#guess i'll have to go back and tag my other worldbuilding rants

[you-cant-fuck-megaman]

something that keeps coming up if you look at the games’ stories is wily’s accomplishments. or, rather, the lack thereof. the truth is, Wily's actually kind of a shitty roboticist!

he's not very good at making robots, he's much better at modifying robots. i know the series (and a good chunk of fanwork) likes to hype him up as a mad genius of robotics, but he's actually kind of a complete phony. a tremendous hack. a huge fucking fraud. he's the brutal doom of the megaman-'verse, only famous because he used other people's work as a stepping stone. just like angry birds, he’s all about seeing someone else’s successful work and putting his own reskin on it so everyone else associates it with him. he’s not a developer, he’s a modder with delusions of grandeur.

the idea that his work all culminated in Zero and Zero’s the coolest bestest most awesomest robot ever is, frankly, completely laughable when you look at the track record of how many robots he’s actually made and how they’ve fared. his strongest work that’s come the closest to seriously threatening Megaman has never really been his own work. with Bass, Shadow Man, Ra Thor, and the Stardroids, he’s always had something else as a base and modified it to be stronger. even popular fanon is that Roboenza is based off MM8′s Evil Energy, which makes sense.

ironically enough, he does his best modding with weird alien shit. my personal theory is that Zero’s a modified Terra+Sunstar hybrid, utilizing his knowledge of making Ra Thor as a basis, powered by Super-Bassnium. the canon is that he’s based on Protoman, of all fucking people, but that’s completely nonsensical on so goddamn many fronts.

however, he is a fantastic designer. he's much better at making areas that adhere to an aesthetic! he has designed a lot of mini-bots specifically for the sake of complimenting an area, and he's revamped areas multiple times before to have a theme that compliments the Robot Master. even his own castles themselves, he has a clear skull motif that applies to everything and he will be fucking DAMNED if he doesn't see it through. even in megaman 11, we see him complete with a fucking set of skull jammies in a skull bed. the man fucking WILL NOT LIVE without his skulls. he probably wears skull underwear, the fucking nerd.

he’s not a roboticist. he's not even a good programmer, he's an artist. he's a mad artist angry over how his stuff never got views as opposed to that fucking Dr. Light's work, and he spent a lifetime trying to game the algorithm only for this fucking upstart to take it all away from him and get quadruple the subscriber counts in half the time. and now he's making it everyone else's problem.

[sunset-a-story]

Writer Q&A Tag Game!

I got tagged by @touloserlautrec on this one and you can see their answers here.

I'm not sure who hasn't gotten this one yet but I'm no pressure tagging @squarebracket-trick @captain-kraken @vsnotresponding & @tisiphonewolfe (and open tag)

1. What motivates you to write?

The whole absurdly-large scope of Sunset is going on in my head whether I'm writing it or not. You know when you have a song oppressively stuck in your head and the only thing that helps is to listen to the song all the way through? It's like that. If I don't write it out, my brain just churns it over and over on a loop.

2. A line/short snippet of your writing that you are most proud/happy of. If not maybe share a line of someone else's work you love (just please credit them)

Ooo. Hrm. Here's something from Arc 2.

Gerrit's heart sank. The idea that this sort of attack was more than a sporadic phenomenon was a dreadful, heavy thing that he didn't have proper words for. But that was the benefit of telepaths--he didn’t have to. When Gerrit would normally have needed to look away, attempting to grasp his fingers around some sort of words that even remotely fit the gravity of what he was being told, instead he just looked at Penn and felt. Penn held his gaze for a moment and Gerrit felt a gentle nudge of his telepathy. Penn understood. “Go.” Penn clapped him on the back.

3. Which OC makes you smile every time you think/talk about them and what are they like?

It's tough to pick! I'll say Marek just because I enjoy his antics and stalwart refusal to be a "serious corporate adult" while being one of the most competent people in the Corp. (Plus he and Baguette are a package deal.)

5. What part of writing do you think you are the best at? (Yes stroke your own ego it's okay)

I guess I'd have to say planning/mapping the big picture. Sunset covers a lot of threads that all branch out to affect others down the line with cascading consequences. It's all connected somehow and I feel like I do a decent holding it all in my head.

(That and I think I can write some pretty damn funny dialogue to break up the tension of the rest of the story.)

6. What is something in the writeblr community is most enjoyable?

The people! It's so amazing to meet so many supportive writers and get to get excited about everyone's projects. Listening to other rant about their oc babies brings me so much joy.

7. A writing tool/device you use that helps you with writing? (It could be speech to text, a writing program etc)

I've been using StimuWrite 2 which has been a great motivating tool. It's a program helps to keep me focused and I can create a mini fake coffee shop background with it.

8. A piece of worldbuilding that you like in your own story? (It could be the magic system, a particular place in the story, a law etc)

I love our take on telepaths because it's not a matter of just hearing thoughts or seeing them like on a movie screen. It's synesthetic and young telepaths have to learn to translate this internal language.

Each telepath's experience is different. Penn's is heavily smell-based like information he takes into his body from outside. Jake's is more external with sounds and physical sensations pressing themselves onto his skin, wrapping around him. Reeve's is more internal with tastes and colors that flow from the backs of his eyes and down his throat like a liquid--so if his knack gets overwhelming it can make him feel like he's choking or drowning.

I like to think that how telepaths perceive their knack has an influence on them in the same way that what knack someone has will influence who they are. (This also makes conflict between telepaths really interesting to write!)

9. What piece of advice would you say to encourage others to write if they are having a rough patch?

Allow yourself to have fallow times where you aren't writing. That's part of the process. I think the saying is something like anything in nature that is producing endlessly without rest or renewal is dying.

Don't give up on your projects, write that shitty first draft, but don't beat yourself up with guilt when your brain needs a break.

[sourestlemon]

So. I made a bet with my friend that I could get through Omegaverse Haikyuu fanfiction because he says I can’t so if I read https://archiveofourown.org/works/13330632/chapters/30514041 that I’m going to get free icecream and twenty bucks.

But still, Bokuaka! Bokuaka is beautiful, I should rant about it more actually

This is me talking about this fic as I read, so it’ll be updated until I finish

Note, I’ve finished and it’s very very long. You’ve been warned

There’s my review and meta at the end of this as well as some critiques

Spoilers ahead.

“The Jewel of Seijou”

THE WHAT NOW

IWAOIIII

Bokuaka is so fucking cute dear god.

Oh. It’s sinful now

Ushijima better stop throwing shade at my boi’s

“"I can't believe you all think that you can go against the crown and live!" Ushishima says silencing them all. The alpha was slowly emitting his pheromones wanting to show them all his superiority. No one said a word against him. "Toru! I didn't know you'll be as lowly to use your family name to gather us here!" The alpha seethed to the omega that could have been his wife. Iwazumi hackles raised and bared his lips at the beginning of a growl. "And you!" Ushijima turned to Bokuto full on emitting his pheromones making the rest of the alpha's shoulder hackle cautiously and Oikawa to cling at Iwazumi. But Bokuto meet Ushijima calmly, unfazed by the bloodlust while Akaashi was frozen to his spot but didn't show any emotion.”

So what we get out of this paragraph is

1) Bitchy Ushi. I love Ushijima don’t get me wrong he’s precious but like. This fic Ushijima? Son of a bitch walking up in here like “Toru! How dare you be so lowly—“ and fucking trying to dominate everyone.

2) Protective Iwaizumi. Protect the precious Seijou Jewel. Do it, fight for him, protect him he’s scared.

3) Is Ushijima salty because Oikawa didn’t choose him? Oh god, he is isn’t he.

4) Akaashi’s go to emotion isn’t emotion.

5) Shits about to go down, Bokuto is gonna flip eventually, if Ushi threatens anyone—it’d probably be Oikawa or Akaashi seeing as they’re omega’s—I can see Bokuto and Iwaizumi just flipping their shit.

God I’m way to invested. Why did I read this

USHIJIMA IS A COWARDLY LITTLE BITCH IN THIS FIC, STAB HIM HINATA

D O I T

Awww Kageyama cares, Tsukki cares

OH MY GOD TENDOU!

More people came surrounding them. "What the hell," Akaashi recognized Iwazumi's voice.

Iwaizumi’s reaction is the only respectable reaction.

Wait this has major character death in the tags

Fuck

Everyone has decided that Oikawa and Akaashi must be defended but just once I want them to flip their shit and kill someone. Just once.

Bokuto, Lev and Iwaizumi all want to protect Oikawa but Iwaizumi doesn’t even fucking trust em.

Why does everyone act like Nishinoya not wanting to move on so quickly is a bad thing? It’s perfectly reasonable and I hate how everyone is like “What’s wrong with you, do you not like us?” And getting super standoffish or snappish simply because Nishinoya loves Asahi so much and doesn’t want to feel like they didn’t need him.

I really don’t like how Nishinoya/Tanaka/Ennoshita became a thing in this fic. It would be cute if it didn’t just happen because Nishinoya was desperate and if he wasn’t he wouldn’t have fucked Tanaka.

Oh dear god I don’t want Kenma to die.

Oh thank god it’s okay.

Fuck I forgot they had boobs

Did Bokuto almost name the Kuroken baby Oya but changed last minute?

BO ISN’T COMING BACK IS HE?????????

I’m feelin a little sniffly. I might fucking cry over an Omegaverse fic. Oh how the mighty have fallen

Oh my god the stars. I don’t think Bo is coming back y’all. I’m so nervous

The fuckin royals aren’t getting Keiji. No. Nuh-uh FUCK THAT SHIT

THAT’S BOKUTO’S MATE STAY AWAY FROM HIM

-cue mac worrying about oikawa because seijou is allied with fukurodani and an easy way to tear seijou away from the alliance is to kidnap oikawa and iwaizumi might split to keep him safe and ushi fucking knows this and possibly tendou also oiks is pretty as fuck-

BOKUTO IS OKAY!

Iwaizumi making Bokuto promise to save Oikawa if things went to shit makes me so worried but the same time his lil speech made my IwaOi heart so happy.

Suga bby...

BOKUTO JUST KILLED A FUCKING CHILD

Tendou, Ushijima I never thought I’d say this but I fucking hate them right now. They better not hurt the other best Boi’s.

Ushijima is salty as fuck confirmed.

"You truly are a piece of art," Ushijima said gently ...."But not as beautiful as him," the alpha muttered as he threw the omega to the floor.

So, this little snippet sent disgusting shivers down my spine for two reasons.

1) Ushijima just yeeted Akaashi, my son and

2) Any reader knows who the ‘he’ Ushi is talking about is, the only person in this book who is said to be as beautiful as Akaashi. You guessed it, the boi who rejected Ushi-fucking-jima, Jewel of Seijou himself Oikawa Tooru.

The thing that grosses me out the most about this paragraph just on its own is that Ushijima is either guessing about what Oikawa looks like, or he actually knows which overall just gives me the heebie jeebies because Oikawa definitely didn’t want that. What makes my skin crawl in this little snippet is what Ushijima would do when if he got his angry little hands on Oikawa—or Iwaizumi, but Iwa would probably be killed or used as a bargaining chip.

Hmmmmm, I’m pretty sure Ushi is in love with Tendou but the beauty statement still stands possibly???? Unless specified otherwise, because Akaashi and Oikawa are canonically considered the most beautiful people in the fic.

Also this entire chapter just makes me feel so gross, fuck Ushijima man. Fuck him.

My Ushijima loving heart hurts reading this fic.

I just want Akaashi and Oikawa to straight up kill someone. Please, anyone who I don’t care about

I FUCKING SEE THE MAJOR CHARACTER DEATH WARNING AND I DON’T LIKE IT

FUCK

FUCK

FUCK

NOT BOKUTO

WAIT IS HE ALIVE

I WANNA SEE MY LITTLE BOY

HERE HE COMES

I WANT TO SEE MY LITTLE BOY

"I came right on time," Bokuto forced out his voice cracking with emotion. "Now I can engulf you in my arms and brighten your days despite the absence of the sun. You will no longer have to endure the cold winters alone. I'll be with you, I be there for you and our child," The alpha vowed his hands itching in need.

"Are you going to leave us again?" Akaashi needed to know. The omega already knew that he wouldn't be able to survive being apart from the alpha. He knew that he wouldn't win the battle with the overwhelming loneliness.

"The seas could dry up, the mountains could turn to pebbles, the trees could die and the whole world could be on fire and I still won't leave your side."

That was all Akashi needed to hear as he leaped into his alphas arm and let go of all the pain he has held in

I’m not crying I swear

They walked together side by side and Akaashi finally faced them. They were both beaten, bloody, and torn butinstead of feeling satisfaction he felt remorse. They both looked at him with soft, wide eyes, and he realized that this was the moment they were waiting for. They wanted to see the child that they both desperately wanted and Akaashi decided to give them a parting gift.

Akaashi had won, he had won from the very beginning and he held his trophy who was a small babe with golden orbs, with mutant white and black hair. He hadn't lied to Tendou when he had said that the baby looked exactly like his father.

OH MY FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOOD I’M SOBBING DON’T TOUCH ME

Meta and Review

So I just read A/B/O for the first time and I knew absolutely nothing about the entire trope that Mpreg existed and to stay the hell away from it. Please remember this in the meta and tell me if there way of dividing characters is ever specified or if it’s just decided by top-bottom dynamics.

Wow.

The story was pretty good outside of what I’m about to talk about. I liked the ships and most of the buildup, the worldbuilding seems solid, the war and UshiTens situation was really interesting to me and it made Ushi and Tendou a bit morally gray and could’ve talked about how people could do bad things for what they thought were the right reason and everything was clean cut.

Overall? Eh. Could’ve been done better

Not onto the rest

This doesn’t seem as toxic or inherently bad as most fics I’ve seen, I didn’t really like how Omega’s are always inherently feminine—the dresses, jewels, how they’re seen as inherently weaker and sometimes helpless, how they’re always referred to as “my lady”—and aren’t really given another choice because they might have the ability to reproduce in A/B/O but they aren’t women. It’s okay if a man is really feminine but for all of them to be? It rubbed my the wrong way.

I wish that the power structure was handled different in A/B/O in general. Omega’s seem to be treated like they’re helpless and I just...don’t like it? Omega’s might be submissive but that doesn’t make them physically weaker and if it did, I would’ve thought they would have picked up some other useful skills like diplomacy or strategy.

As usually, my example of how a character could’ve been handled better is Oikawa.

He’s my favorite character and I adored him but he just didn’t really deliver. It felt like he was being treated like a kid throughout this entire fic, it didn’t seem like he was doing anything during the war. Even if Omega’s don’t have a lot of physically prowess and abilities, what happened to Oikawa’s strategic and analytical nature? Why was it never mentioned in any of Bokuto’s POV sections because out all the leaders of the Allied Kingdoms, Oikawa is the best strategist—Kuroo is the exception, not the rule and I thought they should’ve been working together because smort boys—but he was simply hidden away.

Now I have no problems with all the protective IwaOi scenes when they’re in immediate danger—it makes perfect sense if Omega’s are physically weaker but have other usable talents that are taken seriously—and Oikawa simply can’t talk his way out of said problem.

I do however, have a problem with cowering Oikawa. That feels so OOC at the beginning of the first scene I cited, where is all of the quick wit and worthless pride from the show? Now, it makes sense for Oikawa to start getting scared and simply slip behind Iwaizumi once Ushijima tries to dominate everyone and all the Alphas start freaking out if Oikawa is at an actual, physical disadvantage—I feel like the alpha’s their have similar frames, or at least most of them do. Bokuto, Ushijima, Kuroo and Iwaizumi are jacked and beefy, everyone but Iwa is relatively tall too. Now, Oikawa’s tall too but he’s much thinner and leaner. I’d be scared too if everyone could break me like a twig if it came down to it—but no ??? Apparently at the first sign of any conflict he just gets scared??? He doesn’t know what’s going on in his own fucking kingdom ???

This is not Oikawa.

I didn’t like how they treated most of the Omega’s actually, it felt like they were just reverted to helpless damsels in distress. What happened to Kenma’s observation skills? Nishinoya’s everything?

More importantly, what decides Alpha’s and Omega’s? Is it up in the air like gender is? What are Beta’s then? It can’t just be who’s top and who’s bottom, that would mean the alpha-beta-omega- status wouldn’t be decided until you had a mate

From what I’ve seen in the fic, it goes by ship dynamics but what if the characters who had more strategic, cunning, observant traits and weren’t as buff and muscly would be Omega’s and had the brain power while characters who relied more on physical prowess would be Alpha’s and dominant in a purely physical way sometimes while characters who were an odd combination of the two would be Beta’s.

Going by my logic, instead of the top being the alpha and the bottom just being an omega without any personality it would be...

Bokuto- Alpha, like he was in the story. He’s definitely more physically inclined then Akaashi.

Akaashi: Omega, same as in the fic. Not to say he isn’t athletic but he relies more on his mind.

Iwaizumi- Alpha, like in the fic but from a purely physical standpoint and because he can rein Oikawa in when his friend starts going nuts.

Oikawa - Beta, he’s quite powerful but he’s also manipulative, strategic and his mind is scary as fuck.

Kuroo- Beta, he relies on his physical prowess and dorkily perfect brain a lot so he’s also a mixture of both.

Kenma- Omega, physically he’s a twig but his mind is what makes him the brain of Nekoma

Hinata- Alpha, he doesn’t use his brain a lot and has a lot of physical power

Kageyama - Beta, he’s pretty smart when it comes to volleyball and he’s also physically strong

Suga - Omega, he’s quite clever and his brain power out ways his physical prowess by a landslide

Daichi- Beta, he firms strategies and relies on his brain, plus his killer thighs

Tsukishima - Beta, he has his hue fur and athleticism but his brain power is also strong as fuck

Yamaguchi - Beta, he seems to be really people smart and eventually his serves are pretty good.

Can Betas get into a relationship with other Betas? I don’t know or care, we stan Alpha-Alpha, Beta-Beta and Omega-Omega ships here

I DON’T KNOW IF THIS IS HOW IT WORKS THO

do I have to read more