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mittensmorgul · 3 years

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For anyone interested in long-term residence in the supernatural fandom, please have some observations I’ve made over the decade I’ve been here. Take it or leave it as you will, but I’ve found all of this info useful over the years I’ve been here.

I wrote this yesterday, and it achieved its mission of identifying the sort of folks who would react negatively to it (i.e. a lot of block lists have been updated), so now that it’s been edited for content, it’s going under a cut (because that is how we do things on tumblr in general, unless we have a deliberate purpose for annoying readers with excessively long text posts) for the sake of people who actually do care about the fandom and its history. If that’s not you or your reason for being here, then keep on keeping on with your own thing, I guess. For those who are interested, there’s a lot of fandom resources some of us have been building for years that you might enjoy knowing about.

First off, I’ve been informed by a few friends who’ve read through this for coherency’s sake that it sort of reads like a *shakes cane from porch* fandom grandma complaint, but honestly... I earned this rocking chair and goshdangit imma rock now. So apologies for any “back in my day” vibes or faint aroma of tiger balm this post might give off. Then again, it’s loosely based on a similar post from 2012 so like... time is a flat circle anyway I guess.

1. There is no such thing as “tumblr famous,” unless you’re referring to the hilarious and delightful fic of the same name (please go read it, you will cackle). Posting Hot Takes for imaginary Clout™ on this site is kind of pointless in the long run. Sure you can post solely for the sake of stirring shit and getting notes, but the majority of the folks who do aren’t long term residents of the fandom. They’re just tourists moving through our little beach town for spring break. If you’re actually intent on moving to this corner of the fandom for an extended stay, please bother to really feel out the permanent residents and understand the culture and general mood of the neighborhood. It bears no resemblance to whatever’s going on across town where all the bars and beach parities are happening, and those loud, drunken revelers are, again, gonna disappear back to their regular lives or on to the next party eventually. That doesn’t mean the fandom is dying, it’s just evolving.

(funny how I had several comments implying that I’m just trying to keep the fandom from evolving with this post, because I sincerely do want the fandom to continue on for years to come, and that is impossible without evolution. We can evolve without self-immolating, though. mostly i included point 1 for an excuse to push ancient but hilarious fanfic on you.)

2. Once you post something here, it’s been unleashed to the fandom winds. You never know where it will end up, or who will comment on it or add to it. Remember that time Misha tweeted the link to the Epic Cockles Love Story post? No? It was wild. That was 2012. They all know we’re here, and how to find us if they want to. Please don’t take it to their doorsteps.

Obviously if someone is being a dick on your posts, please feel free to block them, but the whole entire point of this site is to engage people with your posts. Being big mad that someone reblogged your post with comments or supporting evidence, or happy headcanons or “HECK THIS IS GREAT BECAUSE (insert personal story about their experience or whatever else made them Feel Things about your post)” is frankly ridiculous. If your goal is to avoid any sort of engagement with your posts, then maybe try instagram instead. From what I understand, there is a SPN fandom presence there, and nobody can tarnish your original posts with unwanted commentary. But the ability to reblog with additional commentary is a FEATURE of tumblr that builds community through conversation. Otherwise we’re all just talking to ourselves in a vacuum, and that’s what actually kills fandoms.

(and for the folks who just want to blog how they want to blog and don’t want people to engage on their posts at all, please feel free to block anyone you want, as well... nobody wants to step on your toes, but most of us also don’t want to walk on eggshells wondering if this post is one of the “do not add comments for any reason” sorts of posts, either. This is a huge fandom and most people can’t even begin to keep track of every creator and their url du jour, and what their personal rules might be regarding interaction with their content. Including a “please don’t add comments” note at the bottom of your posts-- and not in your tags that won’t even show up on reblogs, but in the actual body of the post-- would sincerely help avoid any awkward or unwanted interactions, too. At the end of the day, you are in control of your own fandom experience and the block button exists.

For the record, I block zero fandom blogs (which is why I posted this, I wanted it to reach a wide scope... refer to the opening paragraphs as to why).

3. Since this post was partly inspired by a tag I left on that post going around about how “previous tags” mean fuckall on this site (which you can read here), just a reminder that if you like someone’s tags or feel they add value to the post, part of the Peer Review structure of tumblr encourages you to PASTE THEM INTO A REBLOG. If you do this, then at least credit the person who actually wrote the tags! Don’t just copy someone else’s tags into your tags on your reblog of the post without credit either. They were not YOUR tags. (I have had this happen to tag rambles I wrote and someone else got credited with them on a subsequent reblog and it is FRUSTRATING). Just... don’t even bother to write “previous tags” because WHAT PREVIOUS TAGS?! Nobody is gonna bother to chase back the chain of reblogs trying to find where the mystery tags came from, friendos. That way lies madness.

(for the record, since some folks seemed to focus on this point solely, writing “previous tags” on a post isn’t inherently a BAD thing, but for anyone who actually is here for more than one-off shitposting, then it’s sort of a pointless thing in the long run. This wasn’t intended to suggest people who ARE here for one-off shitposting are bad or “doing it wrong,” but for people who might actually want to preserve that hilarious joke or insightful comment. People delete posts and entire blogs all the time around here. Links break. I get that the upcoming generation just shrugs at that and moves on with their lives, but heck... you don’t have to accept that all entertainment is disposable if you don’t want to. There’s a bizarre sort of nihilism plaguing us all about the impermanence of pretty much everything that feels like something we should be fighting against rather than buying into wholesale, even in our escapist entertainment. I’m just exhausted by the complete loss of joy in community.

*shouts from the peanut gallery* IT AIN’T THAT DEEP, JUST GET SOME FRESH AIR AND LOOK AT A PUPPY OR SOMETHING

Yes... yes it isn’t really that deep, but bigger picture in the state of reality we’re all entirely disillusioned with, are we supposed to just give up on everything, including the things we cling to because they bring us a tiny spark of hope that we’re not all just trapped in this dystopian nightmare and things might actually be worth living for?

*peanut gallery clinging to burnt husks of peanuts in a barren peanut field* but this is how we have chosen to cope

Okay... you do you... I feel bad for you but if that’s the case then this post is NOT FOR YOU. AND THAT’S FINE. I honestly do not care if you don’t care! I mean, I’m sorry anyone has to live in a world that drives them to that mindset, but I understand. This post is for anyone who might look at their lives and their choices and think “no wait, I unironically enjoy this and want more from the experience of that enjoyment than I’m currently feeling.” Everyone else can continue with their lives as usual.)

4. CONTENT THEFT IS NEVER OKAY. PERIOD. Things like “credit to the artist” or tagging gifs or images you found on pinterest as “not mine” isn’t actually credit. If you can’t source an image or gif set, DO NOT POST IT! We don’t REPOST (i.e. save an image and then create a new post with it as if it was our own creation). We REBLOG (click the little square arrows and reblog from the actual creator). That goes for gif sets, fanvids, screencaps, meta, fic... everything.

(hopefully everyone here already understands this one, but I felt compelled to include some “these are stupidly obvious” reminders anyway, since this is ostensibly some sort of advice column. This is the equivalent of the warning label on your toaster reminding you not to use it in the bath. Like... duh...)

5. Close kin of item 4 is SOURCE YOUR SHIT.

(for 100% disclosure purposes, I specifically discussed this one in this specific way because of an influx of anon ask messages I received in the wake of the finale. Literally the inciting incident for creating this entire post was what I can only assume was a joking ask about a comment Misha made at a con years ago. Someone actually bothered to take the time to type out those sentences to me. I have no idea what they were expecting in reply, or what could possibly motivate them to send this comment about something so entirely random from, again, several years ago. Just a joke? No idea, but whatever... it got me thinking that there might actually be people who are new to the fandom who MIGHT actually care about the fandom history, and maybe they just don’t know where to go for that info, or how to even begin searching through 16 years of history for things they might actually find enjoyment in, rather than just hauling random out of context garbage out on main and pointing and laughing about it now. People are actually allowed to care about things. It’s not cringeworthy to actually care about things, and you are not alone in actually caring, and there’s this whole big room over here full of people who are thrilled to share in that with you. This post is intended FOR THOSE PEOPLE SPECIFICALLY, so if that is not you, please just continue walking by.)

Yes, I know lots of y’all are new around here right now, but dredging up stuff from years ago that fandom has completely debunked and presenting it as TRU FAX again is just exhausting. We’re not trying to be party poopers, but seriously, we have seen it all and are mostly done with extinguishing bags of flaming dog poop on our front porches for the umpteenth year in a row. I’ve seen a lot of posts that have the same tone as “I saw Goody Proctor dancing with the devil” or “I heard kylo ren has an eight pack” and just... the information is there for anyone who cares enough to find it.

This goes double for “why is nobody talking about this thing I just discovered while watching the show for the first time?!” And, oh hon, we have talked it all into the ground over the last fifteen years. We’re happy you’re discovering it again, but I promise we talked about it plenty when the episodes originally aired. We have such a rich meta history that lots of us have worked really hard to preserve. I encourage you to seek it out, if nothing else than as historical artifacts. The way we have discussed the show has been a 16-year evolution. People have written literal doctoral dissertations on this show. Your shitposts are fun! We love reliving our own experience through fresh eyes, and seeing your wonder at experiencing it all again for the first time! But y’all didn’t invent this fandom in the last six months, either.

Meta Sources and Minerals provided by our friendly neighborhood fandom archivist, @lets-steal-an-archive

Academic books and articles about SPN

A collection of Meta Essays going back to s1 and organized by topic (all of this has happened before, all of it will happen again)

SPN Heavy Meta Archive (s1-3)

Mel’s Dreamwidth archive of meta (s1-12)

Oranges8hands Dreamwidth archive of meta (s1-15, with many similar entries to Mel’s... though ymmv on viewpoint in a lot of these too)

Anyone remember Fandom Wank? Not the concept but the actual LJ... No? Okay have a link to SPN topics that ended up there. Through 2013. We have seen so much... including several fandom containment breaches.

for all your art sourcing needs, please see @theroadsofararchive, the repository for so much fandom art.

need to find a gif of something? canonspngifs is a vast repository of gifsets of the entire series. If the gif you want to use in your post happens to be the first gif in the gifset, in the tumblr gif finder thingy just paste the permalink to that post from canonspngifs (which is easily searchable by episode, character, location, situation, quotes, and sometimes even color and clothing items the actors are wearing... it’s really well organized, especially for tumblr >.>) and the first gif will be automatically linked with credit to the gif creator attached. It makes life easy that way. It’s also convenient when trying to remember something specific but can’t remember what episode it’s from. I’ve used the site to jog my memory before going to the superwiki armed with more specific search results to find episode quotes and references. Or sometimes I just scroll through all the nice gifs for fun, too.

Need a screencap of something and know exactly which episode it’s from? Try Home of the Nutty. You might not find the exact screencap you’re looking for, but they have a complete set of caps of every episode, and it’s an incredibly useful resource for quick reference checks and the like. Just give pages a chance to fully load before clicking on the next one. The site is easily overloaded, but it’s still free to use (and again, with credit... Pretty much every screencap on my entire blog is from HotN unless otherwise credited).

As you can see, this is a fandom built on preserving our history. You absolutely are not required to engage with any of this if that’s not of interest to you, but I can only assume that there are people who would be interested in it if only they knew it existed and how to find it. Well, now they do.

6. A few more notes on tags, and how they work on tumblr. The first 20 tags on your ORIGINAL posts are searchable sitewide, so if you want to be able to find something again, tag that thing first before going on general tag rambles. The only place tags on reblogs are searchable is on your own blog. So you don’t have to put 50 tags trying to get a post seen if it’s a reblog. You’re just spitting into the wind at that point. If you have a filing system for finding things again, then by all means add those tags (again, in the first 20, so they’re searchable), but you don’t need to tag a reblog “destiel” and “deancas” and “dean” and “cas” and “dean x cas” or whatever. Pick one for your personal blog’s filing system, that’s all you need.

(this was only added because tagging and searching on this site is so very broken... I get that a lot of folks don’t care about ever searching their own blogs again for anything, so this one only really applies if you do often find yourself trying to find old posts. If not, then it’s not really relevant. It took me years to work out a decent tagging system, and at the beginning of my time here I never thought I’d end up camping out here for a decade and falling this deep into the fandom, and I regretted my lack of consistent tags only years later when I realized I actually wanted to be able to go back and find specific old posts again. So... for anyone who wants to err on the side of caution, working out a sensible tagging system really helps if you’re here for the long term. I personally tag content by episode, because some of my other general tags are so large as to be practically useless as a search term. But whatever system you choose to file stuff on your own blog, it really only has to make sense to you. And again, if this is pointless advice for someone who has no intention of settling here for the long term. Please feel free to ignore it. I just wish someone had explained it this way to me ten years ago and saved me the hassle of retroactively tagging something like 30k posts... especially now that using the mass tag replacer is the fastest way to get your entire blog deleted... oops? so yeah, don’t use the mass tag replacer either >.>)

7. Tags on Tumblr DO NOT WORK LIKE TAGS ON TWITTER. If you @ someone in the body of the post, it will show up in their notifications (if they’re the sort of person who even checks their notifications... not all of us do. For the record, I generally don’t...), but putting actor or ship names in the tags on a tumblr post does absolutely nothing. It’s not the same as tagging the actor’s twitter account in a tweet. Nobody’s getting notifications about you tagging a post about Jensen here as “Jensen Ackles.” There is a difference. Please learn it. (and don’t take headcanons and ESPECIALLY RPF or otherwise explicit art or fic from tumblr to twitter and tag the actors in it. That’s just... not okay.)

(I have seen the pearl clutchers getting all in a huff about the mere existence of RPF or even explicit content of fictional characters if it doesn’t meet their purity standards, but tagging those things allows people who don’t want to see it to actively avoid that content here. Nobody has a right to tell people their fictional content shouldn’t exist at all, or that creators of that fictional content somehow deserve harassment or threats for having dared to create such “immoral” content, won’t somebody PLEASE think of the children... and no... you do not do that here. Don’t be the problematic behavior you wish to ban from the world. Learn to use tags to protect yourself from, as i have attempted to emphasize here, fictional content you are personally upset by. That’s a you problem, not a problem for the creators of potentially upsetting content that they tag appropriately for.)

8. General formatting stuff: If you’re writing long text posts, visually break them up so people aren’t faced with one long wall of text. The enter key is your friend. Also, if you put long text posts under a Read More break and send people to your blog to finish reading, please ensure that your blog is actually visually accessible (tiny text, or light grey text on a dark grey background, or a visually busy background might be aesthetically pleasing to you but nobody can actually read it. Loads of folks won’t even try. Which is great if you don’t actually care whether people are able to appreciate your content or not, but something to at least consider if you *do* actively want to encourage engagement with your work. Confirm how your blog looks on both mobile and desktop and make sure it’s actually functional in both, too).

And since I mentioned that most of my experience on fandom tumblr has been in the SPN fandom, here’s a bit of a reminder for folks who are new around here. With the reminder that I have been here more than a decade and still feel like a newbie myself sometimes...

This is an OLD FANDOM. There are many, many people who have been at this longer than some of you have been alive. The average age for creators in this fandom is older than you think (I think of my friends in their 30′s as young’ins okay? okay). With that understood, you are responsible for the content you consume and are exposed to. Curate your experience. Ship and let ship. YKINMKATOK. Don’t deliberately expose yourself to content you find upsetting for whatever reason. Tags and warnings are your friends, not targets for you to attack in some sort of purity war. People will ship things you do not like (or in specific ways you do not like), will say things you do not agree with, and will find their happiness in things you abhor. That is not your concern. Find what you do like, and support and engage with it, and ignore (or block, or unfollow) the rest. Tumblr has a feature that lets you blacklist tags so the content you’re trying to avoid won’t appear on your dash.

Remember the paradox of tolerance.

It is not your job in fandom to police how other people enjoy the fandom. It’s not *my* job to police how *you* enjoy the fandom, UNLESS your enjoyment is in actively harming other real human beings in the fandom. If you don’t like their take on the character or the show or the plotlines or their ships or anything else, you don’t need to engage with their posts at all! The necessary corollary to this is that clarifying misunderstandings or correcting factual misinformation is not “policing.”

(this is where the peanut gallery reminds me it ain’t that deep, and I plead with them to put down the social media and find just one (1) thing to actually believe in in this godforsaken life, find something other than disdain and cynicism and spite to live for. If those things motivate you to find a larger cause for yourself, then great, use them to your advantage, but use them to find something that makes you a better person or brings you a modicum of joy and connection to your fellow human beings despite living in a dystopian hellscape of a world)

I have seen a lot of posts lately that are founded on the sort of authority that comes with “I watched through tumblr for a few months and then watched the last three episodes of the series” and as such are just... missing the larger context of the entire show, and are unfounded entirely in canon. I 100% appreciate the new enthusiasm for the fandom that we’ve been living in here for years, and it’s wonderful to see new people enjoying the thing we love. Your headcanons are valid, you are valid, but recognize that your headcanons aren’t canon. All of us finale denialists have accepted this in some measure, so we feel you. We truly, truly feel you. But regarding actual canon, we have a resource for that: the Superwiki. Learn it, live it, love it, as Metatron would say.

(which you could discover he said in 10.17 Inside Man, thanks to the superwiki! accept no substitutes!)

(and again, there have been people who have been involved in fandom for years who haven’t engaged with canon in years, either! You can play in this universe however you choose, BUT FOR PEOPLE WHO ACTUALLY CARE ABOUT CANON AT ALL, WHICH I AM AGAIN POINTEDLY SAYING MIGHT NOT BE YOU, READER, AND I’M NOT SUGGESTING YOU ARE WRONG FOR NOT WANTING TO ACTUALLY ENGAGE WITH CANON, but if you DO want to engage with canon, please have some useful resources. Why do people feel personally attacked by being presented a list of helpful resources? Absolutely baffling.)

(also: words have definitions. “Canon” is a specific thing, meaning in this case “the finished media product that aired on television.” Anything beyond those limits is secondary canon (think: john’s journal, which is not canon but canon adjacent at best...), word of god (i.e stuff said by the writers and showrunners), or headcanon (which includes actor commentary-- they may have helped create the show with their acting choices and whatever, but they are not in control of the story overall). If there’s something you dislike about actual canon, you can reject it and supplement it with your own theories or preferred outcomes-- that’s basically what fanfic is-- but that doesn’t make your theories canon (much to all our dismay, that’s just not how any of this works. This is not to invalidate how anyone engages with the show or the fandom, just trying to clarify what seems to have been a source of unintentional misunderstandings. Your theories do not have to be “canon” to be legitimate interpretations.)

***I am setting this section apart, and did make a separate post of just this following information, because this is where we go from being relatively chill about different parts of fandom choosing to interact in different ways and you do you and blog however you want, to “hey can everybody please understand that the way you are interacting with this specific material might be harmful for specific legal reasons, and stating that you do not care about the consequences of your actions does actively make you the asshole here...” Okay, now that we have that understood:

The spnscripthunt collective has been steadily acquiring new scripts (which are posted in full on the superwiki for everyone to enjoy, for free). The language around how some folks are talking about these scripts is... concerning. For very real legal reasons, actually, and not because we’re feeling precious about the collection and don’t wike it when meanies use them in shitposts.

-First off, these scripts are not “leaks.” They are all verified and legally purchased (or gifted, in some cases, but still acquired entirely above board. we didn’t whack anyone over the head in a back alley for these scripts, or swipe them out of someone’s trailer on set).

(in case anyone was unaware, these scripts are the copywritten protected property of Warner Brothers. So yes, how we use them and share them with the fandom could have legal repercussions. We present them as a collected resource of fandom history which SHOULD fall under Fair Use doctrine, but this is untested legal water. Insinuating that the scripts are somehow not entirely legally obtained, or that posting them for public access involved less than 100% transparent and entirely legal transactions is incredibly concerning.

Once again for the peanut gallery, if you don’t care about any of that and are just having a good time with it, at least be mindful of the work and expense a large group of people have gone through to acquire and present the content you’re all too eager to exploit for cheap thrills. Some of us do actually care and are not exactly comfortable with the fact that others don’t seem to care about burning it all to the ground. We can’t force you to listen or behave as we’d hope you might, but at least be aware of the potential consequences of your actions. All we’re asking is for you to not be the douchebag who sets the whole neighborhood on fire with your illegal fireworks display. Is that too much to ask for? more on that in a second, first... a psa)

-If you see a script for sale and are unsure if it’s legit (or believe it might already be freely available in our collection), please feel free to ask us for advice. Our goal is to make as much of our fandom history available to the entire fandom, and we absolutely do not want anyone shelling out money for stuff you can already find for free.

(seriously, we’ve seen a bunch of resellers cropping up selling printed versions of the scripts we bought and uploaded for everyone to enjoy free of charge, or scripts that are otherwise of dubious origin. We’ve been at this for years now and know what’s actually out there. We don’t want anyone to fall for a scam if we can help it)

-Also, the usual reminder that the scripts we acquire ARE NOT NECESSARILY THE FINAL SHOOTING DRAFTS. In fact, the majority of scripts in our collection are NOT. Changes are made daily to scripts, even during filming. Comparing a Production Draft (white pages, effectively the first “final draft” of what usually becomes a series of drafts before filming wraps) to a much later revision (say... green or goldenrod revisions, several of which we DO have in our collection for comparison) and how those earlier drafts often differ wildly from the aired version versus how similar a much later green draft is to the aired version, for example, can teach you a lot about the television writing process. The link above to the superwiki scripts page has a nice little explainer about how this process works.

Differences between our posted scripts (many of which are white drafts, aka FIRST complete drafts, which will likely go through multiple rounds of revisions before filming even begins) and the aired version of the show are not all “acting choices” or a director or editor just cutting whole scenes on a whim. It’s insulting to everyone involved in production to suggest that’s the case.

(and yeah, fine... whatever, make any sort of posts you like regarding how those changes came about, but at the very least understand that it’s not actually the truth about how any of this works. Don’t care that that’s not the truth and want to make the posts anyway because shitposting is fun and that’s the extent of your sense of humor? FINE! You’re entitled to do that! But at least you DO know the truth now, and hopefully so do the people who engage with your posts. Deliberate ignorance isn’t cute, smooth lions notwithstanding)

There’s probably a whole other post to be made on fandom tagging etiquette, but again I don’t really use the tags enough to know what’s going on with that whole situation. I’ve also probably left a lot of stuff out, so please feel free to add things I’ve overlooked.

Thanks also to @trisscar368 and @thayerkerbasy for help compiling this, too. They were kind enough to escort me through the park to feed these pigeons. Now I need to take them out for ice cream. :’D

So I guess welcome to the neighborhood. Make yourself at home, but like... try not to trash the place while you’re here. Some of us live here by choice, lol.

#this blue hellsite (affectionate)#fandom problems #kinda wish i'd made this post six months ago but here we are i guess lol #long post #now edited for the people who are actually personally invested in the fandom #thanks for participating in this little experiment and I hope this version is actually informative to those who are interested #meaning there's a lot more links to stuff and explainers and whatnot...#and one last reminder that for folks just swinging through for laughs absolutely none of this applies to you #if you are legit interested in fandom history and preservation as we move to the post-canon world then hopefully this is useful to you

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yangjeongin · 3 years

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!!! YANGJEONGIN IS ONE YEAR OLD !!!

yes yes, very exciting!! honestly, it feels like we’ve been here for years, but simultaneously i’m like what??? it’s already been a year?? crazy. i’m not sure i expected to stick around this long or be as active on stayblr as we’ve been, but i’m glad we have 💕 on top of this, we’re reaching a follower milestone too, so i’m going to go all out with this fasten your seatbelts

i’m usually a really casual stan, and i’m also multi af, so following one group so closely is an entirely new experience to me despite being into kpop since 2012. in running a blog dedicated to one group...i have to keep up! and that in itself has been really fun. i think i have a love for skz that’s different than any group i’ve ever stanned, so i’m thankful to this blog for that much alone.

on top of that, i’ve really enjoyed meeting and talking to everyone on stayblr that i have, seeing y’all’s amazing content, and i appreciate the support you all have given us in the past year so much. i think i’ve improved a lot as a content creator in the past year, and i think if i just stayed on my main blog, that wouldn’t be as much of the case. everyone’s encouragement and creativity has made being yangjeongin super fun for me, and (usually) keeps me motivated to keep making stuff!! i don’t think i can say thank you enough. so many of you have been so kind to us and i’m really so grateful.

i could probably say so much, but one of the most important things to do is credit @minhos, because without their influence (see: dragging us kicking and screaming to make a skz sideblog) yangjeongin wouldn’t exist at all. we would not be yangjeongin because we even got this url from them!! and tbh we may not even be into skz at all without haru. this is the only time i will say this but thank u haru, every other time i’m going to say you ruined my life even though that’s a lie.

i may joke about stayblr ruining my life too but the truth is i think i needed this blog in my life in the past year and that despite feeling INSANE sometimes, i think i would be worse off today if yangjeongin didn’t exist. i’m actually getting emotional help so just. thanks for making this such a good experience for me, and for helping me to have so much fun.

this is already a lot but i (unfortunately) have even more to say. i don’t have the time or energy to write a message for EVERYONE, and i feel like they would just get redundant eventually, so i’m going to write a general thank you to All of my stayblr mutuals for making the past year so great for me, and some individual shoutouts to some of you that i actually have something unique to say about 👁️ honestly y’all have Made my experience on stayblr, which in the past year, has been a really good one! i’m so grateful for everything, and i appreciate you all so much. really looking forward to the next year with y’all, seeing what you make, and hopefully befriending more of you, too. and ofc, making even more mutuals.

i know some people may not read beyond this, so thank you again for the past year. i’m looking forward to seeing how long yangjeongin goes 😎 you may also see some of our old sets make a return today as part of the celebration. we’ll see.

@1zone: me @ ing you on this account is so funny to me for literally no reason at all and so is the fact that i’m putting these in alphabetical order and you are Rightfully first. for some reason i’m actually super emotional trying to type this up which is weird but uhhh thank you for being yangjeongin with me. even if there are times that you’re quiet on the blog knowing that i’m not by myself in this is idk?? comforting?? to me. this blog would not exist without you either and i hope you never doubt how important you are 😠running this blog w you has been so fun for me and i know i wouldn’t have had nearly as much fun without u so tysm. thank u also for keeping the blog alive on the days that i am dead. i feel like there’s more i have to say but i’m forgetting it now asdsddgdsg so if u see this in drafts make sure to read this part again once it’s posted just in case!! i love u lots mawy 💓 @chrisbangs: miss ganguli...i don’t even know where to start omfg but at the same time i feel like this is almost unnecessary bc u already know everything i could say. but!! you can never hear it too many times. you are so funny and encouraging and TALENTED and i know stayblr has treated you poorly at times but it’s better because you’re in it. even if this place was truly stayblr dot hell for me this blog would’ve been worth it because without it i wouldn’t have met u. u are my favorite mutual....don’t tell the others. thank you for always hyping me up and listening to anything in the world i have to say and supporting me in like every area of my life in the past year. i am so grateful for u and i love u and your talent and content but especially u so much!! @hyune: shoutout to u for being so supportive, i truly appreciate u so much. i will continue to make blue content just for you 💗confession i also always forget your name adsfsdgdg so i have to frequently go look at your about and even then forget it again. but hi jen!! your tags are always so fun to read, tysm and i hope you’re having a great day @hyunjins: i know we have only spoken one (1) time but i wanted to issue a formal thank u for feeding the hyunjinators with me. tbh i find how different our coloring is super funny but also amazing bc we can gif the same thing and have it look completely different from each other, and i think that’s rly fun and that the variety is really good for stayblr too. i also want to thank u for inspiring plsdontrepost even though i haven’t used it in months,,,, it has historically succeeded at its job quite a few times now 🥳 i know u were gone for a bit but it’s been good to see you around again too! pls keep doing what u do!! @hyunjinz: agnes you are like. an angel among men. i see you reblog like the entirety of the bystay tag every day and i think that is so sweet of u. i am always too lazy to even look through the tag most of the time let alone reblog everything so i have so much respect for u. you were also one of the first stays to ever support my content even back when i was just giffing them on hyeongjunz and i’ll always be grateful for that. you are genuinely so kind and wonderful and your talent is unreal; i’m so glad you’re here with us and so thankful for you. @jisungs: hi i don’t think we’ve properly spoken but i just wanted to say hi to u, thank u for being so sweet in your tags, and let you know that i really like your gifs!! i feel like we talk to each other quite a bit in tags so i am doing it and finally personally addressing u hehe so hi zoya! 💞i hope we can properly talk some soon. @jizung: hi omg i don’t think we’ve ever actually spoken eithe r but i’m going to publicly profess to u that i’m a big fan of your content and also your tags. u are both rly funny and supportive so whenever i see that u reblogged something from us i always look forward to reading ur tags on it. maybe we can talk some within the next year 👉👈 @minhos: haru yes u get two messages. we’re so bad at being mushy so i’m already like ew this is disgusting but thank u for dragging me into skz i am unfortunately very grateful and love them they became such a big part of my life i actually don’t know what things would’ve been like in the past year without them :weirdsip: i don’t know how u keep getting me into things that end up monumentally changing my life but thanks i guess ASDFDSGDSG i’m really glad we’ve known each other for so long and that we’re still in touch and talk as often as we do. missing active gifmaker haru but big fan of artist haru please keep making rad art and showing me 🙌i will continue to support u always unless ur gonna do something dumb then i’ll yell at u instead. but i love u, thank you for being my friend and for being the mastermind behind yangjeongin. @realstraykids: em ok i am convinced you are the backbone of stayblr. or like, at least a few important vertebrae. you and your content are both so wonderful. i also think you’re one of the nicest people here lowkey. you just have impeccable vibes okay, and i’m very grateful to know u and be mutuals with u. big fan of both you and all the stuff you make❣️ i don’t know if i just always miss when you’re on dash but i feel like you’re around less often, if u actually are around less often god bless i’m happy for u ASDFSDGSDG even if i miss seeing you a little bit 💔 i hope you’re doing well and that good things come your way always. @seo-changbinnies: marie, queen of comedy, your tags are like actually top 10 best parts of my life. i think about your guy fieri blog and chan looking like a guy you lost a bet to at a gay bar every day. u are insane and i love that so much. thank u. i am so glad that i complimented your tags that one time and that we’re mutuals, being mutuals w you is so fun. thank u for all of the laughs and all the bin and felix content @seungknow: kep!! i feel like whenever i have something to say in createskz server i can always count on u to come thru with the reply, esp when i ask for help on just about anything. thank u for the ts files you have gotten me, i’m very glad mine have been useful to you in exchange 🙏i always rly enjoy talking to u and also want to take a moment to say your coloring as of late has been especially fire, i always anticipate seeing the new things you’ll make! @seunglixes: we haven’t talked toooo much but i just wanted to personally thank you for running createskz for us! it has to be a lot of work especially during comeback season and esp doing it by yourself, but you do a great job, so thanks so much 💗i hope you’re well, too. @seungminhos: ah yes...abia and her controversial opinions...SDFSDGDGSG but no even tho u are a mostly retired gifmaker now i still love seeing u on my dash and just reading your thoughts. also really enjoyed the few times we talked! so i hope we can talk more! but regardless i already feel like we r besties u cannot change my mind about this sorry. @seungs: mia!! first of all i’m a big fan of u and everything u do. thank u for the seung content and also helping me when i need to download files DSDSGGDG i think i knew u even pre-yangjeongin and seungs days? i know u have given me a lot of support on main too so thanks so much, just in general, for everything 💕i hope we can talk more in the future, too. @strayfeli: hi fox 💞you may not be a content creator but you are a treasured mutual and part of stayblr for me so i wanted to thank you individually for being so kind and supportive always. you warm my heart every day!! and i’m sure you do that for so many people with your tags and this makes you a very important part of stayblr regardless of anything else. please keep doing what you’re doing and being you! @strayhags: hi ellie 💓when i see u my thoughts are either 1. i love these gifs or 2. omg icb i flopped on messaging ellie. often both simultaneously SDSGSDG but!! i aM a big fan of ur content i also always think of your twitter stays talking about tumblr stays compilation header bc it makes me laugh so much. but! even though we only spoke once i appreciate you and for some reason it makes me very happy to tab into the createskz discord server and see u online. u are already my friend in my head. here’s hoping if we talk in the future that i do not flop again 🙏

hi, it is i, mary 👋 i know most of you don't actually know me other than for my gifs on this blog but i still wanted to write a lil thank you message. even though i have always been into boy groups i never thought i would get into skz, and even less that i would actually follow them pretty closely since that's not really something i do with the exception of one group (pouring one out for izone) because it's just too much commitment for me. i didn't think i would be running a blog dedicated to one group for a whole year (more to come ??) but i must say that even though i haven't always been really active here it sure has been fun, both keeping up with skz and being here with carly (rip ele you'll be missed). i always enjoy seeing yalls creations cause stayblr sure has a bunch of talented ccs and when there's something i wanna gif but i don't have the time or motivation and i see someone else does it i'm like god bless thank u for my life. thanks for always being so kind, sweet and funny in the tags and thanks for all the support you have all given us in the past year, i'm certain we wouldn't still be here if it wasn't for all of you, like sure giffing a group you life for yourself is fun, but sharing your content on a supportive community sure makes the experience more enjoyable yknow. i'm gonna write a short message to three individuals that i have a bit more to say to, but to the rest of stayblr i'm looking forward to see more of your creations, thank u for a great year 🥳 let's see for how much longer we can keep this blog up! @hyeongjunz: *taps mic* ok carkeys, it's time for me to say something. i was thinking how the possible existence of this blog goes way before we got into skz and how it wouldn't have been possible at all if haru hadn't convinced you first to join the izone server because i don't think we would've met any other way really LOL so thanks haru, AGAIN. you know i'm really thankful to you for keeping the blog alive while i was dead and still nowadays even tho you are busy 🙏 both for original content and reblogs, you are certainly the backbone of yangjeongin, so thank you 🥺 running the blog with you is fun, specially when we Accidentally gif the same thing and i end up laughing for 10 minutes. thanks for all the support and reassurance, and obviously thank you for all the amazing content you create, i don't know who else i could've ran a skz blog with, but i'm happy i got to do it with you. love u lots barneys 🥰 @minhos: thank u for dragging me into skz, goodbye. jk, i think this is gonna sound a lil redundant cause i think carly mentioned it but, even though i miss gifmaker haru i love artist haru and seeing how much you have improved makes me feel like a proud parent for some reason LMAO obviously wouldn't be here at all without you, and it is certain that my experience as a baby stay was more enjoyable thanks to you. thanks for all your support in all aspects of my life, i'm thankful for being your friend. thank u for being the mastermind behind yangjeongin, we would be dead fish in the sea without you. love u 💖 @seungs: last but not least i guess 🙄 not to play favorites but u easily became one of my favorite people, i always have a lot of fun talking to you and sharing my dumb takes with you which Fortunately u end up supporting 😌 thanks a lot for always supporting what i make and supporting me whenever i'm having a giffing crisis. you are certainly one of the reasons i have enjoyed my time around here, i love absolutely all of your content and u are one of my favorite ccs 🙄 happy to share the same brain with you sometimes, specially when it comes to seungracha. well i don't wanna be sappy so i'm gonna cut this off here 🙄 just want you to know i'm gonna think about that 18 jisung set u said u were gonna do everyday until i die, i'm gonna be a little more deranged every day without that set. anyway uh, yeah, thanks for everything pal, lov- [record scratches]

#carly.txt #mary.txt #what do i even tag this omg #*1year #sure #sorry this is so long i have so much to say literally always and also i love u #look under the readmore actually bc mary's message is there 😠#tl;dr happy first birthday yangjeongin 🥳

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blueprint-han · 4 years

Text

ex.

↪ so many what if’s. who would give you those answers?

— where in you stumble into your ex at a friend’s wedding, and the subsequent conversation leads to new hope blooming in your relationship.

pairing: chan x reader

genre: ex au; angst with a fluffy ending.

⇥ warnings: themes/mentions of break up/make up, mentions of alcohol, please let me know if I miss a warning. please note that i, by no means condone any toxic relationships. this fic here with bang chan and Y/N is NOT an example of a toxic relationship or an implication of bang chan’s actions in real life. please take it as fiction.

word count: 3.3 K

type: one shot.

⇥ disclaimer: this fiction does not represent the activities of the real Bang Chan, nor is associated with JYPE in any form. Events are pure fiction. ♡

↯ note: I decided to merge your request with the prompt because it’s angst and guess who’s the queen of angst? You !! 😌 This was picked up from ex, as you can see and again your url ~vibes~ so uwu hope you enjoy it, this is my first time writing angst tho so please go easy on me. <3 Love you mom <333 ⇥ dawn.☀️

The dance hall’s fairly crowded when you take another shot of your martini, drowning in its essence as you make a desperate attempt to disconnect yourself from your vicinity. You wanna believe you’re drunk, though it’s not true in the slightest — you can still feel, hear, see everything around you clearly — the alcohol’s clearly not having its effect today. You wish, oh so dearly wish it did, because the man standing about two tables away from you really doesn’t deserve the attention you’re giving him right now.

The last thing you’d expected when you entered the hall to attend your friend’s wedding was to stumble right into the one man you’d been trying to avoid for the past two months. At that very moment, you cursed all the odds for making you face the man of your nightmares, the one who broke your heart.

Bang Chan.

Sure enough, just like when he’d dropped the news on you, all the butterflies in your stomach drop dead one by one, gloom and desolation taking over. The mere sight of him is enough to send you into a frenzy of confusion — you feel the flutter in your heart to know that he’s doing okay, but you can also feel that pit of sadness, anger and heartbreak mixed to wash over as one of the most conflicting feelings ever.

“O-oh, hi there, Y/N.” Chan had waved a hand and bowed down, but you shakily nodded your head, not bothering to give him any words of acknowledgement as you stumbled into the hall. How is it that you didn’t notice him until half the wedding was over? How could you forget that he was supposed to attend, because he was the bride’s friend alike?

Was it wrong that part of you still wished that you could be standing next to him, watching him as he introduced you to his friends, calling you “his girlfriend”?

You wondered what the look on Chan’s face would’ve been when you left his greeting hanging in the cold air like that. Was he broken on the inside too? Or did he simply not care? He’d been the one to end it, after all. He looks smart right now — adorning a luxurious black suit, his brownish hair slicked neatly to the side and parted. The delicate silver chain you’d given him on his birthday is oddly still on his neck — you promise yourself to not think about it much, because you know it’ll give you hope — and hope’s a dangerous feeling, at least for you.

When the music starts blaring through the speakers and the couple start dancing together, you sigh, straightening your posture from where you’re leaning against the shot table. Your friend has the prettiest smile plastered onto her face — it comes naturally to her, you figure, seeming as to how she’s married to the love of her life right now. They both seem lost — almost peaceful — as they stare into each other’s eyes. Soon, more and more couples join, until the whole hall is filled with everyone dancing on their heels, twirling and smiling and dancing gracefully. Everyone except you, of course.

You sigh, fixing the hem of your swan-white dress. Way to go for your mood to be ruined — all because you happened to stumble upon your ex boyfriend, and thoughts consumed you as a whole. Was it so wrong of you to wish that you could go back in time and change his decision? You’d moved on from this — you’d told yourself you’d moved on a month ago. You wiped him out of your memory — all the things that reminded you of him — but what if you’d only patched up the wound, not healed it in the slightest? What if the person who held the key to repair your broken heart was held by a person who you’d let go, and by all means, couldn’t reach out now?

So many what if’s. Who would give you those answers? He surely hadn’t, when all he did was just break it out to you over a meeting at the park that he’d fallen out of love with you.

You never understood what happened. It just started with the less frequent messages and meet ups, the excuse of always being busy, and that slowly morphed into him ignoring you for days, until one day he broke the news and ended it, on good terms. Or at least you thought so.

You sigh again, asking the bartender to lend you one bottle of the drink — which he does without question — before you walk over to the staircase that seems to lead to the terrace. Away from the risk of your eyes landing on him and your thoughts going all over the place again. If only you could walk away from the pit of emotions in your heart the same way. If only.

When you kick the almost rusted door open, the fresh blast of cold air that hits you makes you sigh in relief. You tuck several strands of hair neatly behind your ear, walking to the edge as you glance at the view. Leaning against the concrete, you let the lights coming from the night cityscape blur your vision, along with the faint, distant echoing of horns coming from the roads fill your ears. It’s a distraction, after all.

You pop open the cork of the bottle, letting the fizz bubble down before pressing your lips against the rim. One gulp, two, you then gaze up at the night sky. Rinse and repeat, until the whole bottle is almost finished. You ignore the void in your heart, filling it with the essence of alcohol and ignoring the feelings bubbling in it right now.

Chan was like a drug — so addicting and so hard to get rid of once you got into the habit of consuming it regularly. You wanted to reach out and hold onto those memories you shared with him — he was the first person where you let your heart do the talking, and all it took was a look at another person to change lanes, leave you alone in the dust of your crushed heart — only to come to the disappointing note that you’d lost those memories forever. They existed merely in a place you couldn’t reach, couldn’t see, but could only recall. It was pure torture to you, but you’d ignored it all for so long, certainly you could ignore it again.

“Need a refill?”

Your head snaps back in the direction of the voice. A familiar, one soothing voice that now brings pain to your heart, now threatens to bring back the wave of emotions you’d kept at bay.

Your eyes meet the hazel brown orbs, and not diverting from their strong, fierce gaze; you scoff, turning back around to stare off into the distance.

Chan frowns, tilting his chin as he tries to soothe the burn from your two reactions. He doesn’t back away though, because now he maybe understands what you felt like when it all fell apart, when he wrote your ending with a shaky hand.

He walks front to where you’re leaning against the concrete, silently drinking out of the glass he holds in his hand.

Should I say something? He thinks. He should, right? When you ended it, you did end on peaceful terms, even though your reaction felt like you were more affected by it. Even after three months, he still feels the warmth that flowed through him whenever he looks at you — you who clearly don’t want to speak to him. He feels crazy now, for wanting to let you go.

You hadn’t even bothered to curse at him that day — just looked at him with eyes that honestly pierced through his soul, and hurt him more than any of your words could’ve. But maybe that was what he deserved, right?

“Why did you come here?” You ask, swirling the almost empty bottle in your hand. Oddly enough, you don’t feel like walking away, feet frozen in position. You’d ended it on good terms, didn’t you? You’d promised to each other you’d be good friends.

“I noticed you were alone.” The man feels himself say.

“Didn’t you bring your girlfriend along? Isn’t she alone right now?” You counter, taking another sip of your drink. Again, the alcohol is having no effect on you. Why did your tolerance have to be so high when you needed it to be low?

“I-” He takes a deep breath, tilting his head to either side to relieve the tension in his neck. “Broke up with her. About three weeks ago.”

You only chuckle. Somehow, your feelings are strong when he’s away, but when the cause is right in front of you, somehow they fail to make an appearance.

“Did you come here so you could win me back?” You ask, straightening up as you avoid Chan’s firm gaze on you, and his face goes gloomier and gloomier with every statement you spew at him. But then again, who could blame you for being angry? You had every right to.

“No.” He shook his head, fixing his position so his shoulders are about an inch away from yours. “I just wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“I’m alright.” You say, softening at the edges at his concerned tone. You don’t know why you’re listening to him and not going back into the hall, but your legs are still frozen in place, something in you, your heart, doesn’t let you move.

Why do you feel like it’s your first time meeting him all over again?

He’s your ex, a part of your life you’re supposed to forget. Instead, you’re here, reminiscing it with the very person who left you in the first place. The situation you’re bound in is so weird — you almost don’t know what to do — but nonetheless, you just stand there, ignoring the slight flutter in your heart — just like the first time again.

“How are you doing?” You give yourself the liberty to ask him that question — just to know how he’s doing. Just another way for you to answer your countless what if’s, another method to try and fill the void in your heart.

Chan sighs, straightening up himself before looking at you. “I missed you.”

At the simple admission, you soften around the edges some more. It was wrong, so wrong that you were giving him to permission to get into your heart again — but what if you never wanted him to leave in the first place?

Hope — the dangerous feeling — starts resonating through your chest. It’s the tiniest emotion, one you can’t quite sense, but still feel. You can feel yourself grow warm, feel his gaze burn into the side of your face as he awaits a reaction.

“I-I don’t know what to say to that.” You reply, tucking some of your hair behind your ear again, before curling it with your index finger. You don’t look into his eyes yet — you’re not so brave to do so — focusing your bored, almost sad gaze as you count all the lights flashing at you on a skyscraper. Anything to distract you from this feeling.

Chan notices your stare, and sighs again. He’s battling himself too, right now. Should I say it? He thinks.

“I-I’ll be honest and confess to you, okay?” Chan turns to face you properly, while you bite your lip, waiting for his next words. Oddly enough, you feel more nervous now than you felt that day when Chan ended it with you. It’s so weird to feel it all over again.

“I’ve missed you and… I truly regret what I did that day.” He runs his hands through his chocolate brown hair, which seems to look particularly soft today. It reminds you of when you’d casually back hug him when he was working, pecking the back of his neck as you’d comb your fingers through his hair.

“Chan, no.” You feel your voice crack, the sadness overflowing out of its cup, spreading to all your senses as you close your eyes, letting out a single tear.

“Y/N…” Chan places his hand on your shoulder. You don’t flinch.

“Y-You l-left me.” You feel your brain cloud over, having no control over yourself as the words start spilling out of your mouth, piercing Chan’s heart bit by bit. “Y-You l-left me when I thought you’d stay… And you left me alone.” You feel his thumb rub against the bare skin of your shoulder, and this time, you stare up, looking straight into his eyes.

“I loved you,” You stammer, inhaling deeply as you take note of Chan’s expression. Surprisingly, he’s crying too. The rims of his eyes are filled with tears, his whole face goes red as he tries not to violently sob. “I love you.” You correct yourself.

“But you left me. You left me when I thought all I had was you and - and, what? Three months later, you tell me you miss me? Is this because your girlfriend broke up with you? You wanna win me back?” You spew, slamming your hand against his chest as you shake in his arms.

He wordlessly pulls you into his embrace, and you don’t complain — you don’t know if it’s because of your brain being cloudy and your eyes being all itchy from crying, or if it was because you missed his hugs, but you feel yourself clutch onto the material of your shirt as you cry, cry and cry until you feel like your tears don’t remain.

“I’m so sorry…” Is all he can say, wrapping his arms around your shoulders as he tries to comfort you.

“I hate you, Chan. I hate you so much.”

Something in him shatters when he hears your words. He wordlessly mouths “Alright.” and doesn’t bother controlling his tears anymore, letting them flow down his cheeks and settle into your hair, not bothering to hold back the sounds of brokenness he makes either.

“I’m so sorry, Y/N.” He pulls away, holding your chin to force your gaze into his eyes. “I shouldn’t have done that to you, it was so wrong of me. I regret it now, so much.” He curls his lips inwards, and watching him cry is soul-crushing. You should be hating him for leaving you, screaming, crying, but you hate yourself for reaching up to rake through his hair, sliding your hand down to his soft cheek before gently swiping your thumb against it. Wiping off his tears.

“We’ve already forgiven each other, right? It’s okay.” You take deep breaths to calm yourself down. Leaving him behind seems hard enough, but seeing him cry in front of you seems impossible. Are you still in love with him?

“I’m still sorry.” He mutters softly, gazing into your eyes as he takes hold of the hand that rests on his cheek. “I was so horrible to not know that I had you beside me all along, and instead I turned my back at you and left you. It was so wrong of me.” he breaks into tears again, and this time, before you can pull him into a hug, he grabs both your hands in his own. Holding them in between each other.

Yep, you’re still in love with him.

You look at him, absorbing all his features, and suddenly you’re thrown back to the first time he ever asked you out. It seems all too familiar — all too real. You find yourself holding your breath once again, waiting for what he has to say. He rests his forehead against your grasped hands, sighing brokenly as he speaks up.

“I won’t ask you to accept me again, Y/N.” He says as a matter of fact. He understands that the things that happened may not allow you to let him into your heart again. “I won’t ask you to date me either, because I know what I did isn’t that simple to forgive.”

Chan feels so stupid now. You were there for him all the time, yet he left you for someone else. You were beside him to help him when he felt desolated, but somehow he became a cause for your desolation. It shocks, confuses him and makes him seethe in turmoil.

“But,” he begins, holding his breath. “I still want to try. I wanna try being the person I couldn’t be when I was with you. I-I wanna change and win you back, b-but…”

“But?” You ask mindlessly, totally overwhelmed and dazed out by his honest words, the newfound emotion thrums to your chest. It’s love, for sure. But it isn’t that special kind of love, at least not yet.

“But I wanna do that only if you let me. It’s your choice, Y/N.”

Your eyes widen as you try to grasp his words, noticing how his warm hands holding onto yours still, only grow warmer and tighter.

“I r-really love you Y/N, a lot. And… well, I know you may not be able to make this decision soon. But please, just give it a thought?”

You shake your head, a soft smile tugging at your lips as you look up into his eyes again. They’re red and puffy by now, but they’re still gorgeous, they still remind you of the time you’d gently kiss over his eyelids whenever he cried like that.

You roll your eyes to the back of your head in deep thought, before tucking your bottom lip under your teeth and nodding. “Okay.”

“Okay…?” He asks, hopeful. You can almost feel his nervousness in the way his palms sweat, but you simply smile.

“We won’t date yet.” You said. “But I’ll allow you into my heart one last time. Don’t break it.”

And at your acceptance, Chan beams, feeling more tears roll down his eyes as he pulls you into a hug. This time, you don’t spare any restraint, wrapping your arms around your waist as you press your cheek against his chest. “Thank you, thank you, thank you…” Chan keeps mumbling and repeating, to which you only shush him gently, telling him it’s okay and he doesn’t have to thank him.

He still does. You only smile to yourself, and for the first time in three months, you feel somewhat at peace. There’s a long way to go — you have to adapt to this relationship, let your heart join back bit by bit and build each other’s confidence again. But you’re certain you can do it together. This story deserved a happy ending, and you were going to give it one, no matter how hard you’d have to try.

“Hey guys!” You hear someone walk through the door, immediately parting away and clearing your throats.

“Yes?” The both of you say at the same time, tensing up and then laughing at each other. If Chan’s tears were crushing, Chan’s giggles were truly healing. The way his eyes would scrunch up into the cutest crescents and his dimples would make an appearance always made you want to peck his cheeks. Now wasn’t the time though.

“Dinner’s being served, so Y/F/N told you to come downstairs.” The person at the door says, immediately running downstairs, as if to not interrupt your moment any further.

“Alright.” You laugh, taking Chan’s hands in yours as you intertwine your nimble fingers with his long, slender ones. “Let’s go shall we?” You don’t bother picking up the alcohol bottles, because you’ll be coming back here with your friends later anyways — they can be tended to later.

“Of course,” Chan pulls you along with him, running to the door — both the ones that lead to the diner and the ones that signified your new start.

Curse at me all you want, as long as you let it all out, and we can go back to how we were.

*:･ﾟ✧ find the other fics here !

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melanielocke · 3 years

Text

@idrisnnet's 2021 secret santa event: merry christmas to Tara@kitslightwood

(I'm really hoping I tagged the right person as I got a previous URL in my inbox)

Grace hesitated for a moment before she knocked on the door of the Fairchild residence. She didn’t know who she’d find here but she hoped Christopher would be in the lab. At least that was where his aunt and uncle thought he would be. She had no interest in speaking to anyone else in the Fairchild residence, and certainly not Charles. Grace didn’t know why she’d ever thought marrying him was a good idea. She’d thought someone powerful like him could protect from her mother, and although powerful men like Charles could be an entirely new trap, Grace had the power to keep him under control. Or at least she used to. The silent brothers had removed that power. She was nothing now.

Ever since the demon had gifted her with her siren like powers, that was how Grace had gone through life, what Tatiana had taught her to do. Whatever she needed, she’d find a man capable of getting it for her and force him. She’d never liked using her powers. She also had no real alternative for getting what she needed. That was what brother Zachariah had told her anyway, that she had kept using her powers despite hating them because she didn’t know any other ways to solve her problems. Then he’d taken that power away. He was right to, she knew that. No one should have the power she used to have. But she felt naked without it, vulnerable.

Except that one time with Christopher. She’d never felt the urge to use her powers on him for some reason. She didn’t need to. He was so unlike other men she’d met. Everyone else was mesmerized by her beauty, and Grace had begun to realize that to them she wasn’t really a person. She was just a pretty looking doll, and Grace had perfected that sweet, innocent helpless girl act. But that wasn’t who she wanted to be anymore. And Christopher Lightwood might be the only one who could help her now. Other men hated her or adored her. But Christopher had appreciated her. He hadn’t questioned her presence in his lab, and she’d never felt more human than when they had solved the mystery of the pithos together.

She remembered the first time she’d met Christopher. He’d accompanied her in her carriage to make sure she arrived safely, and had talked about bacteria cultures for the entire ride. Grace had said nothing. Her mother would not want her to learn about such inappropriate subjects, and more importantly, her mother would not want her to interact with the children of her brothers. But she’d been fascinated. She’d listened intently, even if she’d pretended to stare out of the window in boredom. Thankfully, Christopher had not gotten the hint at all and had just continued talking.

It wasn’t Christopher who opened the door. It wasn’t one of the Fairchilds either, thank the angel. Instead, Alastair Carstairs was standing in front of the door.

‘Good afternoon,’ Grace said politely. ‘Is Mr. Lightwood here?’

‘Both of them are in the lab,’ Alastair said. ‘I think something is about to explode down there, you might want to stay away.’

‘Would it be alright if I joined you in the lab?’

Alastair shrugged. ‘If that’s what you prefer.’

Grace followed him inside and to the lab.

‘I heard you broke off your engagement,’ Alastair said.

‘I did. Charles is boring and stupid and I pity the person who is unfortunate enough to marry him.’

She knew it wasn’t fair to him, she had forced him into the engagement after all. She hadn’t spoken to him since her powers had become public knowledge, she didn’t know what she could say. Charles might be boring but she shouldn’t have used her powers on him. She wondered sometimes if he and Ariadne had loved each other and if she’d destroyed that, but after living with Ariadne for several months she had realized Ariadne hadn’t cared much for Charles either.

‘Me too,’ Alastair said, and Grace wondered what he knew of Charles. ‘I didn’t realize you were acquainted with Christopher.’

‘I am living with his uncle and aunt, but hadn’t seen him since everything.’

The Bridgestocks had kicked her out despite Ariadne’s attempts to convince them to let her stay, and Grace had had no choice but to take up Gideon and Sophie Lightwood’s offer to let her stay with them. As much as she hated it, it was better than living on the streets, or the London Institute with James’ family. Gideon and Sophie had been nothing but kind to her, and their daughter Eugenia had tried to spend time with her just like Ariadne had, but Grace didn’t know what to do with any of them. All she needed was a roof over her head.

‘If you want my advice, James might not forgive you for everything that happened. Their group has a tendency to hold grudges, and it’s best not to let it get to you.’

‘But you’re here with Christopher too, aren’t you?’ Grace asked.

‘Christopher is the more forgiving among the four of them. Thomas too. But I expect James and Matthew will hate you forever. And I’m just saying… It’s no use letting them hurt you over and over again for something you did when you were just a child in an impossible situation. You can find better friends.’

‘I don’t have friends,’ Grace said coldly.

All she had was Jesse, but she wasn’t allowed to see him. Not yet, at least, but it had been decided that if the Clave let him go free, he would move in with Gideon and Sophie Lightwood for the time being, meaning she would be living with her brother again. She sure hoped so, Jesse was the only person who’d ever cared for her. And Christopher, she hoped. Perhaps Alastair was right, perhaps he would be angry about what she’d done. It wasn’t like she didn’t deserve that. But she hoped Christopher would be forgiving, and that he’d let her help him with his experiments.

Just before they descended the stairs, something exploded. Alastair startled and then started muttering something in a language Grace didn’t understand. He and his sister were Persian, she remembered. Alastair rushed down the stairs and Grace followed him. Thomas and Christopher were extinguishing the fire, running around. It was chaotic. Grace loved it.

‘I go answer the door for a few minutes and you’ve already blown up the lab,’ Alastair said.

‘Oh, hullo Grace,’ Christopher said. ‘It’s good to see you! We’re working on our fire message technique. It involves a lot of fire.’

Grace stared at the boys. ‘Yes, I can see that. Your arm is on fire, by the way.’

Christopher looked down at his arm and started shaking it until Thomas threw some water over it.

‘Right, thank you,’ Christopher said.

‘No success sending any messages?’ Grace asked.

‘No, we figured that part out,’ Christopher said. ‘We can address the note to any runed shadowhunter. The problems start when the note arrives. The idea is that the note goes up in fire and then is remade from fire when it arrives with the other person. Except the note doesn’t reform, the recipient just receives more fire.’

Not exactly what they were going for, but being able to send magic fire to any runed shadowhunter certainly had its uses.

‘So how does it work?’ Grace asked.

‘Write the note, then add the powder and runes to activate it. I’m thinking we’re missing something with the runes, but I haven’t figured out a solution yet.’

The obvious solution to too much fire was water, but in case of a note adding water would just soak the note, making it impossible to read. Instead, they were looking for a rune to reverse. Grace wasn’t sure if such a thing existed, her knowledge on runes was lacking. Still, she wanted to give it a try.

She took a piece of paper from the pile Christopher had made, wrote it and addressed it.

‘What runes do I add?’ she asked.

‘They’re in my notes, here… Somewhere.’

Alastair grabbed a piece of paper and handed it to her. ‘These. But it’s just going to explode.’

‘That’s the point,’ Grace said and she copied the runes with the stele lying on the table, probably Christopher’s. It always gave her a headache, looking at runes, was it like that for all shadowhunters?

She sent the note and watched it go up in flames.

‘Who did you send it?’ Alastair asked.

‘My mother,’ Grace said defiantly. ‘I hope it blows up in her face. But if you want it to work, you need a rune to reverse the process… The first part works, and the last part is to turn it all back.’

‘There’s a turn back time rune,’ Alastair said. ‘It’s more commonly known as a mending rune, but the basis of it is that it reverts time on the object it’s placed on. I’m pretty good with that rune, so I could add it if you want more accurate results.’

‘Of course,’ Christopher said. ‘I tried mending runes far earlier in the process, but it didn’t work well. Of course, there are several different mending runes.’

‘It’s this one,’ Alastair said, drawing it with a pen on a piece of paper. ‘This one turns back time on the object. Other mending runes might interfere too much or not mend the note at all.’

Grace wondered how Alastair knew so much about mending runes. She wished she could have learnt more. It was a pretty rune, she guessed, decorative. Difficult to draw for those who weren’t talented with a stele, maybe. Alastair’s drawing was neat though.

‘I think I need to add the mending rune last,’ Christopher said. ‘ Grace, can you write another message?’

Grace hesitated, and then wrote on a piece of paper. It was a simple message, addressed to Christopher. She added the first couple of runes and then handed the message to Alastair who finished it. Undoubtedly he was better at runes than she was. A few moments later a spark appeared in front of Christopher, and Grace watched as it transformed into more sparks, except it didn’t set anything on fire. Instead, the sparks died out, revealing the note Grace had written. It was a little burnt on the edges, but otherwise it looked just like it had before adding the runes. Christopher’s eyes went wide.

‘It worked!’ Christopher exclaimed. ‘It really worked! Grace, you’re a genius.’

‘It was just a suggestion,’ Grace said, but she liked the compliment.

Grace was used to compliments, of course. All over Europe men had complimented her on her beauty, and, ironically, her grace. It meant nothing compared to what Christopher said.

‘Although it works now, I think we should try to improve it, to make it safer,’ Grace said. ‘Right now, I imagine the message still explodes if you’re not in time with the mending rune and not everyone is as good at it as Alastair. Maybe something to slow the process down to give someone plenty of time to do all the runes correctly. A change in the mixture, perhaps?’

‘Too slow, and it won’t light at all, but you’re onto something,’ Christopher said. ‘And of course we need to test how far we can send a message with the current set up.’

‘We can try sending something to Mrs. Lightwood,’ Grace suggested. ‘Let her know that I found you here.’

Grace didn’t understand why, exactly, but Sophie Lightwood tended to worry when Grace disappeared for long stretches of time. She didn’t understand why any of them would care about her when they all hated her mother. Still, she guessed it was nice, in a way, and she didn’t want Mrs. Lightwood to worry.

‘Alastair and I were leaving for my parents’ house anyway,’ Thomas said. ‘So we can check if it sent.’

‘And send a message back,’ Alastair added as he scooped up some of the powder and put it inside a satchel.

‘Okay. Grace, if you like you can stay here and help me a little longer. Thomas doesn’t like letting me work here unsupervised, but that shouldn’t be a problem when you’re there.’

‘I guess so,’ Thomas said. ‘Try not to blow up the house.’

‘Or try to contain the explosion to Charles’ bedroom,’ Alastair said with a wicked gleam in his dark eyes.

Grace had to admit the idea was appealing. For a long time Grace had thought her beauty and her gift was all that mattered, that she would be a siren seductress and nothing else. But her mother was wrong about her. She wasn’t a seductress and she wouldn’t disappear into the books as some consul’s wife either. She was a scientist, and she had helped Christopher finish his invention to send messages to other shadowhunters. She wondered what else she could do if she gave herself the time to really learn the science behind all that Christopher did. She was ready to find out.

#idrisnet #secret santa #Grace Blackthorn #Christopher Lightwood #Alastair Carstairs #Thomas Lightwood #the last hours

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vibraniumwing · 3 years

Note

angst prompt: “being forced to kill your lover, but you can’t do it, so they take your hand, and help you press the knife into their chest, while the antagonist watches your every move, making sure neither of you try to run” </3 do whichever character you think fits!! I HAVE NO CLUE BC I’M CRYING RIGHT NOW 😃

that i lie with.

a sam wilson x reader wherein sam witnesses the one thing he feared the most on a mission.

WARNING: angst, mentions of blood, knife mention, stabbing, and death.

A/N: okay i hate writing angst for sam so this took me a long time to write but here (it absolutely destroyed me doing so) and i listened to the world caves in so it hurts even more; tissues aren't available as i have used them all up.

---

sam was silent and frozen in his place, hands clammy underneath the material of his new suit as his heart paced at a heightened speed at the sight before him; your body limp on the floor as the male he was tasked to hunt was sadistically smiling, a detonator in his grasp.

"come one, captain, make your choice." the criminal taunted, offering him the knife has he kicked your body once more, causing you to groan in agony. "it's either you killed the bitch who killed my best friend and ruined our plans or this whole vessel sinks to the bottom."

he was nauseous, unable to think rationally, "s-sam, go take the knife. please." you managed to cough out, voice gruff as your hand wiped the blood that came out of your mouth.

though hesitant, sam swiftly took the knife and ran to your side, taking you into this arms as the antagonist walked back to watch the scene unfold, "y/n, baby, hang on okay? redwing's just hovering above- i just need you to stick with me." was his whisper towards you, squeezing your frame gently.

"come on, captain, the clock is ticking." was the words that left the villain's mouth, his impatient footsteps heard through out the dark and eerie cockpit of the ship. "you make the decision; you save that bitch and everyone on this ship dies or you kill her."

sam was quiet on his end, pressured to make the right choice but you grabbed on to his hand that held the knife, "d-do it, sammy, come on." and pressed the metal tip towards your chest, right in front of your heart. "leave me here and go save the rest."

"n-no, i can't do it." he answered immediately, attempting to pull the knife further away from your but your grasp was strong. "n-not you, please, i've- i've already lost riley, not you as well, please."

"y/n, sam, we've got almost all of the hostages out of the ship, buy us a few more minutes to make sure." bucky's voice intercepted through both of your in-ears, making you look at sam once again with a knowing look.

"y-you have to sam, come on now." you begged, tears stinging your eyes as your demise was nearing. "i- i know this is a hard decision for you, but you can save a lot more lives; we'll meet again someday, i promise."

but sam was adamant, shaking his head as he pleaded, "no, baby, not like this, please. i- i don't know how i'll be without you." were his words, voice shaky as he tears started streaming down his face.

as weak and as frail as you were, your free hand reached up to flick away his tears, leaning upward to plant a soft kiss on his lips, "this is hard on me too, but i'm at peace knowing that i died in your arms, sam. i'm at peace knowing that i lie with you even in the afterlife."

"a minute, captain, or this whole ship dies with us." the outlaw threatened, eyes trained to the scene unfolding before him, a sickly laugh escaping his lips, "better make it quick, sammy" he mocked, boisterous as circled around the two of you.

"d-do it, sam, come on." you begged, now crying along with him as both of your hands were now circled around his hands, nodding as you gave him the final nod to do the action.

sam was weak, crying as he attempted to pierce your skin with the sharp object, shaking his head as he whispered, "i- i can't do it", head clouded as he couldn't even think straight anymore.

with one final squeeze on his hand, you helped him push the knife in your chest, making cry out in anguish at the pain you felt, breath running shorter than before as you started to feel nauseous, the oxygen in your body running short.

the laughter that came on the convict's end was exuberant, watching how you were slowly dying in sam's arms. "i thought you would never do it, captain america. too bad, you're still going to die." were the words that left his lips as he pressed on the detonator, the other end of the ship lighting up in a big explosion.

"now, redwing." was all that sam said, the drone shooting out a grapple that wrapped around the criminal's body and flew him out of the cockpit.

"everyone's off the ship! come out now!" bucky's voice came in through the in-ears again which you to slip back into consciousness, making you take a deep breath in as you took a hold of sam, feeling him lift you up and out of the ship and on to the air.

you managed to choke out a laugh, feeling the cool breeze tone down the heat that you were feeling due to the stab wound, your hand weakly holding on to his face, "y-you did good, sammy. i'm proud of you." you whispered, chest rising up and down as your body attempted to regulate the oxygen flow but you were quickly growing tired."

"it's time for me to go now." you said, losing the sense of your surroundings as your body started to grow numb, looking at sam with a sorrowful expression.

"n-no, baby, i can take you to the hospital, we can get you treated, please-" sam whispered, hugging you close to his body as he sped to the boat where bucky and the rest of the hostages were waiting, tears fogging up his vision.

"i'm sorry, sam." you whispered, planting a kiss on his cheek before resting your head on his shoulder, "i love you." as your took your final breath, falling into your eternal slumber.

sam was sobbing by the time he landed on the boat, his grim expression was enough for bucky to not ask any questions and commanded everyone to make space for your lover to lay your body down on the deck of the boat.

he kissed your forehead gently, hugging you close to him, "i love you too, baby. i love you too."

---

TAGLIST: @https-bvcky @harrysweasleys @selenasprompts @weasleytwins-41 @anchoeritic @marvel-diaries @demirunner @barneswidow @romanovfreads @punkrific @6r4cie @yougottalovefandoms @swiftssss @kristensworldin

to those whose urls are in bold, i can’t tag you for some reason. join my taglist! it’s in my main main masterlist <3

#vea answers #sam wilson x reader #sam wilson x y/n #sam wilson x you #sam wilson fic #sam wilson fics #sam wilson imagine #sam wilson imagines #sam wilson one shot #sam wilson fanfic #sam wilson angst #captain america #the falcon #marvel #mcu #marvel x reader

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davidkendall · 2 years

Text

*Rubs sleep out of eyes, stumbles over to lap-top*

“Oh, @palmtreepalmtree mentioned me in a post....what’s all this then?......Oh geez, it’s one of THOSE......but it IS PTPT asking, so.....”

*crack knuckles and wiggles fingers anticipatorially*

***

Yeah, I don’t do these “Tell us more!” things too often, either, because I figure if anyone wanted to know, they’d ask. But, I’m trying to be less curmudgeonly, so I’ll try to answer without seeming like TOO much of a jerk:

Apparently, there’s rules:

Rules: answer these questions and tag some blogs you are contractually obligated to get to know better.

QUESTIONS:

Name: I mean, it’s right there in the URL. No big secret .....

Sign: Saggy the Archer. (I’m getting that on a shirt one day.)

Height: Used to be 6′. Doc says I’m shrinking, and it’s normal. Now 5′11″. I protest this development vehemently.

Time: Noon-ish on the East Coast of the US

Birthday: Yeah, I don’t share that, and the only reason I “celebrate” at all is the missus insists on commemorating the day. I know; I’ve got emotional baggage left over from childhood, yadda yadda yadda. It’s just a day, and it happened long enough ago to make me a Certified Old Dude.

Favourite bands/artists: Far too many to name. Everyone from John Denver to Bruce Springsteen, from Beethoven to John Williams to Mike Post.

Last movie: Re-watched Revenge of the Sith for the first time since it came out. Still don’t like it; the only saving grace is Ewan McGregor

Last show: We’re actually watching Nashville, which was on TV about 10 years ago and we’re finally getting around to it on Hulu. It’s decent, soap-opera-ish fun, with country music sprinkled liberally throughout.

When I created this blog: 2008.

What I post: Lots of reblogs of anything that catches my eye. An occasional original thought. Dad jokes, because it’s the law for dads to share them.

Last thing I googled: "tongue sandwich” because I was explaining how my parents tried to get us to eat beef tongue for dinner when I was a kid, and they used to actually sell tongue sandwiches in delis back in the day.

Other blogs: None active anymore; just this one. Of course, there’s my Twitch stream (4 streams a week) and my Podcast (a new episode every week), so if you REALLY want to get to know me, those are the places to go. (You can ask for the links if you’re at all interested.)

Do I get asks: Occasionally. Always welcome, never required.

Following: I dunno. A lot of folks I find interesting. Some, sadly, have just quietly disappeared, and I wonder what happened to them. What, you want me to look up an actual number? That takes, like, effort.

Followers: I dunno. Again, looking things up is SO much effort.

Average hours of sleep: when I was working, 5-6 hours a night, no problem. Now, 7, and it makes a WORLD of difference in your life.

Instruments: Used to play trumpet; can pick out a tune on a piano and a couple chords on guitar. Don’t take any of them seriously anymore.

What I'm wearing: I mean, the uniform of the day for me these days is jeans and a t-shirt. If I’m feeling fancy, I might throw on an old polo shirt with an actual collar.

Dream job: Radio DJ was the dream, which I did years ago. But like any dream, the reality has it’s down-side too, which I also learned.

Dream trip: Before Covid, it was Ireland. Since Covid, any trip without worrying about bringing a mask and catching Covid is the dream. Seriously, everywhere we go, Covid is front-and-center. Maybe I’m too freaky about it, but I can’t seem to help it.

Nationality: My parents always said “We’re Americans.” Heritage, family history, roots, were completely unimportant to them, for reasons they never made clear and, with them gone, which I’ll never know. Over the years, I learned, through bits and pieces of information at family gatherings, that there’s some Welsh, English, German, and Russian in the mix, but who came from where, and how, and why, and when - I have no idea.

Favourite songs: Impossible to answer because music is so mood-dependent.

Last book I read: I haven’t read anything truly memorable in a while. I know I just finished a book about two weeks ago, but can’t for the life of me remember it. Just started one of those David Baldacci page-turner-specials a couple days ago (Long Road to Mercy), which is readable, but which I’m sure I’ll forget a week after I’m done.

3 fictional universes: So, Star Trek, because that’s the first “fictional universe” I became aware of, and it still gives me hope that one day we (meaning, “humans”) can get to a point in our development like that. And, Star Wars, because who doesn’t want to be Han Solo? And then Middle Earth, because if I can’t be Han Solo, I may as well try to be Gandalf.

Oh, as for tagging folks, first, let me tell you - this takes time to do! So I don’t really want to make anyone feel burdened. And here’s the thing (and this is the way my mind works), if I tag two or three (or six or seven) of my mutuals who I really want to hear about, I don’t want anyone who I didn’t tag to be upset or feel left out, so I’m afraid of not tagging everyone. I also don’t want anyone to feel like they HAVE to do it. (Yeah, that’s why I rarely do these - TOO MUCH PRESSURE!) So, any mutuals who haven’t done this, I’m tagging you because I really DO want to know more, and I don’t want to leave anyone out.

Alright, that was WAY too much effort. Time for a nap.

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mudhornchronicles · 4 years

Text

that cantina | din djarin

^ not my gif

pairing: din djarin x f!bartender reader

warnings: sexual themes and outfits, cursing, adult thots...

fic inspired by this post by @flightlessangelwings

a/n: this is my first time publishing on tumblr and writing about my beloved tin can. so pls bare with me. also pls enjoy the read + the little divider thing i just made and s/o to @jangohshit for the awesome url

masterlist

As she picks up her 50 owed credits and wipes away the watery rims on the streaky mahogany bar top left by a patron’s 6th glass of cold spotchka, she commends the Dug’s ability to walk out of the cantina without crashing onto the floor. Dugs may be small and slender, but Maker can they hold their liquor. With the amount of people in the stuffy, ill-lit cantina, she would expect the Dug to bump into something or someone in his alcohol-driven state.

Unfortunately for her, she did not get to see the amusing sight. Instead, she began to sense the sudden feeling of being watched. She discreetly scopes out the cantina and is immediately met with the intimidating figure and intense stare from a very familiar beskar helmet. She smirks over at the Mandalorian and give a slight nod to guide him over to her side of the risqué cantina.

This cantina in particular, located in the outskirts of Canto Bight, was known for the racy atmosphere once you stepped through the door. Many cantinas liked to keep it simple and vintage with a bar top, tables, and space to walk through. This specific cantina was not that. Whether you were looking to have a drink and observe the bartenders clad in lingerie or pay and party with ladies of the night, everyone knew this cantina as that cantina.

She met him about 3 cycles ago. He was looking for a Gungan gone rogue and his tracking fob led him to Canto Bight. When he had asked about the bounty to people in the city, they all told him that he’d find the bounty at that cantina. He began to get frustrated, but then he saw her. As she walked to work, she’d caught his eye. He walked over to her and she smiled at him. Mando had never had someone just smile at him, and Maker did her smile ignite something in him. She walked with him to the cantina with her walking in first and him following minutes later. When she caught his eye again, it was for a very different reason.

The worn leather bustier she wore emphasized her chest so much that Mando had to make sure his visor was not distorting the image in front of him. She wore a yellow and black plaid skirt and some heels whose laces wound up to her knee. He knew she was beautiful, but then he noticed the insincere smile she wore as she worked behind the bar. This job was supposed to be in and out – quick and simple. But meeting her made him want to let the bounty enjoy his 2,000 credits he just spent on a Pantoran lady. When he landed the first time, he told himself he’d never come back to that weird place. Yet, here he is again for what feels like the thousandth time.

She turns around to face the inside of the worn-down bar and adjusts her breasts in her obsidian-colored corset. She always wanted to look her best for her favorite client. She grabs a clean glass of water and turns back around to lean on the counter. All because she is the Mandalorian best view in the place, or at least that is what he's told her.

“Me'vaar ti gar,” he coldly says to her.

She looks into his visor with a stern look. “Naas.”

A lighthearted sound comes out the beskar helmet as he lightly taps the counter and takes a seat. “Kandosii!”

“Don’t know what that means, but what will it be today, Mando? Business or pleasure?” She winks at him while his visor is set on her face. She doesn’t know that the man behind the visor has been in cantina for an hour prior to his approach just looking at the woman he can’t seem to shake off.

“There has never been pleasure, mesh’la. Just business,” he calmly says. She shrugs and passes him the glass of water.

“Never hurts to ask, right? Maybe one day you’ll change your mind,” she says jokingly. “So, tell me. What bounty are you looking for now? I can’t confirm or deny that I have any information for you tonight, but there was a suspicious Twi'lek that came in about an hour ago. He’s on the other side of the bar.”

He looks towards the green Twi’lek and nods. He puts the glass aside and gives her a once over. “When did you get that corset? Last time I was here, you had a purple one. The one with the lace trimming and black ties in the back.” She smiles and looks down. He remembers, she thought.

“It started to get worn down so I sold it for 25 credits. Better than nothing, but do you like it? I just bought it with the credits you oh so greatly left me the last time.” She lightly taps his gloved hand resting on the counter. “What did you say when you left it? Think of it as a tip for your information and all I told you was that there was no Rodian,” she laughs. A modulated chuckle leaves his helmet as he looks at the other bartenders in the place. All in lingerie, more revealing than hers. Although she was wearing a corset, which covered most of her torso, her legs were very exposed. A sight Mando forcibly had to rip away from every time he was here. His mind wandered every time.

The thought of running his bare fingers along the bottom of her smooth legs to the top of her supple thighs.

The thought of how they’d feel wrapped around his waist, bringing him closer to her as he fills her with the feelings he can’t verbally express to her yet.

The thought of her thighs pressing the sides of his head as he ea-

He is ripped out of the less than innocent daydream as she’s waving her hand in front of his visor. “Mandooooo. You in there?” His line of tinted vision focuses back onto her smiling face, the smile that haunts his dreams. “I’m sorry. What did you say?”

She shakes her head and smirks. “I said if you need any information on a bounty! I have a client who wants me to join his little “get together” and is paying a good amount, so I don’t have much time.” She nudges her head up to a balcony set up in the cantina where other ladies are dancing for a group of Weequays.

He looks up and looks back at her. “How much ae they paying for you to waste your time with him?” She smirks and raises her eyebrow at the warrior in front of her.

“You jealous?”

“Jii, dala,” he warns.

She pouts and crosses her arms, which, in Mando’s eyes, only accentuates her chest. “No fair. You haven’t taught me that, yet.”

He sighs. He straightens up and leans a bit forward toward her. “Cyare, how much is he paying for you to go up there?”

She looks at his visor and feels as if she can look into the eyes of her beloved warrior. She looks back down at her hands. “3,000.”

“Dank farrik,” he whispers to himself. He looks down into his belt and counts the credits he currently has. A grand total of 1,400. He knows he can’t out-do 3,000 credits. He still must go out and get The Child and himself some supplies. They can’t survive on the old ration packs he had for emergency purposes.

Truthfully, she doesn’t want to go up there either. She was already given a new “uniform” by the Toydarian cantina owner for the night. A brown leather bra, black lace panties, black ripped stockings, and, weirdly enough, a pair of old brown boots. Weequays know nothing of fashion she thought to herself. As much as she knows Weequays can get touchy, she knows she can’t say no. She’s getting 1000 of those credits. A 33% share is a rare occurrence for Toydarians and she needs those credits if she wants to eat and have a roof over her head. She looks back at her Mandalorian and decides to lighten the mood.

“So do you like it or not?”

He turns and looks back at her. “Like what?”

She does a slow spin with the smile that can melt Hoth. “The outfit you bought me!”

“It’s nice,” he simply says, still not okay with her upcoming shift.

She abruptly stops and pouts. “Nice? I won’t be getting tips with a nice outfit, Mando. What if I unbutton the top buttons?” She goes to unbutton her corset and takes a step back when Mando suddenly grabs her hand to halt her actions.

“No.” He looks at her hand in his hand loosens his grip, but her hand remains in his. “I- I meant that you look nice in it. Not nice as in cute nice, but nice as in you look…” He stops speaking and looks at her. “You look… you look incredible. Any man would be lucky to have a woman like you at his arm.”

She feels almost giddy inside, as if her elementary school crush finally came up to say hello followed by her name. She looked at her hand in his as she felt a light blush form across her cheeks. “You really think so?”

Before he could answer, the aforementioned Toydarian cantina owner flies over to her all the while yelling her name. She immediately let go of her Mandalorian’s hand and acknowledges her boss. He begins yelling at her for not yet changing for her appointment with the Weequay group and she notices the beskar covered warrior tense. Mando stands and faces the Toydarian and begins to speak, but is cutoff by her.

“Don’t worry, boss. I was just wrapping up this client’s order. I’m going. You’ll get your 2000 credits.” She begins to push her boss away.

“You better make them happy. They’ve got loose pockets.” The Toydarian suddenly grabs her chin “If they say jump, you say how high. You got-“ She follows his gaze over to her Mandalorian, only to see him pointing a blaster at the Toydorian’s head.

“She’s going to do what she’s comfortable doing, you got that?”

Her boss chuckles and shakes his head at the bounty hunter. “She’s going to do what is going to make me money.”

She tries to interfere, but the bounty hunter grabs her boss by his face’s trunk. “Listen here, you oversized Kowakian. They aren’t going to touch her and she’s going to do her job. That’s it.” She tries to convince Mando to let the small creature go, but the warrior wasn’t done. “If I hear she was uncomfortable in even the slightest, it’s your trunk on my wall. Do you understand?” All she saw was her boss frantically nod in agreement and fly away as soon as Mando let go. She looks over at the Mandalorian she has grown to harbor deep feelings for.

“What the hell was that!”

He slides his blaster back into its holster and places some credits on the counter, more than what an untouched glass of water costs.

“You’re going to do your job and so am I. You see the biggest Weequay in the group?” she looks over and nods.

He activates the tracking puck, revealing that the Weequay leader was coincidentally his bounty. “Stars, Mando! If you are catching him, then why are you so worried about me going up there?” He looks over to her and shrugs.

“Why would I want you to be in that position?”

She smiles at him and lightly gives her own shrug. She checks the time and takes the still untouched glass of water. “Well Mando, it was nice to see you again. Should I expect you in the next couple of rotations?”

“Possibly.”

She lets out a small laugh and she takes the credits for the water, leaving the rest. Before he can protest, she catches him by surprise with her departing choice of words. “You know Mando, sometimes I think you might love me.” With that she laughs and waves a goodbye as she walks away to ready herself for the Weequays.

He watches her leave and his eyes direct themselves to her behind. Those small shorts that leave little to the imagination as they shape the swells of her ass beautifully. He is a man after all. He smiles to himself as he recalls her previous statement. He lets out a small chuckle as he stands to scope his bounty. “Yeah… might.”

mando’a translations:

Me'vaar ti gar [Meh-VAR tee-GAR] = How are you? (Lit. What’s new with you?)

Naas [nahs] = Good (Lit. Nothing)

per mandoa.org “Me'vaar ti gar = How are you? (Lit: what's new with you?) Can also be used to ask a soldier for a sitrep. If a Mando asks you this, they expect an answer; it's literal.. The response for *I'm fine thanks,* is *Naas.* (Literally - nothing. )”

Kandosii! [Kan-DOH-see] = Nice one! Wicked! Well done!

Mesh’la [MAYSH`lah] = beautiful

Jii [gee] = Now

Dala [DAH-lah] = Woman

Cyare [SHAH-ray] = beloved

tags:

@flightlessangelwings @din-damn-djarin

#din djarin x reader #the mandalorian x reader #mandalorian x reader #din djarin #the mandalorian #pedro pascal #pedro pascal characters #that cantina #star wars

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lostmykeysie · 3 years

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➶*✧*⤪･*✧*2022 FIC GOALS*✧*･⤪*✧*➶

first up, thanks to @theonlywolfpants and @wolfstarhaven for being generally all round amazing, but also for tagging me in this

1. finish Trust is Earned

so this is a two in one, because i need to finish this, but i also need to learn from it: never plan a beginning and an ending for a fic and then just dive in. i need structure!! i need plot!! and yet here i am, without either!! as much as i love writing fluff i cannot write multi chap fluff, i am directionless. but i will finish it!!! i originally told myself i'd do it in time for christmas, but that's not going to happen. 2022 it is.

2. finish and publish my regulus black redemption fic

so this one i am excited about. i have learned from past mistakes and have planned the entire thing, every single chapter, but it means so much to me that i'm worried i'll be writing and re-writing and editing forever and just never post. i've never read anything reg focused/centric and it's all very new but i already love it so much and i'm hoping it'll be my best so far. just need to take the plunge! i have decided i will do it today. promise.

3. read non-wolfstar fic

so my issue is that i have a lot of problems with focusing and attention. i love fanfiction! it completely made my life during lockdown when i was in a situation (that i'm unfortunately still in) where i can't watch any tv or films because my mind just can't focus for long enough. imagine lockdown but without netflix or disney+ or anything - that was basically me. subscriptions to every streaming service out there but no brain that will let me watch, i was genuinely just lying in bed every day staring at the ceiling lol. then something or other got me onto ao3 and i've always been a wolfstar fan in concept but never in practice but next thing i know i'm hooked, and i've finally found entertainment my brain is happy with!!! but now i'm seeing all these talented writers with so much to give and i really want to branch out and read something else so i can appreciate them fully but i need a good introduction to trick my brain into caring about something other than wolfstar. i would really love some fic recommendations for non-wolfstar HP ships (and preferably not remus or sirius because wolfstar are endgame) fic that is short/semi short that you think showcases the characters or pairing and could kickstart my interest - please please please!!!!!!!

4. interact more

i honestly think i've only had tumblr for about a month which is insane. i had it when i was a teenager (makes me sound so old, i am still in my 20s ok leave me alone) - this super angsty depressing black and white blog. i'd love to find it but i can't remember my url and i don't have access to my old email :( but anyway, i've not hopped on here for long, but i am so glad i did, because it's great, but i am so out of the loop. so my plan for 2022 is to interact more and get to know everyone (lame)

5. write more!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Meeting With a Stranger is honest to god the first thing i've ever written. it all started after many bottles of wine with two of my greatest friends. we were talking about ff and how we'd love to write, but didn't have the stones to/didn't have anything to say. (they're completely different fandoms - V is all about supernatural (destiel!) and L is a huge k-pop fan (loves BTS)) and i was saying how i'd love to beta work but could never write because my brain was empty of plot. then it got me thinking, and then the first MWaS scene with remus and james came into my mind, and then i would think of some stupid/funny line and be like haha sounds like something remus would do, and then boom, i'm writing a whole ass fic, and the rest is history.

i have a doc with prompts and inspos and scenes that i would to build on, mostly oneshots (i love writing fluffy oneshots so much) including a christmas wolfstar that i'm going to try and write next week and my reggie redemption fic eek! so i think this one will be my easiest goal only because now i've started, i canny stop

6. beta fics

i want to beta fics!!!!!!! in reality i want to live out my secret dream job of being an editor. i've never beta'd a fic and i'm not sure what the level of involvement is but it's something i really want to start in '22 so... if anyone is in need of a beta hit me up in 2022 :D

sorry this ended up really long, i am apparently an oversharer. all my mutuals have already been tagged and posted their 22 goals which tells me i need to get cracking on #4 asap!

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phantom-moonfire · 3 years

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So, I'm alive.

Honestly, I've been gone for like half a year, so I wouldn't be surprised if most of you guys just straight up don't remember me, but I feel like I owe some kind of explanation as to why I suddenly disappeared and ghosted everyone with basically no explanation beyond "personal reasons" in the dick move of the century.

First of all, I'd like to apologize for that, that was seriously an asshole thing to do looking back, especially knowing how close I was to some of you. (I'm gonna personally say @starfallen-tears @all-my-fandoms-are-killing-me @justafankid @kitkat-kiwikat and @rebelwhodoesntknow here, although there are definitely more, but it's been a while to say the least, and I don't remember everyone's urls tbh, these are just the ones I thought of off the top of my head.) ((If I tagged you do Not feel obligated to read this all the way through, I just figured you might want to know this stuff, don't feel bad if you don't want to read.))

So, uh, the short version is that I'm not actually coming back. Not right now, at least. Eventually.

((Long explanation and more details below, with a TL;DR at the bottom))

For the long version, I'm gonna start off with the reason I left in the first place. My old phone was barely functioning, and had some serious issues with it where it would keep shutting off randomly, and the issues just kept getting progressively worse to the point where the process of just turning it on would take about half an hour. I'm not getting into the smaller details of it, but it was basically unusable. My parents don't know I have tumblr or discord or anything basically (they're mad strict but I'm not gonna get into That rn), and since my phone kept shutting itself off, and we were taking it to get repaired etc (I have a new phone now!) I ended up having to just quickly delete all of my social media/communication apps, which is why I initially disappeared without saying anything.

I'm pretty sure that at some point after I got my new phone, I used tumblr briefly on the web browser to give an update, but I left not long after, and I didn't have access to discord because discord's extremely weird when you're trying to use it from google on a phone, and not from the app. The reason I never just. y'know. reinstalled the apps. was because I was starting to get extremely bad anxiety about my parents potentially finding the apps, and me Getting Caught, and I honestly was just not mentally or emotionally in a good enough place to deal with that extra anxiety. So if you've dm'd me or tagged me or tried to get into contact with me on discord in any way, I'm not ignoring you, I just don't have a way to access discord right now.

As of right now, I'm not planning on reinstalling either discord nor tumblr immediately, because, along with dealing with Anxiety, I also have school to deal with, working on college applications, trying to find a job for the summer, and doing a good amount of the chores at my house due to my dad having health issues, as well as some extra things I need to do in order to help my dad with those issues, as he's not able to drive anymore, and just generally needs help with more things. So, basically, I just straight up don't have time to be active on tumblr anymore.

However, circumstances will eventually change. I'm not going to be gone forever. I'm going to turn eighteen in a few months, along with going to college in a year, so I'll definitely be back eventually, or at least I'll give another update after I turn 18.

Once I come back, I am most likely not going to return to this blog, and instead make a new one. I've been here since I was in like sixth or seventh grade, and honestly I would rather not have my idiot teenage years following me for the rest of my life, cuz I know I've said dumb shit on here before, and there's probably stuff that I've posted or commented about my personal life that I'd rather not have people be able to find, so when I do come back, it will probably be to tell you guys what my new blog is called, and to relocate all of my shit to there.

TL;DR: I have anxiety, I am busy, and I don't know when I'll be back, but it will be on a new blog.

#my post #update

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okmcintyre · 3 years

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I was tagged by @togetherkru , thanks so much for thinking of me! I loved reading your answers & these are always a lot of fun to fill out! 😊☀️

1. why did you choose your url?

I actually just updated my URL after nine long years, mostly because I was uber jealous of y’all with t100 specific usernames. 😅 The majority of my content is catered to that fandom, so it made sense to freshen it up. After ruling out my first choice (@madigriffin, I mean how cool would that be!) I decided that since I relate most to Harper’s energy I’d go with her last name.... and added a variation of my own first name that I thought looked cute.

2. any side blogs? if you have them, name them and why you have them

Yes! Goodness I have private sideblogs for writing drafts/inspiration, and to organize gif-making tutorials that I like to keep on hand... then there’s my Bellarke Fanfiction sideblog (@twosuns-ofbellarke)... and I help out with a couple The 100 appreciation/edits pages. I have my old URL too, just in case I ever want to start using it again.

... And I do actually have @augustkomtrikru active too, which I’d intended to use as my main URL once the prequel started up that is, before Season 7B broke my damn heart and I vowed off anything Rothenberg related unless he goes back and fixes that mess that ended our beloved show. 🤷‍♀️

3. how long have you been on tumblr?

I joined on January 4, 2012.

4. do you have a queue tag?

No, but I do tag original posts!

#t100kt, #friendskt, #luciferkt, #tumblrkt, #liveblogkt, #ask away!

5. why did you start your blog in the first place?

I came to tumblr because I was struggling to find my groove on LiveJournal and Blogger (wow just aged myself there, didn’t I?👵). I liked that I could post different kinds of content here... and I was obsessed with Fringe, which was still on air. This quickly became the place I came for spoilers and spaz at all the beautiful gifs from the show.

6. why did you choose your icon/pfp?

Because our fearless leaders marching away from the rover together, looking like badass supermodels, is a big mood! 💥

7. why did you choose your header?

It matched the icon & I found it in my old cell phone edits ready to go

8. what post of yours has the most notes?

This Clarke & Bellamy post from Season 6, with 1700+ notes.

9. how many mutuals do you have?

Is there a way to see that? I have a bunch and they are all lovely people! ☺️

10. how many followers do you have?

Last I checked I was around 1.7k, I’m super grateful for everyone who sticks around for my hodgepodge of posting!

11. how many people do you follow?

4935, we have a lot of great fandom here and I lack chill...

12. have you ever made a shitpost?

1. (noun) any content on the internet whose humor derives from its surreal nature and/or its lack of clear context... a shitpost is funny simply because it isn't a predictable repetition of an existing form. Shitposts can become memes, but memes cannot become shitposts.

So now that Urban Dictionary explained what that means (I told you, I’m not a spring chicken anymore! 😂) I don’t believe so? Unless you include my old liveblogs, they were absolutely without context.

13. how often do you use tumblr?

I’m always popping in throughout my day. I like to keep up to my notifs & new posts in the tags, and then when I have more time on my hands I’ll look into my mutuals and feed a little more properly.

14. did you have a fight/argument with another blog? who won?

I can remember a couple years ago butting heads with a couple folks when I first got into fandom: the posting etiquette here was quite different from the message boards I was used to interacting on... and I had a mishap or two as a result. I genuinely believe that no one wins when that happens though, so I really make an effort to keep this a positive space. Learn from the mistakes. 💛

15. how do you feel about ‘you need to compare this’ posts?

Thanks gosh @togetherkru that you didn’t know these either! Like, what is that? Google doesn’t even seem to know.

16. do you like tag games?

I LOVE THEM!

17. do you like ask games?

Also love them! The posts are always wildly unpopular but they are a lot of fun

18. which one of your mutuals do you think is tumblr famous?

Every one! There’s so much talent here and so many folks have established their blogs as a cornerstone of their respective fandoms. And again, I have no idea where to find a list of all my mutuals to compare... but I always feel like I’m the new kid on the block, I’m pretty sure most of my mutuals have been here years longer than I have.

19. do you have a crush on a mutual?

I have a crush on my mutuals’ beautiful gif-making and writing and artsy abilities, if that counts? 😃

20. tags (if you guys want to)

I’m going to tag some folks from my notifications, feel free though to participate anyone reading this! Or if it isn’t your cuppa tea, don’t feel obligated those I tagged... have a great day everybody! 🙂☕

@bt06, @padfootx, @isweartobreathe, @bravestartingwithyou, @kizo2703, @pendragaryen, @whatabeautifullife13, @immortalpramheda, @1jemmagirl22, @frecklesandfanfics, @little-oxford-st, @infp-with-all-the-feelings, @kris-lulu, @womanwithaplan, @bellamyschin, @peaceloveandbabyducks, @geekyogicheese, @al3xia17 & anybody else who wants to play!.

#tag game!#thnx for tagging op! ☺️☺️☺️🧡#the 100 #almost all my content is t100 lol #fringe #kateemcintyre #tumblrkt #about me #Play along folks!#this was fun #anti-7b #lol

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gourmetpunk · 3 years

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It’s No Game #2: Dancing About Architecture

My Masters in Information Science was mostly a waste, but I got to take at least a couple electives that made me consider things in a different light. Even when these courses were a little sloppily taught themselves, most contained at least a couple ideas worth pulling out of their contexts and extrapolating on in other fields. Case in point: a course I took on “Information Architecture” got me thinking on its applications to video games, which was certainly not the intention of the professor that taught it.

I should give a brief summary of the central concept of the course before I continue: “Information Architecture” is just a fancy way to talking about the way information is laid out in a multi-faceted system someone might have to access that information through - usually something like the arrangement of links on a website, or the controls for interacting with various webpages. It encompasses things like the structures of menus, the “flow” of navigation and the options available for searches, among other aspects. This isn’t exactly new stuff, but talking about it in terms of “architecture” did make a new connection for me that I hadn’t considered before: the fact that physical and non-physical “spaces” are both products of (usually) deliberate design that can guide occupants of those spaces towards certain uses. Just as a house without a back door forces everyone to enter and exit through the front, a site without a “home” button on every page also encourages users to interact with it in a certain way (probably either leaving as soon as they reach a “dead end” or grumpily having to re-type the URL or search for the site again when they want to go back).

One strange intersection of these two architectures can be found in the design of a video game, where the line between what constitutes a “physical” and “non-physical” space to the player is a little blurry. On one level, technically everything in a video game is “information” and therefore “non-physical” – OK, yes, some smart-ass is going to interject here by arguing that the same could be said of the “real” world, so what’s so different about that? But I want to set aside philosophical debates about the material vs. ideological nature of reality for a second here and simply point out that there is a way in which video games are much more tangibly “all information” than the real world is: we can see their underlying informational structure by which they operate, and manipulate it to make it operate otherwise, in the form of its coding. What I’m saying here is basically “It’s Media”.

Sure, you might say, but so is any other medium – TV, film, music, books, etc. What makes video games so different from other media? Well, this one’s easy enough: you interact with video games and “navigate” their content very directly in a way that you don’t with those other media. As a result of this, video games are typically structured as a medium to be interacted with in such a way, and thus you have developers creating a sort of “simulacrum” (sorry) of real life experience to make the navigation of their information engaging to players. Typically this experience strives to resemble the real world in some respects, and one of the most common ways in which it does is by simulating physical space that the player can “move” around in – thus video games are also pseudo-physical as well as informational space. (Please note that I’ve been using the term “video games” here and not, say, “computer games” or just “games”, and while this doesn’t usually have relevance, here it actually does: my points with regard to physical space just don’t apply to non-graphical games like Dwarf Fortress – so I really am only talking about “video” games here.)

Now obviously no video game is a perfect simulacrum of reality, and this is probably for the best. But what makes the medium interesting in its aspirations towards physical space is the extent to which you can actually witness the gaps between the informational and pseudo-physical spaces in video games as you play them (note: from hereon out I will replace “pseudo-physical” with “physical” in descriptions of games, as I hope it will easily be understood what I’m referring to). Here I’ll contrast three different games that take the same basic action of swinging a weapon and approach it in three different ways. The first and simplest approach is that of something like Dark Souls; you have a weapon that exists as information in the game, but is also represented in its physical space. When you press a button on the controller, your character in the game swings their weapon – but the player has little control over how they swing the weapon. The game’s information with regard to the weapon is pre-programmed to respond in a very limited number of ways to button presses, and the character’s attack will be identical each time the button is pushed with a limited number of modifying circumstances, such as holding a direction down while attacking, or attacking while moving. The “combos” the weapon is capable of can only be performed by singular button presses with the occasional circumstantial context modifying it slightly. The weapon’s movements exist more as information here than as actions in a physical space.

Contrast this with a fighting game like one from the SoulCalibur series. In these games, characters wield weapons which have a wide range of possible movements, and the player has far more options with regard to buttons they can press to trigger attacks. Many of these attacks try to fit their triggering control combinations to the aspect of physical space they take place in – eg., an attack that starts low and rises would be accompanied by directional motion of the control stick alongside the relevant button presses. Many fighting games take this approach to motion and attacking within their physical spaces, and in this they come closer to replicating attack movement in physical space than something like Dark Souls as they add a multi-dimensional element to it. Finally, take a game that uses advanced motion controls such as The Legend Of Zelda: Skyward Sword (I would use a Virtual Reality game for an even more obvious example, but I haven’t played any and don’t feel like doing research into them to determine how well they actually follow physical movement). While some may argue whether the mechanic was a worthwhile addition, the game is notable for including swordplay that follows the actual position of the player’s own hand as long as they hold the motion control remote. Thus the player can, to a certain extent, control the exact position of the main character’s sword in the game’s physical space – if they raise their hand, the character raises his sword, if they lower it, he lowers it, etc. This represents the highest level (again, short of Virtual Reality) of a video game mimicking the action of swinging a weapon within its physical space.

You could consider the three aforementioned examples as each constituting a dimension of space in video games: Dark Souls’s weapon movements are largely one-dimensional (a single data input, on or off, in the form of a button press), SoulCalibur’s are two-dimensional (with the on/off gaining a new dimension in the form of directional control) and Skyward Sword’s are three-dimensional (with its controls being determined by player movements in real 3D space). But note that a simple increase in dimensions does not necessarily result in a more “realistic”-feeling battle; Skyward Sword’s controls were notorious for being exact in their demands of the player’s movements (having to slice across a very specific space to defeat an enemy), as well as for slowing the pace of combat due to enemies having to be programmed to make their 3D “weak point” available to the player in time for them to react.

Meanwhile, Dark Souls has something going for it that the other two games cannot match: it has expansive, detailed 3D environments to a noticeably larger degree. Because the player’s attacks in the other two games only work from certain angles relative to the camera, their combat stages couldn’t have a lot of depth to them if the combat was to get serious and precise. By avoiding having to worry about that level of directional attack precision, Dark Souls opens up the floor to what might be considered more creative stage design for boss fights. Thus you see boss fights in multi-leveled buildings where players might learn to take advantage of higher ground, boss fights in narrow spaces that can be navigated carefully with the right dodge to sneak in more attacks, boss fights where parts of the arena can damage you if walked on, etc. Furthermore, the lack of focus on precision attacking with regard to space is made up for in the form of precision with regard to time (parrying, for example, can open up an enemy to further attacks if timed right) and more aggressive enemies that don’t need to be programmed to make their physical weak spots obvious. These are not necessarily points that make Dark Souls a better game than the others – I point them out to reveal how decisions about how to simulate physical space in a video game always involve trade-offs and may have both benefits and disadvantages to the player, depending on what they are looking for. (You’ll notice that trade-offs will be a major recurring theme in this series of essays, but I’ll talk more on that another time).

But so far I have only spoken to the extent of a single action as it can be represented in a game’s physical vs. information space. This is a very simple kind of information “architecture”, as it is really only the design of a lone object. What about the more complex structures in a game that straddle the line between information and physical space? A great example of this can be found in the concept of menus and “bases”. Each of these structures exists as something usually seen as distinctly informational or distinctly physical, and yet there is a strange amount of crossover through the functions each may serve in a game.

Consider a “home base” structure in a video game. It could be that of the Hunter’s Dream in Bloodborne, or the space station in Super Mario Galaxy, or the main character’s farm in Harvest Moon, or the dormitory in Persona 3, or the End Of Time in Chrono Trigger, or the castle in Suikoden II. Each of these bases is notable for having a specific physical structure that the player can move around in while also serving very specific informational purposes that could theoretically be replaced by a non-physical aspect like a menu. What separates these bases from the rest of the game’s physical spaces is the fact that they exist primarily for the purpose of players obtaining informational content. Typically, you do not fight enemies or otherwise make “progress” in these spaces; they are intermediary, spaces “between” the parts of the “real” game, and yet the developers have inserted them as necessary rest stops for the player on their journey through the game, sometimes to the point that they may spend more time at the bases over the course of the game than in any other single area, even if they are rarely there for more than 5 or 10 minutes each time.

The main purpose of the base is, at its root, to act as an information management system. Here, the player engages with aspects of the game that are the most informational and the least physical in nature, such as changing equipment and party members, levelling up or otherwise adjusting stats, saving the game, and selecting a level or area of the world to warp to, among many other functions. As previously stated, all of these functions could potentially be replaced by menus and conceived of in terms of pure “information architecture”, but they have instead been “physicalized” and organized around a space designed in terms of more traditional architecture. You’ll also notice that not every game does this; many games scrap the idea of a home base entirely and are run purely in terms of information architecture for the management of these systems (think of a straightforward level-based action game like Contra III), or they minimize the home base’s functions as much as possible (the Metroid Prime series’ “home base” of a ship does little more than save and transport the player to different areas, neither of which is a function unique to the ship in the series’ worlds). Some don’t even like the idea of a home base, seeing it as a dated idea that is very much the product of its rise to prominence in the 90s. But love them or hate them, home bases are undeniably interesting from the perspective of the tension between physical and informational architecture. On one level, they can make or break the experience of game due to how much time the player has to spend interacting with them. It is common for the developer to design an “interesting” space to visit for the benefit of players, but there is again sometimes a tradeoff between “interesting” and “usable”; Suikoden II’s castle is, uh, interesting in its Byzantine structure of corridors, barracks and floors, but I found it infuriating to navigate in the early stages of the game when I was just trying to do a simple task like save my game or sail to another town – and even more infuriated once I learned the actual layout of the castle better and realized that I was never going to use approximately 70% of its spaces for anything relevant to the gameplay. This is a case where I wish the space had been collapsed into a menu and reduced to pure information rather than have it try to simulate physical space.

Perhaps a more controversial example would be the space station in the original Super Mario Galaxy, which is circular and multi-tiered. The castle in Super Mario 64 was definitely a complex hub for its time, and Delfino Plaza in Sunshine doubled down, making a full town that was basically a playable level in itself (and which almost disqualifies it from being a true “home base” – let’s call it an “edge case”). But the original Galaxy (and this is crucial, because the sequel changed a lot of this design, possibly in response to complaints) is a strange step back from Sunshine; it’s smaller, but not necessarily easier to navigate. There are no stars to be found there, making it more like 64’s castle than Sunshine’s Delfino Plaza. At the same time, the player must have some skill simple to navigate some parts of it in any kind of efficient manner; a well-timed wall jump will save you having to climb an entire set of circular stairs, and a hop across a platform moving in the opposite direction can help to land you closer to the next level-select point than you would be if you took the long way around. In other words, the base is structured like a level with no real rewards beyond an increased efficiency in level selection time if the player is familiar enough with navigating its shortcuts. Some see this as slightly annoying, as it delays the time it takes for players to access the higher-up levels on the station, and this is a valid complaint; I, however, enjoy the way it makes a game out of level selection in itself – certainly it feels more rewarding than fumbling through the castle in Suikoden II.

So there can be different justifications for these home bases’ physical representations in the face of a potential reductionist design to remove them entirely. Conversely, we could see how the opposite argument can be applied to reduce elements of the “real” gameplay to information architecture. This will be discussed more in-depth in a future essay on player agency, but consider the possibility of a player having to make a meaningful choice that will impact how the game’s story (or even gameplay) proceeds from that point on. This is an informational aspect of the game, but it could be represented physically in the game’s space, and sometimes is; imagine a player being presented with a branching path in the road, or a building they can choose to enter or leave, or a situation with a hostage where they can choose which angle to approach from, with NPCs responding accordingly to reveal the consequences of the player’s decision. This, however, is harder to program than a simple two-way switch in which a player can select one option or another in a dialogue or menu screen, thus fully “informationalizing” the process. Many more games tend to do this, such as Mass Effect, Deus Ex and a whole host of JRPGs. Please keep in mind that both are valid approaches, though they do differ through the experience a player will have with the game; choosing the “informational” approach to design will more likely cause a player to see their journey as a series of fixed points and branching paths for which they must plan carefully at every step, while a “physicalized” approach to choices could lead players to treat their decisions (and, as a result, their gameplay style) as more spur-of-the-moment improvisation and experimentation. The advantages and disadvantages of the extreme ends of each approach should be obvious, and there’s also nothing stopping a game from containing both kinds of decision-mechanisms, implemented at different points.

But why stop only at the point of “crucial choices”? Why not turn every aspect of a game into information rather than physicality? Well, the logical endpoint of this is, of course, a text-based game – in other words, not a “video game” at all. But there is an interesting angle here in that you can classify some games through this lens as more or less text-based due to their de-emphasizing the physicality in favour of information. For example, it would be hard to call most first-person shooters anything close to text-based, but Dark Souls might be closer to text than Halo is, and a main series Final Fantasy game would be closer than Dark Souls. At the furthest end of this, you have “visual novels”, which often allow for only the most limited navigation of a physical space (Danganronpa, Phoenix Wright), if any at all (Heaven Will Be Mine has none, only abstract depictions).

What this all comes back to is an “architecture” of the game in the abstract sense. The game is both an informational and physical space that players will be guided to interact with in different ways depending on how designers build it, just as it is with real architecture. And this is true even when the player is trying to interact with the game’s space in a way they aren’t “supposed” to. Consider the case of mountains or other large structures in a game; no matter what kind of game it is, there will almost always be a decent portion of players whose instinct is to try and climb the mountain. Now this is a particularly interesting case of the informational and physical aspects of video game architecture – the mountains may exist physically in the world of the game, but the informational aspect of their programming will determine how much resistance the player encounters in their task. For example, Breath Of The Wild and the most recent Assassin’s Creed games have built-in climbing mechanics, often actually intended for climbing mountains. There are some structures that are not “supposed” to be climbable, but players nevertheless attempt to do so, sometimes to gleefully glitchy results. Other games might not have a climbing mechanic, but they could have a jumping mechanic that might let the player’s character rest on angles of a certain incline. Thus players might execute jumps at just the right angles to climb a mountain that they were not intended to be able to (this was often easier in older games with simpler polygon constructions for the environments, where a player could find the “sweet spot” in the design that the developers had overlooked). A game like Horizon: Zero Dawn tries to make climbing impossible unless the player is at a spot intended for it, but the player can still jump, and because of this, sometimes “climb” their way up the side of a mountain they weren’t supposed to. Many RPGs, however, will forbid this kind of interacting with the physicality of mountains by way of control design as well as environment design; not only are the mountains programmed as sheer walls the player can’t even interact with aside from bumping into them, the player might not even have the option to jump, let alone move in a multi-tiered structure without guidance along a direct path.

But this is all with regard to the physical space of the game; what about its purely informational space? The design of these spaces can be just as important depending on your game, as a player could be spending a lot of time in menus and decision screens in an RPG. Thus the “architecture” of the information the player will have to regularly access becomes a matter of concern; there is once again an “interesting” angle and an “efficient” angle. Battle menus can make a game incredibly frustrating when they don’t do things like save the last action the player was resting on when it comes back to their turn – at least in some cases! In others, such a feature might be confusing and misleading to the player’s familiarity with the menu. What about things like displaying turn order for a battle? If this is important the gameplay, do you want the player to be able to see it so they can plan their moves carefully? Or do you want them to have to figure it out by trial and error each time? In a game where the player amasses a lot of items, do you have multiple methods of sorting through these by name, type, etc.? Are these the same methods players actually want to use? Speaking of which, how does such a vast array of material make a player feel about the way they interact with that material in the first place? Would someone maybe value having a limited inventory space just so they will be forced to make important choices about what to keep and what to use or get rid of?

Such questions about the information architecture of these various types of systems in games also leads to consideration of how the information architecture can be physicalized for basic tasks like data management and menus, not only through the functions of a base but by other means. The existence of “save points”, for example, is a feature common to many games, and what is this if not the converting of information architecture into physical architecture? “Saving” is no longer a purely abstract informational concept accessible only by menu, it is represented by something that exists in the real world of the game. Alternatively, one might make sections of a menu more “physical” in their construction by using things like skill trees (or the bizarre variant of the multi-tiered “crystarium” in Final Fantasy XIII) or an inventory with physical space limitations such as those in Parasite Eve and Resident Evil 4. As always, there are tradeoffs inherent in such approaches, though most of these are minor enough that I won’t bore you with the details.

So far, I’ve talked a lot about the implications of architecture for gameplay, but what about that part of architecture that comes up most frequently in real-world popular discourse – what about the aesthetic side of it? The aesthetics of video game architecture are partly tied up in a larger discussion about graphics, which is something I might touch on in a later article just because it consumes so much space in popular video game discourse (and not necessarily without reason – I have stressed that these are “video” games we’re talking about). But it’s not just a question of how pretty (or ugly) the developers can make a structure look; aesthetics in gaming architecture are also deeply determined by the different kinds of access developers will give players to the world as it is constructed around them. This is probably at its most obvious in games with particularly large worlds (which from a design perspective is not necessarily the same thing as being “open world”, so keep that in mind regarding the games I’m about to discuss). Much has been made of the worlds in Dark Souls with their interconnected zones and how these zones do or do not fit coherently together into a lifelike map. Many have praised the original Dark Souls’ world for being interconnected on a level at which all space can be mapped out to produce a picture of a coherent 3D space whose different points intersect only where it makes sense for them to, while some of the same crowd has condemned the world of Dark Souls II for breaking with this coherence and instead creating physically-impossible links between spaces. But I would dismiss this as a mere subjective preference for “realism” that some gamers inexplicably value over the fantasy games provide. There’s nothing wrong with physically incoherent spaces in video games; to some degree, they are almost always necessary in terms of setting limits to the environments, and by dodging the constraints of a hard architectural realism, developers can sometimes come up with creative spaces that impress aesthetically even if they defy spatial logic as it exists outside the game.

Dark Souls II, for example, affords an ominous view of the poison windmill in the Harvest Valley from the valley below. Some players might be sharp enough to notice that the pathway into the windmill they end up taking to progress through the level doesn’t actually make physical sense – they shouldn’t be able to traverse the space and end up where they do by heading in the directions the paths lead them. The ensuing layout of the level, however, does provide a very interesting internal structure to the windmill and players can still feel the reward of looking down at the valley they just cleared from the top once they reach it. The Old Iron Keep provides a similar thrill when players make their way to the top of the statue that looms over the fortress and are able to look out through its eyes. Should they be able to see what they can see from that spot by spatial laws? Who cares? It can still be appreciated in terms of the interior design of the structure they passed through and the spectacle provided at the end of the journey.

The extreme end of this approach is a game like Antichamber, which basically exists specifically to show off the kind of architecture that can only be possible in a hybrid informational/physical space like that of a video game. There’s no real plot to speak of in the game, just a mind-bending space to explore that seems to contradict itself at every turn, with many objects programmed to change appearance and function as soon as the player turns around or approaches them from a different angle. What is impractical in the architectural design of a normal game here becomes the driving force behind the gameplay; the game is a puzzle game, and the puzzle is navigating the space it takes place in, trying to figure out the patterns in its structure and the different ways the player is able to interact with its logic. But it is also an aesthetic experience all in itself, not just through the minimalist block-colour design of the rooms, but through the disorientation it invokes in players unfamiliar with its space.

#Video games #Video game criticism #Architecture #Information architecture #Antichamber #Dark Souls #Dark Souls II #Suikoden II #Soul Calibur #Halo #Skyward Sword #Super Mario Galaxy #It's No Game

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