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billthedrake · 1 year ago

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TELEPHONE POLE

If it hadn't been for the lousy weather on the long weekend, Frank Grisholm may never have taken the chance. But he'd spent two days straight in his apartment, edging for hours with a vial of poppers, a tub of Albolene, and a collection of his favorite dildos, some quite impressive in size. The former D1 football player had a life change at 30, but for as long as it took for him to come out, it had taken less than a year for the muscled 6'5" hunk to realize he craved to have his hole worked over.

Just like grocery shopping when you're hungry, you should never log onto the apps when you've been marathon masturbating. But Frank couldn't help himself. Something about the dildos felt second-best that day. He scrolled through some familiar profiles, holding his phone in his right hand while his left slowly sawed a black-rubber Big Boy in and out of his ass.

He saw a couple of tops he'd hooked up with. Not fuck buddies, but maybe he could reach out for a repeat. Only his attention was caught by a new profile. Or at least new to Frank. The picture was PG rated. Well, R rated, maybe. A picture of a guys' shorts with a huge ridge filling out the package. The profile listed the vital stats. 20 years old, 5'9, 155#, top.

But the dick pick is what got Frank excited, and maybe a little scared. He'd never seen a dick as fat as this. Sometimes guys used the term "beer can" for cocks that probably weren't quite as big and round as an actual beer can. Unless images deceived, this one was fatter than one. It was a bludgeon of a cock that looked like a butt plug, slightly torpedo shaped with two heavy balls clinging to the stalk and a tuft of dark brown pubes behind it.

Then there was the rest of the writing:

THE REAL DEAL. This isn't photoshopped, fellas. It's a tree trunk cock ready to plow some experienced muscle ass.

TURN ONS: Masculine men, linebacker builds, meaty asses. Older guys cool. Cunt training. Seeing that gape.

TURN OFFS: Guys who pussy out. Condoms. Drugged out dudes (poppers and 420 ok)

FRONT OF THE LINE: NO FOREPLAY fucks. Military men.

I need serious takers only.

Frank had enjoyed some intense dildo play, for sure. Even back in his 20s, he had a secret stash of them, and he'd use them on himself whenever his fiancee was out. It was a lie he kept up, until his 30th birthday. He splurged and rented an escort on a business trip to Atlanta. He had to scratch that itch, to get it out of his system.

Only it was the best sex of his life. That big cocked escort had fucked the ex-jock to two toe-curling orgasms in quick succession. He didn't even charge Frank for going over the time.

The next week, Frank called off his engagement and started making plans to get a job in a city, a real city.

"Hey," he now typed. He was actually intimidated to reach out to Mr. Tree Trunk.

But he got a quick, flirty reply. "Hi man. You're fucking hot."

"Thanks," Frank said. Maybe it was the kid's age, or just that sheer cock size, but he didn't expect this easy rapport with the messaging. Frank revealed that he'd been edging all afternoon. Jake said he was taking a study break because he was really horny.

"Feel like coming over man? I'd love to pound your ass." The direct approach might not always work, but in Frank's worked up state, it was just his speed.

"Sounds hot," he wrote. "But I won't lie, that monster scares me."

"You a noob?" came the reply.

Frank had a sudden fear he'd killed the vibe and spoiled his chance to get laid. But his asshole would thank him, he decided. "Not to bottoming," the man replied. "I have some big toys, too."

"Hot," the college dude wrote. "I like breaking in new dudes. I won't hurt ya. Promise."

"That's tempting," Frank replied. "I'm so frickin horny."

"Me too man. Let's do this. My roommate is gone for the weekend." Jake sent his dorm name at one of the universities not far from where Frank lived. "I need to get back to my studying soon, but I wanna get my rocks off, bad."

It felt tawdry as hell, but the 32-year-old got cleaned up and dressed and made his way over to Jake's campus. Frank texted him when he was close, and Jake was down in the lobby waiting for him. The tall, almost beefy man blushed when he thought how transparent this was, being some college kid's booty call. But what the fuck, Jake was an adult, Frank was an adult, and it's not like anyone there knew the man.

"You're even hotter in person," Jake growled as they made our way to his room. He was wearing just some shorts and T-shirt and flip flops, with a college ball cap. He had a soccer player look about him, not a competitive one, maybe, but that tone, lean-muscled look accentuated by his ruddy cheeks and cute face. His body was buff for a college kid's, but his face looked younger.

Jake may have been in a rush, but Frank had to give him credit, he took his time. They sat on his twin dorm bed and made out, then lay back. The ex-jock had never made it with a dude this much younger than him, but the fact Jake had a massive cock gave that age differential a certain thrill. And when the college dude started tugging at Frank's sweatshirt, that put the man in a real bottomy mood.

"Fuck," Jake growled as he lifted Frank's arm and started feasting on the furry pit. The swipe of his tongue sent goosebumps down the bigger, more muscular body. Jake kissed along the chest, then munched at the other pit.

When they finally kissed again, both could feel the temperature rising. Frank reached down and massaged that fat boner in Jake's shorts.

"Wanna see it?" he asked. Boasting.

Frank nodded. "Please."

"Big muscle guy is a frickin size queen, aren't ya?" Jake wasn't a dom, not exactly. He mostly loved the physicality of sex. But he also knew he had 7 incredibly fat inches calling the shorts.

He undid his shorts and there in the flesh, Frank learned that in fact no Photoshop was involved. He was staring at the most colossal prick he'd ever seen or could imagine.

Like a hungry power bottom the big man scrambled to get down and lick it. He actually tried to work the head between his lips, but that cock was too fat.

Jake gently massaged my short hair and laughed. "Don't worry, dude, I've only met one guy who can suck me."

Frank Grisholm felt sad he wasn't that guy. And more than a little ashamed for his lust for that tool. The college kid was cute as fuck but it was the monster meat between his legs that had me acting like a slut. "OK if I lick some more?"

"Be my guest," Jake said, hands on his hips as the man laved him. The thing about dicks that big is they're generally not as hard as smaller cocks. Too much blood flow needed for all that vascular tissue. But as Frank licked him, Jake grew harder and definitely sported a fuck hardon now.

"On your back, man," he hissed. "I wanna eat your hot hole."

The big man did as instructed and when he pulled those meaty legs back, Jake actually whistled before getting down into place. He stared at Frank's pucker and gently ran his finger around it. "So nice... you have a little looseness." He looked up at the guy, a horny expresion on his face. "You been playing with your toys all day, huh?"

Frank nodded. "Yeah. But none of them are as thick as you, kid."

That made Jake smile. "Should be a tight fuck, then," he growled and dove in to lick the hole.

Frank loved every part of this. On his back in some goddamn college drom room getting a very eager and skilled rim job. He had to imagine Jake's endowment meant he had a good deal of experience, if he wanted it. Now he softly urged the college stud in a deep gravely voice, coaxing to lick him deep.

The rimming didn't last TOO long. Maybe five minutes. But Frank's hole felt alive and ready. There had been too much stimulation and edging and now he wanted it.

Jake wasn't giving him a chance to back out. At least not unless and until the big guy said no. He slathered on some milky viscous lube, and Frank realized he'd seen it in some toy play videos. The college kid was actually nervous as he pushed that first fat inch past Frank's ring.

The ex-footballer wanted this, bad. But the entry stung and he did his best to hold back a wince.

Jake looked on concerned but also majorly turned on. "Yeah, man, first time's a bitch," he said. "But you got it." He reached down and ran his hands along Frank's beefy furry front. "I'm in ya now, buddy. So just relax and let me in."

Frank took a couple of deep breaths until he decided the heavy breathing was making him tense up.

"Want some poppers?" Jake asked.

"Um, yeah," Frank said. Sometimes they gave him a headache afterwards, but that would be worth it if it allowed him to take this massive cock.

Jake walked as the big guy huffed the fumes. "You're just my fucking type, man," He said excitedly as he fisted that tree trunk meat and added some extra viscous lube.

Frank screwed the cap back on the vial and lay it down on the mattress. He nodded up at Jake.

The poppers rush coincided with the college kid's second entry. That humongous prick was boring right into that slick ass and Frank's body was letting it.

"Fuck!" the big man growled. "You're huge."

"You like huge," Jake said in his turned on voice. He pressed on, feeling a crazy snugness but not an outright clenching of the man's guts, like he usually did with noobies. Soon he felt his balls press against that muscle ass. "I was right, man. You're tight as fuck."

Frank had lost his hardon earlier but the idea he had that giant dong buried all the way up him turned him on and made his cock bone up. He reached down and scooped up some extra lube and applied it to his cock.

Jake was now sawing in and out. Not a lot. But priming the pump. "Not gonna last long today, I'm afraid," he grunted. "Too fucking tight."

"That's OK," Frank said.

Jake nodded down to the poppers. "Take another hit," he urged. "You'll need it."

The ex-jock did just that. Then enjoyed the wave of warmth in his body. Jake was fucking now. Heavy full strokes. It wasn't rough or hard or fast, but with a tree trunk dick, it didn't have to be. Hands down, it was the most intense fucking Frank Grisholm had ever experienced. He tugged at his regular-sized boner and felt jolts of pleasure. His prostate was downright flattened by that torpedo-tapered dong, which sawed over it over and over.

"Shit!" Jake hissed. As he came, that was the only time he lost control, his hips jerking harder and fast as that bazooka blasted deep inside Frank. He'd actually had bottoms pass out with that part, but Jake couldn't help himself. When he was mid-nut, nature took over.

Fortunately, that extra intensity pushed Frank to the hardest cum of his life. Pleasurable to the point of hurting as ropes of seed got pushed out.

Before the poppers wore off, Jake was pulling back, very slowly. With size comes responsibility, and Jake was always careful in the dismount, at least until he knew a bottom was well trained for some rougher stuff.

His eyes were fixated on Frank's well-fucked hole. "Damn, that's one hell of a gape!" he enthused. "Fucking beautiful."

Frank felt exposed and slutty but the fact this kid liked his wide-open cummy hole made him less self-conscious.

"I wish I had more time to play with that," Jake said softly, actually wistfully as his fingers traced the gaping rim. "Is my finger OK, man?" he asked.

Frank winced a little. "I'm a little tender. But go ahead."

Jake was like a kid in the candy store as he examined his handiwork. The man's pucker was a little red and a lot stretched, though it was closing back up before his eyes. Frank leaned back and watched that giant college dong shrink to a soft elephant trunk.

Jake looked at Frank with a leer. "You think you'd ever be up for cunt training, man? You have an amazing pussy."

Two years ago, Frank would have objected to those terms. Now, he was OK with them. "What do you mean, cunt training?"

Jake smirked. "I've given some guys real big pussy lips, just by fucking regularly." He added, "though some of the dudes have also used toys. Either way, it's hot as fuck."

"I dunno," Frank hissed. He'd loved everything about taking on the challenge of Jake's cock, but he didn't want to be a freak or anything.

"Just think about it, man," he urged. He pulled up his finger and licked off the fuck juice from it. "You'd have a lot of fun doing it."

Jake patted his meaty thigh. "Listen, I really do need to study for my midterm. But dude, that was incredible... I'm glad you hit me up."

"Me too," Frank said sheepishly, gathering his energy to get dressed again. The popper headache was coming on, but he'd been right: this was all worth it.

"Seriously man," Jake said as he slipped his shorts back on over that soft heavy, flopping meat. "Let me know if you want a repeat. I'm not looking to date or anything, but it would be hot to have a longer session."

"We'll see," Frank answered, but with an encouraging smile. Jake stepped up for one last kiss, then Frank was off.

The whole way home, the ex-jock's hole felt tender and used, but that very feeling made him smile.

#drakestories

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1-800-i-ship-it · 4 years ago

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ToG Characters on April Fools

(if u think im procrastinating by doing this, ur absolutely correct) this is supposed to be purely entertaining, you are free to disagree with me

Shibisu: tries to pull a prank on everyone but 9 times out of 10 probably fails, Hatz really doesn’t get why he tries to hide his swords and replace them, it literally never works. (rip to every year he loses a tracksuit to disaster dye...everyone has way too much fun messing with his tracksuits that he seems to have an infinite amount of.

Rak: poor guy gets pranked every time with fake bananas...he has become very wary now, but the first time he bit into a plastic banana he chased down many, many turtles. legend says they never returned again, fearing the mighty chibi spear bearer who now has a bigger affinity for chocolate bars instead.

Khun: how the hell do you even prank this guy??? answer: you don’t. (I mean, unless you have moronsexual energy + are bam) very, very good at planning out elaborate pranks...the prank war he had with Hatz was absolutely insane and Khun won by a landslide; Shibisu tried to butt in many times but they just ignored him :’) really good at making you feel like something’s off and by the time you figure it out you would have realized you have already been pranked.

Bam: honestly you can’t even prank him you would feel way too bad about it...I mean like, this kid literally. ate grass. like, just straight up ate this yellow plant thing from the ground to test what it is. idk what he’s made of, but probably something better than litmus paper. prank tests probably won’t work on him? he’s prob just going to absorb them somehow.

Yuri: oh hoi oh BOY does this lady pull THE BEST PRANKS. poor Evan always gets dragged along with her and her shenanigans, groaning and mumbling the whole time, but he secretly enjoys her company, even though he now has many more targets on his back because of her. definitely one of the most extra pranksters out there (will definitely paintball the walls outside of your house and toilet paper it and bake something that looks marginally good but definitely has something sketchy inside...mildy poisonous mushrooms? 3-day-old leftovers? you never know.

Maschenny: probably Yuri’s and Khun’s equal when it comes to pranks. think she will forget pranks you pulled on her before? think again. revenge is a dish best served cold....that’s all you need to know. don’t get on her bad side or you’re screwed, save for the fact that she practically already hates everyone, so good luck! if she favors you she just probably hates you even more so you best get ready for April 1st and do your best to survive.

Hachuling: definitely on par if not above Yuri’s and Khun’s and Maschenny’s pranks. has his own style and is always nonchalant about everything but will probably be silently laughing to himself when you fall for his pranks, inevitably. just does it for funsies cause he thinks it’s amusing.

Lero ro: literally the only guy with braincells left on this godforsaken day lmao. good luck trying to prank him he will probably see it coming from a mile away, much to Quant’s chagrin.

Hansung Yu: literally has the :3 face the entire day like wtf is this mans problem?? could probably prank everyone really well but only does it once in a while. besides, he always replaces the coffee with horrible instant coffee anyway. never falls for pranks either like damn does everyone want to sock his smug bastard in the face.

Evankhell: try not to get burnt or get on her bad side. you can’t run away forever, unfortunately.

Urek: loves pulling pranks, collabs with Yuri sometimes to Wreak Havoc and then promptly gets scolded by Garam, probably. Garam doesn’t even have the heart to pretend to say yes when he asks her out inevitably on April Fool’s.

Hwaryun: the silent prankster who you will forget about if you don’t pay attention. watch out cause she’s coming for you and it will well-thought out, very much so, on par with all of the khun family’s pranks.

Anaak: oh god the prank wars between her and Ran...just run away as fast as you can, the fight’s about to break out at any second whenever they’re in the same room. both don’t care about other people’s pranks except whatever this feud is between them.

Wangnan: don’t ever, ever open the pokeballs he gives you on this fateful day. I warned you.

Miseng: watch out cause she’s got ALL the blackmail material AND the photoshop. no escape cause she’s got pics of literally everybody. don’t underestimate this smol bean, she can go feral.

Rachel: just salty about everything, probably leaves eaten chip bags on people’s desks but everyone’s already learned that they contain nothing inside. is this a metaphor? maybe.

Parasol: oh god this poor guy everyone loves pranking him so much. I mean, can you blame them? the faces he makes are hilarious and god-tier meme content. I’m sorry pickle, your fate awaits you every year on April fool’s, and you cannot escape.

Jared-19: pulls very bad offensive pranks and then gets hurt when people tell him to stop doing so, proceeds to blame it on someone, repeat cycle.

Eduan: lmfao goddd F all his wine gets replaced with weird substances...courtesy of the khun kids. grape stash taken away, hidden somewhere, far, far away.

Kallavan: can’t even joke about being disloyal to Jahad...does this guy ever crack a smile??

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hailing-stars · 5 years ago

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Thanks to @irondadbingo for putting all of this together!! It was an amazing idea!!

Trope: Peter Wearing Tony’s Hoodie

Summary: 2 times Peter steals Tony’s hoodie, and 1 time he doesn’t have to

**it’s a fix-it, kind of, so it does contain spoilers for Endgame and if you’re staying away from Far From Home trailers, it’s kind of spoilery for that too

like the sun

Peter waited for it, with his bare arms cold, huddled against his stomach, and with bare feet, hanging off the deck, just inches away from brushing the top of the water with his toes.

That morning, the breeze was light, but it kicked water up off the lake, and that was enough to make him shiver, to make his feet and legs just as cold as his arms.

He should’ve put on shoes, or at least socks, but he didn’t have any. Not any that wasn’t borrowed from someone else.

Still, even cold and underdressed, he waited for it, for that couple of seconds when the sun would rise up and hit the water at just the right angle. It was beautiful, and more importantly, it was the same.

A lot changed in the five years Peter Parker was dead, but he could still count on the sun to come up the same way it always had.

Tony’s cabin by the lake was beautiful too. He built a beautiful life with Pepper and Morgan, and occasionally Rhodey and Happy. They dropped by for visits a lot, even now, as well as other mismatched Avengers, just looking to say hello or thank Tony for his sacrifice.

It wasn’t lost on any of them that Tony could’ve lost more than his arm.

A stronger gust of wind blew off the lake, and Peter rubbed at his arms, trying to get warm. It didn’t help much. He needed a jacket. One of his jackets, but they were all gone. Looted after the snappening, like the rest of the items in May and Peter’s old apartment, like the rest of their old life.

Stolen from them. Gone. Everything was gone.

Peter took a deep breath, to remind himself that he could. That he had life, even if it wasn’t the same as the one he lost, and he should feel grateful to have it.

Some mornings being grateful was harder than others.

“Pete?”

He turned his head and saw Tony walking down the deck, towards him, with a cardinal red hoodie in his hands. He handed it over to Peter, and after he accepted it, sat down next to him. Peter looked at the hoodie in his hands.

White letters across the chest spelled out MIT, and now that it was closer, Peter noticed the red was slightly faded. He slipped it on before Tony could order him to do it. Warmth spread over his arms, and across his back, as Tony stretched his arm over him and pulled him closer.

That was another difference were life then and life now. A positive one.

He had died as Tony Stark’s intern, as Iron Man’s protégé, but came back as his child.

Evident by a hug that knocked the air from his lungs, by a kiss on the cheek in the middle of a battlefield, and by the way all that affection was so freely given once they were all home safe, under the roof of the cabin by the lake.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” said Peter. “I’m good.”

“Oh right, that’s believable,” said Tony. “You’re out here, barefoot and freezing to death this early, when you should be sleeping, because you’re good.”

Tony’s sarcasm, and his way of forcefully and accurately calling him out on bullshit, that was the same, just like the sunrise.

“I like watching the sun come up,” said Peter. “It’s the same every morning, when there’s no clouds, and I don’t sleep well at night, anyway.”

Tony sighed and squeezed Peter’s shoulder, brought him closer to his side.

“You know, it’s okay if you’re not good,” said Tony. “I’d understand. We’d all understand.”

Peter took another breath, a deep one in, then exhaled. Again, trying to remind himself he should feel grateful, but it didn’t work. Something about Tony’s presence, his arm around his shoulder, forced honesty. Another something that hadn’t change. Another good thing to add to his list to convince himself that this new life was good, and still held glimpses of the one that was dead.

“Everything’s so different now,” admitted Peter. “The world… just kept going, some of my friends are in college-“ he looked down at his hand, his fingers, where red and gold fingernail polish was chipped and starting to fade “-You have a daughter.”

“She’s amazing, isn’t she?”

“Yeah.”

She was a difference, and another good one. Peter had always known Tony wanted kids, but he sort of always thought that he’d be there in the hospital when they were born, that he would hold them as babies.

Morgan was four, and constantly reminding everyone that she wasn’t a baby.

And Peter wouldn’t change that. Not for anything. Morgan was perfect, and playing with her, letting her paint his nails red and gold, made Peter stop keeping track and making lists of all the things that were different and all the things that were the same. Peter just wished he wouldn’t have missed so much of her life.

Or so much life, in general.

“I know I shouldn’t feel sad,” said Peter. It felt wrong to even admit it out loud, especially to Tony, who’s sacrifice made his breath possible. “I know I should be happy to have another chance, but I just can’t. At least not all the time.”

“I get it,” said Tony. “And its okay. You’re allowed to grieve for your life before, for what you lost and still celebrate being alive. It’s okay to feel both, nobody’s mad at you, and no one wants you to feel guilty about it, alright?”

Peter looked at Tony, meeting his brown eyes, and nodded, slow and unsure, then turned his eyes back to the treetops. A breeze ran through the leaves as gold light peaked through the empty spaces it left. The sun was almost up.

“There wasn’t a second you were gone I didn’t miss you, or that I didn’t feel awful for not being able to save you, but still, I couldn’t regret the way things turned out, because if they didn’t turn out that way, maybe I wouldn’t have Morgan.”

And yet, when given the chance, Tony put his beautiful new life on the line so he could have them both. Peter didn’t know if he’d ever be able to repay Tony for his gamble.

Life was pretty complicated and messy, filled with contradictions and emotions that contradicted themselves but somehow never cancelled each other out. It was more complicated now, after the snaps, but the sun still came up over the trees in that just right angle to cast a goldish, greenish, turquoise light out onto the lake, just the way it did every morning, when there weren’t any clouds.

Peter and Tony sat on the end of the dock, huddled close together, and watched the array of colors that were reflected on the lake, and once the light show was over, they went back inside. Peter fell back asleep on the couch, with nothing but Tony’s hoodie keeping him warm. Hours later, he woke up to the sound of Tony and May laughing together in the kitchen, and to Pepper and Morgan playing outside on the porch.

A couple of days later, when boxes of clothes arrived for Peter and May, he held onto Tony’s hoodie, stashed it away and plotted to never give it back. Weeks after that, when it was time for them to move back to Queens, Peter stuffed the red, MIT hoodie into the very bottom of his suitcase.

He needed to take a little bit of home with him.

“Hey Pete,” said Tony. He was under a car as Peter rounded the corner and entered the garage. His greeting stopped him dead in his tracks and made him wonder how Tony knew it was him. “How was Europe?”

“Uh. It was okay.”

Peter walked further into the garage, and as he did, his eyes got caught on a blue hoodie that had been tossed over the back a chair by the worktable. He inched towards it, while Tony was preoccupied under the car.

“Just okay?” There was skepticism in his voice already, as if Tony sensed out his lie just as accurately as he sensed his arrival.

“I mean, it was fun,” said Peter. “But it was still for school, you know, so we had chaperones watching our every move.”

“Good.”

Tony didn’t need to know by chaperones Peter meant Nick Fury and his SHEILD friends. He didn’t need to know about the mission Fury had given him, or about Mysterio and their impromptu fight, which resulted not only in a very defeated illusionist, but also, in the destruction of the MIT hoodie he’d brought into battle with him.

Peter slid a hand over the blue hoodie on the chair and picked it up reading the Stark Industries logo printed across the front. He looked at Tony again, making sure he was still under the car, then slipped it on over his head and inhaled its scent. Home. It smelled like home. Like Tony.

“How’s MJ?”

That was another secret he needed to keep from Tony. Peter didn’t need him or anyone else in his family knowing someone else had figured out his secret identity. Tony worried about him enough already. Besides that, MJ was harmless. She wouldn’t out him, and she knew how to keep a secret, unlike Peter.

“She’s good.”

Tony rolled out from under the car, sudden and abrupt, and from the look on his face, Peter knew he was caught in something.

“I saw the strangest thing on the news,” said Tony. He grabbed a cloth from the worktable and began wiping grease and dirt off his hands as he advanced towards Peter. “Something about out of the ordinary weather occurrences, and oh yeah, what was it? A molten lava man terrorizing cities?”

“Oh,” said Peter. He played with the strings of the hoodie he was in the process of stealing. “That’s weird. The media’s really taking this whole fake news thing too far.”

“I suppose all those pictures of Spidey fighting the lave monster are photoshopped, then.”

“Yep. Has to be.”

Tony stared him down, with dead, no nonsense eyes that communicated to Peter that there was no use pretending. He gave a defeated sigh, and took a seat on the chair, wishing he had MJ’s sense of secrecy.

“So, I might have run into just a little bit of trouble in Europe.”

Tony continued to stare at him. “Normally you can’t wait to come and babble to me all your Spider-Man hijinks, never mind the heart attack they give me, so you wanna try explaining to me why this is a secret?”

There were too many reasons, and he didn’t want to share any of them with Tony. There was the multiverse the Avengers accidentally created by screwing around in the past, there was the very real need to protect Nick Fury from Tony’s wrath, and then there was Mysterio.

He’d tricked him, betrayed him, tried to kill him.

It wasn’t something he was ready to talk about, and if he were still keeping track of all the things that were different now, and all the things that were the same, he’d added betrayal to the lists of things that were true on both sides of the snap.

“What happened, Peter?” asked Tony, again, and this time, his arms were crossed.

The words flew from Peter’s mouth without his permission. Rambling was a second nature and spilling his guts while trying to protect a secret continued to be one of his deepest flaws. It didn’t help he was trying to hide it from Tony. He hated lying to him. Stealing his sweatshirts was fine, but lying, that hurt too much. It crossed a line.

Once Peter was finished not a detail of his trip was spared, and the garage got quiet. Tony simply blinked back at him, silent, and seemingly processing, until outrage twisted its way into every line on his face.

“Fury ruined your summer vacation.”

“It’s not like that – “

“-he put you in danger. You could’ve died.”

“I could die just walking to school in the morning.”

Tony’s expression turned harder, and Peter wondered what was wrong with him, wondered how he thought his latest statement would improve the situation. He shook his head, trying to snap himself out of saying all the wrong words.

“He needed me. The world was- “

“Is,” corrected Tony. “The world is always in danger. He could’ve found someone who’s not a teenage to help him.”

“Without you and Nat there really aren’t that many viable options.”

“Oh really? What about Thor?”

Peter shifted on his chair, feeling a sense of deja vu. “He’s still traveling around the galaxy with those dance-off guys.”

“Carol – “

“-probably has a more important crisis to solve,” said Peter. “Look, I’ve been through this whole list once before.”

The garage went quiet again, and Tony released a deep, loud breath. He pulled Peter off the chair by his arms, pulled him in for a hug, then kissed him on the forehead.

“I’m glad you’re okay.”

“You don’t have to worry about me so much,” said Peter. “I’m not that breakable.”

More wrong words, Peter knew, because Tony would never stop worrying. He’d literally broke apart into tiny dust particles in Tony’s arms.

Tony tightened his hug, then released. “Go play with your sisters.”

“What are you going to do?” asked Peter, but he had a feeling he knew. Tony already had his cellphone out of his pocket, and he imagined Nick Fury was about to get an earful. Part of Peter wanted to listen, and that he hadn’t just been order to go play with his – “Wait, what? Sisters? Did you adopt someone else?”

Tony didn’t answer. His phone was pressed up against his ear as he waved Peter away, telling him to get lost.

Peter left the garage, telling himself it had more to do with curiosity and his need to escape with his new hoodie unnoticed than it did the actual order.

He walked into the cabin through the front door and followed the noise to the living room, where Morgan and Nebula were sitting on the couch. Their eyes were glued to the screen, and Nintendo Switch controllers were locked in their hands. They were playing Mario Kart, and from the looks of it, Nebula was letting Morgan win.

She didn’t, however, let Peter win after he joined their game. They both battled hard. They both shouted at each other when the blue shells were deployed. A win by blue shell was a cheap win, and everyone knew that. They were in the middle of a close race when Tony walked into the living room and ordered FRIDAY to shut off the TV.

“I’ve been yelling that dinner is ready for ten minutes,” said Tony.

When they all sat around the dining room table, Peter had the nerve to look at Tony and ask, “How did your phone call go?”

“Very productive,” he told him, as he piled a mountain of broccoli on Morgan’s plate. She frowned at it, and at him. Tony moved on to slicing the ham at the center of the table. “Nick Fury isn’t allowed to talk to you unless he goes through me first.”

“Oh,” said Peter. Nebula capitalized the time Tony was distracted with the ham, and scrapped half of Morgan’s broccoli and dumped it onto her own plate. Morgan rewarded her with a grin. “Just until I’m eighteen, right?”

“Yeah, sure,” said Tony. “Until you’re eighteen.”

Somehow, Peter doubted he was being sincere.

Tony’s tennis shoes squeaked against the sparkling white floor of the new Avenger’s compound as he sped through the halls of the medical wing. The plastic bag he gripped was dripping drops of water everywhere, just like his hair dripped down the back of his neck onto the back of his shirt.

Outside, it was pouring. Inside, his kid was in a numbered room, hurt, lying on a hospital bed.

Tony needed to get to him.

He quickened his pace, separating himself further from Pepper and Morgan, who tried, only half-heartedly, to keep up with him.

“Tony, slow down,” said Pepper. Her voice was loud, echoed off the walls, even though her gritted teeth.

He kept going, at the same speed, and eventually his search led him to turn a corner, leaving Pepper and Morgan out of sight.

Tony watched the numbers on the closed doors get bigger and bigger as he continued through the halls, until he came to the door with numbers that matched the text message May had sent him.

The one that had Peter inside.

He paused with his hand on the doorknob, shut his eyes, and prepared himself for the awful sight of a broken kid, of his child bruised and bloody and unconscious, but when he finally willed himself to turn the knob and open his eyes, that wasn’t what he saw.

Peter was sitting up in his bed, smiling, surrounded by flowers and get well cards and presents. His arm was in a sling, his face was a little bit bruised and he had a bandage covering his forehead, but he was alert. He was fine. Better than fine, actually, by the looks of him.

“Oh, hey Tony,” said Peter, with a grin splitting his face.

Tony was still standing at the door, staring at him. “They said you were in a serious car accident.”

“I was.”

“They said you had a major surgery.”

“I did,” said Peter, with a shrug. “It’s over now.”

Over. Just like that. As if Tony didn’t just almost have his entire world yanked out from under him, again.

He took a breath and tried to let the panic leave his chest.

“I heal fast, remember? It’s a spider thing,” he told him. He grabbed the glass of apple juice from his bedside table and sipped on it through a straw. He looked up at Tony, then cringed. The smile left his lips. “The car’s totaled. I’m sorry, Tony, I know you worked really hard on it.”

“I don’t care about the stupid car,” he said, with an exhale. He left his panic and his anxiety by the door and walked over to sit in the chair next to Peter’s bed, holding up the wet, plastic bag as he went. “I brought you something.”

Hesitantly, Peter took the bag and looked inside. His smile came back, like a light in the dark, as he pulled a red, Iron Man hoodie away from the plastic.

“This is awesome,” said Peter. The plastic bag fell, forgotten, to the floor, while Peter struggled to put on the hoodie with his one good arm. When he had no success, he looked at Tony. “How… did you know to bring me this?”

“Kid,” said Tony. He knew Peter well enough to know what he was really asking, to know he was really asking if Tony knew about all the hoodies of his that had seemingly walked out of his home since Peter came back from dust. “You’re not sneaky.”

First, it’d been his MIT hoodie that never returned, then the SI hoodie that disappeared from the garage. It had become a pattern after that. Hoodies left out whenever Peter was around would inevitably become Peter’s. Once or twice, Tony left out a few on purpose.

“Sorry,” said Peter, but he didn’t sound very apologetic. “They just remind me of home. When I’m not there and I’m wearing one, it’s like I’m carrying a piece of home with me.” He paused, then looked away. “I know it’s stupid.”

“It’s not stupid,” said Tony.

If only Peter knew how much he lived for those words, those words that confirmed to him that he thought of the cabin by lake as home, and if only he knew how much he loved him, it’d be impossible for him to believe for a second Tony thought anything he had to say was stupid.

Peter offed Tony another, small, shaky smile. “Help me put it on.”

“Nope. Absolutely not.”

“Why?”

“You’ll hurt your arm,” said Tony, as he gestured to his cast.

“I won’t. I promise,” said Peter. He gave him puppy dog eyes. “Please?”

Tony gave in and helped pull the hoodie over his head and down over the rest of his body. His casted arm stayed under the fabric, but he managed to get his good arm in the sleeve.

“Thanks, Tony.”

“Petey!”

Morgan zoomed into the room, leaving Pepper behind at the door, and jumped up onto Peter’s hospital bed. She tackle-hugged him.

“Be careful,” Pepper told her, but she wasn’t listening. She clung onto Peter, who hugged her back with his functional arm.

“It’s okay, Pep,” said Tony. “He seems to be the one made of iron.”

“And now I’ve got the hoodie to prove it.”

“Peter,” said Morgan. She let go of him, scooted backward and sat at the end of his bed. “Dad was so worried about you, then I was too, but mom said everything would be okay, because spiders have nine lives.”

Nine wasn’t enough. Three thousand wouldn’t be, either. Not for his kids. He didn’t say so out loud. If tonight taught him anything, it was that he could stand not to worry so much, especially it if was affecting Morgan.

They stayed with Peter for hours. It was long enough for him to tell them multiple different Spider-Man stories that made Morgan laugh, and that made Tony’s heart jump to his throat. It was long enough for Peter to wear himself out talking, and for Tony to discover that was, indeed, possible, and long enough for Peter to admit his arm was getting achy again.

Tony alerted a nurse, who gave Peter more pain meds, and ten minutes later, he was out cold, just like Tony knew he would be. Morgan was cuddled up next to him, also asleep. It was a miracle. Tony’s entire world fit just on that one, small hospital bed.

He brushed the hair back off Peter’s forehead. “I love you, kid.”

“Mmhmm,” said Peter, quiet, with his eyes closed, mostly asleep, but not as far gone as Tony had thought he was. “Like the sun.”

“The sun?”

“Sun’s the same, every morning,” said Peter.

On both sides of the snap.

Tony finished it for him, because he was sure that’s what he meant.

Peter and his lists of all the things that were different and everything that was the same. His search for everything and anything that could tether him to his life before Thanos snapped his fingers and took five years from him. Tony could be that for Peter. His anchor, and his home.

Tony watched Peter’s chest move up and down, watched breath moving out and in, to remind himself that Peter could breathe. He dabbed his eyes with his thumb, then spread a blanket over his kids, so they wouldn’t get cold.

#irondad #fanfic #peter parker #tony stark #irondad bingo #irondad and spiderson

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muppetchristmascarol · 6 years ago

Text

Guess who finally fuckin wrote something?

This would not exist without @babbushka ’s absolutely gorgeous fic Blue Moon, her characterization of Pale and super encouraging messages are what made this happen! Also me dicking around on photoshop.

Warnings: swearing, mentions of sex

Word count: 1500

“You know how fuckin’ dirty those things are?”

He had just gotten back from a work trip. Three days in the middle of goddamn nowhere, working out a deal with a new alcohol provider for the restaurant. All he wanted to do when he made it back was fall into your bed, but he found his place taken.

“He’s not dirty! I gave him a bath” you defended the little thing currently curled up on your lap and purring. He decided to try another angle.

“It looks sick.”

“He’s just underweight is all.”

A frown creased his forehead, and he decided he was too tired to argue, “whatever. That thing just better not watch us fuck or throw up in my shoes.”

After you had agreed to put the cat out in the living room for the night, only after making a cozy spot for him on the couch with a worn out old afghan, and putting Pale’s shoes safely in your closet, he all but forgot about it.

That was, until he tried leaving several hours later. You were stretched out happily snoozing in bed when he retrieved his boots from the closet and made his way to your bedroom door. The second he opened it, the little thing darted inside, faster than he thought something that sickly looking could move.

“Hey!” He whisper-yelled at it, “you’re gonna wake her up!” He said, as though that were the biggest sin either of them could commit. As though he hadn’t woken you dozens of times for breakfast or a bath or more sex. The animal seemed to realize it was being spoken to and turned to look at Pale, who gestured at the open door, “out.”

Somehow, it listened. And traded snuggling up to you in favor of purring very loudly and doing its best to rub against Pale’s expensive slacks.

“You fuckin’ kidding me? Get off.” He pushed the animal away lightly with his boot, but it persisted, “get off, oh for—“ he sighed and picked the thing up with both hands, looking directly into its eyes, “listen to me, we are not friends, alright? For whatever reason she’s lettin’ your furry ass stay here, and that’s her business but you and your nasty fur can stay very far away from me, and my nice clothes. Got it?”

Pale sighed heavily. He was talking to a cat. And it was purring at him. He dropped the animal with a quiet ‘whatever’ and left, putting it out of his mind.

He swore that thing was mocking him. The brief moments that he was in his loft and managed to glance out the window, and it was always sitting there, at your window and staring at him.

As the weeks went on they developed an odd truce, the cat kept off his clothes and he did his best not to be jealous when it stole his place on the bed. He’d come into the apartment and see it sitting on your lap, in your arms, on his goddamn pillow, always looking so smugly at him. Cats can look smug, right? On one of his rare days off, he came in with the intent of going over your spice rack and seeing what needed to be replaced or refilled. The cat, who you had still yet to name, was clearly feeling a little lonely as it tried for the first time since its first night in the apartment to garner some affection from him.

“What? The fuck do you want?” he frowned at the animal when it stood very close to him and started mewing. It even went as far as putting its front paws up on his leg as it whined. If he was honest with himself it did look.. Maybe a little cute. But mostly sad. And he certainly couldn’t have you coming home to a depressed looking cat.

“God damn it.” Pale sighed, reaching down to pick up the cat. Strictly speaking he didn’t know how to handle a cat, and the thing wriggled around in his palms before landing against his chest. He adjusted his arms to support it before he dropped the thing, and it immediately started purring and rubbing it’s little face on him.

“Oh, come on. Gonna smell like fuckin’ tuna now.”

He gave up on the prospect of your spice cabinet and resigned himself to sitting on the couch, flipping mindlessly through the channels as the cat made itself comfy on him. He must have dozed off at some point, because the next thing he hears is your key clicking in the lock, and he has maybe two seconds to jump up and get the cat off him before you’re walking through the door.

“What’s wrong with you?” you ask with a laugh.

He frowns, “What’s wrong with me? What’s wrong with you?”

“You just look.. Weird. What did I catch you about to jerk it or something?” You teased, your fingers sliding easily into the top edge of his slacks.

“You and I both know if you walked in on that I wouldn’t stop.”

“Okay” you concede, still grinning, “Then tell me what’s wrong.”

“You know you got shit for spices in there.” He breezes past you into the kitchen, gesturing to the still open cabinet. You couldn’t say you were surprised, but you still had to tease him a bit

“Who needs anything besides salt, pepper, and garlic?”

“Christ.” Pale shook his head, “How am I supposed to cook for you?”

“Be creative. Isn’t that your job?” You challenge, smirking at him.

“Yeah, yeah. Gimme a kiss” and with that, it’s forgotten.

It wasn’t often that he had time alone in your place, but lately if he was there alone the cat was in his lap. Or it was following him around the kitchen. At one point he even carried the thing as he went from room to room checking that none of his stashes of cigarettes were low. He’d given up on trying to resist, the affection made the cat happy, and the cat made you happy, so whatever. He invested in a lint roller and moved on.

“You ever gonna name that thing?” he asked one night as he smoked a cigarette and you reclined on his chest, the cat was perched at the foot of the bed. Seemingly always watching.

“Why? The only person that talks to him is me. Cats don’t understand names anyway.” You shrug a little, moving your feet around under the sheet to get the cat to chase them.

“Sure he understands. Understands when you say food. Or hungry.” As if to prove Pale’s point the cat perked up a little, looking at him with interest, “oh, I know one. He goes fuckin’ nuts whenever you mention t-u-n-a.”

“Tuna?” You ask, eyebrows raised. The cat meowed loudly. You sat up, reaching for the little animal who happily climbed into your arms, much to Pale’s protest,

“Aw, come on. Ain’t I enough? It’s bad enough you let him up when I’m not here.”

You ignored him however, in favor of watching the cat snuggle against you while he purred loudly,

“Tuna it is.” You chuckled lightly.

Not long after that the jig was up on their little hidden affair. After one of the rare nights of Pale staying over you woke to the smell of breakfast cooking, and you quietly slipped from bed and pulled your robe on. Pale cooking in your kitchen was not at all uncommon. What was, however, exceedingly uncommon was to see that not only was he touching Tuna, he was letting the little cat balance on his shoulders as he cooked! He didn’t hear you approach, and you leaned against the door frame grinning at the pair for a moment or so before you were noticed.

“Don’t get any hair in my eggs.”

“Jesus!” Pale startled, causing the cat to jump off him with a disgruntled mew, “don’t sneak up like that, almost gave me a friggin heart attack!”

You apologized, doing your best not to laugh, and picked up Tuna, “so.. I thought you didn’t like him.”

“We were just, uh.. you know. Cohabitatin’.”

“Cohabitating?” You ask, eyebrows raised as he flips the bacon, toasts the bread. All while expertly avoiding looking at you. As though he couldn’t cook with his eyes shut.

“Yeah. Like those nature movies. You know, like the goats and the chickens hang out or whatever.”

You laugh a little at that, “You watch nature movies?” He shrugs, serving the food up on chipped plates that he makes a mental note to replace. Your dishes had seen better days, especially now since he’d been cooking here so much,

“Well no. That shit’s so boring, PBS puts me right to sleep. But you know what I mean.”

You take your plate with a smirk, and sit down at the table, “I think you mean you like Tuna.”

“Fuck no.” He scowls at you over his bacon

“I think you do” you insist. He frowns more,

“Yeah, whatever.”

The next time you come home, they’re both asleep on the couch.

#my writing #burn this #pale x reader #pale burn this

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mysticsparklewings · 4 years ago

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Sparkle By the Sea

Pardon me as I just barely squeeze a MerMay piece of art in. I'll be honest with you guys, I've been pretty lacking in artistic motivation since NaPoWriMo ended. Although if you've noticed my lack of uploads, you probably could've already guessed that. This isn't abnormal for the aftermath of a month-long challenge for me, especially with a brand-new video game calling my name at every moment of the day, but even so I feel like this particular motivation drought was a bit different. Part of it definitely had to do with the changes to DeviantArt that I'm sure I don't need to remind everyone of, but that's been more of me dreading seeing what the state of the community is than anything else. (However, I have noticed I'm not a fan of the new tag system over the old category one, as confusing as the category system could be sometimes.) Rather, I think this lake of motivation has more to do with the fact that being largely absent from all social media during NaPo reminded me...well, that I hate social media. This is really a bigger discussion for a journal or something, but suffice to say it did not feel good to realize just how many literal hours I had previously been spending trying to desperately to scrape up just a little bit of support on other social media platforms (namely Twitter), versus the more natural growth I see here on dA that also feels a lot more genuine and less forced/obligatory. I can't really explain it, but that reminder/realization really helped my brain slip back into a place where I felt like creating again. And with that, I'll transition into talking about the art and save the social media talk for, as I said, a journal or something later on. Naturally, I've been seeing a lot of mermaid art this month and every year I feel the urge to get in on the fun, though I know better than to try actually doing the MerMay Challenge (especially not this year after having just done NaPo), so I usually either do a one-off drawing or if I'm too busy with other projects I just skip it. But I was starting to feel that need to make art in my brain again and I've had a specific set of stickers from the dollar store sitting in my stash for quite a while now that more or less sealed the deal for me. How do these stickers fit into the mix? Well, I originally fell in love with/picked them up because they are mermaid-themed and absolutely adorable--See for yourself! And I thought they would make for nice decals in a book project since they're wall stickers and therefore repositionable with minimal adhesive-yuck. And at first, I thought maybe I'd end up making them into said hypothetical book project in time for MerMay...except that felt a little cheap in combination with my lack of uploads. Did I really want to come back with a book project featuring mermaids I didn't even draw? And for MerMay of all things? So I sat on the idea and left the stickers out where I could see them, and eventually I sat down and took a closer look at them. The art style, upon further inspection, actually didn't look like it would be too far outside my usual art-making realms...Most of the coloring looks a lot like watercolor, except for the skin which I thought was flat and smooth like alcohol marker and the glitter accents which from my perspective pretty much had to be digital, but could potentially be replicated with glittery/metallic supplies... And that was the moment the idea hatched. I decided I'd try drawing a mermaid myself in the same style. This would work for MerMay, have something to do with the stickers, and based on my plans would work well for me as a mixed-media project, which as I'm sure I've said before is where I think my artistic talent shines best. I thought the scariest part was going to be replicating the looser and less strict line style, and to a point it was, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be. I find it's usually kind of tricky to explain this, but really what this part of the process boils down to for me (if I'm replicating an existing style and not using my own), is really just studying the original artwork(s) and looking for patterns, then trying to stick to those patterns. For example, the style here features fairly large & rounded faces, and the hands are more like hand-shaped mittens (which was great news by the way because hands are always a pain in the butt for me), so I did my best to emulate those features. As per usual, I did start with a sketch, but I tried to keep it looser than usual, and then when I did the inking I started with my 0.2 Micron, again trying to keep things loose and no be too fussy if I could help it. Then I went back with a brush tip liner from Prismacolor to get more natural variation in the lines and to force myself to not have quite so much control over the line weight. I was also very careful with my choice of liners because I knew pretty much everything except the skin was going to see a lot of watercolors, which meant the lines had to be waterproof. And of course, I went with watercolor paper (my nice 100% cotton stuff this time) to make sure I didn't have any issues with blending or layering. Now, at this stage, I didn't know what I was going to do for the background, though I was leaning towards the idea of making one separately and placing the mermaid on top afterward, as sort of a nod to the original mermaids being stickers. But I wasn't totally sure yet. What I was sure of was how scared I was to just dive into coloring. The sketching and inking and gone so well I was thinking I was in for a rude awakening at any moment. So, just in case, I scanned my uncolored lines as a fall-back if I royally screwed up. With my paranoid mind set at ease (for the most part), I could begin with color application. I started with the skin since it was the easiest; Just one good layer of alcohol marker, leaving a little white space here and there like the artwork I was emulating. Although 1. The marker color turned out a bit darker than I was expecting and later blended too well with her tail, so I had to lighten it in Photoshop, and 2. because watercolor paper really soaks up the ink, I ended up with less white space than I thought I would. But beyond that, this step went off without a hitch. So then came the second-scariest part: The watercolor. I used a mixture of my Master's Touch watercolors and Mermaid Markers (yes, that was a very conscious supply choice ) and tried to take my time and be mindful of the color balance I was looking for. I'd decided ahead of time that I wanted to try and stick with a soft-ish palette like the original art, but I still wanted my choices to be different. Since yellow/gold is featured in the original but not used for a tail color, that's what I went with, and I opted for the blue-y-purple hair since a soft blue and purple are also prominent in the original and based on color-theory would be a nice contrast to the gold-orange tail. Though I did also try to get some pink in both the tail and the hair for a bit of unity and calling back to the pink in the original art. The trickiest part with the coloring was actually the tiny lips and blush spots. I ended up using a fluorescent pink for that turned out as more of a red originally and had to be touched-up via Photoshop because of that and also because of the lightening I did to the skin. It's more that it was a bit of a challenge to get the shapes of these much smaller areas right and in the correct place, since I had to use very minimal pencil markings, lest I end up with nasty graphite marks mixed into the paint. Getting the hair to be dark enough without being extreme compared to the rest of the drawing was also a great test of patience, but it ultimately worked out, I think. I also had a hard time deciding what color the piece of coral in her hair should be, which is why it ended up as this vague dusky-orange color. And I got more pink on the sand dollar next to it than I intended, but neither of those things is a huge deal. While I waited for all that to dry though, I had to decide how I was going to go about tackling all that extreme sparkle the original art had. I could have just added it in digitally and not even attempted it traditionally, but everything else had gone so smoothly that I decided to push my luck this time. Originally, I started with just glittery gel pens, but I found pretty quickly that they were sinking back into the colors underneath them too much and thus just weren't doing what I wanted. I wanted high-impact sparkle. After some brief consideration, I turned to the metallic watercolor sets I have made by Art Philosophy, which are very high-impact metallic and pretty opaque, which would work well over my failed gel pen and would work wonders for the areas where I wanted that high-impact over an opposing color. (I.E. Where I wanted the blue sparkle over a very orange-yellow area, which would normally make brown mud if the color on top wasn't opaque.) The funny part about that is that I originally used a different shade of purple and gold for those areas of sparkle that I ended up completely covering with different shades (the purple needed to be lighter and the gold needed to be darker/more gold and less yellow). And her eye shadow cover saw all three colors before I settled; The purple just seemed wrong, and the gold blended too well with her skin. I thought the blue wouldn't work so close to her blue hair, but it actually ended up looking the best out of the three. Although, I do have to make a full disclosure that the high-impact sparkle you see here is in fact where I went in and re-did it digitally once I scanned the artwork in. Unfortunately, glitter and metallic supplies just don't scan very well and usually end up looking too dark, dull, or flat by comparison. The metallic paints work just fine in person since you can move the art and see how they reflect the light, but it just doesn't work in a still image that's been captured by having a bright light uniformly shined over it. Still, re-tooling the sparkle digitally ended up being an interesting challenge, especially since it's been a fairly long time since I was messing with digital textures like this. Also worth noting is that I had to re-paint some of the metallic areas because they weirdly lifted off onto the plastic cover I used to protect the art when I pressed it onto the background to make the glue stick. I'm not sure if it's because those were the extra-layered areas and they hadn't fully dried all the way down to the paper, or if that particularly plastic just picks up this metallic paint really easily or what. And speaking of that background... Like I said earlier, I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do for a background for a while, but after reviewing my mermaid-centric Pinterest board I decided a simple rock seat and something to vaguely suggest the ocean/water without getting too detailed would suffice just fine. Based on that, I felt like using gouache would work nicely (and I just really felt like using the gouache since I don't find a lot of opportunities to use it) and that a color scheme that flipped her hair and tail colors would be best for the effect I wanted. I've found I really like the Strathmore 400 series mixed media paper for gouache because of how smooth it is, so I cut a piece down to size and got busy. For the most part, I just kind of went in with the colors doing whatever felt right, and trying to use some gouache I'd already mixed from past projects (since gouache can be reactivated and I've found this kind, in particular, seems to reactivate really nicely) either on their own or to mix the colors I felt like I needed. And I also tried to do a lot of blending straight on the paper to get more variations in color and make things a bit more lively. Oddly enough, this ended up being a good example of gouache's covering power because I accidentally started applying the colors upside down--using more greens and blues on top and more pinky-purple on the bottom--and not only had to flip the paper around but also had to do a fair amount of covering the colors I'd already put down with colors you don't really want to mix with them because they don't make very pretty results. But it worked out just fine, so yay! I also added some clouds for a little extra ambiance, which I think looks quite nice. Believe it or not, the most difficult thing about the background was the rocks. I spent far longer than I care to admit (or bothered to document, for that matter) trying and in many ways failing to mix the proper shades of gray I wanted, and the end result didn't turn out quite as clean and graphic as I had hoped, but by the time I put the mermaid on top, you really can't tell because you can only see a fraction of what's actually there. And I mean, the end result isn't terrible, it's just not quite what I was picturing in my mind's eye is all. Personally, I know it's kind of an odd choice, but I really like how there's no defining line between the water and the sky, and yet you still get a clear idea that they're separate and the rocks aren't just floating in space. I'm not sure how, but I think I'd like to work with this kind of ambiguity more often. It's like a step between abstract and more structured art. Anyway. With the background done, the next step was to attach the mermaid, which I felt like doing in a more 3D and less flat manner, so I chopped up a cardboard box that previously held a chocolate bunny I had on hand and glued some pieces together to boost the mermaid up a bit. This where those deep shadows between her and the background are coming from. Here I feel the need to insert a comment about how difficult it was to get my tacky glue to dispense the glue for me, though there's a chance this is because I need to poke the opening in the tip to be a bit wider. (You have to poke it open yourself and I always felt like I never did get it open quite enough...unless you like strenuous hand exercises...) Of course, once all the above was done then I had to scan the art in, which I was admittedly a bit nervous about after the incident with the plastic cover peeling off the metallic paint (though fortunately, the scanner glass didn't have the same effect), and then all that was left wad the digital retouches. Overall, I'm really happy with how this turned out. It doesn't blend in as well as I originally wanted it to with the original art, but in the end, that doesn't really bother me. It's just a nice piece of art on its own that is also unique from what I normally do...except it's still got a lot of similar elements to how I normally make art. It feels a lot like the days when all I made was fanart. The key difference here is that I know myself better as an artist now and thus can use that knowledge to my advantage. I can't promise this a return to regular posting for me, though I do hope it's a gateway to me posting more frequently at least, but I can say I do intend on getting back to working on art more often and therefore being more present online again. At the very least, I can happily tell you guys that I have a couple of new art supplies en route to me that I've been wanting for a while and am excited to share with you once they arrive. If nothing else, we at least have that to look forward to! ____ Artwork © me, MysticSparkleWings ____ Where to find me & my artwork: My Website | Commission Info + Prices | Ko-Fi | dA Print Shop | RedBubble | Twitter | Tumblr | Instagram

#mermay

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quicksilversquared · 6 years ago

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Pictures on the Wall

It started as a tickle of a thought in Alix Kubdel's mind- wouldn't it be funny to plaster Marinette's room in pictures of her crush?

She didn't expect a TV crew to show Marinette's room on TV before her friend could fully finish cleaning the room up.

(Troublemaker fix-it/AKA why Marinette has So. Many. Pictures. on the wall)

(FF.net) (AO3)

It started out as a tickle of a thought in the back of Alix Kubdel's mind. She snickered briefly at it and then refocused on her homework, re-reading a passage for French Lit.

But the idea was not forgotten. Not fully, at least.

"I don't think he's capable of taking a bad photo," Marinette said dreamily the next day as their little group of girls sat together during a break between classes. She was staring at a page in a fashion magazine. Alix didn't have to be a genius to deduce that Marinette was talking about Adrien yet again. "He's just so-"

"I'm pretty sure that his father and the photographer probably weed out any photos that aren't great," Alix told her, cutting Marinette off before she could finish her sentence. She really didn't need to hear about how dreamy or handsome or bla bla bla Adrien was another time. Ever since Marinette and Alya had decided to "let her in" on the "secret" of Marinette's crush on Adrien (it wasn't a secret. It really wasn't. Even Kim had caught on ages ago, which said something about how obvious Marinette was), she had had to hear Marinette's gushing.

(Alix was starting to think that Alya had only pushed to let the other girls in on the 'secret' so that she wouldn't have to put up with the Adrien-talk by herself. As much as it could annoy her, Alix couldn't really blame Alya for that.)

Besides, Adrien was hardly dreamy and cool all the time Anyone who believed that believed in a lie, because Adrien was a giant dork. Anyone who spent more than a few minutes with him knew that much. It was hard to keep a straight face around Marinette's dreamy sighs over Adrien when Alix had seen him fighting to keep a pencil balanced on his nose longer than Nino earlier in the day and pouting when he lost, or when she had spotted him making outrageous hair styles with his ridiculously long hair.

(Despite what Marinette said about Adrien being able to pull off any look, Alix knew better. Adrien could not pull off a mohawk. It just... no.)

Still, Marinette was stubbornly shaking her head. "I bet they only have to choose between great photos! He does a great job with his modeling-"

And Alix tuned her out, mind churning deviously as the others discussed ideas for having Marinette ask Adrien out.

Surely there had to be some awkward photos of Adrien out there, considering how much of a following he had in Paris and how many photos got snapped of him on a daily basis. And some of his fans would post any photos of him, even bad ones, just to prove that they had seen him.

Alix decided to make it her personal mission to track all of those photos down to bury Marinette under them. And what she found made her very, very happy.

There were so many photos of Adrien looking supremely uncomfortable as he was pulled into a selfie with one fan or another (those got cropped so Adrien's ridiculous expressions filled the whole screen). There were photos of him dashing down the street away from fans, photos of him laughing with friends, photos of him with his bodyguard and Nathalie, photos of photoshoots but from another angle, photos of him getting photoshoot makeup touched up, photos of him messing around and purposefully pulling weird faces.

In short, there were a lot of photos. Not all of them were good. Alix cackled as she printed them all off and stuck them in a folder to bring to school. She would have to spring them on Marinette when Adrien wasn't anywhere in the vicinity or else face the combined wrath of Alya and Marinette (which she was not willing to do), but she was sure that that wouldn't be that difficult.

She wasn't expecting Alya to intercept her first.

"Oh, you should put those up in Marinette's room and see how long it takes for her to notice," Alya's voice said with a snicker several minutes before homeroom started. Alix jumped and spun around, abruptly abandoning her conversation with Kim. Alya stood there, perusing Alix's folder of ridiculous Adrien photos. How she had snuck up completely undetected was... well, it was very Alya. "I bet it would take her a while to notice."

Alix snickered at the suggestion, remembering her original idea of absolutely plastering Marinette's room in Adrien photos. It would be a good way to tease her about her crush a little bit while maybe helping her realize that she should calm down about having pictures of Adrien up everywhere. "Or I can mix in actual decent photos with these and then stick them in all sorts of weird places."

Alya grinned. "Such as...?"

"On the walls, under her bed, in the desk drawers..." Alix added, that original funny idea coming back full-force. She grinned, then glanced towards Marinette's normal seat. It was empty, as was Adrien's seat up front. "Where is Marinette, anyway? She's running late again."

Alya threw a look over her shoulder and then shrugged. "Who knows. But that gives us time to plot." Without waiting for further answer, she slid onto the bench next to Alix. "So, show me what you have!"

It wasn't difficult to find a time to sneak into Marinette's room when Marinette herself wasn't there. It was difficult to find places to put all of the photos they had dragged up.

And there were a lot. Along with the less-than-good photos, Alya had dragged up a whole slew of photos from old magazine ads Adrien had done, as well as screenshots from some of his commercials. Alix was a bit worried that the poster putty she had brought wouldn't be enough.

"At least her desktop picture isn't so awful anymore," Alix commented as she reached over the computer to attach one of the pictures on the wall behind it. "That was...yikes."

"I think she changed it when Adrien came over to play Mega Strike," Alya told her. She handed Alix a smaller photo to hang next. "And then she went with an, uh, unaltered photo next, after he left. I don't remember if she lost the collage one somehow or what."

"Good riddance to that one," Alix muttered. She clambered off of Marinette's desk, making sure to replace everything on it where it had been. "Okay, where should that next poster go?"

Half an hour later, Marinette's room was thoroughly decorated and she and Alya were puzzling over what to do with the leftover pictures.

"We can't put them too high, or Marinette won't be able to get them down again," Alya said. She flipped over a particularly bad photo of Adrien doing what appeared to be a Vulcan salute. Alix had maybe done a teensy bit of Photoshop on it to make an already pretty bad picture worse (and to get rid of the "fan" who, in Adrien's defense, looked slightly unhinged), and she was...well, a bit creeped out by the result would be the most accurate description. "Where did you find this?"

"Photoshop."

Alya snorted in amusement. "Oh, gosh. Okay, let's stick these under Marinette's bed and on the underside of her chaise and see how long it takes for her to notice. There's no point in wasting a perfectly good picture."

"Or a perfectly awful photo." Alix made another face at the Vulcan salute photo and then handed it to Alya to take. "Okay, yeah, good idea."

It didn't take long to stash away the rest of the photos and get the rest of their mess cleaned up so that they could go. Alya led the way towards Marinette's trapdoor, opening it and starting to climb down.

Alix paused, turning to look back at the room one last time. An inkling of doubt crept up her spine. "You're sure there's no way that Adrien would see this? He wouldn't come over to play video games again before Marinette can clean up?"

Alya shook her head. "Nah, he wouldn't come over out of the blue. And you know he would never go into Marinette's room without her permission, and she would want to clean up her normal posters before letting him up. Believe me, it'll be fine."

"I hate you," Marinette announced the next day at school as soon as she saw Alya. She was pouting. "Very funny."

Alya tried not to grin. "It was Alix's idea first. She helped me."

"I hate you both."

"Aren't you going to take the pictures down?"

Marinette glanced up from her homework at Tikki. "Hmm?"

Tikki pointed to the pictures covering all of Marinette's walls. "The pictures! Shouldn't you take them down?" She frowned at Marinette. "You aren't thinking of leaving them up, are you? Marinette..."

"I'll take them down, just not right now," Marinette said, turning back to her homework. "I just don't have the time! I'm really behind on my schoolwork, thanks to all of the akumas we've had, and I shouldn't prioritize cleaning photos off of my walls over that."

"Oh, that's smart." A pause. "But you'll take care of it soon, right?"

"Of course!"

"Marinette, about these pictures..."

Marinette shook her head, eyes not leaving the computer screen in front of her as she typed. "This is due tomorrow. I'm already on thin enough ice with Madam Mendeleiev, I can't possibly ask for an extension for no apparent reason. It'll have to wait."

Tikki considered the wall. "Can I take some of them down? The really awkward ones?"

"Sure, I guess."

Tikki worked her way around the room, removing the worst of the photos from the wall. It was slow work, mostly because she had to remove the poster putty from the wall as she removed things, and she didn't want to accidentally leave any marks like she and Marinette had in their frantic tearing-down of posters when Adrien visited. Once she was done, there were still a lot of photos, but at least they were mostly normal.

Hopefully Marinette would have a spare hour soon to finish returning her room to its normal state.

"Marinette, are you going to take the photos down today?"

Marinette paused with one foot out the door. "I can't! I told Maman that I would help down in the bakery. Tomorrow, for sure!"

Marinette had pulled three large photos down when her phone rang with an akuma alarm. Sighing, she tossed the picture in her recycling without a second glance (she was never going to mention how photogenic Adrien was within Alix's hearing range ever, ever again- where the other girl had found such awful photos she had no idea) and raced up to her balcony to transform.

"About those photos-"

"Still behind!"

"Can I take more photos down?"

Marinette glanced up from her Physics homework. "Yeah, I guess? Just don't do this area, I don't want to get distracted."

Tikki frowned. "Marinette, I'll have to take down those photos sometime. Can't you work somewhere else? Downstairs, maybe?"

"I'll do it this weekend, after the Jagged TV thing," Marinette promised. "But for right now, I can't. I need to use my computer for this assignment."

Alix stared at her TV in horror. There, in full color on the screen, was Marinette's room.

And Marinette's wall.

And a number of the pictures of Adrien that she and Alya had put up two weeks prior.

And Jagged Stone was pointing to them and the camera was focusing on them, bringing them up full-screen.

"She didn't take them down?" Alix exclaimed, fingers clutching at her hair. How? Why? Sure, Marinette had mentioned being crazy busy and really behind after spending time working on a sewing project instead of doing her homework, but surely she could have spared a couple minutes to clear her walls.

At least it looked like she had gotten the purposefully bad photos down, and most of the room was largely free of pictures. It was just that corner of the room, really-

-but that one corner was really bad. Like, it was plastered with pictures, from desk to ceiling.

This was bad.

Her phone rang, and Alix scrambled to answer it. "Hello?"

"We gotta fix this," Alya said, sounding panicked. "Oh, gosh. I never thought- no one else was meant to see that! At least it wasn't her entire room, but- Adrien's gonna be so weirded out, and it won't even be her fault."

"Maybe we can text him?" Alix suggested. "Let him know that it was part of a prank? Even if half of those photos were Marinette's anyway." It would be their apology to Marinette if they did that, she figured. Everyone else would forget about the photos after a few weeks, but Adrien wouldn't, and Marinette would probably flounder through an explanation too badly to be any use if Adrien approached her with any questions. "Should we text him now, or wait until school tomorrow?"

"Do you think we can get to him before he spots Marinette?" Alya asked, not even waiting for Alix to answer before she plowed on. "I think it would be hard to explain anything over text, personally, but- oh! I could call him, hang on-"

The line abruptly went dead and Alix flopped back in her seat, watching the screen. Marinette had chased the cameras out of her room- and Alix had to give her props for how composed she was keeping herself while surely embarrassed beyond belief, and she was ordering Jagged Stone and Alec around too, and they were celebrities- and now Tom and Sabine were trying to shoo the crew out completely, except some strange stuff seemed to be happening.

Like, mega-strange stuff.

Alya called Alix back a minute later, once it had been confirmed that there was an akuma at the bakery- and poor Marinette, she must be having an awful day- and Alya sounded frantic. "He's not answering his phone. I tried calling three times and nothing."

"Maybe the pretty boy is busy and missed the show?" Alix suggested. "You could ask Nino."

"Nino is out of town this weekend. He won't be back until Monday." Alya groaned. "Oh, this is such a mess."

"Maybe we can just wait until Monday?" Alix suggested as she watched Chat Noir get flung into a news van on-screen. "I mean, Adrien is always early and Marinette is almost always running in last-minute anyway. Surely we can catch him before Marinette gets there."

"Sounds like a plan," Alya agreed. "So, any ideas for excuses as to why we covered Marinette's room in pictures of Adrien?"

Adrien wasn't in the classroom. It was three minutes to the bell, and Adrien wasn't in the classroom yet.

Alix was starting to get concerned. How were they meant to corner Adrien and give their excuses if the boy was MIA?

And then, a minute before the bell, Adrien slipped through the door and into his seat. Marinette followed forty-five seconds later.

There was no way they hadn't run into each other in the locker room. Alix hoped that Marinette hadn't said anything too strange to him. If she had, all the excuses in the world from Alix and Alya wouldn't help anything.

They cornered Adrien in their next break between classes.

"Hey, you two, what's up?" Adrien asked. He looked a little puzzled about being cornered, but it only barely showed. "I saw you tried to call me yesterday, Alya- sorry I didn't pick up, I was busy."

"You're always busy, we're used to that," Alya said cheerfully, waving it off. "But, uh, we wanted to talk to you about something- well, admit something, rather- anyway, did you see the Jagged Stone show yesterday?"

Alix tried not to snort. For a moment there, Alya had sounded rather like Marinette trying to talk to Adrien.

"I did," Adrien told them, grinning. "Jagged looked like a ghost with the flour all over him, didn't he? I'm glad Tom and Sabine were willing to kick them out, though. They didn't have to go all the way upstairs."

Alix winced. "So you saw that part, huh?"

Adrien's answering nod was so slight that it would have been easy to miss it.

"The wall of photos was actually our fault," Alya admitted. "We put it up as a joke- we hid photos all over her room, actually, we should probably actually tell Marinette about that, if she hadn't found those- and she's apparently been too busy to get it all cleaned up."

Adrien looked puzzled. "Wait, that was you guys? Then why didn't Marinette just say so? And why pictures of me?"

Alix and Alya exchanged a surprised look. Apparently Marinette and Adrien had already talked, and Marinette hadn't made a complete mess of it.

Maybe they should have talked to Marinette to see what she had told him first.

"Maybe she just didn't want to explain the prank?" Alya suggested after another couple beats. "A-and it was pictures of you because of, y'know, the fashion thing, and it's really easy to find pictures of you. It wasn't anything bad at all, I swear."

Adrien huffed out a small laugh at that. "It is easy to find pictures of me, isn't it? It's a bit annoying at times. But I guess it saves my father from having to take photos of me growing up himself." He shrugged. "But thanks, I guess? That would explain why some of the photos weren't from any of my photoshoots. I did wonder."

"Heh heh yeah, that was us." Alya flashed a too-wide smile. "It was just a bit of fun, y'know? We wouldn't have done it if we knew it was going to get onto TV."

"Right, I figured." Adrien glanced over to where Nino and Max were talking. "Thanks for telling me, I guess. See you in class?"

"Of course," Alya and Alix said in near unison as Adrien waved to them and left. They both let out a sigh relief as soon as he was out of earshot and then dissolved into giddy giggles.

"Well, that was easier than I thought it would be," Alya said a bit breathlessly as they recovered. "He kind of accepts any excuse, doesn't he? He probably made it really easy for Marinette to come up with something."

"Hey, I'm not going to look a gift horse in the mouth." Alix started walking towards their next class, and Alya followed. "Adrien listened to us, and apparently Marinette managed to get some coherent sentences out around him earlier, so that's a win. And Jagged and his crew didn't manage to, say, upend the chaise and scatter photos all over on live TV, so win there too, I guess."

They walked in silence for a few moments.

"So d'you think you could make it over to Marinette's house after school today?" Alya asked as they joined the group of students heading into Madam Mendeleiev's classroom. "To help Marinette take down posters and clean up all of the photos we hid? I feel like we kind of owe it to her to help."

Alix winced. She had been planning on practicing her roller-skating sprints, but yeah, they did kind of owe it to Marinette. She had probably already spent enough time taking stuff down already, and Alya might not be able to remember all the places where they hid photos away.

"Yeah, yeah. I'll be there."

#Miraculous Ladybug #My writing #Troublemaker #because that episode's framing of Marinette annoyed me

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kayinnasaki · 7 years ago

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This was a weird year in gaming for me. I played all of one game released in 2017. The bulk of the year was covered by weird hacks and modded minecraft, as well as the usual slurry of bad games. I don't want to frame this as 'best of list' because while I like... most of these games, it's honestly more 'games I remember playing that I have some thoughts about. Anyways

Stardew Valley

What a lovely game. Due to a lot of Zachtronics stuff and modded Minecraft I got a little bit of a taste for a slower experiences again. The farming was alright, but the characters were super lovely. The game had very simple but effective writing that had me change my choice for Farmer Naomi's wife multiple times. Even the characters on the bottom of my list were great. The only issue I had was... and honestly I didn't notice it much because I wasn't going for that content... that the guys were lame. Shane had a great arc that got me to befriend him, but the rest? eh. Also that super simple fishing game was so fun.

Biggest issue with the game was the lack of an end game. I feel like randomized goals in the style of the carepackages would have been lovely. But on well, you can't play every game forever.

Momodora: Reverie Under The Moonlight

I played this on my flight to Japan since I was going to meat Rdein and the game was on my list for awhile. The level design of it had this lovely Demon's Souls meets Knytt Story feel to it. The map they made for the game was lovely and the world felt tangible and sensible. It had a very Japanese-esque style without being generic anime. It had lovely but simple combat. Just one of those games that's just... simply solid and good? Just a game with a lot of soul.

Getting Over it with Bennett Foddy

Foddy is a cool guy I've gotten to hang with a few times. Just... smart and funny and of course he makes real assholish games. But I found Getting Over It to be the least frustrating. It, more so than QWOP or GIRP became zen like to me. I just let go of any stress immediately. Progress didn't mean anything until the job was done. I didn't get mad or frustrated once. It was all zen. And Foddy talking philosophically about the nature of art and hard games was wonderful and a lot of it really resonated with me. A pleasant experience for a masochist.

Also this is the only game I played this year that game out in 2017. Yikes!

Metroid Rogue Dawn

What a flawed but lovely game. This is a game I wish I could get a physical copy of (it's just a little too expensive). This romhack has a lot of rough edges but truly creates an alien planet. It also looks unlike any NES game. It's gorgeous and just feels.... uncannily out of place, graphics from another time... Because, well, they are. I played this at the beginning of the year so a lot of details are lost on me but it was rad!

Super Metroid Rotated 90 Degrees

It's what it says on the tin. Some parts of the game are tweaked to make it reasonable but for the most part it's for crazy bomb jumping and walljumping nuts like me. It's great to have something familiar yet different, where you can use your knowledge to help you, but it doesn't ever quite help enough. Which also plays into...

A Link to the Past Randomizer

I played a Super Metroid Randomizer and some DS Vania randomizers bu the ATTP randomizer takes the cake. These are addictive. In Super Metroid, finding a stash of items meant either, depending on difficulty settings, finding a stack of nothing or find a ton of great stuff, ATTP has enough diversity in its chest drops to make every chest feel like the pull of a slot machine. Every little trick gets you a little bit further and nets you a few more pull of the slots.

I even did entrance randomizer once because I hate myself. It was... something to be making diagrams in photoshop to figure out what goes where.

Sylvan Tale

A weird Game Gear Secret of Mana/Zelda clone thing? Certainly the only Game Gear game I have ever beat. Never released in America and oddly charming and good. If this was a GBC game released by Nintendo, it'd be one of those games people say is overrated. It hasn't aged excellently but in its time it was surely wonderful. The game has a neat, curious world with a strange cosmology that, while nothing shocking, is just... nicely thoughtful. It has simple but memorable plot moments. It just plays -nicely-. Not excellently, but definitely nicely. Also you change forms and shit and its kinda annoying but it's one of those weird gems that Sega fanboys would likely clutch close to their heart if it got a US release. But sadly, despite being a SEGA game, it did not.

I replayed Circle of the Moon and Harmony of Despair thinking Circle was the "okay one" and Boy was I wrong!

I didn't remember either of these games being great. In fact, I remembered Harmony of Despair being downright awful and ugly and Circle of the Moon being... odd but playable...

Oh my god Circle of the Moon sucks. I know there was some article claiming it was secretly The Best Portable Castlevania, but it is just... awful. Bland in looks, bland in level design, tedious to transverse. The DSS system is garbage, saved only by the fact that you can use a glitch to use any card combination. Finding them in the wild? Fuck that. You move weird. You jump weird. You're like a slug who can somehow jump 100 feet in the air. There are no items to pick up besides Health and MP ups so there is no real discovery -- just tedious cleanup work to maximize your stats. The only things that don't suck about this game: The monster choices are odd and there are a lot of them. A lot of classic enemies are replaced by oddbalsl like... archer wolves? Sure, okay, that's better than just another skeleton. And some of the bosses are okay? Sometimes? Maybe? Even if Dracula sucks horridly.

Harmony of Despair by contrast was much better than I remember. And by much better it was "Okay". I won't be itching to replay it any time soon and it was a number of steps below Aria of Sorrow but it was.. fine? A little bloated and with a few advancement triggers that defy reasonable design but... it's fine and... looked much better than I remember? Likely because GBA emulators are better about colors/backlight compensation so the game looked much less overblown than I remember. Hell at its best, it looks better than Aria, though Aria is just more consistent. Also it has a weirdass soundtrack. At first I hated it, but over time it oddly grew on me. The sample choices are weird but I guess kinda match the "Dissonance"? But the important is the soundtrack leverages these grainy, awful sounds in awesome ways. It reminds me of the horrible Demon's Souls trumpets. They're so bad. But so good. God I love them. Anyways here have my favorite HoD track.

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Devil's Crash

There is something captivating about this stupid pinball game. Naxat has a skill for making games just... feel nice. And they never got to stretch that muscle much but this pinball game from the guys who made Rekka is awesome. It just feels cool, has a lot of energy, lots of little subboards to find. It's impossible to really explain. Just try it. I don't know if, as a kid, I'd be down with paying full price for a single board pinball game but hey it somehow works.

Also known as Dragon's Fury in the US, where it is on the Genesis rather than the PC Engine. Both versions are good. I feel like I slightly prefer the PCE version, but the Genesis version looks and arguably sounds better (which goes against my usual Anti-FM Synth bias). Also the main song is awesome.

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Golden Axe Warrior

I can't believe there is a Golden Axe game that is a flat up clone of Zelda 1. Like almost nothing tried to clone Zelda 1. It's like a weird look into an alternative history. It's not particularly -good- but it's educational. Never beat it because my save corrupted but w/e.

This Fucking Thing

My uncle got me this weird crappy handheld thing for Christmas loaded with old NES games that is various minor tweaks of Super Mario Bros, Adventure Island and Contra, a few other random old shitty games and a TON of AWFUL chinese games made in the 2000s. They're awful and awesome. I just load it up sometimes and pick a random game and groan at how bad it is... but a good groan. An oddly... exciting groan.

Modded Minecraft

I played a ton of modded minecraft this year. Too much, really. But the engineering you can do in modded minecraft is just wonderful. It's weird because no other modded game I can think of regularly assembles mods under 'mod packs' (without it being a huge community drama thing). So you get these weird custom play experiences made up of multiple peoples work. The integration a lot of time doesn't make sense but all things considered it works really well. Modded minecraft, with all its pipes and machines isn't even the same game. It feels like a sandbox Zachtronics game or something.

https://www.youtube.com/user/kayinnasaki/videos I've been uploading base tours and stuff so if you wanna get an idea of what I like doing, that'd work. But yeah, it's oddly infection. Sometimes I worry it's slowed down BEP but then when I cut myself off I just refresh reddit for 4 hours, which honestly is a huge downgrade. JUST GOTTA WORK ON MOTIVATION, SEE YA ALL NEXT YEAR.

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miss-martini-corsets · 7 years ago

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This jacket I’ve been drafting up in my spare time over a few days. I went back to a drafting book (Old Winifred Aldritch book) to remind me about collars. I didn’t really need to, I could have just cut a rectangle and bunged that on and I’m sure it would have worked fine enough. The pleats in the shoulder head was because there was too much ease in the block but I found it sits nicer with that bit of extra room. I pretty much made the lining and the shell, then bagged it out. It’s supposed to take a machinist an hour ish to make a lined reversible jacket with a CF zip at my day job so I just used the same techniques.

Here are my Photoshop designs – all inspired by the polka dot fabric pieces I bought from a FB group where I was supposed to be de-stashing

Below is my trial piece, that I am wearing below, it’s about 2 sizes too small for me but I can get in it! A good sign that the armhole is big enough so I can safely grade this pattern into other sizes without worrying about fit. This is as far as I’ve got with it so far, I want the black collar to sit more forward towards the front and the fronts to have a bit more coverage. Ive drafted it all up ready to cut out and try.

The jacket is about size 14-16 or Large, fits very snug on me and I am more 22-24 or 3xl-4xl.

Here are some more of the Photoshop fantasies I had with this polka dot fabric and ‘what can I make that doesn’t use loads of fabric?’

The layout above is not correct for the grainline, I just wanted it to fit into what fabric I had. I’ve had a break from this and made a couple of dresses, but I will be back with updates.

Bolero jacket trial This jacket I've been drafting up in my spare time over a few days. I went back to a drafting book (

#pinup #rockabilly

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beauty4free2u · 8 years ago

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HOOKER TO LOOKER BY JENTRY KELLEY

Hooker to looker is a "makeup guide for the not so easily offended" by Makeup artist Jentry Kelley. I stumbled on this book while watching this video by the lovely Dominique Sachse (which I highly recommend watching as well) and had to have it! It sounded just like something I would enjoy. So, from hooker to looker? Let´s check it out, shall we?

And I absolutely loved the cover! Not only brings it the title to life- but also to see Jentry's real face. Yes, we can see Jentry's skin! I am so over the crazy filters everybody is using these days! Nobody seems to have skin and pores and wrinkles anymore. This is not right.

Jentry shows her "hooker side" (obviously) on the left and the "looker side" on the right. While the hooker side shows an impeccable makeup application technique- it seems so unreal and just too much- but this is exactly how our millenniums these days seem to apply makeup. Much of it is really coming from the drag-queen scene. Each to their own and whatever pleases you- but in bare day light, this comes off as too much for sure. I agree very much on Jentry and keep it with the "looker side" (at least that is what I am aiming for) instead! ;-)

But maybe I am also just too old to walk around like a hooker (though I remember wearing too much makeup for sure in my teenage years). It´s probably cause in our younger years we don´t have enough confidence?

Instagram is full of photoshopped girls and yes- even our Beauty Gurus on YouTube use filters, like Wayne Goss demonstrated brilliantly in this video:

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Who to trust still these days? Jentry Kelley that is!

So I ordered my own copy of this makeup guide that starts off with a little life story of Jentry. And a true and honest story that is! Jentry started with 18 to work at a Clinique´s counter, later she freelanced at Mac, she also worked at the Bobbi Brown counter- all the while studying at college. 5 years later she graduated with a Bachelors degree in Business Management- so Jentry is a true business women: not only does she know how to apply makeup, but she also understands the business side of it. No wonder that her business plan: becoming a makeup artist including selling her own makeup line succeeded.

With pure honesty and self humor she describes, how at one point she realized, that her face was "lily white like a porcelain doll" but her body "was the color of a Brazilian beach babe" (picture below on the left). She never claimed to "know it all", but to be in a constant learning phase- she seems so down- to earth and so approachable to me!

I watched all of her Youtube videos which I can highly recommend - even though they are a couple years old- the techniques are still all very up to date- no! no drag queen looks here. And that is just exactly what I adore on Jentry: nothing fake and she knows just simply how to enhance your face!

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The book contains also a bit of self advertisement for her own skin care and makeup line- but which smart business women would not do that, right? Anyhow: I found the tutorials definitely were missing more pictures to show the makeup application techniques she is talking about. A makeup tutorial just in words? That is just not good.

The part I was most excited for when buying the book, was the one for "the not so easily offended" and I felt it fell a bit short- much more at the very end of the book, I got what I actually was out for: the witty, humorous side of Jentry (p. 105-113).

I was really hoping to get much more of this kind of language. The title "a makeup guide for the not so easily offended" sounded for me more of a "fun book" than of an actual guide. But I couldn´t agree more on her opinion about "extreme contouring": please stay away cause that is just aging! Baking and extreme highlighting is in her opinion for drag queens- which I also highly agree. The problem is that it might look great on YouTube and Instagram, but in real life this ain´t flattering at all (at least not if you have fine lines and pores- or let´s say if you are above 25 lol!)

I love how she makes fun out of new trends such as grey ashy lips or even frosted lips or overly tweezed brows (which thank god is actually more of an "older trend" I think)! I am guilty myself of over tweezing- happened many times and then I need forever to grow them back (I have a tutorial here) - but right she is! And the "quotation or comma brow" just made me smile, as I have seen it too many times (don´t know what I am talking about? Scroll down this post and see the last photo!)

This part of the book is finished off by an amusing, but very true list of "Top 20 items to toss out of your makeup bag". I am currently in an active decluttering and de-stashing phase, I feel like it feels so freeing to toss stuff I am an not using and this list definitely helps!

Jentry also notices in the book that your pencil sharpener (the blade) has got to be "Made in Germany". So true and I wrote about this also a year ago. Yes, best blades are simply from Germany (the same one Urban Decay uses). (I am so un-biased as a German lad lmao).

I disagree on her take on washing makeup brushes once a month- but maybe I am overly OCD. My personal take is once a week! ;-)

OVERALL VERDICT:

This is a short entertaining read and great coffee table book- I especially liked Chapter 1 "How it all began" where she tells her life story and Chapter 11 "What not to do".

If you are a complete makeup beginner and have no clue of skin care, this book might also be insightful for you, however as mentioned earlier: the tutorials are lacking in descriptive photos. Someone that has a bunch experience with makeup will not really profit from the tutorials.

Hooker to Looker by Jentry Kelley, available on Amazon ($39.99)

I bought this. Contains Affiliate link. Read my full disclosure.

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