cos it’s so fun to nerd out over tech stuff, and there’s none of the baggage that comes with ortega. he’d rather not compromise that friendship by stringing her along, so I think he makes it clear at the gala on the feelings? i’m still working out his canon route, but for sure he tells mortum the truth in retri. 

Also his flirting as yasmin bleeds over into his argos persona when he fights with argent. he def likes playing with fire lol. Romantic relationships are a big ????

However, in general relationship terms, he’s pretty familial with rosie and his crew, in part cos the dynamic reminds him a lot of the rangers in his sidestep days, and old habits are hard to shake. 

Motivation tends to vary, but the underlying principles are that he’s very very tired and bitter and just wants to feel like he’s in some control of his life again/not powerless - the argos suit is in part a mobility aid, because it lets him do what he could as sidestep, and more. argos gives him a lot of freedom and at times euphoria, but also huge guilt, just as he does with yasmin. he's following the path of least resistance (fate motive), even if that’s driving himself (further) into a self-destructive spiral. at least it’s by his hand instead of someone else’s?

Basically he’s swinging between these two modes: 

He also does a lot of joking to deflect from when he accidentally lets slip he’s not doing well  (which is. all the time) which is probably best summarized by an excerpt from the Hoots scene:

Faulty logic aside, there’s a lot of anger at himself, especially his past self for his naivety and getting careless (as much as he tries to bury it, he’s still a hero at heart), but also at the Farm, but it’s not like he can really touch them. I have a soft spot for the outsider scar cos that’s the first one i ever got, and the whole disconnect from the rest of the world feels very very fitting, and coupling that with the suicidal scar (so suicidal from rebirth → outsider into retri), though I have tried him out with puppetmaster too, and maybe some parts from the hunger scar can work too?

idk if he'll actually remain driven enough to stick to being argos, but it sure is fun watching him be a trainwreck about it

this has been a (semi-coherent) ramble about suranga thanks for indulging me <3

[quidfree]

bff i am wondering how do u feel abt dark academia as a whole?

i strive not to get parasocial on here but i'll allow bff bc it's so cute. so hi temporary bestie.

keeping it real & keeping it brief: obviously parts of the 'dark academia'... genre? appeal to me greatly. i love a lot of classic literature including greek tragedies etc, i did latin at school, i have a love hate relationship w academia and aspirations of intellectualism, and i do like the sort of.. vaguely historical european architecture or whatever the usual aesthetic is. it gives me a lot of fresh nostalgia for my uni experience 🤍 and in terms of the more Brand elements there's also things i like. obviously i'm a TSH fan. i enjoy dramatic excerpts of Romantic poems. yada yada. fatal flaws. people building connections between works and whatnot.

that said, i have my gripes with Dark Academia despite all the above; it's not something i really want to make part of my online identity. partially that's just bc in general i try to steer clear of getting too deeply entrenched in internet subculture type things (i contain multitudes that cannot be expressed in a tiktok hashtag!!). but with dark academia in particular there's also notably 1) a weird, elitist, eurocentric superiority complex pretty transparently underpinning some people's attitudes about it and 2) a lot of content that is cringe to me specifically. and bc i like to mind my business online i would rather not engage and then succumb to the temptation to start vagueposting about, like, people who think they're intellectual titans bc they've read a bad 'modern girlboss retelling of elektra' or whatever's the latest on booktok.

i don't want to sound too harsh on dark academia bc like i said there's lots to like abt it. it's just one of many of micro-identities online really. if it's something you enjoy and identify with, then go forth and be a dark academia girlie (gender neutral). for better and for worse i am also richardpapencore! but as with any of these aesthetics there's always also going to be aspects of it that are less ideal (see richard papen above). and i am a part time hater so i will never b able to overlook those enough to claim DA as my schtick. (or more seriously it just feeds into my desire not to make any one Thing my Brand.)

[ladyseidr]

And another headcanon dump! TW for vaguely discussed self-harm.

by the time he's, like, 20, he's got multiple ear piercings and a septum piercing

in that same vein, planned on getting tattoos before getting scooped

only interested in the above because it's genuinely his style, not to like. get back at his dad or whatever. (like at most my william would slightly resent the fact that mike does whatever the fuck he wants with his appearance VS william forcing himself to stay so in line, if that makes sense. he's not old-fashioned regarding piercing/tattoos/etc)

bi, but has an extremely strong preference for men and masc-aligned ppl

complicated relationship with gender. like, he's fairly openly queer and interacts with other queer ppl, so he does explore gender presentation to an extent in those spaces, but hurricane isn't exactly... a queer hotspot (unless they're my portrayals in which case nobody is straight ever). still, he doesn't really hear abt IDing as nonbinary until long after the scooping. at that point, his identity as a whole is, er, complex and it's not really his priority. but he does recognize that he's nb at that point. tends to still default to using he/him pronouns and masc terminology, but comfortable with and occasionally uses they/them.

this is a headcanon i'm Tentative to post because i think ppl can be nervous because of my personal experiences, but fuck it: he absolutely struggles with self-harm. it starts in high school and honestly he never fully recovers normally. the scooping kind of, uh, gets in the way of it. he was already trying to get clean prior, but y'know. this should be a given, but he covers the wounds/scars and doesn't tell people. by default, nobody in his family knows about it.

to be clear about the above: i am comfortable exploring this topic so long as you don't try to get me to write him (or any muse) actively self-harming. i'm a grown adult, i know my limits and i'm more than capable of messaging ppl if i need things toned down. i'm also many, many years clean at this point. please don't baby me if you're interested in exploring this topic (and, on that note, i will never even allude to his self-harm unless you have explicitly told me it's okay).

def works at fred.dy's off-and-on prior to william's disappearance. fucking hates it, but also struggles to keep jobs elsewhere. prefers working at locations william isn't active at, but just keeps ending up alongside him regardless. can't escape each other and all that shit lmao

actually pretty damn intelligent but absolutely doesn't believe this abt himself

hates his father but also still loves him. yes, ever after everything. nothing about their relationship is or will ever be simple. regretfully remembers the "good times." wishes he didn't. (glad he does, because what else does he have?)

speaking specifically on my elise: loves her. resents her deeply. when he's younger, fully pegs her as a shitty mother. when older, gets it but still just can't completely forgive her. absolutely feels abandoned by her and tells her at one point in the midst of an argument

headcanon tag is a reference to this song because uh? "this is who i am / nobody said you had to like it / this is who i am / a modern tragedy / bury your mistakes / clear those bones from your closet / with wisdom there’s pain" ?????

there's literally so much more i could write but let's just fkjsdsda leave it here for now

[codes]

hello matthew!! :D this ask isnt related to the little game u made unfortunately but id like to ask for some advice from someone who probably has to read a lot for school!!

i finished reading a classic of literature recently, jane austens persuasion. having repeated myself many times today, it was a very good thought provoking book. except that i didnt really realise that until i read the introduction of the book where they discuss her techniques and how she handles the themes!! argh.. in fact while i was readin the whole thing i didnt even really know what to feel! i knew about the instances of titular persuasion but i wasnt even really sure what they were saying with nuance...

since im so troubled by my lack of sensitivity and find no help elsewhere on the interwebs, as someone who i find can parse the complex muddled text of enstars with clarity, what should i do to become a more sensitive reader! or rather how do u read matthew?

hi lab! im a lil honored that u hold me in such high regard bc honestly, i dont always feel that my literary analysis skills are up to par! though i think thats an opinion shared by many but i often end up in the same position as you and even my professors say the same thing where they have to reread books before they start to really delve into analysis. its p normal, honestly. a lot of themes in literature are largely opinionated so some people pick up patterns faster than others and sometimes two readings can conflict with one another. it happens! one reading may be more clearly supported by evidence within the text but analyzing literature usually takes a lot of practice more than anything, but sometimes going back to the basics rlly helps and focusing on which critical theory may be applicable. could you maybe analyze the text through a character? perhaps the psychoanalytic theory may help! are gender roles present within the text? maybe looking at it through a feminist critical lens may give you a good ledge to start off. theres also formalism, post-colonialist, Marxist theory, eco-criticism, etc... the world is your oyster and having trouble with analyzing a text is normal! we're not all-knowing and sometimes it helps to look at what other people have to say will help you most of all.

also i asked my friend @cupidneos who is insanely smart for her advice since i bet that she would have something to say (also shes also a jane austen fan) and this is what she said:

i do wanna say that you shouldn’t be too hard on yourself since Persuasion is easily one of her hardest texts to really extend and make sense of so it’s no fault of your own … literature that uses free indirect discourse to hint towards our knowledge of character tends to be harder to understand bc of how limited that info can be! that being said, not being able to place our finger on something until it’s highlighted is completely okay! that’s what the introduction is there for; to help you out. there’s no set list of criteria to being a “more sensitive reader” since the phenomenon of reading itself is so mercurial. with practice i’m so certain that u will get a better sense of where to look for those literary themes. and don’t sell urself short in doing so either! if u find a passage important, pursue it!!! doesn’t matter what everyone else says abt it hehe

[mogai-sunflowers]

2 for the mogai/liom ask game -

how much did the community effect your identity? if youre open abt it, compare your identities from before and now. if your identity is private, did you identity solidify or instead get more complicated over time?

- @ithriel-coins

oooooh!! it has affected my identity so much asdfasdfaf. i never even considered or thought about gender before i found out about the mogai community. before i found out about it, i had pretty much ran the whole gamut of identity. i had identified as bi, pan, lesbian, gay, aro, ace, demi, you name it i had identified as it.

i had very set ideas of what terms could be. two years ago, i didn't think you could be bi and pan at the same time, bi and lesbian at the same time, aro and bi at the same time, etc. i thought all queer terms were distinct, separate categories. i didn't believe lesbians could use he/him, didn't understand how you could be both non-binary and a man/woman, etc.

learning about how identity is much more complex, personal, and fluid, less boxed in, than i thought it was, has changed how i view my own identity. i realized that i didn't have to deal with the constant stress of choosing one label or the other when i could embrace different aspects of my identity at the same time.

now, instead of going back and forth every other week between bi, pan, aroace, gay, lesbian, etc., i've embraced that my identity can be all of those things! it takes off so much stress and pressure.

but the biggest way it's influenced my identity is through gender. i never thought about gender before, but seeing the unique way that mogai ppl talked about gender resonated with me in a way i didn't understand at first- at first it was the autigender community. i wasn't diagnosed yet, but i started realizing that my gender felt weird and disconnected, but not because i didn't HAVE a gender, but because it just wasn't binary in the typical way you'd consider it binary.

so identifying as autigender and quoigender described the "what the fuck" part of my gender, but identifying as xenogender described the "cool as fuck" part of my gender. i feel so much more connected with both my femininity and my masculinity because i discovered xenogenders.

so tl;dr: before the mogai community, i was a mess. i changed my labels every other week and thought i was just a cis girl. now, i'm a bipan aroace queer lesbian who's xenogender and genderqueer. and i couldn't be happier about it :3

[solitarelee]

Also a non-insignificant number of "men following lesbian blogs," as people are pointing out, are trans women or nb ppl who either aren't out yet or are just getting misgendered. Not to mention the complexity for genderfluid people who're SOMETIMES male... do they unfollow according to gender lmao? Can I only interact when I'm not feeling the he/him pronoun vibes? If someone is nb and AMAB are they really going to be chill abt it? Or do they once again mean "AFAB nonbinary people I can treat as woman lite"? The whole thing just smacks of gender essentialism and this weird idea ppl have online that everyone should be sharing all their personal info publicly.

TBF tho I find all DNI lists performative and foolish, so that's definitely coloring my opinion.

My queers, we really need to put the "no men" thing away. Men are not inherently bad. There are queer men. There are questioning men. There's men that are just plain cool. Denying these men a space at our table is not helping - except the TERFs. I just came off the back of reading a transphobe gleeful rant about the need to have pride without men - They of course mean me. This kind of stuff is damaging to me and I really need us all to take a step back and maybe kill this "men dni, men not allowed" stuff. What you mean is "no men who are going to do mean stuff to me." And frankly those men won't give a shit about that kind of boundary.

But I promise you there's a fleet of good honest men who will see that and be sad they're not allowed in your version of queer spaces.

PATRIARCHY is what you hate. Dni Patriarchs.

[dykeyote]

obviously i know of the wonderful real and true lesbian hermie but i would still like to hear ur thoughts on her :3

HIII :3 thank u for the excuse to explain because truly i feel so strongly abt this . here is my extensive reasons as to why hermie unworthy could never be anything but a lesbian and ur hcs are all wrong and this IS a personal attack on you btw <- thats a joke this post is very silly and not meant to be an Actual Theory but i DO feel strongly

lezzermie realness: a manifesto

REASON 1!!!!!!!!! again . WHAT WAS THE BEND IT LIKE BECKHAM THING ABOUT . and this isnt "actor character randomly dresses up as kiera knightley from bend it like beckham for no reason" which to be clear . would still make me raise my eyebrows . HOWEVER hermie isnt just any kind of actor shes a SPECIFICALLY DC ACTOR . she ONLY does dc characters . the ONE other time is when she's dressing up as scary for like a Real Reason . this is not a real reason its not even a musical or a play or smt its not even theatre kiddy . what are you trying to say hermie others will silence you but i will let you speak

REASON 2!!!!!!!!!!!!! further reasons will be predicated on the assumption that scary marlowe is a: a lesbian and b: that her crush on hermie is lesbianistic in nature . this can be proven simply w the line "im not like other girls i dont like ned or earl but when im with you my heart shatters or smt along those lines i cant be bothered to check verbatim" . abt hermie . oh so youre not into GENERIC MASCULINE NAMES like OTHER (STRAIGHT) GIRLS but hermie is different ...... this is successfully✅ proven . also she compared her and scary to the joker and harley ..... and scary STILL had a crush . i dont think anybody could tolerate that unless it was from a lesbian 🙏

REASON 3!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! with this assumption presumed ....... now i know what you were thinking in reason one when i asserted hermie only broke dc those tow times . "val thats not true he was jack on the titanic" . to that i say YES ...... she did an overdramatic romantic scene riffing on an iconic straight couple from a historical movie with (as we have 100% proven) a lesbian w a dykey ass crush on her . whats more lesbian than that . thats the butchfemmiest shit

REASON 4!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! i hear you cry from the crowds . but valentine ur MISSING something . ur WRONG . because NORMAL!!!!!!!! to which i say normal is so obviously a girl to everyone but herself lets be real . the eldritch beast she has this deep connection with and empathizes with immediately is fixated on being a bad girl? she has a whole arc where she tries to be a normal son and boy to appeal to her parent who doesnt approve of how she chooses to express herself and picks a masculine name to go w it in contrast to . um . i mean i guess an adjective is gender neutral??????? hermies a lesbian FOR normal not DESPITE normal ......... also lesbians can be mlm and have complex genders too . me for example . bigender swag which hermie absolutely has

REASON 5!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! if we assume normal's arc is transgender THEN we must observe the parallels with hermie and come to the same conclusion of girlmie (or boygirlmie but bigendermie is a convo for another day) realness . both created to be a specific type of son (normal well Normal, hermie a joke machine) both Not Quite Right in a way they cant shake both reaching out for a new more fitting identity which in hermie's case EXPLICITLY includes gender nonconformity (we will discuss next bulletpoint) . and if we prove girlmie by way of her crush on scary (and as previously stated normal) we prove lezzermie

REASON 6!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! dressing up as poison ivy isnt necessarily lesbianistic because she dresses up as other dc villains HOWEVER!!!!!! i will argue that the way she goes about it is uniquely suggesting of dykery . a: she flirts with normal .... THROUGH poison ivy . distinctly RELATED to poison ivy . this is lesbian behavior and reinforces my prior point and b: she REPEATS poison ivy ...... which she rarely does with others she goes through Eras with the rest of them but abandons them after HOWEVER!!!!! she does poison ivy sexy and gets sort of interrupted . THEN does batman in the spiderboyz intro . THEN goes back to poison ivy in hell........ why does she only repeat the known lesbian 🤨

REASON 7!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! HERMIE unworthy ... HER MIE .... like her and me ...... instead of her man (heterosexual in nature) she chooses herMIE . normal holds her face and goes YOURE HERMIE (her x me) . think about it guys . think about it ........

ok anyway thats enough of my ramblings . this post is very silly if u cant tell but i am a #believer

[papermonkeyism]

That wasn't meant to be rude!! DD: You said yourself your changed a lot since your early days on the internet and you said you wanted to write a story featuring queer themes since that is something closer to you now that you're an adult and you also at one point said you treated Arcanth as almost a fictional boyfriend of sorts (unless i misunderstand!!!!) which is why you stopped identifying with him and which is why i thought he was meant to be what your thought was the """"default'"" at that age of a het cisgender male character and just wanted to suggest that now that you're revisiting his character you can do with him what young you couldn't bc of your preconceived notions abt gender&romance!!!

Okay. I'm still annoyed, so apologies if I sound clippy with this answer. It's residual, not aimed at you.

I thank you for clarifying.

Yeah, I've changed a lot since my teenage years, but I'm 35 years old, so I did a lot of the changing looooong time ago, and I swear I haven't spent all these years just fiddling my thumbs the whole time. My characters have changed with me.

My views on personal romance have always been between "nope" and zero interest, I've been very aware of myself being ace for practically my entire life. My gay awakening was also eight years ago by now, so this isn't a new developement. I just suck at making up stories to put all the feels in.

Okay? Okay.

(I had queer themes and characters before the great Gay Awakening, but since that point it's been personal and out loud.)

(okay so Arcanth is "any pronouns good" kinda character, this whole avoiding pronouns alltogether is annoying, and my antipathies towards English language are great and numerous. Now with that out of the way-)

I don't know why people keep getting this backwards. No, Arcanth never was my imaginary boyfriend. Arcanth was created as a character for myself to have fun playing as. Technically their gender is "my default", which for the teenage me having grown up in the 90s-00s meant male because of the old days cartoon logic of "well, I'm not interested in dating boys or make up or girly stuff, so it can't be a girl. Boys are allowed to be anything". Those were the options I knew.

My views on gender now, as an adult are way too complex to sort through here (and frankly not your business), but to put it simply binary it ain't. I'm most comfortable as undefined default, so that's what Arcanth gets to be these days. Basically I just found better ways and words to describe what they already were.

Now, the imaginary boyfriend thing was a popular thing at the time in certain circles. I had several peers who had such characters, and once I figured out there was a possibility people could mistakenly think that's what Arcanth was meant to be, I kinda immediately noped out of it and stopped drawing him, because the whole idea squicked me out.

So it was never a case of seeing them as a some sort of default heterosexuality, and more like "holy shit people could accidentally think I'm into this!" Absolute horror.

It's extra flavour of sadly hilarious how people STILL TO THIS DAY keep assuming that's what was going on. Congrats on hitting that exact same button. I hate it.