#critrole tma au

[nellasbookplanet]

I was tagged by @mllekurtz to share a snippet of a current wip, which gives me an excellent chance to throw this scene from the Molaesmyr au of Caleb interacting with alternate Essek at you all, behold:

“I have already told you, we know each other.”

“You and… some other me.”

“Ja.”

“And I—he told you about that.”

“Not as much as that,” Caleb admits. “We found out, me and my friends. Years ago. He has left the Dynasty since. We are—” He stops, figuring that perhaps ‘lovers’ would be too much for this Essek to hear. “Close,” he settles on. “Very close.”

“You could be lying.”

“Your favorite foods are soups and stews. You have a brother named Verin, who used to play tricks on you by putting jam in your spellbooks. You enjoy knitting.” Caleb gives a short, slightly pained laugh. “In fact, the socks I’m wearing right now are of your making.”

For a second, Essek’s gaze is drawn to Caleb’s boot clad feet. Then he scowls, seemingly at himself, and turns back to Caleb’s face.

And, because I've been sitting on this one for a while, a bonus snippet from the next chapter of the magnus archives au:

“You don’t know what I do, then?”

“I know you watch people. Give them nice, tasty little nightmares, make sure they can never move on from their pain, open the door for your god to soak it all in like a hungry sponge.” He laughs. “Boring way to go about it, if you ask me. You want to be there as it happens.”

“Mhm.” Essek nods. “What are you?”

“I—” The Traveler stops, his already large eyes growing wider.

“Turns out I can do a little more than just watch,” Essek says. “What are you?”

[intertexts-moving]

OK TO BE FAIR. irt to that modern aus post. ok preliminary reminder that i am not one to yuck someone elses yum & truly i do understand the appeal of everything is kind & nothing hurts aus etc, like, i get it. but. unfortunately i am always thinking. anyway.

this one. tbf. one of my favorite thought exercises IS examining the relationships & dynamics btwn characters & world & thinking about how u would communicate that in a world without the fundamental elements that tie them together in the text itself. the root cause of most of the miserable flanderization into "what if they all went to highschool together..." or "oh my god.. what if [x] was a barista & [x] was a college student & [xyz]" tropes: they take the way a character works & transplant that into a completely different setting w/ no regard to how the change in setting would affect the guy. cases in point of stories where character is deeply rooted in worldbuilding itself: trigun, tian ya ke, COUNTER/weight, six of crows for all its faults. (counterpoint: stories where characters are not fundamentally intertwined with the worldbuilding: tma, homestuck, critrole, etc.)

but dear god is it fun to look at a piece of media & go ohh okay. how would i translate this. how is their trauma shaped, like, objectively-- they're human, right? what would it have to be, in a normal, depowered universe, to achieve this level of effect. how do they interact with the world or the narrative. WHY do they do it Like That. how is that done mechanically. how do you reverse engineer that. how would lack or presence of [x] impact how they work. etc. & some of my favorite fics ever are about that. !

[epicmusic42]

WIP Game

Okay so I've seen this around a few times, where you're supposed to list all the stories in your WIP folder and followers can ask about them/request snippets. And it did get me curious how ridiculous my list is because uh... I work on many stories simultaneously. And it's a WIP until it's finished or I decide I'm not writing it.

So yeah. Folks can ask about anything they want. I do not promise you will get an answer since I also included the count of [Redacted] WIP files I've got.

Everything is organized by Fandom and if I have multiple wips for a series, then the series has a subheader. Things in [brackets] are more commentary than wip, but I felt should be acknowledged when counting.

Arda

Crown of mikhil

Prompt notes

Untitled 1

CritRole

Time Fuckery

Modernish AU

Mirror Images?

Two Steps Forward, Nein Steps Back

The Brunch Club

Flashbacks

The Brunch Club backstorys

Mechs AU

Murderplay blumentrio 

Untitled 2

DC

My Wish for You

Not my sister, my uncle 

Agent A

I'm calling Martha

Ot4 but Crack

Untitled 3

Mechs

Breaking Marius's curse

The Terror: God of grieving, living out of spite, and the trapped

Going from Yes, to I love you

Pangolin Brian 

Time loop

Brian is Arthur 40k fiction go

Ocean Pirate AU

On Recovery When You're Immortal 

Te amo

This is new

Next Steps

Untitled 4

I Said I'm Keeping You 

Lyf/Raph

Not Quite Human

[Loose Change]

Promise You'll Keep Me, Even If I'm Real

Quick Thots 

TS/Brian

TS/Jonny

Ts/Jonny end

Ts/marius

Ts/marius/Jonny

Ts/tim

Smut

Ashes/Aurora 

Jonny gangbang

Marius/Jonny cannibalism 

Superhero Stuff

@fracnkie 's Outsider Pov

The Inherent Eroticism of…

Asking for what you want

Welcoming a new crew member

Ivy

Marius

[Concatenated]

Urban Magic

Eyot Cemetery 

Sexy Ghoul Feeding Time

[Like five docs on Ghoul language]

Star Wars

Ka'ra the Gota

Copikla 

Friends

Loose Change 

More Dead than kaysh thought

Prologue?

Sexytimes

Untitled 5

Mir'j'ade

Advice

Comfort 

Consent?

Discussions

Interview

Obi-wan Kenobi of aliit Kryze 

Obi-wan Kenobi of Clan Kryze

Xai giiyha'ah anohrahak uu ehnoctel

[Also like 7 notes docs]

Tra'kem'ad

Goran joha

Tra'kem'ad

Translations

Jesara, celo kat fohl

Ke'nuhoy, ner ad'ika 

Mando'a I see fire

sa sarad cuyir gotal de pitat

Tal jabat te laamtorun (Blood upon the risers)

Werdlaar

Follow up

Jesara celo kat fohl, juve e paihenelru foh keelak

Misc

Tamah qa brok vaversi

"I've been yours"

Alpha means buir

And I say

Bat Concordia 

Dom/sub thing

Ehnap im Lunetana'unru'yth; Rumar'eyir nu Ru'hiib'manir

Jatinobi

Jensaarai

Jetii ori'vod 

Ka'ra'ade 

Kar'ta beskare

Mattress red

Melida/Daan

Merged world's

Mission: babysitter wanted

Paden'hibir

Protest snippet 

Rex fucked up

Rex/sabe

Staging a couple

Stewjoni witch

T'ad runise

Time travel dooku

Time travel maul/Obi-wan 

Time8

To be naasade

To: a connection 

Untitled 6

Untitled 7

Xanatos/Jango?

Xarehk paiochl Rakadaiji

TMA

PA

Brain wtf?

Jonny dville and Jon Sims same guy

Other

Genderfluid?

Marvel-Dimension Travel

Sire, if I may?

Prompt Bucket

Original Work

Space Beowulf

Satan & Jesus go to pride

Cyberpunk persephone 

The Adventures of the Wise Old Wizard

Novel

This is my idea of a pandemic

Generic Prompt Bucket

Loose Change (technically not a WIP)

Redacted

Redacted A

Redacted 1

Redacted 2

Redacted B

Redacted 3

Redacted 4

Redacted 5

Redacted 6

Redacted 7

Redacted 8

Redacted 9

Redacted 10

Redacted 11

Redacted 12

If you read this far, I'll do you the favour of informing you that there are 133 WIPs.

No, I'm not actively working on all of them. But these are all projects that I haven't removed to a "fics I'll never write" or equivalent folder.

[charterandbarter]

2am tma dnd au thoughts

broke: dnd jon is a warlock because jonny sims said so 

woke: dnd jon is a warlock because he is the epitome of the grey area between choice and circumstance, especially since jon’s internal conflict comes from his innate affinity for the beholding, his complex trauma, and his bullheaded resolve to value humans even at the cost of his own humanity. 

bespoke: halfway through the campaign dnd jon slam dunks the Beholding into a lava pit, then multiclasses as a Paladin of the superior deity of knowledge, the goddess Ioun. Eventually he settles on an Oath of Devotion because a] he wants to do better after all the people he tormented while in service to the Beholding and b] his love for Martin convinced him that spending his life protecting art & the people who make it (aka all people because life is an artform) wouldn’t be half bad. He gets the final smite on jonaelias’s Boss Form and kisses Martin (who was counterspelling the FUCK out of everything + generally being a badass) while Ioun-made fireworks explode in the background. He’s a Holy Librarian now. insert dnd flavored honeymoon.

[preciousdark]

what i’m learning is that i have never been right about a critrole theory ever but my tma aus and related red string theories i get right with prophetic accuracy.

[unicyclehippo]

in a critrole tma au, which fears do you see the m9 being affiliated with?

i don’t know enough abt tma yet im sorry !! this is a guess from the little i do know from my run & spoilers (im on episode 89 i think but i need to go back a bit bc i was sick when i was listening to the later ones)

beau - the lonely; jester - the lonely; yasha - the spiral; veth - the buried; fjord - the other, or is there like a straight up fear one?; caleb - i think there is a burning one caleb can have that as a leetle treat or maybe the slaughter (?); caduceus - the flesh (?) or the buried might be interesting for him

i don’t know all of the fears!! but also i think the lonely would fit a lot of them although idk if i have even heard abt the lonely yet i presume ur alone

i believe their fears are not the same as who they might be an avatar for? again, this is going off spoilers. that being said

beau - the watcher/the eye; jester - the spiral; yasha - the hunt; veth - the other; fjord - the vast; caleb - the web; caduceus - the buried

[morrithal]

Please, please. I require more Magnus Archives and Critical Role cross-over content. Didn’t realize how good this mash-up would be until that ask of yours. 😭✨

Alright yall let’s do it. I’m going to put it under the cut because I’m going to do both TMA-in-CR and CR-in-TMA because that’s who I am as a person

Also it’s very important to me that you know that @trashprinxe is homebrewing custom Warlock patrons based on the 14 fears and I’m shook

Very important to this crossover is the fact that I think that there are a lot of parallels between the Cobalt Soul and the Archives. They’re both very knowledge-based, employ spies, keep records, and most importantly try to keep corrupt powers in check.

Listen. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, but Jon Sims is a wizard who studied his ass off, wondered why his magic was acting weird, and then realized that he accidentally became a warlock. Very inconvenient. Also he’s a wood elf.

Martin Blackwood has POWERFUL hobbit energies. I don’t really get very strong class energies off of him to start, so he’s lowkey an NPC who accidentally became a party member. Also Blackwood is already a fantasy name and I just can’t get over that.

Basira (half-elf) and Daisy (human) are oathbreaker paladins who were meant to be upholding the law against these patrons but that kind of… all went to shit, didn’t it?

Basira is going to multiclass her way out of this mess if it’s the last thing she does

Melanie is a dwarven ranger who multiclasses as barbarian. It just feels right in my heart. Listen, I know rangers sort of fall under the Hunt category rather than the Slaughter (and Daisy is definitely also a ranger) but ghost hunting is a viable ranger career, okay??

Tim is a tiefling who chose his last name (Stoker) to reflect his habit of upping the ante on situations (like “stoking the flames”) but literally no one gets it and he’s honestly a little grumpy about it.

The Magnus Archives is an institute based in Zadash, but features satellite locations across the empire. While they don’t deal so much with magical beasts, they do record instances regarding otherworldly beings with the intent of understanding and keeping tabs on them. Of course, why wouldn’t the Great Old Ones take notice?

Georgie Barker says Fuck Magic. She’s a rogue with a familiar because Fuck Magic Rules.

AAAAAAND Critrole in London!! I can’t really see them working for the Archives, but Beau has big archival assistant energies so she’s mostly their correspondent, if that makes sense?

Listen. I know I said that Uk’otoa is a stand-in for the Buried in this post but honestly?? The eye imagery is kind of throwing me off. So straight up the Falchion is straight up a sword that Fjord has and it’s influenced by both the Beholding and the Buried

The Cobalt Soul is still a library, but it also doubles as an archives ruled somewhat by the Beholding. It has given Beau the ability to analyze her enemies and compel truth Jon-style, but she’s not super happy about it.

It’s very easy to say that Caleb is tied to the Desolation, but more than the fire thing I think he has a deep connection to destruction on a personal and inter-personal level. So, Desolation.

It literally cannot be clearer to me that Jester is an avatar of the Stranger and she SUPER digs it. The only thing keeping her from going Full Monster honestly is her love for her friends

Molly seems very The Hunt to me, not just by virtue of being a blood hunter but also in the sense that he’s running from something unknown. I get the vibe that in this AU Molly had a run-in with the hunt years ago, but now finds himself tied to it. He also has powerful Web energies.

I struggled with Nott but in some ways she seems very The Lonely to me. She’s isolated from her past in a way that very much affects her present, and it’s interesting to me that the Lonely seems to attach itself to individuals, if that makes sense? I’m not saying Nott has claimed Caleb as Her Person because of the Lonely’s influence but it definitely helped.

Yasha “Orphan Maker” Nydoorin as a quiet and controlled but still massively dangerous avatar of the Slaughter HELLO???

Caduceus just thinks the Corruption is neat

[iamalivenow]

wip list of self punishment

tma list

corset fic- like 25% of the way done maybe less who knows

nikola/jon- uhhhhhhhhhhhhh??????????????????

bookshop au- also like 25% of the way done might split it into multiple chapters;;

peter/martin appletini sequel -  like 15% of the way done???? or 50%???? who knows??????????????

peter/elias conjugal:  uh?????????????????? (but bass boosted)

critrole

caleb/cad ship smut - 50% done

jester/the traveler - just a twinkle in my eye at this point

jester/fjord/avantika- like 10%???? idk???

very convoluted and abstracted caleb/cad beetle thing- Well

penumbra

juno wears a pencil skirt and peter eats him out - you’d think this would be easy considering its jsut pwp  and yet

second citadel 3way - again, you’d think

caroline/mira - a vague hand gesture

castlevania

alucard/hector -75% of the way done

hector/isaac - ill get to it eventually;;;;;

[nellasbookplanet]

Caleb squints at him. “What were you doing?”

“Fighting pirates,” Essek says, deadpan. Suddenly, something Nott said catches up to him. “Wait. What do you mean ‘fully realized avatar?’ I’m not an avatar at all.”

“You keep telling yourself that, hot boy.”

Essek frowns down at her, but she doesn’t look up from her work. He isn’t an avatar. Avatars are… monstrous. Sure, Essek is a bit strange, but he isn’t like the followers of one of these entities. He doesn’t worship anything. He’s just an archivist, picking up an oddity or two in his line of work. That’s all.

“Pirates, you say?” Caleb has placed his elbows on the armrests of his chair, fingers intertwined in front of him and gaze intently on Essek. “Uk’otoa, I presume?”

Chapter 3 of the magnus archives au is live!

[nellasbookplanet]

Apparently the answer to “how long can i resist” is “less than a day,” have some tma au featuring Essek as the Archivist encountering a strange man with bad manners.

The first time Essek meets the man with the black-stained hands, it’s only been about two months since he was promoted to the role of Archivist.

Two months are just about enough time to realize something about the position is seriously fucked up, have his life threatened on three separate occasions, and develop an even stronger dependence on coffee than he already had, and so it’s no surprise that he, as Beauregard so eloquently puts it, is high-strung as fuck.

“What are you doing here?”

“Hm?” The man looks up from the handful of papers he’s been leafing through, looking distracted and faintly annoyed, as if he wasn’t just caught trespassing. “Can I help you with anything?”

He’s skinny and rumpled, all but disappearing in an oversized leather coat and a mess of hair that would probably be red if it’d been washed the last month or so. His skin is sallow and unhealthy, only partially visible beneath a short, untrimmed beard, and there’s a ratty scarf wrapped around his neck and pulled almost all the way up to his mouth. Honestly, he looks like someone come to give a statement.

Essek bristles. He hasn’t had his morning coffee yet (that is a lie; he had a cup at home) and was feeling irritable even before he stumbled on a strange man rooting around the Archives. Taking a breath, he forcibly pastes on his practiced customer service smile. “If you’re here to leave a statement, office hours are between twelve and three. Now, seeing as you’re already here at­”—he looks at a clock on the wall, not even trying to be subtle—“seven in the morning, we could arrange for—”

“No.”

Essek blinks. “I’m sorry?”

“No, I am not here to leave my statement.” The man goes back to reading the paper at the top of the pile he’s holding, calm as all that. “You will have to find someone else to feed on today, I’m afraid.”

This is about the time Essek starts to realize something about this, something about this man, is wrong. Of course, being Essek, he keeps right on going anyway.

“This isn’t a public library,” he says, fingers itching to rip the papers from the man’s hands. The only thing stopping him is an unwillingness to risk damaging them. He hasn’t yet gotten to this part of the Archives in his effort to digitalize the nightmare left behind by the previous Archivist, and would be loath to leave part of the statements unfinished, no matter the nonsense recorded within. “How did you even get down here?”

“Walked in the front doors. Followed the signs saying ‘Archives.’”

“That’s not possible. The doors to the Archives are locked.” Or at least they are supposed to be.

The man flips a paper, scanning it briefly before going for the next. “Then perhaps someone wanted me here. You should know by now that Ludinous always has a plan.”

This is ridiculous. Essek is reaching to grab the man by the arm­—exactly what he’s going to do after that eludes him, seeing as he’s got the upper body strength of a day-old wet noodle—when he notices something that makes him freeze.

There are dark smudges on the papers in the man’s hands. At first, Essek thinks them dust or maybe dirt, and his anger gets another boost, but then he follows the stains and sees them entirely cover the man’s fingers, his palms and the back of his hands, before disappearing into his worn shirtsleeves.

And the thing is, it doesn’t look like dirt anymore. Doesn’t look like a covering of any sort. It looks like the man stuck both his hands in a fire and didn’t take them out until his skin had sizzled and turned to coal.

“You are…” Essek gulps. Much too late, the tiny hairs on the back of his neck are standing up in warning.

“Caleb Widogast.” Finally, the man looks up to meet Essek’s gaze properly.  His eyes are burning like fire, and Essek does not mean that in the poetic sense. “And you,” he says, “are the Archivist.”

Essek tries to gulp a second time, but his mouth has gone fully dry. He has to make an effort to stay where he is, faking calm. Predators can smell weakness, whispers the sensible voice in the back of his head. If you run, you will not leave this room alive.

“What are you?” he breathes.

Caleb Widogast cocks his head, looking for the first time interested in the man before him. “Am I your first avatar?” When Essek doesn’t answer, the corner of his mouth quirks up. “Oh, I am. What an… interesting turn of events.”

He steps closer, and this time Essek’s body reacts before his mind has a chance to give an order and he scrambles back, nearly falling.

“I admit I have been somewhat disconnected from current events,” Caleb Widogast says, following as Essek retreats. “Last I knew, someone else held your… esteemed position. Most knew better than to mess with him, and those who did not were quick to learn, even if they did not get to learn much else afterward. I would not have dared to openly challenge him. But you…”

Essek’s back hits a bookshelf. Papers slide off piles and float down around him, quick to cover the floor. Essek’s lizard brain lights up like a firework and he raises his fists. Caleb Widogast does not stop until Essek’s knuckles are pressed against his chest. It’s hot. Dangerously so. It’s a wonder his clothes don’t burn right off him.

He isn’t very tall, but it doesn’t take much to be taller than Essek. Tilting his head forward, he looks Essek in the eye. It occurs to Essek that, underneath the dirt and the grime and the overgrown beard, Caleb Widogast is a handsome man. Sharp jawline. A nose with a bit of a bump to it, lending character. Very nice lips. It also occurs to him that this is entirely the wrong time notice such things.

“Do you even know what your job is?” Caleb asks.

“I am—the Archivist,” Essek replies, trying to pull himself straight.

“And what does the Archivist do?”

“I… archive?”

Caleb huffs something that could very nearly be called a laugh. “Oh, it would be easy to kill you.”

He lifts a hand, fingertips starting to glow dully red as he goes for Essek’s face, and Essek blurts, panicked, “Wait.”

Caleb, raising a brow, waits.

“You’re looking for something, yes?” Essek babbles. “Some bit of information you think is hidden here. Well, trust me when I say you won’t find anything worthwhile in here without my help.”

“Maybe I will surprise you,” Caleb says, hand still hovering just at the edge of Essek’s vision. “I am very good at finding things.”

Essek, astonishing himself, says, “Then try.”

This time when Caleb smiles, there’s no real amusement in it. “I could make you tell me where to find what I am looking for.” He plucks at a lock of Essek’s hair, fallen from the otherwise meticulous quiff. Once trapped between his fingers, the white hairs scorch black in an instant. “I can be very persuasive when I put my mind to it, Archivist.”

Caleb’s tongue flicks out to wet his chapped lips. Probably it’s just because the air has gone dry in the sudden heat, but something about it looks hungry, like he can’t wait to do to the rest of Essek what he just did to his hair.

Essek realizes, belatedly, that he’s been staring. By the time he corrects his gaze, it’s clear Caleb has noticed. He cocks his head again, a considering, almost interested look in his eyes as he studies Essek.

“You do not know what an Archivist does,” he says, slowly, deliberately, “but do you know what you want?”

“I—” Essek has to stop to gather himself. Caleb waits patiently, not giving Essek back an inch of his personal space. “I want to get to the bottom of all this. Of the statements, and the things that cause them. And I want to do it before anyone else has the chance to.”

“Mm. Perhaps it would be a waste to kill you already. The next Archivist might not be anywhere near as accommodating.” Caleb’s blackened fingers brush over Essek’s cheekbone. It hurts, like putting hot metal against one’s skin, making Essek suck in a breath, but Caleb is stepping away too quick for him to react.

“Until next time, Archivist,” he says, nodding politely before turning and making his way toward the glowing exit-sign.

At the sound of the door closing, Essek’s body gives in all at once. He has to catch himself against the shelf, sending even more papers flying, and then just stands there for a while, shaking and gasping too much to move. It isn’t until the pain in his cheek grows too hot to ignore that he starts dragging himself toward his office and the cellphone left on his desk.

If he was smart, Essek would call up his boss and ask why the fuck the doors to the Archives were unlocked and security nowhere in sight. It would appear, though, that Essek isn’t very smart, because he scrolls right past Ludinous’s name in his contacts and goes straight for Beau, affectionately saved under the name of ‘nosy journalist.’”

He puts the phone to his ear—remembering just in time to avoid the injured side of his face—and prepares to be yelled at.

[nellasbookplanet]

A continuation of the critical role tma au:

Caleb as an avatar for the Desolation who comes to the Archive in search for information. Starts showing up to either save/threaten Essek in the wild when said information is denied him. His motives are unclear, but he seemingly has no connections to other Desolation avatars and even expresses revulsion toward them.

Once he becomes aware of how little Essek knows, the two strike a deal for information exchange, with Caleb giving his statement and gaining access to the archives. This bit by bit grows into him helping fight other avatars, while all the while insisiting he's only doing it for selfish reasons.

He is eventually revealed to have been a member of the Lightless Flame with Astrid and Wulf, but left after he killed his family and now searches for a way to undo it. He uses some kind of magical artefact to hide from his entity and from the cult, and is hoping to find a more permanent solution.

Veth as an avatar of the Buried. First spotted in the company of Caleb, it is unclear what her motives are outside of helping him, though she is clearly hiding something. Essek eventually finds out she became connected to her entity by making a deal with it to survive an encounter, forcing her into its service and away from her family.

She works with Caleb because both of them hate their entities and are seeking ways to be free of them, but they both also somewhat crave the power they have been given and never hesitate to use them.

[nellasbookplanet]

OKAY so the idea of a critical role tma au won’t leave me alone, have some rambly thoughts:

Essek as the archivist, possibly with him also being influenced by the Lonely (and the Cerberus Assembly as a stand in for the Magnus Institute; Ludinous as Elias subtly encouraging him to take risks/endanger people in his search for answers and driving him closer to enacting the Eye's ritual). His family are possibly followers of the Lonely, but since they have no interest in actually researching/understanding the entities, Essek distances himself from them early (as did Verin, though for other reasons). He doesn’t fully know what his family worshipped other than it was supernatural.

Ergo, he knows about the supernatural (ghosts, monsters, etc) from the start but nothing of the true nature of the entities, which is the information Caleb, an avatar, initially uses to draw him in and gain his interest.

Beau as an opposing force working for the Cobalt Soul to stop rituals without aligning with an entity (sort of a Gerry character). She is possibly tempted to align herself with/already somewhat aligned with the Eye through her occassional collaborations with Essek (which are unapproved by the Soul/Dairon and definitely something she does secretly).

She might also be tempted by the Hunt (symbolized by a fling with Reani), which she later distances herself from by getting with Yasha, who as an avatar is an enemy (rather than giving in to the Hunt and continuing to fight her). She DOES NOT trust Essek, but the two would risk their own lives to save the other in a dangerous situation (of course, neither would admit to this).

So Essek and Beau have this buddy cop dynamic, with various members of the nein showing up to wreak havoc occassionally. Eventually, all nine of them will come together to put an (at least temporary) end to the archives.

[nellasbookplanet]

Okay I'm on a roll let's keep going with the critical role tma au.

Link to the Essek and Beau post

Link to the Caleb and Veth post

Yasha as an avatar for the Slaughter, with aspects of the Lonely. She was at some point under the influence of another entity through Obann (either the Corruption or the Web) and assisted in an attempted Ritual, which was thwarted by Beau and Essek, during which she nearly killed both of them.

After this she's been traveling around on her own, causing various violent incidents but having no clear goal. Her only friend pre-Obann was Molly, and when Lucien tries to enact a Ritual wearing his face Beau and Yasha both show up to stop him and end up teaming up.

She and Beau has a fraught realationship where they sometimes try to kill each other but experience an undeniable connection. She definitely goes to Beau when injured because she has no one else to turn to, and starts showing up more frequently just to hang out when Kingsley's in the picture.

Kingsley shows up one day with Yasha, who dumps him with Beau, who dumps him with Essek to keep her bosses from finding out. After Lucien, Flesh avatar, failed his Ritual and died, the body woke up empty. (The Molly persona was possibly "erased" prior to this by its entity when he started fighting it.) He isn’t technically an avatar but the Stranger is definitely trying to win him over.

Since he's no longer an enemy but still attracts trouble he doesn’t have the skill/knowledge to handle, he mostly hangs around the Archives as an (awful) assistant while Essek and Beau pretend not to care about him. He occasionally has memories resurface and works very hard to ignore them. He definitely befriends all the avatars who show up at the institute.

[nellasbookplanet]

The first part of the magnus archives au is not yet done (what has been written so far can be read here, if you want some semi-evil shadowgast and soul bonds), but I have already begun cobbling together part two, which will focus on Fjord, Jester, and Caduceus.

This is part of the first chapter, and takes place some years before All in a Day’s Work, featuring Fjord encountering a pretty blue woman who is, unbeknownst to him, an avatar of the Spiral.

The first time Fjord saw her, he had no idea what she was.

He was on shore leave at time, walking the streets of Nicodranas with no clear goal as he silently counted down the minutes until he could return to the Tide’s Breath. Part of him wished he’d never left. The docks weren’t the same as the open sea—not enough movement, not enough space, and far too many people—but it was still preferable to the bustling city. He could feel eyes on him as he wandered, looking at him as if they knew him only to frown when he didn’t fully fit the picture.

Not that he didn’t catch more than his fair share of shit out at sea. Sabian was there, for one, always ready with a snide barb or reminder of what Fjord lacked. But with the wide-open horizon all around, what Sabian said didn’t seem to matter as much. The captain didn’t care who or what Fjord was as long as he did his part of the work without complaint, and the ocean, well.

The waves and the tides did not care one way or another.

But there he was, steady ground underfoot, the ocean close enough to smell in the salty wind but too far to hear or see between the buildings. Vandran had told them to go have fun for the night, and Fjord didn’t have it in him to disobey even an indirect order from his captain. Besides, he was in his full right to be here. Most people didn’t even really care, he told himself. It was a coastal town, after all. Lots of travelers from all over. He was far from the only half-orc.

Still, he was uneasy. The rest of the crew was at a pub, but with Sabian happily and drunkenly holding court, Fjord had figured he’d be better off on his own. Get some fresh air, maybe even meet some people who weren’t sailors. Wouldn’t Vandran be proud.

He wasn’t sure how he’d ended up in what was clearly the oldest—and nicest—part of town. The streets were cobbled rather than paved, and instead of the blockish, modern buildings of most of the town, big, lavish villas and storefronts showcasing wildly expensive wares surrounded him. There was brickwork, arched windows and doorways, domed towers and sharp spires lined with wide balconies and finely carved balustrades. If it weren’t for the occasional car and moped passing by, he’d have felt as if he’d walked into another time.

The passersby were different, too. No more dockworkers and fishermen but rather nicely dressed men and women, too high society and polite to do more than glance and whisper at his rough exterior. Trying not to attract attention, he ended up following the flow, and didn’t stop until he realized most of them were headed into a huge hotel at the end of the street.

Music flowed out the open doors. A minotaur stood at the top of the stairs and welcomed people inside, likely also serving as a warning to potential troublemakers.

Fjord stepped back, moved to the side of the street to be out of the way. Tilted his head back to take the place in. It was, in a word, fancy.

And there was a woman.

Fjord blinked when he spotted her. She was leaning out of the wall a few floors up, wild blue hair sticking to her face and streaming in the wind as she surveyed the crowds below. It was a wonder he’d spotted her, really; the opening was hidden in a niche, all but disappearing between balconies and lavishly decorated window frames. Actually, the more he looked, Fjord felt sure there shouldn’t be a window where she was leaning. The placement was all wrong. If anything, it looked like she’d opened a door in the middle of a fourth-story wall, like something out those cartoons were they’ll draw a door on a surface and it’ll become real just like that.

She was sitting with her back to the doorframe, one leg dangling out the side of the building, dress hiked up to her blue knee. The other was folded in front of her, letting her prop something up against it and scribble at it with great concentration. Every now and then, she’d turn to look down at the street, before turning back to her work.

She’d done so maybe three or four times when she spotted him.

He froze under her gaze, feet anchored to the cobbled street. She smiled, so wide and white that it was unmistakable even high up as she was. Then she raised a hand and waved.

Heat rose in Fjords face. His hand waved back almost as if on its own accord, only for him to realize that fuck, stupid, she probably wasn’t even waving at him, now he looked like an idiot.

She was still smiling when he unstuck his feet and hurried away.

*

“It’s really nice here, don’t you think?”

An undignified squeak escaped Fjord at the sudden voice. He turned on the bench he’d been sitting on, frantically looking around, but didn’t find the source until he looked up.

The bench was placed by a wall, low enough that he could’ve seen over it if he was standing, high enough to grant him a sense of privacy in the otherwise well populated city park. At least, it had until now, because atop it sat the woman from the hotel, feet kicking off the side as she smiled down at him.

“Uh, yes.” He cleared his throat. “It sure is. Lots of… flowers.”

She grinned, and before he had the chance to embarrass himself further she placed both hands on the edge of the wall and pushed herself down, landing easily on the grass. Righting herself, she plopped down next to him on the bench and stuck out a hand.

“Hi, I’m Jester.”

Fjord, who had his hands full with a paper plate with fish and chips he’d bought to keep himself occupied, shuffled things around until it rested securely in his lap. He wiped his hand on his pants before accepting her handshake. Despite the soft look of them, her fingers felt oddly sharp, and pricked against his skin. Some kind of expensive manicure, probably.

“Fjord,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Very nice.”

She let him go and retracted her hand, but not without stealing one of his chips.

“I saw you at the Chateau earlier, right?” she asked, stuffing it into her mouth. She lit up. “Oh, this is really good! Where’d you get it?”

“There’s, um, a kiosk? At the edge of the park?”

“Right, right.” She nodded, then stole another chip. Fjord thought that maybe living by the coast made some people act a little like seagulls when it came to the property of others. He didn’t move the food out of her reach. “But it was you at the Chateau, right?” she said, chewing happily. “Just before the show?”

“If you mean that big, fancy place, then yes. And you were, ah, sitting in a window?” he hazarded, thinking it must’ve been a window. “What were you doing up there? It looked kind of dangerous.”

She snorted. “Dangerous-schmangerous. I was just drawing people. And you left before I got to draw you. Oh!”

Wiping her hands on the bench, she went to dig through a satchel that rested snugly against her hip and came out with a sketchpad. Unlike her pristine clothes and bag, the sketchpad looked worn, but in the way old paperbacks sometimes do, well-loved and thumbed through innumerable times. There were pictures drawn on the cover, spiraling and winding that made Fjord’s head hurt when he tried to follow them.

“Is it okay if I draw you here?” Jester asked. “I promise to make it really flattering.”

Fjord wanted to say no. He’s uncomfortable enough as it was with being seen; the thought of having this stranger scrutinize him for however long it took to finish a portrait made his skin crawl. But she’s batting her eyelashes and pouting at him, and he found himself smiling weakly and saying, “Why not.”

She lit up with something that could only be genuine happiness, and immediately opened the sketchpad to a blank page. Well, almost blank. There were a couple of doodles in one corner; dicks and lollipops and what looked like hamsters with horns. Fjord tilted his head, trying to make sense of it. Despite the silliness, there was distinct skill to them.

“Ah-ah.” She pushed at his cheek with a finger, turning his face away. “No peeking.”

He almost obeyed. That is, he didn’t look at the portrait—didn’t want to, in either way; the very idea made him feel weird and itchy—but he snuck a glance or two at her.

She looked different when she was drawing. Enhanced yet private. There was still a smile on her lips, but something about it seemed less performative than before; slightly crocked, lips moving on their own as if mouthing words or imitating whatever expression she was sketching. Movements still wide, but less as if she was making them to be seen, to make herself everyone’s problem, and more like she simply couldn’t contain them even when hyper focused on pen and paper.

Tiny bells and charms hung from her small, curved horns. Every time she turned her head, as if trying to view the picture from another perspective, they jingled softly.

She knew she was visible, Fjord had thought, watching those bells. Knew there was no way for her not to be seen. And rather than cower and please, she made herself big, unmissable. He wondered what it was like. Being that brave, yet still so hidden in a larger, grander version of yourself. He imagined it was lonely.

“You aren’t from around here, are you?” she asked after a few minutes of silent work.

“How do you tell?”

She drew a long, sharp line, and Fjord very nearly went to look before catching himself. “Your clothes,” she said, absentmindedly lifting the pen to chew at the end of it as she studied her work. “And your hair.”

Fjord self-consciously lifted a hand to pat his salt-stiff hair, but stopped when she made a noise of distress.

“Don’t move! I’m not finished yet.”

He dropped his hand, trying not to squirm. “What is it with my clothes and hair?” He tried a laugh. “Not fashionable enough?”

“Nah, it’s not that. I mean, they aren’t, but that’s kind of good? What I mean is, you look practical. Travel worn. Not like someone who’s just walking home from the office, or even someone who’s traveled here on business. You look like your business is the travel.”

Eerily spot on. Then again, she probably saw a lot of sailors, and they tended to sport a similar style.

“I’m guessing you are from around here?” he said.

“Yeah.” She paused, looked up to consider him long enough to make his cheeks flush before turning back to the sketch. Though she laughed, there’s a tinge of sadness, or perhaps longing, to it. “That easy to tell, huh?”

He thought back to how she’d hung out that hidden window, safe and comfortable as if she did so every day. “You just seem to know the place real well,” he settled on.

“Oh, I do! If you climb the highest tower of the Chateau, you can see practically all of Nicodranas. Even the ocean, and the ships coming and going.”

“I watched the ocean for a long time too, back when I lived in Port Damali,” Fjord said wistfully. “Went out there first chance I got. Kind of awkward being back on land. Haven’t found my land legs yet.”

“It is very pretty,” she conceded. “All sparkly when the sun hits it right. But it looks empty.”

“That’s part of the appeal.”

“Yeah?” She looked up, grinning, and waggled her fingers at him. “Don’t like people? Even if they are really pretty and super cool?” Horrifyingly, she did a wink and a fully body wiggle, thankfully contained by her, very nice, dress.

“I like people,” he said, not knowing how else to respond to her growing grin and thus opting to pretend he hadn’t noticed (though his blush revealed otherwise). Her teeth were sharp and pointed, even for a tiefling, and made it look less like she was smiling and more like she was about to bite him.

“But the ocean is better,” she teased.

“The ocean has… certain qualities people lack.”

“Uh-huh.” Still grinning, she turned back to her picture. “What if you could go somewhere where there was no annoying people? Just like, a really cool place where they could never find you, and you could stay forever?”

He snorted. “What, like a deserted island?”

“Maybe. Or like, the coolest house, with too many doors and corridors for anyone to get in or out.”

It sounded, frankly, terrifying, and should’ve given him a hint.

“It sounds lonely,” he said. “Even a ship has other people, and every port has new faces, too. Sometimes I’ll even meet one I like.”

He smiled at her, and though she smiled back it looked a little like a grimace.

“People always come here and then leave,” she complained. “I just want to put them someplace where they can’t leave, so I can come by and hang out for as long as I want.”

“And when you don’t want to hang out anymore?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know.” She grinned, widely and slowly, until Fjord felt like he was no longer looking at a person but a concept, sharp and stretched and dangerous. “I guess they can have that part of the cool house to themselves for forever.”

“I would go mad,” he admits.

“I mean, most people do.”

Ominous. “I just don’t think I could stand being trapped like that.” He glanced at her, trying to be subtle. “Would you?”

The pen stilled on the paper. She didn’t look at him. For a moment, she wasn’t even smiling. “Sometimes there isn’t a choice,” she said softly. “Either you make someone else go mad, or you go mad yourself.”

“There’s always a choice, even if it’s a hard one. You could just leave.”

She blinked three times in rapid succession. Then the smile came back, genuinely amused. “Fjord, are you trying to therapize me?”

“I don’t think that’s a word.”

“That’s so sweet. Hey, you know what.” She snapped the sketchpad closed and skipped to her feet. “I don’t think you’d like my cool house very much, so I’m not taking you there. But I’ve loved talking with you, so I’m going to leave you a door. You know, in case you ever change your mind and feel like going a little mad.”

She winked at him.

And then she opened a door in the stone wall and ducked through it.

*

Of course, there wasn’t actually a door in the wall. When Fjord eventually calmed enough to go look closer, there was just a drawing of one, painted right on the stone bricks. That was weird enough, seeing as he could’ve sworn the wall was perfectly clean before.

Not thinking, he touched it.

It was just stone. Cool from the shade under the trees, uneven and rough. Nothing liked the painted and cracked wood of the image. He imagined that one would’ve given him splinters.

He decided the thing must’ve been there all along, and that he wasn’t disappointed at all the handle was flat and two-dimensional when he tried to grab it. He wasn’t the most attentive of people; probably he just hadn’t seen it. And obviously Jester hadn’t walked through it. That was ridiculous. She must’ve just… jumped the wall. Yes. Made perfect sense.

He finished his fish and chips, and then he went back to the Tide’s Breath.

[nellasbookplanet]

Chapters: 2/? Fandom: Critical Role (Web Series), The Magnus Archives (Podcast) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence Relationships: Essek Thelyss/Caleb Widogast, Nott | Veth Brenatto & Caleb Widogast, Beauregard Lionett & Essek Thelyss Characters: Essek Thelyss, Caleb Widogast, Beauregard Lionett, Nott | Veth Brenatto, Jester Lavorre Additional Tags: Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Enemies to Lovers, Body Horror, flirting in the form of blackmail and death threats, Everyone Loves Jester Lavorre

Having been promoted to Head Archivist, Essek expects an increased work-load and late nights researching. He does not expect the man with fire in his hands.

Chapter 2 is up!

[nellasbookplanet]

Only Fjord and Cad left for me to ramble about for the critrole/tma au, let's gooo

(To see me ramble more on this subject, check out my critrole tma au tag!)

Fjord as an avatar for the Vast (possibly with influences of the Web). Like Jester he's outwardly friendly with a ruthless streak and no compunctions about using his abilities, but doesn’t needlessly hurt people. He did at one point assist Essek and Beau in stopping a Ritual for the Vast by killing another avatar (Avantika), but did so in a way that ended with him significantly more powerful than before.

He is possibly seeking a way to escape his entity's service without losing its powers. It is possible he eventually gives them up anyway to escape, and instead becomes an assistant at the archives along with Kingsley, with the rest of the nein (especially Jester and Caduceus) helping keep him safe.

He initially encountered Jester before he became an avatar (it is unclear whether she was one at the time, but if she was, he was unaware) and later met her again when they showed up at the archives at the same time. The two connect over knowing the other behind their "mask" and sharing vulnerabilities, though they don’t get together until they both nearly die stopping a ritual.

Caduceus as an avatar of the End. He seems to completely lack motive and often shows up just at the end of/after a dangerous encounter to watch or comment judgmentally on Essek's handling of it. Initially seems to know a lot but it turns out he's absolutely clueless as to what’s going on and just kind of vibing.

His family are followers of the End but not avatars. Caduceus willingly became one when the grove came under attack by the Corruption, and came to the archives for answers. Fjord and Jester (and possibly others of the nein) helped him out, but after the grove was safe he worried his presence would endanger his family and stayed away.

Because of this he's very lonely, isolated, and lost, no longer sure what his destiny is. Meeting Fjord and helping him away from the Vast, and gaining companionship from the nein, becomes a new purpose for him. Since the End doesn’t necessarily seek to manifest in our world, he's pretty much the most chill of the avatars, though no less dangerous.