#here's hoping this doesn't still annoy people in their mentions despite me breaking that lol

[eumenidaes]

I posted 14,506 times in 2022

That's 2,162 more posts than 2021!

157 posts created (1%)

14,349 posts reblogged (99%)

Blogs I reblogged the most: (breaking the @ so I don't have to show up in people's notifications lol)

@ possum-tooth

@ gxldandpurple

@ aspiringwarriorlibrarian

@ pinkyshy101

@ caspercryptid

I tagged 2,857 of my posts in 2022

#video - 336 posts

#kitty - 282 posts

#tag game - 215 posts

#space - 158 posts

#my posts - 114 posts

#chae-yeong - 102 posts

#ask meme - 94 posts

#ironwood - 81 posts

#rohan - 75 posts

#about - 57 posts

Longest Tag: 139 characters

#james watching his wife beat the hell out of a man for disagreeing with her war crimes: hmm. think this might have awakened something in me

My Top Posts in 2022:

Rest of this is under the cut because some of them get LONG

#5

gxldandpurple: Have you ever traveled to a different country? If you haven’t, which one would be the first you would go to?

eumenidaes: Technically I left the US once bcs I went on a cruise when I was like 5 and we stopped at one of the islands in the Caribbean, but I don’t remember any details of it or even where specifically we stopped. I’d like to go to South Korea one day tho, I’m part Korean but have always felt kinda disconnected to that aspect of my culture for a number of reasons (I’m a quarter Korean and white, American assimilation means I didn’t learn pretty much anything about my background growing up, etc). idk if going there would really help with that, but it would be cool to get to go there and like. Learn more about that part of my background, if that makes any sense

5 notes - Posted September 28, 2022

#4

22 for the Spotify ask meme!

It didn't take nearly as long as I expected it would, but the short story's finished! Thanks for exchanging requests for art with our number 22 songs with me lol, this song is Oh No! by MARINA (tho for some reason it looks like spotify moved around some of my songs and it's not there anymore??? idk, I'm not changing it to be another song when that other one was also requested lol)

I tried to incorporate themes from the song of things like neglecting personal relationships due to a desire to succeed and make a change in the world/life. This is focused on my RWBY OC, Chae-Yeong Vermeil, and you can also read it on ao3!

“Miss Vermeil! Chae-Yeong!”

Chae-Yeong turns at the sound of her name to see the familiar cheery face of Ashley Linden making her way through the first floor of the Vermeil Foundation building. 

The musician has become a familiar face at the charity’s headquarters over the past couple of months, and as much as Chae-Yeong’s inclined to believe people are good, she can’t help wondering if Ashley’s just here out of a desire to help people in Mantle. She’s well aware that Ashley insists on making her donations to the charity with Chae-Yeong personally, and that she’s been known to leave upon finding out that Chae-Yeong isn’t there today. It's clear that she doesn’t like staying in Mantle for long. That combined with how even now, Ashley casts a quick glance downwards towards Chae-Yeong’s chest makes her main intention for being here clear— she’s attracted to Chae-Yeong, and she wants to get close to her. 

If she were twenty years younger and not used to people who don’t even know her pining after her, Chae-Yeong might be flattered. But she is forty-six, and Ashley is twenty-eight, and Chae-Yeong has long since moved past enjoying people she barely speaks to wanting to date her. There are far more important things in the world, like running her company, working on developing space travel, and trying to improve Atlas and Mantle for everyone in it. 

But Chae-Yeong knows how to play nice. She has an image to upkeep, and whatever feelings she holds privately don’t need to be shared with anyone. 

“Hi, it's Ashley, right? How are you?” Chae-Yeong asks. She knows exactly who Ashley is, but pretending she’s bad with names is all part of the act. It also might deter her from continuing to pursue her. 

She hopes this won’t take long. She has work to do. Neither the Vermeil Foundation of Vermeil Industries run themselves, and even if her job as CEO isn’t meant to keep her involved with what’s happening in her company, she likes to be. Chae-Yeong would rather sit through mind numbingly boring meetings and seemingly endless emails than do nothing but play golf and only ever interact with people that are inordinately wealthy. Besides, her involvement in her company’s practices and its charitable offshoot means that she can make sure that everyone working for her is getting treated well. 

“I’m great, for sure,” Ashley says. She fiddles with the end of some of her long blonde hair. “Actually, I was just looking for you.”

“Yeah?” Chae-Yeong prompts. 

“Are you doing anything tonight?” 

And there’s the question Chae-Yeong had been waiting for. Honestly, she’s impressed. It usually takes even less interaction with her for someone to get bold enough to ask her out. 

The answer will, of course, be no. The question is how to phrase the rejection without upsetting Ashley too much or letting her get far enough to feel humiliated. 

“I’ve actually got a date later tonight. I don’t know how well it’ll go, but I might be, ah, unavailable for a long while after that,” Chae-Yeong says. It’s a complete lie, but those can make the best excuses. Plus, it helps her to maintain the playgirl reputation she’s cultivated over the years.  

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t know you were in a relationship,” Ashley says, and she’s mastered the Atlesian art of burying your feelings deep inside. There's disappointment clear in her eyes, but her expression remains bright as if she hadn't been hoping that Chae-Yeong was single. 

Chae-Yeong is in a relationship, but that’s not something that anyone is supposed to know about. Everything between her and James is supposed to be private. If she were telling anyone about it, the last choice would be a pop star that would tell the tabloid’s that Atlas’ general and the CEO of Vermeil Industries are dating. 

“It’s nothing too long term, just our second date,” Chae-Yeong says. It’s best to keep these made up relationships short, that way it’s harder to fact check. 

“Yeah, that’s pretty early on,” Ashley agrees, and Chae-Yeong recognizes the way her eyes regain their light at the thought. With a short relationship, she sees opportunity. If they’re only in the getting to know you phase still, it could be brief. Maybe Ashley won’t try to ask Chae-Yeong out now, but she will again in the future, after this fictionalized relationship has fizzled out. 

Chae-Yeong knows that she’s only creating an endless cycle with this by lying and acting like if she was single, Ashley would have a chance with her. But outright rejecting Ashley would only upset her. At least this option gives her hope, even if it is a false one. 

“Sorry if you wanted to do something, though,” Chae-Yeong says. 

“It’s fine, don’t worry. I hope your date goes well!” Ashley says, even though she definitely doesn’t hope it goes well. 

“Maybe we can get a rain check?” Chae-Yeong suggests. “I should be free at… some point. I’d have to check my schedule, it’s hard to keep track of everything.”

It isn’t, and Chae-Yeong knows exactly when she’s free. But this is another part of her public persona, and it gives her a good way to postpone any future attempts by Ashley to ask her out. 

“Yeah, we can figure it out later,” Ashley says. She rocks back on her heels. “I guess I should let you go, huh?”

“If you don’t mind. I have a lot going on, well, pretty much all the time,” Chae-Yeong says with a laugh. That’s not a lie, but it’s also a good way to get out of this conversation. 

“No worries,” Ashley assures. 

“Thanks so much.” Hoping to avoid getting caught up in more conversation if Ashley thinks of anything else to say, she starts walking towards the elevator. “See you later!”

With a press of a button, the elevator is called to the first floor. It arrives with a ding as Ashley says her goodbyes, and Chae-Yeong steps in, waving one last time before the doors close. 

See the full post

5 notes - Posted December 2, 2022

#3

If anyone wants to know how unhinged about Ironwood I am, I did a sporcle where you were supposed to write out his entire ultimatum and I was stumped bcs I had literally one word of it that I couldn’t figure out bcs the word I thought was supposed to go there was said to be wrong. It turns out it’s bcs I knew the monologue better than the quiz did

5 notes - Posted November 3, 2022

#2

See the full post

5 notes - Posted April 17, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Love tumblr ads that clearly were not supposed to be published

29 notes - Posted February 8, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[jadehaven]

Hello! I hope I'm not coming across as rude or anything, but I notice that a lot of people are upset because negative stuff about Celeborn is being accidentally tagged and it shows up in his tumblr tag. I'm of the belief that we are free to ship and dislike whatever we want, but I don't think it's a good idea to put negative stuff about him in his own tag. I'm Elondriel myself, and I know we hate seeing negative stuff about it in our own tags too. Could I ask you to please not write 'celeborn' as a whole word, but to break it into parts like cele/born or even 'cele born' when you're mentioning him in your tags so it doesn't look like we're intentionally putting hate into his own tag? Again, sorry for the weird ask, I just want shippers to be respectful of each other and create a peaceful environment for everyone!

Hello, thanks for clarifying your intentions, I appreciate it.

*Ahem*

I went back and forth on how to answer this tbh. There’s some things to be said here that maybe the whole fandom should pay attention to, so let’s get into it…

First things first, I am ship and let ship. Do I strongly disagree with some? Yeah. That doesn’t change the fact that if I follow the tag “Rings of Power”, I’m going to see those ships that I dislike come up on my feed. When I see those posts, I quickly and respectfully scroll on by. Because “ship and let ship” also means to let other people have a voice, and as long as it’s not active hate speech, I can respect without agreeing or even paying any attention.

Secondly, we need to remember that this is a fictional world, and Celeborn currently doesn’t have an actor in Ring of Power. Therefore, I’ve said nothing to offend a real person, even if it offends his fans. We are all allowed to have individual opinions about created things. That’s what art is supposed to be, up to the viewer’s interpretation.

Thirdly (sorry to be annoying by starting my paragraphs this way lol), we need to remember that the internet is a VERY diverse place. There are certain things that should under no circumstances be tolerated. That being said, I think that some folks have become a little bit sensitive about certain subjects, such as fandoms and fictional characters. I’m NOT talking about actors, or real people.

Thing is, I personally don’t mind if people come for Elrondriel. I don’t mind if they hate it with every fibre of their being, and I don’t mind that they post on it either. If someone has criticism about it, writes a well thought out post addressing their problems with it and tags Elrondriel, I will not care. Will I read it? Likely no. But their post is literally on that topic. I can’t go around dictating whether or not their post will be received by the right audience or not.

I think this all weighs in to remind us that we shouldn’t need to walk on eggshells when it comes to certain subjects. I’m sorry if my post offended anyone, but respectfully, it was not a “hate post” or “hate speech” regarding the character. It was an it was a critical observation if anything. Had this not been the case, your request would be more than valid. I expect to see all kinds of opinions when I come online, and it’s my personal duty to guard my heart when it comes to the things I love. But even despite this, there will be things that pop up that I will strongly disagree with and will have to make my peace with. It’s not easy, but it’s real life.

My final point is this: how folks judge my content is solely up to them. They can decide if they think I’m being petty or not, though I never intend to be. If they see my content and tags and discern that it’s being done out of spite, then that is on them. In this particular situation, it would be a different case had I tagged “haladriel” or “celadriel” because I specially wanted to ruffle feathers in the other ships. If some folks still interpret me tagging Celeborn as spiteful, then there’s nothing more I can do other than clarify that it was not my intention.

In lieu of your request, I will make sure to not tag Celeborn in any outright blasphemous posts about him, should I ever make any. But as for now, I will continue to tag the subjects that I write on and leave it up to viewers to either show their support, or scroll past. I hope you can understand.

Thanks for reading, sorry it’s so controversial lol.

xo Jade

[ninetqs]

pls can I hear your ten paragraphs on ferrari 2025

i really appreciate the way you see and express stuff and even if sometimes i disagree bc of blorbo vision the way that you get the point across feels like. good? idk it feels logical and rational in a way that makes me examine why I’m disagreeing and what bias is affecting me rather than just get annoyed when other ppl criticise things

sorry if this sound kind of incoherent lol <3

disclaimer i have no idea if this is a popular opinion on here or not i've only had this blog for like 3 weeks but tl;dr

at least on reddit and etc. there's this common view that lewis will suddenly find wdc form next year and the only thing holding him back right now is mercedes. while i definitely agree mercedes are shite and not supporting him properly, i just don't see him randomly regaining like 5 tenths worth of pace? a lot of ppl get really defensive about this bcs they see pointing out lewis is aging as being like a slight against his legacy. yes, he is one of the best drivers of all time but he's also getting older and i think it's okay to acknowledge even lewis isn't immune to the natural process of aging

this rhetoric is also a bit insulting to george who has done really, really well in the w15 this year and yet his performances aren't rated and/or he gets put down because "lewis isn't even trying and so he isn't a good benchmark." it's extremely similar to what people said about seb and charles in 2020, i.e. the younger driver's accomplishments can't be rated because their wdc teammate has checked out. but i think not checking out when the car is bad is in itself something to praise and while your teammate is certainly your largest benchmark, they aren't the only one

anyway because of this, despite the fact charles/lewis is by far the strongest teammate pairing on paper, i still think mclaren will have a decent chance for the wcc because they also have a very strong pairing and their drivers are likely to keep improving. ferrari are in a better position as a team (as i keep mentioning i think the sf-24 having obvious areas of improvement means ferrari is more likely to take a huge leap over the break) but i wouldn't say it's certain that ferrari will be the strongest team next year

i hope this makes sense and doesn't come off as me dissing lewis 😭 imho he's the best driver of all time (or at least tied with schumacher) but if you go onto reddit or the merc f1t thread it's like... it's okay to admit lewis in 2024 would be washed by 2018 lewis. even "washed" lewis is still an above average driver; losing to his 26 year old teammate isn't actually the end of the world

[writerforfun]

Underwing Challenge Day 6 + Day 7

6. What does your portfolio look like? Talk about as many other WIPs as you’d like here.

I have to be honest here, I never understood portfolio. I mean u understand what it is and its purpose but I never understood how to make it for myself.

But either way I guess I do have certain things I worked on.

Starting of with Collection.

1. Collection: Story 1: Mirror Defect: (DONE) (Sorry no cover)

Not all is as it seems.

Not all can be explained and even when the truth is out not everything will make sense.

"I just lost my brother, I can't lose her."

What can you do when you lose trust in those around you? When grief holds you too close?

When lies are hidden all around you?

When nothing is real?

Can you trust your own eyes? When all goes wrong who can you trust?

"Experitment 1034, you are next"

Is anything real? Are you real?

**Warning: character death, graphic description of the deceased character.**

I SUCK AT SUMMARIES.

The story was originally done to scare my uncle. I was going to send him this other story, which R.L. Stine wibe to it but sadly I lost it.

So here we are. Now this story features Mark, who despite all that has occurred, is trying to fix his broken family, even if it means destrying himself but is this family real?

You can check it out here

2. So, A Deal?: (DONE)

Met with death she has no choice but to let death consume her.

"No, I can't leave like this! Not like this."

There is no other way, or is there? But is she ready?

"What do you want? Does your soul not fill with rage, anger and despair? Pushing you to the core of vengeance? Don't you feel like a ghost? Dreading you will disappear? You know you are nothing but a ghost, and eventually, you will have to fade."

"I have seen the face of affliction brought by my reality, I'm tortured by the future of things that cannot be, haunted by visions of yesterday."

Her sin is great, but her desire greater. Will she survive the burn?

This was something I did for my school wrok once. Although it is quite different than the original work. I'm quite happy with the last chapter. I honestly just posted it out as a test to see if others would like it.

It took quite an effort and I enjoyed doing the last bit of it. I really want to make a sequal to it, get it going, but not really sure if this is going to go well.

You can check it out here.

3. Solar Elements: (DONE)

Avatar: The last Airbender inspired.

A lot can happen during a lifetime, faultless rotating to flaws, heroes into villains, a lifetime of destruction smiling in your wakes.

A lot can be lost in a lifetime.

"Wolf is going overboard,"

"We do not have time to wait."

"Surrender now and we shall show you all mercy."

"No, we will never yield to you"

"Then so be it."

"You are not prohibited to address better yet conduct such disgrace." "We are still alive!"

"Love you, Son"

A lot can happen during a lifetime, faultless rotating to flaws, heroes into villains, a lifetime of destruction smiling in your wakes.

"And so she has finally awoken."

I had done this for a story contest once, sadly I was unable to win. But I have to behonest, if I had I would have been so annoyed, it was awful, so awful. I won't talk much on it, as I still don't like this too much.

This feature elemtnal magic and time twist you can say, where a character, reborn must choose to either repeat history or change it completely.

4. Pirates tale: (WIPs)

Had this in for a while, been working on it but didn't have a plot till now.

The ship has no name, no crew, nothing. But if you see it, it's already too late.

Legend says they're ghost, some say they are cursed, others....... others don't live to tell the tale.

It was inspired by a prompt I saw once. Hoping to make these pirates cured to be vampires, hidden from all and only visible at night. They are insearch of their first crew captain, the one who must break the cures. Problem is, Captian dies 30 years ago.

Guess, his hidden daughter must be placed instead.

This is dumb, so dumb, but hey, I'll work on it.

5. The Basement: (WIPs)

Another school work.

This one feartures students sneaking into their school's basement. Each with their own story on why the basement is forbbiden.

If only they had listened and not followed through, then maybe they would not have encountered, the hidden dark past of the school.

This has a gay couple, lol I actaully send it to my teacher but I don't think she noticed :(. It needs alot of work though, so this may take a while.

6. To find the Truth: (WIPs)

This one seems to be liked a lot by you guys. Many seem intrigued.

In the dystopian future, when the world government collapsed, when humans fell and the virus took hold, out rose a series of mutants. Their genes mutated by the virus released when a power plant went nuclear.

These mutants, blessed with powers beyond their control, have taken leadership. Smart, strong, powerful and undefeatable. They hold power over the weak like you and me. But I won't let them stop me. I won't let them come in the way.

They are sloppy, weak and useless. The world is filled with criminals, danger and people in need. This world needs justice, it needs help and they won't help, so I will.

"They'll take you away. They take people like them away"

"I won't let them"

I worked up a lot on this in the past few day and have actually most of the plot down. Well the main chracter's backstory at least, even how the virus started and why these mutants have taken over.

I just need to start it out and get it going. I have done that and I was thinking of adding bits and pieces on how the world is after every sub-story, like telling the tale as the story progress.

Was also hoping to give this story, a big reveal as to who these mutants are and how they came to be, why they take other's like them and how they find other's like them.

7. To Sacrifice or To Live? (WIPs)

Still working up on the name here, but the story goes like this.

Two wedding decades a part, each holding nothing but tale forgotten.

An evil entity hanting them both. A power over both familes, readdy to demolish them whole this time.

Will the scarifice work?

Ok, before you turn away, here me out here.

Two weddings, one in the 1900s and the other in 2000s. Both familes trapped in a curse long active, each must work to find a way to break the curse. One failed, made it worse, will the new bride make it? Or will she suffer worse?

8. Collection: Haunting Memories (WIPs)

Jenny doesn't know how she did it but she did. She didn't mean to. She really didn't. But Nina is dead now and it's her fault. She did it.

It's her fault.

Then why do they blame Jake? Jake is sweet, kind and caring. Sure he was the one with the blade, covered in blood and coming to kill Jenny next but it wasn't Jake. Because she saw.

Saw him kill her. Push the blade through Nina, watching as the girl fell. Her blood turning the ground crimson. She saw as the life left Nina's eyes. As the killer slumped to the ground, the control over him wearing off.

Jenny knows because she killed Nina. Then why does no one believe her? And why do her memories differ from Jake's?

“I am telling you what happened.”

“All you are doing is wasting our time.”

“Then be patient, this is all I have. Please just hear me out.”

“We are busy people here. We don’t have time for stupid tales, girl”

“This is not a stupid tale. If you could just listen.”

“We are listening. Listening to you for the past 10 minutes, all you have done so far is tell us useless things. We have things to do.”

“Everything I mention is important. One thing missed and you won’t understand. Please. I need your help.”

“You have 10-”

“15”

“Fine 15 minutes.”

This I hope to work and get done by at least in the next month. It need a lot of work and must be quite slow yet fast paced. I need to make the plot a bit more than just what I have written.

8. Trick? No, I'll take the Treat (WIPs)

Halloween themed. Done quite long ago.

What will you do when your Halloween turns into a nightmare?

I have nothing much on it at the moment, but will update this soon.

7. What kind of partnership are you looking for in this event? Friendship? Somebody to bounce ideas off of? Something else? What sorts of people are you hoping to meet and adopt?

Honeslty, I did a lot of research in the past few days and boy do I ned a lot of work done.

For starters, I need someone who can actually tell me how my work is going, just how kuch of an effort I have out in and how it seems to others.

I need harsh, quite harsh feed back so I know what I am doing wrong, what I should improve with and what interests the reader about the book.

I also say wish to meet and know other writers here. Would love to meet them and get to know them.

[vcepsis]

heyy, saw your 100 followers post (congrats!!) and i have a prompt if you're interested? i've been craving appendicitis recently, with a whumpee that doesn't know what's happening right away and is taken by surprise when the pain hits them. (suddenly doubling over clutching their abdomen in the middle of practice with a pained groan, maybe?) u kno i'm a slut for sick vitya but any character is 👌👌👌

I’m sorry this took so long (like…a month?). But thank you so much for the prompt! I know how much you love hurting poor Victor so I decided to try my hand at that for you :) this is the first time I’ve written any kind of Victor whump, so I hope it sounds ok!

(Side note: I’m always up for taking YOI whump prompts so if any of y’all want to you can hmu, it just might take a month lol)

About 2k. WARNING: Emeto mention (no descriptions), hospital scene.

Victor landed his quadruple flip with ease, per usual. Hewasn’t even sure why Yakov forced him to practice them anymore: they werealmost second nature to him at this point. It was worth it, though, to hear Yuuri’ssmall, appreciative sigh from where he was taking a break in the stands.

Something was off about this jump, though. He landedperfectly on one foot, but the landing seemed to send a jolt of pain thattraveled up his leg and settled in his stomach.

Wincing a bit, Victor skated over to the side of the rink,grabbing his water bottle and taking a long drink, hoping it would help.

It didn’t. Instead, it made his stomach churn.

“Victor?”

Yuuri had come over to where Victor was standing, still onthe other side of the ice. He was frowning at him. “Are you alright?”

Victor smiled on instinct. “Of course!”

Yuuri’s frown deepened. “Are you sure?” He cuppeda hand to Victor’s cheek. “You actually feel kind of warm…”

Victor forced himself to keep smiling. “Your hand isjust cold. Now, are you coming back on the ice?”

Victor brushed Yuuri’s hand away and skated backwards,raising his eyebrows at Yuuri, who blushed a bit. “Oh, y-yes.”

Victor turned, skating forward while trying to ignore thepain. It worked, for a moment or two.  Hewas just turning into the set up for another jump when the pain flared anew,this time on his right side. Gasping a bit, he abruptly dropped out of the jump,skating over to the side of the rink. Skidding to an ungraceful stop, hegrabbed the boards in a white knuckled grip. Squeezing his eyes shut, he triedto will the sudden pain and nausea away.

He heard the scrape of skate blades next to him, and felt ahand touch his back lightly. “Vitya?”

Yuuri didn’t know about the pain; Victor would have had toactually tell him for him to know. So Victor wasn’t annoyed when Yuuriunknowingly touched the spot on his back where the pain was radiating from. He did,however, suck in a sharp breath at the touch, and Yuuri’s hand quicklydisappeared.

“Victor, what’s wrong?” Yuuri was trying to staycalm, but there was the slightest tinge of panic in his voice.

“J-just give me a minute.” With that, Victorslowly skated to the exit, which luckily wasn’t too far away. He slipped on hisskate guards before walking as fast as he could to the bathroom.

Once there, he locked himself in a stall, fell to his kneesover the toilet, and promptly threw up his breakfast, groaning when itexacerbated the pain in his side.

Coughing harshly, he raised a shaky hand to quickly flushthe toilet. “Fuck,” he murmured under his breath. He hated throwing up.

Did he have the flu? It was the season for it, after all. OhGod, he’d been kissing Yuuri all day…

No sooner had the thought crossed Victor’s mind that heheard the door to the bathroom open, and there was a tentative knock on thestall door.

“Victor?”

“I’m ok—” His reassurances were, unfortunately,interrupted by a dry retch into the toilet.

“Victor, open the door, please.” Yuuri sounded calm enough, but when Victorfinally turned and unlocked the stall door, he saw Yuuri’s wide eyes andslightly shaking hands.

“Victor, oh no, are you alright? What happened? What’swrong? Are you feeling sick? Should I get Yakov—”

“Yuuri.” Victor cut off Yuuri’s panicked bombardmentof questions before he could spiral into a full anxiety attack. “It’sprobably just the flu. I’ll be ok, but you shouldn’t be too close.”

Yuuri blatantly ignored that last part, kneeling down andpulling Victor to him, pressing their foreheads together. “I knew you hada fever. Why didn’t you tell me you were feeling bad? We could have stayed hometoday.”

Victor shook his head slowly, smiling a bit. “Icouldn’t miss a day as your coach. What would you do without me?”

“Your health is far more important than training,whether it’s mine or yours!” Yuuri scolded him, trying to look sternthrough his worry.

Victor chuckled. “Look who’s talking, Mr.Practices-with-a-103-degree-fever.”

“That was one time,” Yuuri said, unperturbed.“You know I’m not a good role model. In any case, we need to get youhome.”

Victor just nodded as Yuuri stood, offering his hand to him.Victor took it, standing slowly and gasping out loud as the pain in his sidemade itself known again. The anxiety returned to Yuuri’s expression. “What’swrong?”

“Nothing. Just—hurts,” Victor managed to say,blinking rapidly.

Yuuri frowned. “What hurts?”

Victor gingerly touched his lower right side. Yuuri’s eyeswidened, and he pulled his phone out of his pocket, typing quickly with onehand while still holding Victor’s with the other.

“Ok, just….stay here for a second.” Yuurisqueezed Victor’s hand once before letting go and rushing off as fast as heskated feet would allow. Victor sank back down to the floor, his back to thetoilet, resting his head on the metal wall. He knew it probably wasn’tsanitary, but the cool metal felt good on his skin; he was suddenly feeling hisfever.

A few minutes went by, and Victor ended up dozing a bit inthe stall, before the door to the bathroom slammed open and made him jump abit. But this brought the pain back in full force, and he tried to bite back awhimper.

Suddenly, Yakov appeared, with Yuuri close behind him. Hehad changed out of his skates and was holding Victor’s shoes.

Yakov knelt down in front of Victor, placing a hand to hisforehead. “What hurts, Vitya?”

Victor was finding it harder to concentrate through thepain. “Right….right side…”

Yakov cursed loudly, turning to Yuuri. “Get his skatesoff and bring him outside. I’ll bring the car around.”

Victor frowned, the words not making sense. “Whatfor?”

Yakov stood, already on his way out. “We’re taking youto the hospital.”

~~~~~

Yuuri’s hands shook as he untied Victor’s skates. Victorwasn’t really paying attention, head resting on thewall, clearly a bit out ofit.

Yakov had been quick in his decision to take Victor to thehospital. Yuuri hadn’t been sure, at first, but after looking up “pain inright side” on his phone, he knew he needed to get Yakov involved. Yakovhad frowned when Yuuri ha d told him about Victor’s sudden illness, but afterseeing his reaction just now, Yuuri was sure.

It was definitely Victor’s appendix.

Rationally, Yuuri knew people went through this all thetime. Getting it removed was a fairly common occurrence, with things rarelygoing wrong. Still, people could diefrom this, right? Didn’t people used to die from this all the time? Andanything can go wrong in surgery, even with the best doctors in the besthospitals and oh God—

A hand suddenly cupped his cheek, wiping away tears thatYuuri didn’t realize were falling. Looking up, he saw Victor’s glazed eyeslooking back at him with concern.

Yuuri took a deep breath, trying to calm down. He wouldn’tbe any help to Victor if he had a panic attack right now.

After what felt like an eternity, Yuuri finally got Victor’sskates off and his shoes on. Yuuri helped him to his feet, holding back tearsagain when Victor—strong, capable Victor—actually whimpered.

Yuuri led Victor out of the bathroom and to the entrance ofthe rink, supporting most of Victor’s weight with his skates in his free hand.It was a bit awkward, but they managed to slowly make their way to where Yakovwas waiting.

The drive to the hospital was tense, with Victor’s head inYuuri’s lap in the backseat. Yakov was silent, expertly weaving through thedense St. Petersburg traffic. Victor’s eyes were squeezed shut, and every nowand then he would strengthen his grip on Yuuri’s hand so hard it made Yuuriwince, though he didn’t mind. He would do anything to ease Victor’s pain, evenif it was only a little bit.

By the time they actually arrived at the hospital, Yuuri’snerve were pretty well shot. With Yakov’s help, they got Victor into theemergency room, and after hastily scribbling on a few forms, Victor was beingprepped for surgery. Despite both the doctor and Yakov’s reassurances that thiswas a fairly routine procedure, Yuuri knew he wouldn’t be able to rest untilVictor was alright.

~~~

Victor felt like he was swimming.

His head felt heavy, and there was a weird pressure on hisside. Was he asleep? Had Makkachin fallen asleep on his stomach again? He triedto move, but found his limbs weren’t responding, and eventually, he drifted offagain.

Soon after (or was it long after? It was hard to tell)Victor found he could actually open his eyes, though his body still felt heavy.A stark, white ceiling greeted him, as well as the steady beep of machines.Where was he?

Looking over, he saw a lovely, familiar sight in all of thisweirdness: Yuuri, hunched over his phone in a chair next to him.

Wait….was he in the hospital?

Looking around some more, he saw the heart monitor next tothe bed, the IV connected to his arm. Yes, he was definitely in the hospital.

He turned back to look at Yuuri. Dark circles were smudgedunder his eyes, and the screen of his phone made his face look incredibly pale.It seemed like he hadn’t slept in a while.

Victor hesitantly moved his hand out, his fuzzy head stillnot sure how to use his voice. Luckily, the movement caught Yuuri’s eye, whosnapped his head up from his phone. Seeing Victor awake, he hastily shoved his phonein the pocket of his jeans and sat up straighter.

“Vitya…” Yuuri took his hand gently, smilingeven as his eyes filled with tears. “You’re finally awake. How do youfeel?”

Victor took a moment to find his voice. “Yuuri…whathappened…?”

“You got sick during practice,” Yuuri said, voicesoft. “It was your appendix. Yakov and I took you to the hospital.”

“Oh…” Victor frowned, trying to remember. Thepainkillers were still weighing on him heavily, and thinking was hard. Histhoughts had a strange, watery texture to them, and they slipped through hisfingers when he tried too hard to grasp them.

Yuuri squeezed his hand gently. “You were in surgeryfor a while, but it went alright. You’ll have to stay in the hospital for acouple of days, but you’ll be able to skate again in a few weeks.”

“Mhm,” Victor responded, the words not reallyregistering in his brain. He was too busy looking at Yuuri.  "You looked so tired, my Yuuri…“

Yuuri gave him a small smile, and a few tears slid down hischeek. Victor’s eyes widened, trying to reach Yuuri’s face with his other hand,but the IV stopped him. Why was his Yuuri crying? Victor hated to see him cry.

“I’m ok, Victor.” Yuuri quickly wiped his tearsaway with his free hand. “I was just so worried about you. But you’regoing to be fine.”

“Ok,” Victor said. He wasn’t sure why Yuuri shouldhave been worried; after all, he hardly remembered what happened. But as longas Yuuri was ok.

Victor found his eyes growing heavy, despite his desire tohold on to Yuuri’s voice. Yuuri noticed, though, and cupped a hand to hischeek, stroking the skin gently with his thumb. “Rest, Vitya. I’ll be herewhen you wake up.”

Victor smiled, and let sleep take him.

[helloandwelcometomariasblog]

Review #69: Love in the Moonlight

I was going to write about this drama after I finished the last episode, but I'm halfway through and I just can't contain myself anymore.

This drama is such a joke. I'm honestly laughing incredulously here. Well, I'm up to the part where Yoonsung goes to fetch Raon with a bunch of guards behind him to - in his own words to his dad - "test the depth of his feelings for her". What a joke. You know and I know and he knows and we all damn know that he's too soft hearted to hurt anyone. And the writer is expecting us to believe that he would hurt Raon? The girl he's in love with? The girl he would go against his long-term friend and family for? The only girl he's ever liked even after frequenting a hundred kisaengs? Yeah, right.

That is this writer's biggest downfall. They're just too much of a softie. I'm pretty sure this writer fell in love with their own characters, so much to the point where they're too mushy-hearted to do anything bad to them. This happens multiple times throughout the drama, I can't even count. Nothing bad EVER happens to the characters. Well, let me rephrase that. Nothing bad EVER lasts for long with these characters - because the writer just can't bear to see them suffer for long!

Think about it. EACH damn time Raon and Young have to go through a tearful and heart-wrenching separation, they just get back together in the next episode or even earlier. The writer can't pull through with their own storytelling. The separation of the two main characters is always presented in this intensely tear-jerking fashion as though it's the hardest thing they have to go through, but in less than an hour there the prince is AGAIN, and all I can do is sit here and cry out in frustration because there are no stakes! How are we as the audience supposed to be sad and emotionally invested and feel like their love is a life and death situation when it just really ISN'T?

The examples go on and on. Think about the time Byeongyeon sacrificed himself for Raon and the prince. (Don't worry, Raon's unbearable passivity is coming up in another huge post of its own.) I actually liked that scene. I mean, yeah I love Byeongyeon as a character (more than Raon for sure) but his death meant something. It was an incredibly meaningful moment. You could see how much love he had for the prince and the entire scene was done pretty well, including the dialogue. And then what happens? HE DOESN'T DIE. Like, really? Okay, so he got shot by several arrows (and one of them definitely hits very close to his vital organs) and gets slashed by a sword and he still LIVES? So a hundred other people who gets slashed just once in the drama all die but this dude LIVES? Oh please. I swear, the moment I saw him lying down getting taken care of I wanted to smash the wall. That's not how it works! When you do that, you totally destroy the meaningful scene that you initially set up. If he comes back to life so easily, what was his death for? What meaning does it hold now? Ultimately, it tells the audience that nothing really is at stake, and that all of the "important" characters will come out unscathed. Nothing bad will ever happen to them. And what does this do? It destroys every ounce of tension in the drama. Nobody in the audience is going to ever feel that the situation in the drama is a life and death situation. Because it isn't.

That's really bad writing. One of the first things I learned in my screenwriting class was that you gotta put your main character through hell and you gotta have zero sympathy. You have to keep making bad things happen to them. The moment you become a softie, the tension just goes splat. It's really got to feel like a life and death situation and the stakes have to feel REAL. At the moment, the drama does none of that.

That's why I had to stop watching and rant when Yoonsung (of course) takes out his sword and slays the guards. Of course. I wasn't expecting anything else anyways. Who in the world would even think Yoonsung would do something other than protect Raon? Well, for a second I guess I was kind of hopeful - but only for a second, because the drama of course ruined it as quickly as possible. The drama never lets things simmer and turn bad. The writer is too weak-hearted for that. They probably can't bear to see any of their characters suffer for long. So of course Yoonsung would take out his sword but of course it wouldn't be to harm Raon. Of course he would stop at the SLIGHTEST squeak from Raon and start slaying all of his guards lol. I was trying really hard from not typing lol but I really can't help it. It's just too incredulous.

If only the writer would pull through with their threats. If only they would actually let things go bad. Then the tension would rise and rise and the rubber band would be pulled and pulled tight until all that's left to do is for it to snap and all hell breaks loose, which is when you reach the story climax before the happy happy ending. Other dramas do this really well. Especially when they make the main couple break up for reasons outside their control. You really gotta milk that situation. But this drama just can't do that and has never done it. It's supposed to do that the most right now, when there are only so many episodes left until the end. However, the drama DOESN'T do that when it most needs to. I'm so frustrated.

Don't get me started on how much I hate Raon. Well, more like, how much I hate the way Raon is written by the writer. Raon used to be a great character in the beginning. But the moment she falls in love with the prince - well, let's say "falls in love" but where's the evidence that she even loves him? I could write ten pages on how much Raon doesn't love the prince and how passive and wide-eyed she is while the prince actually loves her and ACTS it out ALL the time. Okay, let's have a pause here, and I'll go watch the rest of the episode (well, try to) before going on another huge rant.

If you're going to do a sageuk, do it like 100 Days My Prince or don't do it at all. Or even like Scarlet Heart. At least the stakes there were huge. So many people actually died and the main girl was ACTUALLY tortured. The biggest advantage of sageuks (compared to modern dramas) are the fact that the situations can get really life-and-death. This drama didn't use any of that strong point. What a waste.

Okay. I just came back from watching the rest of Yoonsung's sudden attack on the guards and wow. I was not expecting HIM to die. After all that ranting I did up top about how the drama doesn't pull through and doesn't kill any of their important characters, this is kind of a huge blow. But I have to say, I don't understand why he had to die. When Byeongyeon sacrificed himself, it made all the sense in the world - with his sacrifice, he was able to save Raon, her dad, and even the prince. But didn't Yoonsung lead the guards to Raon himself? He then attacked the bunch of guards himself. Then you see Raon actually try to do something FINALLY but it might have been better if she hadn't done anything this time, cause he clearly got stabbed trying to save her. I guess I just wish his death was worth more than this. I really liked him as a character and I still feel like the drama did him dirty. He could have died a more meaningful death. Not like this.

Now everything is being wrapped up and I honestly feel like there was no real climax in this drama. Maybe it's coming up. Let's see. But from the look of things everything is being wrapped up like a pretty gift box with no imperfections. Have I also mentioned just how much I hate the fade out transitions in this drama? I honestly hate it. It feels like a cop out each time. It feels like a lazy cop out instead of following through with the action that is presented at the time.

As the drama wraps up, I gotta say that I've grown to really love the second female lead. I started off disliking her (just cause I liked the main couple too much back then) and thinking she was just a plot device but she's shown a lot of character throughout the time she was in the drama. SHE is the one who truly loved the prince and actually acted it out each time. And just as I say this, here we go again - the writer lets her off easy, making the king erase her princess-to-be history and ultimately making her sacrifice useless and bland. Sigh. Just LET people sacrifice and be selfless and just let the audience see and feel the deep worth in that! Why you gotta keep taking that away from us?!

I have finally finished the entire drama. I loved Young as a character and I love Park Bogum as the actor who acted him out. Young was BY FAR the best character in the drama, followed by Byeongyeon. Raon was annoying until the very end and even seeing her smile was annoying me. All I could think of was the fact that she was lifeless and had no personality and didn't even properly love the prince and even despite all that she was standing in front of him receiving his love. The prince deserves better.