#he doesn't remember Sam's name half the time either

[coockie8]

current high point of Peaches and Cream (Part 2) is Vlad just completely forgetting what Tucker's name is and referring to him by a different 'T' name every time until Danny says "Tucker" out loud lol

[magniloquent-raven]

Day 3: Missing Moments

a little something for @bucktommypositivityweek 💜 tommy POV after their first date + buck calling about meeting for coffee

**

Tommy's not moping. He doesn't mope. Especially not over a relationship that wasn't even a relationship yet. It was one date. Arguably less. Half a date with a guy he's hung out with—if he's counting very generously—a grand total of four times.

A blip, as far as relationships go. He has more history with that guy he used to trade semi-frequent blowjobs with who's saved in his phone as Nose Ring.

...Come to think of it, he should delete that guy's number. They haven't spoken in years. He's pretty sure the last text in their message history is—yup. Dick pic. From Nose Ring. They'd gone six months without contact, then he sent a picture of his penis and nothing else. Tommy couldn't find it in himself to be even vaguely interested, and there's been no communication since.

And that's really that's the problem, isn't it. His dating history is riddled with guys like that. Dead-end hookups and bad dates with people he didn't click with no matter how much he tried to force it. And people who just...didn't care enough. Then Evan...

Alright, he's moping a little bit. He's only human.

He's been laying in bed, staring at the ceiling. Pretty much since he got home. It's not late enough that he's tired, really, but he's also exhausted. In a soul-deep sort of way.

It was nice. He had a nice time, sitting across from Evan, letting him stutter his way through all the usual first date talking points like he was reading them off a list in his head. It was cute, how seriously he took it, how he'd pause and smile and get that soft look in his eye when he was listening to Tommy talk.

It would have been so easy to be greedy and keep spending time basking in that warmth he seems to radiate. Evan was clearly willing to push himself way past his comfort zone, but. Tommy wasn't. Isn't. His stomach twists just thinking about it.

But maybe he's being selfish either way. He wants more than Evan can give him, so he's pulling away completely, retreating before he can get too deep into planning a future Evan isn't ready for.

He sighs, feeling around next to his pillow until his fingers close around his phone.

Maybe Evan will reach out again. Some day. Eventually. Once he's more at ease with himself. Or maybe Tommy already ruined what could have been before it even started. Probably safer to just assume the latter. Restrict himself to hoping they can still be friends after this.

He scrolls aimlessly through his contacts. There's quite a few numbers in there that he should delete. Names he's not sure he recognizes anymore. Ones he wishes he could forget.

For some godforsaken reason he still has Sam Westbrook in here. Just reading the name puts a pit in his stomach. He doesn't remember everything about the three horrible months they spent together, it's mostly just flashes. The taste of too much beer on his tongue, saturated and clumsy in his mouth. A sharp smile and a sharper suit, always pressed and starched and better-than-you.

Tommy was newly out and far too hard on himself about how difficult it was. Guys like Sam seemed to sniff that out, made his personal shame all about them. It didn't always work, but Sam was particularly good at it. He always left Tommy feeling gutted and guilty and far too willing to do whatever it took to make it up to him the next time they saw each other. It's not a relationship he likes to think about.

But it's a reminder that he did the right thing tonight.

And...

Maybe he'll call Evan. Not yet, not right away. Tommy needs time to square away his own messy feelings, but maybe in a couple weeks. Just to let Even know he's. Around. If he needs someone to talk to about all this.

They can be friends. He'll make it work.

He deletes Sam's number, and tosses his phone aside.

Two weeks.

—

It's only two days later when his phone rings, Evan Buckley written across his screen in big white letters. He stares at it through five long buzzes while his heartbeat pounds in his ears.

This...wasn't the plan. And to make matters worse, he's at work. He catches one of his coworkers side-eyeing him curiously, and that pretty much guarantees he'll have at least three people ask him what was up with the phone call before his shift it over.

Well. He should at least give them something to gossip about. A guy called me and I watched it go to voicemail isn't much of a story.

He swipes to answer, before he can make himself any more nervous.

"Hey."

"Tommy! Hey!" Evan's voice crackles a little through the phone with a surprised intake of breath, like he wasn't the one who called in the first place. The corner of Tommy's mouth twitches. "H-how's it going?"

Tommy spent four hours yesterday taking apart his neighbours' lawn mower because he'd convinced the man it was making a weird noise and he could fix it. There was nothing wrong with it, but he checked every inch anyways, and put it back together well-oiled and exactly as pristine as it was before. That morning he'd gone grocery shopping with a paper list and his phone at home so he'd stop obsessively combing through all his files trying to find things to delete.

So, he's having a very normal week, clearly.

"Good," he says instead of explaining any of that. "I'm actually at work right now, so—"

"Oh crap, I forgot you were working today, sorry. I—I can call back later if you're busy."

"No, it's okay. Slow day so far." He pauses. "One might even say qui—"

"Ah, don't jinx it!"

Tommy snickers. Apparently Eddie wasn't exaggerating. He's known a lot of superstitious people, but most of them didn't take it this seriously. Evan sounded less panicked about flying directly into an actual hurricane. "Right, the dreaded Q-Word."

"Did you hear about the power lines that fell on our engine?!"

"Yes." He'd seen the pictures too. Pretty much everyone had, the 133 were sending them around all day after they took that call.

"And then some guy stole it later that same day, y'know. It was a terrible shift."

He'd heard about that too, but not that it was the same station. Damn. "Alright, alright. No tempting fate."

"Well. Good. Too many things can go wrong with helicopters."

Tommy squints up at the rafters, feeling unbearably fond. Like he's full of something warm and syrupy and too big for his chest, like he's spilling sunlight between his ribs.

He should ask why Evan called. Polite check-in after their date ended so abruptly? Another storm he needs Tommy to fly into? Metaphorical or otherwise. Hopefully it won't involve stealing anything else. They got way too lucky the first time for Tommy to trust it working out again, and he kind of likes his job.

He slips his free hand into his pocket. "How are you doing, Evan?"

"Oh." He lets out a soft exhale that comes through as quiet static. "I, uh. Good, actually. B-better, um. Listen, are you free tomorrow?"

Tommy stops breathing, lungs seizing for a long moment before he very carefully reminds himself how to use them. "Yes."

"I wanted to. Talk. To you. Um. In person, preferably."

This really wasn't the plan.

But it's fine. It's more than fine. It's...

He'll just have to deal with wanting to kiss the living daylights out of someone who's off-limits, it's not like he's never had to do that before. If Evan needs something from him he's not about to say no, he just didn't expect it to happen so soon, if it happened at all.

"I, uh, would've just popped by your house unannounced, but I thought this might be more polite," he continues, a teasing lilt in his voice. Tommy purses his lips against the smile threatening to overtake his face. "Also, I don't know where you live."

"You could've asked Eddie."

"Oh, so you're saying I should have ambushed you then?"

"No, that's very rude. Who does that."

Evan's delighted laugh is bright and infectious, and has him grinning at his feet, sunlight spreading down to the tips of his fingers.

"So, coffee? Tomorrow?"

"Alright."

"Cool. Awesome. I'll text you the details?"

"Cool," he echoes, purposefully deadpan. "Awesome."

He can hear the smile in Evan's voice when he pretends to be offended by the mocking. It's there all through their goodbye too, and Tommy finds himself coiled up around his anticipation at the thought of seeing that smile again.

It's going to be a long 18 hours. But it's worth the wait.

[lumineary-arts]

Saw you ask about ppls AUs uh

Most of mine, admittingly, don't have designs yet. At least not drawn ones. Oops!!

But I can like?? Still ramble ig?

I also have a swap AU! I haven't posted a lot ab it, but it's called Solver Shift.

In it I put Sam in Cyns place. So the DDs have pink accents (wasn't comfortable using Doll and making them red, despite barely drawing DD armbands anyways - personally at least)

Some places I'm still unsure about, like idk whether Khan and Nori should be direct swaps with Ron & Tessa or should be put in Tessas parents position. If I go the latter idk who to put in Tessas place lol.

Ron and Tessa weren't actually ever romantically involved. They were just best friends, and were like "well we live together, we both kinda wanna know what having kids is like. So let's raise one together"; insert Nuke (N) being built. Tess survived a few years into his life, they built Cyn and then yada yada you know the story - dead mom

If it wasn't obvious by Ns name, the rail gun gets replaced by explosives. Thank Cyn for that, it was her idea. (They both take canonverse Uzi her engineering skills, but Cyn takes the more unhinged aspect of the personality.) - Nuke was like "we gotta do something about the DDs but idk what!" And Cyn, sparkly eyed and all, was like "Let's blow them up!"

I need to figure out some episode stand ins seeing as Cyn is younger but still sticks to N like glue. Beau takes Dolls place, they'd be Similar in age to Cyn (aka I gotta give them a body design F)

Oh also, as for befriending the DDs -- whilst Ep1 would run similar to canon; after that Thad/T would bond faster with the siblings than Uzi/Z bc they keep their canonverse personalities mostly!! So that's a reverse. Also T wouldnt want to kill the Prom unlike V, he just genuinely wants to make friends 😭

Don't ask me why Beau is at the prom, being younger and all. Might just make it an all years general prom rather than just the graduating class.

Next AU yay

Blood & Bats is a Vampire/Human AU! DDS and Solver Drones are vampires, you get the gyst!

N & Cyn are bio siblings, got separated bc of a divorce. Eventually both were separately taken away for shitty parenting, one of which caused Cyn to get vampirism one way or another. She also has DID/OSDD1 in this AU, the Solver conciousness isn't an evil entity here, just s Persecutor under the definition of "Misguided Protector who hurts as a form of protection" -- they're basically just a terrified vampire kid who thinks they're a danger and thinks isolation is the only way to keep their lived ones safe.

At some point the Elliots adopt N, later Cyn too. They also have previously adopted V and J. As time goes on, the alphabet trio one by one get turned by Cyn/Solver but they catch her after that so Tessa never is turned.

Uzi is basically a half vampire. Her mom was one, her dad wasn't. I don't remember the details atm, but I assume I've posted them somewhere in the tag on my account, but iirc Khan killed Nori in a moment of shock and survival instinct when finding out. Uzi doesn't know this. She finds out later after being turned herself (on accident!) - either through N or Cyn. Might do N to draw a parallel to the miscommunication between ep 2 and 3. Bc yeah Uzi would assume it's on purpose and he broke a promise.

Once they fix things, she finds out about her dad killing her mom and she runs away from home, terrified he might kill her too -- she crashes at the siblings place OR Thads place. I'm not sure yet. Both have pros and cons.

Khan cant easily access the manor, needs to be at an event for it. But the parents would want Uzi OUT asap. On Thads end; Teacher (Thad and Lizzy are either step or half siblings idk yet) and Ron (uncle, moved in after his sister died to help with the kids!) Would not let Khan take Uzi home sending as they see her terrified. They don't know what happened. But Khan has easier access bc he's friends with Teacher and obviously Lizzy is there which Uzi isn't thrilled about.

That's as far as I can remember the storyline -- there would still be parallels to some episodes! Ep 4 would still happen! Just some would survive! Rebecca would be found by one of the alphabet trio and turned to save her life. She's wheelchair bound after that. Sam survives but everyone thinks he got too high and doesn't believe him when he talks rambling about Uzis vampire form (Becca keeps it secret bc like if she says something it by extension endangers the other vampires in the school which now includes herself)

Intertwined/Inteetwinjng Codes (Me when I keep going back and forth between both titles) is a next gen AU thing. It started off as a joke,,, oh well

Kids.

These little shits are twins, they started this whole rabbithole. They would boot up sometime after Ep 4.

Later on their parents would want to program another kid & adopt one. Invert Annika and Zagi, except unexpected thing happened and they now have two babies to upload. Insert Raven.

Annika is currently undergoing redesign, ignore how basic she looks compared to her siblings lol.

As for the last 2 kids -- they didn't WANT any more, but when being sent to another colony they run into this toddler with a baby, who are being attacked by other DDs so they step in. Whilst they argue with N, Uzi gets the kids to safety. They were gonna keep the kids at their place for that night but Olicia did NOT want to sleep in the same place as a DD & a ton of half DDs -- so Thad gets called at 3am 😭 hes the cool uncle to their kids so yk

Next day it turns out adoption wing is full, so the siblings get passed around Thad, Uzis dad and Nuzi a ton (their own colony got killed so they cant go back there) until Ray gets attached to Nuzi, and you shouldn't separate a baby from its bonded adults. Seeing as he already lost the code related parents, they didn't want to risk further hurting his programming. So the siblings were basically accidentally adopted by Nuzi, despite Olivia not being happy about it at first. But she didn't want to separate from Ray.

That's mostly that. Theres not too much lore tbh. Just a silly half joke AU.

Also I have 6 siblings IRL so I tend to like give my ship kids many siblings 😭 so ignore that fact lol, just projecting

Then theres like 3 more Cyn centric AUs.

2 are pretty small.

DD!Cyn AU that has no name yet is just the AS uploaded a copy of Cyn/the Base Drones conciousness into a DD body and kept her with the trio. That'll lead to major Identity crisis once Cyn realizes technically she's a clone and her memories aren't *hers*. Aside from that: Cyn and J constantly have beef bc of J abusing N, Cyn tries to get her to stop but just faces verbal abuse herself in return :(

Shes also pretty distrusting of Uzi at first bc like!! Nobody except Cyn ever spent time with N!! That's a Drone getting close to her big brother which possibly could hurt him in the long run if she turns out to be like the other teammates!! (She eventually warms up to her)

Then there is Trapped/Hivemind AU. Literally just Cyn trapped in the hivemind, unable to reach her body for control. She can HEAR the other Solver Drones and the DDs, as they're all part of the hivemind. But she can't communicate with them. No matter how hard she tries.

Especially when she hears N she will call out to him but not get a response

So shes probably on the brink of losing it

Then there is "Dormant" Absolute Solver

Originally it was gonna be "The AS lost interest in Cyn as a host" and ig it still kind of is correct-? I need to go back and forth between certain aspects lol

But long story short, Cyn now got a separate body from the AS, doesn't know it killed Tessa & comes to C9 with J & "Tessa". The AS just brought her as a tool to manipulate N with, but she doesn't know that. Cyn joins the group from ep 6 onwards. Yay more PTSD for the child I guess :)

I havent written out ep 6 yet but I think she'd be with N & "Tessa" for that part.

Ep 7 she ends up on the side of the rocks with Uzi, and walks at a distance after being told to basically F off bc Uzi doesn't trust her now but Cyn is scared to be alone. Uzi notices Cyn isn't okay tho.

(Varian tangled reference yay)

Might I add that seeing Uzis wings and tail in ep 6 would have majorly triggered Cyns PTSD but shes unaware of why she feels so scared. So seeing Uzis tail the whole time definitely adds onto the stress =)

During the fight Uzi would reach out to Cyn through the hivemind, both girls calling out to N through Cyns body. The AS doesn't like that and forcefully shuts Cyn down. It has admin rights over her after all.

By the time Cyn wakes up, the AS is grabbing her to blackmail N after just having eaten Doll. Talking about how he wouldnt want to hurt his baby sister (hes aiming his laser cannon at the AS for context). Then it gets bored, drops Cyn and the regular program ensures. Except Cyn took Tessas gun and shoots herself free from the tentacles and runs to the pit after seeing Nuzi be pulled in. Whilst shes there trying to figure out how to get them back up (seeing as she cant use her Solver on them, or at least not Uzi. The show us so unclear if it works on DDs or not) the scene goes on.

I'm not sure yet who Cyn will stick with, probably N bc I've more ideas. BUT also I'm waiting for episode 8 to decide that for sure. Same with the ending. I got multiple bad ending ideas and also a good ending :) ep 8 will determine which one will be canon :)

Oh yeah Cyn lol -- both new and old ref bc of the oil canister I didn't draw in the new one yet. She still has it as you can see by the oil tubes!

Also the Good!Ending DAS!N would run a Daycare post canon. IC!N also runs one. I just like having N work with kids.

Most of these (I think all except DD & Trappsd Cyn) are tagged on my account probably with some more info

Idk if the tags will show up tho bc they don't always for me when searching for them :(

My pinned post has the tags listed I think

I think that was all of them hm (istg if I forgot one 💀)

OKAY THIS ONE'S SUPER IN DEPTH I'M HEAVILY INTRIGUED. MULTIPLE AU'S DUDE!! I LOVE IT, KEEP EM COMING. Loving the ideas behind the swap AU. Putting Sam in Cyn's place is unique, I hadn't heard anyone do that before!! Also the thing about using pink is fair, I did use red but I didn't keep that in mind! A vampire AU's extremely fitting for Murder Drones, being a substitute for the Solver/Disassembly model. Since ep. 4 is my favorite, I love the fact it'd still play out here. Also I must say I REALLY like the next gen AU designs??? I actually kinda wish we saw more next gen stuff, or maybe I'm just not looking in the right places. Either way I very specifically love Rexim and Raven's designs, I think the color choices are really speaking to me. ALSO ALL THE CYN FANS ARE GONNA BE EATING UP THE CYN-CENTRIC AU'S. But it seems like the poor girl could never catch a break. WONDERFUL WORK ALL AROUND!!

[cescalr]

Oooh, definitely glee for the fandom asks! <3

Always with the hornets' nests with these ones, I see! Though i don't think there's a fandom out there that isn't in some way a hornets' nest once it gets large enough... hm. Alright. I'm just gonna be as honest as i can be about this, and tag accordingly.

Glee:

my favourite female character: augh. argh. ouph. so difficult. so hard. Since I'm working off of half-remembered show and half recently-rewatched show... its a tossup. Mercedes, Santana, Quinn. Probably Mercedes. She did nothing wrong ever in her entire life <3 well okay maybe except that one time she smashed kurt's car windows (but it was a banger song, though). Can't say Santana because of the Biphobia TM and other things like excessive use of bigotry-based insults, and Quinn. Oh god girl. Cheating is not cool! Funnily enough! So I find them really interesting but 'favourite' is hard to say. Mercedes. Mercedes for sure <3

my favourite male character: Blaine sam blaine sam blaine sam yes. I am imitating ripping petals off of flowers and coming to a conclusion based on which is the last name i said. So I guess that means Sam! But really this is a tie.

my favourite book/season/etc: Mannnnn idk. I don't like shows for seasons as-a-whole. Also i could not tell you what happened in any given season if you held a gun to my head. I'm not good at that. The only shows i know 'seasons' of are Buffy and Teen Wolf because i've watched them like 100000000000 times (exaggeration) for various reasons (mostly fanfiction research).

my favourite episode (if its a tv show): I can tell you my LEAST favourite episode (blame it on the alcohol, thank you Kurt king of biphobia! this is a persona foible it's not the worst episode in the show. by far. by far. it's kind of an average one. I'm just angry at it.) BUT er. Favourite? Idk. Genuinely some of the earlier Kurt-centric stuff was really well done (his convo with Burt... <3) and the Quinn giving birth accompanied by bohemian rhapsody was obviously iconic, but if I'll be honest I couldn't name any episodes of this show (other than That One previously stated, anyway). And yeah most of the time they were named after song titles and No i don't remember those song titles either. I'm just so bad at this. My memory is that of a goldfish's being haphazardly bounced around on a sieve.

my favourite cast member: it would be really funny if I said Demi Lovato [she counts!] but the truth is N/A: i don't know these people !!! They are strangers!! (i don't. follow celebrities. at all. I couldn't even name most of them. They're just people doing a job and their lives are irrelevant to me beyond their ability to perform that job well. I do not need to know where they live and what coffee they drink. Stalker shit tbh. I'm kind of a very private person myself, so rpf-adjacent stuff just... creeps me out. I've never watched a single cast interview in my lifetime and I'm not about to start!)

my favourite ship: Difficult to say! Grave and obvious lie. Blam. It's blam. Quintana is a close runner up though Santana really needs to stop dating people who cheat on the regular (I'll accept Quinn has grown enough not to do this by the time a Quintana coupling would be viable - and satisfying in terms of character arcs - narratively speaking).

a character I’d die defending: Blaine Anderson did something wrong for sure but like Kurt did it first so shrugs. Cancels out. Bad for each other! Case closed!

a character I just can’t sympathize with: genuinely don't remember if I had one of those the first time around because I was like 10 and just didn't pay attention if I didn't care, but Terri and her racist self take that 'prize' this time, alongside the obvious predator in the room [original choir teacher. Sandy? I forget his name immediately after hearing it. He doesn't deserve to be remembered]. Also JBI is just.... a yikes character all around. I mean, he's a blatant stereotype for one, in a the people who wrote this person don't like jews kind of way. Unfortunately common stereotype too, for the era, so not only is he that, he's also lazy. Just a one-note pervert who's the butt of various antisemitic 'jokes' you've heard from era-peer shows a million times over, tired and awful and a sour reminder of bigotry that continues to this day. Really regrettable character who's lack of redeeming qualities was probably purposeful. (I know Rachel and tina are also jewish, but this comes up very rarely and mostly only when santana needs to say something kind of fucked up, as is her modus operandi, for 'comic relief'. Tina's jewish-ness wasn't even canon for several seasons, because she didn't have a surname or a family or anything resembling complex character depth for several seasons. The one time I really remember Rachel's religion being important was when she was pressuring Kurt into believing in some kind of god, which??? don't do that. Bad example. Trying to guilt trip a friend into faith sucks. I take back what i said earlier Mercedes did that too. Boo. Girls try again that was a bad showing all around. Though i have no idea why Kurt went the acupuncture route as his 'secular' option but i think that has to do a lot with the writers doing literally no research ever once in their lives (you can tell they don't by the way they write the football segments of the show, which make no sense according to football fans who watch Glee, of which there are numerous because real life isn't like fiction where you can only like music or sports. Most of the kids in my school year were doing the most of everything ever if they were the 'popular' ones - we do that differently; popularity isn't really based on who know know; for some bizzare reason literally everyone knew who I was? Even people I'd never spoken to?? - but more about like... how much you can do, I guess. Overachievers, but I'm not saying that negatively; these people were generally - generally - very nice, and surprisingly chill for people who had no spare time whatsoever. I'm not entirely sure when they slept; A* across the board, at least one sport, at least one instrument, several extracurriculars, parties every weekend, dozens of friends and an s.o. . Eh? Way too much going on. Scary lifestyle! Impressive burnout rate, probably. Er. Tangent! Back to the scheduled programming).) There's uhhhh there's a lot of bad characters on the show, but i'd say Sandy and Terri and her equally but more loudly racist sister are truly completely irredeemable ones. Like they're not interesting or anything, they're just there to be narrative annoyances (which, in the case of Sandy specifically, is insane. Arrest that man!!! He has actively sexually assaulted minors!!!).

a character I grew to love: difficult to say because I tend to just make an opinion and stick to it. Also i don't remember who i liked at first and who i didn't, this show came out when i was eight. I didn't watch it until I was a little older than that, of course, but I frankly have spotty memory until my late teens, so! I'm not sure!! Quinn, probably. Pink-hair-era Quinn helped me understand her more, and seeing the moments of kindness hidden behind practical cruelty, when you understand her family and situation, makes things make a lot more sense. It takes a lot to get me to sympathise with a cheater, but I can see where Quinn was getting all turned around in her head about life because of her upbringing and socialisation, not to mention the profoundly negative impact cheerios had on her mentally and that the school's culture in general was not exactly a breeding ground for empathy and optimism.

my anti otp: can you tell (klaine). I don't dislike Kurt!!! Please let him have a fun chillaxed boyfriend in new york with his vogue friends. But also please stop attempting to control other people's diets thank you!! Thank you!! I'm of mixed feelings. Blaine and Kurt both did at least one bad, relationship-ending thing, and proved over and over again that they just weren't on the same wavelength in regards to life goals and ways of living it. They can't even share the same living space, which is kind of required for a functional marriage. I don't know, it just seems like they settled for their first proper, serious boyfriend even if that's not really the best match, and I... wish they'd just got to see more of life first, you know? They got married at like 20! Or something! I'm 23, I cannot imagine getting married at 20. That's a baby. Let them live first!

(same for Santana and Brittney, imo. I also don't really like them together because Santana and Brittney have very different ideas regarding monogamy, which is just never going to go down well in the long run. If your girl cheats on you like twenty times and tells you to your face its not cheating in her view of things, but you think it is, break up with her because you'll just make each other miserable. Brittney sort of seems incapable of feeling guilt but if she were, this kind of moral pressure would be Not Good, and obviously Santana isn't comfortable with the idea and doesn't have to be!! Just move on!!! Find other people!!!! Don't marry your first girlfriend if you've broken up like ten times this is simple!!!! Please!!!! But Klaine wins out over Brittana because - in my opinion, glee fandom please do not persecute me, I am known for this specific thing - I see... interactions that verge on abusive between Klaine that I don't see in Brittana. So. Oof? Ex; use of public perception to disguise attack; deliberately hurting Blaine in a stage-combat fencing match (you are not meant to make actual contact in these) and thus using Blaine's own dislike of making his difficulties common knowledge against him in order to 'punish' him. This is no good! Don't do this!!.[Also just to err vaguepost about a comment.... that is. not. what i would call passive aggressive. Physically attacking someone with a sword - no matter the type of sword, fencing foils hurt just as much, they're just not stab-you sharp... er, these days - is just straight-up aggressive.]).

Note that negative things stick in the mind better than positive ones; on a rewatch I may well alter my opinion!

But also I'm really, really stubborn. So it's not likely. Klaine.

[kayetra-spade-queen]

Danny Phantom

There's not much change in name, but I intend to use what the fandom come up for his middle name (at least I think that's what the fandom agreed on? I might be wrong).

Daniel James Fenton.

Daniel, his actual full first name.

James, is what I remembered the name the fandom agreed upon, or at least some of it.

Fenton, his family name. There's nothing for me to explain about.

Also, a friend pointed out that I have a habit of giving things dramatic names (I'd say the influence of Genshin is strong af-). I do have a habit of making something to be more extreme than it was when it was originally made, so please don't mind it.

Relationships:

Maddie and Jack:

They're still the goofy and quirky parents Danny and Jazz had, but was smarter, more understanding and compassionate compared to the original. Knew Danny turned into ghost and the portal incident, more like they were also witnesses of that said incident. The sound of his scream of agony and pain manage to pull out nightmares for the both of them on several nights. However, that doesn't waver their love for their son. Sure, he may become half of the being they're hunting down for the sake of studies or something, but that doesn't erase the fact that this ghost child is their child, their little baby who unfortunately fell into the abyss of their own mistakes and neglect. They assists Team Phantom many times when it comes to the supply and whatever knowledge they have currently and are still expanding beyond their current understanding for the sake of learning to find a solution that wouldn't harm either side of the plane.

Jazz:

Nothing much different compared to the canon, except she was also a witness to the incident. Her overprotectiveness tenfold, much to Danny's dismay, and it took a lot of time for them to find a common ground and for her to tone down. There's nothing much different in this version compared to the original.

Sam, Tucker:

Danny's friends since elementary. Their relationship is pretty much the same as they are in canon, but what's different is that Danny and Sam doesn't harbor feelings for one another (I apologize for those who ship Amethyst Ocean), and therefore they aren't in any other relationship other than best friends.

Valerie:

Danny's relationship with Valerie is very contradictive compared to their relationship in canon. First and foremost; Valerie listens to people more than just act out and shutting her ears out, yes she sometimes act out first questions later, but she had made pretty good judgements and know that nothing good happens when jumping to conclusions too quickly and taking everything at face value without knowing the full story. She and Danny became friends during freshman year of middle school, and although Valerie still somewhat in the 'popular' clique in their school, she'd prefer to spend time with the Team Phantom any time. She could be considered the hub of all gossips at school with how much information she gets from the most loud and chatty clique of the whole school.

Dani/Elly, Dan/Ozzy:

Dani: The first ever semi-success clone of Danny made by Vlad. Nothing really is different in their relationship, until Dani was in the most critical condition that had something to do with her unstable ectoplasm, which required her to have to be revert to a some sort of fetus and undergo a process similar to normal human pregnancy, but instead of putting the halfa fetus into Danny, it was put inside of a bottle first before a birthing pod when the halfa child became more mature and resembles a newborn. In turn, she'll be reborn back as purely Danny's child (think about Ben who asexually reproduced, but went through a completely different process) without any of her past memories in place. The art and technology of doing this process remains undisclosed. Her new identity became Eleanor Maria Fenton with the nickname "Elly", and she became the ghost princess by right of birth after her "rebirth".

Dan: Their relationship remains the same until Danny decided to properly take care of Dan (before the de-aging). Think of it like a Nahida-Scaramouche/Wanderer relationship. Although it was a painfully grueling process, Danny was patient and really think about Dan and his freedom and his disoriented characteristics at heart and tried to the best of his abilities to help Dan out through it all. However, it turns out the ectoplasm from Vlad's half in Dan was found out to have a corruption, making Dan going through an excruciating pain and suffering. In order to cleanse the corruption entirely, Dan have to go through the same process as Dani, reverting him back to that of a fetus, born now as a halfa, and restart everything from scratch. His new identity became Kalos Marcus Fenton with the nickname "Ozzy", becoming the ghost prince by right of birth after his "rebirth". He and Elly had became twins in this current life.

Cujo:

The ghost dog that Danny found outside the building of Axion Labs (no, he didn't went in and wreck the place, because I'm twisting some things in Shades of Gray because Valerie is part of Team Phantom from the start). The dog looked lost, confused, as if it doesn't know what to do, so Danny decided to take the dog in and brought him home. After a while, he realized the tag on the dog's collar, and figured that this dog at some point was a staff at Axion Labs or maybe someone related to someone who works at the lab, and decided to check what's the deal with the dog and the lab. Danny later found out that the ghost dog, along with other dogs before (he didn't know if the other staff dogs are also dead, but he'll have to check it up later) are used to be guards dogs decades ago, but they were let down when technology became more efficient. The dog canals, food bowls, and other stuff are being put in an abandoned storage space that was completely sealed off. But a single toy stood out to him, a squeaky toy. Since this is the only toy in the whole room, Danny assumed this might've belonged to the ghost dog he found, so he decided to go back home and hoping this is the item that the dog was looking for to the point of waiting outside the walls of the lab for, which thankfully it was. However, instead of going back to the Ghost Zone, the dog decided to stay, and Danny became his owner after asking Maddie and Jack (to which both agreed). Cujo became his name.

Vlad:

Good god, where do I even begin... Ok, I guess I should start that their relationship is a lot worse than in canon. Yes, he still had that hatred towards Jack, but he also hated Maddie as the miniature portal was also her creation as it is to Jack's. By extent, he hated both of their kids too (unreasonable? Yes, but anything goes for me-), but particularly Danny due to his status as a halfa and the many connection he had between the living plane and the Ghost Zone. Dani's creation wasn't because he wanted a perfect son, it was an attempt to use the clones as an army to attack Danny. Dan's creation was literally a succeeded version of Vlad's plan. Vlad figured that the only way to really hurt Maddie and Jack, was to hurt their beloved youngest, the more pain the better he said. Vlad was so deep into his hatred towards the Fentons, morality was completely out the window and down the drain for him. Every attempt was another way for him to destroy the Fentons of what they did to him, he wasn't willing to talk whatsoever, even an attempt would've been futile instead. Due to me completely erasing Phantom Planet from existence, Vlad was still roaming free under the facade of a good natured mayor while scheming to get rid of the Fentons by any means necessary. His ectoplasm became corrupted due to many times it was used to experiment dangerous creations and many mysterious methods. However, Vlad could withstand it due to his overflowing amount of sheer hatred, while Dan couldn't handle the corruption due to having Danny's DNA.

Manny:

A fellow member of the Nicktoons Team. Manny (alongside Jenny) joined much later. They started out as acquaintances then friends, then after a while, they both started a relationship. Manny's life became even more interesting by the time the twins came to the picture, and Manny wouldn't want it any other way. He's a great babysitter (and maybe even parent, someday).

Jimmy, Timmy:

Danny considered both of them as his troublesome younger brothers, particularly Timmy. It all happened because the Turners asked the Fentons if it's ok for them to leave Timmy under the Fentons for a while, and that's how Danny's babysitting career started (do not ask for details. If you know what the Turners are like, that should speak volumes enough). Danny met Jimmy a little later afterwards after seeing a lonely kid on the bench of the courtyard of Timmy's school, so he decided to approach him, and that's how they get to know each other. Danny was a bit protective towards Jimmy due to how many times he's been bullied and being treated as an outcast because of his high IQ, so Jimmy found a safe haven in Danny. Although Danny said he's more of their babysitter than anything, Danny turned out to be that of a parental figure of the team; slightly strict but responsible and gave out reasonable rules so no one gets into unwanted troubles even outside missions. Both Jimmy and Timmy viewed Danny is that of the 3rd parental figure who kept them grounded and the voice of reason and motivation for them. Although he is still capable of grounding them, like confiscating Timmy's video games and locking Jimmy's lab while taking the key with him. Jenny said it was a given considering many times those two caused trouble.

SpongeBob:

Danny's best buddy in the team. SB had always been the motivational one of the whole team and kept everyone in spirits. Literally the closet person he had in the team way before Manny and Jenny. Supports Danny through thick and thin, and was the first person Danny ever confided with whenever he had problems and vice versa.

Jenny:

Was the only person (robot?) Danny recognized in Center Shades, and the only one Danny talked with for a while until he got to know the other members (particularly Randy and Jake). Danny was Jenny's backup fixer whenever Jimmy is not available and/or wasn't with them altogether, hence the only person Jenny trust in the other team with her mechanisms.

Info Dumps:

I will be dumping a hella load of info in this column, so be warned if you don't want to read everything. I'm not really willing to make a separate blog about this topic itself, so consider it like a Danny speciality that you can't find anywhere except asking Danny himself;

The term 'ghosts' is an umbrella term used for all types of spirits that originates from all the realms of the Infinite Realms (commonly known as the Ghost Zone). Just because they're called ghosts, doesn't necessarily mean they are whatever that's left of a human spirit.

Ghosts aren't inherently bad natured; they're more driven by their obsessions more than anything, and doesn't really meant to cause harm, but their obsessions could clouded their better judgement, making them getting mischaracterized as 'bad natured' and 'pure evil'. They're not bad, they just need something to feed off of their obsessions to find a few specks of peace.

The Ghost Zone is actually named as Infinite Realms, but another name was also proposed when the realm was first discovered; Gap of The Sun. The reason for this naming is that it was once believed that this realm had been created from a sun that once exploded, and instead of turning into a black hole, it turned into a neverending realm filled with doors leading to many other realms. However, the naming and this theory was eventually dropped due to lack of evidence to support the claim of the exploded sun that created this primal realm.

The nature of ectoplasm is currently unknown, but it is theorized to be remnants of a spirit's will and their former drive when they were still alive. But due to the lack of evidence, there is no concrete info that the ectoplasm were remnants of the ghosts leftover living will. It was only left that ectoplasm are just what give these ghosts their shape after their soul no longer resides using a human vessel in the living plane.

There's a phenomenon between the ghosts called a "Death Day", where the ghost will have to relive the memories of their death, the feeling of pain they felt all over again. They would go completely paralyzed and won't be able to move at all as they relive the memories and pain of their death with nowhere to go as they couldn't move. The aftereffects when the day of their Death Day had passed are; extreme numbness, lacking color vision in their sights (everything is in black and white for them), complete blockage of their powers, and whatever that's left in their mood swings of their Death Day. The only way to minimize the pain during Death Day was when the spirit's living loved ones visit their graves or commemorate the death anniversary. Even then, that won't erase the pain entirely, as it won't affect anything in the aftereffects (although this is unclear for those who are born as a halfa). (This is inspired by that one DPxDCA fic on AO3).

Danny's ghost king title:

Ok, so I did said that Danny became ghost king in this version, right? Well, in version, Danny became ghost king a little later after the defeat of Pariah Dark. Technically, he was already crowned shortly after, but due to the fact he's biologically and chronologically too young to rule yet, it was decided that Danny have to wait until he was 20 to finally take on the big roles of being the king of ghosts. Until then, he was made to do smaller tasks that seemed a bit big to him at first, but once he became king, the weight was even more immense than what he had initially thought it would.

The Ghost Law:

A law that is absolutely mandatory to follow by all ghosts of every realm and every kind. Here are some examples;

Ghosts are absolutely forbidden to harm those who still resides the living plane by any means.

In terms of handling one's obsessions, it is absolutely advised to ask the Ghost King for any solution that wouldn't involved the living beings.

Killing a living soul or the environment of the living realm will be heavily punished.

In terms of living amongst the alive in the living plane, a barrier must be made around the property to prevent ghost hunters or unwanted guests from lingering the property.

When a soul from the living plane had lost its human vessel and could no longer resides amongst the alive (basically: someone died), it is an absolute must to inform the ghost king in order to conduct the 'White Farewell' ceremony for the now-departed spirit.

Personality:

Not much different, except he radiates mom energy all over. Well, no wonder. Along with Ben, Danny has plenty experience when it comes to hyperactive and/or rowdy kids, and had a huge sense of parental responsibility towards everyone. Both Danny and Ben would be fussing over those who would dive head first into trouble without a clear plan and getting injured in the process, or when someone did something incredibly stupid it ended as a huge problem (they're in the Overview department for a reason).

Danny is more... Elegant compared to the original. There's always an aura of grace coming from him, and sometimes his voice comes off a sort of a mystical vibes, even if he didn't intend to it. Although despite being king, his overall personality didn't change; humble, friendly, and approachable.

Battle attire:

Something like a royal outfit, but nothing extravagant. Ok, maybe adding a bit of claws on his gloves could be a bit extra, but you can't blame me, blame Ningguang-

The hair tho, I have been thinking like a Zhongli-style ponytail in battle form. But in normal form, like human form will varies depending on what Danny wanted. Majority of his hair would already be white even in his human form.

The design I came up with.

(Base: TheCherryMonsterLu (DeviantArt));

Weapons:

Polearm

Fenton Thermos

Flashdisk

Abilities:

Ghost powers

Ice powers (from his Ice Core)

Ectoplasm generating

Mind reading

Dream-jumping

Other Info:

Obtained the title or nickname as "Siren Voice", due to his mystical and beautiful voice. Think of it as those myths where sailors would disappear when they heard the voice of a mermaid/siren. This'll be hella useful for Danny in so many ways.

Ftm transgender, though he liked being called 'mom' by the twins.

Although he is a Fenton, he does not have the Fenton luck when it comes to driving (neither does Jazz). But he was usually being driven to by his ghostly staff/guards than driving himself. He still have a driver's license though.

Still can't get close to Blood Blossoms, otherwise he'll experience pain as horrible as the time of his 'death'.

Danny's body is sturdy but also hella flexible. He used to do gymnastics when he was younger, but his flexibility was greatly enhanced when he became a halfa.

Danny's eyes changed after the incident, not just when he's a ghost; originally icy blue, now blue on top half, and ecto green on bottom half. His eyes is still fully green when he went ghost.

The 2nd tallest in both at Nicktoons and the other team. Sorta thriving and suffering at the same time (the whole 'shorter people live longer' joke became a bit too literal than it was intended to due to Jake's longevity).

Danny would, quite literally, became a dictionary when someone would ask about ghosts, its nature and laws, etc.

Danny and June are actually pretty close friends due to their shared dreams to be an astronaut (even with their current circumstances).

Danny used to love eating sweets and desserts, but as Sam and Valerie monitored him and limit his consumption of sweet food ever since he had the twins.

Given everyone his protection seal, so ghosts couldn't really harm them, and it'll be much easier dealing with the ghosts like that because they're under the 'territory' of the ghost king himself.

At some point, Danny will start an orphanage for lost young souls who met their fate far too early. Randy might also do the same, but just with living children, and there will also be rescue shelters and such.

He, along with Jake are currently searching to find ways so that lighter energy-beings like Jake and June could enter the Infinite Realms due to having absolutely chaotic and mixed energies.

Danny's signature flower is Star Lit Orchid.

[blazehedgehog]

If one decides to start a creative project about their favorite thing, be it fanart, fanfic, fangame etc. , which approach do you prefer, the creatives involved fully dedicating themselves to recreating and recapturing what made the original works...work, or make an active choice to be derivative (this doesn't mean artists are ignorant about the original material, not necessarily) How do you feel about either, and are there any other approach you can think of?

There's this guy who used to post at SFGHQ named Sam Beddoes who now runs Freakzone Games. He's made the official Manos: The Hands of Fate game, he did both AVGN Adventures, he's the project lead on that Toxic Crusaders beat'em'up, etc.

But he's an old guard Sonic head and I've heard him turn up on a couple of Sonic podcasts, specifically to talk fangames, and by his account he got really fed up with the Sonic fangaming scene when everybody became obsessed with perfectly replicating the Genesis games, because to him, all the creativity and magic went away.

I remember hearing that and both agreeing and disagreeing with him. And I have enough thoughts about it that I've actually considered doing a video about it, and about fangaming overall.

I think there is a stigma to replicating something perfectly that's very adjacent to people who are concerned about young artists who start out by tracing pictures other people have drawn. Plagiarism is a real, legitimate problem. But it's only a problem if you lie about tracing.

I'm of the mind that if you're starting out drawing, half the problem is just learning control. Tracing can be a valuable tool in helping you to understand hand motions and give you a perspective on the construction of an image. For the earliest beginners, I don't think there's any shame in starting out by tracing. It's building muscle memory. Just don't say you drew it.

Similarly, my game development skills went way, way, way up about the time I started to analyze and perfectly replicate existing games. Like, the long canceled Sonic Forever project used an early enough version of the Sonic Worlds codebase that I had to read the Sonic Retro Physics Guide and use their data on how to add Knuckles in from scratch. My code matched how he worked in the Genesis games almost 1:1, because it was largely me just interpreting the values into something Clickteam Fusion could understand.

Something similar happened when, in 2012, I started (and never finished) a remake of my famous Mario Blue Twilight DX fangame. That's when I started really paying attention to how the source games worked so I could get a better sense of how a Mario game needed to "feel" in order to be correct.

And that trend continued with every fangame project I worked on following that, like when I figured I could make my own version of Sonic 2's Hidden Palace Zone, since I wasn't happy with the Retro Engine version. The idea was to be accurate above all else. In some cases, I'd even watch recordings of official gameplay in slow motion just so I could see exactly how the game was created, and in some cases, count frame by frame the duration of certain actions.

And all of this just makes me think of when I showed a friend my game jam game, OverBite. He complimented me on how nice the controls felt, in that kind of backhanded way where he said "When did you learn to make games feel so nice?"

Because if you go back to those really early games of mine, they all feel like garbage to control. And I attribute it to putting in a lot of time pulling apart the nuts and bolts of real retro games and putting a microscope up to why they work the way they do. Deconstructing all of their little nuances and sub-states and then trying to put it all back together again in a different programming language.

You learn a lot when you're forced to stop and understand why a piece of code exists in the way it does. Why there are all these little edge cases that you never notice but still exist to make a game feel just a little better.

At the end of the day, yes, Sam was right. Games need to have creativity and seeking out the perfect replication of the Sega Genesis Sonic games can feel somewhat futile. Every SAGE for the last ten years, there will be at least three games that instantly vanish from my memory because they are basic, plain Sonic Worlds Delta fangames with no style of their own. They just want to make Sonic 4 and we've had a lot of different Sonic 4s by now.

But the thing about learning is, you gotta learn the rules before you learn why and where to break them, because breaking (or at least bending) all of those boring, standardized rules is where your personal style starts to emerge, and that personal style is ultimately what people are going to be interested in at the end of the day.

So I think it is vitally important to start at 1:1 exact recreation and once you've made a comfortable replica, only then should you start asking yourself what you'd change and why. Make sure you understand the material before venturing further. You gotta learn to do it right first.

[spiritual-activity]

Headcanons! (Isaac & Nigel)

[Warning: Contains spoilers and talk of death (of course there will be)]

Have fun reading!

*Isaac*

I like to think that he is from Virginia, so he has a slight southern accent. He hides it well, but it does slip out every now and then. The accent does come out during specific pronunciations and whenever he is caught off guard. He doesn't hide it around Nigel, however.

The Iliad is one of his favorite Greek stories. Can and will recite it word for word. Give him a quote from it and he can tell exactly which book and line it came from.

This man is autistic. You can't tell me any different. The war was sensory hell for him. His handkerchief is essentially a main grounding object for him due to the texture. He will also fidget with the handkerchief when he is nervous. Prefers his room without too much light, but just enough to see (i.e. candles).

Has an extent amount of knowledge about horses. He grew up raising horses on the farms of either family members or family friends. He took great care of his horse (Chestnut- a bay-colored Arabian stallion) during the war since it reminded of the one he had took care of as a boy. Can name the breed of any horse just by looking at them for a second.

Tired a good chunk of the time. Dying of dysentery was not great- dehydration and malnourishment really took a toll on him in the afterlife. Some days, he can manage, but is really sluggish and attempts to hide it from everyone. Other times, it's hard to get out of the bed.

Has a scar on the left side of his face. Obtained said scar from trying to fix the bayonet onto the gun, dropping it and attempting to catch it, with the blade slicing him in the process. Proceeds to say he got it in a fight with another British soldier, but only few know the truth. (Nigel)

Loves giving Nigel top-of-the-head kisses due to his height.

Forgot everything he was originally going to say while proposing to Nigel. Practiced in the mirror for a full hour, went to go propose, then forgot everything due to nerves. Made up something he guessed was what he originally planned. Turned out great either way!

*Nigel*

Has named every duck on the property. Every duck has a different mannerism and/or marking that makes it subtle to tell which is which. Only him and a few other ghosts can tell which duck is which. (His favorite duck is Percy, a mallard that follows him around from time to time)

Has documented over 2 centuries worth of ant drama. By documented, I mean remembered everything and has not forgot a single event. He has given Isaac an overview of the lore so he can rant about what is going on in the ant colony.

Prefers The Odyssey over The Iliad. Him and Isaac have "debates" over which is superior. They both know that both stories are great on their own, but enjoys having to defend their favorite. It adds a bit of fun to their days.

Big on pet names for his beloved. Seems to come up with a different one every hour. Commonly used ones include: "love", "darling", and any variation of "dove" and "dear".

Enjoys the sudoku puzzles that Sam leaves out. Isaac joins him half of the time to assist in the solving. Record time to solve one alone is 5 minutes. With Isaac, 3 minutes.

Contrary to what Isaac says, Nigel fell first. Caught a glimpse across the field and saw him attempting to instruct his men on how to properly fix bayonets. It did not end well for Isaac, but Nigel thought it was adorable.

Complements Isaac's accent every chance he gets. Absolutely adores the accent.

Has a small poem book inside of his coat. He has most likely read it over 1000 times, and yet still enjoys it as well as the first time reading it.

There will be more to come!

[canonicallysoulmates]

J2 Gold Panel Vegascon 2023

Going to jump right into questions, with regards to Radio Company what gets written first melody or lyrics? Jared jokingly answers that he just starts humming in the shower and right when he's washing under his left armpit he knows it's gonna be good 😆

Actual answer, Jensen and Steve usually come up with a melody and then start humming where the words might go and from there they try to come up with the lyrics that fit the melody. Jared says he was actually listening to a podcast that morning where they were talking about Paul McCartney creating Get Back and they said he was walking around humming the melody he had in his head and that's how he went figuring out the lyrics.

Jensen says that's probably the most common way of doing it, that writing a poem and then trying to put music to those words would be more difficult. x

Without mentioning the cast and crew, what do they miss most about being Sam and Dean? And what was the hardest part of them to drop for their next character? Jared needs a minute to think about his answer so Jensen says he'll answer first; the first thing he did after SPN was The Boys and the thing he was most fearful of was using Dean's voice, that luckily he had Kripke and Phil Sgriccia watching his back and he remembers there might have been a couple of takes where Sgriccia had to step in and point out to him he was doing Dean's voice. But he'll take Kripke's word that he never saw Dean in Soldier Boy so that was the pat on the back that he was looking for but the voice was a hard thing to drop.

As for the thing he misses the most, it's hard for him to come up with something other than the camaraderie of a set that's been working together for the better part of two decades. That one of his favorite things about what he does for a living is the morning set walk, getting to the trailer and then walking over to maybe get some breakfast and saying hi to the catering crew and seeing the morning kind of come to life as everybody gets ready, that feeling and the camaraderie that exists between the whole crew and the cast, and everyone gearing up for a day that's going to be at least 12 to 14 hours which is what SPN was- everybody was gearing up for battle and he misses those morning moments with people that he knew so well; he still gets that he got it on Big Sky, he's gotten to know those people but it will be hard to ever know their crew as well as they knew their SPN crew.

Jared concurs, he says that he does have 2 and a half to 3yrs of experience with his Walker cast and crew so that's starting but on SPN it wasn't just knowing somebody's name or what they did for a living it was knowing when they got married or when they lost someone, they really knew the people they worked with and that's a product of time. He will say that for him on Walker he gives kudos to Fricke and Fahey who were kind of co-running the writers' room at times because he felt out of sorts but during the first season of Walker, Cordell is also out of sorts so it kind of worked. He felt weird as Jared but Cordell also felt weird.

Something random for him that has been an adjustment is that Walker doesn't have long setups, they don't shoot studio mode often where there's a bunch of lighting so on SPN he and Jensen would shoot a scene then they'd have like half an hour to do whatever, on Walker they're always ready because it's not so crisp if there's a shadow on your face or you're partially obscured by another actor it's not a big deal. So a day of work on Walker is shorter but it's kind of a sprint, on SPN they would shoot 14hrs, sometimes 16, Bugs was around 18 they even had a third lunch cause if you're doing a night shoot and only have the location for a day you have to get it done.

Jensen brings up that they never referred to any meal on set as dinner it was either lunch or second meal no matter what time they were actually eating, and Jared adds that every year, at least once a year they'd be eating "lunch" at 1am. Breakfast would be at 6pm and lunch would be at midnight.

Jensen also mentions there's also things they probably can't talk about, things they kind of grandfathered in because they had started so long ago, when they started SPN they were shooting on 35mm film, he doesn't know of any show that films on actual film anymore. But there were things they started to do early on that established that's just their behavior that no other cast could get away with for example back when they started the show social media wasn't what it is today so their contracts didn't include any SM clauses but when SM became more popular, around 2012 every season they would have a piece of paper in their trailer that were the SM guidelines and they were supposed to sign it, it was a commitment between them and the studio and the network that they would follow certain protocol via their personal SM accs. And every year they would crumble it up and toss it away, didn't sign it once.

They got left to their own devices and Jensen comments that's something he misses because now that they're on new shows they're having to follow the rules a little more closely while it was the wild west on SPN. x

I'm just going to point out what I think all of us have noticed which is that the boys SM has changed over the past couple of years sometimes a lot of the times not even sounding like them. Just something to think about in connection to this comment Jensen made about now having to follow the rules more closely.

Jensen reveals he would have scotch tastings at lunch, Jared says if it was like midnight on a Friday. He also shares that for the first few seasons for their birthdays, they would get each other an entire keg of beer put it in the trailer, and just drink it all day while working throughout the day they'd go and get themselves some beer like they were in college and everyone in production just pretended not to see what they were doing. But as they got older the amount went decreasing until it was just a six-pack.

Another thing Jared brings up is that because they filmed in Canada they don't recognize American Thanksgiving which is an important holiday for the boys so during s1 they were scheduled to work the full week and they were like that's cool but we're going to be watching the Cowboys game, they were shooting like an hour away from Van and their plan was to find the nearest place that had the game on and go there to watch it so what production did was get a portable satellite dish so they could watch the game in their trailer and stay closer to set but then they were like "why don't we have this all the time?" and so from that moment on they had TV in their trailer, and people would be surprised by that even Stephen Amell was surprised, sometimes their teams would even have to get there early to set up the satellite.

Also, Jared makes it clear that while they sound like heathens they always got their work done on time, they always knew their lines, knew their marks, hung their wardrobe, all that stuff. x

By the way, them reminiscing and sharing stories takes up a huge chunk of the panel, they only got through 4 questions, but it is one of the best panel segments I have seen in a very long time, I loved hearing these men share some of the crazy shit they were able to get away with I highly recommend seeing it for your self.

Would they be on Hot Ones, and how well do they think they would do? They both immediately say yes! And Jared gets all excited because he became obsessed with Hot Ones, and met the host, Sean Evans, in the green room of a UFC fight.

Jared saw him across the room and got all giddy, and baby girl is about to break into giggles remembering that they had eye contact for a moment, so he goes to Evans and tells him he's a really big fan and that he'd love to be on the show and it turns out they've tried to get both of them on the show! And Jared did not know that! So he was like "what???!!! why don't we do it?" and after that Jared went online and ordered a bunch of super hot sauces and he ordered one called Dave's Ghost Pepper hot sauce (the name is actually Ghost Pepper Jolokia Sauce by Daves Gourmet. Neither Jared nor I are responsible for anybody who decides to try that sauce.) which is supposed to be really spicy and he decided he was going to train and he put it some on a plate and dipped a chip in and got a bunch and everything above his clavicle started draining. For an hour or two he couldn't do anything he was a snotty, teary, drooly mess. Milk my boy. Milk. Or another dairy product, he had too much hot sauce so it wouldn't take the full burn away but it would have helped. Also, he's so lucky that didn't result in getting mouth ulcers. But he'd love to do it, and he'd like to do it with Jensen and MC, and he thinks he'd do alright.

Jensen says he would not tap out that he'd just let his face melt off. x

Last question, what has been the best part about wrapping up such a momentous project? For Jared, it's that he finally started to allow himself to be proud of it 🥹

Something he and Jensen talked about for 15 and a half years is that when you're in it, when you still have a job to do you can't really toot your own horn or pat yourself in the back, but now with it in the rearview mirror he's like yeah that was pretty fucking cool, we did work our asses off, we did grow up a lot, we did learn this and that, and make these friendships. At the time he was like don't tell me how cool it is cause I still have to wake up and do eight pages or watch this video on a fight I have to do but now that it's "behind" them he can go 'man that was cool'.

Jensen was proud of the fact that they went out while still firing on all cylinders. That one of his biggest fears was that the show would start to decline in its quality and that it was hard to still be performing and telling a story and loving the characters and playing at that level and walk away but something he and Jared had talked about is that they didn't want to stick around until it started to decline or until the audience lost interest and they started caring less and not putting in the effort. He still feels like they went out after winning the Super Bowl and that's something he's proud of and he thinks it's one of the reasons why they can still talk about it because it wasn't dying, it was still very much alive, it still had a lot to give, and that it still is giving, it's kind of living on through the cons and he thinks that's just setting up the return at some point.

I don't agree with Jensen POV regarding the quality of the show but I'm really glad that he's so proud of the work that he and Jared put forward because he should be; the writing might have gone down in later seasons but these two always gave it their all and put their best work forward.

Jared adds that something he tells his kids when they're upset about losing a game is: did you try your best? He is very competitive with himself, he just wants to be the best he can be and do the best he can so if he gets home one night and he's won whatever game but didn't give it his best he feels worst than if he had lost and done his best. He'll never beat Lebron James in a one-on-one game but if he works really hard and he can maybe dribble a couple times without him stealing it and dunking on him he'll lose but he'd have done the best he could do, and he'll say this he and Jensen are both aware that some episodes were not as good as others but every day, every scene, every line they gave it everything they had. Yes, you did baby. x

J2 Gold Panel Vegascon 2023

[dorefasolsido]

35.

Habits

Do you tend to speed when you drive?

Not normally. I've learned my lesson with two speeding tickets (I overstepped the limit by just a bit) and I'm not giving my money to this country or any related institutions more than I have to.

Do you smoke cigarettes?

Nope. I tried one once just to see how it is and I hated it. Never felt the peer pressure either since most of my friends don't smoke.

Does your temper flare a lot?

No, when that happens you know it's serious since I really am super phlegmatic.

Do you get emotional easily?

Again, not too easily. I mean, I think I'm a fairly sensitive person deep inside, but there's no way in hell I'm letting other people see that side of me unless they are really close to me. And even then.

Do you get obnoxious when you're drunk?

I don't think so. I've never been 100% drunk, so I can't honestly say, but I think I'm kinda the same as I normally am, only more relaxed and fun. Like, I'm way less in my head and care much less about what other people might think about me, so I can talk more openly.

Which shoe goes on first?

I think I do the right first.

Are you lazy?

I probably am. Tbh, I'm a weird mixture of a workaholic and couch potato. I don't know how it works, but yes, I can procrastinate forever but I can also work 12+ hours when deadlines approach. And I hated those two weeks I was basically jobless this summer. Although at the same time, I love taking days off.

Name one thing you do that people always tell you about.

Mmm, nothing specific comes to mind right now.

Are you superstitious?

So listen, I'm not really superstitious, but I like my lucky charms and I find such things generally interesting. I think they're a fun part of the culture.

Do you get bored with relationships quickly?

Well no, but I also struggle with my avoidant personality very much.

Can you sleep without blankets covering you?

Normally not, it's just comfier to have at least something covering you.

What position do you sleep in?

On the side (well, more like half stomach) without a pillow.

What do you do when you're angry?

Well, I usually go quiet and talk very little to others, especially those that pissed me off.

What do you do when you're sad?

Depends, if I'm alone then I just snuggle up in my blanket on the floor and watch videos or shows I find comforting. And preferably eat some chocolate.

Who do you call when you have a bad day?

I don't, I prefer to be alone then.

YOUR ABC'S

A - is for the last person that made you ANGRY.

My friend for not responding to a text for days. I'm not very demanding when it comes to texting, but geez, at least once in a day would be nice.

B - is for BEER you prefer.

I don't have a preference, beer is kinda gross. I still drink it sometimes because it's the easiest to order, but yeah.

C - is for do you have a CAT?

Yeees.

D - is for can you DANCE?

Lol, I don't know if I can but I love to.

E - is for do you have your EARS pierced?

I do, several times.

F - is for your best FRIEND.

Sam.

G - is for did you ever watch GUTS on Nickelodeon?

I've never even heard of it. But I didn't actually have Nickelodeon growing up.

H - is for the last person who HUGGED you?

I honestly have no clue who it was. I don't get many hugs, if that hasn't been clear lol

I - is for close your eyes.. what IMAGE do you see?

Like those weird star thingies you see when you close your eyes. And red blackness.

J - is for have you ever been to JAIL?

Nope.

K - is for when is the last time you flew a KITE?

I don't think I ever did.

L - is for the LOVE of your life.

Well if we don't count Park Jimin... which we don't because he doesn't know I exist, then no one.

M - is for the last piece of MAIL you got.

Probably some bills. I should check my post office though, I ordered something that should probably have arrived by now.

N - is for do you remember NERF guns?

I do.

O - is for do you OWN a car?

I don't yet, but my parents will soon give me and my sister their old car since they got a new one. So I technically will own one.

P - is for your favorite PASTTIME.

Doing surveys, reading, watching stuff on YT or wherever, scrolling through apps, etc.

Q - is for do you like peace & QUIET?

I definitely do. But I also like chaos.

R - is for do you like the color RED?

I'm okay with it.

S - is for how many hours of SLEEP you need to function?

My phone actually tracks that now, it turns out I get like 5.30h on average almost every day. And I feel totally fine with that, but I probably shouldn't.

T - is for what TIME is it?

1:19 PM

U - is for what is UNDER your bed?

Nothing, I think. I hope.

V - is for what you did last VALENTINE'S day.

Nothing, Valentine's is nothing special for me.

W - is for do you drink a lot of WATER?

Not as much as I should, though I've increased the intake a bit.

X - is for have you ever had an X-RAY?

When I was little yes, and also one for my wisdom tooth.

Y - is for the last person you YELLED at.

I actually have no clue. It's extremely rare that I yell at someone.

Z - is for have you ever watched ZORRO?

Nope.

RANDOM

Who do you wish you could hang out with right now?

Tbh no one right now. I haven't seen anyone aside from my sister for almost a week, but I don't really mind. I'm honestly just tired of always pushing for plans and waiting for people to answer messages and then them suddenly cancelling plans and so on and so on. So I decided not to bother this weekend and I just stayed at home.

Name one thing you absolutely can not stand.

Andrew Tate fans.

Where do you spend most of your time?

In my room, probably.

If you could fly, where would you go first?

Japan.

What was the best vacation you've ever been on?

Thassos in 2007, such fun times.

Have you ever hit a squirrel when you were driving?

No, and I hope I never do.

Did your car ever break down?

One time I think something was with its battery while I was driving, but we resolved that.

What's your favorite thing to do on the weekend?

Hang out with my friends, which is why they piss me off so much with their constant indecisiveness and inability to get to their damn phones and answer. Actually, I know they are on their phones, which only makes it worse.

What radio station do you listen to most often?

I don't normally listen to the radio unless I'm in the car.

Pick one: Papa John's, Dominoes, or Pizza Hut.

I've never tried any of these.

What is the longest amount of time you've been awake?

Like hours? Idk, less than 48, more than 24.

What would you do if you found out the world was ending in one week?

Lol I don't know. I guess I'd follow the development on social media or something. Also, I'd just quit all of my jobs and do nothing all day.

Do scary movies make you paranoid when you watch them alone?

No, or at least not seriously paranoid. A little bit, yeah, but that's exactly the charm.

Name one thing you've lied about recently.

I'm not sure, it was probably something really small and silly. But I always lie about the smallest things because it's more convenient or because I don't want the other person to feel bad or whatever. Like, for example, if I make plans to meet with someone and wait for a long time, when they ask me how long I've waited, I just say 5-10 minutes.

What is the worst movie you've ever seen?

I don't know, because some movies are so bad they are good. I'm trying to think of one that really pissed me off, but nothing comes to mind right now.

Who was the first person to ever give you flowers?

Not sure about the first person, but one friend gave me a sunflower for my birthday which was super cute but I made it super awkward and I still hate myself for it lol. Tom, I'm sorry, man.

[nephiliminality]

The Wrestler

After a year in which I managed to more than double my fanfic word count so far, but unfortunately only in unposted WIPs, I finally managed to sneak a couple of things out in the dying embers of 2022. In this one, Dean and Cas are getting a few (hah) drinks in Soho after their reunion in Aziraphale's bookshop. I'm sure there are no awkward subjects to skirt around or anything.

This is a short interlude before the longer follow-up to What Love Can Do (which is now a series because my brain just would not let it go). The interlude is just Dean and Cas, but part 3 will have plenty from both canons. I may even include both Crowleys, despite the fact that putting two different characters with the same name in the same story will be something of a challenge...

Rating T, 3.8k words. CW for (canon-typical) excessive alcohol consumption.

[Full version on AO3]

Excerpt

Dean downed half his beer in one go, and slammed the bottle back down on the sticky bartop with a satisfied sigh. “Damn, that’s good. For British beer.” He turned the bottle in his hand and peered at the stylish but unreadable label. “No clue what this is, but it’s good.” He brought the bottle to his lips again and half the remainder disappeared too. “The beer in Heaven sucked. Why does the beer in Heaven suck, Cas? It’s freakin’ Heaven.”

“I don’t think Heaven understands beer. Despite all the monks.” Cas watched as Dean made the expression he used when he knew Cas was trying to make a joke, but he either didn’t get it or didn’t think it was funny. He thought he’d never get to see it again. “The beer should taste the way you remember it. It’s how Heaven works.”

Dean shook his head. “Not any more, not since we beat Chuck. It’s not all greatest hits any more. It’s like being alive, but only the good stuff.” Dean shrugged. “I was sharing a beer with Bobby – the real Bobby, not a memory. I thought Bobby had better taste in beer.”

Cas nodded, taking that in. So Chuck had been beaten, and Heaven was different now – very different, by the sound of things. Dean looked happy to have been reunited with Bobby. Cas wondered how Bobby felt about seeing Dean so soon. “How is Bobby?”

“He’s good,” Dean replied, flashing a smile. “Bored, I think. You know Bobby, if nothing’s on fire he doesn't know what to do with himself.” He lifted the bottle and drank again.

“And how is Sam?”

The bottle froze in mid-air for a moment on its way back down to the bartop, while Dean’s face arranged itself into carefully composed neutrality. It was a mask Cas had seen many times. Dean finished lowering the bottle, very carefully. “He’s fine,” he stated, as if saying it confidently enough would make it true. “Having a nice life.”

“That’s good to hear,” Cas said, pretending to be convinced. Sam had lost his brother. He was very unlikely to be fine. Dean needed to believe it though, being stuck here in this other world, so Cas wasn’t about to suggest otherwise. He watched Dean study the bottle again, as though it were a fascinating artefact and not merely a glass vessel with a paper label he’d already read several times.

The bar was quite busy, but the other patrons were avoiding the space around them, as if something was subliminally warning them to keep their distance. Cas wasn’t doing it. At least, he didn’t think he was doing it. The effect was pleasant though, a bubble of calmness in a sea of boisterous human contentment. He kept watching Dean, who was nursing his bottle and his thoughts, alone in a crowded room as he so often was.

“So what’s this world like?” Dean said at last, looking up from the bottle with his mask firmly in place and an obvious desire to change the subject. “Is there really nothing to hunt?”

“Nothing I’m aware of,” Cas replied. “Crowley and Aziraphale insist that there isn’t anything to find.”

“You’ve been looking anyway though?”

“Of course.”

Dean nodded and swigged the beer again, finishing it. “Good, I don’t trust those guys.” He tried to catch the bartender’s attention. “What about the angels and demons? Are they a threat?”

“That's complicated.”

Dean shrugged. “We got time.”

[bearpillowmonster]

Transformers Movie Ranking

I alluded to this and immediately jumped into making it. I don't care to see the Last Knight because it's at the bottom of everybody's list. I like Isabela Merced and I like Sqweeks but I could care less from what I've seen about it.

6. Dark of the Moon - People love this one and yeah, it has cool effects but I saw this in theaters and I remember being disappointed because I wasn't sure what I just watched. I remember a snake destroying a skyscraper, Wheelie dying and Sam going to college, getting seduced by a Decepticon. Did I miss anything?

5. Age of Extinction - Should've been the easiest one. I mean robot dinosaurs seems pretty hard to mess up. I'm even ignoring the story but it's long and it's boring and Transformium? The Beats Pill? Ok, that's kinda cool, same with everything seeming dilapitated and aged, giving it a semi-reboot. Ok, I actually just popped this a place higher than I had it writing this, but Mark Wahlburg?

4. Rise of the Beasts - Kept the cool redesign but somehow looked worse? The story is questionable...characters are cringe. I can't say any one part grabbed me, it was all just kind of there.

4. Transformers One - Probably the best underlying story here but it's too jokey for its own good. Over time, I imagine it'll age the best though if I'm being honest. This is not long after seeing it so I expect it to be higher in the coming years.

3. Bumblebee - It's not bad but it's not the best of its kind in any category. I saw a post the other day pointing out that the Cybertron scene ruins it and really, I kind of don't blame them because it's right at the beginning and it's immediate peak. It'd be lame without it and it's a great tease should they have actually followed up with it but as it remains it doesn't fit rest of the movie.

2. Revenge of the Fallen - It feels weird having this here as last time I watched it, I didn't like it. A dog humping is one of the jokes, an old Transformer pissing on someone is another and then giant wrecking balls used as...balls. This was one of those in the writer's strike, wasn't it?

2007 - It opens hard. The human characters aren't too bad. Unforgettable ending in more ways than one, probably the best payoff. While it has aged in terms of directing and humor, the CGI stands up and is probably the most entertaining. This one is the only one that I'd actually say is "good". The others are fun but this one actually did something, the others either tried to cash on the same or do something different enough that it wasn't my tea.

You might see this list and think "He's not much of a Transformers fan is he if he just pointed out what he didn't like." and you're half right. I saw all these movies and I always went in with high expectations (aside from T-One) and I want to like this franchise so bad. I've been trying almost everything and very few do I actually feel live up to the name. I'm sure I'm not the only one either. I liked the Animated 2007 series as a kid but that was mainly for design, I went back to it recently and I couldn't get into it. My next venture was the Cybertron games but those aren't easy to find a way to play in 2024.

[casspurrjoybell-27]

Our Hearts Collide - Chapter 27 - Part 2

*Warning - Adult Content*

Simon

Loreta either knew we hadn't eaten or she heard us coming down the steps, quickly placing a heaping plate of waffles with fresh strawberries and whipped cream, almost resembling Cindy's Diner, without the milkshakes.

She smiled as she handed each of us a plate, though I was sure her smile had to do with the elephant in the room or in this case, on our necks.

Loreta didn't say anything, though, merely raising an eyebrow before turning to retrieve some silverware.

Vince blushed as he pulled the plate of waffles closer to us.

"If Xavier doesn't see us first, she's going to gossip to him about it."

"The hickeys?"

He nodded.

"I'm not going to hear the end of it."

"What?" I laughed.

"It's not like these will be the first."

His face reddened.

"Well, yes but I'm fairly certain he made a bet with the Betas, possibly even Loreta."

"About us?"

"About last night," he whispered, Loreta, entering through the doorway to drop the silverware on the counter.

She smiled amusement before saying 'enjoy' and heading back into the workstation.

"Oh," I said.

"You think he won that bet?"

"Depends what he bet on exactly. He didn't want to tell me."

"Classic Xavier."

I reached for the knife to cut the waffle while Vince placed the strawberries onto my plate, only taking two slices himself.

"That just means we can tease him when he's covered in Sam's hickeys."

Vince laughed.

"You're certain it's not the other way around?"

"Maybe they both would, who knows. Xavier does surprise us half the time."

I scooped a strawberry onto a piece of the waffle.

"Unless they already have."

Vince nearly choked on a piece of the waffle, his eyes widening.

"No."

"They snuck past us that night, who's to say they haven't?"

I gestured to the staircase behind us.

"We teased them, remember?"

"Yeah, just can't picture my baby brother doing..." he shivered.

"No, I don't want to know."

I laughed as he went back to eating his waffles, occasionally dipping them into the whipped cream.

"Clayton and Rina seemed nice," I said, remembering their conversation yesterday.

He nodded.

"It's too bad Arthur wasn't here. Clayton wasn't a big fan of me if I'm being completely honest. Arthur wanted to meet you."

"I'd love to meet him too and Clayton didn't seem to hate you."

"No, he just really hates my father," he clarified.

"So me, by default but I don't blame him, after what I was told. He finds it strange that Arthur was so interested in talking to me in the first place, I'd have to agree."

"Because of what your dad did to him?"

He nodded.

"I don't even know the full story and from what I gathered, I doubt the rest of the pack knows either. It's probably for the best, though."

I hummed, slowly picking at the last remnants of the strawberries, then remembered what else Rina had mentioned.

"What was that about his heir?"

He stopped mid-bite, a piece of the waffle falling to the plate.

"Rina doesn't want to take over?"

"She never showed interest in it before," he explained.

"But Arthur and Clayton can't lead the pack forever. Clayton may be the Alpha but if they were to follow the hierarchy, Arthur is the rightful Alpha of the pack, his parents founded the pack."

"And since Rina's not Arthur's child...." I trailed, seeing where he was going.

"You think he does have an heir out there?"

Vince pursed his lips.

"It's possible. Maybe unlikely but the chances of his son surviving as a rogue, on top of inheriting the qualities of an Alpha, are fairly low. He'd probably be prone to fighting or getting into trouble without the guidance of either of the parents."

I wasn't sure what intrigued me, maybe it was because I was naturally curious.

"Does he know their name?"

Vince shook his head.

"Arthur asked the mother to name him, had her hide away to protect the child from my father's grudge against him by not associating with him or the pack."

"And he doesn't know anything else about him?"

With the tilt of his head, Vince replied...

"He said he'd be around my age, maybe a little older than Rina. Oh, he mentioned something about the mother."

"Her name?"

Vince's eyes widened.

"Yeah. Arthur knew her name. Now, what was it again?" he groaned, pressing a finger to his temple.

"Why can't I remember her name? Was it Wendy? No..." he hummed before sitting up straight on the barstool.

"Willow," Vince said.

"I think that's what he said."

"Willow."

'Willow. The same age as Vince. Prone to fighting?'

It couldn't be a coincidence.

It definitely fits the bill if fighting meant being quick to judge, overprotective and stubborn as a mule.

"What's up, Simon?"

"Willow," I echoed.

"Her name was definitely Willow?"

"Yes. I'm pretty sure that's what Arthur said. Why?"

"Did Arthur say if she would be alive? Or...." I trailed off.

Vince shook his head.

"Clayton told me she died a long time ago. Why?"

'Died under a willow tree. Left Cedar in my care.'

What were the odds?

Though I wasn't sure why it made me hesitate to tell him, this meant it would change many things if it were to be true.

Aspen as the heir?

Aspen is a part of a different pack, being treated as a future pack leader.

What else did this mean for Aspen, for Sarah and Rowan too?

"Is something wrong?"

Vince's hand touched my wrist.

"Did you know of a She-wolf named Willow?"

I looked down to his wrist, then trailed until my eyes steadied on his, the worry etched into his face.

I nodded, giving him a forced smile as I tried to make sense of it.

"I did."

His brows shot up.

"And?"

"Aspen's mother's name," I said.

"Her name was Willow."

Vince's eyes blinked, his face emotionless until it dawned on him.

His shoulders relaxed, his body leaning back as if to look at me like I grew a head.

"Aspen?"

"It can't be a coincidence, can it?" I mumbled but I couldn't deny that it did add up.

He gulped.

"Well, let's think this through. It could be a coincidence, right?"

"You and Aspen are the same age. Their mother died shortly after Cedar was born," I explained.

"You know how quick Aspen is to argue and defend. He's capable of holding his own, I've seen that time and time again, both humans and wolf form."

Vince nodded.

"He is intimidating, I'll give him that. Not to mention his wolf's larger."

"If it's true," I said slowly.

"That means Arthur is his father. Which would also make Aspen his...."

"Heir," Vince's words cut the air like a knife.

We looked at each other with the same thought.

How would we tell Aspen... if we were to tell Aspen?

[catostrofiqu]

The first one to come was a 4 year old by the name of Danny. Dick claimed he couldn't leave him on the street and that he must've also inherited Bruce's adoption tendencies. When Bruce said they unfortunately aren't related dick replied "osmosis".

After 2 month Tim came home with a 4 and a half as she insisted was Sam. After Bruce questioned Tim as to the how and why Tim proceeded to explain that it was again osmosis.

At this point the 2 toddlers are getting on very well and Bruce insists to Alfred that he must help update the playroom. Alfred says that he doesn't want toddlers with batarangs in the house. They compromise with lil plush batarangs.

The next child to come into the house came via Cass. Another 4 year old by the name of Tucker.

At this point Bruce started to take bets with Clark as to who of there kids would bring home a kid next. Apparently Jon had made a friend who followed him home with the name Dani. Bruce said Conner and Clark said Jason.

The money proceeds to go to Barbara when Duke brings home a 6 year old who insisted on being called Jazz and not Jazmine.

(Jason did adopt a kid before Conner but Jason is as Jason does and refuses to tell Bruce he got his adoption tendancies. He's adopted a little 1 year old with the name Dan)

Damian claims favourite uncle privileges whilst Steph try's but Barbara wins favourite aunt.

At the current time

Danny, Tucker and Sam are 4

Jazz is 6

Dan is 1

And Dani is looking like a 12 year old again.

Everyone has vague memories except for Dani due to brain capabilities, Dani got lucky and remembers everything whether that's a good thing or not who knows.

Dani followed Jon home in hope of getting help to find the rest of her Family.

Vlad and the Fentons were forced to stay behind because they either got caught by the GIW or one of them was the reason why everyone jumped ship.

Before the portal jump

Danny and Tucker 18

Sam's half a year older and hit 19 and is why she claims that half year.

Dani had reached a total of 4 years alive but looked 14 now instead of 12 (something went wrong with the cloning so her age is a little funky)

Dan had reached a year of good behaviour living with Vlad.

Jazz was about to turn 21 and had returned home for her birthday

Something happened in Amity everyone had to take a gamble and jumped through the portal.

Bruce sighed as he watched Duke walk through the door with a little boy in toe. He was officially the 4th Wayne to bring home a child in the last month. A trend started by none other than Dick when he brought home Danny.

"Et tu Duke?" Bruce asked.

Duke smiled non apologetically before guiding his new charge to the newly decorated child's playroom.

[c-is-for-circinate]

I for one am deeply interested to find out just what the rules for FCG's stress point system are. Especially because the party doesn't know yet, either.

It's not simply 'low HP FCG go smashy'. That's Chetney's thing. FCG was at real, real low HP yesterday for like half a day, and was still firmly and cheerfully himself, though admittedly he may have been accumulating points of stress during that time.

What set FCG off was talking to Dancer (and then getting smacked by Chetney, but let's be real, once he bluescreened there weren't a lot of other ways for that whole situation to go). He had full HP! They'd just had a long rest! Sam was actively, visibly breathing a sigh of relief about it!

FCG accumulates stress, here and there, under rules I'm very interested to learn. (I imagine that those times they've glitched out for a moment -- used the wrong names for people, repeated themselves weirdly, tried to remember or talk about the party slaughter, etc -- probably stacked them up.) I wonder if there's a way for them to reduce stress aside from exploding. I wonder if he ever went off on Dancer & Co before that time. I wonder what his triggers were back then, before he massacred his way into whole new trauma.

...hell, and now I'm thinking about A Familiar Problem, too, with its version of murdermode freakouts so much funnier and less deadly than FCG's. Especially I'm thinking about it because of what it vaguely connotates: FCG as a familiar. A companion, but not a character in their own right. Not quite a person, just a little creature accumulating stress.

[walks-the-ages]

Mkay definitely going to be writing..... multiple Quantum Leap fanfics at some point in the future so establishing some ground rules / changes because the writers clearly have no concept of the word "consistency":

1) 100% body swap. Sam and the person he Leaped into are physically in each other's bodies, the only ones who see Sam as "Sam" (aka the actor Scott Bakula) is canonically the AudienceTM, the other side of the Fourth Wall. he literally has no idea what he himself looks like because he sees the person he's Leaped into in the mirror, and Al also sees him as whoever he's Leaped into.

(On the inverse, this means that whenever Sam Leaps into someone new, everyone at home has to deal with the fact that the body of their best friend is being possessed by a wide variety of people, some of whom are super traumatized, confused, and alarmed at what is happening, from terrified soldiers taken straight from the front lines of Vietnam, to coldblooded hit men, to Sam's literal 13 year old self. There's a lot to unpack here in terms of potential angst)

(Also, None of this bullshit where Sam can see while in the body of a blind man, or having half the episode try to convince you he's not actually pregnant until the last minute or saying "she could have the baby in the future and then the baby could be stuck there!" Like excuse me writers, you are breaking your own universe's established rules in the most hilariously stupid reach with that lol. That's now how this works.)

2) Sam knows american sign language. Any man that goes out of their way to learn 8 different languages is going to learn the main sign language of where he lives, especially with a photographic memory, he would learn quickly just from being around Deaf colleagues and friends.

3) Sam's 100% autistic in my fics :)

4) Sam is also 100% Asexual in my fics :) wether or not he remembers that or even knew it existed as even a concept is up in the air, but either way he'll slowly discover it over the course of the fics. He's also sex repulsed.

5) 4X01 doesn't exist. It was dumb, contrived, and didn't do anything except derail the storyline and completely throw the storyline off it's rhythm and make 4x02 feel very disjointed, leaving the audience needlessly wondering what stakes have changed only to realize... Oh. Literally nothing. (I am so glad nothing changed, but it would have been nice if they didn't try to hype it up like Sam had been leaping on his own for who knows how long, only to have Sam and Al start chatting as though they'd never been separated.)

4x01 was also used as a dumb excuse for Sam to suddenly be into sex, and flirting with women, because clearly they were fishing for more male audience engagement by making Sam have enthusiastic sexy times with women of his own free will (instead of the previous 3 seasons that established that he wants nothing to do with sex or anything physical). Also just the complete irony of them retconning in a wife for Sam in the same episode they start making him more....sexually active shall i say.

6) Ziggy is the "God/Him" in question, clearly, and is Orchestrating Events to make a more perfect timeline that is also a self fulfilling prophecy where he is always created by Sam. Not that Sam or anyone else ever realizes this.

7) Al is super fucking queer, and is very involved in the community and equality movement. Running for Honor doesn't follow the same script anymore, it was probably pretty good for 1992 television,but uhhhh no to Al saying "I can't always be the good guy" like, sorry writers but no .

Anyways. Al is Aromantic and genderqueer, and his full name is Ally which he chose himself after running away from the orphanage for the nth time and being taken in by a group of homeless queer folk and learning about everyone's experiences with gender, sex, romance, and everything in between.

8) "Time travel within his lifetime" except every time Sam Leaps into someone their lifetime is factored in to that count. Exponentially increasing Leaping dates. Aka Sam Leaps into Jesse Tyler in the year 1955, which is when Sam is 2 years old (born in 1953)? Well, now Sam can also leap as far back as Jesse Tyler's birthday and birth year. And every single time he Leaps, the Leapee's lifetime is added to his pool of potential leaping years.

.... I'll add more as I think of them :)

[dreamsclock]

Hey Sparrow? Yeah, I was just thinking my little thoughts, and I realized something. Wilbur still fully believes that it has been thirteen and a half years for everyone, and that they have all ages while h is body like, stayed the same or whatever, yeah? So like, when he breaks Dream out of prison and starts talking about how it's been thirteen years since he died, how badly do you think that's going to fuck up Dream's sense of time? He knows Quackity visits every day, but he doesn't have a clock and there was a time when it was only . I highly doubt anyone answers his questions about how long it's been. Maybe he was unconscious for some of the torturing? Maybe his memory gets bad. I think it will definitely fuck him up, and that will only make his and Wilbur's relationship even more idolizing, because, "It's been thirteen years, and nobody tried to help me except for him," and "This is /my/ hero and I will make sure people Know That." So yeah. If Wilbur doesn't get corrected on the thirteen years bit, I think it Will Be Interesting.

YO I HADN’T EVEN THOUGHT OF THIS OH MY GOD ,,,.,,, YEAH holy shit, if both of them come to believe it’s been Literally Thirteen Years and nobody had bothered helping them,,,, oh BOY,,,, 

i thought i’d write a little something because i’m always a fan of the sort of incoherent, derealisation writing (ie. a place to call home fic LMAO), but be warned: this features a lot of dereality + dissociation, so pls be careful reading!

warnings: dereality, derealisation, dissociation, trauma, implied torture, implied death, mental instability, mental deterioration, messing with time as a construct (?), toxic relationships, hurt/angst no comfort

Time fractures.

It’s never been something whole and stable, Dream knows this (is that even his name?), because time is never stable, but, gazing out at the SMP now, eyes watering from the sunset reflecting into them, time is fractured, shattered into tiny pieces, and Dream can only scramble for missing shards. Thirteen years is a long time to miss - he doesn’t even know how old he is. Doesn’t even know what’s changed in the SMP, doesn’t know who’s still alive and who’s dead and who even remembers he’s in there.

Nobody had visited him in thirteen years, other than Quackity and Sam. Nobody, in thirteen years.

“My sunrise will be soon,” Wilbur breathes, eyes fixed on the horizon, “you’ll see soon, Dream. My sunrise is coming.”

...Nobody except Wilbur. Dream’s eyes fasten onto him, and something older that feels like oily gratitude drips into his chest. Wilbur, his saviour, after thirteen years of hell - thirteen years of torture and isolation and screaming for the pain to stop, and Wilbur had finally come to save him. 

And it’s not even that he remembers all of it, either. Prime, most of it is a blur of blood and blackstone, vague memories of bones shattering and bruises forming, and though he knows that Quackity must have shown up every single day for thirteen years, he struggles to piece together every day. The first few days are etched into his memory and will never remove themselves, and then after....

Blurs. Everything blurs. 

Wilbur turns to face him, and he has never been in sharper focus. 

“We are going to do so much,” he murmurs, sharp, sharp eyes boring deep into Dream’s, “we are going to do everything we ever dreamed of, Dream. This server is going to be glorious.”

Dream sways on his feet. Try as he might, he can’t remember if Wilbur is speaking to him after prison or before L’Manburg’s war, when Wilbur had come to him, eyes blazing, with low triumphant words of Tommy and I are going to do so much, we’re going to lead our nation to glory, you’re a tyrant and I’m going to prove it and Prime what time is it? When are they? 

“You’re my hero, you know,” Wilbur adds, offhandedly, and Dream reels silently, “if it wasn’t for you, I’d still be stuck there. I’d still be in the fucking Void, and it would be so, so much longer than thirteen years. You’re my hero!”

He laughs in sheer delight, clapping his hands, and steadying Dream with them when he sees him stumbling. It’s Pogtopia all over again, it’s L’Manburg, or maybe it’s exile and Dream had forgotten Wilbur had been there. Thirteen years: he’s missing so much from his memory and time is undone and time is and he is

“My hero, Dream. And I’m going to make sure everyone knows it.”

Time fractures. Let’s be the bad guys plays in his mind and you’re the fucking villain, Dream, you’re a monster competing for attention in there and Dream struggles, stuck between time and history and the future. Wilbur is his past. L’Manburg is his past. Being the villain, he’d hoped, would be his past.

But Wilbur is whole and Wilbur had saved him, and surely, if Wilbur is his hero and he is his, that means they’re the good guys. Maybe they’ve always been the good guys. Dream doesn’t know anymore - doesn’t know who’s bad and who’s good, what era they’re in or why Wilbur still smells like TNT and gunpowder when nothing has been blown up in a long time, and then decides that maybe it doesn’t matter.

Time is shattered, and Wilbur doesn’t attempt to piece it back together. He lets it shatter, and lets Dream shatter with it, and so he smiles, staring out at the SMP - their SMP - with an old unfamiliar bloodthirst.

“Team Chaos,” he murmurs, and Wilbur’s smile broadens into a grin.