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darkficsyouneveraskedfor · 2 months ago

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The Perfect Gift

Warnings: non/dubcon, and other dark elements. My username actually says you never asked for any of this.

My warnings are not exhaustive but be aware this is a dark fic and may include potentially triggering topics. Please use your common sense when consuming content. I am not responsible for your decisions.

Characters: Bucky Barnes, older!reader (50s)

Summary: you remember Bucky's birthday but he wants more than you give him.

Note: HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BUCKO.

As usual, I would appreciate any and all feedback. I’m happy to once more go on this adventure with all of you! Thank you in advance for your comments and for reblogging ❤️

It's a bit silly. A bit of extra effort feels like a lot. You're almost embarrassed at the thought of it. You should just keep it to yourself. Give it to someone else. You probably won't even see him.

You stand at the tall lab table, one elbow planted as you hover your pen over the report. There's not much going on that day but it's still special. For him. He must have plans, certainly with someone else. Forget it, do your work.

No one needs any stitching up so you'll stick with the usual. You still can't figure out what that thick blue sludge is. A venom that sticks to the skin like tar. Despite running it through almost every piece of equipment available to you, it remains mysterious and it wouldn't be too unusual to find it isn't an earthly substance.

Sigh. The icing's going to melt. You're stupid. And too old to be.

You cringe behind your hand as you lean your forehead into your palm. The door slides open from the other side and you sit up, the stool wobbling beneath you dangerously. You latch onto the table and steady the feet.

Oh, it's him. Shoot. Despite the work you put into the surprise, you suddenly wish he'd stayed away. That he kept to his actual friends.

"Hey," Bucky marches up to the end of the table. "You figure out that gas?"

"Gas... er, oh yes," you perk up. Work is easy to talk about. It's what you know. They only thing you've ever known. "I'm surprised it didn't knock you out. You brought me an empty canister."

"Serum," he shrugs, his vibranium arm flexing as if reminding you of who he is. How can you forget that?

"Right, uh, about that--"

"No more needles, doc. I heard you got enough samples from Hydra," he crosses his arms. Despite his warning, humour dimples in his cheek.

"No, I wasn't..." you shake your head. "I was just thinking you could do eight hours on a treadmill while I monitor your levels."

"You are insane," he scoffs and unfolds his arms. He rounds the table, dragging his metal fingertips over it.

"Anyway, er, about that gas," you hop off the stool before he can reach you. "It's designed to inhibit neural processing. I mean, the immediate effects are typical. Unconsciousness but after that, it sticks around." You look at him and squint, "how are you feeling?"

"As good as I ever do," he levels his hand and wiggles it, "middling."

"Right," you exhale and tap your toe nervously. "Even... on your birthday?"

He pokes his tongue into his cheek and his eyes list away, "you remembered?"

"I have a thing for dates." You say.

"A historian and a doctor, wow," he utters.

You look away, "sorry... if I overstepped. I know some people like that to keep that stuff private. You know, small celebrations."

"Well, I haven't celebrated since 1941, so... yeah, not on the top of my list."

His words hang in the air. Your heart races and he sighs. He slowly nears.

"But..." he drags out the last consonant, "you did something."

"Bucky..."

"I can hear your heart. No use pretending. Oh, shit, please don't say it's a surprise party. I knew Sam was up to something," he growls.

You laugh. It's nice of him to think you'd be included. You shake your head and back up.

"It's... just from me. Nothing big," you go to your locker and reach into the cooler bag. "I hope you have a sweet tooth--"

You turn back and find him right in front of you. You flinch. You gasp in surprise. He's fast. And silent.

"It's er," you look past him, at where he just was, on the other side of the table, "a cupcake. Strawberry swirl with a shortcake crumple on top and cream cheese icing," you cradle the container daintily.

"Wow, you did that? For me?"

"I mean, it's a hobby. I always end up giving cookies out to the neighborhood kids," you shrug. "Really, it's small. Nothing big."

His blue eyes focus on the clear top of the container. He blinks. His jaw tenses and his dimples deepen, the cleft in his chin tautens. You nearly wilt at the heat roiling from him; or that's just you and your stupid self.

"I... thanks," he reaches to take it, his fingers brushing yours. "That's..." he exhales. "That's nice of you. It's... incredible." He turns it and examines your delicate work. "The last birthday cake I had didn't even have eggs." He looks you in the eye, "rationing."

"Oh, right," you heave. You forget he's technically older than you. That serum has surely helped. "Well, I hope you enjoy it."

"I'm sure I will. It's almost a shame to eat it. It's so nice," he says. "At least, it would be a shame to eat it al--"

"There you are!" A voice calls from the doorway. "Did you forget?"

You look over at Nat as she puts her hand on her perfectly curved hip. Even in street clothes, you can tell she has an hourglass figure. And she's stunning with her bold red hair and porcelain complexion.

"I didn't forget," he rebuffs and sends you a goofy smile. "Girlfriends."

"Ha, right," you sidle away awkwardly and go back to the lab table. He crosses to Nat as she stands by the door.

"Whatever," she drawls. "Oh, what's that?"

"Cake. My cake," he insists and holds the container out of her grasp.

You peek up as he raises his hand and meet Nat's eyes. You blanch. She tilts her head slightly. You offer a weak smile.

"Just see if you can keep it from me," she returns her attention to him with a snarl. "I mean, we were planning on wrestling anyway."

She grabs the front of his tee shirt and pulls him to her. She stands on her toes and pushes her lips to his as he angles down to meet her. You quickly look at the forgotten report and search for your notes.

Ugh, you are so lame. You really thought you'd outgrown crushes. Well, time heals everything, doesn't it? That man is all the proof you need of that.

🧁

You look at the clock and sigh. You did it again. Time is your nemesis, always eluding you. You rub your eyes and stifle a yawn. If you head out now, you might actually get some sleep.

You open your locker and slide the tablet into your burgundy leather bag. You wish you were as sophisticated as you seemed. From the outside, you have a degree, several, you splurge on labels, you always have good food...

But you don't do anything. You don't go out with friends. You don't have friends. You have acquaintances.

A subtle swish prickles your hackles. You peer over as the lab door opens. You fumble your bag at the figure there.

Bucky cradles his face as he looks around with his uncovered eye. He winces as he sees you and enters, "thank god you're here, doc, think I need stitches."

"Stitches?" You grimace and put your bag back on the shelf. "How on earth--"

You hurry over to him as he chuckles, "yeah, I know. I always gotta ruin things."

You tut and wave him over to the table. You open a drawer and take out a sanitizing wipe. "Let me see."

He lowers his hand. His eye socket is already discoloured and there's a gash in his brow. Your eyes round.

"What happened?" You reach to dab away the blood gently.

He groans, "well, you know, Russians and their vodka."

You look him in the eye curiously. You continue to wipe away the blood. You try not to ogle him. How many times have you patched him up? Don't be a fool.

"Natasha?" You wonder.

"Mhm. Well, I mean, she gets rough just typically... in a different context," he laughs again and the insinuation makes you twitch. "We were arguing..."

"Arguing," you echo as you toss the wipe and examine the cut. "No stitches. I can glue it shut."

"Right," he nods, leaning in to give you a better angle. "Anyway, we were kidding around and it got a bit serious. She gets jealous easy, ya know?"

You uncap the bottle and place a hand gentle on his head, framing his brow. You're as careful as you can be. He hardly seems bothered. You apply the glue precisely.

"Jealous?" You prompt.

"Ha, yeah, funny thing," he clucks. "She's jealous of you."

"Me?" You put the glue away and snort. You busy yourself as you tuck the kit away then go to wash your hands. You feel him watching.

"That cake you made me. I might have been drooling over it," he says. "You're a hell of a baker. You got a degree in that too?"

You roll your eyes then face him, once more startled to find him close. You steady yourself as you lean on the table behind you.

"Well, I'm glad you enjoyed it," you murmur, clearing your throat as it clenches. "You know, it's not my place but she did some nasty work on you."

"Yeah, she did," he touches his brow and winces. "But you got me, doc. Like always."

"Yep, well, you're all good, so..."

You realise how close he is. It would be hard to slip by without brushing him. You freeze and stare at him, confused.

"I think you forgot something," he says.

Your brows knit and your lips downturn, "I did?"

"Yeah," he runs his knuckles up your arm, "aren't you going to kiss it better?"

You blink. Then you guffaw. Then you feel horribly dumb.

"Don't be silly," you catch his hand as it crawls along your shoulder.

He doesn't stop. He flicks your fingers away and tickles your neck. You gulp and lean away.

"Not being silly," he grabs your chin, his grip firm. "I'm serious. I think it would help," he grins.

"I don't... alright. I think it's late and I--"

"Those lips have gotta be just as tender as those hands," he stretches his thumb up to touch your lips. You shiver.

"Bucky," you say appeasingly. You have to be asleep at the table, dreaming again.

"You think I can't hear your heart hitch every time I walk in? Hm?" He steps closer to loom over you, "think I can't smell it in your sweat? That I can't smell you getting wet--"

"Stop! Stop, please," you try to pull away from his hand. "Bucky, that's... please."

"A little kiss," he growls. "Just here."

He lets you go and traces the cut. You quiver, blood surging, skin alight. You slowly hover closer and press your lips to his brow. He hums.

He pulls away. He's too quick for you to elude. You have to no time to react as he takes you off your feet.

His hands are on your hips. You wriggle. You’re overly conscious of the extra cushion there as his fingers curl into it. You yelp.

“Please, Bucky,” you push on his hands.

“I know you want me,” he snarls as he slides his fingers under your ass, groping you as he pushes between your knees.

“Bucky, it’s just--”

“It’s just...” he interjects as he leans in until his nose touches yours, “my birthday and I know exactly what I want.”

#bucky barnes #dark bucky barnes #dark!bucky barnes #bucky barnes x reader #one shot #drabble #mcu #marvel #avengers #falcon and the winter soldier #captain america #winter soldier

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datesinredink · 6 months ago

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Ranking the yandere rottmnt boys by how likely they are to kidnap their darling

Just a little crumb to keep myself from losing my mind while staring at google docs this late at night. Sorry if this is super bad, it's way later at night than I'm used to staying up and election night stressed me the hell out.

Donnie.

I have absolutely no doubts that he's going to at least try very very hard to kidnap you. And honestly, I doubt it would be too hard. He's a highly trained, mystic wielding, tech inventing, mutant ninja turtle. And on top of that, he's very fond of planning absolutely everything. And to finish it all off, I think it would be once in a blue moon that he actually treats his darling as an equal. He already thinks he's better than almost everyone, and when he gets obsessed, he has to make himself feel better about it somehow, so he decides to cope by thinking you need him instead of it being the other way around. As a result, he treats you a bit like a very glorified songbird, and songbirds.. well, aren't they usually put in cages anyway? You won't even care after a week or two of adjustment! (He will get upset if you aren't content with being kidnapped by then, by the way.)

2. Raph

The only reason Raph is behind Donnie on this list is because I think he would take longer to justify it to himself. He thinks you're fragile, that you need to be protected from the harsh world! I mean, he barely trusts his youngest brother, who is also a highly trained ninja, to do a simple mission on his own. How do you think he'll treat you after the obsession sets in properly? Not really as an equal, I'll tell you that. He's much nicer to you than Donnie would be, but he still doesn't respect you enough to let you handle yourself, even if that's not how he sees his behavior. At the same time though... isn't he supposed to be a hero? Do heroes kidnap their darlings? Or would this make him the dragon... In the end though, he'll decide that he's fine with being the dragon so long as he knows that the rest of the world won't be able to run their metaphorical (or maybe literal, depending on how unpopular you are in the area) pitchforks right through your heart.

3. Mikey

Mikey wouldn't just.. outright kidnap his darling, I think. I think it would start with a fun sleepover at the lair! Then he insists you stay just one more day! You're having so much fun, after all! Don't you wanna hang out with your best friend for a while longer? You agree, of course- him and his brothers have been nothing but nice to you ever since you met them, and their company is always a delight, so it's worth a shot, isn't it? Then suddenly, the weekend is over, and school's ready to chew you up again, so you do leave. Then it's finally the weekend again! You've heard of a fun game from your school friends, so you plan on trying it when you get home this afternoon- it's friday, after all- when you get a text from Mikey in the group chat with his brothers. He wants you to come over again- and, of course, you say "sure". Not like you can't just play the game on sunday, or when you go home saturday. The sleepover flies by, but you're a bit weary by the time you're pretty sure you're supposed to go home- but here's Mikey, and he's so sure that you promised you'd stay at the lair until sunday again! So, you give in. There's always next weekend, right...? I think you get the pattern, but eventually, he'll be keeping you at the lair 24/7, and you'll be rubbing at your weary eyes wondering how you got into this mess. Sometimes you can even see his brothers shoot you worried looks.

4. Leo

Leo would only kidnap his darling as a last resort, and I think it's because of two reasons. One, he's the brother who sees you closest to being an equal (Donnie and Raph constantly go against your personal autonomy and Mikey puts you on an extremely restricting pedestal), though to be fair, that's not a high bar to pass- and two he much prefers to have some sort of interesting conflict to be present because he finds it entertaining. His life is a weird, morally incorrect soap opera at this point, and he's the number one viewer. Kidnapping would only really happen with him if he thought you were either seriously leaving him (moving or getting into a serious relationship with someone else) or if the circumstances around him got too stressful and he needed something to cling to for any semblance of support outside his brothers (who, at that point, would probably also be super stressed). Think post movie, when the city is still recovering. Man, he was probably freaking out thinking that you might've died to the kraang.

#yandere tmnt #yandere rottmnt #rottmnt x reader #yandere #tmnt x reader #Strawberry's basket #oughhh im so tired #just have to add a little more to something....#then i can sleep....

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redhandedstag · 25 days ago

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005 , SPLASH OF RED

. . . dark, single muse template: 8 pages, includes magic ability info. has a title page, character basics and personality description on the second page, appearance description and personality notes on the third, appearance and magic notes on the fourth, a connections page to showcase characters they know, 2 pages for backstory and an extras page where you can pretty much put anything you want, so long as you keep the credit. this document is mobile friendly! the line colours are default ones. if you're using, please keep the credit and consider a like and reblog. goes a long way to help creators out! HOW TO USE this doc uses a few tables so i suggest having some knowledge on how they work if you plan on editing anything about the appearance of them. i also recommend keeping your text around the same number of lines as shown in the template. it prevents the doc from going all wonky! to edit the images, click the original image and select the "replace image" button. i suggest making sure the images you want to add are a similar style to the original - similar size or shape. the red star symbols/emojis are for inserting links. copy your link, highlight the star, click the little 'insert link' button, and insert your link - I like to change the colour of my stars once the link is filled in, but you don't have to. PC Once you have the document open, go to the top bar and click "file". There will be a "make a copy button" that appears third down from the list. Then you can name your version of the document and go from there! MOBILE Open the document in your standard browser and click the 'open in app' button. From there, click the "..." button at the top right corner and select "share & export" button. Then you can select "make a copy" at the bottom of the list and you can go from there! after that you should be good to go! if you have any questions or issues that arise, please let me know. keep in mind I'm not too active on this site, so if i haven't noticed your question, i'm not ignoring you! just haven't seen it. have fun!

#google docs #google docs template #roleplay #rp resources #rp template #rp doc template #muse template #templates #roleplay resources #free template #roleplay template #character template #roleplay blog #writing template #gdocs template #oc template #oc sheet

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antiadvil · 8 months ago

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early tit shows request

I already posted this in the community tab but wanted to make a separate post so it can be shared more widely.

TLDR I’m very photosensitive and have tit tickets for November 3rd in Chicago. I would like to compile a list of the flash effects in the show and when they are before I go, so I can know when to look away. If anyone else would find this useful, I can share the list publicly. I'll put the rest under a cut because it's very long and I want any discussion via reblog chain to be legible:

why i need help:

As some of you may know because I bitch about constantly, I have chronic migraine, and one of my symptoms is photophobia that ranges from moderate to severe Literally All Of The Time. On a good day I’m able to hang out in a dim room wearing my tinted glasses and experience no light related pain but even on my best migraine days I still find very bright, flashing, or flickering lights to be very painful to look at or generally exist around. I bought a tit ticket fully knowing there would likely be flash effects in it because WAD did, many of their videos do, ii and tatinof probably did, I don’t remember, and literally every stage production I have been to in the past year did, except for an orchestra, if that counts as a stage production 😂. I literally would not be able to leave my apartment if I avoided everything that triggers my photophobia considering the Literal Sun is one of the biggest offenders so I am really not looking for people to tell me to just not go or whatever. Obviously I hope that my migraine resolves by the time my show comes around (like at least breaking down into individual episodes instead of one incredibly long migraine would be nice), and it’s possible it will, since I haven’t actually gotten to try the most promising treatments yet bc insurance bullshit, but I expect to still be dealing with this two months from now.

how you can help:

So, it would be really helpful if anyone was able to tell me about the flash effects in the show before I go. Ideally, I would like to know how many there are, how extreme they are, how long they last, and MOST ideally, approximately when in the show they happen so I can cover my eyes and look away beforehand (I’m thinking, like, “after they do abc they flash the lights,” not timestamps, since I think that would be much easier for everyone involved to remember. I know this will probably involve spoilers, I don’t mind, I’m currently planning to look at spoilers for the show). I know this is not something people with normal eyes/brains/optic nerves normally remember after shows (even my closest friends who are genuinely trying have failed to warn me about flash effects before) but I am hoping through the power of crowdsourcing i can put together a semi-complete guide to When To Look Away At Tit For Photophobic people. I can share that doc if there’s any interest in it and anyone who is able to “test drive” the document before my show would be very helpful. I’m also willing to keep making changes to the document after my show, if that’s something people would find helpful. If it is though I would really appreciate hearing from you- even if it's just an anon or something, because I'm not going to do extra work if I don't think it will reach anyone who needs it. I'm sure I'm not the only person who's planning to go to tit and just suffer through any flash effects, but I don't know if this post/the document I make will reach any of them (does anyone know if there's an accessibility/disability community on phan twitter??). My tentative plan is to share the document regardless, since it doesn't take much extra work from me, but if this is something that would benefit you please reach out so we can make sure it benefits you too.

a hopefully helpful guide to flash effects:

Another challenge is, quite frankly, most people are very bad at even noticing flash effects if they’re not photosensitive. I get it, as a newly photosensitive person I was genuinely confused about why I left across the spiderverse with such a bad headache, because nothing in it looked like a “flash effect” to me. Some things that have triggered my photophobia before that people may not think of as “flash” effects include: the snow effect in stardew valley, candles (flames in general create a very flickery light), glitch/static editing effects, the sort of stuttery/laggy way video games look when your graphics card is bad, and video that flips through photographs/backgrounds very quickly (this is worse the more different the colors/etc in the photos/backgrounds are from each other but even if it’s done in a more stopmotion kind of way it still bugs me at low FPS. It’s like the video game thing, I’m not sure if there’s an actual word for that). Another thing that commonly bothers people (personally it doesn’t hurt much though it can make me a bit motion sick) is sort of swirly “hypnotizing” gifs.

From the set photos, I think any flash effects would most likely come from the light/rope/wire things, those just look perfect for some kind of sparking/lightning effect which I imagine would be very obvious and easy to spot. The video screens could probably also be a problem but if they’re all at standard screen brightness, unless they all start being flashy at the same time, they’re a much smaller portion of the audience’s field of vision so I don’t think they would be as problematic (though I would still like to know about them!). My worst fear is that they’re playing something really staticky for the entire show, though I hope that at my distance from the stage, the static would be small enough to just kind of blend into gray and not bother me much.

in conclusion:

Yes, this could all be solved if people stopped putting so many fucking flash effects in their shows. I am begging for the entire world to realize that nine times out of ten they are Completely Not Worth It and just putting a “some flash effects may not be suitable for photosensitive viewers!!!” warning on every piece of media ever created does not make their media accessible (hey Netflix! Wanna give me a timestamp to skip or am I just expected to never watch Stranger Things?). But here we are.

#lou is loud #dnp #dan and phil #phan #terrible influence tour #migraine #photosensitivity #photophobia #<- mostly for my own organization

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that-sarcastic-writer · 10 months ago

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Terms and Conditions

Russell Shaw X F!Doctor!Reader

Summary: when your sister's fiance goes missing, you call Colter for help, and he brings along his rugged, but handsome and charming older brother, Russell.

Warnings: mature content, eventual smut so minors dni (always), no use of y/n, this part only contains cursing. I've never written anything so tame (it's okay next part won't be)

WC: 3.6k

A/N: so I finished tracker, yay and Russell owns my thoughts rn so here we are. I'm not exactly sure where I'm going with this. I'm not great at writing series, but this idea called for development I can't do in a one-shot. I started this right after finishing tracker last week and I finally had time to proof read it. I also had a hard time with Russell's characterization, mans been in only one episode, so if i didnt portay him perfectly sorry i tried. Happy readings.

I don't do tag lists, if you'd like keep up with upcoming parts follow @midnightreadinglibrary and turn on notifications (I only reblog my written works on there)

You have encountered a lot of grief and sorrow in your life. Pain, you were familiar with it. And you could safely say that one of the worst was heartbreak. You were all too familiar with that one. And right now, your baby sister was experiencing it, too.

“Rosie?” You called into your apartment as you kicked your shoes off and tossed your keys like they had offended you. With a heavy sigh, tired from a long and stressful day at the hospital, you dragged your sore feet through your apartment.

The living room was empty, TV off. The kitchen was dark with the lights off. You frowned, calling your sister’s name, louder again. Couple seconds went by. Silence. You padded down the hall to the guest room. You could hear faint indistinct sounds. The closer you got to the guest room the clearer the sound became. It sounded like crying.

“Rosalie?” Your voice grew louder with concern as you opened the door to the bedroom, and there you saw your sweet baby sister, sobbing into her pillow. Your heart immediately sank and you rushed to her side. “Oh honey, it’s okay.”

You sat on the edge of the bed and pulled her into a hug. She held you tight as she cried. It broke your heart to see her like this.

“It’s not okay! He’s been gone for over a week!” She sobbed. You squeezed her shoulders as she sat up and sniffled. “Our wedding is in three months! Why hasn't he come back?”

You stared into her eyes, the same color as your own and you sighed, only being able to give her a look of sympathy in return. You didn’t want to tell her what you thought.

“I dunno.. I mean.. What if he just.. You know?” The look on your face said everything you couldn’t with words, and Rosie looked like she wanted to cry even more.

“He didn’t bail. He wouldn’t… I know him. He's missing, why won’t anyone believe me?” She raised her voice, almost choking on a sob, and you immediately felt so horrible for even suggesting such a thing.

“No, hey, I’m sorry for saying that, I do believe you. Have you heard anything from the cops?” She shook her head and you sighed heavily.

“I can’t keep waiting, what if he got hurt? What if someone hurt him? Please, I need to do something.” She begged you, eyes filled with tears, you had never seen your sister so sad, so hopeless. She was always the more bubbly, optimistic and lively out of the two of you. But ever since her fiance went missing, you didn’t see that spark anymore. It broke your heart.

“Hey, it’s going to be okay. I think I know someone who can help, alright? We’ll find him.”

~~~~~~~

“Hey Doc, to what do I owe this call? It’s been like what, three years?”

You sighed softly at the voice on the other line. You didn’t exactly want to resort to this, but you didn’t know what else to do, but you had the money, your sister didn’t exactly have a lot to spare with her wedding planning, and all.

“I need a favor, Colter. Well, not exactly a favor, I’ll pay but, I need help asap.” You rubbed the side of your throbbing temple, you heard him hum, telling you to go on. “My sister’s fiance went missing last week. They’re supposed to get married in three months, and the poor thing is a wreck.”

Colter sighed. “A runaway groom? You know what that sounds like, right?”

“Yes, I know. But I know this guy, he’s a decent guy, and I know he loves my sister, he wouldn’t just leave her like this.” You tried to explain, Colter sighed again. “Listen, the guy was in the Army, he’s a Navy SEAL now, went overseas a lot, and my sister told me he’s been acting weird since his last assignment. Just humor me, please? I can’t see her like this.”

Colter stayed silent for a long minute, you honestly thought he had hung up, but you ultimately heard him take a deep breath before responding. “Fine, send me his details, I should get there by morning if I head out now.”

“Thank you.”

~~~~~~~~~~~

Chaos, chaos and more chaos.

You just wanted five minutes to breathe. You sat down, for the first time in hours today and took in a deep breath. Out of the corner of your eye you saw Rosie, almost zombie-like as she walked through the emergency department You called out to her.

“Hey, did you get some sleep?” You asked her with worried eyes. She shrugged. “Listen, I called an old friend, he helps find people. Maybe he can find James, ‘cause the cops clearly aren’t going to.” You saw the smallest smile, and the smallest bit of hope light of her eyes.

“Really? What, is he like a PI or something?” She tilted her head at you, seemingly just as exhausted as you were.

“I mean..” You hesitated, unsure on how to explain Colter’s job to her. “I guess? He collects reward money. When someone goes missing and a reward is offered, he finds people for that reward.”

“But I didn’t offer any reward. I can’t even afford to buy a pair of shoes right now.. On my shitty nurse salary. I’ve already spent so much of my savings on planning the wedding. And these student loans are killing me. I can’t pay him.” She started to ramble in panic, motioning her hands around. You stood up and grabbed her hands.

“It’s fine. I got it covered. Take it as your early wedding gift?” You flashed her a toothy smile, hoping to humor her at least a little. She looked at you with apprehension. “Not a word, okay? I want him to come home to you, I don’t mind spending some money if it means you can be happy.”

She could have the happiness you never could.

Rosie’s eyes filled with tears and you thought she was going to burst into tears in the middle of the emergency department, but instead she hugged you, and she hugged you so fucking hard you thought she broke one of your ribs. You laughed softly and patted her head reassuringly. You were about to say something to her but you heard your name being called. You turned around and saw one of the rotation nurses.

“You have visitors at the front desk.” She told you. You scrunched up your face in confusion.

“Who? I wasn't expecting anyone.”

“Don’t know. The front desk just said two guys asked for you directly.”

Oh. Colter. But who was the other guy?

‘Alright, thanks.” You nodded at her. You then looked at Rosie with a warm reassuring smile and you held her hands in yours. “We’re gonna find James, I know it. I’ll let you know when my friend wants to meet with you, he normally likes to talk with the missing person’s closest relative. Try to focus on work alright?”

You left her with that, hoping she would trust you. And you hoped you could trust Colter. With a heavy sigh you walked to the front desk of the emergency department. And there you saw Colter, hands in his pockets as he talked with another man you didn’t recognize. With a bit of skepticism, you approached both men, letting your presence be known with a clear of your throat. They both turned to look at you, Colter with a warm welcoming smile, but the other guy, who was arguably the hottest man you had ever seen in your life—not that it was relevant—looked at you like a deer in headlights, like starstruck.

“Hey Colter,” you gave him a cordial smile, then you looked at his slightly shorter companion, though both men were still a good head taller than you. “And Colter’s friend. Didn’t know you had a partner.”

“I don’t. This is—”

“Russell. Colter’s more handsome and charming older brother.” Russell interrupted, extending a hand to you. You looked at Colter, who looked less than impressed and you couldn’t help but snort a bit.

“I see the flirty nature is a family thing then?” You took Russell’s hand with a small laugh but you quickly swallowed when you felt the warmness of his large hand as it engulfed your smaller one. You weren’t really laughing then. You made eye contact with Russell, you had never seen a pair of prettier eyes, a breathtaking shade of green, and an intensity that was equally breathtaking. It didn’t help that he was smiling at you, too.

You cleared your throat and took your hand back, choosing to look at Colter instead, “So uh, what’s the plan?”

“Right, well, first things first, I need more details about this James, think you could take an early lunch? I would also need to talk to your sister as soon as possible.”

You chewed on your bottom lip, catching a glimpse of your watch before ultimately nodding, “Yeah, just give me an hour. We can meet at this cafe nearby, I’ll send you the address. You can meet with my sister after her shift. She’s been staying with me.”

They looked at each other for a second, shrugged then nodded at you. These two were definitely brothers.

~~~~~~~~

You were frantic as you pulled into the cafe, running late after a code blue that took up almost the whole hour to get under control. You were sure that you looked like a mess, still in your scrubs, pieces of hair falling out of your bun as you entered the cafe. You were almost embarrassed that Russell was going to see you like this, you didn’t care too much about Colter, though. When you entered you saw them sitting at a booth, two cups of coffee sitting on the table but no food. You felt a bit bad. Colter noticed you and waved you over, making Russell turn his head to look at you. And somehow he didn’t seem to care about how wild you looked.

“I’m so sorry. I had a code blue. I hope I didn’t waste your guy’s time.” You said almost frantic, barely able to catch your breath. You unconsciously sat next to Russell, who seemed quite happy about that.

“Nonsense. We were actually waiting for you to order, right Colt?” Russell reassured, and when you turned your head to look at him he was smiling at you, a toothy smile that made the corners of his eyes wrinkle a tiny bit, it was kind of cute, actually.

“Yep. Russell insisted we waited. Even though we haven't eaten anything in over six hours.” Colter sighed sipping on his coffee.

“Well at least one of you has manners.” You narrowed your eyes at Colter, and you heard Russell rumble a laugh.

“Y’know what? Let’s just focus on the case, okay?” You held back a laugh and simply nodded, trying to ignore the intoxicating scent of Russell beside you, a mixture of bourbon and sandalwood.

Colter asked you a million questions, ones you had answers to, and others didn’t, which was probably best if he talked to your sister, too. Your food also arrived quickly, which you were thankful for since you hadn’t had anything other than the Keurig coffee from the doctors lounge.

“So, you said James was in the army?” You nodded as you munched on a fry. “And is Navy SEAL now?”

“Yeah, he went overseas every month or so. But after his last assignment a few weeks ago he told my sister about getting out.” You answered as you bit into your cheeseburger. You didn’t often like to indulge in greasy heavy foods, but you were beyond stressed from both work and your sister, so you needed some joy in your life.

“He wanted out? Why?” Russell asked beside you. You shrugged.

“I don’t know. One thing or another about being tired of being on the battlefield, wanting to be home more. Or that’s what Rosie told me.” You answered as you munched on your burger. You thought for a few seconds before speaking again. “But if you ask me, I think something went wrong in his last assignment. Rosie said he didn’t speak to her for a whole day after coming home, and that he was constantly on edge and irritable for weeks leading up to his disappearance.”

“Maybe. Might be worth looking into.” Colter shrugged as he took a bit out of his sandwich. “You think we’d be able to look into his assignments overseas?” He asked Russell.

“Doubt it. If they’re classified, which most likely they are, they’d either have little to no paper trail, or they would be heavily secured.” Russell said with a mouthful of fries, which Colter clearly disapproved of. But Russell paid no mind to it, his attention was all on you.

“How do you know?” You asked Russell with genuine curiosity. He half grinned a bit.

“I used to be in the Army too. Spec ops. That's why Colter brought me along.” Russell explained, and you almost wanted to sigh out loud. “So I know damn well how secretive some of those overseas assignments can be. Most are black-ops and off the books. It’d be hard to find the files.”

So much for tall, rugged and handsome. Guess you’re going to have to look from afar.

‘Well fuck. That sounds lovely.” You mumbled into your burger, annoyed and frustrated. Russell actually laughed this time.

“You know that burger isn’t gonna run away, right?” He chuckled at the way you were so aggressively stuffing your face. Colter narrowed his eyes at his older brother and kicked him under the table. “Okay, ow.”

“Mind your business? Also, you have no room to talk dude.” You scoffed, eyeing his sriracha covered fries with disgust. “That’s actually fucking criminal.”

“Well, this one has a mouth on her. And here I was trying to be a gentleman.” He chuckled, playful grin on his face as he shoved a particularly heavily sriracha-covered fry in his mouth while you watched. “Don’t knock it ‘til you try it, sweetheart.”

You stared at him with an indescribable feeling. You didn’t remember the last time a man had this much of an effect on you. Sure, in your mind it didn’t do him any favors that he used to be in the military, but you’d gladly break your own rule for just a little taste of him. He was a little rugged, sure, but he was undeniably handsome and carried himself with an alluring sense of self confidence. And the way he smiled at you, God, it made you feel like a schoolgirl, warm and tingly. You didn’t remember the last time a man looked at you like that, either.

“Can we focus here?” Colter, the ever present voice of reason.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Who woulda thought, you look even more beautiful without the scrubs.” Those were the first words out of Russell’s mouth when you opened the door. You had told them to stop by in the evening after Rosie’s shift so they could talk to her.

“Russell,” Colter sighed, looking at his brother with annoyance but Russell simply smiled, unapologetically proud of himself. They both looked at you, you were trying so hard not to smile right now. “Alright, is Rosie home?”

“Yeah, she’s in the living room. Come in.” You shook your head softly as you allowed both brothers into your apartment.

You led them to the living room, you caught Russell looking around with curiosity. Maybe he was trying to figure you out, figure out how to get on your good side. But he otherwise didn’t say anything.

“Rosie, the guys I told you about are here.” You called out to her and she immediately shot up to her feet and rushed to your side. You looked at her, poor thing looked like she had been crying again. “This is Colter, the tracker, and that’s his brother, Russell. They’re going to help us, okay? Colter just needs to ask you a few questions about James.”

Rosie was nodding profusely, “Anything, I’ll tell you everything you want to know. Just help me find him? Please?”

Colter led her to the couch, perhaps she’d feel safer if she was comfortable. You didn’t want to intrude, you probably weren’t needed right at this time, anyway.

“I’m going to get you guys something to drink.” You announced, wanting to give them some privacy.

“I’ll help.” Russell piped up and you looked at him with curiosity, he simply smiled at you. You didn’t bother to question him.

You went into the kitchen, Russell was close behind you. You could feel his intense gaze burn into the back of your head as you rummaged through your fridge. You tried to ignore it.

“Beer?” You asked, glancing over your shoulder at him.

“Sure.”

You grabbed three beers from the fridge and Rosie’s iced tea. You handed Russell his beer before moving around your kitchen to grab a glass cup from the cupboard. You poured the iced tea into the cup before turning around to find Russell still looking at you, with wonder, and maybe something else you couldn’t quite decipher.

“So what’s your deal?” He asked you as he sipped his beer. You tilted your head at him and furrowed your eyebrows.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, yeah you’re clearly a kick-ass doctor, and a caring sister but, what else is there? I don’t see any pets, surely no kids, no pictures on the walls, minimal decor, hopefully no boyfriend,” You laughed at the last part. “So, what are you about?”

“Right, well uh,” you chuckled softly, awkwardly sipping on your beer as you leaned on the counter. You shrugged. “I’m a doctor who works sixty-plus hours a week, I have zero social life, I’m not home nearly enough to have a pet. And I certainly have no time for the nonsense of men my age. But hey, if you want to know what I’m about, it’ll take more than just shitty beer and a kitchen conversation to figure me out.”

Russell smiled. Genuinely smiled. But it was a different kind of glint, like he was amused, impressed almost. He chuckled as he nodded, stepping to stand in front of you. You straightened up, looking up at him.

“Surely you’d have time to get a drink with me sometime then? I don’t know if I’m your age but I can assure you I’m not going to waste your time. Would love to try and figure you out while I’m here.” He bit his bottom lip, eyebrows raised and green eyes big with expectancy.

Yes—said the warmth between your legs.

No—said your rational mind.

“Russell…” Your voice was a warning, apprehensive as you chewed on your bottom lip. “I don’t think I should be going on dates while my sister’s fiance is missing.”

“It’s her fiance that’s missing, not yours.” He chuckled. You knew he didn’t mean to sound mean, or mocking but you scoffed softly, moving away from him. His words hit you in ways he could never know.

“I don't do… That. Y’know, dating? Or hookups. I don’t do romance, period.” You argued, hands on your hips. He tilted his head at you, eyebrows raised as he looked at you with that indescribably charming look of his. God, did he make it hard to say no.

“Don’t have to be anything. I’m not expecting anything. Just drinks, no strings attached, we’ll see where the night takes us, yeah?” He made a very compelling argument, and his unwavering confidence and charm was hard to resist.

Truly, you didn’t remember the last time you felt so tempted to go on a date with someone, and it wasn’t for lack of trying. From coworkers to patients have made advances you’ve always easily turned down. But Russell? You didn’t feel like you wanted to turn him down. You gave in so easily.

“Whadaya say?”

“Yeah, okay. Just drinks. We’ll see what happens. But don’t get any funny ideas, okay?” You warned him. He chuckled but ultimately raised his hands up in defense when you narrowed your eyes at him.

“I am a gentleman, sweetheart. I know how to behave in front of a pretty girl.”

Your concern was if you could behave in front of a hot guy. Especially when he was as hot as Russell.

#russell shaw x reader #russell shaw x you #russell shaw x female reader #terms and conditions #terms and conditions series #russell shaw #tracker

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knickynoo · 1 month ago

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Hey hey! New BTTF fan here! I've been obsessed with the franchise for a bit now and I've done everything from reading the comics to watching the telltale game and reading fanfics and reading your blog (you have no idea how much your blog satisfies my cravings for new content) and I was wondering if you had any recommendations for fanfictions and fanartists :D

Hello! Welcome! I love the Telltale game so much. It's great that there are so many extensions of the movies for us to sink our teeth into. And I'm happy you're enjoying my blog :)

I'm not super familiar with fanartists in the fandom, but here are a handful of some great fics.

• "It Can Be Cruel Sometimes" by Anakin_McFly : A short little fic dealing with Marty's existential crisis post trilogy events. Ends on a sweet note.

• "Time to Time" by kathkin (aka @penny-anna): This one is just. It's incredible, okay? I return to this one over and over just to experience how beautiful it is.

• "A Bubble, Bursting" also by kathkin : After years missing, Marty returns home not any older and with a ridiculous explanation as to where he's been. Love the complexity of this one and the heavy inclusion of Linda!

• "No Little Plans" by cleflink : I think this was one of the first BTTF fics I came across when I got back into the fandom. Doc and Marty go on a trip to the World's Fair and, as usual for them, things go terribly wrong. But this is a lovely fic with some great Doc and Marty friendship moments. Einie is there too!

• "Now I Am Become Death" by @bg-sparrow : A great fic about Doc's involvement in The Manhattan Project. Really well done.

• The "Time Circuits Series" also by BGSparrow is also fantastic.

• "Time is a Flat Circle" by ThePhenomenalStingray (aka @fourth-dimensional-thinker) : Truly one of the most unique and well executed concepts I've come across in the fandom. It's so good.

• "'Cause I Might Not Make It Back" by @rose-of-pollux : A rival scientist is after the secrets of time travel, and Marty gets himself stuck in the middle of it all—with amnesia, no less. So on brand for him. I loved this fic.

• "The Impossible and the Improbable" by @rose-of-pollux : This is a short but fun one that brings Marty and Doc face to face with the supernatural. I'm a sucker for anything that integrates Marty's Irish background into the story, and I love the idea that he grew up hearing Irish folklore.

• "Until I Get Home" by @daryfromthefuture : This one is an epic 30 chapters long, so great if you're looking for a fic really savor. I love stuck in 1885 fics, and I think Dary wins the award for most time poured into a fic about it. Angst, friendship, and our boys trapped in the Old West. Lots to enjoy in this one.

Whew! That was more than a handful, wasn't it? It was so hard to pick these because a lot of these authors have written countless other ones I've enjoyed, but I'll let you explore their works for yourself! I didn't include any of my own fics on here (is it weird to put your own fics in a rec list??) but if you've been through my blog, you've probably read some!

Thanks for the ask, and happy reading!

#back to the future #bttf #asks #fic recs

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hollowed-theory-hall · 2 months ago

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Hello ( ￣▽￣) , me again, but i was wondering if you use a writing program? and, if so, which one do you like/recommend? I've been using Google docs on my phone cuz I don't really have access to a computer/laptop, and it's a pian in the ass trying to organize that shit lol

Have a Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious~🎵 day❤️❤️❤️

Hello again 👋

I have tried a lot of writing programs, but I always go back to Google Docs. I have a computer, it's not a laptop but one of the big computers that rest at your desk, so I can't really bring it with me everywhere. Google Docs is just the most comfortable to me to write on my phone while I'm on the go, and then open the same doc on my computer to edit it properly. (I wrote on my phone a lot while using public transportation to and from work, so I get it. Though Docs starts struggling when you pass the 30k words mark on a single doc in the phone version. It's why I tend to split up my writing docs).

Also, it's what my beta finds easiest to use when working on the same doc as me (their edit mood and how they save editing history is really good for collaborating and knowing what changed, by who, and when). I wish there was a better app for it since I'm not a huge fan of docs, but all the ones I tried lacked features I consider essential or weren't as friendly to use.

As for organization? Well, I'm a fan of making a lot of folders and sub-folders. I have this crazy folder tree split into original writing and fanfic, then fanfic is split into fandoms and within the HP fandom folder it's divided into ships or central theme (I have a few Gen ones there) and within each ship there are ganere sub-folders (like "time travel" or "soul mate au" or anything else) It really depends on the folder what I use as the sorting system. In my nottpott folder, for example, almost all the fics are light canon divergence so I divide them by the year the story starts in ("3rd year", "4th year", "5th year", "AU")

That's my organization method for the writing itself, but I don't do most of the planning/organizing on Google Docs. Like, I have a few placeholders in the doc I'm writing in to give me a general direction while writing, but outlining, character docs, and worldbuilding I write in Notion.

I don't know if you're familiar, but the basic plan is free (both the phone and computer versions, and all edits are synced up across platforms), and it's so useful for organizing. You can make pages really pretty there, and the databases are really useful for searching information you already wrote for yourself. I never really needed anything outside the free version, as the free plan allows you to make plenty of workspaces with as many pages as you want as long as you don't share them.

Here are some examples of what's going on in my HP notion intended to help my fic writing (and meta, a bit). It's mostly lists of stuff I like to be able to find quickly and easily filterable & searchable databases:

I do outlining and plot planning on Notion too. It's just not pictured because of spoilers.

I also have a notion like the above for worldbuilding, character planning, and outlining for my original writing (Iridescent). It's really useful to have one place to go to that has everything organized like a wiki of sorts.

#asks #rowenlumos #writblr #about writing #hollowedwrites #writing #not a theory

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wavesoutbeingtossed · 7 days ago

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TTPD PLAYLISTS PART 4: Old Habits Die Screaming

Better late than never! We're onto the fourth playlist in the "5 Stages of Heartbreak" series, and the one I was most excited to get to, because it's the one I've been obsessed with for the last year. I think I've started and abandoned posts about this about a dozen times, but nothing like an arbitrary deadline to get the juices flowing, right?

(Links to Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 if you missed them)

If the bargaining playlist gagged me when it came out because of the implications of what she wanted and what she'd do to get there, the depression playlist punched me in the gut because of how it highlighted the ramifications of losing these things-- and yourself along with it.

Usual disclaimer: we're going into the themes, focusing on pre-TTPD songs first, have fun.

You can find the full playlists on this Reddit thread, which is where I got the transcripts from.

Let's go: Old Habits Die Screaming, aka Depression

Putting under a cut because this got a little long

Here is how Taylor describes this playlist:

“We're going to be exploring the feelings of depression that often lace their way through my songs. In times like these, I'll write a song because I feel lonely or hopeless. And writing a song feels like the only way to process that intensity of an emotion. And while these things are really, really hard to go through, I often feel like when I'm either listening to songs or writing songs that deal with this intensity of loss and hopelessness — usually that's in the phase where I'm close to getting passed that feeling.”

In other words: It was house and then cardiac arrest.

Track list:

Bigger Than The Whole Sky // Dear Reader // Maroon // You’re Losing Me // my tears ricochet // epiphany // hoax // champagne problems // coney island // right where you left me // Nothing New // All Too Well // Forever Winter // We Were Happy // Last Kiss // Castles Crumbling // Carolina // White Horse

The lyrics that tell (a) story:

Every single thing to come has turned into ashes 'cause it's all over, it's not meant to be, so I’ll say words I don’t believe // You wouldn't take my word for it if you knew who was talking, if you knew where I was walking, to a house, not a home, all alone 'cause nobody's there // How the hell did we lose sight of us again? Sobbing with your head in your hands, ain't that the way shit always ends // How long could we be a sad song 'til we were too far gone to bring back to life? // And I can go anywhere I want, anywhere I want, just not home // "Doc, I think she's crashing out," And some things you just can't speak about // My twisted knife, my sleepless night, my winless fight, this has frozen my ground // "She would've made such a lovely bride, what a shame she's fucked in the head," they said // Lost again with no surprises, disappointments, close your eyes and it gets colder and colder when the sun goes down // Did you ever hear about the girl who got frozen? Time went on for everybody else, she won't know it, she's still twenty-three inside her fantasy, how it was supposed to be // I've had too much to drink tonight, how did I go from growing up to breaking down? // Time won't fly, it's like I'm paralyzed by it, I'd like to be my old self again but I'm still trying to find it // I call, just checking up on him, he's up, 3 A.M., pacing, he says, "It's not just a phase I'm in" // Oh, I hate those voices telling me I'm not in love anymore, but they don't give me choices and that's what these tears are for // You can plan for a change in the weather and time, but I never planned on you changing your mind // My castle's crumbling down and I watch all my bridges burn to the ground // Lost I was born, lonesome I came, lonesome I'll always stay // 'Cause I'm not your princess, this ain't our fairytale, I'm gonna find someone someday who might actually treat me well

Once again, it was harder to pick out lyrics than I thought it would be, because so many of the songs are one giant ball of depression and grief and any one line could be included here. Based on Taylor's intro (we'll get to that in a second) I tried to weave a story about how the narrator was feeling by picking out lines about their thoughts and actions that depict grief, loss, loneliness and depression. Because while the songs all depict different kinds of loss (dreams, faith, innocence, people, identity, work, etc.), the common thread is the devastation left in their wake.

… And what that story means:

I've said repeatedly over the last year -- to the point where you might be sick of me saying it idk -- that one of the things I love about the Depression playlist is her introduction to it. Because it sums up what her career-- and this album-- have really been about: writing her way through life, even the most painful bits, in order to process her experiences. I know she's said it in other contexts, but it was incredibly poignant to me that she said that when she's dealing with intense loss or sadness, writing about it is how she knows she's on her way to getting through it, which is especially pointed given what we now know are the themes of the album, because TTPD IS about grief, full-stop.

In this way, I do think it's significant that Bigger Than The Whole Sky is the first song on the (pre-TTPD additions) playlist, and the first song to come on the heels of the intro, because it's the starkest, rawest depiction of the actual feeling of depression, and that sets the stage for the rest of the playlist and the story therein. It perfectly distills the idea of life-changing loss and the absolute heaviness of its aftermath, which is then explored throughout the rest of the playlist. (And, unsurprisingly, is exactly what TTPD is about.) It's incredibly vulnerable and brave of her to talk about writing through that hopelessness, and presumably these songs are a reflection of those sentiments.

(Soapbox speech: I've said many times that personally, I believe BTTWS is the gateway to understanding both Midnights and TTPD. Midnights is an album about someone in the throes of depression grappling with how they got to this place and ruminating about events in their life, and TTPD is an album that delves into grief in the aftermath of loss. BTTWS quite literally describes how the narrator feels about both of those very things, and I think is essential to putting listeners in the mindset of the person telling these stories. IMO that's why it's included on Midnights, and why I think it's an excellent "gateway" leading into Fortnight/TTPD, both sonically and thematically. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.)

So with all that being said, this is what this "medley" sounds like to me:

Our dreams have gone up in smoke and I've lost faith in the future // and behind closed doors I am all alone in sitting in this grief // We broke apart and somehow we ended up turning into the very thing we scoffed at // How long could we stew in this sadness before it killed us both? // Because our home is no longer our home anymore // And it's making me careen off a cliff // I can't move past this betrayal // and maybe I would have gotten the life I'd wanted or people expected of me if I weren't so fucked up // The constant letdown is bleeding me dry bit by bit // And I'm stuck here while the world moves on and I don't know how to leave // And on the nights where I drink my sorrows away I wonder how I got here // I miss who I used to be before all of this happened // This isn't temporary, there's something fundamentally wrong // I know I have to leave, but I can't help mourning what I'm giving up in the process // Because you were the one thing I counted on and I never thought you'd give up on us like this // and I'm watching everything we built collapse around us // I might be destined to be alone forever // But in the end, leaving is right, because I don't deserve what you've done to me, and it's time for me to move on.

Oof.

It's just unrelenting sadness from start to finish.

But like with the other playlists, there are bookends to this journey. We start BTTWS with a narrator who is wholly weighed down by unrelenting grief, and we end with White Horse and a narrator who is coming out the other side of it and realizing that they have to walk away in order to save themselves and rebuild after the loss of that dream.

Again: her mind 🤌

I said in the post about the Bargaining playlist that that selection feels like someone grappling with the need for control vs. the lack of it, and this section is what happens when that lack of control sends you into an emotional tailspin, because loss by its very nature is out of your hands. It's the fallout, and the ways in which you claw out of that pit, that help you regain the footing you lost along the way. (Which, again: is extremely evident as a theme on TTPD on the road from grief to mania to depression to rebuilding.)

What struck me in the way this particular playlist was organized is that the album sections almost feel like their own chapters, too. Midnights starts us off with a run about breaking down, breaking apart and intense loneliness. Folklore is about betrayal and the trauma from it. Evermore is about the disappointment in your life not turning out the way you'd dreamed of. Red is about sinking into depression and being unable to find your way out. We Were Happy/Last Kiss/Castles Crumbling is grappling with the life you've built coming down, even when it's at your own hand. Carolina is feeling lonely when no one understands you. And White Horse is the period on the sentence, the summation of the entire journey which is: you might watch your life be dismantled, but in the end, you can rebuild it with an even stronger foundation from what you've learned.

(As an aside: the folklore run in particular struck me, because it feels like the stories in those songs go: losing her masters -> covid -> potentially the inflection point of the relationship breakdown. The track order throughout these playlists is absolutely purposeful and if I could remember what I've been thinking I'd dive into it more, and I'm just curious if this might be one of those things.)

So then jumping back into TTPD, here are the songs that then made the cut afterwards:

Chloe or Sam or Sophia or Marcus // How Did It End? // I Look In People's Windows // Clara Bow // loml // Florida!!! // Down Bad // Fortnight

Maybe it shouldn't be a surprise that the Depression playlist ended up getting the most TTPD songs on it. Because again: it's an album about grief and loss! It makes sense that that informed so much of the art.

You see the pining and grief over the "what if?" from BTTWS in songs like Chloe et al. or I Look In People's Windows or loml. You see the confusion over loss from Last Kiss or We Were Happy in How Did It End? You see the rumination over the ways in which society destroys women and leads to the systems in which they end up playing these roles professionally and personally from Nothing New or Castles Crumbling (or even My Tears Ricochet) in Clara Bow or even Florida!!! to an extent. You see the fear over the future if the present stays its course from songs like You're Losing Me in Fortnight. You see the paralysis in the wake of loss from songs like All Too Well or even Right Where You Left Me in Down Bad.

(I also think I could make direct parallels between individual song themes/stories and the TTPD songs, but this is long enough and I'd be here all day.)

One of my favourite things that Taylor has said about the album is:

“This writer is of the firm belief that our tears become holy in the form of ink on a page. Once we have spoken our saddest story, we can be free of it.”

And IMO that is exactly what this playlist reflects. It starts off as a story about unspeakable loss, and ends with the narrator moving on to write their next story.

We're in the home stretch! One last playlist to conquer, Acceptance!

(ICYMI: Part 1 Part 2 Part 3)

#once again not proofreading just posting to get it over with lmao #ttpd playlists #the tortured poets department #writing letters addressed to the fire #me thinking too hard about taylor lyrics #bigger than the whole sky #bttws #<- tagging for once so I can actually find it on my blog with my other posts one day #i thought i'd have more to say but i'm too tired and too sick of myself tbh!

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directdogman · 8 months ago

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Hey Doggo, how do you go about writing the story script (not coding, just writing) for your games?

Particularly how you incorporate the "choose your own adventure" concept where choosing an option can lead to an entirely different exchange.

I am making a (sorta) Dayshift fangame and found myself having to write the entire story as an "if then" flowchart.

Is this the method you use as well? Or is there annother way?

Depends on the scale.

For DT, specifically, I usually plot the route story out on a flowchart first and then when I'm happy with the story, I go scene by scene and write the characters doing what I've plotted out. It's not uncommon to go BACK to this chart and make changes as I'm writing though, as you usually think of good scene ideas/changes on the fly.

Specifically I mainly just list what happens in a scene (aka, what characters discuss, basically a few sentence summary) and then I represent splits that majorly affect content, like when you make a route divergent choice. in DT, all content after these splits are totally divergent, so this is pretty clear cut. With the exception of one short split at the start of Karen's route, you don't tend to really get stuff rejoining after major choices.

Then when it comes to writing the actual script, I just write everything in plaintext (no character tags or anything like that) because I'm unhinged. The only dialogue that's really indicated as being different in any way is Gingi's bc it's in quotation marks. However, in multi character scenes it tends to be obvious who's saying what just based on what the characters are saying and how they say it.

As a for instance, this is from from Oliver + Theoroar's scene. You can kinda tell from context who's who without Theoroar's dialogue being in all caps, like it appears in-game.

You can map dialogue in flow charts if it makes it easier (draw.io is what I use as it's free + easy to use) but if you plan to have a LOT of dialogue, it can make the process of actually implementing dialogue a little more time consuming since you have to paste from a format that isn't already more or less engine-ready. The idea of having it in a plaintext doc like this, for me, is that I can copy + paste really fast.

But yeah, usually when I write these sorts of things, I just shut the windows, doors and go into a scary trance like state of hyper-concentration and then wind up with something that passes for a finished conversation by the time I've finished. Hope this helps!

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vanilladollette · 7 days ago

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hii can you make a doc or a short fic where everyone is a yandere for reader, but reader is a student council president which makes them a little hard to spend time with reader together. also the reason why yeonjin and the others bullies dong-eun is bc they knows that reader will always come to the gym to help dong-run and thats one of a way that they could get reader's attention

All I Want Is You

Pairing: Yandere Bullies x Student Council Fem Reader

Summary: Desperate for your attention, Yeon-jin and her friends turned to tormenting Dong-eun, finding twisted satisfaction in the fleeting moments when your anger and concern finally focused on them, even if only briefly.

Word Count: 2.2k

Warning: Yandere behavior, bullying.

Author's note: The point of view switches between reader's pov and the bullies. I'm not sure if it will be easy to tell.

When you're involved in something as demanding as Student Council, you quickly realize how much of your time and energy it consumes. It is the one thing often requires you to prioritize meetings, events, and responsibilities over your personal life. You can’t just show up and expect things to run smoothly. Behind every successful school event, every well-organized fundraiser, and every decision made for the student body, there are countless hours of planning, discussions, problem-solving, and sometimes even conflict resolution.

Despite how time-consuming it is, you can’t deny that you enjoy being a part of it. There’s something fulfilling about knowing you’re involved in shaping the student experience, that your voice has influence, and that the work you’re doing is making a difference—even if it's behind the scenes. You get to be the bridge between students and faculty, the organizer of spirit weeks, the one helping to coordinate dances, sports events, and school-wide initiatives. It’s exciting, energizing, and—at times—completely overwhelming.

Your days start early and end late. Between balancing your academic workload and your responsibilities on the council, you barely have time to catch your breath. Lunch breaks turn into planning sessions, and free periods are often filled with committee meetings or catching up on emails. Weekends, once reserved for rest or hanging out with friends, are now used for setting up events, designing posters, or running errands for upcoming activities. There are moments when it feels like you’re running on autopilot, just trying to get through everything on your to-do list.

But even in those exhausting moments, there’s a sense of pride that comes with being part of something bigger than yourself. You learn how to lead, how to listen, how to work with people who see things differently than you do. You discover strengths you didn’t know you had—like staying calm under pressure, speaking confidently in front of a crowd, or handling last-minute changes with a cool head. The growth is constant, and the lessons you learn often extend far beyond the school walls.

Still, the pressure can be intense. There are times when you feel like you’re missing out—on spontaneous plans with friends, on quiet evenings at home, on simple things like taking a nap or binge-watching your favorite show. There’s always something demanding your attention, and time for yourself becomes rare and precious.

But at the end of the day, you remind yourself why you joined in the first place. Because you care. Because you wanted to be involved. Because you believed you could make a difference—and in many ways, you already have. And even though the work is never-ending and the pace rarely slows down, there’s a kind of joy that comes with the chaos. A sense of purpose. And for now, that’s enough to keep you going.

Student Council.

That was the only thing standing between you and them, the single obligation that kept your time stretched thin and your schedule packed. While they lingered in the hallway waiting for lunch to start, or strolled through campus carefree after classes ended, you were buried in meeting minutes, event planning, and chasing down teachers for approvals. Student council wasn’t just an after-school activity—it was practically your whole life.

And they noticed. How could they not? You were always there but never really with them. A smile in passing, a wave across the courtyard, a quick apology for missing another hangout. They said they understood, but sometimes you caught the flicker of disappointment in their eyes.

They never joined student council. Why would they?. It demanded too much of your time, and they didn’t want to lose themselves in it the way you had. They didn’t have the patience for long debates or the interest in school functions. They wanted to spend time with you, not become another reason you were too busy.

Still, sometimes they wondered. If being a part of it meant being closer to you, should they try? Could they survive the early morning meetings and late-night prep just to steal a few more hours at your side?

But they never asked. And you never offered.

So you remained on separate paths—yours paved with duty and theirs with longing. The space between you filled with unspoken feelings and missed chances, all because of student council.

And yet, despite it all, they always waited—just in case you had five minutes to spare.

Despite it sounding easier said than done, it was not easy to grab your attention when so many other people demanded it too. You were always surrounded—by classmates needing help with assignments, teachers asking for updates on school events, and council members scrambling for decisions only you could make. Your name echoed constantly in the hallways, followed by a request, a question, or a plea. You were everywhere, yet never still long enough for anyone to truly reach you.

And yet, somehow, you always seemed to have time for Moon Dong-eun.

It didn’t matter what you were doing—reviewing budgets, setting up decorations, or speaking with the principal. The moment she appeared, your attention shifted as if the world itself paused to make room for her. The subtle softening of your expression when she spoke, the way you leaned in just slightly closer, how you always managed to smile despite your exhaustion—it didn’t go unnoticed.

They saw it all.

They saw how you’d brush off exhaustion for her. How your patience stretched longer, your tone turned gentler. You didn’t treat her like just another person pulling at your time. She wasn’t another obligation. She was something else—something different. And that hurt more than they cared to admit.

Because they had been trying. Trying to catch your eye, to be part of your day in more than passing moments. They offered to help, stayed late to support you, found excuses to linger after meetings. But none of it seemed to matter. Your gaze always wandered past them, searching for someone else—her.

They told themselves it was jealousy. That it was childish to want your attention when you were clearly busy. They weren’t entitled to your time. They knew that.

But it still stung every time you dropped everything to walk beside Dong-eun, every time your phone lit up with her name and you answered before the first ring finished. You said you were just friends. You said she needed help. You said it was nothing.

But it was something.

To everyone else, it was obvious. To them, it was undeniable.

And they started to wonder if they had been foolish from the beginning. Thinking they could be someone special to you when someone else already was. Thinking their quiet presence would ever mean as much as her whispered words.

Still, they kept showing up. Kept watching from the sidelines. Kept hoping, somehow, that one day you’d look at them the way you looked at her.

But with every passing moment, it felt more like a losing game.

Because no matter what you were doing, no matter how chaotic your world became, you always seemed to have time for Moon Dong-eun.

However, it was not a total loss when they figured out that bullying Dong-eun meant grabbing your attention. It may not have been the most ideal or moral way to do it, but for them, it worked. For the first time, you actually looked their way. You didn’t just pass by or smile politely—you reacted. Maybe you were angry, maybe you were disappointed, but you noticed. And for them, that was everything. They had lived in your shadow for so long, desperate for even a flicker of your gaze, and suddenly, through something cruel and twisted, they found a way to keep you looking.

It wasn’t right. It wasn’t justified. But it was effective.

They didn’t care that it hurt Dong-eun—she was simply the means to an end. What mattered was the attention they finally earned. Because no matter how many times they tried to impress you, be like you, or win your affection, it never lasted. But this? This got a reaction. This kept you engaged. Even if you scolded them, even if you were disgusted by them, it was still the longest stretch of time you had ever focused on them. And to someone starved for your approval, that was worth everything.

You always stayed later than the other students at school because of your responsibilities with the student council. On average, you were at school one or two hours after the final bell rang—just one of the many things that came with the role. It wasn't something you minded much; the quiet halls and empty classrooms gave you a sense of calm. Fortunately, today’s meeting had been brief, and you were heading out just an hour later.

As you made your way through the hallway, the silence was interrupted by faint but frantic yelling. It was coming from the direction of the gym. That was odd—the gym was supposed to be locked after school hours. No sports clubs were active today, and any scheduled practices had ended well before your meeting.

Curious and a little concerned, you approached the gym doors. The cries for help grew louder as you got closer. Your heart sank.

You pushed open the door.

Inside, your eyes immediately landed on the familiar faces of Yeon-jin and her clique. Surrounding them was Dong-eun, cornered, bruised, and clearly terrified. It wasn’t hard to piece together what was going on.

You knew exactly where this was headed.

Yeon-jin and her friends had a reputation. They were the kind of girls who tormented others for sport, and they got away with it. Their parents were powerful—wealthy, well-connected, untouchable. It was unfair, infuriating even, how often their behavior was overlooked, excused, or swept under the rug.

But now, you had seen it with your own eyes. And this time, they couldn't talk their way out of it. Not with you here. Not with someone who actually gave a damn.

You took a step forward, your voice steady.

“What the hell is going on here?”

Your voice echoed sharply against the gym’s high ceilings, slicing through the cruel laughter. Dong-eun flinched at the sound, pressing her back harder against the wall, as if trying to disappear. Yeon-jin turned to you slowly, her expression shifting from surprise to something far more familiar—calculated confidence.

“Oh,” she said with a smirk, flipping her perfectly styled hair over her shoulder. “Didn’t see you there.”

“I bet you didn’t.” You took a step closer, your eyes flicking to Dong-eun briefly—checking for serious injuries, making sure she was still standing. She looked shaken, scared, but not broken. Not yet. Not while you were here.

Yeon-jin crossed her arms. “It’s not what it looks like.”

“Really?” you said, raising a brow. “Because it looks a lot like six people cornering a defenseless girl in a locked gym after school. Do enlighten me if I’m wrong.”

“We were just playing around. It was a joke.” Jae-Joon laughed.

“A joke?” you repeated, your voice cold now. “Then why was she screaming for help?”

You walked past them and went straight to Dong-eun. She stiffened as you approached, clearly unsure of your intentions. You crouched down slowly, gently, keeping your hands where she could see them.

“Dong-eun,” you said softly. “Are you okay?”

She hesitated, her lips parting but no words coming out. Her eyes were glossy with unshed tears. You didn’t press her for an answer. Instead, you stood up and turned back to Yeon-jin and her entourage, your expression steely.

You left the gym with Dong-eun by your side, your hand gently resting on her back to guide her forward. Neither of you looked back.

Yeon-jin and the others stood frozen in the gym, watching as you walked away with Dong-eun. The door closed behind you with a quiet click, but the silence that followed was deafening. No more laughter. No more taunts. Just the sting of realization and the weight of something unfamiliar—powerlessness.

They hated it. Hated that in the end, it was always Dong-eun who got your attention. No matter what they did, no matter how loudly they laughed or how cruelly they played their games, it was her you looked at with concern. Her you reached for. Her you protected.

But even as that bitterness settled in their chests, they couldn’t deny the fleeting satisfaction they felt—because for one moment, even if it was brief, you looked at them. You spoke directly to them. You saw them. Maybe it wasn’t the admiration they wanted. Maybe it came with anger, disappointment, even disgust. But it was something.

And that something was worth more than they’d ever admit out loud.

So they watched you go, silent and unmoving, clinging to the hope that maybe next time—next confrontation, next outburst, next scene—they’d manage to capture more than just a glance. Maybe next time, it wouldn’t be Dong-eun you rushed to help. Maybe next time, it would be them who had your full attention.

Because underneath the cruelty, the privilege, and the pride, there was something deeper—desperation. A hunger not just for power or control, but for validation. For acknowledgment. For you.

And if that meant tormenting someone like Dong-eun, if it meant pushing boundaries and crossing lines, then so be it.

Because for one single minute, you looked at them.

And that minute was everything.

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tadpoles-and-daydreams · 9 months ago

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A witchcraft basics doc; update, resource call, interest check, and a possible second doc

Bet most of you didn't even know I was working on this >:D

Yes this is a huge post. It's a lot of things.

So, one of my first posts ever on this blog was me mentioning that a friend of mine had NO clue what they were signing up for when asking for the basics of witchcraft. The google doc I wrote took on a life of its own, and the post did as well when people started asking for it. I still plan to tag said people when I post it, assuming they haven't deactivated. The thing is, this doc had become a proper project, and it took a long time for me to have the motivation to work on it again. Now, though, it seems to me like a damn good way to reconnect to my craft after a rut! (which, by the way, is why I've been offline.)

So, my first post back is for a couple of reasons. For one, if you have any resources you'd think would be useful for beginner witches, feel free to shoot me an ask, DM, or comment/reblog on this post! I'll have a list of things I'm putting in the doc (taking recommendations there as well) at the bottom of this post.

The other thing is that I might end up making a second doc, one that's a little less "101" in vibe. It would have a MAJOR MAJOR UPG warning on it, first off, and I'm not sure whether or not I would be marking any UPG either since this would essentially be a second Grimoire/Book of Shadows for me that would be public to others for the sake of sharing information! I can't say I'd call it "advanced witchcraft" by any means, I'm not very fancy lol, but I don't want the basics doc to get too overwhelming. I do, however, want to scream about random witchcraft topics that interest me. So this is also a bit of an interest check for that, as well as the basics doc.

FINAL NOTE: I fully plan on posting this basics doc before it's done. Some sections will be unwritten or unfinished, because if I wait until I find it "finished" I'll never post it. It's going to be added onto whenever I can, but I feel as though getting it out is the best course of action.

A list of stuff in the doc that I'd take resources on (AKA everything planned in it) with * by anything that will be left unwritten/unfinished on purpose until I know more. I will take resources and recommendations on EVERYTHING though. This is in no particular order:

grounding and centering

VOCAB (intention, intuition, UPG/SPG/VPG, appropriation. probably others I'm forgetting.

candle, plant, crystals and safety* (as well as any other tools one might need safety tips for. This is left completely unwritten as I use very few tools of this type.)

deity work* (the whole debate surrounding when to start, as well as information about it. Will include smth about house rules/boundaries. My work is very casual, I'd love to see different POV's of this! This is by nature left unfinished because deity work is so unique to the witch.)

grimoire/book of shadows

tools of the craft* (common tools and how to use them consumerism in witchcraft, etc.)

cleansing

appropriation* (I don't know near enough about this, I just check what's in my own practice. I would like this to include a list of commonly appropriated closed practices, a definition of appropriation and why it shouldn't be done, open pantheons, and common open practices.)

spellwork*

meditation

where someone could go from here* (including sigils, tarot, crystals bc my friend likes rocks lol, maybe astrology but oh god I have nothing about that it makes my brain hurt just looking at an astrology chart /pos. I will probably make a list of stuff that I could add in this section.)

casual/daily/quick/low energy practices and witchcraft

paganism and witchcraft; overlap, what they are individually, why one might be for you rather than the other, etc.*

there'd be a credit section for anyone who wants to be credited for links/resources at the end! If you send me resources plz specify if you want to be included in that or not.

Things I might include in the second doc if I make it:

the craft and mental health and my experiences with it

things commonly touched on in the community (your deities don't hate you, cycles of inactivity and burnout, other things I'm forgetting rn)

deity-specific things, more specific topics of the craft, etc. yet another reminder that this would all include UPG, possibly unmarked, because it would basically be primarily used to give me motivation to research more.

#witchblr #witchcraft #paganism #pagan witch #witch community #witch blog #deity work #paganblr #eclectic pagan #pagan #beginner witch #baby witch #witch tips #witchy

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enidtendo64 · 5 months ago

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I know you said that Archibald possessing Pacifica was an old concept but do you have any plans with that? Because honestly it's a really cool idea imo. Also do you have any ideas for Abigail Northwest? Because I learned about her like a week ago and my mind was blown.

So I have this master doc for Diner At The End of the Falls and I have like a list for my mock little seasons and episodes, and I had planned for the Corduroy Clan + Paz competition thing to be in it but with how the lore for the story is looking, Archibald can't really possess Pacifica so I scrapped that part

However I'm still keeping the overall idea! Basically at this point Pacifica and Kevin and Archibald (the friendly ghost that hangs around Pacifica that Kevin cannot see and is both terrified yet familial-y fond of) have become a decent team. When the lumberjack family contests or whatever happen, Archibald talks Pacifica into helping the Corduroys with the contest since they can never fully do their usual shit bc they're missing a member. Of course said missing member is the Corduroy MOM--

Anyways so Pacifica gets roped in, and it splits off into two sort of plots; Kevin trying to prove his manliness/toughness as a lumberjack with Archibald posessing him (since his little brother is outdoing him in that regard) til he realizes like okay, maybe he IS the ZestiestTM Corduroy brother (which is saying something considering his older brother is straight up hiding a whole boyfriend (not for homophobic family reasons--but bc he's embarrassed his family's gonna scare him off lol) but that doesn't make him less of a flannel loving lumberjack blooded Corduroy!

Meanwhile, Pacifica's naturally competitive nature clashes with Wendy's devil may care attitude, especially since for someone who doesn't usually put much effort in work, Wendy is putting a lot of effort to not put any effort in this competition. Eventually they clash with Wendy uncharacteristically verbally bursting on Pacifica, but with Dipper's hat on her Wendy is reminded of the twins and like, haha, hey she's trying this good person thing. Also this is Kevin's sister. Also honestly at the beginning Wendy was kind of nice to her and it was cool hanging out with her. All of this leads to Pacifica gritting her teeth and treating her like how she would solve a local ghost problem--asking her what the problem is and listening and offering solutions.

And this would start one of the show's mysteries of "Where is Wendy's mom?", since this would be when Pacifica learns of the Corduroy matriarch and decides to use her little ghost connections to see if she can't find out what happened to her. AND THEN, when it comes to Abigale, I've been thinking about her a lot as I write stuff for Diner at the End of the Falls, but I haven't really finalized everything with it yet, but the most concrete thing I have for her is just. Northwest ancestor. Tries to warn everyone of Bill. Gets screwed over by the Northwests, obvi. And that funny enough, Pacifica's the splitting image of her (I wonder why........)

I honestly need to organize my notes about it more lol

#uhhhborgor #asks #diner at the end of the falls

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bomberqueen17 · 5 months ago

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while i've got the file out

So the last bit of time when I was at the farm, I finally gave in to the pressure of @sassaffrassa's art and started reading the Queen's Thief series.

It's... It's great, I'm not as obsessed with it as some (the selective concealment of stuff that POV characters know but the reader can't Until The Reveal is... clever but rubs me the Wrong Way, not enough to throw me out of the book but enough that I do find myself resenting it, but totally understand how it works beautifully for other readers) but it is extremely, extremely ripe for fanfic, I allow that. And I found that it made me think about the fics of Ciri in Nilfgaard again. It certainly made me realize my error in not including any slaves in the Nilfgaard settings-- that's a big dynamic I missed an opportunity to include, but it's not a thing I like to think about and so I had mentally assigned it all to just be slaves working fields etc., which as anyone knows is like. Only a percentage of what societies that contain slavery actually use slaves for. There should have been enslaved people in the households, all through the society, and Ciri objecting to and wanting to change that could have been an entire underlying theme.

But it's not, because I had meant to write that story as a 5k oneshot, and also I'd entered it right out of Goblin Emperor fic-writing, and whatever that particular fictional society contains, it doesn't have any enslaved people. So I just hadn't thought of it.

Anyway, a digression, but-- it made me, on one exhausted evening, reread the next bits I was going to publish of Not A Crest, and then I still didn't feel like writing but I wanted to keep reading so I dipped into my extras/cut scenes/written ahead docs, and I found an entire a/u I'd come up with and wrote 5k of and then realized i couldn't possibly fit in anywhere.

But. It stands alone somewhat, and I could strip it out of this world and create a new backstory and file all the serial numbers off that too, and...

well now I have another book to write, so I've started a doc with the serial number transpositions in it, LOL.

Now that I'm done at the farm, I have December, January, and probably February without any major commitments. If only I can wrangle my ADHD-or-whatever into some kind of shape, I can hope to bang out at least rough drafts of a couple of these things, or at least enough of them to know whether there's anything to pursue. And, I hope, I can achieve some of my other personal goals around the same time as well. If only I could miraculously learn how to operate a to-do list and make/keep a schedule........

Behind the cut, I'm gonna summarize the a/u snippet and my plans for it. We'll see how this goes.

So this plot depends on Ciri's powers of teleportation and time manipulation, so it can't possibly be in the same continuity as the mammoths and the tall ships, but that means I have a ton of leeway in worldbuilding. It needs to be fantasy-ish but it could be sort of cyberpunk if I wanted. Really it could be just about anything, provided that not-Ciri (I've already renamed her Leila) can still uniquely manipulate time and space, and the mechanism of how she does that is unimportant. It should have a cost, of course, which will be part of the worldbuilding.

So the backstory would be that a larger kingdom/nation-state/whatever kind of polity gobbled up Leila's when she was a young teenager, and she spent her youth as a guerilla, fighting or fleeing and honing her survival skills. There was some larger existential threat, related to the as-yet-undone worldbuilding, but the reveal is that the larger polity attacked and absorbed its neighbors in order to fortify itself against a yet larger invading power-- could be another kingdom, could be like, space invaders, I really haven't decided yet.

Leila meanwhile has come into her powers finally, and has begun to be able to manipulate time and space. i'm going to give her a wise and powerful sorceress mentor, Yennefer-like; instead of Geralt she might have a sword tutor slash captain of the guard or something, an older man who loves and protects and teaches her. Undecided; don't know whether he's important for more than backstory.

And this is all backstory, mind. In this backstory, she finally comes to aid the armies of the polity she had been fighting against, to resist this greater existential threat/invader/whatever. And as part of that she's paired up with this universe's version of Morvran-- I've renamed him Corbin since it means Raven but I'm still open to changing my mind on that. Anyway he's got the important bits of Morvran-- he's both a hostage and a presumptive heir, far too young and far too responsible, a strange balance of overly powerful and completely vulnerable. And for the duration of the backstory, he is helping this mystical enemy-turned-ally (Leila) fight a desperate, scrambling battle using powers that none of them entirely fully understands.

And he has an underling, an aide-de-camp, a young woman who keeps track of things and isn't much of a fighter, and that's where Luliana comes in, and I think I'll keep her name since i made it up anyway. She's a relative of his perhaps, a little older than he is, but allowed to be close to him because she's so unimportant, and she's really his only friend. And she of course falls in love with Leila, who to everyone's surprise falls in love back. Corbin is secretly delighted with this.

The war is long and difficult and horrible things happen to everyone, but in the end they triumph. And Leila is brought back to Expansionist Polity, her own homeland being so thoroughly encompassed and destroyed there's no restoring it, and the leader (perhaps he was injured in the war? perhaps he was already dying? perhaps he's just a guy who wants to retire?) begs her to become his heir, which effectively deposes Corbin, who silently doesn't mind it. But the rest of the government does mind it, and insists she marry Corbin to give them stability. Corbin privately proposes that they have a paper marriage; he is not inclined that way himself, you see, and he would be delighted if Leila and Lu kept their relationship and just let him be nearby, the way they did in the war. Leila counter-offers; she'll stick around long enough to make everyone feel safe and happy, but then she and Lu will run off someplace to live in peace, and leave Corbin to rule and to marry whoever he actually likes. Corbin, too used to not letting on his feelings about anything, agrees to this. And so they all rule together for a year and a day or whatever, Leila gets a bunch of the reforms she'd wanted pushed through, they get along marvellously, and then Leila disappears mysteriously, as agreed.

She and Lu go off and live happily somewhere peaceful. She is unexpectedly bored, Lu is homesick and sad, and her sorceress mentor finally finds her and scolds her for running away. "Haven't I done enough?" Leila asks, and her mentor is like obviously not, but doesn't have anything to convince her with. Until a little later, when the sorceress comes back and tells Leila that Corbin is dead, assassinated. He could not in fact get by without her.

Leila uses her powers to go back, but arrives too late, finding Corbin's head on a spike and his hands nailed below. She notices his hand still has both their wedding ring and the ring she'd given him as an engagement gift on it. He was supposed to have moved on and found himself a better partner.

She musters the last of her power and jumps back a little farther, interrupting the assassination attack, but she is again too late; Corbin is mortally wounded. She sits with him as he dies, and with his last breath he admits that he has always loved her and never wanted her to leave. She needs to jump again, and doesn't have the power for it, but sucks the last of his life-force out to do it, which is unethical-- she also draws from his would-be assassins and the guards who betrayed him, knowing it's a terrible thing to do but will be largely erased by her abandoning this timeline. There'll be a cost and I'll worldbuild that in too, however it makes sense once I've written it.

And this is all still backstory, and the story begins as she arrives, just in time, to interrupt the attack and save Corbin's life, wounded but not mortally. But this time Corbin has some self-possession left, and he is still wearing her rings and apologizes for it and merely admits that he was relying on his enemies' remaining respect for and fear of her. We the audience have not seen Leila's two previous attempts and do not know what she knows.

(Yes, yes, I was complaining that the Queen's Thief series relies too much on this, but I admit I'm trying to figure out whose POV this is from, and I may well not use Leila's, in order to make it not dishonest to exclude this knowledge. We'll have to see what seems honest to me as I'm writing it.)

And the story goes from there, as she tries to restore his rule and tries to figure out which version of him is lying, the one who said he loved her with his last breath before she stole the rest, or the one who calmly, collectedly bled all over her and politely apologized for his inability to do as she had asked him to and find a different spouse.

Obviously I need more plot than that, but it will come to me, I'm pretty sure. But that's where I'm starting. As I've said before, I'm a pantser, and that means I can't outline the plot or I'll paralyze myself.

#about the author #writing #my process #who even knows

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