#fuck google bard

[willowjay07]

[bhaal-battle-beer-bard]

Astarion x Tav

📜🪶📜🪶💙🎻🫧🌹🌸🌹🫧🎻💙🪶📜🪶📜

request: for @aristenfromwarsaw

Fangtastic days of our lives

➹summary: a comforting day/evening in the life of Astarion and his love Aristen after post-game settling down, takes an unexpected turn as Astarion while enjoying his new found life and love, sees something of interest…

➹pairing: Spawn Astarion x F!Tav (Aristen by @aristenfromwarsaw)

➹content/tags: fluff, comfort, romance, smuty flirting, fun, slice of life, little tiny bit of angst and guilt

➹word count: 5,036 ➹ao3

➹cameos: @evander-jane Devana Lysander @alpydk Ragnar @goromimii @pinkberrytea (by order)

➹a/n: another belated birthday present for @aristenfromwarsaw  Thank you very much for all the great photoshoots you always did for me, just like that. Such things really fill my heart with joy. I hope you like it. Thank you for trusting me with your Tav Aristen. I take writing other OCs really serious, because an OC is very personal thing and it is way harder to get them in character. I used the infos/backstory you gave me once about Aristen for the best I could.

📜🪶📜🪶💙🎻🫧🌹🌸🌹🫧🎻💙🪶📜🪶📜

Fangtastic days of our lives

Teak, mahogany, oakwood, dried tobacco with the hidden essence of vanilla. From somewhere the sweetness of honey and roasted nutmeg.

These were impressions of antique wood, boiling kettles, clanging beer mugs and laughing voices that filled the Elfsong tavern.

It was like a honey-colored, subterranean, starless sea.

A sea of ​​people, scents, voices and music.

A sea of ​​life that would envelop the coming evening when the sun would have completely disappeared, making way for the aurora again after the starry night.

Astarion was acutely aware of his surroundings. Perception meant survival.

But not today…not anymore.

He could simply explore and enjoy his surroundings while he waited for his beloved:

Aristen the storm sorceress and former daughter of Bhaal. She was able to walk in the sun and as a vampire spawn he had to wait until the sun had made the rays that were fatal to him disappear.

That didn't matter to Astarion. He was used to the night.

But he never wanted to go back to that cold, lonely life.

The Sorceress, along with the other companions, had freed him from slavery once and for all. But it was she alone who had given him back the vision of his eyes, of his entire senses. Astarion could sit in the tavern and just be, taking in the surroundings of life.

No more looking for victims. No more fear. Never again.

The Elfsong Tavern was full of life and he was part of it.

So after hundreds of years, Astarion could finally taste life again. See it. Hearing it with his pointy ears and feeling and smelling it warmly with the scent of pumpkin, butterscotch and spicy beer.

A quite pretty bard with white freckly tattoos on her face and braided crimson hair beneath her Tiefling horns played the lyre on the Elfsong stage. Astarion noticed dagger-shaped earrings on her pointed ears. The Avernus fire of her origins blazed in her blue eyes as she sang:

“Empty kisses, shallow words,

Fiery passion only hurts

When the sorrow takes an oblivion hint

Will you cure and begone with the wind…”

Astarion continued to look around while the sadly whispering voice reached his elf ears.

“I hope someone sings a song like that for me too. Such expressions of love really manage to make me weak,” sighed a tall black-haired woman, whose face bore at least as many tales of adventure as freckles.

"Me too. But I really hope that the ballad has a happy ending,” replied a long-haired beauty at her table. The human woman's wavy, light hair framed a gentle face with captivating blue eyes.

“Oh you heard that? Oh no! ", the adventuress, ashamed, put her hands on her head with her side-braided hair and covered cringing with embarrassment one of the green eyes. "I should stop talking loudly to myself."

The other woman laughed a little and her wavy hair swayed on the shoulders of the long, light dress with floral embroidery: “It’s all good. I won’t tell anyone else.”

She winked briefly.

“But tell me…” she took her hands away from her face with the little different eyes, “…you’re not from Baldur’s Gate either, right? You also speak with a different accent than me.”

"Correct. I come from the East..."

“What did she say? Sêlune guide me?”

Astarion was distracted by an almost desperate voice that sounded at least as concentrated and angry as it was beer-soaked.

He saw a barbarian sitting at the next table, holding his beer mug almost too tightly.

The raised dark blonde hair did not distract from the piercings and black war paint, which Lae'zel would certainly have approved of.

“Okay, can I memorize this Sêlune prayer or not?” he muttered to himself and downed the beer in one gulp.

Astarion had seen him before and that evening he had stared at Shadowheart the whole time. Was the barbarian building up – or drinking up - the courage to speak to Shadowheart next time?

The vampire was distracted from the barbarian when a pale woman walked past his table accompanied by a brown-haired man. He noticed them because they both had scars on their faces. But no, that wasn't it at all. Something else drew his attention to them...they smelled somehow, almost reeked of...swamp? No magic.

That same hidden scent of feymagic that came from the black haired adventuress with the freckles.

The woman's pale face was friendly, almost cheerful. She enjoyed the music and the sad ballad. Did she know the feelings and sad love that the Tiefling woman sang about?

Astarion was all the more struck by the face of the dark-clothed man with the scarred hands who accompanied her: he was rigid and joyless and his eyes had an almost malicious shimmer. He didn't seem to suit her. He walked rigidly like an aristocrat or a trained soldier, or was he rigid because of the blade - that was clearly visible to the Rogue - that he wore under his clothes?

The man's gaze fell on the bard's dagger earrings. But not only the brown-haired human looked at the earrings, but also a white-skinned, tall elf who walked behind him. Astarion didn't know what was more noticeable: his large deadly sword, the long white hair, the black tattoos on his face, or...or the earrings in the shape of a dagger that hung from his ears.

He nodded almost imperceptibly to the bard and she returned his nod briefly.

Frowning, Astarion averted his gaze and looked around the taproom.

Many of the guests listened attentively to the ballad. Couples in love held each other tightly and some wiped a tear from their face.

“…in the dark of the night I see your tears

Rubies glisten full of pain

Rage and misery

Don’t get lost in brandy, bergamot and rosemary”

The ballad finished gently and the bard stood up.

"Thanks! And now for the bard duet!”

With a wave of her hand, she invited her partner onto the stage.

Wild white hair adorned the scarred drow face. It looked like survival for Astarion.

She could be young and old at the same time, that's how it was always with the elves. Young pretty faces and centuries behind them. Sorrow, suffering, joy. Everything was possible.

The narrow waist with the subsequent curved hips and thighs with short pants was adorned with a weapon belt with a sword and a flute.

The skilled hand whirled out a shiny silver flute and the duo began to play:

„Two bards do the trick, because bards do it better

Drow or Tiefling, it doesn’t matter

Shiny white hair, or wagging tail

Their persuasion will never fail“

They quickly changed the melancholic mood and the silver flute had a captivating sound, as if it were a homage to a goddess.

“One plays the flute, the other smashes lutes

Buy us a drink and we’ll tell you who is who“

A Tiefling whose rosé colored hair matched her white pink frilly clothing cheered enthusiastically to the tavern song.

Astarion heard her applaud with a giggling laugh. Cute little laughs with a sweet smile upon her light face.

It was that kind of sweet laugh that told the vampire how innocent, unspoiled, kind and naive the person was.

Yes, the delicate Tiefling woman was a sweet, innocent thing, Astarion could tell that with just a sideways glance of his red eyes. The sweet and naive kind of girl that immediately fell for him. Who he easily ensnared and seduced for Cazador. Or was she one of the people he would have avoided because they were so naive...innocent, undeserving of it? He would probably have avoided her if possible because such a sweet, lovely person didn't deserve to fall victim to the vampires.

Astarion closed his eyes briefly and grimaced at the emerging memories that he immediately wanted to repress.

Thanks to his beloved Aristen, he no longer had to do this.

He was free.

Cazador dead.

All of Baldur's Gate saved, saved from the Empire of the Netherbrain and the Mind Flayers.

Yes, thanks to the blonde adventuress whose fate was forever intertwined with his and all her other companions, he had escaped his fate as a slave. Their courage and their determination, with the help of the other fighters, allowed him to defeat Cazador.

But not only that, the storm sorceress had also given him love and patience. And the confidence to be better than Cazador. He didn't need blood-soaked, soul-eating power to be safe, to be worth anything.

Astarion would never have to hurt innocent people against his will again.

All thanks to her.

And yet Aristen did not consider herself to be good, nor to be lovable.

She loathed herself for her actions as a born Bhaalspawn, which she only dimly remembered. No one could hate her more than she hates herself.

And perhaps it was even worse for her, imagining every day what atrocities she had committed in the name of the God of Murder instead of knowing for sure.

She didn't see herself as a lovable hero, a savior. Astarion wished so much that she could see herself through his eyes just once. Then she would finally forgive herself.

The problem was that the sarcastic vampire had never said that to her and perhaps never would. There would always be something gnawing inside him, at his battered heart, that would prevent him from casually revealing his innermost, deepest feelings. What if he did lose her to someone else one day?  If it would not be an arrow or observer to steal her from him? How could he then pretend that his vain heart had not been destroyed for all eternity?

Darkness crossed Astarion's face at all the thoughts and he shook his head with his white curls to drive them away.

Once again he let his gaze wander over the audience, while his pointy elven ears only casually listened to the singing of the bards. It was only thanks to his beloved Aristen that he was able to recognize the diversity of the guests gathered. To be recognized again.

It had once been a faceless mass. At some point, after all the years of slavery under Cazador, the people in the taverns had become nothing more than a uniform mush to him. Victims, cattle like sheep, to his master. Criminals who hurt him and whom he hurt in return and they became victims of the vampire lord.

Dark, blank faces.

Without eyes, without soul. Just like Astarion himself had felt.

But after Aristen came into his life - with the craziest tentacle adventure of his life - everything had gradually changed.

First he recognized her blue eyes, then her face. The smile of her lips plagued by guilt and bloody ghosts of the past. The same smile as his own.

Then he saw all the faces, the people, their stories and lives again.

He saw the colors. The differences and the similarities. He heard the voices, the laughter, the music. He noticed the scents and smells again. Astarion saw joy and life again.

A scent that stood out from the rest of the tavern's smells suddenly tickled Astarion's nose.

Orchid drifted discreetly from the front door.

A slightly tickling shiver ran over the tips of his elf ears, while Astarion was already peering towards the door with large, round eyes.

Like the true epiphany she was, a blonde woman made her way through the elven song. Her appearance truly stood out from the rest of the tavern's audience:

Her delicately pinned hair and a ladylike, sweeping blue dress made her truly look like a lady of name and rank.

Astarion smiled as he looked at Aristen's appearance.

She always made an effort to look chic and beautiful, no matter what the circumstances. Like a true lady who belonged in a ballroom and not a tavern.

A ballroom, not a bhaalroom.

But Aristen loved all facets of life and also sat in the meadow under a tree in the forest with her fancy dress on.

If Astarion had his way, then very soon she would be pressed into the grass beneath him with the dress rumpled.

He chuckled dirtyly to himself as he couldn't help but think of that thought. And before he even thought about the first visit to his grave together, he shook his head and pushed it all away from his white curls.

"Darling..." Astarion stood up after Aristen made her way to him, having spotted him with a smile beaming with joy, "...you give me all sorts of ideas as always."

“What do you mean?” the high elf asked in surprise and blinked in confusion because she couldn’t follow him.

“Nevermind little love,” Astarion grinned mischievously and briefly kissed her delicate hand in greeting. He gently stroked Aristen's hand again as he slowly lowered it.

“The sun has already set enough for you to go out, Astarion,” his lover informed him. She would pick him up when it was safe for him outside.

"I've already run errands from a few merchants," Aristen spoke as the two left the tavern.

"Nice. Then we can now buy the rest together. Have you got everything so far?” asked Astarion.

The blonde nodded as they stepped outside.

Astarion sucked the air outside the elfsong into his lungs. Had breathing changed since he became a vampire? After all, he was undead.

Astarion didn't know. He couldn't remember, it had been too long.

In addition, the past no longer counted - smiling, he glanced furtively at Aristen who was carrying the basket with the purchases - only the present and the future counted.

“Yes, I did the grocery shopping that wasn’t of interest to you,” the blonde laughed and winked knowingly. “There was wonderful blossom honey, I couldn't resist,” enthused the sorceress, rolling her eyes heavenly at the thought of it and licking her lips in anticipation of the taste of the honey.

“Then I can taste it from your lips and tongue,” Astarion whispered seductively.

"What?"

“Oh, nothing…” the pale elf just grinned again.

His pointed ears were suddenly tickled by the brush of her lips as she leaned in very close to him.

“I heard you very well, my dear,” she whispered to him, her blue eyes sparkling meaningfully at him after she leaned back and gave him a knowing smile.

The vampire laughed. It was a serious laugh. It went from its sonorous, seductive, dirty murmur to a deep rumble before dying out in a high-pitched spike.

“I saw such a beautiful pair of earrings in the window at the Glitter Gala,” sighed Aristen languidly after she continued the story.

“So why didn’t you buy it, darling?”

Aristen shook her head: “Because it’s not necessary. I prefer to save our money for important things. After all, magical artifacts are expensive and the most important thing is that we find something that makes you immune to the sun.”

Yes, that was the ambition and current mission of Aristen and Astarion: to find a way for the vampire spawn to walk in the sun again.

Their friends also kept their ears and eyes open.

Gale read every book that might contain useful information.

Shadowheart, as well as Lae'zel on her travels through the astral planes, always sent them messages when they heard about mysterious artifacts.

And Halsin and Jaheira also reached out to all their acquaintances from near and far.

"If you hadn't used so much of our gold to rebuild the city and help its people, then you could afford any jewelry you wanted," Astarion nudged her with his shoulder and winked knowingly. The slightly accusatory tone was just an act.

“You know I wanted to try to somehow make amends for my actions when I was under Bhaal's control. This will never work, I know that. I can't bring back the people I killed. But I can at least try to help those left behind. It's too little. It’s no consolation…but at least it’s something.”

There was sadness in the blonde's voice. The look in her blue eyes was sincere before they slid slightly to the ground.

Astarion didn't like that, so he decided to cover up the whole thing: "I don't know what you're doing with this penance and compensation anyway."

He casually folded his arms behind his head and sounded as indifferent as he could.

“But…” he grinned playfully at the blonde Sorceress, “we could visit The Counting House again with Minsc. Then we have enough money to play benefactors and buy jewelry and beautiful clothes.”

Aristen raised an eyebrow with an amused grin: "You want to volunteer to do something with Minsc, really?"

“Now that you mention it…argh…better not. You may find him amusing, but he's always bursting in to chatter about his hamster at the most inopportune times. The guard almost caught me picking the lock of the Tabernacle when he suddenly stood loudly behind me, screaming my name and his hug almost broke every bone in my body.”

“What did you want at the Stormshore Tabernacle outside of opening hours?” Aristen asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Oh, nothing!” Astarion quickly dismissed the topic. Too fast.

“What’s next on the list for today?”

“We really have to go to the Devil's Fee. It has finally opened since the devastating battle against the Netherbrain and the reprocessing. If there are special artifacts or information about them anywhere, it’s there!”

Astarion nodded eagerly and the two elves walked quickly through the streets of Baldur's Gate.

"Oh no! No no no!” Helsik shouted from afar as her eyes saw Aristen.

The Sorceress blinked in confusion at the violent reaction and she looked around to see if anyone else was behind her, as the shopkeeper thought she might be.

“Not you!”

"I? But…"

“Nothing but!” Helsik cut her off. “After last time, I already told you that it was too hot to be seen with you and that the store was off limits for now. After the fuss you caused with your little friend and the black-haired fuzzy head.”

Astarion grinned briefly. He knew exactly who the saleswoman was talking about. After all, they had learned of Bhaal's daughter's past and how she had been involved in the Grand Design.

“I have new business partners, so I don’t need loud attention, after all, hell operates quietly.”

“We don’t want to cause any problems, I swear!”

The vampire let his eyes wander over the lavish and devilishly mysterious display while Aristen soothed Helsik.

“We just want to buy an artifact or information. Nothing improper, nothing complicated, nothing dangerous. Just good old Mammon.”

“Child, you will never have as much gold as I want from you so that I can burn my fingers again because of you.”

"Are you sure? I'll pay any price...whether it's gold or otherwise. We're just looking for a way to break the vampire curse of being vulnerable to the sun. Please."

Helsik laughed briefly, compassionately, not maliciously: “Deary, at the Devil’s Fee we don’t break curses, it’s more about the other way. That should be clear to you from the name.”

“My Love…” Astarion slowly tore his eyes away from the display cases and stood next to Aristen again, “…let me talk to her. I think I can convince them better with less…emotional involvement based on old stories.”

“Are you sure?” Aristen asked, unconvinced.

“Of course, baby…” he was already pushed the Sorceress toward the exit, “…you go do the other errands in the meantime and leave this to me.”

Aristen left the devilish business and made her way to the large square of the lower city wall. She visited the arms dealers and her thoughts continued to dwell on the fact that if even devils couldn't find a way to free Astarion from his curse, who would?

She would never give up hope. Anyway, Helsik was probably right: if it was about help, then hell wouldn't be a good negotiating partner.

Maybe they should trust in nature, magic and clerics. The gods may not have heard Astarion then, but perhaps they could now request divine intervention?

The vampire could walk in the light of the Moon Maiden, perhaps Dame Aylin and Shadowheart could ask even more of Sêlune. Maybe she could expand her moonlight.

Perhaps…

“STOP IMMEDIATELY!”

Aristen was snapped out of her thoughts and the blacksmith who was stationed across from Sorcerous Sundries just handed her back Astarion's freshly sharpened dagger.

“COME BACK IMMEDIATELY!”

From the direction of the Devil's fee came rumbling, loud voices and, above all, lightning and sparks.

“Stop the criminal scum!” shouted a city guard. “Subject, let him stand still!”

“Where for?”

“That way!”

“Or rather there?”

“I thought I saw something in that direction…”

“Then I here, you there,” the steel armored guards rumbled.

The clatter of steel armor slowly faded from the blonde Sorceress's ears, but a perfume that differed from her own scent of orchid and rose reached her nose.

Aristen smelled cherries, musk, palmarosa, black pepper and…

“Does this belong to you, little mouse?”

…sulfur.

Raphael's slightly tanned complexion stood before her. His brown hair was done to perfection with meticulous work, as were his clothes. Large, sparkling brown eyes regarded her, both sublime and mischievous.

The devil in human disguise had the white-haired vampire in tow, holding him by the collar like a naughty schoolboy.

"Raphael..."

“So you still know my name. Ah…very good. Tell the wizard of yours that too. Hopefully he’s still looking for my crown?”

Aristen nodded: “We defeat the brain. The crown will then be at your disposal. That’s how it was settled.”

“Excuse me…” the vampire groused

The devil released Astarion, who grumbled and moved his shoulders.

“Stealing from a shop that has connections straight to hell, very very naughty.”

As was his style, Raphael moved his hands theatrically while his voice whispered mellifluously. The reprimand was more than just played as amusing.

“Anyway, you were there in vain. There is nothing to buy there that could solve the vampire's little “problem”. Otherwise they would all be walking around here freely in the sunlight. Or not?”

The devil made a sweeping gesture and looked around ostentatiously before laughing.

“I'll talk to Helsik and smooth things over, after all you don't sleep well in unmade beds like in clover. But tell your wizard that it is my crown. When he finds it, he has agreed to hand it over to me immediately. Not to Mystra and he certainly shouldn’t get the foolish idea of ​​using it himself.”

“He is not my wizard,” Aristen clarified briefly, “Gale belongs to no one but himself. Mystra also has nothing to command him.”

“Does he see it that way too? Or does he like to be walked on a leash? He always just does what others tell him. After all, his own decisions are the stupidest I've ever seen...and I've literally seen it all."

“You mean as stupid as wanting to rule the crown of Karsus?”

“Haha…careful, little mouse,” laughed Raphael. “Just make sure I get the crown as quickly as possible.”

“When Gale finds it, you get the crown. That was the deal. We stick to that. But you'll have to be patient. It wasn't intended that the crown and the stones would be lost again, but it was hard to prevent it when the Netherbrain fell into the sea during the fight."

“I'm surprised you're so relaxed about this. You can't put me on a leash as easily as you can put the vampire spawn on a leash. Or was it rather the other way around and you Astarion put the former Bhaalspawn on a docile short leash?”

Mischief sparkled in the brown eyes of the human-shaped Cambion. There was a subtle, biting, malicious provocation in his words, which he spoke with a sonorous purr, as always.

Astarion's face contorted a little and the vampire barely suppressed a roll of his ruby-colored eyes. For a moment he seemed like a disgruntled cat.

"I think I liked you better when you just rhymed all the time," Astarion replied sassy.

Raphael laughed briefly, unimpressed: “Whatever. Less dawdling and making long fingers, but more diving for the crown,” reprimanded the devil with a raised eyebrow.

The devil wrinkled his nose slightly at the vampire spawn before turning back to Aristen and giving her his full attention.

“By the way, greetings from your fiery friend Karlach and her rapier-wielding colleague Wyll Ravengard.”

“Why are you ordering greetings from Karlach and Wyll? Have you met them?”

“Well, those two made themselves quite a name all around Avernus,” Raphael smiled in his smug way, “furthermore, I greatly welcome their actions against Zariel’s forces.”

He made one of his swinging hand movements with his manicured fingers: “I would like to invite you all to my House of Hope to linger, relax and chat. So you can catch up. You know, the Crown of Karsus is the key that grants you access. And until that happens…fare thee well, little mouse. I hope I will see you soon, knocking on the door of my house.”

As was his style, Raphael bowed expansively and his scent of leather, cedar, lily, rose, oud, vanilla and sandalwood disappeared into a swirl of sparks and sulphur.

“He hasn’t forgotten his flair for great performances. I don't know whether I should admire it or whether he's starting to get on my nerves with it," Astarion sighed briefly before straightening his shoulders and straightening his doublet with a quick tug.

"Anyways..." the vampire turned to another topic, "...I think it would be a good idea if we get out of the immediate area while the city guards are wandering around here."

The elf touched Aristen's elbow to encourage her to leave.

“What did you want to take from the store anyway, in the first place?” Aristen wanted to know from Astarion, curious and skeptical.

“Well…” he started to press and scratched the back of his white curls, “…I saw something…”

"And what was so terribly interesting that you would risk to be arrested by the Flaming Fist?"

“Well...it reminded me of you...and...I thought you should have it. But Helsik is really a cutthroat bitch with exorbitant prices.”

Aristen smiled good-naturedly: “Oh Astarion…”

“However…here…”

The vampire held out a white silk scarf to the storm sorceress.

Aristen's eyes widened. You could see from the shimmer and the way the fabric fell that it wasn't just silk that was woven there. It was definitely the weave itself and more that was at work there. Depending on how it fell and how you moved it, a golden blue shimmered.

“The scarf reminded me of the one you told me about. You know, the scarf with your name on it that you were found wearing as a baby in the Bhaal Temple. It’s one of the few memories you have left.”

The vampire took out a borealis blue thread from his pocket and began to embroider “Aristen” into the scarf.

“I wanted you to have something that you could never lose, that could never be destroyed, that had your name on it. Because if something ever happened again that made you forget...that made you forget yourself, at least you would always have your name with you. Then you know that you are Aristen. Not the daughter of the murder god. Not the chosen one of Bhaal. No Bhaalspawn. Just you. You are Aristen.”

The vampire began to embroider an “&” sign into the scarf.

“And well…” Astarion began to shuffle uncomfortably again and focused entirely on his work so that he didn’t have to look his lover in the eyes, “…if you ever forget something again, then you’ll know that we belong together. I don't want you to ever forget me. And so you also always carry my name with you.”

The vampire finished his work and the white scarf now embroidered with new memories read: "Aristen & Astarion"

“There is nothing in the world that would ever make me forget you, Astarion,” the high elf spoke softly.

She closed the distance between the two of them and kissed Astarion. The elf slowly closed his eyes as their lips met. His cool, hers warm. He felt her breathing life into him as they kissed.

"Thank you so much," the blonde said after they pulled away from each other, "you can't imagine how much this means to me. I love you, Astarion."

Aristen held the silky, white and blue scarf in her hands, stroked the pale elf's blue embroidery and smiled. "I think this used to be the color of your eyes too."

She smiled softly, as soft as the silky fabric of the scarf felt on her soft hands. Hands too soft for the crimes they had probably committed earlier in the name of Bhaal. In a previous life.

Aristen raised her eyes, which were also blue, and caught Astarion by surprise. Speechless.

That rarely happened.

Very rarely did the vampire find himself without words.

“Ah, I…” he took a breath to say something, but he lacked a suitable response, so he could only hold his breath, taken aback.

The gentle look in his lover's eyes and her words had triggered something in Astarion that he still couldn't handle: affection, sincere love.

Towards him and in his own heart.

The white-haired vampire exhaled and smiled just as gently at his beloved Aristen.

He reached out his cool hand to her and placed it against her rosy cheek. The blonde nestled herself a little in the vampire's hand and her gaze lingered lovingly in Astarion's now ruby-colored eyes.

“You never stop surprising me,” his whispering voice sounded sincere and just as genuine was the smile he continued to give her.

It was a smile that acknowledged how happy he was, partly surprised, partly just realizing that he wasn't really surprised anymore. And perhaps that was what surprised Astarion the most.

It was a day like any other.

A day like any other.

One day in the rest of their life.

Their life together.

And it was beautiful.

And he would never want it any other way.

📜🪶📜🪶💙🎻🫧🌹🌸🌹🫧🎻💙🪶📜🪶📜

➹a/n: i just gave my own Tav Saulus a little cameo guest appearance  😉 in the style of AU I also inserted aristenfromwarsaws other OC Devana, like a little, what are all the other tavs doing when not being the main character

the great Tavs of my lovely mutuals also did a tiny cameo:

Nala Hartwick of @evander-jane

Thomas Rosewood and Nana of @alpydk

Lovely Vierith of @goromimii jamming with my Saulus, best bardic duo

Mavka of @pinkberrytea

I hope I did the slice of life good justice and you all could taste, feel, smell, hear the life through all the description of scents, etc.

[this-world-of-beautiful-monsters]

Okay. So. After some thinking, I believe that while the Google Drive controversy (you might have seen the TikTok going around) is definitely part of a long, miserable crawl towards robot dystopia, I don't think Google Drive is ACTUALLY being scraped rn or in the immediate future.

These are the most grown-up site discussing these issue and it's very fukced--but again, this is a controversy that has been boiling for a while, with AO3 and other sites possibly vulnerable to scraping. I'm looking for stuff that focuses on the docs.

Revision history for Google privacy policy. Includes:

Again, public. Still fucked, doesn't automatically mean Google Drive. You can see the current version of the EULA below.

Google has asked me to engage in Labs (AI) before, but I believe I successfully opted out.

I think my Google Drive is safe, although I could say less about the web. Of course, I could be a fucking idiot. Encouraging anyone with more clarifying information to opt in.

I have seen people talking about how Google Drive uses private information from powerful companies who will, hopefully, sue Google into oblivion if these concerns become a reality.

[llatimeria]

Someone reblogged that dnd uquiz from me and their result was warforged druid which made me go "wait, what? aren't warforged the robot-looking guys? how can a robot be a druid??", but then i realized i know exactly how a robot can be a druid:

[moonlit-orchid]

It was called Google BARD, what did you expect?

Let’s see how Google’s AI is getting on!

[ever-so-slightly-monstrous]

I use Google for pretty much nothing nowadays, with the only exception being maps on my phone for directions. But probably not even that anymore after what happened the other day.

I had a Dr appointment so I put in the clinic and hit directions and the map gave me directions for a place that was not the one I asked for. Not even close. Off by 5 miles in the wrong direction. Turns out, the clinic I was going to has a small satellite location. But that's not the one I needed. So I went back and re-selected the right one. And maps resolutely redirected to the wrong location again. So I removed the clinic name and just asked for directions to the street address itself. AND MAPS STILL REDIRECTED. I can't figure out if it was trying to give me directions to the closest location or if it was seeing the name of the clinic as being at the address and defaulting to a different "home location" of that business or what, but the only way I could make it work was by using the literal gps coords of the street in front of the clinic as my destination.

Y'all, I'm so fucking tired. I don't need my gps service to have an AI trying to guess at what location I'm "actually" asking for instead of just giving me the directions to the literal place I ask it for.

[gayestcowboy]

fantasy dildo recs please? im trying to find one that isnt like $100 but is still good and reputable and wont fill my body with microplastics. ive been looking at neotori and they look great but;; the price;;; anyway yeah recs please?

hi! i have a lot of information for you.

first off, my specific recommendations of fantasy toy shops i’ve bought from or know to be reputable: uberrime, wandering bard, twilight meadow creations, strange bedfellas, pleasure forge, pp sculptors, batbites, xenocat artifacts. all of these shops have toys under 100 usd. uberrime especially has a huge selection including non-fantasy, realistic, and dual density. my top 3 fantasy toys right now are TMC’s ambrose (mini), wandering bard’s shadow demon (x small), and uberrime’s ardor dragon (small). highly recommend ambrose to transmascs with bottom growth. also it looks cool as fuck. mine is bright green and yellow.

second, this google doc is a masterpost of fantasy and fantasy-adjacent sex toy companies (created as a list of alternatives to bad dragon) and is organized quite well, and includes some shops to be wary of. it was last updated in 2022 so it’s outdated, but it’s massive and still quite useful. safe fantasy toys dot com also lists body safe toy companies, although you should still check reputability of the company before you buy (some of the companies listed on the site should still be avoided for various reasons— try cross checking with the google doc, browsing reddit, etc). all of the specific companies i recommend in this post use platinum silicone only, but if you go searching for other toys make sure to avoid jelly and other porous materials because they cannot be sanitized properly and will store bacteria. just like with piercing and body jewelry (another one of my special interests lol), it’s always better to pay more for safety when it’s something going inside your body. reputable stores will always list the material, and tend to have pages on their sites with even more specific information on their silicone. shipping also affects the price, especially international shipping.

also, when youre shopping for fantasy toys, make sure you check the sizing. smaller toys are frequently under 100 usd. many fantasy toys tend to be quite large anyways, especially knotted toys (many small knotted toys still have diameters of 2”+ which is too large for me personally. for reference i think the average human penis is somewhere around 1.5” diameter and my personal maximum for toys right now is ~1.75). there’s so much diversity in fantasy toys that you will probably be able to find toys that fit your desired length/girth and are still classified as small and therefore less expensive. if you’re new to fantasy toys or have trouble with insertion (or even just have an average sized vagina/rectum), small fantasy toys can be cost efficient and accessible and more fun than more standard toys. many stores will also sell b-grade toys at a discount for minor cosmetic flaws that don’t affect usage. also, there’s a pretty big market for secondhand toys/dong sales on twitter, reddit, etc so if you’re willing to buy secondhand, that can be more cost efficient. quality silicone toys can be properly sanitized by boiling and other methods. for more cheap options— good glass toys can frequently be under 50 usd, and are easy to sanitize. also, tantus isn’t quite a fantasy brand, but it’s very high quality and has some great toys on the cheaper side (i love the tantus magma). and if you want a really good cheap vibrator, the romp hype is amazing and only 35 usd.

i am by no means an expert, just incredibly autistic, but i hope this helps! i’m always happy to try answering questions about sex toys!

[brotrustmeicanwrite]

I fucking hate AI but heavens would it be useful if it wasn't such an unethical shit show

First, just to be clear, I'm talking about actually using AI as a tool to support your writing process, not to generate soulless texts made from stolen data instead of writing yourself.

Back when ChatGPT first became available it was still pretty useless so I had a lot of time to learn about how it's made, how it works and the ethics of it before ever touching the technology. I decided pretty quickly to never use it to generate text (or images) for actual writing and art but I still wanted to experiment with what else it could do (because I'm a nosy bitch that needs to know and poke everything).

And HEAVENS was it a blessing for writing with adhd

The last time I wrote more than 200 words in a day (outside of school work obviously) was 7th grade. I wrote over 8k just in notes the day Google's "Gemini" (formerly "Bard") became available to the public.

In order to not jeopardize my existing work I decided to make a completely new story with Bard's help that wasn't linked in any way to anything I had made before. So I started with a prompt along the lines of "I need help writing a story". At first, it immediately started generating a completely random story about a green tiger but after some trial and error, I got it to instead start asking questions.

What do you want the theme of your story to be?

What genre do you want to write in?

What time period do you want your story to take place in?

Is there magic?

Are there other sentient creatures besides humans?

And so on and so forth. Until the questions became extremely specific after covering all the bases. I could tell that all I was doing was essentially talking to an amalgamation of every "how to write" blog and website you've ever seen and telling it which part I wanted to work on next but it still felt great because the AI didn't actually contribute anything besides a few suggestions of common tropes and themes here and some synonyms and related words there; I was doing all the work.

And that's the point.

Nothing in that exchange was something I couldn't easily do on my own. But what happened was that I had turned what is usually a chaotic mess of a railway network of thoughts into a clear and most importantly recorded conversation. I can sit down and answer all those questions on my own but what usually happens when I do, is that every thought I have branches out into 4-7 new ones which I then attempt to record all at once (which obviously doesn't work, yay adhd) only to end up lost in thought with maybe 20 lines of notes in total after 6 hours at the table. Alternatively, either because I get bored or just because, I get distracted by something or my own thoughts about a different unrelated topic and end up with even less.

Working within the boundaries of a conversation forces you to focus on one specific question at a time and answer it to progress. And the engagement from the back and forth is just enough entertainment to not get bored. The six hours I mentioned before is the time I spent chatting with what is essentially a glorified chatbot that day, way less time than what I spent on any other project, and yet I have more notes and a clearer image of the story than I do about any of my real work. I have a recorded train of thought.

In theory, this would also work with a real human in a real conversation but realistically only very few people have someone who would be willing to do that; I certainly don't have a someone like that. Not to mention that someone doesn't always have time. Besides that, a real human conversation involves two minds with their own ideas, both of which are trying to contribute their own thoughts and opinions equally. The type of AI chat that I experimented with, on the other hand, is essentially just the conversation you have with yourself when answering those questions, only with part of it outsourced to a computer and no one else butting into your train of thought.

On that note, I also tried to get it to critique my writing but besides fixing grammatical errors all that thing did was sing praises as if I was God. That's where you'll 100000% need humans.

tl;dr writing with AI as an assistant has basically the same effect as body doubling but it’s an unethical shit show so I’m not doing it again. Also I forgot to mention I did repeat the experiment for accuracy with different amount of spoons and it makes me extra bitter that is was very consistent

[illarian-rambling]

So, for the month of November, in the spirit of Novelember (cooler Nanowrimo), I tracked my writing data. I didn't really have a concrete goal other than to write every day, since I'm in college and that means November is Hell Time. Anyways, that said, here's the highlights!

My most productive day was the 29th. I wrote 2538 words in two sittings, with an average wpm of 10.5

My least productive day (excluding the 7th, 13th, and 27th, where I didn't write anything) was, big surprise, the 6th. I wrote a total of 48 words at a wpm of 4.8.

My slowest wpm day was the 5th, at a wpm of 2.5. I think I was in class then tbh.

My fastest wpm day was the 30th, at a wpm of 17.5. Like most writing sessions, I was on my phone for half the time, but I guess I was just on it less for this one.

My average writing session length was 65 minutes. Mostly, I was writing at night.

Other data I collected was in regard to my surroundings, including distractions. Such notes include gems like:

"Submarine documentary in the background" (10 wpm, 644 word session)

"Bing chillin'" (9.6 wpm, 228 word session)

"Might've failed my exam but that won't stop the sexytime grind" (6.65 wpm, 266 word session)

"Shit was rainty" (12.3 wpm, 246 word session)

"My cat fucking drooled on me" (7 wpm. 842 word session)

"Google probably thinks I have a gambling addiction" (12 wpm, 595 word session)

"Described food too hard, now I'm hungry" (10.6 wpm, 962 word session)

"Oh god I'm gonna have to fix my sleep schedule" (5.8 wpm, 349 word session)

"Smut is hard when your characters won't stop infodumping about magic" (8.7 wpm, 1048 word session)

All in all, my total word count for the month of November was 27,326 words at an average speed of 8.99 wpm. Those are cool numbers I guess, but within them, I made it to the middle point of The Final Voyage of the R.S. Starbreaker, I wrote my first sex scene, I started my second Rel project, and, most importantly, I had fun! Even on days when I wrote only a few dozen words at a snail's pace, I had fun. Even on days when I squeezed out what I could between classes, I had fun. Fast or slow, many words or few, writing will always be a passion I adore and one I intend to pursue no matter the speed of my progress. In the wise words of Mr. Sanderson: journey before destination. What's the point in getting somewhere if you don't enjoy the views along the way? I've never found a hobby where this applies more fully than to writing.

So here's to journies! May everyone's path be a scenic one, no matter how long they take to walk it, or how many detours they make along the way <3

@amandacanwrite @elsie-writes @riveriafalll @kosmic-kore @kaylinalexanderbooks

@bard-coded @carrotsinnovember @patternwelded-quill @somethingclevermahogony @whatwewrotepodcast

@the-angriest-author @mk-writes-stuff @frostedlemonwriter @vyuntspakhkite-l-darling @watermeezer

@leahnardo-da-veggie @mr-orion @televisionjester @ray-writes-n-shit @evilgabe29

@trippingpossum @tragedycoded @halfbakedspuds @ominous-feychild @cain-e-brookman

@wyked-ao3 @thecomfywriter @mysticstarlightduck @rumeysawrites @the-golden-comet

@cowboybrunch @gioiaalbanoart @theink-stainedfolk @sableglass @thelaughingstag

[victoriadallonfan]

Hi, since I haven't seen anyone mention this on reddit or tumblr, I'd just like to say, as someone whose first language isn't english, Worm's cape names are fucking weird. Are all of them words? Who knows, i read Worm and Ward without knowing Eidolon and Brandish are real words and not made up words. Or they are words i know but idk wich meaning is? Is March like the month or like the organized walking verb? So do all cape names mean something, and say something about the one who chose them? I refuse to google them at this point, but Anelace? Cinereal? Myrrdin? Couldn't they pick more known 2 word combinations? Do parahumans get a discount on thesaurus? Thats all I wanted to say, thanks. PS. Wildbow, the fuck you doing using Califa de Perro as a name, couldn't you ask any Spanish speaker?, i'll kill you.

BIG ANALYSIS INCOMING

Eidolon = spectre, phantom, and idolized object/person

Brandish = to flourish and wave about an item, usually a weapon. Also an epitaph for Athena

March = to move in a uniform manner and derivative of the roman god of war, Mars

Anelace = double-sided dagger used by civilians

Cinereal = grey matter of the brain and nervous system

Myrrdin = Too many to count but generally tied to Myrddin Wylt, prophetic folklore bard and a facet of Merlin (genuinely more work than I can ever give on the topic of how insanely intertwined those myths are)

The thing about Wildbow's cape names are two-fold:

In the 80+ years of superhero genre, a LOT of cape names have been chosen and used already. Taylor mentions this to Armsmaster as a meta-joke in the first arc (ironically, DC also has a Skitter, who debuted in 2011.... the same year as Worm), so he has to be creative and sometimes creativity is simplicity.

He loves giving character names multiple meanings.

To go down the list:

Eidolon's name is ironic, because he notably not idolized (and pushed out of the spotlight compared to Legend), and he ends up becoming one of GU's spectres.

Brandish creates weapons, yes, but there's connection to Pallas (brandishing) and Athena accidentally killing him while distracted to Victoria accidentally caving her head in while distracted. (There are several story iterations, including one where they had a parental relationship).

March is about how she organizes her megacluster like an army or marching band, but also reference to her civilian name (May), the Mad March Hare from Alice in Wonderland (which her entire fight with Vista is a huge reference to), and the Ides of March (notorious for the stabby stab stab of Julius Caesar)

Anelace is a master of weapons, but he's notably reluctant about that fact, and is noted to have a healthy civilian life by other characters

Cinereal is the grey matter of the brain. She is the Atlanta Protectorate leader that turns things into grey matter (ash)

Myrddin = See the King Arthur and various clusterfuck of mythos

Even his main characters have this: Taylor tailor makes her outfits and is a silk Weaver, Khepri is an Egyptian god that bring a sunny morning... and she debuted on Gold Morning. Victoria is a Roman Goddess of Victory (Contessa uses her to find "the Path to Victory"), Antares means "Anti-Ares/Rival of Ares/Anti-War" and is the constellation "heart of the scorpion" which is Victoria inside of the wretched forcefield. We can even stretch this to Khepri and Antares: Khepri is a beetle that carries the sun on to a new day. Antares is a binary sun system (with one sun being invisible to the naked eye). In the slaughterhouse 9 fight, Taylor and her beetle (khepri) carry Victoria and the fragile one (antares) to safety (to live another day).

WE CAN EVEN GO FURTHER: Atlas is the man holding up the sky in Greek Mythology, which Taylor names her beetle. Victoria's PHO name is Point_Me_@_The_Sky (which is also a Pink Floyd reference). In Worm, Atlas holds Victoria up in the sky.

Its really fun to analyze.

Califa seems to be a simple goof. Or maybe Taylor just butchered his name.

They can't all be winners.

[willowjay07]

Google adocalypse 

[wafflerageface]

Hello! I'd love to hear about any OCs you want to talk about, and any durgetash fic ideas you're thinking about!!

First and foremost I’m in love with the name 😭 it’s so good

Secondly I have SO MANY OCs to talk about it’s kinda hard to pick one… I’ve been writing little short stories since I was seven (albeit they haven’t always been of quality) so there’s so much lore I could vomit about. To keep on brand with the user name though I could definitely talk about my Durge for hours.

She’s my pfp currently (I’ve got some good screenshots of her somewhere around here) Her name is Aria, and she’s a necromancer bard who plays the violin to channel her music! Literally when creating her just thought “It’d be cool to have a bard raise the dead while playing danze macabre on a violin” and thus she was born

She’s my favourite little fucked up character. I think that, out of all of my OCs, she’s my second most favourite. The only reason she doesn’t take #1 is because that’s for my first ever character who will forever remain the heavy weight champion of stupid and fucked up.

My favourite tidbit about Aria is that, when creating her, I wasn’t entirely sure how to make her look. She’s a half elf (given the other parent is a god) but aside from that I was completely stumped. Since music is her entire theme, especially given her name and that she was born from the concept of playing violin, I actually decided to look up where the violin was invented, which is northern Italy! During the 16th century even. So I based her appearance off the stereotypical (according to google no one @ me I’ve never left my country) Northern Italians. With the lighting I feel like it’s hard to tell sometimes but she’s meant to have a very rich golden tan, she’s super freckle head to toe, gold curls, and very green eyes.

As far as Durgetash fics go… I have several in mind I’ve wanted to write. I love writing. So I really want to do a big fic following their entire journey from Aria meeting Gortash to the entire adventure with the Tadpole Party to ending of the story and how they resolve everything. I also have a few AU ideas that I think would be fun to play around with, like what if Gortash found Durge before the rest of the party, what if Gortash was the Durge and Durge the Chosen of Bane, a regency era AU… I could go on. I’ve always liked writing fanfic, even if I never posted it, but this is the first time I’ve ever really been gripped so tightly by the characters and story. I’ve never wanted to do AUs before so it’s almost overwhelming just how much I want to write about my two idiots, but for over a year now they’ve been my favourite two idiots

[rvioletprince27]

Something hilariously depressing was when I was completely alone and homeless I would talk to google AI Bard because it felt like I had some company at night

I think it’s fucking insane how BAD earlier this year was and I’m so thankful for all the beautiful people that have picked me up and helped me

AI bard knows my deepest darkest secrets

[rook-of-the-woods]

So. I was having a convo with @bard-coded about ‘biblically accurate angels’ and I just. Want to mention. That yeah they are pretty fucked up so here’s some Bible verses I dug up

So yeah. They are from the literal Bible. Thank you for inspiring in me this lust for knowledge and a fervor of Google searches that lead me to even more what the fuck than I thought I signed up for <3

[derseprinceoftbd]

In honor of the new Upd8, here's the updated version of my Personal Homestuck Explainer.

An explainer for Homestuck, typed up on a Google doc for Reddit, and now transplanted onto Tumblr, and too long to fit in a single reddit comment. Most explainers I've seen utterly fail to get the tone of the series across, thus not answering the main question I see: "what is Homestuck *and why is it like this*". Why does it evoke the reactions it does? Why are so many things considered a reference? Who is Vriska? (I can't actually explain that one in under 3000 words, it turns out.) But, here's a briefer briefer (heh) on the subject of "What the actual fuck is Homestuck":

Andrew Hussie, a person (now going by any pronouns) then known for various obscure things around the net, made an interactive reader-driven comic-type-thing called Jailbreak where he would draw panels demonstrating the events of the story as dictated by other posters in the thread, putting his favored suggestions in the narration and responding in kind. The happenings and variables were influenced by his own strange brand of humor and set of fascinations, such as rap, horses, clowns, and H!rry P!tter as a cultural presence. He would eventually compile this, along with the unfinished followup, Bard Quest, on its own website.

The third installment of the so-called MS Paint Adventures, Problem Sleuth, was a massive step up in production value, featuring impressive art and output speed as well as evolutions such as some pages being flashing gifs. This sort of thing was considered to be one of the best demonstrations of the potential of the internet. It ran for 1674 pages over the course of about a year.

Homestuck was the followup to that, running 8123 pages from April 13th 2009-2016 with numerous hiatuses in the latter half of that time. It featured such advancements as videos with sound, small WASD-controlled computer games on various pages, and most significantly, actual conversations between characters, semi-hidden behind clickable boxes at the bottom of some pages, allowing them to become three-dimensional and truly sympathetic. Hussie, it would soon be revealed, was heavily skilled at writing compelling and unique character voices and dialogue writing in general.

Homestuck was definitely the most complex MPSA, with a grand overarching plot being integrated into the results of the actions of the readers. The plot revolved around an in-universe game called SBURB with the power to influence reality, sort of a Jumanji with time-travel mechanics that would soon be revealed to be the centerpiece of reality itself, destroying the home planets of its players to motivate them to enter the world of the game and fulfill an unknown grand purpose, complete with millions of fully sentient NPCs. (Homestuck is, technically, an isekai.)

Homestuck has been described as "a story that's also a puzzle", and this lens has gained authorial approval; events are often told anachronistically, as a kitchen sink of high-concept ideas are explored by a man who sometimes wants to show off his semi-deconstructive version of a classic sci-fi/fantasy trope, sometimes wants to infuriate readers through anticlimaxes and misdirections, and sometimes wants to just go off on a tangent about a random movie from his childhood that somehow soon becomes integral to the plot in an absurdly esoteric fashion.

Eventually the suggestions from readers became so numerous and difficult that the suggestion boxes were closed near the end of the first year, leading to less meandering from Act 4 onwards, but the influence of the audience remained; one easy example is a character only seen from the top half initially being theorized on the official forums as using a wheelchair, a fact which would not only become Canon, but highly relevant.

The early MSPAs curated an audience through programming humor and 80s-90s film references as filtered through the styles of Terry Pratchett, Mark Twain, and the Something Awful forums, but the audience for Homestuck, due to the nature of the characters, was markedly different, especially after the Trolls showed up.

You've probably seen them.

The Trolls, initially presented as some extremely odd and bothersome fellows on the internet, were soon shown to be a race of grey-skinned, orange-horned aliens. Trolls possessed multicolored blood in both organized castes and clear deviations, psychic abilities, unique typing styles, insectoid traits as opposed to hominid, near-universal bisexuality with the sole known exception being Sapphic, and a complex romantic system with its own symbols, comically vague-yet-comprehensive reproductive system, and of course, relationship dynamics.

I cannot express how perfect the Trolls were in terms of catching on. Tumblr loved these fuckers and it's not at all hard to see why.

It's also worth noting that this wasn't the only market-perfect part of Homestuck; Classpecting, the equivalent of Hogwarts Houses, featured a 144/168/288/336/384(depending on who you ask and what they count)-strong grid system of human personality traits that not only seemed eerily accurate as a personality mapper, but corresponded to what elemental powers one received in the game of SBURB.

So... yeah. Homestuck was an incredibly complex and engaging work, driven by a single incredibly talented and flawed creative voice, which was perfectly made to attract a massive, unabashedly bizarre/proudly cringe, and notably largely queer fanbase across a younger internet; you may well be aware of incidents such as cosplay failures and inappropriate recreations of Troll culture. The style of presentation, art, and character writing was instantly recognizable and relatively easy to imitate, leading to fanfiction and even fanmade adventures galore, most of the latter hosted on MSPFA.com.

The main site for Homestuck is broken now-it's recommended that new readers download the [Unofficial Homestuck Collection](https://bambosh.dev/unofficial-homestuck-collection/), and starting with Problem Sleuth to ease into the format and writing is a pretty popular choice. The ending is also considered generally quite poor in a number of ways, particularly regarding unfollowed foreshadowing and blatant abandonment of character arcs, with some fans even [making](https://friendlybatteringram.tumblr.com/tagged/altstuck) their own [works](https://mspfa.com/?s=44153&p=1) as [substitutions](http://mspfa.com/?s=12003&p=1). You can find The Homestuck Epilogues (a sequel novel) on the official site, and Homestuck^2 Beyond Canon (a sequel webcomic after the Epilogues) on its own website, but neither of these are very well liked by fans (at all). YouTube also has several dubs of the comic; by far the largest and most popular is [Voxus](https://youtube.com/@Voxus), which has unfortunately slowed to a crawl at around the 65% mark.

Content warnings for Homestuck include: blood, violence including decapitation, clowns, brainwashing/mental possession, dicks-out furry bara art in the background of like ten pages, brief black-and-white nudity, swearing, the R-slur, a joke about an acronym organically forming the F-slur, child abuse, discussed child abuse and homophobia, mocking of the disabled (as an unsympathetic action), cartoonish levels of sexism (as an unsympathetic action), statements that an antagonist is analogous to Hitler, mocking of otherkin, a minor character being a racial stereotype of Japanese people (Damara), a somewhat major character being a stereotype of Black people (Meenah), minor characters being stereotypes of disabled people (Meulin and Mituna), a controversial and prominent depiction of blindness, eye trauma, underage alcoholism, written depections of noncon facilitated by mind control (as an unsympathetic action), sexual assult (an unwanted kiss, as an unsympathetic action), jokes about pedophilia, and child grooming (textually 100% non-sexual, but sexually-coded).

Also: when I said the Trolls type weird, I wasn't kidding. Every character gets at least one color for their speech text, plus a pattern for how they type, generally worse for the Trolls, ranging from "no caps" to "British" to "drunk" to "ebonics" to "aLtErNaTiNg" to WH4T3V3R TH3 FUCK K1ND OF L33TSP34K BS T3R3Z1 1S DO1NG. So that's worth a warning.

And that's as abridged as you can get when summing up Homestuck.

[docholligay]

Drunk Shakespeare

I’m not sure what else there is to say about Drunk Shakespeare* other than I think a humorous recap of a Shakespeare play in one and a half hours while one of the cast is drunk is a delightful time. 

The show is: Imagine me and a bunch of my drunk Lit friends are all trying to recap a Shakespeare play in a dive bar, one of us is already wasted, and we have gotten the rest of the bar to pay attention. You’ll have an excellent idea of what you’re buying tickets for. 

The room was small and intense--I think there were only about three rows to the back in total, and the room was the size of what I would consider a decent-sized restaurant, decorated as a library with the sort of color-sorted books that suggests no one in the family actually reads. We were seated in bench-style seating with a little cubby underneath, next to two young girls celebrating a 21st birthday. 

Birthdays are, as you might imagine, a common thing at intimate activities like this, especially in big cities. Hell, we were there to celebrate my mom’s birthday. But there was something about her that was so perfectly eager and artless, in the way some people are. She was telling the actors (who come around before the show to get a feel for who in the audience is willing to participate and be picked on a bit--more on that later--and who would prefer to stay in the background) how she was an acting major and how she had always wanted to go to this for her 21st birthday, had waited until she was 21. She was intensely awkward in the way that only people who deeply love a thing can be, and I was actually rather touched. 

Again, birthdays, not an odd thing, but anyhow, they do this auction for the king and queen of the evening, who get to sit in the throne, and wear crowns, and twice in the play get to, de jure, do a sobriety check and if they are deemed too sober, force them to take another shot. De facto, this means, force them to take another shot. They get a bottle of champagne--actually, if I was going to say I had one annoyance with this show, it would be that they gave the king and queen a bottle of decent midrange bubbles that was unavailable for purchase on their drinks menu. I had a glass of middlin prosecco, but I would rather have split a bottle of decent sparkling wine between me and mom wow I am abusing the FUCK out of this em dash, amazing--and we all have to call them by their royal name and they get to participate in the play and it all seems very lovely. 

They auction it off. 

This is where I would tell you that I won the royalty, and that I gave it to the little weird girl and her friend for her 21st birthday because she would enjoy it more than any person living. But, that didn’t happen, because I was outbid to a level i could not afford, and so the fantasy of being nice to a stranger will have to be just that. 

They only ever do plays that are well known to audiences, as there’s not a lot of point to doing Coriolanus jokes when most of the audience have no idea that’s a Shakespeare play. The biggies: Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, etc, seem to be the choices here. As a practical matter, NYC is always Macbeth, unless google reviews have lied to me, which is great, actually, as I don’t need the element of surprise here and Macbeth is my mom’s favorite Shakespeare play. 

Who this show is for: 

Drunkards

English majors (Drunk)**

People who have never read a Shakespeare play

Drama nerds (Drunk) 

Attention whores (First row only) 

Moms from Worchester

Who this show is NOT for: 

Someone expecting a “real play”

People who don’t like to be around drinking

Moms from, I don’t know, Texas, probably

I don’t say that to criticize the show as I had a great time, but if you’re looking for a serious discussion of the bard I have to assume you can’t read, because this is anything but. The joking is often barroom joking, tits and sex and surface level political stuff that plays very safe to a New York audience. I had a great time, I think many people would have a great time, but I think it’s always important to frame who something is for, or not for. 

During the little entree in which the actors come around and talk to you, I had stated happily that I was quite the extrovert and very difficult to embarrass if you know nothing about me, so they could happily go at without any worry. During this time, I also got into a sort of play-argument with one of the actors when I was telling him Mom was very game, too, and extroverted, and he accused me of answering all the fucking questions and while in fairness, he had me there, I reminded him that I only occasionally let my mother out of the basement and so social interaction is new to her. It sounds aggressive on paper, but I assure you there are people in the world who tease around like this and I’m one of them, I had a great time with this guy. You can sort of see where this is going. 

We get to the scene with the drunken porter, and he’s played by the guy that I was having so much fun with before the show. He sees me, and for his speech comes over and says, “Helllooooooo,” and starts talking about his conquests and how drink “Provokes the desire but takes away the performance” and it is very funny, and he keeps saying my name, and doing knock knock jokes with me, because the door keeps knocking and knocking, the actress playing macduff yelling at the door. So he’s backing away from me, still talking to me, telling me:

“It is my job to answer this door--”

To which I reply: 

“Well, you’re not doing a very fucking good job of it” 

To which I gave great thanks to my lord and maker that I thought to reply that. I love getting a laugh like I love few things in life. Best part of the show because I’m an attention whore (See: Who this show is for) 

At one point the sobriety test bell was rung and they had the actress who was drunk balance a beer on her head and then, try to drink it faster than the lady, leslie, they picked from the audience. Sarah could not use her hands, they said, and so Leslie had to have a straw. This is clearly a very good party trick that Sara can do, to show how funny it is that she’ll be asked to take another shot. And it was truly amazing to see. I can’t believe she got the fucking thing off her head and had started to drink it in an INCREDIBLY QUICK amount of time. 

But. They were not counting on moms from Worchester. 

Leslie was a powerhouse. A monster. An icon for the ages the likes of which we may never see again. It is so so difficult to chug a beer through a straw. Nigh-impossible. Leslie cared not at all for this reality. She blew through it. She killed. Sara was laid to waste. I pledge allegiance to the moms of Worchester. 

In all, a very fun show, assuming you know what you’re getting and show up with the right mindset. It very much helps to be unserious about Shakespeare, or have the ability to be unserious about Shakespeare, and also to be a drinker. I loved it, very much recommend it, if you are that sort of person, and unlike most shows in NYC it has a tight run time so you can get on with your evening very easily or go to bed early or whatever your needs are. 

*Followed by me saying many hundreds of words. 

**Some of the language is Shakespeare’s and some, obviously, is off the cuff or jokes or whatever. My ONLY disappointment was that the very funny gal playing lady macbeth was doing the whole “I wish i were a man, I’d fucking kill the king, I wouldn’t be such a fucking pussy about it. I would use my huge fucking dick to stab him. You know, if I were a man.” thing and when she got to “Unsex me here” She waggled her eyebrows and it was all I could do not to stand up and go, “THAT’S NOT WHAT IT MEANS AT ALL”