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tempenensis · 3 years

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Halo! Here's a reddit link to information and research papers about onmyodo consolidated by other people and a link to an overview. Tried to summarize below bits and pieces that may be relevant to jjk (and which I tried to understand to the best of my abilities :P )

I think this will be the last time I write such a long-ass ask again, my apologies

About cursed spirits and mono

Court onmyojis in Heian used divination to find out the cause of things like curses, strange events (kaii), natural disasters, illness, why your dog is barking at a seemingly empty spot (answer: Megumi's divine dog is barking back) and so on. Strange events were referred to as mokke (物怪) or mono no satoshi (もノノサトシ) and believed to be omens of calamity that were caused by mono or "things" which could be anything like the curses of gods or something from the Imperial mausoleums. Furthermore, during the rule of Emperor Kanmu from end of Nara to early Heian, the Ritsuryo system of government began to crumble as imperial rule changed hands and political victims were feared as onryō (怨霊) that caused disease or death to the Emperor's nearest relatives (but not the Emperor himself). The fear of strange phenomena spread through the aristocrats and became commonplace. Onymojis were believed to be able to deal with the curse of mono as well (otherwise it's off to the chopping board for their jobs (and lives) they go, chop chop). And so the Imperial Court funded them to perform quelling rituals and ceremonies to appease gods, clear away damages by insects, pray for harvests and prevent the spread of epidemics (which ironically was exacerbated by the court's overspending and large-scale deforestation but that's another story). For individual cases like the spirits of living persons (ikiryō or ikisudama), or spirits of dead people (akuryō, ryō, onryō, shiryō or bōkon), onmyojis might determine that spiritual energy or evil spirits (mono no ke) was the cause but mikkyō genja (験者) or ritualists were the ones to subdue it by incantations. JJK cursed spirits resemble mono no ke in that they cannot be seen and may harm humans. Whereas jujutsu sorcerers are more like genja ritualists (complete with flashy kamehameha bombs) (and besides being cursed).

Lifespan rituals

The most popular theory for Sukuna's fixation with Megumi has already been covered by this blog owner with additional info on the Ten Divine Treasures. Another theory is that Sukuna could have been aiming for a higher level of enlightenment. Besides the Shinto-Buddhism angle, Onmyodo also has its own set of rituals concerning life and death. Onmyodo is basically a system of divination and techniques that focuses on worldly benefits and has no vision of the world after death. The rituals were instead based on the Chinese beliefs in honmyō (本命), Zokushō (属星) or the realm of the dead (冥界) and by the end of Heian, there were more than forty Onmyodo rituals to pray for the individual health and longevity of aristocrats (commoners: eat the rich 👎). For the terms honmyō and Zokushō, the closest meaning I can give without being too horribly misleading would be the life/destiny that you are born with according to your birth year, zodiac, constellation and so on. The most popular ritual was Taizan Fukun sai (泰山府君祭), which originated around the beginning of the tenth century and was closely associated with Abe no Seimei (yes that guy you keep seeing in anime). Taizan Fukun (泰山府君) is the lord of the eastern peak of Mt. Tai in China, a deity that summons the spirits of the dead and administers the lengthening and shortening of human lifespans. Twelve deities of the realm of the dead including Taizan Fukun were involved in this ritual. It was implemented on every honmyō day, but also as needed for illness, childbirth, natural disasters, and strange events. Media adaptations often depict Abe no Seimei (or other onmyojis) using the ritual for resurrection or reincarnation 😅 e.g. Tokyo Ravens, Shaman King, Onmyoji (2001). I don't think Gege will go for the same cliché trope for Sukuna but it's still interesting to know.

Seimei and Dōman (Gojo and Getou)

Anyone who knows about the folklores of Abe no Seimei 安倍晴明 would be familiar with his eternal rival, Dōman 道満. Like Gojo who's the strongest jujutsu sorcerer, Seimei was the leading onmyoji specialist of his time. His position as the Kurōdo-dokoro onmyōji (highest-ranking onmyoji), legendary reputation and long lifespan lent to the notion that he had mystical powers due to being born from a human father and a kitsune mother. During Heian, Onmyodo referred to the organization of onmyojis under the control of high-ranking people of the same profession (kinda like the JJK elders) rather than the system of beliefs known today. Onmyōji with official status like Abe no Seimei would be kanjin onmyōji (官人陰陽師) or official onmyōji. Non-official onmyojis would include hōshi onmyōji (法師陰陽師) or priest onmyōji, who had the appearance of Buddhist priests (like how Getou was dressed as a cult leader), and presumably the control of the Onmyōdō did not extend to them. Official onmyōji, under the strict supervision of their superiors, would not have been permitted to have any connection with criminal acts such as curses. Instead, the Heian nobility turned to hoshi-onmyojis like Dōman to lay curses on their political rivals. There were many incidents involving curses within aristocratic society in Seimei’s time, and in a majority of cases the curses were placed by hōshi-onmyōji. Dōman himself had been spotted visiting a noblewoman, Takashina no Mitsuko, who employed hōshi-onmyōji to put a curse on several prominent political figures. Getou: "Let's curse each other... to our hearts' content!"

War onmyojis (and questioning of Gege's probable naming sense)

The Sengoku era treated court onmyojis poorly (ceremonies were expensive to fund). Warrior onmyodo being more practical (divining auspicious days for battle/forming alliances and exorcising evil spirits) became prominent instead. Academies that taught Confucian studies with divination and medicine as part of the curriculum flourished and the most famous was Ashikaga Gakkō (足利学校) (not as modern as Tokyo Jujutsu High though). Like Nanami and co. who became professional sorcerers, many of its students went to the battlefield as diviners and doctors. When peace returned during Tokugawa Ieyasu's rule, a few practitioners thrived by attaching themselves to powerful men. One would be Tenkai (天海) and another Kanshitsu Genkitsu, head of the Ashikaga Gakko. Being Ieyasu's bff, a temple Fushimi Enkoji (伏見円光寺) modeled after Ashikaga was built and Kanshitsu appointed as its head. Ieyasu also sponsored Kanshitsu's Fushimiban (伏見版), a publication project printed with wooden blocks. I'm definitely reaching here for Tengen and Fushiguro but I do wonder if Gege ever chanced upon those names.

🦆A Tail of Many Kamos: 鴨川, 下鴨, 鴨, 加茂, 賀茂 🦆

鴨川 - the Kamo river northeast of the Heian capital (modern Kyoto)

下鴨 - the Shimogamo Shrine (下鴨神社), a Shinto shrine dedicated to the Kamo family of kami

鴨 - the clan associated with the Kamo shrines and the famous poet-priest Kamo no Chōmei (鴨長明) who witnessed the end of Heian. Also Bucephala albeola.

加茂 - Kamo no matsuri (加茂祭) or Aoi no matsuri (葵祭), an annual festival of Shimogamo Shrine and Kamigamo Shrine and one of the three major festivals in Kyoto, also one of the three big jujutsu clans (加茂家) in JJK. It's funny that Gege would choose a name with the same pronunciation as a real-life historic clan, which brings to the next point.

賀茂 - the formal name of the Shimogamo Shrine (賀茂御祖神社), also a once-prominent Heian Onmyoji family that died out during the Sengoku era. Thereafter, the Tsuchimikado (former Abe clan) took over their hereditary duties of keeping the calendar. Abe no Seimei's teacher was the astrology scholar (tenmon hakase 天文博士) Kamo no Yasunori (賀茂保憲). Could Kenjaku be based on Abe no Seimei as well?

The Musical Exorcist

The rock-n-roll grandpa, Gakuganji, might be based on the lesser known lute-priests called biwa-hoshi (琵琶法師) or zatō (座頭). Their musical style is referred to as heikyoku (平曲), which literally means "heike music". Accompanied by their mōsō-biwa (盲僧琵琶), the often-blind lay priests would chant Buddhist mantras, placate earth deities, perform spirit pacification chinkon (鎮魂) of vengeful spirits including onryō, communicate with the dead (Principal Yaga 😢), purify defilements haraikikyomeru (祓い清め) and border rites kyōkai girei (境界儀礼) that expel malign forces. The thesis "From Heike to Nomori no kagami" suggests that the musical practices and theories of Heike correlate with Yin-Yang principles. Which I will not further expound bcos I haz zero music theory knowledge and also this ask is far too long 😛 Hopefully Gakuganji will not remain blind to the less-than-holy intentions of the jujutsu higher-ups as the story continues.

Hello, lore anon! Thank you for compiling another stellar read!

Aaw, you'll be missed, but it's fine. Just do things and drop by if you feel like it.

Yes, onmyodo has a large influence on Japanese pop culture. Numerous manga takes their inspiration from onmyodo, jjk only one of them. Onmyouji had a very large political influence in the court. They were also a legit government position, literally civil servants back in the day.

The legend of Abe no Seimei and his rival Ashiya Douman is also famous. Abe no Seimei was said to be born from a kitsune (fox spirit) mother and human father, so he is often thought to not be fully human, hence his supernatural ability. I wouldn't be surprised if one of these characters is inspired by either Seimei or Douman; Sukuna, Kenjaku, or Tengen.

Kamo, yes, it seems that Gege actually takes the name of the clan. The fanbook said that Kamo clan arised to influence during the heyday of Heian period, the Golden age of Jujutsu. While it's lesser known, Kamo family is quite a legend too alongside Abe no Seimei in onmyoudou. As you said, Kamo no Tadayuki and his son Kamo no Yasunori has been known to teach Abe no Seimei.

#le-ask #jujutsu kaisen #jjk lore #jjk meta #thank you for this!

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hatchetfieldtheories · 3 years

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Return to Hatchetfield-Town – The Guy Who Didn’t Like Musicals Part 1

Alright settle down kiddos. Get comfy, find a warm blanket and hug your favourite fwendy-wend as we start our Return to Hatchetfield-Town series.

I’ll be rewatching all the Hatchetfield scripted content (i.e. not livestreams or interviews) and jotting down what happens, explaining some concepts and delving into some of the key theories in the series (and using the word “implications” that often it will cease to have meaning).

Even though I’ll be doing the rewatch by show in order they came out, there will be spoilers for all Hatchetfield content that is available as of the rewatch.

I’ve also linked to a number of other blog’s theories here because they are amazing, but if you aren’t happy with your theory being included I will be more than happy to remove it! Just let me know.

[Part 2]

The Guy Who Really Hated Brigadoon

TGWDLM starts off with the greatest song ever to feature dancing zombies… at least I can’t think of any other notable ones.

In the title song, the cast of singing and dancing zombies explain to us that all great stories have to have a hero, someone who knows right and wrong and that the best way to do this is through singing and dancing in musicals. This with the later line of “they evoke the philosophical” make me think that Pokey took a class in Campbell’s Hero Myth in College and became that guy.

Hatchetfield Challenge: try not to shrug your shoulders along with the music at the chorus. Its impossible. No wonder the Hive spread so quickly. Literally killer dance moves.

So then they introduce us to an awful Grinch named Paul and we hit the first point in the show where I laugh out loud every single time I watch.

I know TGWDLM was not originally intended to be the first Hatchetfield show but starting this series with a song which sets up the story so well is truly spectacular. And is there anything more Starkid than introducing your main character by having other characters sing about how awful they are?

One thing I have noticed while writing, reading and collating Hatchetfield theories is that while most Black Friday and Nightmare Time theories are usually about the overall Hatchetfield lore, most TGWDLM theories are usually quite self-contained and focused on this one show. TGWDLM – while so fully within the Hatchetfield extended universe, is definitely the show that can best stand-alone without the others.

It’s the end of the world, Paul

If you don’t sing

This is the bridge, Paul

Where we globalize everything

And the words will come to you

We swear we will teach you

What it means to love

What it means to obey, Paul!

On a first watch this is very funny. On your 10th watch this is terrifying.

CCRP Technical: No-one here knows how to use their printer

Following the absolute bop of a title song we find ourselves in CCRP Technical and all feels very… normal. It’s very weird following all the revelations in subsequent Hatchetfield media, to be watching a show where there was genuinely nothing obviously fishy about CCRP. We’ll obviously discuss CCRP more when we get to Nightmare Time, but for now all we know is that Paul works in the technical department of CCRP – an unknown corporation, with some key characters, Charlotte, Bill and Ted.

We also find out more about Grinch Paul’s personality and honestly, Paul is me pre-pandemic just outright avoiding social interactions and suddenly going for coffee in the middle of the work day. (I have become a changed woman in lockdown – someone please invite me somewhere… anywhere!)

For all the dark humour and death in the Hatchetfield series, Starkid do know how to bring the joy – I love how excited the town of Hatchetfield are for a touring production of Mamma Mia.

Fake Fact: TGWDLM is actually an allegory for Europe in the 1970s, when we all became mind-controlled by Abba’s Waterloo. (Find me a better explanation for Eurovision, I dare you! The sequins were just too shiny!)

“The idea of sitting there… trapped in a musical. That is my own personal hell.”

Two words: Emma Perkins – need I explain any more?

Ah Hot Chocolate Boy. I really look forward to finding out more about him. Where does he come from? He just appears out of the ether. What’s his story? How old is he? How many hot chocolates does he have per day? I know we have since had some confirmation on who he is, but they raise more questions than answers. For now I will just point you to a gorgeous Mood Board by @hatchetfieldmoodboards which features a bit of a spoiler.

For real though – is it just me who would love a full version of “I’ve been brewing up your coffee”?

Hatchetfield Challenge: Try not to sing “Shut the f*ck up” along with Emma.

“Watching people sing and dance makes me very uncomfortable”- oh boy Paul… you’re not going to enjoy the next hour and 40 minutes. Also, Paul, you’re making me uncomfortable watching you throw your brand new coffee around as if you’ve just been given an empty cup. There’s imaginary coffee everywhere. Hopefully, HCB won’t slip on it before it’s cleaned up… he’s already having a bad day.

“Thunder and Lightning… very very frightening. But a big rock hurtling through the clouds is no biggie.” – all the residents of Hatchetfield apparently.

The next sequence happens so fast and we get introduced to a lot of characters. Notably Greenpeace Girl, Alice and Deb, Sam, and Hidgens (though we don’t find out his name until much later). This scene impresses me because they do such a great job of very quickly bringing out so many characters who nonetheless are memorable when they return later in the show.

Peanuts the Hatchetfield Pocket Squirrel is an Eldritch Being. I won’t go into Peanuts theories here as that could be a whole post in itself – and many a person more brilliant than I have written some fantastic theories on this. You can learn all about how a Squirrel took over the fandom in the following posts:

@dahlialupine : x

@frombothofmyhearts: x

@abiimaryy: x

And finally mine which is definitely a serious theory: x

It’s… A… Musical!

Now to remember we are actually watching a musical. La Dee Da Da Day is such a happy joyful song performed spectacularly by a throng of the undead.

The song is about the Hive singing about how much of a great time they are having now they are tap-dancing zombies, and trying to find ways to convince Paul he should join them too. So the grins on all their faces are not at all terrifying.

It’s worth noting also that according to the laws of the TGWDLM world, only those infected by the Hive can hear the music in the background. This becomes important later when it becomes clear some characters have started being infected before they are fully turned into zombies, but for now it just paints quite a funny picture of what Paul must be witnessing. I definitely think for him, this whole scene just sounds like this clip of Greased Lightning without the music: x

The important thing here however, besides Mariah’s singing, is that the Hive leave Paul alone. They don’t actually attempt to turn him at this point. I have a theory on the implications of this, but note this has big spoilers for the end of the show and Black Friday. It was written before we knew that the Hive (Pokey) was related to Wiggly but the content still stands: x

Charlotte, Honey, you don’t need that much sugar – you’re sweet enough

For reference:

@melchron noted that the lyrics for La Dee Dah sound very similar to the incantation for soul transferal read out in Jane’s a Car, which leads me to two possible implications.

The Freaky Furbies have a language other than English that they use for their incantations so this is why they sound similar.

There is soul transference happening to the souls of the bodies the Hive take over.

Or it’s just Starkid using similar sounding words for their content…. Three! There are three possible implications…

Paul – just print off another copy of the report

From this point on the musical numbers really do come thick and fast. We move on to the first instance of Jeff Blim encouraging Paul to talk about his feelings, which I am sure is not important and isn’t worth discussing. Paul goes through a musical rendition of a promotion interview, which is actually the Hive attempting to find out if he will be the “hero” of their story. They picked out Paul for the role from the start. That he was chosen was inevitable.

What do you see for this company? I'm looking for someone with strong ambition Someone to sell their specific vision Someone to share with precise precision their thoughts 'Cause I want you to want…To want

So it turns out these will be looooong, so I will end here and see you in part 2! I’m not sure yet what the upload frequency will be. It takes quite a while to go through the show like this but it is a lot of fun!

Hatchetfield High Homework:

Where do you stand on the Peanuts the Hatchetfield Pocket Squirrel debate?

Why do you think that the Soul Transference Spell and La Dee Dah sound so similar?

Go follow all the lovely people mentioned in this post!

Bonus points if you know the reference in the post title.

[Part 2]

#the guy who didn't like musicals #tgwdlm #return to hatchetfield town #starkid #team starkid

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scarlet--wiccan · 4 years

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Hey, since the maximoffs are generally white-passing (though not always and “passing” is a complicated thing) in the comics, do you think it’s rude/unnecessary to confront someone for making very pale art of them? If I did it I’d try to be nicer about it than I would if they were just blatantly whitewashing a visibly brown or black character, but I see a lot of artist who I feel like might not know and I really wonder if it’s worth it. Do you have any thoughts?

That's complicated. It's not a misrepresentation of the characters in the way that, for instance, a blonde Wanda or a tall, muscular Billy would be.

I can't reasonably fault anybody, fanartist or canon illustrator, for drawing characters on-model.

That said, in the last few years there has been an ongoing conversation in this fandom, at least here on tumblr, about who the Maximoffs are, and the ways in which their general representation is lacking. It's become more common to draw the characters with darker skin or more apparently ethnic features. If you're a fan of Wanda, or Pietro, or any iteration of Young Avengers, it's pretty hard to avoid that conversation, so it's easy to point fingers at anybody who seems to be ignorant to, or is intentionally ignoring, that trend. If I'm reading your message correctly, you seem to be asking if that trend represents a truer, more valid version of the characters that we should all adhere to, and if it is necessarily problematic to do otherwise.

I'm of two minds. On the one hand, I believe that disrupting the representation of all Roma people as white-passing, or even interchangeable with white Europeans, is crucial. Setting aside the fact that the diaspora intersects with just about every racial group, not just white people, the broad whitewashing of Roma communities in media erases our origins and occludes the fact that the mistreatment of Roma people is a race issue. On a wider scale, I believe that this manufactured ignorance contributes to systemic antiromanyism, but within the sphere of pop culture, specifically, it allows people to get away with obviously racist art and writing, and it's why Romani history and identity are viewed as disposable whenever people adapt these comics for the screen.

On the other hand, I'm deeply frustrated by the tokenization and co-opting of Roma identity that this fandom performs. This may sound hypocritical, considering how much of my blog revolves around my edits, but I see a lot of folks on tumblr who draw brown Wandas, make fancasts with Romani actors, and, like me, photoshop comic book panels, but not a lot of people who demonstrate any understanding of antiromanyism, or better yet, material allyship. In everybody's haste to earn diversity points, they've produced a lot of unintentionally racist content. I've seen a lot of cultural tourism, inappropriately co-opted activist work, and even virtual brownfacing in the form of RP accounts. No one, myself included, should feel entitled to dictate what a true or valid image of Wanda looks like, but especially not a community of people who think that having a folder of Hiba Abouk gifs and a Wikipedia list of common chib phrases makes it okay to racefake for your MCU roleplay.

Anyways, when it comes to fanart, you're going to have to rely on your own subjective judgement, and try to think about more specific issues than "whitewashing" because these characters just don't fit into that idea. Content that's derived from the movies is complicit in erasure. Content that is derived from the comics, but which applies lighter and straighter hair to Billy or Wanda is complicit in eurocentric standards, and the trend of gradually lightwashing characters of color, and even white Jewish characters. Content which employs racist stereotypes is not better than canon "white-passing" depictions. Cultural appropriation is still cultural appropriation, even if the character you're drawing is a member of that culture. Many popular writers and artists have a history of ignoring or shutting down dialogues about representation, even harassing people like me.

Hopefully, thinking about that stuff gives you a more clear idea of what to look out for, what's worthy of confrontation, and how to articulate your problems with a specific person or their content.

I know this ran longer than was strictly necessary, but I wanted to roll your message together with a similar question about whitewashing:

The Maximoffs weren't conceived, written, or designed in such a way as to be intentionally whitewashed, at least not originally-- their background was established via a retcon, at least a decade after their first appearance. Up until that point, they were generic, apparently white, Central Europeans. The fact that they are treated as interchangeably white and Roma is both product and perpetuation of the broad whitewashing of European Romani that I described earlier. Nobody's going out of their way to make sure the twins always have at least one white ancestor in order to justify "whitewashing" them, rather, nobody has ever truly envisioned them as people of color in the first place.

People will perform all kinds of mental gymnastics in order to minimize the Maximoffs' ancestry, or come up with reasons why it makes the most sense for them to look white-- invoking Erik as the father; dredging up the short-lived Robert Frank retcon; or, for Billy and Tommy, claiming that their resurrection somehow erased their genetic and ancestral ties to Wanda, even though the text implies the very opposite. I'll let you in on a secret, though-- these characters aren't real people, and their stories aren't immutable truths. If anybody, fans, writers, or artists, is making leaps of logic to avoid making comics more inclusive, it's not because their hands are tied by the unbreakable chains of canon, it's because they don't want comics to be more inclusive.

Also, I could be off the mark here, but I don't think I am-- Sinti people are Roma. Different parts of the diaspora have different names for themselves, but are all part of the same larger population. It's mostly a regional thing, as I understand. If you want my opinion, it doesn't matter what version of the story you go with-- whether Magda, Marya or Natalya is their birthmother, Marya and Django raised them. They have direct Roma ancestry either way, and they were raised by a Roma family. It's hard to say exactly where in the world the Maximoffs lived, or what specific label they might have identified with, but the twins would likely identify with the community they were raised in, be that Sinti or Servitka or Kalerash or whatever else. If I'm being honest I don't think that distinction is relevant for non-Roma to make.

I've said this before, but I don't really care what the characters look like, and I'm not interested in playing identity politics with fictional stories that were created by and for American gadje. Obviously, I love these characters as a fan, and I do have my own vision, no pun intended, of who they are and how I'd like to see them represented, but I worry that these conversations are unproductive. I hope you guys understand that I'm not out here trying to canonize an arbitrary idea of what Jewish Romani people look like. American superhero media has a long history of exploiting, misrepresenting, and erasing Romani history. I want more people to understand that, and understand the material consequences it has, and think about how comics, American culture, and art in general can deconstruct this specific mechanism of racism. It's not about any one character's identity, and it's not about my creative vision.

#bee text #wanda maximoff #pietro maximoff #billy kaplan #tommy shepherd #robintext

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hawkbucks · 4 years

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Prompt: I always see you in the library and I think you’re really cute so I leave you little post it notes on your work whenever you go and get a book just to see you blush AU.

Note: Originally sent in by an anon on my now-deleted older blog (as is usual with these reposted ficlets jgkfld)

It starts, like every good this-is-how-I-met-my-boyfriend story does, with Bucky dragging himself to the library after barely getting 2 hours of sleep last night.

With his trusty can of Red Bull and an ancient laptop that might as well have had dust spluttering out of its vents, he sits down in silent isolation from the other groups of students who take the library as a place to socialize and listen to music without earphones on as opposed to actually studying or writing their 3 essays that are due the next day. (He does, however, realize the hypocrisy in his way of thinking considering the obscene amount of time that he spends shooting the shit with Steve, Sam, and Nat in their group chat whilst his physics homework lies ignored.)

He takes a generous gulp of his Red Bull and turns on his laptop, ready to wait the 34 years it takes to boot up. The chair creaks disconcertingly underneath him as he leans back, but he’s had too many sleepless nights and too many mental breakdowns to care. If it snaps, it snaps. A trip to the hospital for a bashed-in head would at least give him an excuse to take time off from the hell that is university.

His laptop groans like it wants him to put it out of its misery, preferably with a BB pellet to the motherboard. He watches as the screen flashes white and the Baintronics logo pops up and swirls on the screen. A black loading bar appears under the logo. He waits, tapping his fingers on the table.

30%

Somehow unloads to 19%

5–hold on. There’s movement in his peripheral vision. People sometimes come and intrude in his little corner when they’re tired of everyone else like he is, and it’s been long enough since the last person that he curiously looks up–

–and promptly lays his eyes on the cutest guy he’s ever seen. His black hair sits in a mess of soft-looking curls on his head, he’s wearing an oversized t-shirt with the Jurassic Park logo on it (Bucky thinks he’s in love already), and a pair of glasses perches on the bridge of his nose. Glasses. Bucky chokes on his spit and almost tips his chair over. It’s not creepy, he tells himself as his eyes follow the cute guy who ends up sitting two tables over and, thankfully, ends up sitting in a way so that Bucky can see his face. He watches as he take out a sleek laptop, a binder, and dumps out a bunch of pencils and pens. No, I’m just… admiring his looks. And it’s not like Steve doesn’t openly ogle Thor every time they pass each other… fuck, Barnes, get it together.

Bucky shakes his head and turns his attention back to his laptop screen.

As it turns out, concentrating on his stupid study guide for this stupid quiz that’s coming up is near impossible when the adorable (yeah, because cute just isn’t enough) guy keeps shifting in his seat and giving Bucky excuses to look over. Bucky’s trying to remember all these formulas but the only thing that he’s committing to memory is the way that the guy sticks the tip of his tongue out when he’s, presumably, deep in thought, or the way that he has to blow his bangs out of his face when they come down to cover his eyes. The study guide, Barnes! Bucky’s mind yells. You don’t even know this guy! Stop mooning over him!

He goes back to writing down practice problems in his notebook and gets maybe 4 problems in when he hears wood screeching against linoleum and realizes that Adorable Guy has gotten up, leaving behind pretty much everything. Bit trusting, isn’t he?

Then, a light bulb flickers on in Bucky’s head. He rummages around in his backpack for some post-it notes.

He pulls out a stack of post-its–the pastel blue ones that he was supposed to be using for his history class but never actually got around to doing so. They’ll do. Just wanted to say that you’re cute, he scratches out on one post-it. His stomach twists and turns as he peels it off and tiptoes over to Adorable Guy’s seat, looking around to make sure he isn’t seen. Before his mind can catch up and tell him that this is a terrible idea, he flattens the post-it on the binder and slinks back to his own table.

He doesn’t know when Adorable Guy will be back, but he works on making himself look as busy as possible. There aren’t many other people around, but there are other people, so hopefully the guy won’t assume it was Bucky if he looked like he was elbow-deep in physics. He taps his foot, impatient.

1 thunk of Bucky’s head against the table later, and Adorable Guy comes back with a veritable stack of books in his arms. Bucky watches over the top of his laptop as Adorable Guy lays the books down and looks at his binder in confusion, sliding into his seat.

He picks the note up, reads it, and a pretty pink starts to rise up on his cheeks and dust itself across the bridge of their nose. He look around with wide eyes, seeming to take in everyone surrounding him and calculating who’s most likely to have written him that note. “Excuse me.” He reaches out towards Bucky, the note in his hand and sounding as sweet as Bucky thought he would. “Did you see anyone leave this here?”

Bucky puts on his best confused face and shrugs. “No, sorry.” He tries to not stare into the other’s eyes, even if, as cliche as it is, he feels like he could get lost in them.

Adorable Guy nods. “It’s fine.” And he turns away, just like that, probably pondering on whether it’s worth it to bother others and solve this mystery.

Bucky goes back to looking busy, but continues to watch over his laptop as Adorable Guy smiles softly, folds the note, and puts it into their pencil bag.

Oh, Bucky’s so screwed.

If anyone notices that Bucky starts frequenting the library even more than he usually does in the following weeks, they don’t say anything. Well, okay, they don’t say anything, but Natasha does throw him questioning looks and Sam wiggles his eyebrows at him. He might just have a tiny, slight addiction to passing on some anonymous notes to Adorable Guy. It’s just small. Miniscule. It’s not like his day feels a tad bit worse whenever he sees that Adorable Guy aren’t in his seat, and it’s not like his day brightens up whenever he sees him blush after reading one of his newest notes.

Nuh-uh. None of that.

None of Bucky waiting impatiently for Adorable Guy to get up and get some new books before he writes, Your hair is looking especially good today, when Adorable Guy comes in with his hair looking extra fluffy, or before Bucky writes, You’re smart. Just keep studying, I know you can do it, when he notices that Adorable Guy is huffing and puffing and running his hands though his hair more than usual.

None of Bucky barely able to hold in his own smiles, feeling his heart flutter when Adorable Guy positively beams.

All of this and it’s without Bucky actually knowing the other’s name. He realizes that he should remedy that sooner rather than later, but for now… he supposes he can keep anonymous for a little while longer.

As if on cue, Adorable Guy gets out of his seat again. Part of Bucky wonders if Adorable Guy has grown as excited as he is about the notes; he’s been getting up more and more, and he comes back empty handed or with a bag of chips from the vending machine more often than with another stack of books.

Quickly, Bucky takes out another stack of post-its–this time in a light pink–and writes, I’m not sure if you’ll still be coming here after this quarter is over, but I just wanted to say that you really are beautiful. Thanks for hanging around. He signs it with a smiley face and begins that familiar walk to the other’s table.

“You!” Adorable Guy whispers as he pops out from behind a bookcase, looking entirely too delighted and proud of himself, when Bucky’s about to stick the note onto the table.

Bucky freezes like a deer caught in headlights. He’s maybe 0.5 seconds away from bolting and never stepping foot in that library ever again, even if it is the one that’s closest to his classes. “Me?”

“You’re the one that’s been leaving the notes–” Adorable Guy licks his lips, and Bucky wonders if he picked up on his nervousness– “I’m not angry or disappointed or anything, if you think that’s the case. Now that I think about it, it’s actually, uh, kind of obvious that it was you, but… I’ve been wondering for a while, and… yeah.”

“Yeah,” Bucky repeats. He moves to cram the note into his pocket.

“No!” Adorable Guy blurts out, which earns them quite a few dirty looks. He bows his head in apology towards the disgruntled students and turns back to Bucky. “Don’t. I wanna read it.”

Bucky raises an eyebrow. “You sure?”

“I was sure about reading all of the notes you gave me before I knew who you were,” Adorable Guy retorts and sticks his hand out. “Now let me read it. Please?” He actually pouts, and that’s incredibly unfair.

Hesitantly, Bucky places the note in Adorable Guy’s outstretched hand (because he’s pretty sure if he tried to go against that pout, he’d get sent straight to hell immediately) and stuffs his own hands into his pockets. He can feel a thin layer of sweat start to form on his brow, which is ridiculous because usually he isn’t this nervous around people he finds attractive. Although, to be fair, none of them have ever looked like the guy in front of him.

Perhaps it’s because he’s a masochist, but he doesn’t look away and prevent himself from seeing Adorable Guy’s reaction. So, when his eyes light up and he smiles and that blush is back and Bucky realizes that he’s seeing this face to face, he smiles right back.

“God, you’re sweet, aren’t you?” Adorable Guy laughs, holding up the note. “I swear this just gave me cavities.”

Bucky rubs the back of his neck. “Sorry. I’ll pay the dentist’s bill.”

“You better,” Adorable Guy teases. “I”m gonna need a name so I know who to make it out to.” He steps just the slightest bit closer and Bucky tries not to choke on his own spit again.

“James,” Bucky replies, “but my friends call me Bucky.”

“I’m Tony.” Tony. Tony, Tony, Tony. It’s nice to be able to put a name to the face, and Bucky suspects he’s not gonna tire of saying Tony’s name any time soon.

“So, Tony…” Bucky looks at the table and quickly snatches up a notepad and a pencil. Tony doesn’t seem to mind, or he at least doesn’t protest. Bucky quickly writes something out, then turns it around and hands it to Tony.

Would you like to go out for lunch?

#old posts #filled

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tripstaysnoided · 4 years

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Flow Just Like Water

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Story and writing-related transparency update and my many shames...

The Question on Everyone’s Mind

“Hey you haven’t updated No Stars over Uptown in almost a year...”

Hmm, I hate it when you’re right. (This section has been rewritten ad-nauseam to curb back the bitchiness by the way)

So back in early/mid 2018, the idea was to divorce Uptown from a person who influenced it (and myself) heavily. She was my most important audience member, the closest friend I ever had, and unfortunately someone who used her power to bully, ostracize, and hurt others with my help. I cut contact when the hurt + some self-awareness finally reached me. Apologies were made and I feel like my work will never be done with it, but there was still Uptown.

Between censored comments, entirely recasting Axel’s save, different plot threads, and a load of disclaimers, there was nothing that would scrub her influence from the story. There was no way to cleanly drop everything because of how deep her influence went. It disgusted me to look back at it, and I had to private the blog because I feared what it endorsed, even if just in the past.

I pulled back from that sims writing community. I had its main thread on the Official Forums removed too (I guess if that was a mystery to anyone). It was a surrender that I never wanted to do, but I had it in my mind that if I was gone, then she wouldn’t be there either. Uptown became this cursed item, and as I quietly retired it, I noticed that she went quieter too. Not gone, but enough to make me sleep easier at night and even occasionally say hello to old friends.

And I hope deep in my heart that no one else is getting hurt in my place, but now this is gonna haunt me all day huh!

The two paths forward...

1) Complete Uptown rewrite that I’ve been threatening everyone with all year. While it won’t ever be clean because I can’t undo time, I do have a sound outline for a story that is much more true to my actual vision and how I’ve evolved, with a few necessary boundaries in place that are going to be there for all stories moving forward: no more casting calls and no more collaborative efforts. I am not going to open myself up to this happening again, even if the people have changed.

2) Same as above, but I continue the original Uptown as a favor to loyal readers alongside the rewrite. I would try to put the effort into it that I initially did, but with no promises on an update schedule and no advertising. I did ask myself “is there Patreon but without pledging money, just the private posts function” but it could operate as part of a private forum, a members-only part of a website, etc.

Also readers of the original would be beholden to a rule of “don’t spoil the rewrite for new readers, c’mon guys”. I mean, not really, but it is a good courtesy to extend to people.

Priority on this isn’t high but you at least will see what is!

I will probably make the blog public again either way due to the many broken links on my Tumblr but we’ll see. There are other things to deal with as I shall list!

Where Life’s Been Regardless

Been spending more time with my grandpa every weekend. Life’s pretty good and he’s warming up to my dogs.

Shiny New Webbed Site

Cucumber Fields Forever is a site I own now. We have a full domain, cucumberfieldsforever.com, a blog with one post, and the framework needed to host stories the way I want to and still through WordPress. The functionality of likes, comments, and following should still be the same but you know...I’ll take feedback too...

The main blog still has an undefined purpose though I do have drafts sitting around about:

The maybe/maybe not hoax band that was on the Metal Archives and the history of Funeral Doom Metal.

The curious case of when Sims 4 babies get their genetics and my only collaboration (read: was talking about it with a friend and might quote her if needed, it’s actually a bit of a doozy)

Amazon.com’s fake dried udon noodles, an actual issue by the way.

Things I’m reading! (This’d be a monthly feature if so)

For the sake of unity, I am thinking of solutions for hosting old and shameful content there including Uptown and for the real fans in my followers feed, Eight Cicadas...a world I totally have plans for too (not really). I don’t want them to be front-and-center, and that’s why I mentioned forums/members-only content. I finally have that power! Maybe.

Ooooh but what are the costs? Not too much to handle, that’s what. 😉 (Like really, I don’t need any hand-wringing about this, I can manage my finances)

Project Queue (In Order of Confirmedness)

Outrun the Scythe: have you seen me post out-of-context Sims 3 pictures? Did you want more? Did you hope it was Linda in Custody? If the answers are yes, yes, and “meh, whatever you want”, then you’re in luck.

Outrun the Scythe is a Sims 3-based tale of a young gay man and his zombie grandma, as they are both offered separate roles of being the undying intermediaries between the world of humans and the influence of a race of space daemons. It’s pretty familiar if you’ve been following me pre-Uptown, taking some cues from stories I’ve kept under lock and key like Eight Cicadas, The Chains of Lyra, and the not-so-locked-up Ironstar Immortals (of which Outrun is just the direct sequel to sans any retconning...ah the smell of early 2013 and performative heterosexuality)

Ah, back to my roots.

It’s a hybrid of gameplay, story, and lore about my little race of daemons with a lot of my own idiosyncrasies that I’m not really ashamed of: basing it off a super-polarizing Sims 3 challenge from a site I moderate, using a lot of EA’s pre-made townies and their genes, lots of unnecessary posemaking, stupid references. It’s a comfort to have in my roster.

While the first few chapters are in the middle of revision, I have around six in the queue and will be making this public when I have ten. I’m guessing December then?

Undocumented Black Widow Challenge: I just did this for fun/forum kudos (yes, in fact I have joined many forums), there was going to be a short story but it was quickly becoming something against my code of ethics. I mean, sims die and all. (read: I had to choose between “heterosexual widow” and “widow with some same-sex marriages that still end in tragedy, reinforcing negative stereotypes to the public for the sake of me not getting bored and detached during gameplay” so there were no good choices. Except for her affair with the mailwoman, 10/10) I hope to finish this before October ends and get my medal on Boolprop, I’m pretty far through it all. I might upload the sims involved anyways. This is for TS4.

I mentioned it because it’s keeping me busy. But not for long!

NaNoWriMo 2020: Dipping my toes into that again! It’s not sims-related, just a tale of lesbians, nosy neighbors, a haunted beach house, and some light murder and kidnapping. And I actually got my brother to scout out locations for me this weekend. If there’s any demand, I can share chapters as the rough drafts are finished, especially for the sake of proofreading.

Not saying I’m publishable, but wouldn’t it be nice? Will keep me occupied for much of November.

Untitled “Dear Diary” Challenge: Tired of feeling left out of the fun on the Boolprop forums, their “Dear Diary” challenge was the one that appealed to me the most on first glance. Why? Probably once I found an idea that let it be set in the early/mid-2000′s to begin with and explore some interesting characters through diary entries (which I have mixed feelings on as a literary device but I think that’s just me saying “well I didn’t like Dracula”, yes you get bonus points for writing it like a diary)

Also writing is the one skill I’m good at across multiple games. Wanna hear me bitch about the cooking skill tree in TS4 or riding in TS3? I’ll spare you.

I guess I could have included “spending time on Boolprop with old and new friends” in where my life has been. It’s a nice lil community if also a place with its own idiosyncrasies as well. So it doesn’t feel like I’m promoting another community if/when I make a thread there for Outrun the Scythe, I want to have a couple chapters of this ready to go by Outrun’s release, though it’s not gonna be the highest priority compared to it nor as long because I think I can blast through the gameplay quickly.

This one will be played in TS4 due to it having the easiest writing skill/I dunno variety is the spice of life. And hopefully another December release.

Defunded or Forgotten?: Oh shit I actually released stuff in 2020 and told no one? I do have a “mortifying ordeal of being known” sinking feeling whenever I get a site hit because it’s not my best work (but good enough) and veered sharply into issues I may be over my head in, though I try to be a good noodle with research and listening. Maybe hiding is bad after all.

Being based off a very flawed and incomplete Sims 3 challenge I found in the annals of the Official Forums, there’s a lot of behind-the-scenes work just making sense of things. And I’m scared of working on reconstructing the house but I haven’t abandoned the project yet. The story has eight chapters so far and is pretty game-based with some additions here and there. Scared of how long it could be though!

Date for this unknown.

Untitled Sunlit Tides Decadynasty: another year-long abandoned TS3 project with a much stupider reason why. Last update was about Hua getting ready for her wedding, and I wanted to do some poses for a bait-and-switch wedding chapter because to put it mildly, her real one was an absolute disaster.

Blender decided to fuck up its interface again, I got discouraged (this probably does account for some of the Uptown delays too), and when I decided to plow forward, it was for other projects instead.

Meanwhile I played all the way to Gen 5′s teenhood and the only thing stopping me is time (it takes almost 30 minutes to load the file right now, though they’ll be looking at moving towns in a couple gens) and maybe fear of the Logic skill.

Date for this also unknown but it’s easy to pump out updates once I’m in the groove for it. My third heir had a difficult life so maybe I’m just trying to bury it.

Also I just noticed the view count there was really good and probably because I linked it here on Tumblr last year. Thank you so much guys. I can’t really fret over views on Carl’s forum these days thanks to the years-long death spiral pretty much every forum anywhere has been riding on. But it’s a nice surprise. And it’s an alright little challenge recap to read during your lunch break or whatever.

The Wawas

I figured I’d end on the real news everyone wants! Both the chihuahuas are a year and a half now and reached their adult size around a year ago. For the most part, they are happy and healthy dogs.

#state of the uwunion #long post

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monsterywriting · 5 years

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Zombie Boyfriend Adam

Read the original parts here and here

AN: I can hardly believe it’s almost been a whole year since i started this blog (though i haven’t been as consistent as i had wanted/was planning to be).

I started this blog off with Adam, so i wanted to end this year with a rewrite of my very first story i posted. Hopefully there has been an improvement in my writing as well lol.

word count: 7.6k

Living alone in the middle of nowhere had many perks, all of which you could appreciate fully as a hermit who enjoyed immensely the understated solitude of nature, a cabin in the mountainside during the off season.

Nearly three months had flew by since you first agreed to fix up your grandmother’s old lakeside cabin and you had yet to tire of the place, even more so once the last of the other cabin owners and late season renters left and the snowy season began.

The cabin had been vacant for half a year, your parents finally succeeding in convincing your grandmother to move back to the valley below. She was getting older, and her eyesight had been going over the years, so her spending winters alone up here hadn’t been feasible any longer.

So you were now tasked with getting the place ready to be rented out by next summer, and you had your work cut out for you. The most pressing structural wrk that needed to be done had been completed over the summer, making the place livable for you to move in during the fall. Your work over the winter consisted mostly of sorting through everything that had been left in the house and keeping the place dust-free until spring. Once the snow thawed you would finally be able to complete the more cosmetic changes; fresh coats of pain, new furnishings and the like.

Your grandmother’s cabin sat alone on a hill overlooking the frozen lake, the first cabin built at the site. Other cabins dotted the shore in small clusters, the nearest one halfway around the lake. The clearing was surrounded by great pines, the only break in the tree line to the right of your cabin, the space the road carved from the final cabin all the way down to town and which was currently buried underneath several feet of snow.

You were currently pushing a large wardrobe down the hill towards the road. It had been in one of the three upstairs bedrooms, the one that you had spent your summers staying in. You had hoped to salvage some of the old wooden furniture, but a bad roof leak had left almost all of it water damaged.

It was still a shock to you to see the second home you remembered so dilapidated, the only evidence that they were one in the same the personal touches you and your siblings had left over the years—a sticker here placed by your brother, a knick there from your sister trying knife throwing. Now, it would remain on the side of the road for easier loading to take to the dump once the snow melted.

You struggled to maneuver the bulky wardrobe down safely, at first worrying that it would slide uncontrollably all the way down the hill and then as the ground grew uneven that it would topple over when the legs kept getting caught. Just as the wardrobe got stuck for the umpteenth time, you suddenly had the sensation of being watched.

The hair on the back of the your neck stood on end as you spun around, scanning the tree line where you thought you felt the stare come from. You weren’t sure what you would’ve done if you’d actually caught something looking back, but whatever it was had been at it for days now. At first, you just assumed it was some wild animal hoping to find some food, but it had been so consistent and long now that you were no longer sure what to make of it.

Deciding it best not to linger outside for too long, you shuddered and turned back to the wardrobe, giving it a particularly hard shove in your rush to dislodge it and get back inside. However, instead of moving again, the entire wardrobe tipped over, making you lose balance as well.

The wardrobe fortunately stayed where it landed once it crashed into the floor, but you weren’t so lucky as you immediately started rolling the moment you hit the ground. You flailed wildly in an attempt to find some sort of purchase to stop yourself before finally landing unceremoniously on the hard frozen gravel next to the road. Wheezing slightly, you picked yourself up off the ground, horrified to find both your palms scraped and bloody. Your temple was throbbing in pain, and you felt a warm wet roll down the side of your face.

Stooping down, you felt around the ground for your glasses, squinting to try and focus your vision enough to look for them. You finally found them on the road, cracks completely covering both lenses and one completely falling apart when you lifted them.

You groaned, this the only pair you had with you and unable to drive down to town for at least another month, meaning you were effectively blind until then. The snow didn’t help, either, you couldn’t even rely on colorful smears to tell you what you were looking at.

“Oh my god, are you okay?!” Someone called out to you from down the road.

You turned like a deer caught between fast approaching headlights, well aware of the fact that there shouldn’t be anyone this high up on the mountain besides you right now. Even with your terrible vision, you could tell whoever it was towered over you, impossible for you to even think about fighting them off—or running as he reached you. You couldn’t even begin to make out the details of his appearance underneath the layers of winter clothes and black shades he wore, only able to tell that he had long black hair, making him appear paler than he already was.

The stranger bent down to get a closer look. At least, you assumed that was what he was doing since you couldn’t tell what his eyes were doing underneath the sunglasses.

“Your forehead is bleeding pretty bad, but I don’t think you’ll need stitches. Looks like it’s just a scrape,” the stranger murmured to himself while holding your head in place and pushing your hair out of the way.

“Sorry, but who exactly are you?” You lifted your arm to press the sleeve of your jacket to the cut on your forehead and squinted up at him, getting on your tiptoes trying to get a better look, “I didn’t think anyone else would be staying here during the winter- and I don’t remember you from this summer…”

You definitely would’ve noticed such a giant guy walking around, a thought reinforced as you gripped his forearm.

The stranger seemed to grow nervous under your scrutiny, craning his head back before you could make out the details of his face. Considering he relaxed as soon as you got back down, however, you assumed the reaction was a matter of personal space rather than making sure you couldn’t give a good description of him to the authorities—not that they would ever make it.

“I bought that cabin at the end a few years ago; I only come up here during the winter,” he answered once you backed off, pointing across the lake to the specific cabin. You turned to look, though you couldn’t tell the difference without your glasses, “Did something happen to the old woman living here? She was always so nice…”

“Oh, gosh, no my grandma’s fine,” you reassured your apparent neighbor quickly, relaxing slightly with the knowledge that he knew her, “she just moved back to town. She’s still healthy as a horse. Y’know, besides her eyes.”

“Oh,” he paused before adding tentatively, “are you… blind, too?”

“No!” You burst out with a snort, nearly laughing as you held up your destroyed glasses, “they broke in the fall…”

He grimaced at the sight before noticing the scrape was still bleeding when you lowered your arm, turning all business as he ushered you back up the hill towards the cabin.

“You need to get that cleaned and bandaged. Do you have a first aid kit inside?” He asked, all but sitting you down on the steps leading up to the porch like a mother hen.

“Uh- there’s rubbing alcohol in the bathroom, and I don’t think I bought any bandaids…” you said after racking your mind, realizing you never even considered what you would do if you got injured out here, in the middle of nowhere with no way for any ambulance to arrive to help you—though fortunately for you your surprise guest seemed well equipped for situations such as these.

“It’s fine, just keep putting pressure on it while I run and grab mine,” he ordered, leaving you to watch his blurry form become a blob before disappearing completely in the white of the snow. You were puzzled by the man, helpful and nice enough in his own right, if not a bit odd—your neighbor but also a complete stranger.

Rather than wait in the cold, you went into the kitchen and ripped off a bunch of paper towels and pressed them to your forehead. You also dug around a few drawers in search of glasses of any kind, managing to find some cheaters but only succeeding in giving yourself a headache when you tried them on.

With your only back up plan a resounding failure, you went back to the porch to await the man’s return—and making a mental note to ask him for his name. You grew bored as you waited, your mind coming to the conclusion that he was probably hot, despite not being able to get a good look at his face. But then you began to dwell on the fact that he had definitely seen you eat dirt with your fall—possibly even from the initial trip. By the time you finally noticed him jogging back up to you with a small bag in hand, the embarrassment gnawing at you was almost unbearable.

He didn’t seem to notice your inner turmoil, focused on unzipping the bag and taking out everything he needed before shrugging off his jacket and setting to work. Neither of you spoke as he cleaned your scrapes with wet wipes, even taking the time to clean the blood that dripped down your face before dabbing antiseptic on the scrape.

You tried not to break his focus by fidgeting around, and bit your tongue to keep the million questions darting around your mind from bursting forth. Instead, you focused on taking advantage of your close proximity to try and get a better idea of his appearance. He still kept you at arm’s length, but it also happened to be the only part of him close enough for you to see in detail.

Scars ran up the length of his arm, both gashes and apparent burns all long since healed. Your curiosity was piqued by the countless number that seemed to cover his arms, looking up until they disappeared under the hem of his shirt—and you suspected they continued underneath. Still, you didn’t want to be nosy after only just meeting him.

Eventually, your vision began to adjust slightly to seeing without the aid of your glasses, though your head was still throbbing from the shift, but you could just make out fairly large scars running up his neck and on his face—the size of which clearly would have been gaping wounds.

You finally broke the silence by offering your name as he placed the final bandage on your palm, jumping as if he’d forgotten you were even there.

“I’m Adam,” he replied once he composed himself, quickly turning from you to put everything back into the bag. It was now evident to you that he was trying to hide his appearance from you.

“Well, Adam,” you said as seriously as you could, the man in question fidgeting as he waited for you to finish, “I ought to repay you for saving my life. How about I feed you for your trouble?”

You felt triumphant seeing the faintest hint of a chuckle escape Adam, even as he stammered out assurances that it was all right and really, you shouldn’t waste rations, you were not to be dissuaded, placing a hand on his arm to stop him and pretending not to notice the way he stiffened when you brushed against the raised skin of his scars.

“Come on, I’ve got enough canned food to last me years,” you said gently, letting go of Adam’s hand to still give him the chance to walk away, “It’s not every day you find out you have a neighbor by falling flat on your face. Besides, I keep deer sausage in the freezer for special occasions. I think this fits the bill.”

After a moment’s hesitation after listening to your short spiel, Adam bobbed his head in acquiescence and you immediately bounced to your feet, leading the way inside. Both of you cracked up when Adam was forced to duck down to fit in the doorframe and awkwardly sat on your grandma’s tiny old lady couch.

“Sorry for the mess; I’m clearing out the rooms so it’s kind of a catch-all in here,” you called from the kitchen, remembering too late that trash bags and old furniture filled the living room.

“It’s fine,” Adam replied, suddenly appearing in the kitchen entrance, making you jump before letting out a sharp bark of laughter, “Sorry, didn’t mean to sneak up on you, just thought it’d be awkward talking from across the cabin… and I wanted to come help.”

“You’ve helped more than enough; you can just sit at the table,” you insisted, more excited than you thought you’d be for the company, “So, how did you meet my grandma?”

“She’s usually the only other person up here during the winters,” Adam answered, ignoring your command and walking to the sink to start cleaning your dishes. You were embarrassed to admit you let them pile up since you were alone, mortified that Adam was learning all your deep, dark secrets very quickly, “She always insisted on giving me something to drink whenever she saw me jogging. Also food. I still don’t know how she did it. Just wait out there with it until she heard me passing by? Is it the same deer sausage she used to make?”

“Yeah, it is,” you answered, chuckling at the mental image of your grandma being able to somehow sense a young person in need of nourishment in the vicinity despite being half blind. It was very on brand for her.

You fell into easy conversation with Adam as you boiled water to thaw the sausages faster, telling him about the plans for the cabin, but also trying to learn more about him as well, enjoying coaxing the shy giant out of his shell.

Adam told you that he was an editor, mostly working via email, which explained why he could stay up in the mountain all winter. Despite seeming to talk more freely with you as time went on, you were careful to steer clear of the subject of his scars, as he hadn’t brought the subject up himself. However, you did eventually figure out that it had been Adam who was stalking you for the past week whenever you were outside.

“I wasn’t stalking you,” Adam protested, the two of you sitting on the couch with your plates of food, your table completely covered with boxes, “I was just worried something bad really did happen to your grandma. And the window to approach you without it being awkward had already passed… I didn’t want to freak you out and be trapped alone together for months.”

“Oh come on, how am I supposed to be scared of a guy who’s best friends with my grandma?” You laughed, sensing that Adam was referring to his physical appearance more than anything, and the fact that seeing a stranger injured overpowered his own self-consciousness about his appearance endeared him to you already.

The more you learned about Adam, the more you wanted to know, to ask him about himself. However, he seemed to clam up whenever the conversation broached the subject of his past, so you decided it best to let it go until whenever Adam felt comfortable telling you.

So, you contented yourself to find out just how much you had in common, even learning that Adam had been the editor for some of your favorite novels of recent years. You also learned that Adam aspired to write a novel of his own someday, something he worked on out here specifically. The conversation didn’t end until long after your plates were empty and the sun slunk below the trees.

“You can’t go out in that,” you fretted as Adam put his outer layers back on, “You can get lost! Or fall in the lake!”

“I’ll be fine,” Adam insisted, the most certain you’d seen him all night, “It isn’t completely dark and I’ve got 20/20 vision.”

You were skeptical to say the least, well aware that it was all too easy to get turned around in the darkness and especially with the blanket of snow covering pretty much every discernible path. But Adam insisted that he’d be fine, so you gave in quickly so he wouldn’t lose any more light, though not before forcing him to take one of your flashlights just in case.

“I’ll come back to help you tomorrow. Don’t want you to have any more accidents,” Adam called over his shoulder, waving to you before disappearing out of reach of your porch light and limited field of view.

Just as Adam promised, he came the very next day to help you clear out the rest of the furniture from the second floor, adamant he did the heavy lifting himself—but this time you brought the sledgehammer from your grandmother’s shed to break the furniture into more manageable pieces before bringing it down the stairs.

With no one else around for miles, Adam soon became a daily presence in your life, though he never seemed to allow himself get too close to you, constantly holding himself back. But despite whatever issues drove him to seek the seclusion of the mountain, it was clear he still craved human interaction, evidenced by the fact that he was always around.

You eventually video called your grandmother so Adam could speak to her, both ecstatic to talk again after so long. She even gave him her number, insisting he come down to visit her for a ‘real meal’. It was the closest you’d been to Adam since you met, both of you crowding together to fit on your phone screen.

You also managed to call the optometrist in town to have new glasses made before your prescription expired, so you only had to drive down to pick them up once the roads cleared.

There had already been very little work you could do over the winter months, and you finished much more quickly with Adam’s help. Within a few short weeks there was nothing left to do and still had at least a month until the snow melted.

Even with the work finished, Adam still came over just as often, enjoying the company of the other in your isolation. You had a feeling that Adam needed the companionship more than he let on, if the way he opened up to you so quickly in spite of his own insecurities was any indication, and you had to admit you enjoyed his company as well. Perhaps more than was simple friendship.

Like now, Adam read out loud one of the old books you’d found while you sat next to him and listened. A sudden snow flurry forced Adam to stay the night, and while neither one of you were tired when he’d begun reading earlier, his voice was so soft and soothing you could feel yourself being lulled to sleep.

You were out cold by the time your head fell onto Adam’s shoulder, completely unaware of how you curled instinctually into his side. You also missed how he stiffened at the contact, torn between wanting to maintain his distance and not wanting to wake you, sitting completely still for hours until you shifted away from him in your sleep enough that he could extract himself.

When you stretched awake the next morning, you were covered with your thickest comforter and the smell of breakfast filled the cabin. You shuffled into bathroom to go through your morning routine before going to the kitchen, wide awake once you saw Adam at the stove.

“Pancakes? You’ve been holding out on me, Adam.” Your sudden entrance made him jump and nearly drop the spatula in the batter before he caught himself, “I’m ready to get down on my knee and beg you to marry me right now.”

“Ran to my house to get food once the snow stopped,” Adam said, rubbing the back of his neck bashfully and refusing to meet your eye, “Just thought I’d be the one to cook for once.”

You beamed at his thoughtfulness, dragging him away from the stove so the two of you could eat together. Your grandmother definitely rubbed off on him, considering he made enough pancakes to feed an army and still insisted on making more. You praised Adam’s cooking knowing the compliments flustered him, but while you teased him to see the reaction you garnered, the compliments were genuine.

In the blink of an eye, the worst of the snowfall was over and the weather warmed rapidly, the road soon completely cleared for driving. As soon as you could, you set up an appointment to pick up your glasses.

Your excitement was swiftly struck down, however, when you told Adam you would be going to town soon, jokingly telling him that you would finally get a good look at him in just a few days. He had suddenly gone quiet while you went on talking before suddenly announcing that he wasn’t feeling well and leaving abruptly.

Adam began to distance himself, claiming he could no longer come over for a while, having been sent a new manuscript to work on.

At first, you didn’t realize anything was amiss, taking at face value Adam’s explanation that he had to focus on work. You initially suspected something was wrong when he grew evasive even over text. Your suspicions were confirmed once the day arrived for you to drive into town and he wouldn’t even come see you off.

Still, you set out and put your worries aside, stopping by the optometrist’s office and then going to lunch with your parents. You ended the day at the hardware store, stocking up on paint supples and different samples to test out before beginning the long drive back up the mountain, this time determined to find out exactly what was going on with Adam.

You knocked on Adam’s door for several minutes before letting yourself in with the spare key, your multiple calls going unanswered. You were struck immediately at the pristine modern design inside, your first time actually inside Adam’s home as you couldn’t make the trek around the lake without your glasses. The place was only sparsely furnished, and there wasn’t a single personal effect in sight.

You had long since accepted your feelings for Adam, cemented in your mind after your time away that it wasn’t simply the isolation and proximity of being alone together for so long. While you had no intention of aggressively pursuing the timid Adam, you were determined to at least tell him how you felt. You suspected he felt the same, and that those feelings were the reason for his abrupt disappearance, constantly restraining and withholding happiness from himself. No matter how much progress you felt you made with him, there was always a barrier he kept up around you that you couldn’t break through.

Hanging your jacket by the door and leaving your shoes at the edge of the foyer, you walked around the staircase deeper into the first floor. You still couldn’t believe he had the nerve to describe the home as a ‘cabin’ to you. You walked in a circle into the living room, through the kitchen into the dining room before finally ending up back at the front door. Just as you were about to walk back to the stairs to try the second floor, Adam’s shocked voice choking out your name stopped you in your tracks. He sounded terrified, which in turn terrified you.

“What the hell, Adam?” You tried to make yourself laugh, but the resulting noise came out too forced, “Come on, I finally got my new glasses—”

“Wait!” Adam’s raised voice made you stop in your tracks once again, now certain his voice was coming from the top of the stairs, only the corner of the wall in your way. Still, you ignored your urge to make the final step.

“I don’t want to see you! I mean—” Adam fumbled his words and you waited patiently as he deciphered what he wanted to say, “There’s something I need to tell you. About me. But I don’t really know how you’re going to take it. And I’ve been thinking about how to say this but now you’re actually here and - I’m just blanking on everything I had planned…”

“If this is about your scars, then I know,” you interjected in Adam’s increasingly panicked ramblings in an attempt to calm him down, or at least to save him from flailing around the subject.

Adam fell silent immediately, which you took as a sign to continue talking, “I’m nearsighted, not blind, Adam. I obviously saw them when we met. I just figured you’d tell tell me about them when you were ready to. Now can you please get down here so I don’t have to keep talking to a wall?”

Before I come around this corner myself. You held that final thought back, no matter how badly you wanted to say it. You wanted Adam to be the one to make the decision, not pressuring him to reveal things he wasn’t ready to share of his own accord.

After a few brief moments, and a few creaks of the stairs later, Adam’s voice sounded closer than ever, though still just as hesitant, “the scars… they’re related but not exactly what I was going to say- it’s just not easy to explain—”

That was all you needed to hear, taking the final stride necessary to round the corner and stopping at the foot of the stairs, effectively scaring the daylights out of Adam, sitting on the steps, with you sudden appearance. Despite his shock, he remained still, though clearly uncomfortable to be so openly stared at.

In the comfort of his own home and without the need for layers of winter clothes, you could easily see the scars and more than what you saw initially. The scars—mostly old burns of varying degrees of severity that seemed to cover every inch of his skin—were more condensed on his torso, peaking out the collar of his loose-fitting shirt. The ones that caught your eye the most, however, seemed almost surgical in nature, two lines that diverged from his sternum into a y-shape along either side of his neck. Your eyes moved upward, Adam’s nose almost completely gone, what was left misshapen by one particularly long scar that cut from his temple through his nose and curved down to his jaw in a sort-of ’S’ shape.

The worst you had long since gotten used to, so there were no gasps of surprise or fainting spells from you. Your glasses did, however, showed you the full scope of what must have been horrendous injuries, almost unimaginable in their sheer volume. You were certain that they couldn’t possibly have all happened in a single event, accident or otherwise, and Adam survive it. Despite his casual dress and the indoor setting, however, the shades remained on.

But, even as you tried your damndest to focus on the very serious task and show of trust at hand, it was hard when Adam was right in front of you, your attraction to the man only reinforced the longer you looked. You wanted to assure Adam that you weren’t repulsed by his appearance as he probably expected you to be nor were you tolerant of it—far from it, in fact. But to admit that you were fawning over the skin visible through the material of his shirt, or found him incredibly attractive seemed inappropriate for the moment—and it wasn’t likely that he would believe you if you came on too strong. Adam ran his fingers through his lengthy hair, and you sensed he was quickly reaching his limit for scrutiny.

At last, you made your way to the one thing still hidden away from you: his eyes. As you got closer, Adam tensed. He had returned to the stranger you first met, reluctant to get comfortable and with his guard constantly up. Back then, you had to be the one to make the first move and invite him inside.

So, you knelt down in front of him, carefully reaching out to take off the shades, stopping when Adam’s hand touched your own, even if he didn’t exert any pressure against you.

“I need to tell you- before you see,” Adam trailed off, clearing his throat before continuing, “These past few months- I haven’t felt so happy in a long time. Not since- well, I never imagined I’d get so close to you, and I’ve been trying to work up the courage to tell you before saying all that but I couldn’t so- these scars, I got them-”

You interrupted Adam’s rambling again by moving to sit next to him—though not by choice, your legs falling asleep from your uncomfortable position.

You recovered, however, taking Adam’s hand in your own and intertwining your fingers with his, “Adam, your scars and how you got them- you don’t have to talk about either if you aren’t ready. Even if I didn’t break my glasses, nothing that’s happened would’ve changed; I still would’ve invited you inside and tricked you into helping me clear out the cabin. You don’t have to feel obligated to explain yourself to me.”

“Thank you; I wish things were that simple,” Adam sighed, though some of the tension left his shoulders after your impromptu speech, “I got the scares in a car accident. I died back then.”

You blinked slowly, not quite understanding what Adam was getting at, “Well, I’m glad the doctors were able to bring you back, Adam—”

“I was dead for six months.”

You said nothing for a moment, at first attempting to convince yourself that he said minutes. You didn’t know what to think of the proclamation. The only thing that stopped you from immediately disregarding it was that Adam was the one saying it. And another thought wormed its way into your brain—the realization of exactly what the surgical scar on his chest reminded you of.

You reached up, hand moving past Adam’s face to the back of his ear, feeling the ridges of a scar and following the cut up to the top of his head, where you knew it would continue to the back of his other ear. You felt slightly lightheaded.

“My dad tried everything to bring me back- and he finally found something that worked,” Adam explained, taking your hand in his own and lowering it, “I’m not… entirely human- anymore.”

“Bring you back meaning like… magic? Or is it a Frankenstein-type deal?” You weren’t even aware of what you were saying anymore, words spilling out of you before Adam could even respond, “I mean, Frankenstein’s monster since, y’know, Frankenstein was—”

“I wasn’t going to correct you, but yeah, the latter,” Adam laughed drily, “except all of my body parts are from one person. Well, except my eyes. My dad never went into that much detail of what he did exactly, though.

“Wait, so your name- was that on purpose or…?” You gasped aloud as you made the connection.

“No!” Adam’s eyes widened as he shook his head emphatically, “that’s just a coincidence. A weird one, now that I think about it, but that’s always been my name.”

Taking a deep breath, you turned to face Adam more fully, reaching up once again to gently remove his sunglasses, folding and putting them down on the stairs before looking at his face again.

Adam’s eyes had a cloudy blue haze over them, so glazed over you could hardly tell what color they might have once been underneath, much less how Adam could possibly see through them. Though, he clearly could from how they moved as he carefully studied your reaction.

“Now can I tell you what I came here to say?” You finally broke the tense silence, your voice barely above a whisper, to which Adam simply nodded, looking at you in amazement as you brushed off the earth-shattering news—reanimation was possible, the world wasn’t as it seemed, you had spent the winter with a dead man.

Inching forward slowly, giving Adam every opportunity to pull away, you gently placed both hands on each cheek and angled your face upward, just inches away from his own. You were tempted to close the gap between you, but managed to sit still.

After a short pause, Adam dipped his head down and pressed his lips against your own. He was awkward, stiff and out of practice. Taking pity on him, you decided to take the lead, prodding his lips with your tongue to get him to relax a bit. Eventually he did, melting into the kiss and even deepening it before wrapping his arms tightly around you and pulling you closer, as though you would suddenly slip from his grasp.

You let Adam go at his own pace, allowing him to grow used to the close contact after undoubtably going through a dry spell without any intimacy for a while. Soon, however, you were forced to break the kiss to catch your breath, Adam giving a small noise of discontent at the loss.

You realized you were practically on Adam’s lap, his arms still holding you close. Rather than return your lips to Adam’s, as he clearly wanted you to, you snaked your arms underneath his and pulled him into a tight hug, resting your chin on his shoulder. You couldn’t see his expression, but from the way he clung to you and buried his face into the crook of your neck, you knew it was perfect.

“Not to rush you, but the stairs are kind of uncomfortable,” Adam’s voice was muffled as he spoke into your shoulder, but as soon as you registered what he’d said you snorted and extracted yourself from his embrace, Adam standing after you with a lot more stretching and groaning.

Once you were both up and all joints were properly popped, Adam wrapped his arms around you once again and rested his head on your shoulder. But before you could lean back into him, he offered to go make coffee and didn’t give you a chance to respond before he vanished into the kitchen.

Exasperated that Adam’s urge to be caring had made him part from you, you decided to just wait on the couch. You were unable to keep the grin off your face for long, your mind occupied with thoughts of the kiss. It had been a while for you as well, and even longer still since you had kissed someone you cared for as much as Adam.

When he came back with two steaming mugs and sat next to you—much closer than he had during the entire time that you knew him—you decided to finally ask Adam about his past, now aware of why he couldn’t go into detail before. And once you worked up the courage to ask, it was as though a dam had burst, Adam truly seeming thrilled to tell you all about his family and childhood, his voice only getting thick with emotion as he arrived at the point of his death. He even soldiered through all your weird questions about his current state.

“So do you still eat regular food? Or were you puking immediately after eating what I made?” You set your empty mug on the table, your heart dropping at the thought of poisoning Adam, even inadvertently.

“Yes, I still eat,” Adam tried and failed to sound exasperated, “and before you ask- no I do not crave human flesh or brains or anything weird like that.”

“Are you immortal?” Was your next question.

“Well, I haven’t changed all that much since being brought back. I eat and sleep like normal. Though- I did find a gray hair the other day,” Adam mused, though upon another glance at you, seemed to ascertain your true question and adding, “But I’m definitely not rotting away- no limbs falling off or anything.”

With nothing else to interrogate Adam about for the moment, you simply began to admire Adam’s features again. Now that it had been pointed out to you and you could study him more closely, the undead aspects in his appearance were undeniable, especially with his glasses off. His chest barely moved, and you imagined it would be quite something to watch him sleep—or just sit still. And if the wounds were all incurred in a single accident—it was obvious he wouldn’t have been able to survive.

You were still unsure what the implications of it all were, if the fact that Adam was a reanimated corpse would matter to you once the initial shock of finding out wore off. As of right now, it was still an abstraction—you knew Adam was once dead, and could clearly see the evidence in front of you, but you also didn’t know the grisly details behind the process of bringing Adam back. You didn’t know if any of it mattered in how you viewed Adam.

All you knew for certain was that you liked Adam, fundamentally as your friend, and possibly as more.

“What are you thinking?”

You jumped slightly as you realized Adam was watching you stare at him, fear flashing across his eyes as he pretended the question was nonchalant.

“Just about how good-looking you are,” you recovered with a grin, a wry chuckle leaving Adam followed by a quiet ‘please.’

“What?” You scoffed indignantly, sitting up and staring Adam down sternly, daring him to try and argue with your assessment.

“Just thinking about what a great kisser you are,” Adam shot back, his wiggling eyebrows making you both burst out with laughter.

You leaned into Adam, a comfortable silence falling over the two of you and his arm wrapping around your shoulder and pulling you closer.

“I think I love you,” you had your eyes closed, nearly dozing off when Adam’s soft words snapped you back to reality.

“I think I love you, too,” you murmured in response. There was no feeling of regret once the word was out, and you decided not to overthink things while in the moment. You tilted your face up to press your lips against Adam’s jaw before moving down the column of his neck, smiling against the muscular flesh as you felt Adam’s breath hitch at the contact.

You were careful not to use your teeth—at least, not for your first time. For now, the entire purpose was to make Adam feel good, loved, worshipped.

You felt Adam’s entire body stiffen as your mouth moved along his clavicle and jolting when your hand slithered under the material of his shirt to rest on his hip, but when you pressed a kiss against one particular spot at the base of his neck he let out a strangled moan.

A fire lit within you as you became even more brazen in your actions, you tongue flicking out and sucking on the same spot and your hand moving up to Adam’s pec, your thumb swiping across his nipple. This time, Adam’s entire body shuddered and the hand that had been resting on your wast flew to your hair, his fingers twitching as though fighting the urge to hold you to that spot.

Getting onto your knees, you looked down to examine your handiwork, Adam’s head thrown back against the couch, his pants the only thing audible in the room and his eyebrows furrowed upward in a pleading expression.

Your eyes roamed downward, your arm under his shirt lifting it away from the tenting material of Adam’s sweatpants. Your hand moved from his chest down to brush over the front of Adam’s pants, his hips bucking up at the touch. You brought your hand to your mouth and licked from the base of your palm to the tips of your fingers before slipping it underneath the hem and ran it along his length.

“I don’t think I’ll last long at this rate,” Adam breathed into your ear as you gripped the base of his girth and lazily tugged upward.

You smirked at the admission, determined to see just how sensitive Adam was, pumping your hand faster and smearing his precum onto your fingers, his growing moans music to your ears.

“So sensitive,” you purred, reveling in the surprise that flashed across Adam’s eyes before pure pleasure from your attention overwhelmed him, unable to believe the words that were spilling from your mouth yourself, “When’s the last time somebody touched you like this?”

“N-never- Ah- never this good… please,” your name came out as a strangled cry as you lifted Adam’s shirt with your unoccupied hand to close your mouth over his nipple, rolling your tongue over the hardening peck.

Distracted, your other hand slowed in its movement and loosened in its grip, and Adam’s hips jerked upward in an obvious attempt to get more friction. You knew there was a very high chance that Adam would come too quickly if you weren’t careful, and you were enjoying teasing him more than you anticipated, wanting to keep him at the edge of orgasm so you could continue to hear his whines for more. His extreme reactions to your every touch made another question pop in your head.

“When was the last time you touched yourself?” You asked, reluctantly parting from Adam’s chest.

“It- I’m-” Adam clammed up, which undoubtedly meant the answer was either embarrassing or so long ago he had forgotten. You would put money on the former.

Licking along the shell of his ear, you stopped your movements entirely, though you kept your grip on the base of Adam’s dick, “What did you think about while you did it?”

“Few- few days ago…” Adam cursed, your reward for the answer a small jerk of your hand.

“Mhm…?” You prompted, stopping again.

“Had to st-a-y during a blizzard and s-saw you when I went to take- take a shower and-” Adam cut off as you started moving your fist again, nipping along his jaw and murmuring praises in his ear.

You remembered the night well, whispering a reminder that Adam insisted you took the first shower and a plan ruminating in your mind while you stood under the water. When you exited the bathroom and announced that Adam could go next you went to the guest bedroom to change, leaving the door slightly ajar—easy to miss walking past—listening intently for the sound of footsteps and your heart racing when you heard them stop outside the door.

Suddenly, the muscles in Adam’s stomach tensed and he let out a choked groan. Looking down, you could see white ropes of cum spill onto his stomach, your reminiscing distracting you from your careful edging. You continued your ministrations throughout his orgasm until Adam hissed in pain, too sensitive for your touch.

Taking your hand by your wrist, Adam wiped it down the front of his shirt, a dopey smile on his face as he looked up at you. You grinned back, admiring how fucked out Adam looked from just a handjob, pulling him in for yet another kiss. Perhaps you were addicted.

“‘M sorry,” he suddenly mumbled as you pulled apart, leaning his head back and throwing an arm over his face, “I didn’t mean to take things this fast so soon.”

You chuckled pulling Adam’s arm away from his face and kissing his palm, waiting until he looked back at you, “I’m not complaining. But, if you want to take things slow from here on out…”

“Fuck, no,” Adam said immediately, sitting up slightly and his hand gripping your waist, “I have to return the favor.”

You couldn’t help but laugh at Adam’s eagerness, excitement bubbling within you as well at the prospect, but it was clear he was already struggling to stay awake, and you were overcome with the urge to kiss him again, speaking after your parted once again, “We can have a round two after you take a nap.”

“What did I do to deserve you?” Adam yawned, letting out a small sigh in contentment, as his eyes slowly slid closed.

“I love you, too,” you yawned as well, Adam’s sleepiness contagious.

For the moment, you were satisfied to just be there, on a couch in the arms of the man you loved, to let the rest of the world move along at its own pace. Questions of practicalities and ‘what now’s could be dealt with at another time. For now, you were finally falling asleep.

#exophilia #monster boyfriend #reader insert #zombie boyfriend #adam

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quickspinner · 4 years

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WIP Report 4/22/20

So just a heads up (I know, I gotta stop starting sentences with so, it’s a bad habit) on how things are going and what you can expect to see soon and slightly less soon! Here’s a quick rundown on what’s in progress ‘round these parts.

Sorry, this is long because y’all ought to know by now I’m a wordy bitch! So (I did it again) buckle up I’m about to ramble.

Backlog - I still have some works to crosspost here from AO3, so you’ll still see some of my older work pop up in the evenings for the rest of the month. I’m going to do some of my older one shots for the rest of this week, and then Sunday will be the college AU multichapter I did for the first week of Lukanette Month last year (not Hey Gorgeous but a different college AU I did before that). Again if you’ve already read my AO3 stories and you don’t want to see them again here you can use the ‘backlog’ tag to filter.

Weekly Prompts - I’m still doing them, although I missed last week’s and I may actually miss this week’s (or it may inspire one of the kiss prompts) just because I’m so behind. But I’ll still be doing those, they’re fun and they help me from getting tunnel vision on a project too badly. As a reminder the @mlweeklyprompts is open to anybody and is any ML ship allowed, no ship required, just check the rules and tag the blog so that you can be reblogged. And if you don’t feel like following the rules, there’s no prompt police, so you can do what you want, it just won’t be reblogged if it’s outside of the guidelines.

Beautiful Dreams - I’m so thankful for the people who’ve let me know they enjoyed the first chapter. Now that I’ve started posting this will be my absolute priority until it’s finished. I love this fic, I’ve been working on it a long time, and I’m really excited for it. I know it’s a little heavier than my usual fare but it’ll still have happy endings all around so I hope you’ll stick with me. I’m expecting about a week to a week and a half between updates. The first four chapters are mostly written so there will be some editing and polishing that has to happen (I’m still debating about exactly where to to put the break between chapters two and three) and I will also be working on the last two chapters so that hopefully by the time the first four chapters are up, the last two chapters will also be mostly done so there won’t be a huge delay there. These are long chapters compared to my previous stories, so there’s that too. Chapter 1 was the shortest by quite a couple thousand words so far.

Gamer AU - Also high up on the list. I’m actually debating making this a separate story from the rest of I’ll Never Not Know You and splitting it into chapters because it’s getting to be kind of a monster to do all in one bite. But, even if I do that, because I write terribly out of order I don’t have a part 1 to put up yet. I was thinking I could finish this week but I just got so behind last week that I don’t think it’s going to happen, I’m still catching up on the have to do list and I haven’t even had a chance to touch this yet.

April Kisses - I’ll keep this going if I can get some short ones up over the next couple of days to give me some breathing room; I hate to give up so close to the end - there’s only 9 days left (8 because I wrote a short cute one for tomorrow already). They’re not really worth delaying the other projects over, though, so I’ll just have to play it by ear and see where I’m at.

The Soulmate AU - I hear you guys that want this, I love it a lot and once I get through the rest of Beautiful Dreams I really want to focus on this and toss some ideas with my writing buddies and see if I can really get this one rolling again. I have a beginning, I have an end that I love, I just...have to figure out what happens in between and I haven’t had a lot of time to focus on it. If I decide that I just can’t make it work as a full length story, I promise you will get what I’ve already got. If worst comes to worst, I can write about a paragraph to connect the end and the beginning and you’ll just miss out on the long distance stuff.

I’ll Never Not Know You - I still have some things that people requested that I haven’t done yet, and they’re still on the list, but again these will be backburnered a bit while I focus on Beautiful Dreams, and to be honest, I think it will be a good thing. I won’t say I’m burned out on first meetings, I don’t think it’s that extreme, but these were originally meant to be fun and short and they’ve started turning into these huge monsters, which isn’t a bad thing necessarily because I like the pieces I’ve done, but they’re work, when they were meant to be just quick, fun little pieces to go between the longer stories.

Other Stuff - I still have a list of ideas for Across All Realms, I’m still planning on a part 2 (and possibly 3) for Man’s Best Fang, I’ve got five or six other things in various stages of writing, some of them AU’s that I’m really excited about (Although WHY I keep writing AUs involving stuff that I know NOTHING ABOUT is really beyond me, but then again if I stuck to what I know that would be like...knitting. It would be a knitting AU. Knitting and dogs.) As we get closer to the end of Beautiful Dreams you might start seeing some of this stuff in WIP Wednesdays or SSS as I start looking ahead.

A quick note on WIP Wed/SSS - I just want to thank everybody who likes or reblogs those WIP Wed and SSS posts and/or tells me that you’re excited for a particular thing, that’s actually both super encouraging and really helpful because it helps me prioritize, and while I absolutely try to write what I like and the things that are important to me, your excitement gets me excited.

So thanks for sticking around and reading through all this mess! I hope that gives any of you who might want to know a rough picture of the plan going forward.

#wip report #that's the plan #thanks for your support #quickrambles

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damagedsmile · 4 years

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list seven random facts about your character about how they were made and/or facts that have not been made known yet.

- J has a metal plate in his right elbow (known as a fusion plate) from having broken it as a young man. He doesn’t carry around the correct certification for it because he doesn’t travel, but when undergoing a metal detector search in, let’s say, a rival boss’ office or club before entering, he has to show the scar to prove it (& that there isn’t a weapon strapped in that area); it makes for an extra bit of weaponry in itself however when elbowing somebody in the face.

- He once OD’ed while hitting up in an alleyway with his old shitty crew of wannabe gangsters; he’d been sold a hotshot & shot it up without knowing. His so-called buddies freaked, rang 911, & hauled ass, but during the ambulance ride the technicians managed to get him halfway lucid to confirm what he had taken and roughly how long ago, so they could give him an opoid receptor antagonist to counteract the affect and buy him time before receiving thorough attention at the hospital. Where he was promptly arrested, pumped for info on his dealer - given some slack on the info supplied - and so given a minor sentence with a rehab programme to follow afterwards.

- After his very first guy-on-guy experiment as a teen, he became paranoid that he was actually gay & stopped listening to artists such as Adam Ant & Prince. He became very sensitive to the whole ‘queer’ jibes he’d get off friends (said jokingly) & would react violently. Then he saw ‘The Lost Boys’ at the cinema & fell in love with Jami Gertz, & quickly got over his paranoia.

- I created my take on J (aside from movie canon etc) after one conversation with a friend. I was itching to get back on Tumblr but I wasn’t really feeling right about returning to my only other blog at that time, so i wanted to try a new one. My friend suggested Joker because I was such a fan & it’d be something I’d never done before. I was worried at first, saying I wouldn’t pull it off, then I said (I’ll never forget it) ‘To me, the Joker’s a dog. He’s a stray mangy dog that if you put on a leash, he’d starve himself just to slip out of the collar.’ After that one thing, I said to myself that’s it, I’m on to something with that image, let’s try it. The rest is history.

- I was adamant about using Jared Leto’s Joker as my fc because to me it made perfect sense for what I wanted to do with him: I wanted a middle ground so to speak between anarchist & artist (which were Heath Ledger’s Joker & Jack Nicholson’s in nutshells) so I needed something fresh. There were very few leaked photos at the time & very little known about the movie, so it really was a fresh slate. I recognized the gangster vibe obviously but other that that, I had leverage to do my own thing & go from canon lore to create something that could echo everything gone before. I wanted to make a Joker who encompassed those gone before while still being modern & something I could do my own thing with too. Like when people read, I wanted them to go ‘oh yeah I can see Nicholson there’ or ‘yeah there’s Mark Hamill’ or even ‘hmmm that hc makes sense’ etc etc. Hopefully I’ve done that.

- First thing I did after setting this up & reblogging some things was look in to ASPD (possibly the most fitting diagnosis for Joker). I did not want to do the whole ‘he’s crazy because he’s crazy’ thing nor did I want to do something like ‘he’s a mystery, who knows, oooooo!’. I wanted to be realistic &visceral. I wanted to take an actual diagnosis & kinda show that a) Joker has a past which helped create his ‘Joker persona’ & b) a diagnosis is just as scary as no diagnosis. I personally find it blagh when I read books or watch movies where the crazy guy is ‘crazy for the sake of crazy’; I find it scarier to know that Joker was essentially born with this diagnosis (character-disturbed child would’ve been the term at a young age) & yet the real craziness only began after ‘one bad day’, meaning it can happen to anyone, that this society we prescribe to actually drove him off the edge.

- Do not ask me wtf we was smoking but when the very first trailer for SS was leaked / released, me & the ex huddled around my phone to watch with bated breath & swore we could hear a country twang in Joker’s voice. We re-watched that tiny segment over & over &over because we couldn’t figure out if we were imagining it or not but in the end, that’s what we were hearing. So originally I was kinda writing Joker with this country twang. Then I heard more stuff & I just had a vision of Boston come to me. Looked in to that accent, fell in love, & could recognize similar phonetics: so I changed it up.

#hc #origins #the good ol days

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italkaboutbooks · 4 years

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An in depth review of Aurora Rising by Jay Kristoff and Amie Kaufman//Part 1

So...I usually don’t do this kind of thing. Normally on this blog I just give simple, non-spoiler reviews. And then I give that certain book a stared rating out of five. And then I move on with my life.

But I’m starting to realize, that I may not be able to do that. At least, not for the YA sci-fi novel Aurora Rising, written by Jay Kristoff and Amie Kaufman.

I have a lot of thoughts on this book. I have read many reviews by other people about this book. The reviews I read were very mixed. Some people loved it and gave it 4-5 stars, and others hated it giving it 1 star. But for me, I cannot sum up my thoughts on this book with a rating out of 5, or any number for that matter. No, I have to get into the nitty gritty of this book, and explain every thought I ever had about this book.

So this is very obvious, but this will be an extremely spoilery post. I am not holding back on the spoilers, you have been warned.

Intentions

I feel like when analyzing everything Aurora Rising did, you have to understand what the authors intended it to be. Because I personally believe that Aurora Rising is just meant to be a fun time. It’s not meant to be profound, or deep, or revolutionary. I think Kristoff and Kaufman just wanted to write a light-hearted sci-fic novel about teenagers in a space academy. When I read the synopsis of this book, I could easily tell just by the tone that this wasn’t a book to take seriously, and it was just supposed to be a fun time.

And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. If you like reading stories that are just fun, good for you. I understood that when I read this book, and I think that’s why I gave it 4-stars on goodreads. Because I enjoyed it. But a part of me has to ask, does writing stories solely for fun, take away something from the story? It’s a debate that has no end, and I understand that, but here’s what I think.

Stories intended for fun? Totally cool. Sometimes we just want something fun without any messages that challenge us, even though those are extremely important. But sometimes I can’t help but wonder, especially in reading this book, what if you changed this or improved on this? Because that would make the story have more meaning.

One could argue that the most profound stories are the ones that are also fun and light-hearted. Take Disney and Pixar for example. Ignoring the questionable stuff that they as a corporation are, they have movies that are fun and light-hearted, and yet are still meaningful and can withstand time. Basically, stories can do both. Be fun and meaningful at the same time. And this might be the main problem with Aurora Rising.

Personally, I think Aurora Rising is a fun story, with little sprinkles, tiny sprinkles of meaningfulness. However some reviews said that the authors didn’t really care about making the readers care, and a part of me agrees with them. Because Aurora Rising is intended to be fun, and while that is enough for most people, and myself. I can’t help but wonder, how much better it could’ve been.

Plot

The plot of Aurora Rising is pretty basic in my opinion. However, I saw a reviewer say that it completely ripped off Firefly so...that’s disappointing to hear. Especially since these authors are apparently big names. Tyler Jones goes to a space academy, and misses the draft, a.k.a the event where graduates choose their coworkers for the job they’ve been working for years to get. Tyler misses the draft, because he received a distress call from a ship that’s about to explode, but there’s a sleeping girl there.

So Tyler gets grouped with the “worst of the worst” reputation wise and there’s also a poor girl who is trying to cope with the fact that literally everyone she knows is dead, and that she’s been sleeping for centuries.

So this girl does some creepy things and it turns out she has a bigger role to play in the fate of the world and Tyler and this gang of misfits get themselves wrapped up in it.

Pretty simple, really. There’s not much I can say on the plot. It’s not bad, it’s pretty basic. I don’t really care for basic plots. As long as the characters are great, whether they’re likeable or intriguing, I’m fine. However, I have one huge problem with the plot. And that is the ending of part 2.

The novel is separated into three parts.

Specifically, chapters 18-24. Let me try to explain to you what happens, because it had left me so confused.

So, Aurora (the girl who was asleep) keeps having strange visions. It had led the group to a black market planet essentially. The person who runs this “planet” is a criminal, I believe, who has the strongest security in the universe. The main gang is trying to break into the “criminal’s” place to steal a statue from him. There’s also a murder hungry beast that guards the place. Basically, it’s a suicide mission.

Cat, one of the characters, does not agree on following through with the plan, and for good reason to. They get into a fight about it, and Cat storms off to a bar to drink her feelings away.

While she’s at this bar, getting drunk (not a good state to be making decisions btw) the GIA comes to her. All you need to know about the GIA, is that they are looking for Aurora, and they are not going to be nice to her when they get her. They are here, because they want Aurora, and they tell Cat that. They also tell her that if she just gives them Auri, then her other crewmates, will be fine. Off the hook.

So, this girl is leading the people you care about into a dangerous situation, and people come up to you and say that if you tell them where that girl is, everything will be okay. Oh, and you’re currently drunk, and not thinking straight. What would you probably do? In this situation, I would say that you would sell Auri out.

When I read this scene, it seemed pretty simple to me. Cat was going to reveal Auri’s location, and the GIA would take her, and everyone would be pissed at Cat. But that’s not what happened.

We don’t get a scene of Cat actually selling Auri out.

The chapter ends, and in the next chapter, Cat is back with the others, going through with the plan. So I was thinking, “okay, she sold them out, but she obviously hasn’t said that, but then the GIA is going to come, and the plan would fail.”

But here’s what happens.

Cat, Tyler and Auri get super close to their goal. And the the person who ran the place caught up to them. He isn’t happy because they were breaking and entering. Then, the GIA comes, and I’m thinking that it’s game over. Cat betrayed them. They’re like, “we just need Auri but it’s okay you can beat the others up.”

Cat goes, “That wasn’t the deal.” And Tyler goes, “what deal?”

Cat basically confessed that she sold the squad out, and Tyler is rightfully upset about that. They get into an argument which turns into a fight. The GIA takes Auri away, and now I’m thinking, “Cats mistake caused Auri to fall into the wrong hands. The third part is going to be them saving her. Maybe Cat will have an arc surrounding this.”

You wanna know what happens next? The GIA agents take out the “bad guys,” and take off their masks to reveal that they were actually members of the squad all along.

What? What??

How did this happen? Does this make any sense to you? If you have read the entire book, did you understand what happened? Because I don’t have a clue how any of that made any logical sense.

Listen, I know what an unreliable narrator is, and I’m not saying it’s bad. However, if your story is so confusing that I don’t even believe that an event could’ve happened, you did something wrong.

I literally skimmed through the book again to remember what happened and I’m still confused and upset.

I think what happens is that Cat does sell Auri out, but she tells the squad what she did. And they’re apparently cool with it, and don’t get mad at her. None of these scenes are shown, so two of the members go to get GIA disguises, and it turns out that everything went according to plan all along, even though the readers are lead to believe the opposite.

I hate it. I hate it so much. I hate it because it just leaves you asking what was genuine characterization and what was just “acting” to go along with the plan. Like, did Cat actually get upset at the plan originally? Was that fight when Tyler finds out Cat sold them out a genuine fight of betrayal and anger? I don’t know. A part of it may be because I’m dumb, but I think this part in general was also way too confusing for its own good.

Not to mention that it throws out an opportunity for a character arc in Cat, that was thrown out of the window and replaced with something much cheaper in my opinion.

Personally, I wished that Cat did betray the squad and Auri does get taken by the GIA. But during the heist, Auri saves Cat (that’s an actual event btw,) from a monster. This could make Cat regret selling Auri out. Then, Cat could go and personally save Auri, as a way to amend her actions and give her an arc. I think that would’ve been much better.

But we didn’t get that. And it’s what I hate the most about the plot. I have more complaints about chapters 18-24, but we’ll get to those later.

So I’m now looking over what I just wrote, and I’m realizing that I need to split this up into more than one part. So this is part one of my deep dive thoughts on Aurora Rising. If you want to see part two, I recommend following me. Hopefully, I don’t make you regret that choice.

Part 2// Part 3

#bookblr #book reader #book review #ya book review #books on tumblr #books #bookblogger #aurora rising

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thirstzone · 5 years

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On The Interpretation Of V

V is an interesting character to be sure, and certainly one that’s taken the hearts of many of us, I’m sure. I’m still trying to nail down how I want to portray him, so hopefully this helps organize my thoughts a bit more. As always, everyone is entitled to their own character interpretation and their own way of writing characters! This is just how I personally analyze things.

On to the topic of the mysterious one, V.

Where to begin with V... As I write him on this blog, he’s... sort of his own character? I leave it ambiguous whether or not he’s his own entity or if he retains his origins. I do this because most of the time, it’s not relevant to the writing at hand. This leaves it up to the reader, and everyone has different opinions on this. Everyone can see V as they wish, so long as they aren’t attacking others for having a different opinion. Personally, I’ve already crafted a completely alternate storyline for the purposes of my own fantasies. However, for this particular analysis, I’m writing strictly from canon. So let’s dive in.

Before I reflect on V’s personality, let’s trace back his beginnings and his emotions when he came into existence.

With the release of the Visions Of V manga, we’re getting some more information about V directly after being formed. It’s still being released on an every other week basis, so this is absolutely subject to change as we get more information from that.

I think to understand V’s situation, it’s important to understand where Vergil’s been in his life. Of course, that post will be coming soon, so for the short of it, Vergil’s been broken. He didn’t always start out so corrupted, but having been tortured to the point that he completely lost his identity must’ve seriously messed the guy up. Even before that, Vergil was trying to suppress his human side, but he still acknowledged it, sort of. But after all that broke him, well... we saw the state he was in. In the manga, he states that he needs to sever his human emotions because it was doing nothing but holding him back, plaguing him with nightmares.

And thus, V came to be.

V was just dregs. I’m honestly stunned there was enough of him left to even manifest alongside Griffon, Shadow, and Nightmare with how absolutely broken down Vergil had been. But there’s something the manga revealed: he was scared. He realized he was separate and he was scared of what “he” had become. We can even see it on his face in the game. He’s absolutely mortified when he sees Urizen. He realizes he’s helpless, and it terrifies him. And let’s not forget this panel.

Pardon the non-translated text, but the website I use to read the English translation isn’t connecting at the moment. What he’s saying is shinitakunai which translates to “I don’t want to die.” He knows almost immediately that being split off means that it’s a death sentence. Given what he’s saying, and the imagery of the darkness creeping in around him, it’s obvious that he’s at least mildly afraid of dying.

So let’s tie that in with the prequel novel Before The Nightmare. I won’t linger too long on this because I’m mainly analyzing his actions in relation to his emotions. He’s already mentally separated himself from Vergil, as evidenced in the manga when he says, “I guess ‘I’ had forgotten how scary it is to be helpless.” Or something to that effect. I attempted to use Google translate before the chapter was actually translated and I noticed that when he uses the pronoun “I” in that sentence, it’s in the equivalent of quotation marks. Just that shows he sees Vergil as someone different. And in the novel, he even says that his “past self” was “full of delusions.” Though it’s interesting to me that Griffon seems to treat V’s actions as surprising when he chooses to leave on Dante’s suggestion. It’s possible that Griffon sees V as Vergil, even though V himself doesn’t feel the same way.

Another action of V’s that Griffon is shocked by is his decision to stay in Redgrave City to try and help the humans there. Vergil would’ve never done something like that. He may not have actively tried to kill them, as Urizen was doing, but he wouldn’t have bothered saving them. So for V to actively want to do so is something out of character for his old self. And V volunteers to do this knowing that doing that would only accelerate his death.

So we know that at the beginning, V is, to some extent, selfless. He would wear down his already decaying body to save people, or at least attempt to.

Regardless of this, let’s not forget that V has a touch of ruthlessness to him. In Before the Nightmare, he obtains the money to hire Dante by basically mugging a man. He’s not above doing things like that if he really needs to. He’s not maliciously manipulative, but he knows how to pull strings to reach the outcome he desires. He even refers to how he gets Nero involved as “using” Nero, with that exact word. In the prologue of the manga, he states that he will use anything at his disposal. In the game, he tells Dante “I never would’ve dreamed of using that child.” He’s pulling strings by getting Nero involved. He didn’t outright lie to Dante, but he did leave out some pretty important facts. He told Dante his adversary was Vergil, which was partially correct. He knew the name would mean nothing to Nero, and so he named him Urizen when speaking to Nero. Why he would make this distinction, I’m not sure. It wouldn’t have impacted anything to tell Nero Urizen’s name was Vergil from the start.

In regards to Urizen and Vergil, I think another thing that I should discuss is his motive. Was V planning to re-merge with Urizen? Was he planning to defeat Urizen? In my personal interpretation, I think merging with Urizen again was not his initial intention. So what changed?

When he tells Trish the story of his birth, you can tell he’s sincere. He’s being genuine and open and vulnerable. He is truly regretful for the things that Vergil had done and wanted to set things right by taking down Urizen. He’s guilt-ridden, and it’s clear in his voice. I do think he told Trish his origins in particular because she looked like Eva. Vergil’s mother. The memories V was in possession of. When he tells her, she basically brushes him off and tells him that it’s his own problem. To hear that from someone who reminds you of your late mother must have hurt. To add insult to injury, my friend pointed something else out: that must’ve drove home the fact that no one cared about V. When he says he’s glad Lady’s okay, she responds “You too, I guess.” Now, I get it. This stranger you know nothing about is kind of shady. But to add the “I guess” on is sort of... well, it’s rude, in my opinion. Then again, I’m southern, and manners are a huge thing here. And when Trish also shows that she’s not personally involved with V, it must’ve made him realize that oh right. They don’t care about him. They’re only working with him because he’s paying them. What happens to him or what he feels doesn’t matter to them.

So when Trish tells him “You need to see this through,” I think that’s when his goal changed from “I need to take down Urizen” to “I need to take down Dante.” He wasn’t seeing his goal as V through anymore. He was seeing his goal as Vergil through. That moment is when he decided to merge with Urizen, even though he didn’t originally plan to do that. I think he really was ready to bring down Urizen and save Redgrave City, even if it meant he died.

Now that I’ve talked about that, let’s talk about his personality in regards to how I write him.

When I write for V, I always write during the point of the story that he wants to save Redgrave. So basically I write V as he is before mission 12. Whether or not he’s a part of Vergil or his own person doesn’t come into play with his personality, as it only effects his motivations. V is polite, that much is certain. He tells Lady that he’s glad she’s okay, he specifically picks up a piece of Geryon for Nico without her asking him to, he doesn’t fuss when Dante tells him to turn back, among some other examples if I thought a little more about it.

He’s kind, but not too kind. He would willingly sacrifice his health to help the people of Redgrave. At the same time, he doesn’t have qualms about acquiring money (or clothes, according to the new Visions of V chapter) by unsavory means. He’s most definitely an “ends justify the means” sort of person, as he strung along Dante and Nero with just a bit of manipulation, although his intentions were good at the time.

Above all, being someone’s concentrated humanity, I think V feels his emotions very strongly. He may not know how to process them, but he’s the most open about what he’s feeling.

#devil may cry 5 #devil may cry #v dmc #dmc v #v (dmc)#musings #I'm almost done with the next request. It's not long by any means but I got SO HUNG UP ON IT #writer's block hit me SO HARD #and it was a double whammy of being overworked for the past week #ANYWAY here's this #I have so many feelings about V

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featuristicfilm · 5 years

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Movies of Fall/Winter 2019 (and 2020) that I’m really excited to see

With awards season kicking in, the movie release slate is about to bring us some incredible pieces of cinema. There are many films this year that sound fun, interesting, profound and promising so here is a shortened list of the ones that get me giddy with most anticipation. TOP 5 let’s go! (and a few honourable mentions)

5. Lucy in the Sky (Noah Hawley, December 6th, 2019, UK)

Randomly stumbling upon its trailer on Youtube, I was surprised as to why I haven’t heard anything about this film at all because it actually looks super intriguing. Even though the notion of a space movie can feel fairly worn-out, and there is only so much originality you can bring to that kind of concept, Lucy in the Sky looks like it’s going to be a completely shifted take on space dynamics and exploration. In fact, it seems it’s going to be a story fully centred around one character’s individual, self-reflective, very personal journey, with space acting only as a narrative device that creates the background, rather than it being at the forefront of the film’s events. Natalie Portman seems completely in her shoes in this trope of a study of a character who’s deeply damaged and emotionally transformed by whatever trials she undergoes. The trailer is put together so perfectly as well. It tells just enough information for us to understand what is the movie’s premise while also creating a dramatic and suspenseful energy. Also, to me the imagery feels very grounded and serious but also kind of weird, daring and eccentric in some shots, so if the creators managed to balance a kind of art-house approach with some epic, grandiose visual elements it is going to be one hell of a film. To be fair, I was kind of excited just ‘cause it’s Natalie Portman but the more I think about the story the more interesting and promising it sounds. Unfortunately, it comes out October 4th which means its going to have a biiiiit of a competitor in the box-office in the form of Joker.

4. Jojo Rabbit (Taika Waititi, January 3rd, 2020, UK)

This one exhibits several traits that make the film very enticing. First of all, of course, the subject matter. I think it’s fair to say that a little boy interacting with Adolf Hitler in the shape of an imaginary friend is as crazy and amusing an idea as it gets. And, of course, many of us have our understanding and reaction towards the people and events of the WW2 era but to have that portrayed in a comedy genre is definitely going to cast a whole new light on the subject, at least as seen on the big screen. This will most likely be a story exploring harsh realism through imagination and fantasy but also through the earnest and innocent eyes of a child and it will likely be a surprising take and not what anyone expects it to be. Due to many reasons, it is, obviously, going to be a widespread conversation piece and for that alone I have to see it. The other thing that perfectly complements the idea of this project, is the man himself, Taika Waititi. I don’t think a better combination between the material and the creator can emerge because it is hard to imagine someone else taking on such a bold proposition. He’s just the type of writer and director that is so unique in style and taste that you just believe anything he makes is going to turn out special in one way or another, and having creative will and freedom and integrity might be exactly what made this whole thing possible in the first place. Plus Waititi himself is playing Hitler which, I’d imagine, just raises the scale of humour and energy and dynamics of the whole piece.

3. Jumanji: The Next Level (Jake Kasden, December 13th, 2019, UK)

I know, a not so popular of a choice. Compared to the way every other film is awaited based on their technical and creative merits, with this one I am so genuinely eager to experience the fun. After all the amusement Jumanji: Into the Jungle brought to the franchise, I don’t see why anybody wouldn’t be excited about this next instalment. I absolutely loved that film, it was so so so funny and entertaining! The story was really great because not only did it bring that fantasy and adventure aspect once again but also the way the avatar/game player narrative approach was incorporated was so unique. So, after seeing the trailers for this sequel, it sparked even more excitement to see how else can they possibly spin that concept. With that in mind, bringing in Danny DeVito and Danny Glover, well regarded comedic figures and over all talents, to the mix is genius. Them trapped in the bodies of Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart is, honestly, a hilarious thought and having old guys interact with the other teenage friends and deal with challenges in the desert, jungle, mountain tops will be no less than a thrilling journey. I think this is going to be just the right film to kind of step back from all the serious and deep dramas that will be in full motion for Oscar season at the time, and switch to some good-old light-hearted cinema. With holidays coming up during its release (December 13th) - nothing better than to go see a fun family movie. And if the playfulness and humour combined with the fond spirit of the story lands at least the same way as it did with the previous film, it’s going to win over people’s hearts and probably the box-office. Can’t wait to just fully enjoy the action and immerse myself in the wonder of this adventure all over again!

2. Joker (Todd Philips, October 4th, 2019, UK)

I have to admit, while initially I was very interested in this new iteration of Joker purely on a general movie-goer level, it was maintained and gradually piqued as time went on largely due to everyone talking about it so much. The sheer amount of hype and anticipation this announcement has managed to create is baffling. Every film coverage outlet, magazine, blog was discussing it. And maybe it’s just that I follow a lot of superhero genre loving people and maybe the idea of this film, in fact, doesn’t concern the general viewer as much, still it has kept many eagerly waiting. The thing that gives it an edge, though, is the fact that this is not simply going to be your general superhero action blockbuster but rather an intense psychological drama reflecting on certain societal issues applied to a familiar mythology. The character everyone knows as a rival to Batman here seems to be a troubled man, beaten down literally, as well as emotionally due to social injustice and his own mental complications. Therefore, this film will probably not rely on epic showdowns and comic tropes as much but actually will give the concept of an ‘origin story’ a different meaning. It’s exciting that DC took it upon themselves to make a bold and creatively charged version of their beloved character, and with Joaquin Phoenix as the lead and Todd Philips as director I think they can be confident about their vision. Whether it is going to be received well or not, that’s the question. While it did already receive heaps of acclaim, including the Golden Lion in the Venice Film Festival, the early audience reviews are quite widely mixed. Nonetheless, it is very intriguing. I have to say, it’s shaping out to be one of those films, and performances, in particular, that have the ability to stay in the minds of the viewers long after. Not long to wait now and we’ll finally see if it lives up to what it set out for. ‘Cause let me tell you, the standard’s high, for sure.

Knives Out (Rian Johnson, November 29th, 2019, UK)

For the longest, this film and Joker were up to par for the number one place on my list of the most awaited movies of the rest of year. Every trailer amped up the excitement so much more and, ultimately, when I felt that I could’t stop thinking about Knives Out, counting days ‘till it’s release, I knew which one has won me over. No surprise, though. I absolutely love whodunnits!!! There’s just a certain thrill to a mystery or a detective style film that cannot be found anywhere else. There’s always so much room for exploration of characters and narratives and the story can take so many directions. If a screenplay for a murder mystery is done right, and all the twists and turns are unexpected and smartly placed, it’s just the best. I also love the interactive aspect of it. Even though I know I can’t change the way it all plays out, I have the ability to have my own reasoning and conclusions that I can apply in my head as the events role out. So with this film I was instantly hooked. Chris Evans’ attachment to the project definitely helped me discover it, though. I’m a huge fan of his and I was curious already to see what kind of role he is about to take on next after the culmination of his journey as Captain America in the MCU. Since I find him to be a very intelligent actor, I think I can trust his judgement on what kind of material is interesting to explore and what kind of people are worth collaborating with. That in mind, this cast looks absolutely incredible! Some really experienced ‘veterans’ in Toni College, Jamie Lee Curtis, Christopher Plummer, a big big star Daniel Craig, as well as some less known but promising names such as Ana de Armas and Katherine Langford, for example. And that’s just to name a few… Wow. With the nature and genre of the story, given it’s a suspenseful mystery but with a comedic flare, a good ensemble of performers is crucial, as is their dynamic. Hopefully, writer/director Rian Johnson has managed to create a rich, powerful and unique film that will entertain and won’t disappoint. I do believe that will be the case, as that much talent on screen and behind the camera is usually a recipe for success.

If not for the short list… I have so many other films that have caught my attention and that will absolutely have me in the cinema seat on opening night. These include Bombshell whose team is worth an applause for that amazingly well put teaser trailer; Just Mercy, for a true story that will no doubt have an impact on me and for what seem to be astounding performances by the lead cast; and Marriage Story because it will make me cry… Stories about family, love and relationships always hit close home, this one might break my heart but there’s pain and joy in life all the time, I look forward to seeing the often difficult reality reflected on screen.

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innocent-until-proven-geeky · 5 years

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Get to Know Me Better

Tagged by @slightlyhopeful

I’m just gonna preface this by saying that I don’t normally do these and I don’t really have a reason not to, I want you guys to know me better, but if you’ve ever tagged me in something like this and I never did it I swear it’s nothing personal, I love all of you. Anyway, without further ado:

Name: Scotti or Hope (there’s a long chain of nicknames and words that goes into that second nickname)

Birthday: July 12

Zodiac: Cancer ♋️ Which I think is quite fitting bc crab is probably one of my favorite seafoods, tbh

Hobbies: Reading, writing, knitting, design/hand lettering

Favorite color: Blue. Specifically either slate or basically anything in the turquoise/teal/Tiffany family but I really just love blue

Height: Hm, short? I think something like 5’3”, which I can’t convert to meters in my head so I apologize to you metric system folks

Favorite book: I don’t really have one? Although I love and will temporarily obsess over anything that involves the trope of teenagers suddenly receiving/discovering they have powers.

Last song I listened to: You’re gonna make me actually go into my Spotify and try to find it? Looks like it was Iris by the Goo Goo Dolls.

Last movie I watched: if movies I only partially watched count, then Megamind (although the recording of my sister in Wizard of Oz was on the screen for about half a minute when I walked in tonight). If not, I genuinely do not remember.

Inspiration or muse: Um? I never really thought about it. In my oboe, probably Alex Klein. In being a music teacher, my high school BD and my current instructor. In everything else, it’s one of three things: whatever I’m hyper fixated on (is that the right phrase? Still learning) at the time, compassion and empathy, or just the fact that the thing is calm and I don’t want to be around Loud.

Dream job: Mother, honestly. Like, my goal right now in school is to become a high school band director, and I want that desperately. It is A dream of mine, and it’s a huge dream of mine. But my real Dream Job is to be a stay-at-home mom, hopefully on a homestead where we can have chickens and goats and a vegetable garden and I can just be myself and raise my children and love them and teach them to be good people. And I know that my vision of that future is idealistic at best and completely out-of-reach and impossible at worst, but the question was “dream job” and that’s my dream.

Meaning of URL: Okay you know how in the US judicial system we’re “innocent until proven guilty”? Yeah it’s just a play on that. It doesn’t really mean anything, and in fact if you delve too much into it you’d probably find it means the opposite of who I believe I am as a person. But I made my tumblr account on a whim late at night as a geeky teenager who was originally planning on this being a fandom-themed blog (lol that didn’t happen but it was a cute attempt) and that was what came out of my brain.

Eight people to tag: um yikes that’s a lot of people. Uh, @baloobird @trans-siberian-marching-band @moonlandingwasfaked @kaelvas @javelin-woman @bunnies-scream-exterminate I think 3/4 is close enough, y’all don’t have to do this if you don’t want to but you’re the people I see the most in my dash or notes so you seemed like the kind of people who I’d want to know more about or would want to know more about me so... yeah I hope that made sense, have a good night kids

#random #i’m so sorry

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nomattertheoceans · 6 years

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I made you a promise - chapter 16

Before I let you read on, a few important announcements.

I will be leaving tumblr from Sunday 21st, until I’ve read Kingdom of Ash. Because I’ve already put my spoiler tags up, and still I started to see things about the book (I don’t know how these people got their hands on the book, but how about using some tags, people? I’m so angry about it, I don’t want to dwell on it and ruin your day too….)

Knowing myself and how I read, I’ll probably start reading it on Friday 26th, and will hopefully have finished it on Sunday or something.

Once I come back to tumblr, this blog will definitely not be spoiler free!!! I will be using these tags on every koa post I share: “koa spoilers”, “koa spoiler”, “kingdom of ash spoiler” and “kingdom of ash spoilers” That way, if you want to avoid any spoilers, just filter at least one of these tags and you’ll be safe in my blog.

Regarding the fic: this might be my last update in a while. In November, I won’t be updating it at all, because I’ll spend the month of November developing my original story, and I can’t focus on my story if I keep thinking about my fics. So I’ll try to get a chapter out between the moment when I’ll finish Kingdom of Ash, and the beginning of November, but nothing certain. In any case, whether it be this chapter or the next one, I promise I won’t leave you guys on a big cliffhanger hahahaha (I’m really not that cruel ^^), and I also promise that I am in no way abandoning this fic, and will be back in December! I just need some time for my other project :)

Anyway, that’s it I guess. Thank you so so much to everyone who reads, likes, comments,... I love it all!!

@highladyofherondale @amazinginglyawesomeperson @illyrianbeauty

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Feyre sat down at her small desk after lunch, a smile lingering on her face. She’d just eaten with Rhys, and at some point during the meal, he’d casually referred to her as his girlfriend, before realizing what he’d said and looking at her with dread in his eyes. She hadn’t been able to stop her laugh at the sight of him freaking out, a warm feeling spreading in her heart at the idea that he considered her his girlfriend, that it had come as naturally to him as it had to her. Still smiling, she opened her inbox to check emails, somewhat mindlessly reading through them, thinking - and blushing - about something Rhys had whispered in her ear before leaving her at the door. Something about making his girlfriend moan when he…

There was an email from New York. From John, the author she’d met with the week before. And the email was titled: “John Helvar - Illustrated edition - Trip to NYC?” She opened it frantically and read what he’d written to her:

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Email sent on: Tuesday, October 30th at 1:04 p.m.

Feyre,

How are you?

I’m writing to you as a follow up of our meeting in Velaris last week. I was charmed by all of the ideas you presented to me, and showed them to my publisher on Friday. She also liked them, and would like to meet you and discuss them further before making a final decision. We’re both available at the beginning of next week, and would like for you to come to New York for a few days. It would be a trip from Sunday afternoon until Wednesday morning, allowing us two full days to work. The publishing house would pay for your plane tickets and your hotel.

Let me know before Thursday if you’re available, to book everything for you.

Looking forward to seeing you soon in New York,

John.

She wasn’t sure she was breathing. He wanted her to come to New York. To meet his publisher. To craft a contract. Which meant he wanted to work with her, he wanted her to create every single one of the illustrations for his books. An entire collection, with about 100 to 150 pages per book. After meeting her twice, he trusted her enough to agree to working with her for the next few months, the next few years. She felt her heart racing in her chest, her breathing became jagged and her hands were shaking.

She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t go to New York and meet with these people when she had to drag herself out of bed every morning, when she found every drawing she made harder than the last. Not when she’d been unable to pick up a paintbrush for months, her only drawings being those requested for work. She’d felt sort of confident during the meetings with him, but it hadn’t been serious. For all that she wanted and needed this job, she hadn’t considered the possibility that he might actually choose her. Her vision blurred and she realized she was crying. The realization woke her up and she tried to force her body to calm down. Nothing was decided yet, she thought, clenching at her desk to keep herself grounded, he simply wanted her to meet the rest of the team that was working on the project. Maybe he didn’t even want to work only with her, maybe she would be part of a bigger team of illustrators and her work wouldn’t even be noticed.

But it didn't work, she was still panicking, tears still rolled down on her cheeks. Without thinking, she picked up her phone and dialed.

***

The day was beautiful. Granted, it was raining, and he was freezing, and he had about a zillion paperwork to finish before he could go home tonight. But how could this day not be beautiful, when he’d just had lunch with his wonderful girlfriend - it was official now - and she was coming to his place to spend the night. He’d have to buy some stuff for her if she started to sleep at his house more regularly, like a toothbrush, some of her shampoo, maybe some stuff for her period if she wanted, a hairbrush,...

He was driven away from his mental shopping list by the vibrations of his phone in his pocket. Smiling at the name on the screen, he answered:

“Hey you, miss me already?”

“Oh Gods Rhys, I’m freaking out.” Her voice was stranded, and her breathing frantic.

“What’s going on? Are you ok?”

“I am. It’s just…. I received an email from the guy I met with the other week. He wants me to go to New York next week to meet his publishing team.”

“Feyre, that’s great!” He wasn’t really an expert in the publishing world, but the author wanting her to meet with his publisher was bound to be a good sign.

“I… Yeah I guess it is.” But her voice was flat, and he started wondering what was in this email that got her so freaked out.

“Darling, what’s going on? You don’t sound pleased.”

“No, I am.” A pause. “I am. See you tonight at your place?”

“Y - yes, sure. Are you sure you’re okay?”

But she had already hung up before his question was over.

***

She refused to approach the subject of New York for the entire evening, cleverly avoiding talking about it, and bluntly staring at him when he tried to bring it up. So they ate in near silence, Rhys trying and failing to make her open up to him, and then keeping quiet, hoping she might feel better if he left her alone. They washed the dishes, turned off the lights and got up to his bedroom. He was fishing out a clean pair of underpants to sleep in when he caught a glimpse of her in the mirror, seated on his bed, her hand tucked between her thighs, crying silently. He turned around and hurried to her, kneeling down in front of her.

“Feyre, what’s going on?”

She avoided his eyes, and was clenching her hands together, tears rolling down her cheeks silently. Still without looking at him, she said: “Are you… Are you mad at me?”

“What? No, of course not. Why would you think that?”

“Well… I don’t know. Because I didn’t want to talk about New York, and you might think I want to hide something from you, and be mad.” Her voice had grown quieter as she talked, and she looked so sad, Rhys decided then and there that if he ever met her ex-boyfriend, he wouldn’t mind punching him in the face once or twice.

“Feyre, please, look at me.” And he was pleading her, pleading because he wanted her to look into his eyes and understand that he would never react like that, with her or anyone else. She met his eyes but she was still sobbing silently, her beautiful face stained by tears, and her eyes red. “Feyre, you don’t have to tell me everything. Ever. If you don’t want to tell me about something, it’s absolutely fine, and normal.” He rested his hands on her thighs gently. “I simply stopped talking about it because I thought I was annoying you, and I thought you’d feel better if I left it alone. I’m sorry, I didn’t want to make it worse.”

He stopped talking and let her cry, not wanting to make her feel like she had to stop before she felt better. She cried for a while longer, and then she managed to calm down enough to take in deep breaths. He got up from his knees, sat down beside her and gently took her head between his hand. He brushed away her tears with his thumbs, and slowly, so that she’d understand what he was doing and stop him if she wanted to, he hugged her. She gripped his jumper and he tightened his grip on her back, pulling her even closer to him.

“I don’t think I’m going to go to New York,” her voice was a mere whisper, as if she was indeed telling him a secret, but she was steady.

“Can I ask you why?” He kept his voice equally low.

“I don’t think it’s going to be worth it.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’m not good enough to do this job, Rhys. And even if I was, even if the people I’d met with liked my work… I would never be able to deliver.”

“Why would you think that? You’ve been doing this job for years.”

“But this is different. It’s… It’s such a big commitment. If I do agree to work with them, I’ll probably be involved in this project for years. It’s seven books to illustrate. It would take so long, and I can’t guarantee them that I’ll be able to manage it.”

He gently forced her to move away from him so that he could look her in the eyes when he answered:

“Feyre, this is your job, and from what you’ve shown me, you’re pretty good at it. I have no doubt that if you start working with them, you’ll deliver every single piece of art they need. And every single one of them will be beautiful.”

She gave him a sad smile, and it broke his heart a little, because he could see that she didn’t believe him, that she simply smiled because she thought he was only trying to reassure her. Gods, he wanted to help her so much it hurt, he could feel his heart break at the sight of her being so sad. He couldn’t stand to know that she didn’t believe in herself, when he himself believed in her more than he could express. And it seemed that there was nothing he could say or do that would change her feeling of being worthless.

“Feyre, why do you think you can’t manage?”

“Because… My job, it’s not serious. Working with your hobby, that’s not something serious, that’s not something you can do for your entire life. Drawing and painting, I never learned properly, I was never trained. And untrained skills are useless in the professional world, I wouldn’t be able to hold my own in such a big project.”

And then he knew. He knew why she was feeling so unconfident. And he was boiling with rage at the idea. But he needed to be sure:

“Did he tell you that? Did he call your talents useless and tell you that you couldn’t work with them?” Her silence was answer enough, and he wanted to cry. “Shit Feyre. You are so talented. What you’re able to create, what comes to life under your touch, it’s a gift. And it’s beautiful. Maybe you weren’t trained, but I have absolutely no doubt that you’ll be able to meet any challenge that comes your way. You’re strong, and you’re stubborn enough not to let anyone tell you otherwise.” She chuckled slightly at that, sniffing after her tears, “Feyre, I think you should go to New York, because you might regret it if you don’t. And I’m sure you won’t regret going. Worse thing happens, you don’t like it, you tell them that you don’t want to work with them, and you come back home. Free trip to New York!”

She actually laughed at his sloppy attempt at a joke, and wiped her eyes to get rid of the last tears lingering in them. His chest tightened, and he resisted the urge to take her in his arms again, allowing her space to breathe. When she looked at him once more, there was still sadness in her eyes, but it was coated with a joyful brightness that reflected in her smile. She advanced and kissed him fully, her lips wet and salty, and he kissed her back, hugging her against him.

***

She arrived at her desk the next morning rested and smiling softly. What had happened the night before had been… amazing. Rhysand had been amazing. She’d had one of her most awful days in a long time, and still he had found the right words, given her the exact amount of reassuring and affection and space to sort it out. He’d given her space, had allowed her to cry for as long as she’d needed it, not commenting on it, not asking for her to calm down. And she had felt so much better afterwards. She couldn’t exactly say that she was confident about her abilities to work on the project, but at least she was ready to try. She opened her computer and typed an answer:

RE: John Helvar - Illustrated edition - Trip to NYC?

From: [email protected]

To: [email protected]

Draft written on: Wednesday, October 31st at 9:12 a.m.

Hello John,

Thank you for your email. I am thrilled that you liked my ideas for your book, and would love to come to New York next week to discuss it further with you and your associates. I am available on the dates you gave me, so feel free to book those days for our meeting. Please find enclosed a copy of my personal information for any booking you might have to make regarding this trip.

Looking forward to seeing you again,

Greetings from Velaris.

Feyre.

Looking at her screen, she exhaled loudly and clicked send, afraid she might lose her nerves if she waited any longer.

She was going to New York.

#acotar #acotar fanfic #feysand fanfic #feyre #feyre archeron #rhysand #rhys #feysand #rhys x feyre #feysand fanfiction #my writing

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