#for some weird ass reason

[radiance1]

Vlad has been asleep for a few centuries now, in a goddamn coffin that he specifically made just for that like the weird rich person he is. He was also, the phoenix king.

Or at the very least, one of them.

Honestly, Danny couldn't give less of a flying cheerio how long Vlad would sleep for if it wasn't an inconvenience to it.

But it was.

You see, he's the ghost prince, prince of the infinity realms, dragon of infinity, son of war and ward of time, etc, etc.

And somehow, he has bloody paperwork.

Even though the Infinite Realms fell into Anarchy eons ago.

So he honestly doesn't know why he has paperwork, and it's so much that Danny has been spending centuries doing it and he's so tired of it and then he remembered, hey? Who likes can do mountains of paperwork without breaking a sweat and could finish this way better than Danny could?

Vlad Masters.

Hasn't seen the guy after his mother died, don't know where exactly he is, but he isn't in his lair (yes Danny managed to get in, don't ask how) and Danny is going to find this man by the Ancients because he cannot deal with those anymore.

He barely even made a dent!

Anyways, so Danny goes over to Earth because he hasn't been there for a hot minute, and that's probably where Vlad is and uh, woah there is this really Earth cause it's lookin mighty different to how he saw it last time-

Why was the Earth currently covered in flames? Black flames that look mighty familiar to someone else's that he knows actually. You know, someone who should have been sleeping the centuries away instead of, oh he doesn't know.

Taking over the mortal world?

It even seems that Vlad got himself a goddamn cult too! How neat! How much time did it take you to assemble all these people Vlad? You even gave out pieces of your power when you could've been, oh, he doesn't know.

Helping him with paperwork?

So, he's kinda mad about this, pissed, actually. So, he goes to find where exactly Vlad is in this reign of madness, finds a literal crack in reality and just heads on through because he couldn't care less about that actually.

What he finds is not what he expected.

Cause you know Vlad? Phoenix king who is probably trying to take over the mortal world instead of helping him with paperwork and was supposed to be sleeping inside a coffin?

Yea scratch that. Because that isn't a coffin.

When the hell was Vlad sleeping inside a magical barrier-

And who the heck was that spamming Vlad's signature black flames while laughing manically, and who in the infinite realms were those guys who were currently fighting said spammer.

"What exactly, in the Infinite Realms, happened while I was doing paperwork?"

===

So, the Justice League is now combating a new world ending threat. Some cult who wants to cleanse the world in the name of their deity so they could hand it to him once he reawakens.

Which, apparently, might've been around for centuries, slowly preparing for this day which, dedicated, but not the good kind of dedication really.

So, back to the fight, they're fighting this possible immortal who's been taking over the bodies of each new head of the cult for centuries and, well, he genuinely had power to back him and his cult up.

Not really a shock there, to be fair, since he claimed his powers to originate from the sleeping deity who blessed him with a portion of his power.

Vlad didn't, bro just stole a portion of his power and claimed it as a blessing lawl. Not that the cult knew that-

So the Justice League managed to break their way into the place holding said sleeping deity that also acted as the base for the cult leader and, well. Yea he truly does have the power to back himself up and, if the magic users had anything to say about, a very magically powerful deity he follows too.

So they're kinda screwed if said Deity wakes up, they don't even know when he will actually, neither did the cult leader. He just will 'eventually' which isn't as descriptive as some (read: Batman) would like.

First things first, beat up and disband the cult, figure out a way to prevent the sleeping deity's awakening later.

So they were fighting a battle (shocker I know) with their forces spread between their world and the pocket dimension and things weren't looking quite as good as they hoped. Lots of causalities, both civilians, heroes and even villains alike, a whole lot of magic and powers being thrown about and the monologuing of the cult leader who was floating above said sleeping god.

You could even think it to be symbolic in some way, that he thinks himself above a god.

So, safe to say, in all of this chaos they weren't exactly expecting a new voice to join the fray.

"What exactly, in the Infinite Realms, happened while I was doing paperwork?"

And the owner of said voice, to be a goddamn dragon.

[singtotheskiies]

some sammy maks!! still getting used to drawing them so expect more🤓

[sallymew4]

kids when they hear that their dad is back in town VS. kids when theyre hanging out with a conman that accidentally stole their wallet once

im not even joking btw

bonus heres me being crazy about them in dms ^^^

[fellamarsh]

another thing i've been trying to do recently is read more self-published stuff. "but fell," you say, "you're a self-published author. surely you've been reading self-published stuff all along" and then i laugh for so long in response we both become uncomfortable.

see, the fear (which has for a long time been killing my mind) that i'll read other self-published stuff and find out that it's so much better than mine that i might as well stop writing forever kept me from doing that basically ever. i have a hard time not unfavorably comparing my work to others and had convinced myself i was being smart by withholding an avenue of de-motivation (reader: i was not being smart). it also doesn't help that i'm pretty low income and have a hard time spending money on books i haven't already read, and that self-published stuff isn't always available at the library---but really a lot of it was just me being a coward. which i'm working on. i could talk about how this particular cowardice is Very Silly, but i think enough has been said about it on writeblr and in the Writing Space in general that i don't feel the need to (though i will if anyone wants me to).

instead, i wanna talk about the self-published things i have read in the past few months and ask about the self-published things you love!

so: what happened was i got real sick, and while i was real sick i (naturally) read over 200,000 words of ace attorney fan fiction in the span of a few days. eventually i got bored of it (and also maybe annoyed at how people were characterizing some of my guys), but i still wanted to read something gay and romantic and nice, something i knew was gonna end happily, which isn't my typical fare.

now you may be saying (having gotten over all the uncomfortable laughter from earlier) "fell, you write gay romance. what do you mean that's not your typical fare?" listen. until a couple months ago i hadn't read a cut and dry romance novel since before i finished college. for context: i graduated in 2015. i know it doesn't make sense. i'm a guy who doesn't make sense.

but in this case it worked to my advantage. not the not making sense thing, but the not having read Published Romance in 1000 years thing. I didn't know where to start. I was very skeptical of everything the library had Available Now in the Gay Fantasy Romance category. what if it was all bad and also not good?

and then i scrolled past the familiar cover of our very own @ashen-crest's A Rival Most Vial.

now this was comfortable territory! this was a novel by a very nice writeblr person whose posts i enjoy! i already loosely knew the plot, i was familiar with the characters, i knew the names of things like rosemond street and the griffin's claw and that ambrose had blue hair and that at the end of it all there would definitely be Boyfriends. i didn't have to worry that this would be bad! i only had to worry that it would be really good!

but i wasn't worried about that, because i was officially Not Writing at the time, and because why the hell hadn't i read this book yet Ash literally emailed me some very kind words last year when my cat died??

Y'all, I devoured ARMV. If you haven't read it yet---especially if cozy fantasy is more your thing than it is mine---you should check it out Immediately. It was fun! It was heartwarming! It was sweet and earnest and confident! I was delighted to find it was occasionally hot! Ambrose and Eli snuggled up into my sick exhausted heart and found a permanent little place there. (Especially Ambrose. I have such a thing for Stiff Guys who Kind of Suck for Tragic Backstory Reasons and are So So Lonely They Don't Even Realize It. gawd)

(And a very small part of my brain spent the whole time wondering why I had been so afraid to really engage with the work my community is doing. The community that I'm in. The one I'm a part of. Why?! Maybe more on that later.)

But from there the curse was broken! I immediately devoured @stjohnstarling's What Manner of Man in a similar sort of frenzy (and hooooly shit guys am I excited for the expanded, finalized version to come out at the end of next month!) and started digging into @lurinatftbn's The Flower that Bloomed Nowhere (which I can already tell is going to be an All Time Favorite).

And now I want to ask you what your favorite self-published books are so that I can read them, too, but I think I will in another post that doesn't dedicate so much space to talking about my various and sundry Issues and isn't Terminally Long

[nexus-opsys]

im a new guy, idk if ill ever be here again but hi im Dink but you can also just call me deimos or cupid.

: Dink💘

[bitchycasenthusiast]

I had a horrible dream that steven universe had a velma-like spin off called connie

[necrotic-nephilim]

this is an invitation to ramble about slade/batboy ships: sladick, sladejay, sladetim, sladedami, and other batfam member/villain ships, especially jayroman and ra'stim :)

AAAAAA this is so delightful oh my god thank you. adding a read more just because this one is going to get Long to cover all the ships and all my opinions. because my god do i love Slade.

firstly, the original Robin/villain ship, SlaDick. Slade Wilson, literally created to be a Teen Titans villains, with the original Robin he cannot be normal about ever. i'm so sad there's not much interest in Slade aside from making him a generic Evil Guy who canonically likes teenagers because i think to just boil down his complex with Dick to 'weird attraction' robs them of SUCH nuance. Slade *trusts* Dick, he trusts Dick enough to ask Dick to train his own daughter Rose. and initially Slade's complex over Dick isn't sexual, it's seeing Dick as a replacement for his dead son, Grant. that's messy as hell and i love them for it. i don't think there's a single villain that has the respect for Dick that Slade has. i'm always of the opinion Dick's attraction to Slade is rooted in daddy issues and Slade's attraction to Dick is rooted in dead son issues. do i think they could end up as an old married couple? yes but only in a world where Dick is completely broken and feels alone. my favorite SlaDick flavor is post-Jason's death. Dick and Bruce are arguably at their worst during that era to begin with so Dick is pretty isolated and emotionally unstable. and Slade would take such advantage of that, swooping in to offer Dick emotional stability and fucked up sex to get out pent up emotions. (i'm big a big fan of Dick fucking out his feelings tbh) and Slade is just. this sort of bad habit Dick will kick for a year or two then come crawling back to. you can directly track how well Bruce and Dick are getting along based on how many times Dick has slept with Slade recently. and that's the prize, for Slade. knowing Dick will come back to him, eventually. it's all about patience. and if something really extreme happened to Dick (like Bruce's fake death) i think they'd even date briefly. it's not entirely impossible for Dick to date someone he disagrees with morally (see: his flings with Helena) and i think Dick would keep trying to 'save' Slade, using the upper hand he has of filling in this role of Slade's dead son to try to domesticate him. would it work? who knows but if anyone is going to try over and over, it's going to be Dick. it's practically self-harm for Dick yet the only thing keeping him sane. i love them.

SladeJay is... an interesting one for me. because i like the *potential*. but they have no significant interactions pre-Flashpoint. and while usually i can forgive New-52 and Rebirth for their grievances if it has ship fodder i just... can't do that for Jason. Judd Winick's Jason is the only Jason that exists to me so even Slade and Jason's canon interactions matter little to me because it's not the version of Jason i care for. the upside of that though, is it's more of a sandbox to explore what they could be and there are no limitations. i can just run wild. which is fun bc. you're telling me Slade wouldn't be so drawn in by the idea of a dead Robin who's come back and is now the antithesis of Bruce's morality? i think at some point Slade would want to poke the bear, really see what Red Hood is made of. do i see them working long-term? no but i do think Jason would have zero qualms working with Slade if he got something out of it. and if he could fuck with Bruce or Dick by having a short, fucked up relationship with Slade? that's even better. i don't think Slade could ever truly respect Jason, at the end of the day the Dick Grayson standard is too high and Slade would sneer at the idea of a legacy who fucked it up so bad he got blown up. but, he'd see that as Bruce's failure more than Jason's. and for Jason to have someone look him in the eye and say that Bruce *failed* him? i think that'd just *do* something to Jason. and Slade has lost a son, he knows what that loss feels like, how you feel you failed as a father. would he have interest in being fatherly to Jason? no but i think he'd have fun momentarily manipulating Jason and seeing what reactions he gets out of what jeers. Jason's been calling himself a failure this whole time, so to have someone else say it is no real big deal, but to have someone else say it's Bruce's fault and voice Jason's feelings? they'd have the most fucked up sex with the most unhealthy dirty talk that's both gentle and degrading. i don't think Jason would ever let himself get too close, he's far too emotionally guarded. but for a second, i think he'd fantasize about having even *half* the amount of attention that Slade gives Dick. bc what has Jason always been, but in Dick's shadow.

SladeTim. my two blorbos. in one place. somewhere in my drafts i have a half-started longfic about SladeTim that's one half really fucked up porn and one half slowburn feelings. arguably Tim and Slade don't have many canon interactions, but it's fun to me that when they do, Slade always seems sort of startled by how well Tim fights back and Tim's willingness to fight dirty in a way even Dick doesn't. and to me, that's the crux of this ship. as far as Robins go, Tim should sort of slip under the radar for Slade. he's not the dead one turned villain, he's not the grandson of Ra's al Ghul, hell he's not even the child of a second-rate villain like Steph, he's not *the* Dick Grayson, he's just... the other one. grew up pretty rich and normal and fell for all of Bruce's wax poetic nonsense. so when Tim puts himself on the map as a hero, makes himself a worthy opponent against Slade that's interesting. even to Tim, Slade isn't a particularly remarkable villain since Slade cares to stay more on Dick's radar. so when they cross paths there's a lot of unexpected. neither of them have thought about the other too hard. so there's this interest and intrigue about it i love. i'm a big fan of the idea Tim is a massive masochist, both physically and emotionally and Slade is The Sadist Ever so. i like them falling into bed together and having the most fucked up sex. like Tim just being a Weird Little Freak so fucked up even Slade raises an eyebrow. because this isn't what you *expect* of a kid like Tim, who's had a pretty easy life before tangling with vigilantes. he should be like a fish out of water, but instead he's matching Slade's energy in ways even Dick doesn't. and of course, how smart he is, that's an asset. it takes a special kind of kid to have the audacity to poison Lady Shiva with hotel chocolates and pull it *off* no less. it earns a begrudging respect, and it's rare to get Slade to respect someone. i really like the idea of Tim seeking Slade out only for fucked up sex and somehow Slade falls for this weird little freak who's cold and clinical outside of sex and keeps him guessing.

i'll be honest i've only considered SladeDami in the context of seeing antis say 'omg Slade has been predatory toward Damian ewww' and going 'no the fuck he hasn't but if you want that so bad i'll ship it just to spite you all' but their canon interactions do fascinate me. a lot of how they interact is predicated on Slade as a father, even more so than SlaDick. like Slade will fight Damian and then be like 'hey be good to your old man fathers need their sons' and fucking dip. and then with the whole Respawn thing and Shadow War? that was extra crunchy. for a brief moment Slade had a son who was a brother to Damian and then he goes and *dies*? talk about the complex that would give him with Damian, the spitting image of Respawn. Make Slade Weird About Batkids That Remind Him of His Son 2024. Damian holds an utter contempt for Slade that is simply unmatched. so Slade not leaving that kid alone because of his weird issues, making sure that Bruce doesn't screw up with Damian the way he screwed up with Respawn is very fun. and Damian slowly building up a tolerance to Slade's annoying antics could be fun. Damian is, at his core, still just a kid who needs the approval of something father-shaped and he will Take What He Can Get. are they ever healthy or long lasting? no but i do think Damian would cling to Slade during his teen years for something incredibly fucked up and codependent until either Slade dumped him or he forced himself to get over it.

JayRoman. i will not lie love these two but i don't think i've read many Black Mask comics when he's not interacting with Jason. which is funny because my entire conception of Roman is him just getting humiliated by Jason and really what more is there to know about the man. Jason is so unserious in how he handles Roman and the best part is you can tell it's truly because he doesn't see Roman as a threat. Roman's just a pawn in the game of getting Bruce's attention and sure, Jason is aiming to kill Roman by the end of it, but he'll always have bigger fish to fry. and that's so *infuriating* for Roman. this new guy who's *clearly* a fucking teenager shows up, owns you so badly it shatters your empire, and then you only live bc he seems to have gotten bored of you. JayRoman is my particular favorite ship for the flavor of 'the sub in bed is in control of every other aspect of their relationship and their submission is a gift that can be revoked at any time' which we don't get enough. fucked up power dynamics always have the sub being the one lacking control. and whilst i enjoy when Roman is able to absolutely control and manipulate Jason through various means, i think in canon, it makes far more sense he's pathetic and begging Jason for even a *chance*. and Jason very specifically picking who he subs for based on someone who he could kill or destroy at the drop of the hat if he needed to is a very Jason thing to do. there will never be trust between these two. they will fuck nasty and Roman will be in love with Jason. but they are both carrying a gun during sex. the gun is probably involved during the sex.

Ra'sTim. my everything. Red Robin (2009) you will always be famous to me. what *don't* they have. forced proximity. enemies to lovers. forced partnership. one-sided obsession. ridiculously large age gap. deep unforgivable betrayal. i will never evacuate these two from my brain dear god. Ra's is another one of those villains who gets painted with one broad stroke of being cartoonishly evil with no exploration of his interesting nuance. making him nothing but a villain is boring. where is the Ra's who loves so deeply and fully and has to lose his loved ones over and over and will not let that happen to Tim. he wants to consume Tim in a 'cannibalism as a metaphor for love but also probably literal cannibalism' way. the amount of trust put in Ra's in order for Tim to be able to betray him as spectacularly as he did? that's glorious. Tim had full unfiltered access to Ra's' computers even when he was advised against trusting Tim so much. and then Tim wins against Ra's and willingly lets Ra's kill him. (obviously Dick saves him, but I'm of the opinion Tim was just committed to dying in that moment and he was Okay With That) 'i will betray you if it's the last thing i do' as an act of love. Tim is to Ra's what Dick is to Slade. you will never convince me Tim and Ra's didn't hatefuck at least once during RR (2009) with a questionable level of consent. i'm so serious i will never shut up about them. the way Tim talks about working with Ra's as if he's making a deal with the devil and Ra's talks about Tim like he's the precious, once in a life time thing, one of the only people worthy to produce an heir for Ra's. how's that not gay. what other ship involved one of them literally trying to have the other's baby to raise as an heir. Ra's would probably carry the baby himself if he could. memes aside they're just so. they're so it. i love when Tim is forced into a Situation where he has to work with Ra's and confronts the darker aspects of himself that Ra's wants to bring out but Tim wants to squash. it is The corruption kink. whether Ra's succeeds or not in corrupting Tim doesn't even matter because the real crux of this ship is the chase. it's the way the heart pounds when they reach out for each other and you don't know if it's for a kiss or a killing blow. it's very Hannigram to me, in that i don't even need or want them to kiss to know they're in love. love to them is not true love's kiss, it's the thoughtful place they decide to stab the other in. be the sheath to my dagger type ship. hold all this bloody violence i know you're capable of inside of you. let me cut the violence out of you ship. what more can you ask for from a ship. Ra's would tie Tim down and torture him both as foreplay and as a love language and Tim would be too fucked up and self-sacrificial to stop him. always playing the dangerous game of how far will the other let them go until someone tries to die or kill. listen i think i lost the plot here but my point is they're unwell about each other. Tim will make Ra's regret the day he met Tim Drake not just for the betrayal but because Ra's can never go back to a time Before Tim. before knowing what the chase felt like. they're so. them.

[ursie]

It’s so?? how weird the Epic fandom is about Eurylochus like. Way to miss the point 😭

[magpod-confessions]

@ doorkeay-disliker anon

You do know that most doorkeay shippers were shipping it before knowing anything about the age gap? And that these are two consenting adults in at least their 30s? And that after that information showed up, Jonny came out saying he fucked up the timeline like an idiot? That he fucked it up many times? Nobody in that group of people wants that age gap, and shipped them before knowing of said age gap. The general timeline of TMA has so many mistakes, and so many Michaels. The Michael that worked with Eric could've been a different one, or he could know about Michael because Mary told him after binding him to the book to make him feel bad.

If you don't like. A ship, that's fucking fine. It's not your thing. Nobody's telling you that you have you like it. But you need to get over yourself with this whole righteous bullshit. If you actually read what people write for doorkeay, you'd notice they're always making them healthily consenting adults.

Moreso. I've never seen a doorkeay shipper harass anyone, or cause any fights. But people who claim "doorkeay has a problematic age gap!" even led harassment campaigns and told artists and writers to off themselves repeatedly for weeks on end for shipping it, when said artists and writers made it explicitly clear that they had always seen the ship as being about 2 to 3 years different maximum.

I hate when people come after ships between fucking grown adults. Why are you so fucking obsessed with it?

Care when they're shipping a minor with an adult.

Gerard Keay is not a child, he's in his 30s, and before we got his birthyear from Protocol, he could've been born anywhere in the 80s. Including 1980. No matter how much you whine, he's in his 30s. That's an adult worldwide as far as I'm aware in this dimension, bucko.

If we didn't get the exact year, he could've even been 43 at the oldest today (1980 to 2023). Doorkeay shippers have been under this understanding since forever (timeline's fucked. Play with it). And they almost always picture Michael as being close in age. Hell, I know someone who made a whole timeline trying to catch all the options that the mistakes cause and found that there's a chance Michael could've been a year younger than Gerry (before getting the set year from Protocol. That timeline was made over 2 years ago)

And the few times there's been a larger age gap, the authors/artist always make sure to clarify:

THESE ARE TWO CONSENTING ADULTS, NOT TAKING ADVANTAGE OF EACH OTHER, AND CAPABLE OF LEAVING THE RELATIONSHIP IF THEY NEED TO.

Smh. G/d forbid girls like anything

.

[spock-adoodledoo]

halfway obsessed with elusive samurai this is terrible.

i wish it was more popular in english spaces because truly it has such beautiful animation and such unserious humor. yorishige compels me and i think back to his monologue about power that comes from mystery and the unexplained a lot. the emphasis that the time period it's set in is the last era of a lot of things and consequently the first era of others is really interesting and makes the narration kind of solemn sometimes. they made 千里眼 and 顺风耳 into evil yaoi. somehow the humor manages to be slapstick but the gore and absurd horror still hits hard. the moments where a lot of characters and even the narration break the fourth wall really make it feel like a strange history textbook with colorful commentary and i think that's neat of them. most importantly historical manga is interesting to me and i think more series should just completely reimagine a historical figure's life, for funsies

[3416]

anyway. this is maybe my favorite thread i’ve found on twitter the past couple days about why empathy directly translates to being able to enjoy sports regardless of the outcome. we’d all be better off and less bitter if we were willing to embrace the randomness of sport (especially ice hockey) or admit that the people we’re watching are actual people, lol. thank you twitter user himbeaux_on_ice for the logic in a sea of ugliness lkjsdklfjsdkl

[fakeoutbf]

five stages of grief but it’s five stages of social anxiety

[motherforthefamicom]

okay fuck it actually heres a drawing from the other day

[underwhelmingalchemist]

I had a dream (nightmare?) last night where everyone was infected with a sort of love virus where they would fall in love with someone nearby and subsequently lose their minds, going mad and destroying themselves and the other person in the process. They would try to infect anyone they could, and the only way to stay safe was to avoid anyone you could fall in love with. The world quickly fell into ruin, and the people who remained were all aromantic. The world was a wasteland, and aromantics were the grizzled survivors navigating the post-apocalyptic world, helping any other survivors along the way

So happy pride to aros I guess???

[theghostofashton]

.

[flower-zombie-rob]

Weird random reappearance but I remember that some of you said you were scared to talk to me in 2020 bro I was an actual terrified 14-15 year old there was nothing scary about 2020 flower zombie rob 💀