#dude you're so accurate with all this stuff you have no idea

[originalwinnerfanfish]

Hey I am the same guy as Dat-lil-shark who has been commenting on all of your Tfp wings of fire arts. I am asking through this blog because it’s my main and tumblr won’t let me switch blog for asks. Anyways I LOVE EVERYTHING YOU HAD WITH IT. ITS A WONDERFUL AU!! Please

Allow me to cook some headcanons of my own for this AU. I’ve been having an autism crisis with it all afternoon.

The dragons and the scavengers (humans) did not live on the same continent and were not aware of each other’s existence until the war broke out, and the dragons dried all the resources on their continent, so they fly away until they found the human continent, still full of resources. In the prehistorical time, the animus dragons in this world put their power inside this world’s version of the Matrix, before all lived in loneliness and let their bloodline die. So there would not be any animus magic born for the unworthy, only those that were chosen by the Matrix.

Shockwave received his animus magic through unnatural means (my guess is through injecting himself with blood from past animus dragons, or through tempting with ancient taboo animus objects. (Potentially half of his face rotting away was a side effect of this)).

Optimus restrain from using his animus magic unless absolutely necessary because he had potentially conceived a grave mistake with it in the past, and potentially, in some way, a mistake that lead to this war. Or he was simply afraid of loosing his soul and hurting those around them. Or potentially. Potentially, the animus magic within the Matrix was not infinite and when it was passed to Optimus, there were only limited amount left, and he got to save them.

Back in the days half breed dragons were very much frowned upon, and because of so, before being chosen by the Matrix, Orion was very much abused. And because of so, Megatronus help him out and protect him and that’s how they became friends. That was also why Optimus not adopted so half breeds, because he was one of them.

Now, Decepticons were also not tolerant of half breed dragons partly because of old traditions, and partly because Megatron was always reminded of Orion when around them.

Ratchet is also an alchemist, and so is Rafael.

Ratchet collects a lot of herbs and rare animals to create his potions with, which Bulkhead always loved to steal and eat when he’s not watching (he got his tail bitten).

And the humans were only in the medieval era.

The Jasper in this version is located near the sea instead (both allows the Jasper Trio to be the first who met the dragons, who came from the sea, and allowed all the Seawings and half Seawings of the Autobots to be comfortable.) and potentially on an island or a half island which still kept them somewhat isolated and remote form the rest of the human continent.

Despite so, Miko was one of the jungle people, and was a traveler who came from afar, hence her bravery and desire for adventures. Since she had been fighting snakes and jaguars all her life she thought fighting the dragons would be the same (it’s not).

Miko loved to use Bulkhead’s entire back as a slide. She also always cling onto his tail when he went for missions so she could sneak away with him.

Arcee disguises herself as a shark and every time Jack was going to hang out with her, he lied to June that he was just gonna chase the shark away from the fish they were farming.

Jack was involved in a few boating races against Vince, and when they did, Arcee was swimming below Jack’s boat, pushing him forward while making it seem he’s just boating faster. Wheeljack always accidentally burn everything around him and was NOT sorry.

The autobot dragons tried to disguise as normal animals to the best of their abilities (crocodiles, shark, lions, etc)

Dark energon also worked similar to the Othermind, and Megatron was so addicted to its fruit that it’s now the only thing he eats.

Silus skinned Breakdown after his death and drooped his scales over a machine dragon that he created. He also claimed that he was the one who took down this dragon and now his townspeople praised him as the Dragon Slayer.

During Operation Bumblebee, M.E.C.H. had clipped the tip of Bumblebee’s wings to study, leaving him unable to fly (and later it healed naturally) and later they did the same to Starscream.

And this was inspired from your design and not the original plot:

Predaking the Skywing suffered from poor sleep and health due to his constant negative mood string from what happened with his race (which lead to dark eye circle and dull scales.)

that is it

hope you like it

I had a lot more head canon but a lot of them were commented down in your post anyways

I just love you AU SO SO SOOO MUCH!!

I might drop in more later

See ya!

GOOD LORD, THESE ARE INCREDIBLY COOL IDEAS!!!!!!

I really like that you focused on the human characters of this AU!

The fact that Jasper located on the coast is a simple and at the same time ingenious move, since it would really solve many problems such as dragons base and variants of humans vehicles!

For example, humans could transport materials and huge mechanisms on ships that were escorted under and above the water by autobots (as in the "Convoy" episode), so the dragons will remain invisible

The idea of boat racing is generally brilliant, as is the detail that Arcie helped Jack while pretending to be a shark (this is not noticeable on the art, but according to my idea, her tail is really very similar to a shark))

I also really interesting about what type of role will play Agent Fowler in this version. Given the medieval setting, he could either be a local count or a knight of one of the lords, somehow having a connection with the king and following his orders to keep the "beasts" away from people

June could also be a local healer in this AU and sell medicinal herbs and infusions (and send her son for ingredients). She might be a great help to autobots, telling Retchet about the plants of the new continent and their effects on organism, which would help him create new medicines. She might even have helped Retchet find a cure for the Othermind infection (while saving Raphael life after Megs attack)

I also really like the detail that Shockwave wasn't born with animus power, but acquired it, and now it's destroying his body. It's even tragic to some extent (especially for Soundwave). But it also works very cool to reveal the character. Perhaps, like Stonemover, he preferred to pay for the use of magic not by destroying his mind, but by destroying his body (idk, this is just so true for him)

So, again, thank you very very VERY much for all of these theorys!

I'm already whant to make many of them a part of this AU canon!

[mantequillamcwhoremick]

HI DONT WORRY ABOUT TAKING TIME WITH THE STUFF UR MAKING, LIFE IS HARD AND WE GET IT IF U NEED A BREAK OR ARE POSTING LESS OR ANYTHING<3

anyway! i was coming here to ask u if i can add chp bunny to a comic im making? id credit u obviously, but still asking for permission since theyre ur characters and all :3 also if i can, would u rather i make them as normal bunny or mystechaos? and can u tell me all about their designs so i can draw them accurate? :3

JAVSHSGSHS THANK YOU🧡🧡🧡🧡 I APPRECIATE YOUR PATIENCE

And also ???? Dude OF COURSE i'd be honored if you wanna do that😭😭 also they're not my characters HAGAHHA it's just fanwork with canon elements all over them (at least i try to make them as in character and close to canon as possible) so you can definitely do whatever you want, just tag me bc i of course i'd love to see stuff that was inspired by my work!!!

And uhhh well i don't know, I'd honestly ask YOU which of the two you'd rather do because i have no idea what the context of this comic is so idk what fits better. There's already pretty detailed designs/descriptions for Mystechaos so I'm assuming you'd like the descriptions for regular bunny if that's what you're going for?

Idk just feel free tell me a little more about the context if you want me to decide, otherwise I'll say you pick!! I love both :>

[xproskeith]

can you tell i'm bored-

please answer those. i also drew a ghost for you. because i'm bored. i'm gonna answer my asks too lmao HAVE FUN!

Lmao ok but I actually love this. The you wrote it out AND the ghost! Tis the season!! 👻🎃 Now let's begin!

11: best friend?

My best friend is awesome! His name is Ben and we've been friends since we met at college for our first degrees (we'd both end up going back for nursing later. He ended up following me on that front). But we really started to get closer after we both graduated and especially after I moved back to New Orleans after moving home after graduation for a year and a half. He's just a really cool and chill guy who has always been there for me and been super supportive. We've both helped each other through some really rough times in our lives and really supported each other. He's pretty introverted, tho if you met him you might not realize that at first. It's a hilarious contrast to my extreme extroversion. I also owe meeting my wife to him. He pushed me to finally get on the dating apps and I met my wife on hinge. He also encouraged me when she and I started talking and dating seriously. He also knows how to deal with my anxiety very well and respectfully, tho my anxiety has gotten immensely better than it used to be. Still, worth mentioning. He's also said on multiple occasions how much he appreciates and like how I am just unapologetically me and an unapologetic nerd. To quote him, "genuine folks are hard to find." So that was also really cool to hear from him and just reaffirmed that being myself is the right move. When he lived in the city with me, we'd hang out at least once a week. But we text daily for the most part and still try to see each other as much as we can even tho he's 2.5hrs away now. He was my best man and gave an amazing and touching best man speech. Now, almost a year later, people still talk about it and quote him, "IDK how else to describe him other than he's aggressively friendly." it's accurate and everyone who has heard that agrees lol. Anyway, he's great and I'm blessed to have him in my life. Here's a pic of us at my bachelor trip and before my wedding. As you can see, and as I've mentioned before in various other posts, the dude is built like a Greek god lol

15: favorite movie

This is actually a hard one lol. I enjoy a lot of movies, but have a hard time narrowing down a fave. Hmm. Deadpool and Wolverine is certainly up there for very obvious reasons, but a movie that has always stuck with me since I was younger is The Prestige. It's a well done film whose twist really got me at the end. It's rare for me not to figure out a movie twist before the end and this one I did not see coming.

18: most traumatic experience 

You're gonna get 2 for the price of 1 lol. 1 childhood trauma and 1 adulthood trauma. Both cover a span of time instead of one specific incident.

First is childhood. From pretty much 1st - 4th grade, I was bullied pretty often. I was a very big and fat kid who was also nice and didn't exactly fight back, so I suppose in retrospect that made me an easy target. But beyond that, I was often made the butts of my peers' jokes or would be asked to do something silly or embarrass or the like and they'd say stuff like "of course we're you're friend!" and "if you do it, we'll be your friend." so this went as well as you can expect. It got so bad and took so much of a toll on me that my mom literally pulled me out of school to homeschool me from 5th-8th grade. This would eventually become repressed as the mind often does only to rear its ugly head later in adulthood when my friends wanted to institute a "punishment" for whoever placed last in our fantasy football league. I had always opposed this idea, but they we were really pushing for it that year. Didn't help I was dead last, but I was having such a visceral reaction and didn't know why. But I was literally about to drop out of the league because of it. Then all of a sudden the memories came flooding back and I finally understood the why. I explained it to 3 of my friends in the league, including the guy in charge, and they abandoned the punishment idea. They said they hoped they knew that this was very different and that no ill will was meant. I did, but it didn't stop how I felt. So the punishment idea was dropped.

Now for adulthood. That would be working through COVID as a nurse. This was traumatizing in many ways, but in particular there were 3 key points. The first was watching patients deteriorate and die so rapidly. Like I would leave in the morning and come back to find out my patient coded and died 3 hours after I left. They were fine before then. We also called so many rapid and codes because people would deteriorate so much and so rapidly. Despite everything I knew and docs and nurses way more experienced than me knew, we couldn't save them all or stop the rapid spiral.

Secondly, every time a code blue or rapid response is called overhead, it's preceeded by a beep on the intercom. I would hear that so many times during that time that I found myself to physically flinch and tense and my heart would race whenever I'd hear it. Even a year later when it was just happening to make an announcement. Didn't realize it was legitimately a PTSD response until I was talking to an army buddy who was like "Yeah dude that's what happens to me when my PTSD gets triggered." I overcome that by becoming the code and rapid nurse for my icu when I moved. So I just threw myself headlong into it and overcame it by exposure and desensitization.

Lastly, there was the whiplash of being called a hero and having my knowledge and insight respected only to be called a liar months later. By my own family even. I still remember making a lengthy thoughtful post about the importance of making and explaining why surgical works for day to day vs the n95 masks needed in hospital and the same day my mom made a post about how covid is a lie and masking is just the government trying to control us. My family has on multiple occasions told me my experiences weren't real and I was exaggerating, especially because I'm liberal. After many fights, we all finally agreed to just never talk about it around each other. An uneasy peace, but better.

So there you have it. My two biggest traumatic experiences lol.

21: what I love most about myself

My kindness and willingness to help people

28: a description of the person I dislike the most

Hmm I don't really dislike people. But I suppose this one older lady at work. Kind of short, white, fading blonde hair that's always short. She's always unhappy lol. Mostly dislike her bc she gatekeeps certain patients and has full control over the schedule despite not being the manager.

42: last thing I ate

Greek yogurt and pumpkin seed granola

[northwest-cryptid]

As a general heads up, I'm so tired of Native Americans getting no good representation in media; if you EVER want to make a character in anything you're doing and you want them to be proper Native hit me up. I can gleefully assist you on writing them or actually help you make them Native (at least within the confines of my understanding which means I can assist with making them Lakota, but in that case more power to you for actually giving them a real tribe and history.)

I'm really tired of the horrible representation we get.

I'm really tired of the way we are seen and portrayed.

I'm really tired of how our issues that we actually care about are ignored in favor of the old tried and true "we want our land back" story, which while true; is not at all the only thing we care about.

I'm tired of the narrative that we're a lost cause, that we're not worth fighting for, that we're already dead.

I'm tired of the fact the best representation of us that a friend of mine gave me when I said we have no representation was "there's a Native dude in Mortal Kombat!" OH YEA DUDE THAT'S FUCKING ACCURATE SURE! YEA MY UNCLE ALSO SUMMONS LIGHTNING AND BECOMES A FUCKING ANIMAL!

So yea believe me, you have no idea how cool it is when someone makes Native shit especially Lakota stuff!

One of my favorite artists is edrw and I cannot urge you enough to check out their stuff! Clicking their name there will take you to their deviantart and they do REALLY cool Lakota/Native inspired art.

If you're worried about it being offense run it by me, if you're worried about it not being accurate; I'm here for you fam.

Mitakuye oyasin, my friends.

[bismuthbookshelf]

A Marine Biology Review Of The Original Little Mermaid (part 1?)

I would love to give this a proper explanation or some decent-sounding context, but really all I can say is: I had an idea!

Okay, well, a bit of context I can provide is that I have a playlist of narrations that I listen to whenever I'm struggling to sleep (they work with 98% effectiveness!), and one of the narrations on that playlist is of the original Little Mermaid story (link to the youtube video/audio of the narration HERE if you're interested). So I've heard the story a fair few times now, and I'm an Ocean Nerd, so I thought it would be fun to have a look at the descriptions of ocean/marine stuff in it and talk about what's accurate and what's not. And, well, I recently graduated university with a bachelor of science, with a marine biology major, so that gives me some validity, right? :P

Note that my intention is not to tear the story to shreds and call it terrible - I just like to analyse and ramble and try to educate when I can. Anyway, I'm just gonna keep going until I decide this post is long enough, and then we'll see if I make a part 2. But without further ado, let's go!

(Final note, THIS is the translation I'm referencing, as obviously the original original Little Mermaid is in Danish, not English)

Far out in the ocean, where the water is as blue as the prettiest cornflower, and as clear as crystal, it is very, very deep; so deep, indeed, that no cable could fathom it.

So you might be aware that "fathom" is both a unit of measurement used for the ocean (about 1.83 metres, or 6 feet), and also a word meaning "understand or comprehend", but actually neither of those definitions are at play here! As the Merriam-Webster page for the word says: "By the 1600s fathom had taken to the seas, with the verb being used to mean "to measure by a sounding line". So basically this sentence is saying that the water is so deep that it cannot be measured! Lacking fathom in more ways than one! ;)

Anyway how deep are we talking? Sunlight can't penetrate any further down than 1000 metres (~3,280 feet) at maximum, but really the ocean often begins to "get dimmer" once you go below 200 metres (~656 feet). However, we must also remember that the concept of depth can be kinda relative/subjective (depth is in the eye of the beholder?), and what is considered deep to a dude in 1837 might not be considered as deep to someone like me now when it comes to talking about the ocean. What we can say is that this depth has to at least be longer than the length of a ship's cable, which itself could apparently range anywhere from 169-220 metres. So let's say that the depth is around 300 metres, (~984 feet) - a good, round number, definitely can't be measured by a single cable, and still close enough to the surface that there would be at least some sunlight penetration getting down there. Moving on!

We must not imagine that there is nothing at the bottom of the sea but bare yellow sand.

Lovingly, this may in fact be the truest sentence in the whole dang story.

No, indeed; the most singular flowers and plants grow there;

And goodbye to the accuracy!

The only type of flowering plant (i.e. in the Angiospermae clade) that lives in seawater is seagrass, but 1, they aren't exactly known for their flowers (they can be quite small and not always very flower-like), and 2, the deepest water that any species can survive in (specifically Halophila decipiens) is 85 metres (279 feet) - a depth most definitely fathomable, and a bit different to the depth estimation I came up with!

the leaves and stems of which are so pliant, that the slightest agitation of the water causes them to stir as if they had life. Fishes, both large and small, glide between the branches, as birds fly among the trees here upon land.

First of all, I know Hans (yeah I'm just gonna call him Hans; it's quicker and easier) was trying to make an analogy, but when I think of fish moving around at the bottom of the seafloor or like in a reef or something, I'm imagining small fish that dart about, rather than gliding (and for that matter, most birds wouldn't be 'gliding' through a forest either - gliding is for wide open space!)

And second of all, any plants that have thin, delicate stems, are not likely to have "branches" coming off of them, aquatic or not!

(Also I swear I'm not gonna talk about every single sentence but there's just a lot to talk about in this opening paragraph).

In the deepest spot of all, stands the castle of the Sea King. Its walls are built of coral...

Dead coral? Actually, there are some species of deep-sea coral that can grow anywhere from 150 feet to 10,000 feet below sea level, but still, you can't expect any coral species to just conveniently grow into the shape of a massive castle, so I guess it'd just be used as a building material?

...and the long, gothic windows are of the clearest amber. 

"Clearest amber" definitely sounds like an oxymoron - 'amber' is also a colour term for a reason! But turns out that the concept of amber in the ocean is not as dumb as I initially thought. Amber, in case you don't know, is fossilized tree resin, and obviously there aren't any actual trees growing in the ocean (more on that later), but there is amber that came from large trees that lived many millions of years ago that got washed away by large rivers and eventually carried to the ocean, and in some parts of the world (most notably in the Baltic Sea Region), amber can (or at least could) sometimes be found washed up on the beach! (But seriously, those windows would be a translucent orange or yellow colour at best).

The roof is formed of shells, that open and close as the water flows over them. Their appearance is very beautiful, for in each lies a glittering pearl, which would be fit for the diadem of a queen.

I'm not sure whether the shells kind of act as 'hatches' that let water and oxygen move between the inside and outside of the castle (helping equalize pressure?) or whether it's just a bunch of clams/bivalves sitting on top of a roof foundation thing, because of the pearl mention which implies that they have an underside. I kinda like my first idea better, though.

on that account she wore twelve oysters on her tail;

I wanna know how exactly Hans was imagining this to work. Like would they all be stuck to the caudal peduncle area (the tail minus the fins)? Would some be on the fins? Oysters secrete a special adhesive substance to help them stick to rocks and stuff, but would that even work on a mermaid tail, and if it did, would it make it harder to swim?

the youngest was the prettiest of them all; her skin was as clear and delicate as a rose-leaf, and her eyes as blue as the deepest sea;

Idk about the skin being "delicate", but honestly a mermaid living 300 metres below sea level, where the sunlight would be somewhat reduced compared to further up in the photic zone, honestly probably would have fairly pale skin (a mermaid living in a tropical coral reef, however, might have darker skin, to be better suited to the large amount of sun exposure).

The large amber windows were open, and the fish swam in, just as the swallows fly into our houses when we open the windows, excepting that the fishes swam up to the princesses, ate out of their hands, and allowed themselves to be stroked.

The windows have hinges? Do they use the same kind of "hinges" that bivalves use?

What are they feeding the fish?

I would love to pat fish underwater though ngl.

Outside the castle there was a beautiful garden, in which grew bright red and dark blue flowers, and blossoms like flames of fire; the fruit glittered like gold, and the leaves and stems waved to and fro continually.

"Come with me, and you'll be, in a world of pure imagination!"

It feels very self-indulgent to me, but honestly I kinda feel like I gotta respect the commitment!

I guess Hans was trying to provide answers/explanations for what exactly the mermaids would eat, but honestly I feel it'd be more likely for them to be largely carnivorous, feeding on stuff like fish, crustaceans, and mussels, with maybe also some inclusions of macroalgae like kelp/seaweed in their diet as well.

The earth itself was the finest sand, but blue as the flame of burning sulphur. 

Hmm no I don't think so. But anyway we're gonna be skipping ahead just a little bit now!

She planted by the statue a rose-colored weeping willow.

I hope I don't have to make it clear to you that trees don't grow underwater, and definitely not weeping willows!

She could see the moon and stars shining faintly;

The moon? Yeah sure benefit of the doubt. But seeing the stars from that far down below? Yeah nope ain't no way

(Also, if the water really is that clear, with such high visibility, then there mustn't be many nutrients in the water, and they likely would in fact be some distance away from any coastline, and be moreso in open ocean).

...to lie in the moonlight, on a sandbank...to listen to the sounds of the music, the noise of carriages, and the voices of human beings, and then to hear the merry bells peal out from the church steeples;

Do mermaids have super-sensitive hearing or something? Ain't no way you could hear all of that from a sandbank! Like if it said that this mermaid sister was on some secluded beach near a town, then maybe, but a "sandbank" is a little area above the water level that's out beyond the shoreline! Maybe not super far out to sea, but to hear carriages, people talking, and music? The only way this would be somewhat plausible in my mind is that it was a seaside town, and the sandbank was relatively close to shore, in which case wouldn't this mermaid be at risk of getting spotted???

she swam up a broad river that emptied itself into the sea.

How wide though??? 'River' can be such a vague term, because it might mean something like a large creek, or it might mean something that's a good couple of miles/kilometres in width, if not bigger than that. But for this instance I imagine it as being more like a large creek, like one that might run through bushland after some periods of heavy rain here in Queensland.

On the banks she saw green hills covered with beautiful vines; palaces and castles peeped out from amid the proud trees of the forest;

Again I wanna know what exactly was going on inside Hans' imagination when he was visualising this. Like why are there vines on hills? How close are they to the river? How big is the forest and how many palaces and castles are clustered together in this area? (Ngl this may just be a case of "who cares about the logistics, it just sounds nice", and as a bit of a hobby writer myself, honestly Mood)

the rays of the sun were so powerful that she was obliged often to dive down under the water to cool her burning face.

Again, there are hills and forests close by to the river, yet apparently there are no shadows being cast over the water at all? (Idk maybe she was just swimming around midday). Also was she doing backstroke or was she just frequently stopping to look around at stuff?

She had seated herself upon one of the largest [icebergs], and let the wind play with her long hair,

Sitting on an iceberg??? Girl how are you not freezing? (Also, like with the first sister, how was she not spotted? Like yes all the ships were trying to steer away from the icebergs, but surely that still involves someone keeping an eye on the water to make sure that the boat is moving away from danger and not towards it? And surely a mermaid would stick out like a sore thumb?)

only that the mermaids have no tears, and therefore they suffer more.

Hans casually drops a line like this and then just moves on like it's no big deal, bruh.

Aquatic mammals such as whales do not in fact have tear glands, but they do still have special eye glands that secrete an oily substance to help clean and lubricate the eyes! (And humans are the only species (as far as I'm aware) that produce tears as an emotional response).

she placed a wreath of white lilies in her hair, and every flower leaf was half a pearl.

"Flower leaf" as in petals, or like the actual leaves? And you mean they were made of pearls, or did they have pearl halves sitting on top of them??

Then the old lady ordered eight great oysters to attach themselves to the tail of the princess to show her high rank.

She ordered the oysters to attach themselves to the princess's tail? I definitely somehow missed or forgot that from all the times I've heard this narrated.

Okay so I guess the mermaids can communicate with oysters and likely other sea life (sure why not), and I guess this low-key implies that the oysters are using their natural method of attachment, i.e. special adhesive substance which is kinda sorta like their own form of concrete.

“But they hurt me so,” said the little mermaid.

So like do they actually make it harder to swim? And how long do they stick on for? Forever? Until you tell them to get off of you? How big/small are these oysters?

Oh, how gladly she would have shaken off all this grandeur, and laid aside the heavy wreath!

I mean I guess the use of pearls in the wreath would make it heavier than a typical flower crown, but surely it still wouldn't feel that heavy underwater? With like water density and stuff?

(Though for that matter, how would any sort of crown stay on your head underwater when moving around, unless it was like fixed tight on top or something?)

.

I was originally planning to go a bit further into the story on this post, but I've done a fair bit of rambling already, and I don't want this post becoming too long, so I might go ahead and make a part 2 post (at some point, I can't say when), and depending on how this post goes, I might make a part 3 as well! Who knows!

[neon-jackal]

Why The Twist In CoC is umm uhhh umm

Each underland chronicles book gets it's own big twist, all with varying levels of quality, but today I want to focus on the twist in Code of Claw, and why (in my humble opinion) it doesn't really work. I actually really like Code of Claw, it's my second favorite in the series behind MoS, but this is by far my least favorite part of it, and probably my least favorite part of the whole series. So why is it so... not good?

First, let's talk about what makes a twist work. I think this really comes down to 4 main factors

Does it make in-universe sense? Pretty self explanatory. It's always good to keep writing consistent with the world building & lore of the series.

Does it fit with the characterization? Beyond it making logical sense, does it fit with the writing of the story? Is it foreshadowed at all? Does it feel like something the character(s) would do? Essentially, does the audience buy it?

Does it further/change the story? Also pretty self explanatory. A twist should have impacts on future event in the series, or re-frame previous events in a new way.

Does it work with the stories' themes? This is especially important for a series like TUC. This is a series with some strong messages, so it's important not to undercut them.

Now let's look at the big twist in CoC. For any who've forgotten, the reveal in this book is that Sandwiches' prophecies are fake. Ripred tells Gregor he doesn't believe in them 5 seconds before the final battle, and Gregor decides he's probably right. So how does this do as a twist?

Does it make in-universe sense? Hard no. Sure, the prophecies can be vague, and a lot of things can be left up to interpretation, but they describe way too many things way too accurately to just be coincidence. You're telling me that a super rare plague starts going around, and they need the help of the one guy that does all the stuff, and the cure for the plague is developed in it's place of origin, and Sandwich just got a lucky guess predicting all of that to a tee? Fuck off. This just feels like such a bizarre and rushed thing to throw into the series, and it feels like something that was thought of well after most of the other books had been written.

Does it fit with the characterization? Not really. CoC establishes that Sandwich isn't a great dude, so him faking a bunch of prophecies does feel believable for him, but like I said before, all the other books treat their prophecies as legit, so this feels kinda out of place. It also feels weirdly cynical? Gregor makes tangible progress on his quests, and sees really sacrifice too, and CoC is essentially saying "all of that was for nothing". Again, this ties into my personal belief that the other 4 books weren't written with this in mind.

Does it further/change the story? Again, no, not really. Even if you do buy the twist, all of the other quests were successful, so like, what's the point? It does set up Gregor surviving the final battle, but I feel like there just would've been much better ways of doing that.

Does it work with the stories' themes? Actually, kinda, yeah. It ties into Regalia's shady government and the ways they keep order, and fits the 'forced into a destiny you don't want' thing Gregor and Bane have going on. The whole "Sandwich can't be a prophet, he's evil!" thing the book tries to do is pretty dumb though, and I feel like there were so many more interesting ideas the book could've done with this.

Now let's compare this to arguably the best twist in the series, in CotW. Does it make in-universe sense? Absolutely. It fits into the prophecy perfectly. Does if fit with the characterization? Fuck yeah! The Regalians are evil bitches, so this is 100% in character for them. Solovet especially works so well as an evil-CIA type figure. It expands really well on her talk of wanting to 'punish' the rats in PoB. Does it further/change the story? Yes on both counts! Not only does it completely re-frame the entirety of CotW, it also sets up the humans' general shittyness, which we already kinda see in PoB, but really kicks into high gear in CoC. Does it work with the stories' themes? My guy. It IS the stories' themes! It so perfectly encapsulates the gray morality and overall pointlessness of war, the shady actions of government behind the scenes, and everything else these books are trying to say, and it gets expanded on even more in the next 2 books.

Wow this post post kinda got out of hand uhh if you're still reading this thank you for listening to my ramblings and point out anything I missed in the notes. If you think I'm wrong about anything, feel free to start a giant argument in the comments.

TL;DR: CoC is very good but the twist in it is not great and CotW does it much better.

[kaylinalexanderbooks]

Character voice

Thanks to @elsie-writes here, @elizaellwrites here, @mk-writes-stuff here and here, and @willtheweaver here.

Rules: rewrite a given line in your OCs' voices!

Got long, under the cut :)

"I've got a headache."

Lexi: "Oh, man I got a headache. Well, that's what ibuprofen is for. Time to go out to a crowded bowling alley!"

Maddie: "I've felt worse. I'll be fine." (Is dizzy)

Ash: "I have felt worse before. Maybe I should use those probing devices :)" (bad idea)

Gwen: (if she has nothing to do) "I should probably go lie down. I don't feel good." (If she does) "I feel terrible, but I'll push through. For [person]."

Robbie: "Pfft I'll be fiiiine don't worry about it! I have braved through more before!" (Is later seen lying down)

Akash: "No need to worry about me. I'll take some Tylenol and be okay."

Jedi: "I will be alright. We have medication for a headache." *Injects himself with some over the counter drugs*

Carmen: "Everyone BE QUIET I have a headache!"

Everyone is so healthy here (:

Prompt: Uh oh, you forgot to do something very important!

Lexi: "Oh no! I forgot!?? How??" *flips frantically through her color-coded planner* "I couldn't have forgotten to write it down.... it's not possible...it has to be here somewhere..."

Maddie: "I did? Whoops."

Ash: "Oh. Sorry. Uh, guess I'll try and remember next time."

Gwen: "Oh my gosh I am so sorry I forgot!! I've been under so much stress lately... It won't happen again. What can I do for you to help?"

Robbie: "Oh SHITSHITSHITSHITSHIT--" *scrambles around trying to get it done in five seconds*

Akash: "WHAT?! Shit, there's no way I forgot... Guess I did, huh. What is wrong with me? This is why I write stuff down... Oh, um, sorry I forgot, man. Uhh hey is there any way I can make this up to you? Like now? Cause this may haunt me."

Jedi: "Oh, I am terribly sorry... It must be sleep deprivation... I apologize, I will go do that now."

Carmen: *borderline panic attack, likely kicks or punches something*

"Where are we? How did we get here?"

Perfect for TSP actually

Lexi: "Wait, what just happened? Everything just simultaneously changed. The temperature and humidity levels are different. I must be dreaming." (Anxious)

Maddie: "Woah that was super weird. Where do you think we are? (Excited and curious)

Ash: "What-- that isn't possible...but it clearly is... what happened?" (Is also genuinely curious)

Gwen: "Woah. How did we get here? It's... admittedly cool here. Beautiful even."

Robbie: "Holy shit, where are we?! Did I blackout? Or was I just walking and not paying attention so much I took a wrong turn?"

Akash: "Dude...what happened? Did we take a wrong turn? I don't think we did - I was paying attention."

Jedi: "Well... *looks around and pokes at the map on his tablet* it appears this map was not as straightforward as I assumed. I frankly have no idea how we got here. I suppose we are lost. Well, if we must be here, let us survey the area and collect data." (This is what I call the Star Trek Voyager method)

Carmen: "Who gave me wrong directions?! There is no way I possibly got lost. Who can tell me in precise detail how we got here?!"

"I don't have enough curse words for how much you pissed me off."

This one was harder than I thought because most of these guys don't get cold angry, but I'll try.

Lexi: "I have a pretty large vocabulary. I know all the synonyms for, like, every curse word. But I don't think that I know enough for you!"

Maddie: "Hm. I'm not sure I can think of enough curse words that can describe how I feel toward you. Like, none of them work."

Ash: "I would love to cuss you out, but nothing is accurately describing how mad I just got."

Gwen: "I'm not exactly one for swearing, and I'm really pissed that I can't use any cuss word in English, Spanish, or Italian because you're making me so angry."

Robbie: "Bro, I have the most creative swears I know, and even I can't think of one you deserve."

Akash: "Y'know you're pissing me off so much that I literally cannot think of a good enough swear for you."

Jedi: "I will have you know that I am not one for expletives, and I see that this is because I have never been able to find one that quite describes how I am feeling toward people like you."

Carmen: "I would love for you to see how angry I am, but unfortunately you're such an irritating idiot that I cannot find a single swear in my vocabulary that can accurately depict that fury!"

"You want me to eat that?"

Lexi: "Oh, you want me to eat this? Um, that's...fine, thank you.... Y'know I actually ate a lot earlier, and I don't think you want me to eat anything else...thanks though. Really thoughtful of you."

Maddie: "I don't want to eat that."

Ash: "No offense, but I'm not going to like this."

Gwen: "It was very sweet of you to think of me, but I don't actually like [ingredients]. Yeah...sorry. I feel bad, can I do anything for you?"

Robbie: *long exhale* "Look, man, I know you worked really hard on this. And...yeah it's awesome for you to uh....do this. But...I don't think you want me to eat that."

Akash: "That food looks interesting. Oh, you want me to eat that? Umm. Okay..."

Jedi: "It would...be my pleasure to eat this. However, I am afraid I don't quite like this meal."

Carmen: "Why would you want me to eat that? It's gross."

Alrighty that's finally done. Softly tagging @aziz-reads @atelierwriting @mysticstarlightduck @steh-lar-uh-nuhs @stesierra @rickie-the-storyteller @sam-glade @memoriethereaderandwriter-blog @ahordeofwasps @spitefulbull + anyone else who wants to

Your phrase is, "Who would leave milk on the counter?"

TSP intro

TSP tag list (ask to be +/-): @thepeculiarbird @illarian-rambling @televisionjester @finchwrites

[quidcumque]

GRAVEYARD KEEPER: FIRST THOUGHTS

I heard it compared to Stardew Valley and aside from the silly title screen, it's definitely visually there. Play through? There are a hell of a lot of cons, but they won't keep me from playing it

Con: no character customization, no choices at all. You ARE a heterosexual white male-presenting protagonist with a female-presenting white sweetheart. Any headcannon re either of you being 🏳️‍⚧️ remains headcannon

Hilarious: you are reading a text from your sweetheart when crossing a road and you get hit by a car. Keep track of your surroundings, kids

Con: the dialog writing starts out real clumsy. You do eventually get choices, but I prefer how SV makes you the strong silent type when you're not actively involved

WHICH REMINDS ME, CON: don't let the dialog bubbles cycle on their own without me clicking??? I missed so much unretrievable info because I was mulling over the first half smh

Plot: she swallowed the dog to catch the cat, she swallowed the cat to catch the bird, she swallowed the bird to catch the spider, she swallowed the spider to catch the fly. I don't know why she swallowed the fly, maybe she died crossing the street and woke up in a shitty little medieval FLAT EARTHER village and she has to rube goldburg her way to and through a magic portal to get back to her sweetheart. Or something.

Pro: I don't play rpgs much so while I don't prefer this style over sv's do-whatever-and-you'll-suck-less-as-you-go gameplay, it's pretty awesome in and off itself BECAUSE it's so different. It also contributes heavily to the swallowed-the-spider-to-catch-the-fly effect because it's got EIGHT TABS OF TECH TREES and I started drawing graphs

Pro: you're on a derelict homestead/graveyard with a familiar need to clear rocks/trees/stuff and bring the area back to life. BUT doing things gives you different xp/knowledge points which is how you advance on the tech trees, so it's different from just a carbon copy SV feel

Con: Jesús Christ you can tell this was made by a dude. So was SV, but where it had nearly equal gender ratios (plus the aforementioned character choices), I've seen... not very many women thus far, and what we get is not exactly impressive. I have no problems with "ms charm" telling me to fuck off until I deserved to talk to her, as half the men I met said the same. But I've met two wives thus far, and uhhhhhhhhhhh one is straight up called sweet but stupid in her bio and the other opens EVERY SINGLE DIALOG with "you should talk to my husband, he's in charge" like jfc lady you're the one I need for recipes, calm down? Does he beat you? What the hell?

Con: let's set aside that I'm pretty sure the "medieval idiots thought world flat" thing has been debunked, because I found info but it didn't have good citations. Also maybe we're going for parody over historically accurate, fine whatever. But whyyyyyyyyyy do you have a guy named "G*psy Traveler" like I know I have an inflated sense of how widely it's known that that's a slur, but it on top of the flat earth thing and the WOW that's bad female-or-anything representation, it builds an image of the creator/creators as the really stereotypical basement dwelling head-up-ass dudes who have never ever looked outside their zone and never ever want to

Pro: like two steps into the tutorial you're slapped in the face with Soilent Green is People and you just live with that

Hilarious: I can tell when I have a first conversation with somebody I was supposed to have met already, because my pre-scripted side of the conversation suddenly backslides in terms of my acceptance of the situation

Pro: time is an illusion and represented only by the cycle of emoji-labeled days. Weeks are not counted, so I legitimately have no clue how many "weeks" I went through last night

Unsure??? I don't know how much I'm going to have to drink the church koolaid to progress? I saw an indication up the tech tree that suggested my good/evil choices MIGHT matter, but I've got no idea how. I told the inquisitor who'd just BURNED A PEOPLE ALIVE IN FRONT OF ME that sure I'd be his friend, and I don't know if the game allows for that to have been a choice made out of the fear that I'd be burned next if I said no

Pro: I still want to play it. The myriad cons will influence how I talk about it to my friends, but it's still giving me dopamine, and that's good enough

[crimsonblackrose]

.

Dream Tory

all the rocks are dangerous even in a dream fight.

It's kinda like how Barnes just showed up in TKK3, but a dream.

Johnny...come on, you're getting beer all over Miguel.

Miguel's recommendations for new karate names: Johnny Lawrence karate, strike hard karate, all american karate.

Both dojos are reopening.

It's interesting that everything that Amanda didn't like season 1 and 2 she's on board now. But it's also because Kreese is a different beast then Johnny. Johnny's a dude trying to ruin a business and who found his calling. Kreese is telling kids to hurt one another and laughing when they beat each other to a pulp in front of him and taking his students sides if his students break someone's arm.

The other difference is Amanda and Daniel finally found balance. Amanda was home and front and center for all the Cobra Kai pain Sam went through and Sam actually communicated with her. So she could see what was going on first hand, try to handle it, realize she couldn't and then now her and Daniel are communicating, and trying together.

It's a little like wait didn't we just try xyz and it was a terrible idea? What changed? And what changed was Johnny isn't the big bad anymore (Probably never should've been considered on in CK) and there's a lot of nuance. Like because they're communicating, Amanda can determine okay Daniel won't be in today, so I can handle everything rather than already having plans and Daniel bailing. They're both better in sync and working as a team now.

Awww Miguel's first day back to school.

Miguel literally being loved as the sweetheart he truly is.

Johnny tries to buy an actual gym but it's his credit that stops him.

It makes me wonder how much money he'd made from teaching the first time/how much he made off of selling Sid's art piece, because he hasn't worked in quite a bit.

And the awful place that's his fourth one he looked at costs three grand.

Johnny now does karate in the park :D Which as mr. tried to have one class outside a week, kinda works.

As much as I make note that Daniel doesn't make as much effort/know how to make an impact with Anthony I do really like Sam and Daniel's relationship, though he does avoid doing a lot of the hard parenting stuff and let's Amanda do that. Which is a bit unfair to Amanda.

The last time they were out there it was with Mr. Miyagi, caught such a big fish Amanda was afraid to cook it so they ordered a pizza.

Though this was probably the smartest move because unlike their conversation in the car before school or any of their other ones, there's like no escape. Sam has to talk about what's going on with her. Which she's needed to do for like 3 seasons.

When the fight started I couldn't move I couldn't breathe.

Not quite accurate Sam, you came in hot, you kicked ass, but then you heard Tory and then shut down.

Johnny talks to the current cobra kai's but his other rejected cobra kais are watching and listening too. 💖

Also Johnny who can get past security because he knows all the secret ways in because he went to school there. 🤣 See, Johnny getting in makes sense, Kreese still confuses me. Did he have like a pass or something?

New dojo Havenhurts and Magnolia at 4.

I love the 'sorry kid old habit' after he knocks a kids books out of his hands. He's trying.

So much undealt with trauma that's been set off.

Yasmine slowly warming up to Demetri has actually been kind of sweet. Aisha really taught her a lesson she really learned.

Daniel needed to also go back to the basics, training with Sam for fun. They both needed that and it's really sweet.

He got a few of them. Pretty sure the kid behind Bert and Miguel is the kid Johnny knocked the books out of his hands.

Bert: a mongoose? Johnny: A real animal Bert (note no mean nickname, the kids actual name)

Also secretary birds, and those are so pretty, the curb stomp the heck out of cobras.

Johnny whipped that up super fast, he must's gotta design this stuff himself, who else would've made this for him. 🤣

Mitch: Eagles don't have fangs (Throws shirt at him)

🥺 He and his students are smiling that their other cobra kai people are joining. Even though it's a trick.

Kreese kicking outs students left and right, but any time he knows where Johnny is he offers to have Johnny come back.

Kreese must be making bank, his clothes look a lot sleeker.

Oof the "My students wouldn't make a mistake, show mercy and end up in a coma." Kreese just dropped all pretense of trying to get Miguel back. Which Kreese makes sure he knows because he looks at Miguel when he says it.

Kreese puts his hand out to stop Hawk but Johnny literally just steps in front of Miguel to stop him.

Kreese: This is your last chance.

Pretty sure you still hope he comes back or at least say so in later seasons. I also spotted new cobra kai students in the group.

[blazehedgehog]

Thoughts on Summer Game Fest?

It's kind of already left my brain what was at that thing and I sort of watched it twice. I caught the back half of it on my own terms and then I rewatched it with Jeff Gerstmann's commentary over it (a friend mentioned he was watching it, so I kind of watched along).

Let's see... skimming an article...

Oh, right, yes. Now I remember. A lot of this stuff I do not care about.

Lego Horizon? Don't really care. I have a stack of unplayed Lego games on Steam. I do genuinely like those games, or I do in theory given I've only ever played demos. But I think I'd like them. But I have no need for another one.

ABSOLUTELY no interest in that Quidditch game. That's, what, the third time they've tried to make a Quidditch game? It never sticks. Also, y'know, please give less money to Rowling and all that. I have little love for Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, given that whole project was spoiled by the whole "white males only, for historical accuracy" discourse (the dude willingly went on Breitbart!) Way too many red flags with that one and it's pretty easy for me to outright ignore games like that. Plus, y'know, I also have zero interest in a historically accurate medieval game, whether the accuracy is real or not.

I'm upset at how stupid-in-a-good-way Killer Bean looks. Like it's exactly the kind of game that would appeal to me if I was 17 years old, and there's a part of me that still thinks that's cool, even if you're playing as a coffee bean in a Deadpool costume.

The whole Tim Robinson sketch for Skate 4 completely fell flat and if they're gonna be coy at showing gameplay I don't have any interest yet. It's EA, so I'm still waiting for the other shoe to drop and hear how they're gonna mess it up.

Power Rangers continues the baffling trend of retro beat'em'up revivals. I don't understand it. Retro beat'em'ups are really boring. Though I say that, but I was really cynical about that Toxic Crusaders beat'em'up and I actually really enjoyed the demo. And Streets of Rage 4 was good, too. And I loved Shredder's Revenge. The first person stuff in Power Rangers looks interesting, at least.

Blumhouse getting into horror games makes me feel bad because I remember like, at least a decade ago, maybe more, talking about ideas I had for a horror game with a friend. That friend was pretty well-connected with game industry stuff and he told me horror games were "about to blow up big time" and that "there's no better time to put out a horror game." I didn't make my game, and now we're tripping over horror games from everywhere, all the time. I mean, jeeze, for a Steam sale around Halloween, all of the Dread X Collections were discounted and I bought all of them. That's like 20-50 horror games right there. And now you got Blumhouse in on it. I coulda been on the ground floor.

Still trying not to care about Dragon Ball Z Sparking Zero. I don't like the Tenkaichi-style arena Dragon Ball fighters. I played Tenkaichi 3 on the Wii and it had like a TWO HOUR tutorial for a game that ultimately felt really stiff and awkward. This doesn't look as stiff, but it does seem to be a bit of an effects overload now.

But we'll see. I'm open to my mind being changed.

I dunno if I have anything else of value to say besides it seems weird for Street Fighter 6 to already be dipping into guest characters and having their entire next four fighters take an entire year to come out.

[toxictoad]

Okay so as promised (By me, to me) I am writing about Deimos!

He's by far my favorite Durge and the first essay length bit of this is JUST for Act 1. Acts 2 and 3 will be in reblogs at some point

Also who knows I might make a post about his days in the dead three at some point (Read; probably soon because this boy has rotted my brain from the inside out).

You know the drill by now. ADHD ramble under the cut.

Deimos wakes up on the Nautiloid with a specific set of items on him. I don't feel like opening a save just to look at the starting inventory, but the thing that matters here is the book Paladin Oaths and Their Tenets;

(Interesting thing- This book is nowhere on the wiki. I would put it on there myself but I don't understand how wiki editing really works)

This book, I kid you not, is the most important part of roleplaying Deimos for me. He wakes up with no memories, head pounding, covered in blood, but he has tenets, and he WILL follow them (He's Oath of Devotion btw).

In addition to the text of the book, I headcanon that there are little notes in the margins of the pages- doodles and little jokes. Just stuff you would do if you were bored and had an old book on you.

Waking up on the beach, his immediate priority isn't necessarily survival or taking in his surroundings, it's his fucked up brain. I think a lot of people downplay how goddamn TERRIFYING it is to not have any memories. Like I've had days where I was sick and couldn't remember anything, and it was genuinely distressing, and this is like... 100 times worse than that.

So he panics, a little, and goes through all the items on his person. He has armor and a Warhammer, and... this book. He reads through it, and his thought is "Okay, I'm a paladin. That's something" And he finds a symbol of Ilmater drawn in the book and goes "Okay, that's my god probably. So I know two (2) things about myself! Awesome"

Thing is; Deimos is an amnesiac with 8 intelligence. He can kind of guess what Ilmater's followers believe, but the specifics are lost on him. The result is the funniest paladin to ever paladin.

Just imagine you're like... Shadowheart. This dude saves you from a Mindflayer pod. He seems nice enough when he's not complaining about a headache, and he's a competent fighter. You ask him who his god is and he's like "Uh... Ilmater, I guess." And you're like "...Okay" because you're a secret Shar worshipper so you kind of get being weird about deities, but Ilmater is a very acceptable god to follow and you're pretty sure he's not lying, but then why is he being weird about it. This guy is extremely devoted to his tenets but he's not even 100% sure what they are. He makes every moral decision based off of a book in his pocket and a general idea of what paladins/Ilmater devotees are like that may or may not be accurate. He doesn't even know how to pray, but he's pretty sure he's supposed to do it. The only thing he seems 100% sure about is his name, but at this point, you wouldn't be surprised if he got it off of a roadsign somewhere.

He's so fucking weird.

Deimos is incredibly freaked out by the urges, because obviously. After Shadowheart the first person he finds is Gale, and their first meeting is wonderfully awkward because Gale is being himself and Deimos is distracted by the fact that he really wanted to chop off this guy's hand like 15 seconds ago.

And then... Astarion.

Look, Durgestarion is canon in my heart and you have to deal with it now.

Deimos is incredibly easy to manipulate but in the weirdest way possible. Basically, if you can convince him that doing something is morally sound, or even just morally neutral but you really want him to do it? He'll just fucking do it. The Gur scene was the first real test of this:

Astarion: Hey this guy sucks Deimos: No he doesn't be cool What's his face: I'm hunting a vampire spawn named Astarion Deimos (Internally): Hm... Astarion is Good... and hunting good people is bad... So hunting Astarion is bad... Astarion: Please can I kill him? Deimos: Yeah okay

(Note; Deimos' definition of a "Good person" is a person he likes and who hasn't done anything morally bankrupt in his line of sight. Astarion encourages him to do bad things but so does his brain so he just doesn't listen to either of them)

However; The Urges. My way of thinking is that instead of doing horrible violence and mutilation and cannibalism whenever the option presents itself he just does something funny and kind of rude (This is the only reason he has high approval with Astarion. Astarion is constantly getting him to do weird confusing shit for his own amusement. Baa-ing at the redcaps in the swamp? 100% Astarion's influence. Threatening a magic mirror? 60% Astarion's influence and 40% because Deimos is a little bit of a himbo and doesn't like it when things try to test his intelligence. He is not a riddle person).

I cannot stress enough how weird this man appears to everyone who meets him. Friend or foe everyone around who talks to him for more than five minutes is hit with confusion. He rolls up to the scene with Kagha and Arabella and ignores the Dark Urge, only to immediately go "Hey I'm a paladin I can cast judgment on things" (A thing he is not sure that paladins actually do but he says it with confidence) and instead of making any moral arguments he's just like "I don't fuck with you snake lady let the kid go." He has high charisma but only uses it for persuasion. Ragzlin is like "The squid man showed me ur face time to die" and he just goes "No, lol." Withers wakes up to the literal chosen of Bhaal in Ilmateri getup and asks what the value of a life is and he says "Idk it's based on vibes." Astarion convinces him that the extra supplies that keep appearing in camp are a result of his charm and that he's totally not stealing from traders and Deimos goes "Yes that makes perfect sense" while Wyll is losing his goddamn mind.

Pretty early on in the game I found a book (I'm pretty sure it's A is for Azuth and Other Gods 6? Can you tell that a lot of roleplay is based around books for me) That has Ilmater, and between this children's book and the general assumptions people make about him, he can guess that he's supposed to be a martyr. It isn't his natural instinct, but he takes to it surprisingly well (His fighting style is protection, by the way. It's useless in combat but thematically appropriate so I don't care). I also think that he would encourage Gale to ramble about Ilmater because the man is like Forgotten Realms Google and this is probably his most trustworthy source of information for a while. I think Deimos really likes Gale because he talks a lot and helps drown out the murder thoughts.

So Deimos keeps up the facade-but-not-really-a-facade of being a brave, kind, selfless person who puts everyone before himself, and he tells his companions that he has dark thoughts and impulses, but they tell him that it's normal, and who is he to question them? (Again, he is easily convinced by things in weird ways. He trusts basically anyone more than he trusts his own brain, right now)

...And then Alfira comes to camp.

OH BOY. Okay so I have done playthroughs where I knock out Alfira and kill the Dragonborn bard instead, but I've been trying really hard not to metagame in this run so sadly our lovely tiefling bard is no longer with us. Deimos' honest first reaction to finding out he gored her is... to laugh.

Not a happy laugh, mind you- He's horrified, but his first thought is that he's broken his Oath, and then that that is decidedly not the first thing he should be thinking after he killed an innocent woman. So he laughs at the irony, and then he cries, and then he vomits. He cleans the blood off his hands but not because he wants to hide what he did. He just thinks that if he has to feel the blood on his fingers for one more second then he's going to go insane.

He never really stops feeling the blood. It will always be there.

My party at this point was Karlach, Astarion, and Wyll, and... Ouch. I felt like physical pain the first time I played Durge and everyone was mad at me. I think Deimos has that experience, here.

He wants to cry but he knows that he doesn't deserve to be upset about this. He vows that no innocent will ever die at his hand again, and sequesters himself in the ruin with the magic mirror in it and prays. He doesn't know how,really, but something in him remembers what a prayer for forgiveness sounds like. He begs Ilmater to listen to his repentance. Deimos carries a permanent, bone-deep guilt, but this is the first time he feels it so keenly.

He must read his tenets a hundred times, that day. He asks Withers to bring her back, but he understands why he can't. This is a burn on his conscience. She's at peace now, at least.

He is not, but what he feels doesn't matter.

(He is still immensely relieved that his oath is still intact. Breaking his oath might as well be breaking Deimos, and there's no telling what he will do once he's broken)

But, while everyone else is horrified, scared, or maybe just annoyed with Deimos, Astarion doesn't hate him.

And, look... Deimos' moral compass is literally a book, and the book doesn't say that he can't like a guy who thinks it's funny when you tell kids they're gonna die. He just really wants someone to not hate him, so now his best friend is a guy with an extremely underdeveloped moral compass. I think he clocks pretty early on that Astarion is manipulating him. But also... he doesn't care.

Deimos has always been- pre and post lobotomy- loyal to a fault. He was loyal to his foster family until Bhaal made him kill them. He was loyal to Bhaal and Saverok and even Orin. He was loyal to Gortash and Ketheric. He is a paladin at heart, whether that be under Bhaal or Ilmater. He is loyal and dutiful and constantly wracked with guilt.

Guilt for disobeying his father. Guilt for caring about people. Guilt for his past. Guilt for his urges. He's catholic coded.

So just like he was loyal to Bhaal he becomes loyal to Ilmater. Just like he was loyal to Gortash and Ketheric (Yeah, I'm going there) he becomes loyal to Astarion.

And like, he sleeps with Astarion, and he doesn't mind it, and for all his manipulation they do actually like each other, and then the tiefling party happens...

And look... Deimos knows that Astarion is lying when he says "I love you." He knows and acknowledges that fact and he can fully see that Astarion is pulling his strings like a good little puppet.

...And he just doesn't care. He lets himself believe, if only for a night, that someone loves him, despite his hands that are stained with blood and death and secrets.

And he lets Astarion feed on him, and they travel through the Underdark, and Deimos tries to hold his broken brain together.

The Grym fight is a weirdly potent moment for him, because I think that's when it really hits his companions that Deimos... Just does not value his own life.

Because at this point my party was Shadowheart, Karlach, and Astarion. Astarion and Deimos lure Grym onto the crucible, and Astarion can disengage and jump away. Karlach takes out the last of the magma mephits, and Shadowheart is next to the crucible lever.

Deimos can't disengage, though, and he cast survival instinct on Astarion earlier. So he drinks a potion of superior healing, and he tells Shadowheart to pull the lever.

Astarion's "No, my sweet bloodthirsty friend!" UGH I love it.

But Deimos (barely) survives (Which in reality means "Yay I don't have to use a scroll of revivify" but I want my angst so shhh)

They long rest, and the next day it's up to the mountain pass. I... really don't have a lot to say about the Githyanki Creche? Except that I know that Deimos just follows Lae'zel's lead on this. He bows to Vlaakith, and he... mildly considers killing the Dream Visitor (Who, by the way, looks as close to Jaheira as I could make her look, because the boy needs a mom and the Emperor clocks that easily)

He also gets VERY angry about the Varsh's treatment of Varrl (That is a CHILD how DARE you. I wish there was an option to fight him without making everyone else in the Creche hostile I hate this man)

I turned on non-lethal attacks for fighting my way out of the Creche, because I think Deimos doesn't want to kill these people- For Lae'zel's sake, and for his own.

Okay so maybe I do have a bit to say about the Creche sue me.

That awful fight with the like death knights or whatever in the mountain pass sucks. I don't know why but it always makes me so incredibly angry. Maybe it's just because that was the first place I ever actually had a party member die idk. Not related to Deimos I just had a bad time.

Oh, the Elminster thing...

Unlike almost every Tav or Durge I have, Deimos understands Gale's want to sacrifice himself to save the world/earn Mystra's forgiveness. He's a martyr, after all. He doesn't judge- He knows that feeling. He tells Gale as much. He doesn't want his friend to die, but he wants his friend to feel like he has a purpose. (Semi-related; This is my first run where I'm free of the bug where Gale is in love with you no matter what, and his platonic Act 2 scene before the Illithid colony is just... So sweet? Like he just wants his friend to be there for him. I love that wizard. Yes I will watch the stars with you buddy)

But now we are on to the Shadow Cursed lands, and Act 1 is over. Wow, this was so long.

[pondscummy]

so me and roommate L talked on Sunday and I finally like aired some of my grievances and was like hey you really hurt me w how you treated me during my recovery and I realized I actually really don't feel like I can safely communicate with you and I haven't felt like I could for a very long time. and they did apologize and we decided to just be polite roommates and not friends at all and that's a big relief honestly bc now I'm not carrying around this tension the way I was before bc I know there's not expectation from either side but like. it's also freed me up mentally where I'm not thinking about all the immediate stuff anymore and instead I'm like remembering various random things that pissed me off but weren't big enough to focus on before lmao

the one I'm stuck on rn is how insistent they are that I'm on the spectrum. idk they do a lot of explaining myself to me that makes me like. bro shut Up you don't know what my lived experience is like lol you have no concept of anything. which. for context I have a dx and I thought I was on the spectrum for years and years but weirdly enough going to therapy and working through my ptsd made a lot of those symptoms just.... start vanishing. and one of my friends had been undiagnosed for the same reason so it got me thinking about it and talking to my therapist at the time and like. ptsd can present rly similarly. like I was neglected and abused as a child and I literally did not learn social skills, and I was very fearful of other people. as I like worked through the stuff that had instilled that in me and found my stride w stepping out of my comfort zone and getting comfortable being uncomfortable I really don't find it particularly hard to talk to people. I retook the RAADS and I got that I have tendencies but am not anywhere near diagnostic level. I'm literally moving states bc I find the idea of being in a new place and starting from scratch socially rly exciting and I want to like go out to events on my own and meet people both through apps and more organically and I want to get to be in the office with my coworkers like. obv there's more to a dx than just social anxiety but the things that my dx was primarily based in (social anxiety, need for stability/routine, aversion to connection, even sensory issues) are so easily linked back to trauma for me and like. being on the spectrum doesn't go away w therapy?? also I've found it harder and harder to befriend other people on the spectrum; I find I have less in common as time goes on and that my communication style is more focused on like small talk and less directness etc. and I don't tend to get special interests at all anymore like I find it a little difficult to discuss interests w people for long periods of time.

anyway idk my experiences just make me think that it was an incorrect dx but a rly understandable one. I'll probably always have tendencies and get along pretty well w others who do or who are on the spectrum but like I just don't think that I am. and whenever I tried to talk about this with them they'd shut it down and be like um I'm pretty sure you are lmao. and when we talked Sunday I made a comment about making some assumptions about their facial expressions at one point and they were like well we're both on the spectrum so. and I was like my guy I can read facial expressions just fine. if you're saying I can't read yours accurately bc You're on the spectrum then fine. sure. I actually think it's bc you're always so fucking stoned that every muscle in your face is dangling from the frame, personally, but like. i don't have this probably of misreading anyone else dude. like ffs stop armchair diagnosing me and acting like bc you said it then it's law. UGHHHHHHHHHGGGHHHH. it would be one thing if I thought they were saying this stuff bc they think I'm distancing myself out of internalized ableism or something. but it really seems more like they bring it up only to tell me how bad I am at things. which like I'm sorry lmao but. if I'm not giving this vibe to anyone else and I'm not displaying symptoms predominantly in my day to day life and if they're rly seeming to be correlated to my ptsd, maybe you're literally just triggering for me to be around. asshat

[ulubionywuja]

Can you talk more about your time as a film extra? It sounds very interesting

Sure!

It started in winter 2020, during my second year of uni. I studied graphic design and prinmaking, both are expensive af (Adobe programs for design + special papers and ink for prints, one sheet of said paper can cost up to $20/80PLN). I was born in the city that I went to uni in, so there was no need for me to pay landlords or even buy my own food, but still, the materials were bonkers costly, so I decided to earn some money for them. It's really easy to become an extra, all you have to do is find an extra studio (Wrocław has two, I'm signed to ABM to this day), record a scene straight from a shit pseudo-documentary (ukryta prawda, Polacy wiedzą), which isn't published, it's just for them to see if you're ok for speaking roles. Then you sign a paper and they send you emails with movies or shows they need people for. It doesn't pay well, but it's ok if you just need a tiny, tiny bit of money.

My first show was Pierwsza Miłość, it was an episode about some guy getting spiked during a party? I never watched this series before and had no idea what was going on :) But turns out the medical people in Polish TV are actual medical pros and the equipment (like defibrillators) is 100% real! On my first shooting day it was freezing cold, around -8 C, but we could eat and drink everything that was on the tables during the fake party we were filming. I went for that show a few times, since they were making an entire season.

The main event of this job happened last autumn, when TVP (we hate TVP here I hate the government I hate homophobia I hate sexism <3 I want them dead) was filming a (kinda crap) historical drama Kordian. The source material is a classic of Polish romanticism, but they took it let's say liberally. I went because I like the book and it's a historical costume film. A few days before shooting, me and the other extras had to go to the main TV and radio building to get our costumes fitted. I had no idea who was about to play the important speaking roles, and when I found out I was literally shocked? Some of my mutuals know that I'm into Sienkiewicz's trilogy (a book series from the 1880s), which got adapted into movies when Poland was a communist country. I love the films a lot, the most known one is The Deluge (which happen to be the movie with the most historically accurate saber fight in film history), starring some of the most well known Polish actors of that time. And they were about to be in the movie I was in IN THE SAME SCENES? We had mr. Olbrychski (Kmicic), mr. Teleszyński (Boguś) and mr. Nowicki (Ketling z Pana Wołodyjowskiego). And Pazura but I found out he's an awful dude, and he didn't have a role in Trilogy movies, he's just famous. I got my makeup done right next to Pazura and I wanted to punch him in the face because of all the sexist stulejarz stuff he was saying <3

99 % of extra work is waiting, so we did that for like 7 hours (legit) and then played a few scenes by the Wrocław cathedral. It was brutal since I was in a historical outfit and heels on a renaissance pavement :/ I talked to some fellow extras, tbh it was slightly intimidating to be next to mr. Teleszyński, dude is like 2m tall and very, very proud and stoic. Mr. Olbrychski on the other hand is such a walking meme. He's like a million years old, yet I wish to be as fit as he is. Bro literally run off into the churchy distance because he was done with the film crew, smoked a cig and came back only because he was excited to see a horse he was about to ride. (he likes horses a lot and I think rescues horses on his own or somethin??) When he met the horse and befriended him (just a disclaimer, I know nothing abt horses), he got on it and escaped the set yet again, to have a ride around the cathedral. The street wasn't closed off so it was pretty funny watching pedestrians be like "o kurwa was that Olbrychski on a horse rn?". He played his role, it took two takes, his voice is as loud as a whole ass Rammstein live show, pyro included. Also he uses a flip phone from the 2000s. I got a picture with him. I was sitting on the pavement, scrolling on discord, while he just materialised out of thin air right in front of me and talked to some coffee people I believe? So I got up as quickly as I could and screamed CAN I SNAP A PIC into his unimpressed face. He just murmured "yea", and we got a photo. I have a pic with all the actors, but I'm an average young (1970s-1980s) Olbrychski enjoyer and my pinterst board is impressive. Mr Teleszyński I met maybe after 30 minutes of being on the set, as I said he was very stoic but much less done with everything.

I must admit, I expected these actors to be just kinda normal, but they're such unforgetable personalities! Can't say much about mr. Nowicki, because I didn't notice him in the makeup camper :)))) I didn't move my head much since I didn't wanna piss off the makeup artist, it was a different extra that told me we even were in one place together.

That was my last time on a set, but I'm willing to go back once or twice, if they do some other historical movies.

[benjineedssleep]

ahaha heyyyyyyyy

i’m gonna ask you Many Things bc i want to see the inside of your brain

24, 27, 40, 65?

after reading over 100k words of my writing i wonder how much deeper you can get LOL but whatever let's go let's go let's go!!! XD here's the og post btw -> Get to know your fic writer!

send more asks (/nf) i love these

24. Worst writing advice anyone ever gave you?

i have the memory of a snail and nothing has bothered me enough to remember (i take most concrit and stuff with a grain of salt) but i hate the pushing of show not tell. i just think it's detrimental to the growth of a new writer the way it's taught. no one ever goes into the nuances of it, they just go "your readers want detail! don't tell them your character is crying! show them the tears streaming down their face, their skin turning red, them hyperventilating! be descriptive!" and it's like no. sometimes you just need to say a character is crying. not everything needs to be overly described as i think it takes from the beauty of what is described, y'know? prose shouldn't all be poetry. you should have moments of poeticism because that is what'll stick with a reader, not the shade of green the grass was.

so basically my opinion on show and tell is: if it doesn't set the scene, if it doesn't matter to the story, tell it. that's very much oversimplified but i think you get the point.

27. What is your most and least favorite part of writing?

this is kinda loaded for me because it really depends on the day. generally speaking tho i loveeeee a good exposition/scene setting moment. this includes both description (like a room, clothing, etc.) and stories. in my long fic i have plenty of expository bits that can almost be entirely removed from the fic itself and still stand their ground. i've even posted some of them here (like this one about seb's birthday). overall i just fuck with description like crazy and could write an entire story with that and internal monologue and i wouldn't have much of a struggle. conversations are important and i've grown to love dialogue over the years, but i'll always be a description lover at heart.

as for my least favorite part? time and pacing. i already have a complex relationship time irl so this is like,,, even harder for me. and it sucks because i do a ton of research on things to make them accurate to the story timelines and even have notes about when things occur to help me keep track yet i still mess them up. i think time is one of 3 big reasons i haven't posted my long fic yet and won't until it's 100% done. i just don't catch things in the initial draft sometimes and also change around ideas as i get to know characters and storylines a bit better.

40. If someone were to make fan art of your work, what fic or scene would you hope to see?

holy shit dude if anyone made anything based on my writing i would fucking explode??? already kinda did after this post knowing they got brainrot from me and my samalex fic-- generally speaking though, i think you can tell exactly what bits mean a lot to me in my stories. they're described in very particular, very vivid ways and tend to have a lot of movement.

i think if i have to give specific examples here though, one of them would be That ™️ scene with sam/seb on winter 10, the scene with welwick on winter 17, anything from the flower dance (y2), and something i haven't written but know very well, a scene from summer 20 (y2). none of this matters to anyone but you though because it's not out LOL

(but for future reference... winter is my favorite season of the entire fic and it spans from spring y1-fall y2. so like,,, anything from there would send me to the MOON)

65. Tell us what you're most looking forward to writing -- in your current project, or a future project.

i'm working on a couple of things right now so i'll answer accordingly.

in my long fic (baby seasons change, but people don't) i'm most looking forward to summer 20 (y2). it's sam's 21st birthday chapter and it's been rolling around my head for about six weeks now. it's just SO FUCKING FUN DUDE. top three bits of the fic for me and i haven't even written it yet XD

in my current short fic (late dawns, early sunsets -- a zombie apocalypse au fic) i'm most looking forward to a particular argument that happens at the end of chapter 4. the entire thing is whump so i'm not... super happy or excited per se, but the scene is very complex emotionally and i feel like i'm gonna make sam come to a few realizations in that moment. there's only 6 planned chapters so this is very much the turning point. him and seb are also very drunk so there's that added layer of complexity.

i have a few of ideas for future projects that aren't just sambastian. i fuck with that ship heavy but i also have some pretty layered ideas for another samalex kinda thing, a different samalex fic that i'm contemplating making a samsebalex thing, and to cope with whatever the fuck i did to sebalex in my long fic, i might conjure up something for them too. i also wanna write haley/abby into my fics a bit more because they don't get nearly enough time to shine and i love love love their dynamic. so maybe i write a short story for them to satisfy those brain worms. we'll see.

ANYWAYSSSSS

that's all i've got for you lc. i feel like i wasn't speaking to you directly for like 90% of the time but it's fine lmfao.

if anyone wants to ask me anymore questions i fuckin' love yapping so hit me with them. here's the list again :3

[temporalbystander]

Final one, for now.

Since I don't want to overwhelm people with stuff they don't want, even though I did warn you so it's your own fault, I'll end this stream of posts with this one. It started off as a sequel to the "lies to protect" story but rapidly derailed into its own oneshot. I did write the follow up though, it's just not finished. Then again neither is this one really, it just kind of ends.

Keeping Secrets Sucks

No I don't, and even if I did, I would still say no.

Apparently that had been Faybon's catchphrase for nearly a decade but recently he'd gotten a new one. "I will neither confirm or deny that I have any knowledge about what you're talking about." For most people that would be a confession. For Faybon? The person who's become so well known for knowing secrets that people have been asking him the most mundane and exaggerated questions to see if he had any tells? It became a perfect cover. The only possible way to know if he had any knowledge of a secret was to confront him while the person who's secret you were asking about was present. Their reaction was the one you needed to watch for worry.

At least that was the original idea until it became clear that, due to Faybon's near omnipotent knowledge, even if the person in question hadn't told him anything they would still be worried as all hell. This came about when Chloe was picking on Rose and Juleka and asked Faybon if he knew what the two lovebirds had planned that weekend. Faybon, barely paying attention, had done what he did next out of habit. He played the voice recording of his new catchphrase. It wasn't until he looked up and saw how panicked Juleka was, as she did indeed have something planned, that he cursed and reverted to his earlier catchphrase.

Marinette found out later that he'd actually sought Juleka out in private saying he had no idea what she had planned for Rose for their anniversary and that he was so sorry if his pre-recorded response gave that impression. Juleka forgave him but said that it clearly still weighed heavily on his mind. All this backstory was necessary to explain the outcome of the one question Marinette did not want answered by him. Which, unsurprisingly enough, regarded Adrien Agreste and was asked by Alya.

"So Faybon, do you know who Adrien has his eye on?" Alya was smirking as she asked it, she more than anyone had been annoyed at how good Faybon's poker face was and had thrown question after question at him to see if anything struck a nerve.

Faybon, without looking away from the assignment he was working on, simply brought out his phone went to the recordings and hit play. "Why don't you ask your boyfriend? Surely he'd tell you." Faybon hated discussing anything that may even come close to being considered a secret. Hell, he got uncomfortable discussing Marinette's feelings for Adrien with anyone other than Marinette, regardless of whether they knew or not.

"Jeez dude, no need to throw me under the bus, I thought we were buds?" Nino, who was currently ignoring the way both Adrien and Alya was staring at him, had placed his hand over his heart with a faux devastated look on his face.

"It's my default Alya response bro, I'm not apologising if it's accurate." Faybon's response drew everyone's attention. Mainly because, once again, it had come from his phone. At least he was smiling this time.

"Faybon. How many of those do you have recorded?" It was Adrien who asked the obvious question this time. Which actually got a verbal response from Faybon himself.

"Well, here is my standard response." He said, hitting play on another file. "If you're asking me you don't need to know." Faybon waited for it to end before he continued talking. "Two for every one of our classmates, one directed at them asking a question and one with a codeword reassuring them that they don't need to worry because I genuinely have no idea what the other person is talking about."

"So then why did Nino's seem to be a response keyed to Alya?" It was Marinette herself who asked that question, needing to distract herself from the heartbreaking reminder that the boy she was in love with could never like her back.

"Because I may have gone a little overboard in my desire to prove just how well I know my friends." Now Faybon seemed nervous. Though whether it was about his desire or the sheer amount of recordings he may have made, Marinette had no idea. "That was my 'Nino defending Alya' response. Alya's was my 'Alya asking after Adrien' response." He gave a small shrug. "I may have several for other scenarios, like other couples or rebuttals to insults. Some referencing secrets and others for more public spaces."

"Wow Faybon, anyone would think that you don't want to hang out with us."

In response to Adrien's smiling remark, Faybon loaded another file. "Oh be quiet, Buttercup-" Marinette froze as Faybon quickly shut the recording off. How did he know that name? Did Adrien know? Would that mean… "God dammit that one was meant for Chat Noir." The relief she felt as Faybon continued talking was palpable. "I forgot I had him labeled as Blondie for secrecy reasons."

"Who's Buttercup?" Nino asked the question as Marinette began to panic.

"Chat Noir's most hated person some nights I swear." Faybon answered, his eyes not leaving the phone. "I've always found rain-" he cut off that recording too but Marinette got the message. Chat had told Faybon about Buttercup, and the letter she'd written, and since Faybon knew who she had feelings for it became obvious who Buttercup was. Which meant it was obvious what rain he was referring to. Clearly this was his codeword for reassuring her, except in this case it was to say he hadn't told Chat anything.

"I think that's the world's way of telling you that you shouldn't have so many files." Alya laughed as she spoke, and the rest followed suit. While Marinette did trust Faybon, despite the complicated situation he had found himself in, maybe it was time for another secret identity talk.

—----

"Oh for the love of all that is just Chat." Ladybug had gone back and forth about whether she should actually talk to Faybon that night and whether it would be suspicious if she showed up. Chat Noir didn't seem to have that issue.

"What? I'm just saying that if I knew who Buttercup was I'd be able to help Marinette." No, her kitty had a much bigger problem of not knowing when to give up. It was sweet, kind of, but it was no wonder Faybon called the fictional Buttercup Chat's enemy if this is what he'd been dealing with.

"Oh yeah? How? Are you going to pay him a visit and threaten him for hurting your princess? Or maybe you're going to give Marinette some perfect tips because we both know how great you are with relationships." It was at this point Ladybug felt guilty about hanging back to see what happens and decided to intervene lest Faybon snap.

"Chat Noir giving relationship advice? Now you must be joking."

"Meouch My lady. Is it so wrong for a knight to wish to help his princess?" Ladybug was stopped from answering as a large smacking sound drew their attention back to the civilian that was currently sharing the roof with them. Who had apparently just facepalmed hard enough to leave a mark. "Something you wish to add, Faybon?" The knight in leather asked, quite easily distracted it seemed.

"Oh, just another realisation that would make lesser men jump off this roof." Faybon answered with an exaggerated eye roll. "One I think I must have had before but suppressed because I couldn't be bothered dealing with it."

Now Ladybug was definitely curious, she'd never seen Faybon react like this with any of the secrets he had known before. "Should I be afraid to ask?"

Faybon's eyes met hers without wavering in the slightest. "It's not an identity thing, just a Chat Noir is an idiot thing."

"Hey."

Faybon carried on, ignoring the small objections Chat made. "Tell me Ladybug, if you had heard the term 'M'Lady' before meeting Chat, who would you think it was referring to?"

LB simply shrugged. "Not sure, a queen maybe?" She answered hesitantly. "Maybe someone else of royalty…." Trailing off, a wide smirk crossed her face as the realisation hit. Normally she'd be freaking out over what this meant from an identity standpoint but if Faybon didn't care then it was enough to keep her calm.

"Exactly. I just find it absolutely hilarious that the only nickname Chat uses with a royal theme besides his Princess, is yours." The way Faybon rolled his eyes showed that hilarious may not be his preferred term to use when describing this situation. "I'm just starting to wonder if he has a type regarding smart and beautiful girls who don't care about his lame puns yet still trust him."

"That's- I don't- I'm not." The sound of her partner sputtering drew her attention back to him and he looked absolutely insulted. "My puns are not lame!" Was the sentence he finally managed to finish. Which started her laughing into her hand so as to not wake the children still asleep beneath her feet.

This was far from the topic she had meant to discuss that night but, since she was left feeling so much happier than when she arrived, she wasn't going to complain.

—-----

A sentiment Faybon didn't share if the look of 'absolutely done with it all' he wore the next day was anything to go by. A look which came with quite an… impassioned response when he was pressed on it. "Have you guys ever regretted being someone's true and trusted friend?" He asked as he sunk his head onto his arms.

"I don't think I could call myself a true friend if I ever did." Alya was the one to answer for all of them as she quickly leaned forward to ask her follow up question. "What happened?" The journalist could smell a scoop coming from a mile away.

Faybon didn't look up as he answered. "I've said multiple times just how normal the heroes can be but never have I felt more like I was babysitting children then when I was talking to the two of them last night."

"Oh please, do go on." Marinette had to admire her bestie's willpower. It was clear she was itching to get to her phone but had enough experience with Faybon to know that the moment she did, he would clam up.

"It's not that big a deal." Faybon's tone clearly indicated otherwise. "Just the normal Chat Noir is an idiot and Ladybug encourages him way too much for me to stay sane."

"Well damn dude, if it bothers you that much why don't you say something." Nino's well meaning question is what got Faybon to lift his head.

"And take away the one place they can relax? Where they can feel normal despite being superheroes? Where they can forget for one moment just how many secrets they keep?" Faybon shook his head vehemently. "I'd rather be Chloe's servant for the rest of my life."

"Well then this must be serious." Adrien's voice coming from right next to her made her jump, how long had he been there for? "What caused this change?" The way Faybon's eyes darted between the both of them meant that he hadn't noticed either of them.

When his gaze settled on her and his shoulders slumped? Marinette felt the unease twist in her stomach again. Nothing could have prepared her for what he said next though. "I am about 65% sure that Chat Noir has feelings for Marinette and is too obsessed over ladybug to notice it."

Alya let out a little squee as she leaned in closer. "Oh please tell me more." While the journalist in her ached for a scoop, the rest of her was thoroughly distracted by the idea of gossip relating to her bestie and one of the heroes.

"Surely you're exaggerating?" Adrien seemed nervous as he asked the question.

In answer Faybon just turned back to her. "Marinette, when was the last time you spoke to Chat Noir?"

She had to think carefully about her answer. As Ladybug she saw him all the time. As Marinette though? "Beyond a passing hello outside any Akuma fights? Probably not since Andre got akumatised the second time." She shifted uncomfortably as Faybon's eyes widened in shock, did Chat say something different? Was she forgetting something?

Before she could freak out about it that much he had turned his attention back to Alya. "I take it back. I'm now 100% sure the stupid Tomcat is obsessing over her. He's been seeing me almost nightly to talk about her ever since then and that was MONTHS ago."

"Okay now I know you're exaggerating." Adrien had apparently relaxed if the smirk was anything to go by.

Faybon just looked him dead in the eye. "Adrien, there are two people in this room capable of forming a full unbiased opinion on Chat Noir. You are not one of them." Folding his arms Faybon continued completely deadpan. "So unless you want me to play your rebuttal stay out of this."

Adrien shrugged. "I have no secrets from my friends."

"You're the second blonde I've met who's compared Marinette to the girl they're in love with." Faybon never hesitated to hit play. Whether he was calling Adrien's bluff or last night had actually pushed him past his limit, Marinette was too busy having a meltdown to fully consider it. "Funnily enough it's the same girl too." And there went any composure she had. Adrien was in love with Ladybug, the girl she'd never be was actually herself. She could die happy.

—---

"I think you broke them dude." Nino mentioned as he held Alya down to stop her from jumping about screaming.

Marinette had practically passed out against the door frame while Adrien had frozen in shock. Faybon just shrugged as he turned his attention back to the DJ. He was way passed caring about time getting rewritten now. "That's not even the best part. From the way Chat has described LB whenever she talks about the guy she likes? I'm pretty sure it's Adrien. The four of them could probably enter a polyamorous relationship and I could have some peace in my life."

Two resounding thuds drew their attention back to the doorway. Adrien's legs had given way and he was staring off into the distance with a dumb smile on his face. Marinette actually had passed out and was now being held by the boy of her dreams as if she was the most fragile thing in the world. 

"Do you think they'd go for it?" Alya asked as she put her phone away after taking a picture of the scene in front of them.

"You kidding? The only one actually settling here would be Chat. If I could date Marinette and LB and all it took was giving Adrien a kiss on the cheek every so often? I'd do it in a heartbeat." Faybon responded with a shrug. "The only worry would be whether his ego can handle not being the most famous blonde in the room."

"So…" Nino spoke up, desperate to get away from the topic of his best bud in that scenario. "Who is Buttercup anyway?" He asked while lowering his voice so as not to disturb the two at the door.

"Oh sweetie do keep up." Alya rolled her eyes at her boyfriend. "It's a codename given by Marinette, clearly it's Adrien. I just want to know why Chat hadn't been told yet." She looked straight at Faybon and folded her arms.

Faybon, eyes stern and mimicking her posture, just hit play again. "Unlike you I am quite capable of keeping a secret when it comes to a friend's love life."

Alya sighed. "You're never going to let that go are you?"

"Not until you stop lying to Marinette about it." Faybon answered, turning his attention back to the book he had been reading the day before.

[thewomancallednova]

I dunno how useful this is gonna, but this post hasn't really gone out of my head since I saw it earlier and i don't talk enough about being trans anyway, so here goes: (also I transitioned in Germany, so you know, some of this may not apply to you if you're not living here, also I did all of the medical/legal stuff in 2018/2019, so... Y'know... may be out of date. But there is a bunch of general transfem advice further down that may be helpful to people who aren't in Germany. Also I'm a binary trans woman, so, you know; that's really all I can give helpful info on.)

So to get hormones, you need an endocrinologist and a document from a psychologist that basically says you are trans from a medical point of view. Check with your local trans groups or online lists if any psychologist you are looking into is actually trust-worthy and will give you the document at the end of the therapy. Typically you have to visit this psychologist once or twice a month for three month, although I was ill-informed and ended up with a guy who wanted to see me biweekly for six months and it was hell. They will ask you for your "transsexual résumé", which is where you basically tell all your "when I was three I always wanted to play with dolls instead of cars" stories. I recommend avoiding any stories where your being trans in any way relates to sexuality, in order to avoid the appearance of "autogynophelia". In general this "therapy" is (at least in my experience) less of a genuine therapy and more you trying to convince some mid-50s dude that you're trans. Don't be afraid to ommit things. Have your mental shields up, cause these things therapy sessions really can suck. But, most importantly, they will eventually be over. I should also say, in my experience these don't replace an actual consideration if you are trans or not. From my experience with a psychologist, from the experiences of others with their psychologists and from my experience with gender, I really don't think the psychologists have a nuanced enough understanding of it to accurately "diagnose" you with being transgender. So you should absolutely do your introspection about if you are trans and if you want hrt before or during that process, but not rely in the actual therapy sessions to help.

Once you got all of that out of the way the psychologist will write a long document about how you're trans. Then you will go to an endocrinologist, hand it to them, they will skip to the last line which reads something like "this person is trans give them hrt" and then they will do that. Definitely talk to your endocrinologist about potential health risks, cause they know their stuff. Also maybe try not to smoke and drink. Now you got hrt. Yay.

Legal name change. In Germany we just got a new law and I don't know how it works, cause I changed my name in 2019. Back then I used something of a loophole called Paragraph 45b, which allows anyone with a "variant in gender development" to change their name and legal gender for a fee of like twenty bucks or so. "variant in gender development" is an extremely vague term meant to only apply to intersex people, but since it is so vague and everyone technically has some variant of any development your endocrinologist (or other doctor honestly) can just give you a piece of paper that says you have that. Then go to your registry office, give them that paper and tell them which names and gender you want. Just in case, please remove all your trans pins or whatever from your outfit and bag, since you don't want to make anyone think you are anything other than an upstanding intersex citizen who wants to change some legal documents. I have no idea if this still works or if this is advantageous to the new system, please ask your local trans group about that. Also I'm a German citizen, I have no idea how any of the medical/name change stuff in Germany works if you live here but aren't a citizen.

Non-Germany-specific stuff!

Skirts are your friends, especially the less stiff and more flowy ones. If you don't feel like shaving or are concerned that your face is keeping you from passing as a cis woman, wear masks. They're great, they have medical utility, covid's still a thing, they obscure your face/facial here, and I'm pretty sure men who might otherwise try to hit on you will immediately think of the pandemic when they see you wearing a mask and the horniness will leave their body.*

If you have oversized shirts, consider tying a knot into them while wearing them, this in my experience looks pretty neat. Also buy dresses! I know this sounds like silly advice, but 99% of the population is not as deeply into gender as us trans people and the few fringe weirdos who hate us. A lot of people will just see dress and figure, "ah, women wear dresses, so that's most likely a woman." (at least over here Germany, I feel like there's a lot more culture war bullshit about us in the US and UK, but I've never been there and can't judge. Pls only do what you feel is safe)

Consider making transmasc friends (actually do that anyway), and exchange helpful tips on presenting however you want. Also, some of them may want to get rid of a bunch of stuff like nail polish or whatever and will gladly donate it to local transfems. That local transfem could be you.

Voice is one thing I often hear people complain about as a thing that's really hard to deal with, or they feel keeps them from passing. I think voice training is one of these things that very strongly depends on how much you apply it. My advice is, every time you take a shower just babble on about whatever or sing something in as feminine a voice you can. The shower obscures a lot of sound, so if your hearing your voice is source of dysphoria you can probably circumvent some of that. If you feel like you're making progress I'd also recommend recording your voice and listen to it a few days later. If you're in the thick of it you're probably not really objective about how your voice actually sounds and you may be too hard on yourself. Listen to it as if you're getting a voice message from a stranger and you may find you don't sound as masculine as your fears tell you. Also, if you're recording your voice, consider reading dialogue from tv shows, and read one character in a masc voice and one in a fem one, to create more of a contrast.** In public your gender expression is never perceived in a vacuum. Chances are people have run into dudes. Even if your voice isn't the highest-pitched thing ever you can probably get it to sound a lot less masc compared to most guys out there. And of course cis women also have a variety of pitches and tones and stuff*** (btw I'm not like a sound engineer or whatever I have no idea what any of those specific words mean, I'm just referring to like the general feel you get from when people talk).

As for how to actually do the voice be more fem, again I'm not expert: make the thingiemagic in your throat go as far up as possible, then try to use head voice instead of chest voice. Which is basically, from what I understand, when you talk and you put your hand on your like upper chest and you can feel it vibrate it's chest voice and if it doesn't it's head voice. I've been told that you can achieve this by visualizing your speech as like a beam attack coming from your mouth aiming at a target. So like. That sounds like fun, maybe just do that right now whether you're a transfem trying to voice train or not and all that. There's also this video series that basically explains this above paragraph better, and I think everyone should watch this whether they voice train or not cause it's frankly a work of trans art. It also fuels my "all female Australien/New Zealand accent havers are trans people conspiracy" which is great for me.*****

But really, and I'm repeating myself, the big thing is that you have to try and keep it up. When you do it for the first time it may not sound great and you may not be able to maintain the voice for long, but by the fiftieth time you've done it, it's gonna sound better. And yeah, all the in-between time may suck a bit. Once you have a result that you're happy with while talking at home, remember that it may be harder to use that voice in public. Personally as a cyclist I always found it harder to use my fem voice after cyling to uni for half an hour than when I was just sitting at home. But that also goes away with more training and repetition.

One thing regarding social media. Whenever I use the twitter for you page and scroll long enough it will eventually serve me a litany of transition timelines from very thin, conventionally attractive, young, white trans women. And that's obviously great for them, however maybe check in with yourself every once in a while to consider if looking at those makes you feel good and happy for them or if you're feeling bad about maybe not attaining all the beauty standards and all that. If you're feeling the latter, considering stepping away from looking at those a bit. Remember that y'all may be in very different points in your lives. Remember that people always post the "best" pictures to the internet for all to see. Remember that you not looking "as good" while wearing sweapants and slouching on your uncomfortable chair as they do all dressed up while taking a picture, is a perfectly normal feature of humanity that everyone experiences. Remember that it's okay to be fat and there's great fat trans women posting pictures of themselves on tumblr at least like once a year. Life is good actually.

Okay, make-up. Consider make-up, it's pretty fun. If you have trans masc friends they may be more than willing to impart ome knowledge onto you. In general, I know it can be scary to admit you don't know shit about any typically feminine activities, like getting clothes that aren't boring, make-up, etc. because there is so much pressure on us as trans women to performe all the typically feminine activities perfectly to prove out validity to a cold and uncaring planet, but like. If you have people in your life who are accepting and who know of the stuff that you don't, please ask them. I promise they'll be happy to share their knowledge with you enthusiastically.

* This is anecdotal evidence, but one time I wore a mask for the first half of the day and no mask for the second half, all while wearing the same outfit, and the amount of people turning to look at me creepily while I wasn't wearing a mask, compared to when I was wearing one, was not trivial. Obviously it shouldn't be on us to prevent men from objectifying us in public like that, but honestly I'll take it.

** And if you're a Doctor Who fan, consider reading the scene where Missy kills her past male incarnation, it is 100% cathartic.

*** Consider listening to some stuff where women are allowed to have slightly lower pitched voices, like the Heathers musical or the original Star Trek****

**** Yes this post is all a ploy to get baby transfems into star trek *evil laughter*

***** Yes this is about Omega from the Bad Batch I will die on this hill she is so trans omg like im not even a big headcanoner but jesus fucking christ i just look at that girl in any scene shes in and its just like fuck shes so trans

if you as a transfem who is actively transitioning or has already transitioned have ever told a pre-transition girl she "just needs to learn to love herself" then you owe her $1000