#i did consider writing the climax for this au but like. i should probably write raz exploring the surface before jumping so far ahead

[razzle-zazzle]

Whumptober Day 17: Nowhere Else to Go

Shipwrecked (kind of) + "We had a good run"

2265 Words; Pearl & Seaglass

TW for brief implied nonsexual nudity

AO3 ver

Heat bore down against his face, uncomfortable and unfamiliar.

Raz shifted. His scales felt weird, and there was sand against his back—but it didn’t feel right. He couldn’t feel his fins, either, and when he tried to move his tail—

Raz’ eyes snapped open with a speed that could rival a frogfish. Bright sunlight assaulted his eyes, making him wince and close them again, blinking rapidly as he tried to get his arms under him.

Slowly, his vision returned, and he found himself—the word humans used was sitting, wasn’t it? Raz glanced down—yes! In place of his tail were two gangly, scaleless legs.

“It wasn’t a dream!” Ohhhhh, okay, that was weird, talking without flashing his stripes. “Ohh. Ahh. Ouwaeghhhhh.” The sounds vibrated weirdly in his throat, different from the clicks and whistles he was used to. Cool!

Raz reached up—okay, yeah, his helmet was still there. His bag was at his side, but that was it—which Raz was pretty sure was less than humans tended to wear. He needed to fit in, to be so super stealthy if he wanted to return to the ocean safely in… Gisu had said seven days, right? So Raz had seven whole days to poke around, which meant he couldn’t mess it up!

Raz looked around the beach. There was a cliff face sheltering it, and in the shadow of the rock was an old, heavy-looking chest, half-hidden under dried kelp. Raz got up fully, the sand warm beneath his feet, and moved to start walking—

He stumbled, arms windmilling as he tumbled forwards. He spat out sand, pushed himself up, and tried again. One foot in front of the other, he was pretty sure—

“Yes!” Raz was walking! Like a human! He whooped, surprised by the sudden sound, then pushed forward, the sand shifting under him. He tilted, almost fell, and then spun around until he was dizzy. This was real! He was a human!

Eventually, Raz made his way over to the chest. He swept the kelp away, prying it open. A bunch of fabric sat inside, smelling slightly musty, slightly salty. Clothes, he presumed.

“Bingo.” Raz fiddled around, picking through the clothes until he was wearing what he was pretty sure was normal human wear. He’d seen some woodcarvings before they rotted, and the rare metal engraving if it wasn’t rusted, so he had a pretty good idea of what went where, even if he wasn’t sure as to the exact names of things. But his torso and legs were covered, and he was pulling his feet into what he thought were called shoes. There was a bit of sand grating against his skin inside his clothes, but Raz did his best to shake the feeling off—there was no way he wasn’t gonna get sand where he didn’t want it. So he pulled his goggles down instead, the world shifting to warmer hues through the lenses. Now he was a proper explorer, just like the Explorer Corps!

Raz bounced in place. If he still had fins, they’d be fluttering, and he’d be swimming loops. But he wasn’t in the water, and he didn’t have fins, because he had become human and made it onto land.

There was a small path up the cliff, hard to catch from up above. Raz dashed for it, excitement filling his chest. He was so ready for this, he was going to learn so much—

He couldn’t wait to be where the people were.

+=+=+=+=+

The human city was crowded.

Raz supposed it made sense; it looked like they could only build their dwellings up so high, and all of the people were groundbound, unable to just swim over or under each other. Raz’ small size put him at something of a disadvantage; he kept getting bumped into and pushed around in the crowd, and couldn’t see over any of the much bigger humans. It was loud, crowded, hot, and a little smelly thanks to all the humans crammed together in the same space all buying and selling, and Raz was glad he had his helmet and goggles on because otherwise all the noise and motion might make him combust—

In short, it was awesome.

They were all talking, too, and Raz could understand what they were saying—except for where the voices all meshed together into an aural paste. How did he understa—oh it was probably magic, wasn’t it. Neat!

Raz still couldn’t quite believe it—surely, any moment now, he would wake up in his room to realize it had all been a dream—

“Young man!” A hand grabbed at Raz’ arm, whirling him around. A lady with her hair tied up tight and glass in front of her eyes was glaring down at him. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Uh.” Raz tried to pull his arm away, but her grip didn’t budge. “Exploring?”

The lady huffed. “Skipping school, are we?” She stood, taking Raz’ wrist up with her, and started walking.

“What—” Raz dug his heels into the ground, but he was benign swept up by her anyway.

“No wonder things are going to hell,” She was saying, “Kids running about in the street instead of going to school!” She shook her head, dragging Raz away from the market—

“Let go!” Raz yanked his arm free, stumbling back. The lady whirled around, but Raz was already stumble-dashing away, struggling not to trip over his own feet. His boots being slightly oversized didn’t help, but he kept going going going—

The lady shouted somewhere behind him, and Raz jumped onto a box set next to a wall of wood. He jumped, grabbing at the top of the wall, struggling to haul himself up—why did everything have to be so much heavier out of the water? Footsteps pounded the stone behind him as he got his body over the top—shit, what was he going to land on on the other side?

Too late! Raz flung himself over the edge, hitting the crate below hard. Whatever was in the crate broke underneath him with several cracking sounds, yellow slime leaking out and staining Raz’ clothes. It kind of reminded him of eggs, but way smaller than mer eggs, and with harder shells than Raz had ever seen.

Raz groaned, rolling off the maybe-eggs. He rubbed at the fabric on his legs, but that only served to get the goop on his hands, ewww—

“Hey!” Raz looked up to see another human staring him down angrily, leaning in an opening in the stone wall of their dwelling. “You better pay for those—”

Whatever else they were saying was lost to the wind as Raz ran.

+=+=+=+=+

Raz breathed hard, his chest heaving. Which was weird, his gills didn’t work like that at all; did humans have to deal with this all the time?

He was leaning against a wooden wall, a ways away from where he had started. The stone path he was on was wide, bordering the sea to one side, with a series of wooden platforms extending out to the sea a ways down the stone path. It was too smooth to be a natural cliff, Raz felt—humans must have cut it up to look like this. Probably. There was a stone basin full of water to Raz’ side, and he had pushed his goggles up to see more clearly.

The burn in his legs was… well, it was unfamiliar, because Raz had never had legs before, but it was just like any other burn in his muscles otherwise. And while the running itself was different from swimming, Raz was no stranger to having to flee bigger, stronger adults he had pissed off; it seemed that was something the ocean and the land had in common. And even in the ocean, being an Aquato could only get him so far—

But he wouldn’t have any of that status here, did he? He was just a kid nobody knew, which was half the reason he came up here in the first place.

(The other being that humans were just cool.)

But that wasn’t an advantage, was it? Raz had no safety net up here, nobody to look out for him. No older siblings to come and flash their fins at whatever giant octopus he had managed to piss off now, then complain for hours about Raz’ recklessness.

That… hm. Raz had sort of vaguely known this would be dangerous—explorers had to go into danger to confront the unknown!—but he hadn’t really thought about how dangerous.

“Hey, kid.” Raz looked up at the third voice to address him in the same day, not sure how he’d find the energy but ready to run—

Oh.

Oh.

Raz’ knees wobbled, which he did not like—and his chest did a funny little lurch that he didn’t know how to explain. If he had fins, they might have fluttered—it wasn’t like Raz had ever

A girl about his height stood before him, red hair pulled back into two dangling tails. Raz didn’t exactly know how to describe it, just that something about her was really wow.

Raz became acutely aware that he was still covered in maybe-egg slime. His face heated up as he took in her clothes, brightly colored layers of fabric that fit her in a way that Raz’ own borrowed clothes didn’t. And the way she held herself carried with it a strong confidence, a sharp familiarity with her body that Raz didn’t have. In mer logic, that made her dangerous. By all rights, Raz should be wary—and he was!

But he also very much did not want to run away.

“What’s wrong with you?” She asked, and Raz was suddenly hyperaware of the way he was leaning against the wall, breath caught in his throat. “You look like a mess.” Her nose wrinkled, one end of her mouth pulling back in a frown—

“What’s wrong with you?” Raz shot back before his brain caught up with his mouth. “You look like an anemone that’s trying too hard.” He wanted to bite her twintails, and he didn’t know why.

Her eyes widened, then narrowed. “Bold words from the weirdo covered in eggs.” She stepped back. “You smell.”

Raz sniffed. He did smell like eggs, and a bit like salt. He couldn’t smell anything else, though. He huffed, looking her up and down again. “You don’t look so tough.” Oh, for the love of the abyss, what was he even saying? When was he going to learn how to stop picking fights he couldn’t win?

Her lip curled, and she glared at him. “Oh, I’ll show you tough.” She threatened, and then she was grabbing Raz’ hand and yanking him forwards as he yelped—

Splash! went the water in the basin as Raz was shoved into it. He sputtered, flailing to get his limbs under him and sit up, memories of being unable to breathe beneath the waves making his chest surge with panic.

The girl was laughing, hand over her mouth. “You look ridiculous!” She proclaimed, and Raz’ stomach did a weird twisty thing.

“Oh, I’ll show you ridiculous—” and then she was falling into the water with him as he pulled her in, yelling as she splashed and her dress got soaked. She kicked him, and Raz shoved back, and the two of them started shoving and pushing and yelling until they had knocked themselves out of the basin entirely, dripping water onto the stones beneath them as they rolled.

Raz acked as her fist hit his chest, and he grabbed at her twintails. She yelled, kicked between his legs—which hurt, ow ow ow—and Raz found himself shoved to the ground as her blunt human claws dug into his shoulder where the fabric of his clothes had fallen loose.

He shoved her off, sitting up and scooting back—and she was yelling but it sounded a lot like her earlier laughter, and Raz was laughing himself—

She had really pretty eyes.

“Now we’re both ridiculous!” Raz declared, victorious. One of her twintails had come loose, water dripping from her soaked clothes.

She laughed, bright and loud. Raz’ stomach did that twisty thing again, his chest lurching. After a moment she stood, holding out her hand. Raz stared at it, not sure what she wanted—

“Just grab it, idiot.” She instructed, so Raz did. She pulled, and Raz slowly stood. Ohhhh.

(Humans were so weird, in all the best ways.)

“I’m Lili.” She introduced herself. “You?”

“Razputin, but my friends call me Raz.” Raz said.

Lili snorted, and the sound made Raz’ chest do that funny little lurch again. “What are you even doing covered in eggs, anyway?” She asked.

Raz thought back to that lady that had tried to drag him off to places unknown. “Uh… not skipping ‘school’?” He tried, not sure how convincing it was. “Exploring, mostly.” He added.

Lili looked him up and down for a long moment. “You remind me of my uncle Helmut.” She decided, still holding Raz’ hand. After another moment, she nodded, clearly having made up her mind about something. “Right, you’re coming with me.” She said, holding Raz’ hand and starting to walk away.

“Wait—” But Lili wasn’t waiting, and Raz had no choice but to get swept up in her grasp as she ran along. And yet, he wasn’t quite bothered—Raz didn’t know why, but he really wanted to follow her, wherever she led.

Everything on the surface was so much more confusing than Raz was expecting.

But maybe, as he watched Lili’s twintails bounce behind her as she ran, that wasn’t a bad thing.

[blue-pastel-cat]

Xiaobedo Fanfic Recommendation

Welcome to my personal “if you are new to xiaobedo peeps please read these” list. As said before this is my personal list so please feel free to reblog/comment/hit me for not including any gem here. I might miss a lot of them because I am drunk or blind. (mostly have them on my to read and then forgot as I am being assault by real life shit).

I would like to say first that so far there are 150+ Xiaobedo fics on Ao3. I can’t review all of them but I can say that I have read a majority of them. Most of them are just pure love and I would like nothing more than a thousands thank you for all the fic writers who spent their free time writting these gems for us to read for free. But these...these takes the cake as it finds a special landing spot in my heart that I would just thrust them into someone’s hand if they say “I am new to this ship can you recommend me?”

1. Orange dust by bobamilkteas (Wes)

In which Xiao learns to open himself up to the world a little more after the collapse of Rex lapis's contracts but it was not always easy for a soul doomed to eternal damnation. Meanwhile, Albedo liked to tempt fate where the extraordinary are concerned.

If only the traveler's comrades are made of saner bunch.

Comment: Long ago when I like both Albedo and Xiao as a character, I was wondering hmmm....will anyone actually even write about them lmao they never met each other. I am surprise to see this one as the 3rd fic in the whole 3 Xiaobedo fic on Ao3 (yeah back when there’s literally only 3 fic for this couple). I was like I’ll read it for the curiosity, I’ll probably won’t ship them. And that people is how I put my clown make up on my face upon finishing reading it. This ONE fic alone convert me into a devotee of Xiaobedo. Please consider joining me in this circus if you want to know what is Xiaobedo. I would put this as the first of my “Big 3″

Orange Dust also come with its compliation of short stories over the course of the game and a big sequel to it. Please also consider reading ALL OF THEM.

2. Solar Wind by birdpriestess (Sparrow)

For the yaksha, his duty was his life, and his life was his duty. No human could ever hope to understand the eternal war he fought out of sight and in silence.

So why, then, did he feel that Albedo would understand?

---

Finding himself at death's door once more, Xiao is saved by a surprising person, setting off the unlikeliest of adventures.

Comment: Do you like crying? Do you like the feeling of getting your heart ripped into pieces as the author destroy your emotions over the end of each chapter as the story picked up the climax? Yeah, this one is for you masochists. The action, the characterisation, the drama THE EMOTIONS OH WOW. I kid you not that it was so good I read this while workinng when I am not suppose to me. Also, this fic has my favourite characterisation of Gold ever. I love that dramatic queen Mad Alchemist. AND DAIN. I LOVE DAIN IN THIS FIC. Our dearest Sparrow manage to toy with our feelings like how I bully ruin guard for big numbers lmao. This is the secound of “Big 3″ of my Xiaobedo list.

Again, just like Orange Dust, Solar Wind comes with its own compliation of short stories of what came after that. Please also consider reading ALL OF THEM.

3. Castle of Glass by AlchemicalStardust (Morgie) 

A black shadow rises over Huaguang Stone Forest. Caught in the wrong place at the wrong time, Albedo flees the shaking ground and the crash of boulders tumbling form the sky. As the dust settles, Albedo finds a young man – an Adeptus – amidst the carnage. Despite the karmic agony ripping his body from the inside, Xiao’s only question is “How?” How did a human survive after witnessing his battle?

Comment: The last of the “Big 3″ of my Xiaobedo list. And it is still on going! Castle of Glass? More like I AM IN A GLASS CASE OF EMOTIONS! Have you read a fic about 2 people yearning, longing, reaching out for each other so damn well that you just want to throw your phone in the air as they both had their impending doom coming down upon them? Yeah this is one of them. You will like want to be stuck in the moment they express how much they just yearn for each other’s love and care that you want to shake the author for what comes next. Like...everytime Morgie update I am expressing my gratitude at the end of the chapter by writing on Xiaobedo discord “MORGIE COME HERE AND LET ME BONK YOU WHY ARE YOU ENDING IT THERE”

trust me when you read you will def feel the same. With just Big 3 and their compliation alone that would give you like a LONG list of reading already LMAOOOOOOO

4. Find a place to call it home  by yamajiroo 

Our room, he said. Xiao’s brow twitches. Zhongli never said anything about this. But then again, perhaps he should anticipate this from the beginning...

Xiao looks over at Albedo, who is now tilting his head, his look as innocent as ever.

“Are you not okay with sharing a room?”

Comment: College AU for Xiaobedo! One thing that I love this is the slow burn and what made me LOVE LOVE LOVE this fic more is how cute Klee is in this fic. Their relationship in this one is very simple, but that simplicity highlight why their chemistry work. Xiao is someone who was just very gentle, who was largely misunderstood by his lonesome nature. Albedo was someone who like peace and quite in his introvert bubble. And how they respect that bubble that each other has actually made their relationship work. I love it when fic highlight this and this one captures it.

5. I Can't See Your Face From the Other Side of the Classroom by MissWeaver  

When Albedo and Xiao unexpectedly start eating lunch together, they begin to find that they have more in common than anyone would have realized. They both struggle in their own ways with blossoming feelings, too many assignments, and annoying classmates as they navigate a relationship for the first time.

Comment: I’ll be honest, I usually hate high school au just because its so cliche. I don’t even watch and drama/anime surrounds high school student anymore LMAOOO (unless it’s very good). So if there’s an high school AU that I actually keep come back and read after a couple of chapters, it means that the cliche that I hate wasn’t there or barely was there at all. The pinning in this fic makes me want to bang their head together sometimes LMAOOO The tag wasn’t kidding when they said both Xiao and Albedo are bad at feelings. Also that’s a lot of heart broken caused by these two idiots XD

6. new world, same me, same bullshit  by  bobamilkteas (Wes)

At the belly of Dragonspine, Albedo lost control to the festering corruption that permeated his senses and watched, from the recesses of his mind, as his devoured body turned his allies into enemies. Before his rampage reached its climax, he is sealed in a crystalized confinement by the last hand of Reindottir, where he then reawakens centuries after, in a rebooted Teyvat.

Comment: Yeah I know it was list in Orange Dust but here me out. This sets out in an entirely different universe. And if you like Polyamory, this one has Zhongli joining the duo and I love it because I also love ZhongXiao with my life. Time Travel is my biggest kink. Especially when I am the person who love it when people explore Archon War era/ Alatus!Xiao. So this one hits double of my kink. Of course it is still on going and I will bully Wes whenever I can to see that new chapter. Albedo is a total fucking badass in this story and I completely agree from using him in Abyss so often. Everyone should write badass Albedo.

7. misplaced heart of mine by  inkburn           

“If you are ill, then you should be resting at home. In Mondstadt.” He emphasized Mondstadt with a pointed look in his direction.

“I assure you I won’t be troublesome, Adeptus Xiao,” Albedo said, “You’ll find I’m a rather low-maintenance traveler.”

“Travel,” Xiao scoffed, “without airstep?”

Albedo looked him up and down. “Are your legs just for decoration?”

(albedo is sent to liyue on mandatory vacation. xiao is his unfortunate bodyguard.)

Comment: Most of the time you will see Albedo and Xiao starting their relationship with one of them taking interest in another. But this one took another approach, they starting off by make them hating each other’s guts LMAOOOO and I live for every second of it. There’s only 1 chapter so far but wow it was SOOO GOOD. I am really really excited for next chapter and is waiting patiently ;w;

8.  Blossom of Grace  by birdpriestess  

One day in Liyue Harbor, Albedo watches a street performance by an enigmatic dancer named Xiao. And he becomes completely obsessed.

Comment: Have you ever look at Xiao fight and thinking that he’s one of the most beautiful deadly thing ever? How it was like he was dancing around the battlefield? How about actual dancer Xiao being so absolutely beautiful and perfect and that slow burn of Albedo falling in love with that beauty with a touch of Modern AU and cute Ganyu as the Wing woman. Yes, Sparrow delivers yet again another beautiful slow burn and while it’s still ongoing it is worth the read.

9. i think we could make this work (could get used to this) by outspaced               

“Xiao? What are you doing out here?”

“I—”

“It’s raining,” Albedo says, as if it isn’t obvious. “You could get struck by lightning.”

“What are you doing out here then?” Xiao does the only thing he knows how to do, he challenges Albedo. “It’s raining.”

Albedo just hums. “If I get struck by lightning, it’s for science.”

Comment: A short one-shot where I read the summary and went “This is it... this is their relationship.” I am sold immediately. Oh god Albedo why are you like this.

10. Ephemeral by criedprinz        

“It’s not for your investigation, is it?” Aether asked mildly.

Albedo traced a finger around the sketchbook, considering the question. “No,” he admitted finally. “I... I just want to see them again.”

He opened the sketchbook to reveal the drawing he’d just finished. Aether nodded, clearly recognizing the sharp golden eyes.

“Xiao,” he said. “You were rescued by an adeptus.”

When a visit to Dragonspine goes horribly wrong, Albedo is rescued by an unknown stranger, wielding powers he's never heard of. Led on a search to find out who it is, he finds himself in the middle of an unforgettable encounter..

Comment: A really really well written one-shot that I love. The yearning oh godddd the yearning from Albedo side is just so so much that I have to put it here. (I think you can see the trend here lmao. I am a sucker for yearning). And the moment they get to meet each other again is just chef kiss. MWHAA

11. Idle Yaksha, Brilliant Yaksha by Pit0fTheEarth

Alatus didn’t have a lot of responsibilities to keep. He spent most of his days dancing across the sky and eating away all nightmares that plagued a person’s sleep.

But one fortunate encounter led to too many unfortunate ones, taking his carefree existence and plunging it in darkness. His wings, stripped from him. His gentle touch, replaced by an unforgiving grip of destruction.

There was a lot of blood on his hands. With each passing moment, it became harder for Alatus to recall the last time someone gently held him.

Comment: This is one of the ongoing fic where I am very very much excited on the take of Naberius. And the way the author portray Xiao when he’s still the innocent Alatus is just *clench fist*. Baby ;w; Baby why do you have to lose all that innocence. Also the fic has long LONG flashback to Xiao past and his relationship with Naberius. We are unwielding more what happened to both of them and why perhaps does this have to do with Albedo.

That’s it for now, might add more later! Thank you <3

[dededaio]

Since I saw at least two other people asking about your thoughts and ideas for what a new Kirby anime would look like I felt like mentioning that a long while ago I made a weird AU that's basically meant to be the anime of it had more game stuff in it (idk how to describe it but like it would also be 100 "episodes" and most would follow similar premises but all the characters would be ones from the games and the roles would be more fitting. And the main villainous force would be Dark Matter instead of Nightmare), and also good guy Dedede (Some other characters still had their moralities altered, like I think Sectonia [so for once Taranza gets to be happy], though).

I forgot a lot of details on what I had in mind for it and I should probably remake the idea soon (especially now that forgotten land is out) but I know that the way I imagined Dedede in that AU was that like the first episode would have Kirby saving him from Dark Matter Swordsman's possession so they'd immediately start out on much friendlier terms, though he'd probably still be at least skeptical, but pretty early into the "series" Kirby wins him over. i can't remember when I exactly but I don't think it was more than 20 "episodes" in, and before that it wasn't anywhere near hostile either.

and then in the au's equivalent to the episode flower power (the one where lovely is basically a weed/parasite to whispy woods) the plot had Kirby getting some kind of flower-related parasite thing (probably dark matter-related) when Dedede brings him along to Floralia for something (I can't remember all the specifics, it's been months) and Dedede kinda almost watches him die (or at least he sees him collapse from the exhaustion/drained energy). Kirby's fine in the end (I think the "climax" had something to do with Miracle Fruits and those being the only cure? I really need to revisit this thing) but I know I imagined that for a good while after that Dedede would end up being like extremely overprotective out of a mix of fear and guilt, but eventually he would have to learn that smothering Kirby didn't really help him (or at least it usually did more harm than good) and that Kirby can still take care of himself pretty well, just that he was a kid and needed to learn things like stranger danger and whatnot.

something like that. I'll probably rewrite it eventually. What do you think?

these ideas are really interesting. i was myself thinking of making a fanfic where i basically just do "fixed" version of kirby anime, but i got really lazy with writing lately lol. haven't even finished my latest big fanfic i started despite it having pretty cool story all things considered.

[weareallstardustfallen]

my time has come. 2, 5, and 9 for mccrodak?

2: what scene did you first put down?

the first one lol, i write linearly. as far as which scene i first thought of, it was probably also the first one, but more generally just the like,,, first half of the fic kind of appeared in my head mostly-fully formed? the original idea was just "mythro runs away and ends up on the mcc server, where he sneaks around the crew" but i sorted out most of the plot while infodumping to eros

5: what part was hardest to write?

the end! i kept worrying that it wouldn't feel resolved, especially because it doesn't really have a climax or anything; the latter part of the fic just kind of slowly winds down until it kinda,,,, stops, and it was really hard to find a spot where it felt like it should end, because i knew more about the future of that au but it wouldn't have worked to just keep it going together. honestly, i was terrified while i was posting it that the end wasn't going to be satisfying, but that doesn't seem to be an issue people have had?

9: were there any alternate versions of this fic?

hmm it never really went anywhere, but when i first came up with the idea i wasn't sure who i was going to have find mythro, and i actually did briefly consider the hermits! so in another lifetime there's a world where i wrote a fic of mythro being found and brought back to hermitcraft for his found family/healing arc instead, which would be interesting but i like the story i ended up telling :]

[shinneth]

SUF as a whole just left me with an empty feeling.

I feel you there, anon. In Dreams aside, I could take or leave the rest of this series (and in most cases, leaning well towards the latter sentiment). 

But I guess that’s to be expected when 90% of SUF focused squarely on Steven’s PTSD and need for therapy and the many, many red flags shown as early on as the beginning that signaled his eventual breakdown to where he ended up in the climax.

Especially with the fanbase itself constantly screeching that Steven needs therapy, Steven has PTSD, Steven’s gonna corrupt, et cetera… like, it was all laid on far too thick. So when we got to Growing Pains, it really didn’t move me like it did so many others because it came off as such a “No shit, Sherlock” moment for me when Priyanka finally addressed the underlying issues the show itself really didn’t even bother trying to be subtle about.

Don’t get me wrong; a lot of people who have suffered (or are presently suffering) from the same problems as Steven irl have been helped a lot by these kinds of episodes, and I do appreciate that.

But from my personal standpoint, yeah… I knew from the start that Steven’s underlying issues alone were not gonna be enough to sustain a full series, and sure enough, it wasn’t. We got to see some bits here and there with the other characters, but we also had a few choice characters be really shitty people in season 5 that never got properly addressed before it concluded, and with the timeskip in SUF, all of that just got handwaved off as “dealt with offscreen”, which is the laziest BS ever. 

And worst of all, at the end, they really didn’t stick the landing well at all. I’ll at least say SUF’s resolution wasn’t the mega levels of offensively terrible as Change Your Mind - but then again, it’s hard to out-do giving totalitarian space dictators with countless lives lost under their watch a fucking FACE-TURN out of nowhere. 

Like, really, the Diamonds’ presence (White especially) in SUF actively made my viewing experience even worse towards the end. Yes, I should be glad they’re establishing that the Diamonds are at least starting to use their powers for good and rebuild some of the lives they ruined.

But, y’know… doesn’t change the fact that they’re all responsible for multiple counts of global genocide. Like, any living creatures native to their colony planets? They’re still fucking gone. And the Diamonds themselves just come off VERY unnatural as “nice” guys - and in many cases, they’re even creepier now than they were as villains. Good god, White’s blubbering in the climax was fucking insufferable, though. 

Partially I think this comes from SU being a “kids show” so there’s this pressing need to end things as cleanly as possible. I’m more miffed that in the end, Steven still got pretty much everything he wanted.

They had some admittedly good set-ups to Steven’s growth, like having him accept that people grow up, change, and move on with their lives. We see the clear evidence that Steven’s got an unhealthy clinginess towards his human friends - and Connie’s no exception. 

And considering they took the time to establish that:

Connie has friends other than Steven. She gets along with them just fine, so it’s not like she’s totally lonely or isolated without him.

Connie is ambitious with many goals and aspirations when it comes to her education and potential career paths. She’s shown to have put a lot of thought into her options and at no point comes off as feeling pressured by her parents or friends into this.

Connie knows she has to work hard and often to achieve her dreams, and despite that rigid lifestyle, it doesn’t seem to bother her in the least. That would imply she really wants to reach these goals she set for herself, whether or not Steven’s in the picture at all.

Connie and Steven’s dynamic is a far cry from how it was when they started out in the original series. You can tell Steven has no clue what Connie’s talking about when it comes to her goals and just plays along, pretending he understands anything coming out of her mouth.

Connie, despite what her speech would lead you to believe, has been every bit as insufferably dense as the gems in SUF when it comes to Steven’s issues. In Bismuth Casual, Steven’s very specifically-worded concerns were misconstrued as a fear of skating (or his inability to, whatever) - and in the end, they just became Stevonnie rather than properly talked things through. You know, something PERIDOT 100% did in the prior episode.

Connie is very firm about wanting to live her life as herself. She’s not against being Stevonnie from time to time, but like hell does she want to be Stevonnie for the long term. 

Connie knows marrying in general at her age is a stupid-stupid-stupid idea, even if it is Steven. And considering her well-established commitment to her studies and reaching her lofty goals, Connie - at least at the time - seemed to know a relationship with anyone just wasn’t in the cards for her at this point in her life. There’s no need to rush that shit, and she won’t compromise her life just to give her needy friend this thing he wants that he doesn’t even fully understand truly is. 

Or, you know… just have Connie backpedal hard on a good chunk of that and date Steven so that he won’t become a monster again. I’m mostly kidding with that - but by kissing his monstrous self and that triggering his restoration, then soon later we see that even though Steven and Connie can only have a long-distance relationship at best, she’s dating him right now anyway even though this needlessly makes her life way more complicated than it needed to be - like seriously, how can I not take that as Canon Connverse being founded on the condition of “Okay, if it’ll keep you from losing your shit, going pink, and turning into a monster, I’ll date you”?!

And in the end it yet again gives Steven more-or-less exactly what he wants, even if it isn’t something he really needs. 

I’m glad Rebecca clarified that Steven would still visit Beach City often, because I had a very hard time buying him just traveling by himself on the road. And maybe it would have worked better if he was just doing it short-term to “find himself” or something along those lines, but nope! They’re basically saying this is what Steven wants to do.

And honestly, even that is dampened with his clearly-stated intention of visiting Connie way more than he intends to visit the gems. Even though Connie’s gonna be busy. With college.

This just… wasn’t a good ending. It had plenty of good moments - his goodbye to Bismuth, Lapis, and Peridot especially was very well-executed and the closest this finale came to drawing out any real emotion out of me. I loved the scene of Steven giving Greg his room; that was adorable. The last meeting with Tsundere Jasper was amusing.

But everything else… ehhh.

I mean, what can we really take from this season that I haven’t already outlined? The biggest takeaways were the plot points everyone saw coming a mile away that weren’t even executed all that well. 

In Dreams, as great at is was, might as well have not even happened - because what really carried over from that episode through to the end? Even though Peridot was the only one who got through to Steven, legitimately comforted him and addressed his fears, and the episode for once ended with Steven being happy with no underlying concerns about his problems - immediately he’s back to being awkward and depressed and frustrated by Bismuth Casual.

And I get that shit like trauma shouldn’t be resolved so easily, but for what In Dreams accomplished, I expected there to at least be a semblance of progress. Steven’s known since that episode he can hang out with Peridot and talk to her about whatever without needing a reason to do it, but he never ever takes her up on that again. 

So again, what was the point? 

You really get the impression that the quality of writing took a backseat just to emphasize the symbolism of an issue people commonly have, but SUF’s execution stretched my suspension of disbelief far beyond its limits. 

And nothing stretched that farther than Connie’s insufferable fucking speech in I Am My Monster; that pretty much completely made In Dreams feel like it never really happened in SUF’s continuity. 

In some ways, I just prefer to believe In Dreams was just a dream itself. An AU offshoot in SUF itself. Considering it’s so ridiculously good compared to the other nineteen episodes and by far the most pure and wholesome, maybe that’s the best way to see it. 

In Dreams was too good for its own series. That’s literally the only thing I personally took from SUF as a whole (at least in terms of lasting impact). 

So yeah, I guess for only one episode of twenty to really hit me in the feels, “empty” is an apt way to describe the series, anon. 

Seriously, if I didn’t have my own massive SU-AU to mess around in and do things properly, this probably would have upset me more. 

Instead, I just chuckle at Rebecca’s Monster Steven and raise her to what I’m putting my version of Steven through in my current story. Where I’m pulling all the stops to make other characters matter even though the stars are undoubtedly Peridot and Steven. 

And I’m actually making actions yield serious, lasting consequences.

(yeah, part of me wishes Jasper wasn’t revived - or alternatively, have Steven accidentally shatter White Diamond instead of Jasper since he came awfully close in canon

or even better, shatter Jasper and revive her, then accidentally shatter White and not be able to revive her since Steven used up ALL that diamond essence on Jasper…

yeah I’m kind of a monster)

Your pain is mutually felt, anon. So I’ll prescribe you endless refills of better-written and better-executed SU fanon to heal the emptiness SUF left inside you.

[vexedtonightmares]

prompt via @draymalfoi​: Could you please write a friends AU of the scene where Chandler kisses every one after coming from London because he doesn't want to reveal his relationship with Monica! 

The One With All the Kissing

Lucas was hanging out with Eliott and the boys, playing video games mindlessly the first time they slipped up. He and Eliott had only been dating a few weeks after pining for years, and none of their friends knew yet. They didn’t want to have to deal with all the questions that would come with the announcement, so they decided to give themselves time to navigate their relationship without outside input for a while. 

It was a good idea, in theory, but sometimes they forgot that it was a secret. Lingering looks did more than linger and they had to pass it off as zoning out so often that their friends probably secretly thought there was something wrong with them. 

“Fuck,” Eliott whispered to himself, frowning down at his phone from where he sat beside Lucas. They’d been discreetly holding hands, crossing their legs just so to make it impossible for the other boys to see them. Not that they were paying attention anyway. 

Lucas furrowed his brows and looked at Eliott. “What’s up?”

“Nothing.” Eliott shook his head. “Just a study session I forgot about, which means I’ve gotta run.”

“Booooo…” Basile called from the floor, pausing the game to focus his attention on the conversation. Arthur and Yann nodded in agreement, looking at Eliott with understanding sympathy. Eliott subtly released Lucas’ hand from his grip.  

“Yeah,” Eliott agreed, “It sucks, but if I don’t go I’m not passing my exam, so…”

“Well, know that we’ll spend our time crying until you can return,” Arthur reassured him, and Eliott laughed, throwing a pillow at him as he stood up. He made his way around the room to gather up his things before returning to where Lucas was sitting and leaning down. 

Before Lucas could register what was happening, their lips were pressed together. It was a great kiss, and he might have enjoyed it if his eyes weren’t frozen wide open in shock, the look reflected on Yann, Arthur, and Basile’s faces. Eliott broke away with a soft, contented look before seeing Lucas’ face. “See you later,” he said, then realized his mistake. 

Lucas blinked rapidly and Eliott did the same. He could tell they were both thinking the same thing: fuck. 

Eliott recovered more quickly than Lucas expected and he had to do a double take to make sure that what he was seeing was actually happening. After blinking again and rubbing his eyes, he confirmed that it was. 

Eliott was bent down over Arthur, pulling his face up to meet his for a brief kiss. After they broke apart, Eliott moved on to Yann, then Basile, giving each of them a kiss. He cleared his throat after straightening up, giving them all a two fingered salute, rushing out the door before any of them could say a word. 

Arthur looked a bit dazed, Yann confused, and Basile kept touching his lips as if he wasn’t sure what had just happened. Lucas didn’t know what he looked like, but he could bet it was a mixture of the emotions reflected on his friend’s faces. 

Arthur was the first to break the silence. “What the hell was that?”

“Eliott… he just… did he… we…” Basile was stammering, and Lucas might have laughed had he not been paranoid about what everyone might say about the whole thing. He’d have to nip it in the bud before they thought about it too closely.

“Maybe it’s something he picked up when he was travelling,” Lucas suggested with a shrug. Eliott had been away the month before school had started up again, touring various countries in Europe with his parents. It had been at that point that Lucas’ feelings had reached their climax and when Eliott got home they could hardly stay away from one another. Absence did, in fact, make the heart grow fonder, and though Lucas had been upset when Eliott had said he would be away for a month, the month apart had allowed them to reach a conclusion about their feelings for one another and everything had been amazing since then, so Lucas had no reason to complain about it after all. 

Yann raised his eyebrows in disbelief. “He travelled around the continent, not to a different planet.”

“Still,” Lucas argued, “We don’t know everything about various European customs. Have you ever even left Paris?”

“I have, as a matter of fact, and no one kissed me randomly,” Yann said with an uptick of one of his eyebrows. Lucas didn’t know what to do but shrug again. 

Basile’s eyes widened. “Maybe he has a crush on one of us.”

“Oh, come on Baz,” Arthur laughed, hitting Basile on the upside of his head. “First of all, I think Eliott is straight, and second of all, he’s literally the least subtle person in the world. If he liked someone, especially one of us, we’d know.”

He knew there were other things to be focusing on, but Lucas couldn’t help the surge of satisfaction that had arisen in him. Everyone thought Eliott wore his heart on his sleeve to quite the extreme, and it just wasn’t true. Sure, Eliott did express his emotions in much more visible ways than most people would sometimes, but the deeper part of his love was only visible to the person he had those feelings for. Lucas was just lucky enough that person happened to be him. 

Plus, it meant that they’d been surprisingly good at hiding their feelings for one another. 

“Why aren’t you freaking out, Lulu?” Yann asked with genuine curiosity. He definitely would have been, if Eliott’s kiss had come from nowhere, and Yann knew him enough to know that. 

Lucas blinked a few times to stall as he thought of an excuse. “Because it’s not the first time he’s done that since he got back. That’s why I assumed it was a travelling thing.”

Arthur choked out a cough. “Excuse me?”

“The other day,” Lucas lied, realizing he was digging himself quite the hole, “We hung out and Idriss and Sofiane came over too and he did the same thing when we left.” He should have just pretended to freak out as much as Basile still was. 

“He’s not…” Yann trailed off, but Lucas caught where he was going. He bristled unintentionally, but it was Basile who answered. 

“Just because he did one little weird thing it doesn’t mean he’s having a manic episode,” Basile stated plainly. 

Yann bit his lip, “I didn’t mean—”

“Yes you did, and it’s natural to think that, you can’t imagine the amount of times I thought that when my mom made too much food for dinner or woke up too early it meant she was having an episode, but people with bipolar disorder can still have some quirks without it meaning that something’s not right,” Basile explained, and Yann looked at his hands. 

“I’m sorry, I guess I’m just not that knowledgeable about bipolarity and all that,” Yann apologized, but Basile shook his head. “Like I said, it’s ok, you just have to try to become a bit more knowledgeable, especially when one of your friends is bipolar himself,” Basile suggested gently. 

Lucas was and wasn’t surprised that Basile had jumped so readily to Eliott’s defense. Of all of them, he’d been the most receptive when Eliott had told them he was bipolar a few months after they’d met. Lucas, Yann, and Arthur hadn’t even known Basile’s mother was bipolar until then either. The part that did surprise him was that Basile was still so willing to step in and try to educate them when they were either being ignorant or complete dumbasses without realizing it. He probably would have gotten fed up with it after a while. Actually, he knew that he would, because he had to do the same fielding questions and assumptions about his sexuality. 

“We can all still agree that was weird though, right?” Arthur clarified, and Lucas was sure to nod along with the others. Thankfully, the subject was dropped, but Lucas knew that he and Eliott would have to be more careful from then on. 

***

The second time they slipped up, Lucas and Eliott were taking a bath together. They had the flat to themselves for the night, or so they thought, so they decided to make a romantic evening out of it. Eliott had even brought over some mini battery powered candles and a bottle of sparkling apple juice they could pretend was real champagne.

They’d barely had time to clink their glasses together, giggly love drunk messes that they were, when Lucas heard a door slam. Eliott widened his eyes. “I thought you said no one was home for the night.”

“I thought no one was home for the night!”

“Well what do we do?”

Lucas considered their options. If it was Lisa, they didn’t have to worry about anything, she was so oblivious that she probably wouldn’t even notice if they made all the noise in the world, and if she did, Lucas could convince her he’d just had a one time hookup. Manon might cause more trouble. She wouldn’t barge into the bathroom or anything, but she would definitely notice that Lucas had someone over and definitely question him about it until he gave in. If it was Mika, they were screwed. He had no qualms about barging into the bathroom and would probably want to sit there and talk with Lucas until he was done in the bath, especially if Eliott was there too. 

“Kitten! You better be decent!” 

Fuck. He and Eliott communicated with a wide eyed gaze before Eliott dove his head under the water, just as Mika walked in. Mika opened his mouth, then closed at as he took in the sight. Lucas was sure it looked quite odd, him sitting in the bath alone surrounded by fake candles and fake champagne. Mika looked at him sympathetically. “Did a grindr date stand you up?” 

“What? No!” At least his reaction was genuine, that had most definitely not been the question he’d expected from Mika. 

Mika gestured to the scene. “Then…?”

“Can’t a guy treat himself every once and awhile?” Lucas scoffed, realizing that Eliott was still underwater holding his breath. Lucas poked Eliott’s foot with his to make sure that he was still alive down there. Eliott poked him back and he nearly let out a sigh of relief. 

Mika nodded enthusiastically. “Yeah, of course, you do you. I guess I just didn’t think that this was… you.”

“I’m trying to get more in touch with my softer side, break down the barriers of toxic masculinity, you know?” He felt Eliott kick him gently and he wondered if it was an accident or if Eliott could hear his bullshit. 

Mika was eating it up, though. “Oh, of course. I do things like this all the time. So sorry for interrupting, kitten, I’ll leave you be.”

“Thanks, Mika, you’re the best,” Lucas smiled, hoping it appeared genuine. Mika turned to leave and Eliott had almost raised his head to the surface when Mika turned back around and Lucas not so subtly pushed him back down. He tried to cover it up as if he’d been shifting into a new position in the bathtub. 

Mika narrowed his eyes again, but then thankfully decided to ignore Lucas’ weirdness. “I almost forgot, I came in to ask if you wanted anything from the bakery on the corner? Manon will kill me for eating something she hasn’t baked, but their chocolate éclairs are to die for.”

“I’m good, thanks Mika,” he said hurriedly. Eliott was going to kill him if he wasn’t already dead. Mika waved over his shoulder as he finally left, closing the door behind him. 

Eliott resurfaced with a loud gasp and Lucas shushed him, earning a look that screamed Really? After I almost drowned for your dumbass? When Lucas heard the door slam again, he slumped against the side of the bath, laughing weakly. 

Eliott flicked water onto his face and Lucas scrunched up his nose in outrage. “Seriously!”

“Yes, seriously,” Eliott said, flicking more water, “I just won the world record for breath-holding and you sit there and laugh.”

“You didn’t win a world record, it was like, a minute,” Lucas pointed out, even though it had probably been longer. 

Eliott raised his eyebrows. “Oh really? You weren’t scared I died?” His eyes glimmered with mischief and Lucas could feel himself falling more and more in love.

“No way, you suck at holding your breath.” 

“Oh, I suck?” Eliott challenged, and before Lucas knew it, his feet were being pulled so he slid closer to Eliott, head falling below the water in the process. 

“Dick!” he exclaimed in outrage when he popped his head back up. “Asshole!”

Eliott nodded. “Yup, those are both things you probably saw down there.”

Lucas couldn’t contain the scandalized laugh that bubbled up in his chest. Eliott laughed too, pulling Lucas closer still, more gently this time. “And I believe you’re the one who sucks at holding their breath.”

“I wasn’t even trying, you ass,” Lucas said as he folded his arms around Eliott’s shoulders. Eliott leaned his head in and hummed against Lucas’ mouth. “Even though you suck at that, I’m still going to make a movie about you,” he said. He’d been saying it since they first started dating, coming up with ridiculous fake titles every time Lucas did something embarrassing. 

Lucas drew away slightly, smirking. “Oh yeah? What’s it going to be called this time? Lucas Lallemant, boyfriend extraordinaire!”

“No… not catchy enough.” Eliott paused, leaning back in for a small kiss. Lucas happily obliged. “I was thinking The Boy Who Couldn’t Hold His Breath Underwater.”

Lucas scoffed, splashing Eliott in retaliation. “Fuck. Off,” he said, but he couldn’t stop giggling, melting into Eliott’s arms. 

***

The third time, they really should have known better. The foyer was definitely not the most private place, but they generally had a hard time keeping their hands off one another as it was, and the foyer was empty at the time of their arrival. 

Lucas had his arms thrown around Eliott’s neck, bodies pressed together so very closely. Eliott’s mouth searched his, and he searched back with even more passion, forgetting where he ended and Eliott began. 

The door banged open and they shot apart, looking at the stunned faces of Daphné, Alexia, Arthur, and Imane. Eliott closed his eyes and Lucas could see the moment he came to a decision, realizing exactly what that decision would be the moment before Eliott said, “Well, see you later, then,” and stepped forward, pulling Daphné into an equally passionate kiss. Lucas fixed his hair in the meantime, pretending that this was all normal. 

Once he separated from Daphné, he moved on to Alexia, who looked shocked but not entirely opposed to the idea. He supposed he couldn’t fault her for that, Eliott was hot. Daphné looked at Lucas in a daze and Lucas shrugged nonchalantly. 

Arthur got another kiss too, but at least he was expecting it this time. He pulled back first, looking at Eliott with a crease between his eyebrows. Eliott turned to where Imane stood right in front of the door. She pointed her finger at him, opening the door. “Don’t even think about it,” she said, and Eliott nodded hurriedly, ducking his head before bolting out the door. 

“He’s still doing that?” Arthur asked Lucas, and Lucas nodded. 

“He’s done that before?” Imane asked incredulously. 

Arthur looked between her and Lucas. “Yeah, once the other day when it was me, Lucas, Baz, and Yann, and then another time before that with—” he cut off when he saw Lucas’ look of warning. The last thing he wanted was for Imane to learn that he’d lied about Eliott kissing Sofiane and Idriss. 

Imane narrowed her eyes and Lucas jumped in. “With Mika, Lisa, and I.”

“I can’t believe Eliott Demaury just kissed me,” Daphné said, touching her lips gently. Alexia laughed at Daphné’s reaction. “I wouldn’t get used to it,” she said sorrowfully, placing a hand on Daphné’s shoulder. 

“I didn’t mind it,” Arthur said casually. Lucas stared at him in alarm. “I mean, the first time was a surprise, but kissing Eliott isn’t too bad.”

“Join us on the dark side,” Alexia pleaded, gesturing between herself and Lucas. Arthur shrugged again, licking his bottom lip absently. Dear god, the last thing Lucas needed was for Arthur to develop a crush on his boyfriend. Of course, if anyone was to trigger Arthur’s sexual awakening, it had to be Eliott. 

Lucas put his face in his hands, wondering what exactly he’d done to deserve this sort of karmic revenge. 

***

All the boys and girls were hanging out at the colloc and Eliott and Lucas were sitting a few feet apart, mostly for their own sanity. Lucas briefly wondered if Eliott was going to kiss every one of them before he left that night. 

Basile cleared his throat during a lull in conversation and placed a hand on Eliott’s knee. Eliott startled slightly and gave Basile his attention, eyebrows cinching in confusion. “Listen, bro, we gotta talk.”

“Oh?” Eliott asked, looking briefly at Lucas, who shrugged. 

“You can’t keep kissing everyone when you leave the room. It’s getting weird,” Basile said seriously, and Lucas choked on his drink. 

Eliott’s eyes widened in discomfort. “I’m sorry?”

“No, it’s fine, man, really, we get that you probably picked it up from somewhere you travelled to over the summer, but we don’t do that here. Save the kissing for whenever you get a girlfriend.” Basile patted Eliott’s knee once, and Lucas almost laughed at how extremely uncomfortable he looked. 

“Or boyfriend,” Arthur suggested, winking, and making Eliott look even more confused and uncomfortable. Lucas tipped his head back, trying to hold in a sigh of exasperation. How did he get himself in these sorts of situations? Really? 

“I won’t lie, I didn’t hate it,” Alexia added, “But yeah, you should stop.”

“It’s just a weird thing to do,” Yann explained. 

“Really weird,” Lucas found himself saying, earning a bemused glance from Eliott. Shut up, asshole, he told him with his eyes, I’m doing this for our benefit. Then again, maybe it would be easier to just come clean with their relationship, but when had either of them ever gone about things in an easy way?

“Ok,” Eliott said warily, “I’ll, uh, stop.”

Yann clapped his hands once. “Now that that’s cleared up, who wants more beer?” he asked, forcing a bright smile. Emma and Manon, the only ones who hadn’t been privy to all the kissing, still looked slightly confused, but they were, thankfully, willing to drop the conversation. 

“I can grab them,” Eliott said, standing up. Everyone looked at him in alarm, and he rolled his eyes. “I’m not going to kiss any of you, but I could use a hand. Lucas?”

Lucas hopped up immediately and joined him, following about two paces behind. Fortunately, no one found it odd and they resumed their conversations. Once alone in the kitchen, Eliott doubled over laughing. Lucas smacked his arm. “Eliott! Shh! They’ll hear you!”

“Do I even care anymore?” Eliott asked between gasps of laughter. “They already think I’m weird.”

“You are weird.”

“Ha ha.”

“Are you serious, though?” Lucas asked. “Do you think we should tell them?”

Eliott shrugged, pulling Lucas in by the waist from where he’d leaned against the counter after his laugh attack. “It’s up to you.”

Lucas raised himself up on his toes and kissed Eliott hungrily, hands running through Eliott’s tangled, perfect hair. Eliott cupped his hands around Lucas’ face like he always did, and Lucas smiled into the kiss, teeth clanging clumsily. He pulled away slightly, eyes heavy as he turned his gaze up to Eliott. “I don’t care if they know.”

Eliott’s eyes softened, then widened in surprise as he looked up slightly. He pushed Lucas away a bit abruptly and coughed into his hand. “I think they already do?”

“What?” Lucas asked, then turned to see what Eliott was looking at. 

All of their friends were standing in the entrance to the kitchen, looking not at all upset that they’d been caught. Imane held out her hand to Yann, who grudgingly handed her some money. Lucas didn’t catch how much, but it was enough to make him scoff. “Really?”

Imane shrugged. “You guys were asking for it.”

“To be fair, I totally thought it was some weird cultural thing,” Basile chimed in needlessly. 

“But how— why did you—” Lucas stammered. 

“Manon pointed out that she’s been all over Europe and no one goes around randomly kissing people, and Imane pointed out the common denominator of all the kissing occurrences,” Alexia explained, gesturing to Lucas.

Lucas crossed his arms. “So you decided to spy on us?”

The eight of them looked back and forth between one another, then nodded. Eliott laughed softly behind Lucas, and Lucas glowered at him. “It’s not funny.”

“It is,” Eliott said, pulling Lucas back by his hips and folding his arms around Lucas’ stomach now that he could do so in front of everyone. He dropped his chin onto Lucas’ shoulder and Lucas instinctively leaned his head on top. 

“Ugh,” Emma said, “If we’d have known you two would be this gross we would have let it be.”

“Seriously? We’re not even doing anything!” Lucas exclaimed incredulously.

Alexia squinted. “No, but you do look sickeningly in love which is, frankly, an affront to the rest of us.”

“Yeah, I thought we had something, man,” Arthur smirked, and Lucas couldn’t tell if he was joking or not. Eliott ignored him and kissed Lucas’ cheek. “Sorry not sorry,” he said, and Lucas could hear the mischievous smile in his voice.

“You’re still weird,” Imane called over her shoulder as she turned to leave the room now that the show was over. Everyone followed behind her, but Eliott and Lucas stayed together a moment longer. 

“She’s right, you know,” Lucas said, turning around and pressing a hand to Eliott’s chest. Eliott laughed, eyes sparkling. “So I’ve been told. Can I show you one of the other weird things I picked up in Europe?”

Lucas nodded and suddenly Eliott was picking him up by his thighs, wrapping Lucas’ legs around his waist. Their heads were now at an even plane, so they could kiss without Eliott having to bend down or Lucas having to stand on his toes. “You picked this up in Europe?”

“Mhmm,” Eliott said, leaning closer so their noses brushed together, “We’re in Europe, I just picked you up. And you’re weird.”

“I hate you.”

“You love me.”

“That too.”

“Kiss me.”

Lucas was more than happy to oblige.

[artgurusauce]

Oh hey what’s this an AU without Haudion in it? What sorcery is this, Saucy?

Yes yes, another AU spreadsheet. Twist this time: The prompt ain’t for shipping. I’ve been playing with this specific idea in my head for a while now and after rewatching an old playthrough of God of War 4, I got a tad inspired.

Without further ado, let us begin.

Context: As you can probably already tell, the prompt here was “What if Gladion was much younger when he joined Team Skull?” The question of how young I’m afraid I can’t put into precise numbers buuut, about the age he was in the anime when Lillie was attacked by that Nihilego. I’m assuming he was around 7 at that time but that’s just an estimate. Anyways, he runs away from home after stealing a Pokeball containing a Type:Null from his mother. Unfortunately, he grabbed a rather aggressive Type:Null that is poorly trained. It doesn’t kill him, but it often lashed out at Gladion and attacks him, scratching and headbutting him. One day, in the pouring rain, Guzma finds this crying boy sniveling and covered in all manner of bruises and cuts. Taking pity upon him, he decides to take him in.

1.) New Clothes

Since Gladion’s old clothes while expensive and cozy were absolutely ruined, they had to be replaced. Not only were they soaked, but they were terribly scratched up and beyond repair thanks to Null. Luckily, one of the grunts happens to be an expert in sewing clothes and makes up just the cutest little getup for him. However, she makes the sleeves just a tad too long. Guzma also gives Gladion an old pair of sneakers he used to wear when he was about his age.

2.) Roughhousing

Gladion, even as an older more mature boy is quite the emotional one. Often times he’ll lash out quite easily and it’s not hard to get under his skin. Imagine if you were to upset an even younger Gladion with far less experience, poise and who’s freshly emotionally damaged by his mother’s neglectful behavior, not to mention his frustration with trying to train Type:Null. So it’s not hard to imagine that Gladion still wouldn’t get along with the grunts. In fact, they pick on him even more since he’s so tiny and pathetic and gets far more attention from Guzma seeing as he’s the youngest one and needs more care. Usually it would lead to a grunt stepping out of line, saying something like, “Why don’t you go back home cryin’ to your daddy?” or “I’ll bet your ugly little pet would make a better jacket than a Pokemon.” This would obviously lead little Glad to attempt to beat up the older kids, biting and scratching and kicking them. And of course, Guzma would have to break it up and drag Gladion off to give him a stern talking-to, man to boy. Just what on Earth was Guzma going to do about all this pent up aggression he had?

3.) The Little Moments

Of course eventually after a while it should come as no surprise: The little brat is startin’ to grow on big ol’ bad Guzma. Even for the spoiled rotten, picky, ungrateful rugmuncher he can be sometimes, he’s not quite that bad of a kid. After all, Guzma actually somewhat admires his spunk. It’s not hard for him to see himself in this kid. He knew how scary it was being away from home at such a young age, and especially with such a goliath under his belt with no experience what-so-ever. This illustration is one of a few wholesome little instances you could probably imagine. Poor little Glad got tired from training and fell asleep while listening to one of Guzma’s post-battle lectures. It’s almost kind of cute.

4.) Motherly Advice

Oh but of course, Guzma isn’t the boy’s only parental figure. Plumeria, more docile and passive aggressive in nature is sure to give little Glad any advice he needs. While it is important he learns to toughen up, he’s not a brick wall. She’s there to talk to him whenever he needs it. While at first he’s not privy to talking to her as putting up with Guzma is enough of a challenge in and of itself, eventually, he warms up to her offers to listen when the grunts’ verbal jabs begin to wear down his self-confidence. She also is prone to helping Gladion understand Guzma’s rules and why he’s so hard on the poor little fella. They weren’t so different, even if it didn’t seem that way. “Might be tough for you to believe it, but everybody here has had it rough, even me.” Gladion definitely takes all her advice to heart, frankly just appreciating that someone would just talk to him like...a mother would.

5.) Tough Love

And now we get right back to Gladion’s biggest conundrum: Type:Null. I headcanon pretty much in any AU that there are 3 Type:Nulls in existence: A docile one, an aggressive one, and a pack leader. Gladion this time around ends up taking the aggressive one, not knowing the difference between the Beast Killers. While under Guzma’s wing, Type:Null and Gladion both endure intense and rough training that while unconventional is actually quite necessary. Guzma knows how to handle a bulky mass of rage after all. So first thing’s first, he uses his Golisopod to battle Type:Null in order to help it get out all that pent up aggression and channel it in a productive manner. The more it associated it’s power and ability with Pokemon battle rather than throwing temper tantrums, the better. Golisopod is more than happy to help, which creates a tense rivalry between the two. Often times they will even spar without either of their Trainer’s request. In a similar fashion that Guzma is a mentor to Gladion, Golisopod becomes somewhat of a mentor to Type:Null. Then of course, there’s the trust-building lessons to help Gladion and Type:Null establish a Trainer-Pokemon relationship rather than a Master-Prisoner mentality. It doesn’t quite understand that Gladion is it’s ally, it only knows that it is free from the tazing devices and cold, claustrophobic cages that prevented it from ripping anyone that crossed it to shreds. It had to understand that the boy was it’s friend, not it’s foe. Leading that, Gladion himself would learn how to battle using his Pokemon. A process that requires surprisingly a lot more paper than hands-on studying. After all, he has to memorize all the moves and rules if he’s to become a proper Trainer for that powerhouse.

6.) Am I Supposed To Apologize?

After a long, long, looonnnggg time of building trust and coming to see Guzma like a second father, Gladion finally spills the beans about his mother’s cruelty and his father’s tragic death. Surprisingly, rather than Plumeria, it is Guzma he confides in. He breaks down, confessing every little horrific detail. How his father died in a horrible research accident. How his mother shut them out emotionally after the funeral. How she forced him and his sister to dress perfectly proper in almost all white. How she ridiculed and belittled and shamed them just to make them complicit. How she locked him and Lillie in their rooms for hours on end for simply wearing the wrong shoes. How she took away their Pokemon, saying they weren’t worthy enough children to be Trainers. How she began to pretend as if Gladion didn’t even exist anymore and gave all the attention to his sister just to spite him. All they were to her were ugly, useless children. She didn’t love them anymore, and they didn’t understand. He didn’t understand. He didn’t know what to do. All he wanted to do was run away. But he also wanted to piss her off, give her something to really be upset about. At least then she would give him attention. At least then she would acknowledge him, wouldn’t she? She had to! But she hadn’t even bothered to look for him, she didn’t care about him. She never would. Why did she act like this? Did he do something wrong? Was he supposed to apologize? Why did she hate him so much? Guzma is obviously taken aback by all this and takes pity on the poor boy again, letting him cry out all of his frustrations and woes. Nothing is more painful for Guzma than hearing the things some of these kids he takes in have gone through, but coming from the mouth of someone so young, it also boils his blood. Lusamine will surely regret what she has wrought upon this boy...

7.) Po Town Raid

So I came up with an interesting plot idea, perhaps a sort of climax to this story. Team Skull is still very much a group of criminals. They steal, vandalize, and sometimes even shake down young Trial-Goers who were unfortunate enough to run into one of Guzma’s lackeys. Up to now, nobody really knew where they were hiding out. However, the police somehow found a lead, and raid the entirety of Po Town to arrest and detain everyone. Guzma knows there’s not enough time to save everyone, and decides to make a split second decision as the police come dangerously close to knocking down the door to the mansion. He calls out his Golisopod, ordering Gladion to hide under him and not to come out no matter what he hears. Of course, Gladion is terrified and objects to this, but Guzma manages to convince him that he can handle himself. Begrudgingly, Gladion hides in Golisopod’s grip as it curls up into a ball, shuffling itself under some floor boards beneath a rug on the floor. With bated breath and tears trickling down his face, Gladion is forced to listen quietly as his father figure is arrested and escorted out of the building, insisting there’s no one else left to detain. Golisopod is just as saddened as the boy, hesitant to sit back while it’s Trainer is being hauled off, but obedient enough to keep the boy safe as ordered. After a few hours of complete silence, Gladion and Golisopod finally emerge from their hiding spot, wrought with grief and panic to find Po Town was completely empty and devoid of any other humans or even Pokemon. Everyone was gone.

Sooo another plot twist, I may consider actually writing a fic for this one but obviously not right now. Or I could just keep posting about it here, lol. Honestly I really like this one so I’m definitely gonna continue it regardless. But lemme know what y’all think. 

[abeautifulblog]

12 and 6 for the writing asks?

Yassssss~

12) My favorite place to write is our courtyard patio:

We live in the literal desert, so it gets too hot to be out there during the afternoon, but it’s lovely in the mornings and the evenings, and I’ve got my chair set up with a little rolling desk I built for my laptop. It’s also enclosed, so it’s safe for my blind & stupid cat  to come enjoy the outdoors with me. (No really, I love her but she’s an idiot and also completely blind.)

(And yes, I gave Gene my own hobby when I wrote him as a gardener.)

*

6) Hardest story to write: haaah, I think you guys can probably guess the answer to this, based on which installments took the longest to get out – “Bodies in the Lake” and “Love Like Light.” And the common denominator there was making those nerds bone.

So yeah, now that I can finally talk about what was going on behind the scenes – why did those take so long?

Part of it was just that as the fic came to an end, there were fewer things left to write, so if I got stuck on one thing, there was really nothing else for me to work on in the mean time. “The Old College Try,” for instance, had been in the works since “This House,” but when I was blocked on it, I could put it on the backburner and write six billion remixes of the bake sale instead.

So after the Thanksgiving chapter, when they finally clear the air about Robert’s mental illness, the next item to check off the list was “nerds get sum fuk” – and I really thought they were ready to get down to it. I was planning a comedy romp at a bigfoot-themed ski lodge that would end with them hopping in the sack. I thought their issues were resolved already.

And then it just.

Wasn’t.

Happening.

Was the setting wrong? I’d chosen to put them on holiday as way to shake up the scenery, get them out of their usual (sexless) routine and perhaps embolden them to try something new. Should I have left them at Gene’s house, where Robert feels safe and comfortable? But then what’s the catalyst that makes them do it NOW, when they haven’t done it BEFORE? What makes Robert decide that now is the “right time”? How do I signal to the readers that it’s okay for them to have sex now, when earlier (like in “Ghosts in the Attic”) it would have been disastrous?

But yeah, I had been trying to make them fuck since chapter 18. It’s why that chapter is shot through with sex, why Robert has a boner for basically the entire first half – and not in the freaky-dissonant way that he did in “Ghosts in the Attic,” but as a natural, healthy reaction to his beloved boyfriend rubbing up on him in slinky yoga pants. It was to telegraph that sex is on the agenda, so that it wouldn’t be coming out of left field when they consummated at the end of the chapter.

It’s why the working title for “Bodies in the Lake” was sex_happens.doc – until it became clear that sex wasn’t going to happen. That the issues raised in “Ghosts in the Attic” were still completely unresolved. Indeed, Gene still didn’t even know those issues existed.

Gene is very good at handling Robert’s crises when it’s something he’s been through before with Alex – but when Robert steps off-script, Gene’s suddenly winging it, and it shows. Alex had a lot of sexual partners in the past too – as people who are outgoing and bisexual and dtf often do – but he never did Robert’s brand of self-destructive, self-loathing promiscuity, and so Gene has no understanding of the psychology behind that behavior, or why it’s different from Alex’s form of slutting around.

And then Mary was supposed to just smack some sense into him and shove him back into Gene’s loving arms, but holy shit, did that conversation get derailed. And as an author, when a character looks you in the eye and says, It’s time to talk about this, you let them talk.

That was when my housemate-beta, who’d been there for all my agonizing over how to make them fuck, said, “You have to break this up into two chapters. This conversation here, it’s the emotional climax.” And she was absolutely right, but that’s why the sex got delayed another year. 😫

(I had not, going into that chapter, intended for them to have that conversation. I thought I was showing their character growth in the gym scene at the beginning, which features a number of deliberate callbacks to the first chapter except for all the ways that they’re healthier now, drinking smoothies instead of mimosas and actually TALKING about feelings. I had not realized they were going to DOUBLE THE FUCK DOWN on character growth later.)

So that was “Bodies in the Lake” finally out, after only eleven months (and I do consider that chapter a conscious bookend to “Ghosts in the Attic”), but I still had yet to make them fuck.

(I feel like some exotic zookeeper – like, I have created the perfect conditions for you, have I not, so why won’t you two just fuck already??)

Because it’s not just about being horny and wanting to get their rocks off (anyone with a sex drive knows how to take care of that on their own), it’s about the profoundly intimate connection that sex can be for sexual people. (The misunderstanding around this is something I find distressing in asexual discourse, when it reduces sex to a one-dimensional, even selfish, urge. I understand that not everyone experiences sex the same way, but there’s nothing selfish about wanting to feel that kind of connection with your partner.)

Not to mention that the hard ban on sex would inhibit other forms of intimacy too – that Robert can’t do ANYTHING without part of his brain keeping track of whether it’s okay or not, worrying how far is too far, knowing that there’s a stopping point coming up. It feels analogous to how queer celebrities, before they come out, seem to have almost no public personality whatsoever – Anderson Cooper and Kristin Stewart are the ones who come to mind here – because they’re having to police themselves so stringently lest anything ‘kinda gay’ slip out, that they wind up clamping down on themselves far beyond that. (And then when they do come out and are free to be themselves, it turns out they’re smart and snarky and all-around cool people!) I feel like after the sex barrier’s been broken, Robert would become a lot more relaxed and uninhibited with non-sexual intimacy too.

I’d had the first half of that chapter written for ages – the conversation after Robert comes back to the house and he explains that period of his life to Gene – but I couldn’t seem to give them that final push. I made a lot of attempts, tweaking my approach in subtle ways, but nothing quite rang true.

It was my friend Sam (dude who wrote the Craig fic) who finally said, They need to fight.

(And also that Gene needed to get pushed off his pedestal – “Because I have BEEN that endlessly patient and supportive boyfriend, and it gets old.”)

And as soon as he said it, I realized he was right – I’d done the thing, the thing that every guide on writing sex tells you not to do, which is to neatly wrap up all the characters’ interpersonal issues and tie them off with a bow and then let them fall into bed. It’s what feels logical, but it is death to drama, because then there’s no tension, and no reason for the reader to pay attention during the sex scene that follows, because there’s nothing going to be accomplished in it.

…Buuuut, when I’d spent 100k words writing a love story about careful consent, and a protagonist who doesn’t have a good handle on his own desires, there was no way for me to let them barrel through sex on a full head of passion and talk about it afterwards. It’s why they had to stop halfway through and dial it back a bit, touch base and explicitly confirm that yes, I want to proceed, bring them back from the edge for a while so it clearly wasn’t just their downstairs brains doing the decision-making.

The result is that it’s not as sexy as I might have hoped for, and while I’m a little disappointed about that, it’s checked by the knowledge that – realistically – there’s no way it could have been. Scorching hot sex requires the participants to be uninhibited, and Robert and Gene can’t afford to throw caution to the wind when they’re venturing into a known minefield. They’ll be able to relax into it later, for sure, but for their first time, they had to be mindful and deliberate about it.

(And also hearkening back to a thought Robert had in “Ghosts in the Attic,” that he wanted to make Gene smile and laugh during sex. In essence, that his vision for them, what he wanted out of sex, was more for it to be intimate than for it to be hawt.

Ah well. Stay tuned for the hookup AU – basically, all the scorching-hot sex they weren’t having in Beautiful Day wound up in the hookup AU instead)

So yeah, getting them to bone was definitely the hardest part of this fic. There were so many factors involved thanks to Robert’s various issues, that required a lot of careful calibration – and in the end, he still had to take a leap of faith. And while it’s not my favorite part of the fic, now that it’s done I can get on with finishing the rest of it. The final chapter doesn’t have anything really fraught (that hasn’t already been written), so I’m optimistic that it’s not going to give me as much trouble as the previous two chapters.

[sirladysketch]

I would love to hear your answers to those 15-fic questions about "How the Light Gets In"!!

Aww, thank you! based on this post) Fic in question can be found here.

Answers below the cut, though, because it’s LONG!

1: What inspired you to write the fic this way?

Honestly, it was supposed to be a oneshot crack fic; I have no idea how the thing ended up over 200k. I’d also just finished listening to all of the Inspector Gamache books (a fantastic murder mystery series set in Quebec), and honestly a LOT of the major plot ideas (and title inspiration) came from the Climactic book.

I also really wanted to explore a world where you could have keyblades alongside of things like cars and advanced tech, so I pulled a lot of inspiration from FFVII, FFXII, and FFXV, which are all good examples of how magic and tech balance each other out.

2: What scene did you first put down?

Chapter nine! It’s the idea that started the entire fic, and everything else was built up around Roxas’s birthday.

3: What’s your favorite line of narration?

Probably when Roxas summons his keyblade!

”She pressed a softly glowing pin into his hand, so hard that he could feel the point dig into his palm, drawing blood. He yelped and reflexively opened his fingers to drop it, but then there was a sudden weight in his hand, metal warming to his touch and prickling along his skin in places where it touched veins of MAKO green crystal.

A keyblade.”

4: What’s your favorite line of dialogue?

Hmmm, it’s too long to copy/paste, but I liked writing the texts Roxas sends at the start of chapter 7! (Does that make me a terrible person? lol)

5: What part was hardest to write?

It’s a toss up between the two chapters where they’ve broken up, and the final three chapters the cover the climax. The breakup chapters were tough emotionally, while the climax chapters were tough because I had multiple subplots that I needed to pull together and resolve within three chapters– some of which were subplots written in and left unresolved in the prequel (which is outlined but not yet ready to post).

6: What makes this fic special or different from all your other fics?

This was a fic of many firsts! First time I

wrote long fic for KH

fully outlined a fic before writing it

wrote a modern AU

wrote action/thriller/mystery stuff

wrote myself into a pool noodle ship

did extensive research and got help from SMEs to ensure content was believable, if not 100% accurate

received fanart for my fic!!!!!

had multiple conversations with my readers and made a bunch of wonderful new friends!!

7: Where did the title come from?

Leonard Cohen’s song, Anthem – which I learned about when reading Louise Penny’s book, How the Light Gets In. (Incidentally, I HIGHLY recommend the Inspector Gamache books, just pretend that HTLGI is the last book)

8: Did any real people or events inspire any part of it?

The fic started as a crack oneshot for a dear friend going through a tough time. (Not going to @ them, but they know who they are

9: Were there any alternate versions of this fic?

I outlined four different ending for the fic!

Spoilers>

The last chapter before the epilogue ends with someone getting shot and Roxas passing out. While everyone lives in the ‘canon’ happy ending, there was a version where Roxas was killed, one where Ven was killed, one where Ven overdid it and went into a MAKO-induced coma, and one where both Luxs died. In the end I went with the happier ending because it left more options for sequels, if/when I get around to them.

10: Why did you choose this pairing for this particular story?

*shrugs* They’re my OTP in the truest sense of the phrase. If I could only write one pairing for the rest of my life, it’d be them.

11: What do you like best about this fic?

I’m really proud of myself for writing the entire thing– both the main fic and the ancillary stories– in a year. It really surprised me to see how much I could accomplish if I really set my heart and mind to it, considering I worked full time AND commuted about two hours each day.Also, I really like the blended universe I’ve created– there are a lot of fun stories just waiting to be written, although I’m not sure when that will be. I have the Zack’s prequel and Xion’s sequel fully outlined, although I’ve yet to write extensively in either of them for various reasons.

12: What do you like least about this fic?

There are probably scenes that could go back and be reworked, and I might’ve found a way to work in the secondary stories within the context of the main story.

13: What music did you listen to, if any, to get in the mood for writing this story? Or if you didn’t listen to anything, what do you think readers should listen to to accompany us while reading?

Oh man. 90% of this fic was plotted/figured out while I was stuck in commuting traffic, and my CDs weren’t always reliable so I listened to a lot of crappy pop songs, because for some reason all of the radio stations only play, like, six songs each hour and it’s always the same six songs. -_-I also listened to a couple of 8Tracks playlists and ultimately ended up making a Spotify playlist!

14: Is there anything you wanted readers to learn from reading this fic?

Hmm… I’m not sure if there’s anything to LEARN, per se. I have lots of tips for writing multichap fics, though, if anyone needs help with plotting, working in subplots, bringing together loose threads, or just getting an idea from how to get from point A to point B!

15: What did you learn from writing this fic?

I learned a LOT about writing and what schedule works best for me, but I probably should’ve written more to allow for a more structured chapter release schedule.

Since writing this fic, I’ve learned even more– HTLGI will always have a special place in my heart, but it’s been over for almost a year and I already feel like my more recent fics have surpassed it in quality. I’ve since written other fics that I love even more, and I hope that I’ll continue to write more stories that I can go back and enjoy as a reader!

[deadcactuswalking]

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 06/02/2021 (Fredo’s Money Can’t Buy Happiness)

This is an odd, scattered week - a slow one thankfully for the day after my birthday - but we do have a bigger album bomb than I expected from Fredo, even if “drivers license” is still at #1 for a fourth week, blocking EDM remixes of sea shanties because of course, it’s the UK after all. Let’s just get back into REVIEWING THE CHARTS.

Rundown

Now, I predicted last week that Fredo would have two songs debut high up on the chart from his most recent album, Money Can’t Buy Happiness, and the pre-release single “Back to Basics” would rise to the top 10. That didn’t exactly happen, as “Back to Basics” actually dropped out of the chart off of the debut for being one of the lowest-performing Fredo tracks, or at least less successful than the three songs that debuted, as that’s all the UK Singles Chart allows. Speaking of drop-outs from the UK Top 75, they’re all mostly inconsequential, made up of recent debuts like “Wellerman” by the Longest Johns and “Bad Boy” by the late Juice WRLD and Young Thug. In terms of notable drop-offs, we do have some arguably premature falls for minor hits, like “champagne problems” by Taylor Swift, “Body” by Megan Thee Stallion, “Lonely” by Justin Bieber and benny blanco, and, finally, “Diamonds” by Sam Smith. This is a slow week outside of the top 40, so we just have some spare oddities to cover outside of the drop-outs. For our fallers, we have “34+35” by Ariana Grande fading its remix boost at #14, “Therefore I Am” by Billie Eilish at #30, “SO DONE” by The Kid Yaoi at #52, “All I Want” by Olivia Rodrigo at #54, “Lo Vas A Olvidar” by Billie Eilish and ROSALÍA at #64 off of the debut and a couple real crashes at the tail-end of the top 75, those being “Holy” by Justin Bieber featuring Chance the Rapper at #71, “WAP” by Cardi B featuring Megan Thee Stallion at #72, “Notorious” by Bugzy Malone featuring Chip at #73 and “Dynamite” by BTS at #75. This may explain the otherwise inexplicable returns for songs that are always clinging onto the back half of the chart, like “Dreams” by Fleetwood Mac at #74, “Perfect” by Ed Sheeran at #70 and, incredibly, “Mr Brightside” by the Killers at #68, the highest it’s been in a while (and that’s a feat considering how long it stays on the damn chart). For gains, we’re really not picking up much traction here. Sure, “Baby Shark” by Pinkfong is back at #73 for some reason, but otherwise we just have middling songs with middling gains, like “Martin & Gina” by Polo G at #61, “Take You Dancing” by Jason Derulo at #59, “Watermelon Sugar” by Harry Styles rebounding to #44, “Your Love (9PM)” by ATB, Topic and A7S making a surprising and scary gain to #42 (and I’ll admit, I’ve warmed up to it quickly), “i miss u” by Jax Jones and Au/Ra clawing back in the top 40 at #39, “Friday” by Riton, Nightcrawlers and Musafa & Hypeman dopamine re-editing itself up to #24 (Please don’t make this a hit) and finally, “Streets” by Doja Cat continuing its rise up to #12. Oh, yeah, and “Skin” by Sabrina Carpenter is down to #41 off of the debut but everyone’s forgotten about that song considering how big “drivers license” still is, so yeah, let’s just get to our new arrivals, because we do have some interesting things to touch on this week.

NEW ARRIVALS

#66 – “Higher” – Clean Bandit featuring iann dior

Produced by Mark Ralph, Grace Chatto and Jack Patterson

Well, they made a song with 24kGoldn, and that was awful, so... I guess it’s Puerto Rican emo-rapper iann dior’s turn. They might as well remix “Mood” while they’re at it. Instead of Mabel filling in for the singing where 24kGoldn couldn’t on “Tick Tock”, however, we have honestly a less charismatic singer in iann dior playing all the parts, without a rap verse to speak of. Okay, so this could work if he just fills in the spot of generic anonymous singer, and it fits exactly within that mold if he wants to, even though that’ll take away any of the character he had – not that any of that character was likeable or interesting, but hey, baby, he is not your dad, so maybe he’ll blend in well with Clean Bandit’s decreasingly unique production. This is a tropical EDM track where iann dior’s non-existent range and raspy, uncaring tone zaps the energy out of the touches of steel drums and orchestral stabs. This drop is nothing more than a vocaloid loop, and a pathetic one at that, with iann dior’s really gross falsetto proving that Auto-Tune can’t really fix bad singing, not that it needed to be proven. The lyrics here are nothing to write home about, wrapping a love song with ocean metaphors probably just so he can say “I’mma get her wet, oh, baby, then slide”... Gross. There’s like zero build-up to this drop at all as well, so there’s no stakes, no climax, and hence not a good EDM track. Come on, Dan Smith of Bastille wrote this, can’t he get the lead vocal? At least it would sound competent.

#63 – “Grown Flex” – Chip featuring Bugzy Malone

Produced by the Fanatix

Ah, my favourite duo. Apparently this is from a Chip album that I didn’t even know existed, thankfully because it’s 21 tracks, over an hour, with two consecutive Young Adz features. “Grown Flex” is another collaboration with Bugzy Malone, probably here because of the video and the sample of iconic UK bass tune “Heartbroken” by T2, one of the most popular songs in that wave of EDM and a pretty damn great song. It has been sampled before by people like DJ Khaled and Drake but no-one’s made a better song, so maybe these formerly feuding Londoners can make a good song with this sample as the base? That isn’t a question actually, but if it was, the answer would be no. They pitch up the (honestly ahead of its time) vocaloid loop, and put an obnoxious UK garage-adjacent drum loop over it that’s barely on beat with all of the chiptune sound effects distracting from Chip’s also off-beat flow. The chorus is really awkward, with him being off-beat and uncredited female vocal backing vocals with entirely different vocal processing coming in and sounding equally janky. This beat isn’t broken inherently, it could work but it’s too shrouded in these two rappers void of personality. Bugzy Malone is here but his rough tone does not work on this beat, regardless of how much he wants to pretend there’s any melody to his drawl with the Auto-Tune and multi-tracking. He’s still somehow the best part though because, yeah, this is just... incredibly awful. The production is onto something by the end with the horns coming in but they immediately fade out and eventually it just abruptly cuts to some pointless chiptune beeping sounds that have been there the whole time but play alone right at the end for no reason. This is aggravating, I know I’m pretty much nit-picking but there’s nothing of substance to pick apart here anyway. This is pure incompetence and a butchering of a good sample... that they should be allowed to use freely, though, by the way. Abolish copyright law.

#62 – “Ride for Me” – B Young

Produced by Mike Spencer and Pacific

Since everyone seems to have forgotten how to actually make music this week, at least we can always count on B Young... okay, no, but at least he’s given up on trying to be a rapper or R&B singer at this point, as a lane of generic guitar-pop probably would work best for the guy’s voice. I mean, we have an acoustic loop here that sounds like it’s jacked straight from a Shawn Mendes demo. At least the incompetence here is charming, with his rougher vocals being a pretty nice contrast from the otherwise kind of ugly mixing, especially on the flat percussion. I do like the lyrics here, as he’s simply love-struck and enjoys the company of this woman, for more than just sex and appearances. He just hopes that things don’t change and the relationship lasts forever. Sure, it’s shallow but it seems genuine. Sure, there’s some drug references and him being pushy to ask her for no make-up, though it does come off as just enjoying her presence instead of any stuck-up preference, especially since he offers his tracksuit and they end up watching some crap Netflix original film. Yeah, this is just a sweet track if nothing else. Since I did do a full song review for his song “Jumanji” years back, I feel a weird sense of almost parenthood for this guy, like I’ve seen him grow and finally he’s made a good song, even if it’s a bit out of his wheel-house. He’s never not been genuine, just only now that’s given him some more likeability, even if it’s just to make a cute love song. He sounds like a good boyfriend, and that’s really the appeal of the song, so, yeah, good job. I’m honestly kind of surprised.

#60 – “Gravity” – Brent Faiyaz and DJ Dahi featuring Tyler, the Creator

Produced by DJ Dahi

This is the most frustrating song I’ve heard this year so far, I’m almost fascinated by it. Before we get into that, I’d like to say that it’s good to see Brent Faiyaz finally debuting a song relatively high, and this is DJ Dahi’s first ever credited UK Singles Chart entry, although he’s produced top 40 hits before for Kendrick Lamar. Faiyaz has been a bubbling artist in R&B for the past few years, and honestly he might have had the most successful career off of the three artists that propelled themselves off of the back of “Crew” with GoldLink and Shy Glizzy. It was a minor hit that ended up producing no rising stars until around five years later, where we have a genuine hit potentially coming from the guy who sung the chorus, of course with some help from Tyler, the Creator. I do think this song is good but owes a lot to that to the production and charisma of our artists, as I can pick this apart way too easily for my taste. This beat is good, with some incredible guitar work from Steve Lacy as he would always deliver, but feels very aimless, especially with the pointless air horns in the background that if anything distract from Brent Faiyaz, who needs room to breathe. I mean, he’s an R&B singer, of course he does. The beat takes certain left turns during the verses that seem like meanders and if it’s not deflating any of its groove for the sake of guitar loops, it’s got this really tense percussion that does not work for the content or performances here, which are both pretty checked-out, especially Tyler, who’s as stiff as always but without any really interesting lyrical moments or a shift of flow. It’s one of his worst verses in my opinion, and he really goes in one ear and out the other with how short it is, which surprises me because of how Tyler usually either steals the show or meshes really well with his collaborators. So, our two performers are mostly checked-out with little to no chemistry, and the beat is awkward and unfitting for the content, which is about them being brought back down to Earth by their loved ones, hence the name, despite their travel habits due to touring – which isn’t a thing that’s happening right now at all, so maybe this’ll be a slow burn hit before it can really resonate. If we listen to these lyrics more closely, we also don’t get the sense that Brent Faiyaz is even likeable here, as we have no reason given for this woman to not feel uncomfortable that he’s paying little attention to her. Instead, Faiyaz just comes off a dismissive ass to this undeserving woman who is reasonably upset at the lack of time spent with him. It’s never made clear that she’s pestering him, so I honestly don’t get how Faiyaz wants to frame this. It doesn’t help that Tyler has the opposite reaction, longing for his partner when he’s on tour instead of feeling annoyed by her, but ultimately with no interplay so this means nothing. Oh, and if the songwriting weren’t janky enough, the chorus is barely catchy and covered in pitch-shifted multi-tracking that takes any of the focus off of Brent Faiyaz, who’s constantly crushed by backing vocals, being pitched down for no reason with unnecessary censor bleeps when they both swear freely at other points in the song. This type of maximalist production works but only when there’s any grandiosity to make it feel warranted, and if there isn’t that, the gunshot percussion is out of place and there ends up being a lot of empty space. There’s nothing smooth about this, and that’s frustrating as you’d expect these three to bring a really relaxed tune with some great 70s soul vibes and... I mean, that’s obviously what they’re going for here, but it is painfully over-produced and ultimately immensely disappointing. I can see people enjoying this a lot but no, this doesn’t work for me at all. Sorry.

#45 – “Dancing on Ice” – Yxng Bane featuring Nafe Smallz and M Huncho

Produced by Don Alfonso and Quincy Tellem

Oh, Jesus Christ, these guys again... and Yxng Bane, I guess. So, you know what the deal is with this UK ‘trap-wave’ type stuff, right? There’s a vaguely interesting synth loop drowned out by cheap percussion and crap bass mastering, as well as awfully processed vocals from everyone involved. They can trade verses, but more often than not don’t say anything that doesn’t embarrass themselves. You get a sense of really toxic masculinity, misogyny and materialism without any charm in their delivery, inflections or wordplay – which is usually non-existent. Here, it’s not any different. Yxng Bane has some good melodic flows – and I really like his line about his Rolex Presidential Watch being discontinued but since he’s “going Donald”, he wears it anyway – but he also threatens... presumably the listener with gay conversion therapy in the first line of the verse, so all good will’s lost. Nafe Smallz sounds better than usual but his nasal flow is still whiny and insufferable, and M Huncho is here to waste time and sound bad doing it, although he’s probably the least worst sounding vocally out of these three clowns. I misread his line about his rucksack being heavy as “nutsack”, and that’s all the positive engagement I could claw out of this. I ask this every time but honestly, who listens to this?

#21 – “Ready” – Fredo featuring Summer Walker

Produced by Mojam

Much like the end of a Morrisons sweet aisle, past this point, it’s all Fredo. Admittedly, I didn’t end up listening to the record but I have heard a select few songs, this being one of them, and I’m not really a fan. I do like the eerie loop but it seems a bit unfitting for a triumphant flex song emphasising a rags-from-riches narrative, especially since the mix really crushes both Fredo and Summer Walker in this blend of boring skittering trap percussion and the ambiance, making her hook impact a lot less. Fredo’s verses are pretty damn heartfelt, I’ll admit, and I really like his lines about pleading with God that he should be let into Heaven. In fact, Fredo’s bars are pretty consistently great, focusing on how his criminal past in the streets of London refuses to escape him despite his efforts to make it out using rap, and by the end, he sounds pretty defeated when he says, “Yeah, I’m lonely, but that’s just a player’s life”. Honestly, for a song that initially builds itself up to be a triumphant flex song, it ends up just being kind of sad, and that’s fine, more fitting for the instrumental but it really makes the hook feel even more out of place. Ah, well, the song’s fine, really, just a blend of ideas that never really stick the landing together.

#18 – “Burner on Deck” – Fredo featuring Pop Smoke and Young Adz

Produced by RicoRunDat and Yoz Beats

Now this is what I want from Fredo. Now, this is posthumous in Pop Smoke’s case but it’s far from an unexpected feature, as whilst this is one of his first UK drill collaborations, Pop Smoke was known for his pioneering of the New York style of London’s grittier, more menacing drill music, and even named Fredo and Young Adz as some of his favourite rappers. Okay, so he had questionable taste – I mean, Young Adz? - but Pop Smoke felt more of a connection between New York and London beyond just instrumentals, with a shared slang, street culture and arguably most importantly, inequality. This is all cited from a Complex interview, by the way, but you can tell even from his music what a great respect he had for British hip-hop, especially considering his main producer, 808 Melo, is from London. The song itself is pretty great too, relying on these spacey synth loops that build up with more eerie keys before finally crashing into an intense drill beat, with all artists sharing the Auto-Tuned hook, but Young Adz probably shining the most in how he plays off of Pop Smoke’s deeper, rich voice with his nasal whine. The lyrics may be generic gunplay and flexing, but the delivery saves it for me, with Fredo enthusiastically shouting out Gorillaz of all people, and the chorus being way smoother than it would usually be for a drill track, as well as being really catchy. Pop Smoke absolutely kills it here, going with his typical stiff, fast-paced flow for a verse that is really short but just as powerful as he usually delivers. You can tell this was made for this track as well from the interplay on the hook and him shouting out Young Adz in his verse. Fredo pretty much completes the second verse by chiming in and showing more of the charm I enjoy from him as he mentions coughing the bar before he coughs for basically an entire bar. It caught me off-guard at full listen and it still leads in perfectly to the oddly-mixed sombre piano that comes in for the final hook. With a better mix – and even then, it kind of works without it – and maybe some extended verses from both London and New York drill artists, this could bang even harder. Maybe for a remix, this beat could bring the best out of Swarmz, DigDat, AJ Tracey, Hardy Caprio, Tion Wayne, Fivio Foreign even... I could go on, this could be a great posse cut. As it is, it’s still pretty damn good, and again, rest in peace to the late Pop Smoke.

#3 – “Money Talks” – Fredo featuring Dave

Produced by Dave

At first, I was surprised this debuted at #3, which seems high for a British rap track, but then I remembered that the last time these guys collaborated on a single it debuted at #1 without an album attached, and it helped that “Funky Friday” is also a great song, admittedly something I didn’t think at the time. It does make perfect sense that this debuts so high, especially since this album was actually executively-produced by Dave, so given these guys’ track records together and alone, I did expect something great, and, well... okay, so instead of a drill beat as this pretty vocal sample would be fit for, as would the flows, we get a lightweight trap beat with odd vocal and bass mixing. Admittedly, the 808 slides here are pretty excellent, but that’s the only shred of intricacy I see here, which is usually commonplace in Dave’s production. There’s also simply not enough consistency or variety here to make it worth the four and a half minutes, with the chorus being awkward if anything. There’s less depth to the rags-to-riches stories here, with Fredo probably giving more commentary than Dave does, which seems odd but fitting for how checked-out Dave is here. There’s just a resounding lack of anything to this song other than a boring beat and performances that could be a lot sharper and interesting. Sure, Dave flexes his technical piano skill by the end but the beat had already run dry by about two extra minutes before that – this could have run through your second verse, Dave, or you could have added a bridge instead of repeating the chorus. I do like some of the lines here that are obviously more personal and introspective, like Fredo’s conflict with the justice system and Dave explaining how he got robbed when he was a child and to cope with the trauma of this, he started toting weapons. I guess the EastEnders reference is funny but it just reminds me of DigDat making a similar cocaine joke with arguably funnier source material on “Guten Tag”. Yeah, this could be a lot better but it’s not offensive and hey, it’s competent at least. I mean, it’s Dave, it won’t be anything less, just a tad disappointing. I mean, come on, “coochie freshly shaven, man’s got expectations”?

Conclusion

This week is so disproportionately male, huh? Ironically as I say that, none of the women represented here – in the form of soulless EDM production and boring guest feature – get Best of the Week, as that’s going to Fredo’s “Burner on Deck” featuring the late Pop Smoke and, yes, Young Adz, with an Honourable Mention to B Young of all people for “Ride for Me”. Worst of the Week will obviously go to Chip and Bugzy Malone for the pathetic “Grown Flex”, with a tied Dishonourable Mention this week going to both “Dancing on Ice” by Yxng Bane featuring Nafe Smallz (for being gross and offensive) and “Higher” by Clean Bandit featuring iann dior (for being remarkably inoffensive). Yeah, Brent Faiyaz and Tyler are safe there but that’s still a fascinatingly bad song, though I don’t think I’ll make any friends with that opinion. Anyway, here’s the top 10 for this week:

Thanks for reading. If you enjoyed and want more of my cacti-branded rambling, follow me on Twitter @cactusinthebank. I can’t make any predictions for next week that aren’t depressing, but we may have to discuss death and politics next episode if a certain song gets renewed traction. Happy times. See you next week!

[destiny-smasher]

Life is Strange: Before the Storm (Episode 1)

I’ve spent so much time discussing this prequel over the past few months, it’s a bit tricky to try and sum up things into something readable. As lengthy as this post is, there’s plenty of details I have to let go of. I’d like to lay out my biggest pros, cons, and a bit of commentary on how I feel about its very conception and potential intent, along with some casual predictions.

I was very critical of this project from the moment it was leaked, but I quickly grew to support Deck Nine, the studio developing the game, because it was easy to see how passionate and thoughtful they were being. Makes sense, right? The sort of dev team who would want to take on a Life is Strange story would probably be the sort to be mindful of just how delicate such an undertaking is. Square-Enix, however, gradually frustrated me more and more, and their choices and actions with this entire project kept me on my guard all summer. With the first episode released, I can confirm my feelings about both companies’ involvement haven’t changed -- I’m still very supportive of Deck Nine, and I’m still rather frustrated and confused with Square-Enix. This first episode helped prove to me to that the developer definitely does have their heart in the right place, and has the ability to realize the same kind of potential one might expect from a follow up to such a special game. I have my concerns, but to be honest, most of them have arisen from Square-Enix's questionable setup to this project and the premise of the game itself bothering me on a core level.

With most video game releases, the way a game is marketed or how it's conceived is rarely important to me. However, Life is Strange was a special indie game that doesn’t come along often. Before I discuss the actual game itself, I feel compelled to bring up the reveal and marketing of this project. We of course don't know the full story, but what we do know has unfortunately colored the whole project with a weird shade. Setting aside the interpersonal experiences I've run into with fellow fansm I will say that at the heart of my concerns is the unshakable feeling that DontNod did not want this game to get made. The feeling that DontNod, who created these characters and this world, wanted those characters to be left alone. That's just speculation at this time, but everything I've seen and heard seems to point in this direction, and while that's not the developer's problem, it is the publisher's. When an indie team creates such an earnest indie game with a strong emphasis on narrative and themes about regret and not being able to fix the past, goes on to say the story is done and they're going to leave it alone, it's pretty damn odd to me to proceed with producing a prequel about the past, ditching the protagonist of the original story, and focusing on two women who we know meet unfortunate fates. Oh, and the actual creators of the characters aren't involved. Oh, and neither are the actors. AND it's not gonna connect its story to the original game because it's “stand-alone” (why make a prequel, then?). AND it's going to cost more but have fewer episodes. AND the fourth episode is conveyed as a thinly veiled cash grab to get fans of the first game to ante up for the Deluxe Edition right away. When a pre-existing narrative has been around for years, and its creators have had ample time to consider how they might expand upon their own story and are ready to let it go, then I'm much more understanding of giving the reigns to someone new who might have that interest. It must've been barely a year since Life is Strange was finished, however, before Square set this prequel into motion. That's way too soon to hand those keys off to someone else entirely, especially if those who created the keys weren't happy about it. The fact that it has taken all summer for DontNod to even acknowledge the game's existence is suspicious, and at this point, even a positively spun statement would come across as legally obligatory pleasantries. I have confidence that both dev teams have mutual respect for one another, but the seeming lack of communication between them with regards to such a delicate story is unfortunate, and I just hope that whatever Deck Nine is doing, the core concept of it was approved by DontNod as a team – or that they at least end up happy with it. Now, let me take a step back from this and point out that Square has made steps to try and correct and reassure concerns folks have had, and that's good. But a lot of it has come across as damage control for fires that shouldn't have even started. All right. There's my frustration with Square-Enix out of the way. Let's move on to the actual episode that has been released. I went into this game feeling very wary, worried, and concerned. I walked away from it feeling...pretty OK, and even pleasantly surprised by parts of it. I will be discussing the game freely, so if you have not experienced the story and don't want to know about any details beforehand, you should stop reading this now and come back when you're ready.

Partway through this I stop referring to Deck Nine in the third person and begin addressing them directly, partly because I'm honestly writing this as a personal expression to them, specifically, because I really do think they have a lot of skills being put to work, and I want to provide useful criticism, support, and feedback, which they've personally expressed an interest in. So, Madeleine, Felice, and anyone else at Deck Nine who might be reading this, I just want to express that it really means a lot to see your team interacting with us fans so directly and openly. I can say that I feel like Deck Nine “gets it” when it comes to what made Life is Strange special, how it connected to people, and what kind of overall aesthetic and tone it has. It's a shame that the concept of the story itself places things in such a bizarre, trapped kind of position, though. I've had so many conversations about this game in the past few months, I'm not even really sure what I would like for it to do as a game or as a prequel. Most angles I've approached it with just end up leaving me feeling worried and dissatisfied. Some things are better left alone. I honestly still feel like this story was one of those things – but, to be fair, that story still hasn't been fully told yet. And this first episode has certainly illustrated that there is intent at work here. This doesn't feel like a cash grab or something purely being made for fanservice. And yet, I still can't see where it could go within the bounds that they've laid out and still coalesce with its source material in a way that is fulfilling and meaningful. I've been vocal in the past that for as much as I love Life is Strange, I found its climax to be unfulfilling, illogical, and self-defeating. If Before the Storm can manage to somehow lead things into the original game's story in a way that can make sense of things (ex. the titular 'Storm'), my feelings about the nature of the overarcing story itself could change drastically. From where I'm standing right now, though, this story still feels pointless and unnecessary. And I really hope that by the end, that changes. When it comes to Chloe, Rachel, and essentially everything relating to them, we don't really learn anything new in this episode. Nothing mind-blowing or revelatory is given to us. On the upside, it means that things basically line up with pre-existing canon, makes fine sense, and even reaffirms things that were implied in Life is Strange. On the downside, the narrative feels like it's spinning its tires here in terms of plot, shoving these two characters together in a way that feels rushed and forced while simultaneously not going anywhere with them. If you look at the actual plot of this episode, and compare it to Max's, the stakes are so much lower, the trajectory of the protagonists so much more unclear, and the character development itself much more shallow. This is not a knock on Deck Nine's abilities so much as the choice of content. Chloe Price was already in such a bad place at age 19. Go back three years and...she doesn't exactly have much room to grow, and even if she does, what's the point when we already know where she ends up? When we already know where Rachel ends up? (and if this all some alternate universe thing, given that AU's are already established as a canonical aspect of this lore, it's gonna be super tricky to make that concept not feel hamfisted if it's gonna be a big plot reveal later) There's clearly more compelling stuff going on with Rachel if only because we don't truly know Rachel, and I do like that this episode sets up some dramatic things for her, but I'm still left feeling like I don't really get a sense of what her arc is supposed to be here. When you're telling a story with only three episodes, it can go a long way to make clear – by showing, not telling – what is at stake for the characters, and what their goals are. I get that  this is a story about teenage drama, but even Max, who was such an uncertain character, had an opening act that established very clearly what her goals were, and what internal and external obstacles she was going to have to confront.  With this story, that clear sense of direction is missing. To be fair, that very well could be intentional, given the emphasis on mystery, trickery, and such. And part of the problem is that there's sort of a 'ceiling' for where this narrative can feasibly go, and thus how these characters could be developed. Again – the very premise itself is, in a lot of ways, holding the story back, and that's a shame. It's a shame because on a technical level, there is a lot of good stuff going on here. The overall aesthetic, the themes, the writing, it all does feel in-line with the source material. While the painterly vibes of the original game are replaced with a bit more flat of a visual design, seeing the character's faces actually emote in a noticeably more detailed way is a technical improvement over the original, and was actually something I was very excited to see. In a way the first game couldn't really achieve, there are even moments here that let the visual expressions alone tell story beats. The music is good, but I actually felt like a lot of the episode was too quiet on this front. While this does heighten the impact of the music later on, the actual story beats didn't quite match the intensity of the music for me. Even the montage at the end felt a little off, like it was trying to replicate the ending of the first episode of Life is Strange but rushed through things too quickly. The subtle addition of more detailed sound effects was great, though. Like the expressions on the faces, those additional sound details put another layer of depth to the setting. The camera angles in particular were another noticeably upgrade from the presentation of the original game. On the downside, some scenes felt very awkward – controlling Chloe through the world in general felt particularly clunkier and harder to do than moving Max around; certain moments that expect you to control the camera in order to pick options, like the clothing bit, were also weird and unclear at first, in a way that didn't occur in the first game, maybe because they usually kept the camera behind Max's back? On the upside, there were a lot of cinematic choices I really liked that fleshed out the presentation, from Chloe grabbing her phone in the bathroom to the neat stuff during the 'Smash' scene in the junkyard to the angles during the tabletop game...just a lot of more dynamic and intriguing camera angles. I honestly wish there were even more “reflection” moments, like Max would often have. The moment with Chloe smoking was a great parallel between the characters while capturing that same reflective vibe. The writing isn't exactly going to turn heads, and there's still a fair amount of corny dialogue (mostly when characters are trying too hard to be 'edgy' or 'sassy'), but the original game had this, too, and usually, it just ends up feeling like that same kind of honest cheesiness you might expect. Some moments, however, the writing gets distractably bad – mainly, the Backtalk sequences, and a couple of clunky dialogue sequences like Chloe's chat with Joyce (which can feel unbalanced and off). The Backtalk is a fine idea on paper, but in practice it's just...taking something away, rather than adding to things. The timer puts unneeded pressure on the player, and lends these segments to be more about random guessing or shallow word play than any kind of legitimate, thoughtful intimidation. I do like the idea of Chloe being an asshole to intimidate people, but it, erh, does kind of feel odd to be encouraged to be an unnecessary dickhead to people who usually don't really deserve it because they're just trying to do their jobs. This is Chloe's character, though, and she is the opposite of Max, especially at this point in their lives, so I get the intent. But the dialogue here is at its weakest, its mechanically unclear and ultimately feels kind of pointless. My recommendation for making it more engaging would be to make it more like what it feels inspired by: the sword fighting in Monkey Island. Let the player use info they've previously obtained to give them more options during an 'encounter' without making it obvious when those options are useful (like finding those bits of things to bring up to Joyce at the house). Give them time to consider their choices, and in turn make the actual dialogue that ensues feel less like hamfisted schoolyard playground disses and more like actual intimidation. I think there's some potential to this mechanic but it needs work. Hopefully, by episode 3, we'll be in for some legitimately intense Backtalk sequences in circumstances that actually warrant threats and intimidation. Noteworthy moment – the wine-theft scene was...just...yeesh. Given the tone of most of this episode, that scene in particular just felt weird, like we were transported from an indie teen drama and into a Nickelodeon cartoon. I've seen the argument made that this scene was intentionally goofy in order to lower the player's guard so the junkyard scene hit us with more 'oomph,' but...yea, I'd recommend tackling the humor in the more organic way you were able to with most of this episode, like the D&D scene. Speaking of which – wow, what a pleasant surprise that was! That scene in particular, I think, really showed what you guys are capable of. Even the Backtalk mechanic's finickiness was less noticeable here because of the less serious context. Getting to meet new characters who were adorable and realisticwas such a treat – much more interesting and engaging to me than the somewhat predictable interaction with Victoria, which felt kind of tacked on for fanservice. The D&D scene felt organic, original, and charming. I especially loved the detail where if Chloe has read Joyce's self-help book earlier, she whips out the phrase she read if the player chooses to encourage Mikey. This was my favorite scene in the episode, and it had nothing to do with Chloe Price being present, or even being tied to Life is Strange in any way. I admit in my own interpretation of the characters for All Wounds, I've written Chloe making D&D references due to a history of playing it with Max – so there's some personal bias that helps elevate this scene for me, but still, I think this was a great scene. Likewise, the 'two truths and a lie' scene was also a game played via dialogue choices, and it, too, felt organic and fresh, using the players' element of choice to more readily establish a connection to the world and what its characters were doing (as opposed to just grilling someone for information or to just move the plot along). In terms of the overall tone and emotion of this episode, the dream sequences were an intriguing callback to Max's Nightmare. There were many interesting details there which made it feel genuinely connected to future events in this forboding way, so I hope there's something intentional there. On that note, I found the imagery of Max hanging to death on a tree branch to be...a bit too much. This is coming from someone who relishes that darker kind of imagery, but usually that's when the character being attacked is actually present within the narrative. The frequency and intensity of Max-bashing going on in this episode made me uncomfortable and that 'hangman' imagery even felt kind of disrespectful to Max's character. I'm not going to do what  others have done and jump to conclusions about 'ohhh they're portraying Max as an asshole' or what-not. In truth, I felt what you've expressed with those letters was so intense and angry that it has an intent. After all, the original game had a strength in showing one side of a character to set up a broad expectation, only to subvert it later to remind us that real life human beings are three-dimensional. The implication I pick up from all of this Max-hating is that it's there to show us just how special Max was to Chloe, just how painful it is for her to face their disconnection, and thus just how meaningful it is for Chloe, three years later, when Max finally reappears (which, I mean, simultaneously has me questioning exactly what your plan is with Rachel, given the layers of context here). I really hope the story you're telling will somehow end up somewhere that subverts all of this Max-hating toward what the original game ultimately does with Max and Chloe. From where I'm standing right now, just one episode in, it feels over the top and unnecessary, but again, I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt that there's a purpose there. The fact that Max is even dressed how she is three years in the future, and the fact that her text states she's see Chloe when she dies – which is, literally, how things play out – combined with the overt 'All Seeing Eye,' and how Chloe's dream even foretold how Rachel would start the fire, all of this feels thought out and intentional, rather than mere coincidence. I certainly hope that's the case, as a story precursing one about time travel could certainly incorporate supernatural foresight in interesting ways. This brings me into the aspect of the supernatural. I was a little offput by how interviews and PR stuff tried to tell us there'd be no supernatural elements at play when it seems apparent that there will be. When a story lies to its audience, that's fine, but when the physical, real-life people are lying about it, that's dodgy. I'm honestly more intrigued by the supernatural stuff here than I ever thought I'd be, and I think it's because between the foresight element of the dreams, the spirit animal implications, and the unnatural wind projected onto Rachel's fire, it tickles my imagination with the possibility of “Oh shit, could this story actually end up implying an explanation behind Life is Strange's biggest plot hole?” The title, 'Before the Storm,' the name of the Platinum trophy, 'Bring on the Storm,' and the premise of the fourth episode focusing on Max and Chloe all further adds to this gut feeling for me that you might actually be trying to fill in some blanks with the origin of the tornado. Because, frankly, the tornado in Max's story is my saltiest issue with everything in those five episodes, so the idea of some kind of explanation tying it together with Rachel and Chloe's past is actually very intriguing to me.

Here's the thing, though: no matter what your team has planned, no matter what big plot twist you might have in store, someone out here in the fandom has already predicted it, and for others it might not even feel too surprising by the time we get there. Either way, surprise and shock value are an exciting but fleeting emotion. I genuinely hope that whatever climax this story is leading up to, you focus more on the execution and establishing a rational resolution rather than just trying to grab “the feels.” I can already tell from this first episode that you've thought ahead with this stuff. From way back when your game was unfortunately leaked, a single question on a marker board has kept me intrigued by what this story will hopefully explore: “Is Rachel good?” I think that question has already been implicitly brought up in this episode, and while the technical plot hasn't moved much of anywhere yet, the prospect of this question, the different themes it could entail, and how it could ultimately flesh out Chloe's background and this world, are all things that have me more interested than I expected. While I think the core relationship of this prequel has been pushed too quickly and illogically, it's true that teens can make decisions irrationally and have sudden bursts of intense emotion – Rachel's angry fits were an example of this I didn't actually expect from her, but now feel almost like I should have, and I also feel a sense of intent with that. Part of me feels like I should talk more about Rachel and Chloe's relationship here, but honestly, I'm just having a hard time feeling invested. I don't think it's because anything is “wrong,” I mean...it makes enough sense for them, given all we learned about them in the original game. I guess it's just that knowing how things turn out – and Rachel's evident role in that – is disconcerting to just how quickly Chloe is diving into this, and how too eagerly Rachel is to pull her in. It makes me feel just as wary about Rachel as would've expected to, and maybe that's the point. Of special note are the very interesting parallels you've drawn between characters from Shakespeare's The Tempest and Rachel, Chloe, and Nathan. Very fascinating implications, I adore the intertextuality here, and the literal 'storm' imagery makes it such a great fit to be drawing from. I'm expecting to see some kind of meaningful payoff here, as well. You might notice that a lot of what I'm saying at this point is basically me seeing seeds you've planted, and expecting those to germinate and grow by the end here. Three episodes is a very short storytelling space, though. I'm worried about just how fulfilling these threads can be resolved, and I admit that how this story ultimately concludes will probably play a huge part in how I ultimately feel about it. But, at the very least, I hope this helps you get a grasp on what kinds of thoughts your story has put into the head of someone who is very invested in this world. I'll confess that I'm maybe not as hyped to see more as I was with the original game. And so much of this prequel makes me feel...just, weird, in a bad way. But, I will just as readily confess that most of what I am worried about or am taking issue with doesn't really have to do with your efforts as a creative team, but rather, the very nature of what this story is in relation to the source material, and the creators of these characters not really being present. I think that for a first software release for a new dev team, this is some great stuff, and to be blunt, I am actually more excited for whatever your team will be working on a year from now – hopefully something entirely your own? – than for this prequel. I'm certainly curious to see what Before the Storm does, and how you continue to build off of this start, but I just want your team to know that I'm already more excited to see what you come up with down the road when you've established yourselves and don't have these unnecessary weights to be contending with. I think this episode's strongest moments don't actually rely on its connections to Life is Strange at all, they just happen to inhabit Arcadia Bay – which you have been able to recapture well, at the same time. There are some discrepancies, a couple questionable details that don't seem to line up, and the incessant Max-bashing feels super weird, but as someone else who's written fan-made content with this world, I can understand the delicate nature of trying to set up dominoes someone else made and trying to line them up in a way where they’ll topple in an elegant fashion. With everyone shouting in your ears that can’t make it easier, but I see such attention to detail in your work that I have much more faith than I did a month ago that as long as the story culminates into something meaningful and satisfying, I think a lot of those 'weird' things some fans are feeling right now will be easier to let go of. And even if things go south with this project, I think you’ve already established the potential your team has. Good luck with the next three episodes. I went into this feeling so much anxiety, fear, and doubt, and while not all of that has been resolved, I'm at least relieved that the team working on this seems to be capable, passionate, and up to the task.

[resbang-bookclub]

AMA Transcript: The Art of Losing

Last week, @redphlox, @sojustifiable and @soundofez stopped in to talk about their 2016 Resbang, The Art of Losing! Here’s some of what went down:

Q: What is your fav scene, to write or just based on how it turned out! 

redphlox: I def had fun writing the climax, it was so much drama and I. love. writing. drama. I'm happiest with that. I also really enjoyed writing the middle section, where Soul and Maka are traveling, because i got to build their relationship in small scenes. It was fun to write a scene and realize it could lead to something else. It blossomed.

Q: Amanda and fez, you both did some really cool unique art! What made you wanna work in those mediums and how did you decide what scenes or subjects you wanted to art?

Amanda: Last year my default position was that I wanted to write music because I wasn't as experienced with visual art and I love writing songs based on stories and I definitely decided to stick with that for Julie's because she has a really poetic style that made for good lyric mining. And then for my other piece, marsh had sent me a bunch of cool art supplies and I wanted to try them out so I decided to do some work with pastels.

fez: I had enough Resbangs that I wanted to do something different for each one? And I'd been wanting to animate lately and I knew I could find gifs to trace from Anastasia so that helped. The third gif tho... so the night before post day I felt like I hadn't really done enough with the Fic Itself, all I really did was trace movie gifs and idk, I wanted to actually have scenes from the fic. So I started skimming and looking for things to sketch and then I came across one particular line that inspired my third gif and... that one took over lmao rip.

Q: What made you inspired to write an Anastasia AU?

redphlox: I was watching the movie and I thought "Imagine Soul in Dimitri's outfit" and it snowballed from there! I also love Anya and Dimitri's relationship, they have a lot of sass at first and grow to like each other, and I saw a lot of SoMa in them.

Q: Amanda/fez, do you feel like you grew in ur arting skillz from this Resbang, and how so? Same for you and writing, Julie.

fez: I learned that animating hair is stupidly difficult hahah. But yes, I definitely learned things about animating (namely how it takes a suuuuuper long time) and it made me appreciate animation so much more.

Amanda: Every time I write a song it definitely gets easier and I can rely more on motivation than waiting for raw inspiration.

redphlox: Hmm I felt like I grew in the plotting department. Style-wise, I learned I change styles a lot, and finding my voice for this fic was incredibly hard at first. It took 3 months to iron out the beginning because of these things, but the rest flowed after I found something I could own. I also learned to write faster and to be more disciplined. I committed to doing 1k a day to trudge through the difficult parts, and on days where I felt inspired I did a lot more than that.

Q: What was the hardest scene to write?

redphlox: Lord, the hardest was the beginning, for plotting reasons. I kept writing and deleting and adding characters and deleting them, it was awful. Overall I think the opening scene gave me more hell than it should have because I couldn't decide how I wanted Soul and Maka's relationship to start.

Q: What kinds of things did you do to find the voice and tone for the fic? Are there any writing rituals you have?

redphlox: I have to find a song that puts me in the feel of the scene I'm writing and I listen to it on repeat the whole time, haha. And to get myself pumped up, I read a lot of good writing that I admire.

Q: Do you do playlists for each fic?

redphlox: I listen to the same songs when I write, tbh. I listened to "4 page letter" by Aaliyah a LOT for this fic. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2maiIc_LACs). The lyrics don't fit the fic but I love the emotion behind Aaliyah's song, and her voice is beautiful. The longing is real, and that's what I wanted Soul and Maka's relationship to lead up to. I also listened to this song over and over again: https://youtu.be/bs2VL_HYG9Y.

Q: What inspired Maka's parents story for you, if anything? I know that that was an interesting subplot that I was not expecting when I read it!

redphlox: I wanted to stick to canon, but I also wanted to borrow from the movie, haha. So Spirit and his wife not having the best relationship comes from the manga, and everything else was a sprinkle from the movie. I was just trying to make everything plausible and it turned out into this subplot xD. All the little bits of what Maka COULD remember had to make sense in the end so I had to think and think and think.

Q: The jazz scene was one of my faves, and one that didn't really have a movie parallel. Was that a scene that you knew to write from the beginning, or did it pop up on its own?

redphlox: That scene literally popped up on its own. It was one of those that bloomed because of the previous scene. I also wanted to address Soul's love/hate relationship with music and extend the metaphor of Maka being able to see things around her, and that included Soul.

Q: Did you do any research to nail the period? Same question to all.

fez: Julie gave us clothing references ;v; I... really didn't do any research.

redphlox: Oh yeahhhh. I know the movie is set in the 1920s-ish and I wanted my fic to be vague time-period wise so that I didn't have to commit to too many intricate details, but I did look up clothing references for Amanda and fez. And I had to research transporation methods for that time period, because Soul and Maka spent so much time doing that. I wanted to be subtle, but not entirely inaccurate. Idk how many times I googled "1920s women’s fashion" in different words.

Q: What are you most proud of?

redphlox: I'm most proud of how much I wrote in so little time. I lost 3 months agonizing over my writing style and the opening scene. I don't think I got the beginning down until after second author check-ins. So when it just clicked, I cranked out 13k one week, 10k the next, and 5k in one day :0 It was insane. I'm also really proud of chapters 5-8 because everything was piling up for the characters and I introduced Spirit and Wes, and tension were running high between Soul and Maka. I can't tell you how much I love to make them suffer.

Q: I loved the part where Soul is like "WAIT WHAT BOY" when she "remembers" him when they're in the train. Did you pull from anything specific to get those emotions across?

redphlox: Ahhh I pulled from those depression feels of inadequacy LOL. He was just touched that he had an impact on her, bc the time they had together was v little. ;-;

Q: Did you watch the movie a lot? I really love how you managed to capture the feel of it while staying true to the spirit of the SE characters. How did you manage to walk that line so well?

redphlox: Ahh, I watched it the first time when I decided to write it, and then I watched it with fez at her house, and I watched it again when I was at my most frustrated with writing. Anddd I love that movie so much, it's one of my favorites, and I wanted to do it justice. I wanted to capture its feeling, because it's so beautiful and nostalgic. I didn't want to take everything from the movie, because some of it didn't fit the characters. Like, I couldn't see Soul trying to con someone for their money, like Dimitri did in the movie, but I could def see Spirit heartbroken but hopeful of seeing his daughter come back one day, even if it was stupid.

Q: Did you have any beta comments Julie that you particularly liked/thought were funny/encouraged you?

redphlox: All of bendandcurl's comments were super encouraging and insightful, and anytime Proma gave me a thumbs up on something I did feel like a proud student. Because my fic was more of a serious drama than fluff there weren't any funny comments besides the occasional gif during a serious moment in the fic.

Q: Okay but. Anya. Did you consider having her make an appearance?

redphlox: Oh I did! I had originally written Anya coming into the bakery to meet Soul in the very beginning to talk about their thing but leave after he didn't show up. That way later, when the truth was revealed, Maka could've had a lightbulb OH moment. But then I decided against it and left Anya as a background character.

Q: fez, I wanted to ask why you liked the spirit and maka gif so much, what inspired you to pick that scene?

fez: Ahhhh I have a lot of family feels, so when I saw the twirlies I... I wanted it. Maka's pigtails made me suffer but in the end it was worth it.

Q: What was [everyone's] favorite part about collaborating?

Amanda: Oo well first of all I was excited to work with fez and Julie because they are both gr8 and I had no idea Julie was writing it, so it was a really fun surprise, and then also a perfect fic to write a song for because Julie has so many good phrases to pull for lyrics.

fez: I also flipped out when I found out I'd be working with Julie and Amanda ;v; probably I had the most fun throwing my WIPs around ahah;;

redphlox: I was so stunned when I saw that Amanda picked mine, and that multiplied when fez joined. :0 It was a wild ride, and seeing their progress on their art was phenomenal like, they truly brought it to life and I'm so grateful for their hard work. I'm happy with it, it was a good team.

[tueeeeeee]

i saw a writing meme abt a ship in various prompts and immediately applied it to shenzed lol some of the scenarios are in the past and entertain a lot of my personal headcanons. like this is basically just a masterpost of my headcanons

wordcount: 4k, not explicit but pretty nsfw

topics: fake dating, bodyswap, sexpollen, secret kinks, first kiss, au, dark fic, and a sick ass crossover with mkx

cw age gap, noncon, yandere zed

Fake dating: as students, shen would try so hard to prioritize the mission, which is good because zed has it running secondary to making sure their relationship is believable as possible. of course that involves throwing himself all over shen and demanding shen make ridiculous sounds in private because they're listening in, shen, give them a show, make it convincing, and shen even knows zed is just taking advantage of the situation but he's too committed to the job to turn him down in public and risk the facade, so he just rolls along with it and smiles lovingly at zed and that's actually worse because zed starts getting the mad dokis

if it's after the fall and they have to work together again, it'd probably be while they're hunting jhin and they actually have to fake that they're NOT dating. they're in disguises but shen the bara giant is pretty hard to not notice, so he's just sitting there trying to be all you know. ah it's just me, a farmer, completely single and alone, my boyfriend is totally not hiding in the shadows ready to fuck u up. or zed gets caught out alone and shen comes to the rescue a la mimi's beautiful amazing comic and "my boyfriend's back and ur gonna get in trouble" is just blasting in the bg

Bodyswap: if this is during their student days, they'd actually probably have a lot of fun with it. zed likes being able to look at himself from different angles and shen secretly likes it too until zed goes in front of a mirror and starts making expressions just to see what shen's face looks like when he's really surprised! or what he looks like when he's picking his nose, or sticking out his tongue, and shen is just desperately covering zed's face and begging him to stop making those faces while he’s in shen’s body and please don't do that in front of other people

zed doesn't do it front of other people because he wants to be the only one who knows what it looks like, of course, and when he's alone, he tries on other expressions. he wants to see what shen looks like when he's happy, and smiling, and laughing, and it feels forced in front of the mirror but seeing it makes his heart flutter anyways. wanting to see what shen looks like when he's happy quickly turns into wanting to see what shen looks like when he's horny and then zed just straight up masturbates in front of the mirror. thanks zed.

anyway shen plays with himself too but he tries not to at first, he's better than that, this is so wrong and zed is going to kill him – until he remembers zed would definitely and has probably already taken advantage of this and then he just touches himself everywhere to see if this area is something he likes or if it's just a particularly sensitive area on zed's body (which is knowledge he's gleaning just for the sake of knowledge, of course, n-not like he's planning on utilizing it or anything...)

while they were students shen almost exclusively topped since "the son of the headmaster shouldn't be on his knees" so later when zed convinces shen into playing around it's an absolute delight for zed to get to be the pitcher for once, even if he's basically fucking his own body. shen agrees just because he doesn't want to have to look at himself, and besides zed's body is already used to it so shen willingly bottoms and being the repressed little sub he is he just fucking loses it and breathlessly asks zed afterwards with tears in his eyes, "are you always that sensitive?" and zed is like ??? not enough to fuckin cry about it and thats how shen discovers he likes taking it up the bum

if it's after the fall of the kinkou they'd probably just try to experiment with each other's abilities, then realize that even though they have access to them they can't really harness the power the same way. like zed's clones are sentient, and when shen finally manages to make one it just stares back at him for a while and then starts laughing uncontrollably, "i thought something was odd. now how did this happen?" and shen is unamused and more than a little flustered at being made to feel incompetent when he can't control the shadow and it just keeps laughing at him in zed's voice. 

meanwhile zed is excited to finally be able to see the spirits the way shen does, and he tries to walk the spirit realm and teleport and kind of just ends up concentrating himself into an aneurysm because he can't fucking figure it out and does the Old Man Yells At Cloud thing when he tries to talk to the spirits to get them to help him understand. they don't give a fuck about shen half the time so unsurprisingly, they don't pay any attention to zed either. also, zed would still masturbate in front of a mirror, except he does it furiously in this case

god im sorry that was so long but i just. i love the bodyswap trope so much o(-<

Sexpollen/fuck or die/aliens made them do it: as students, pretty much everything between them has to be a competition so it's a battle of wills to not jump each other and zed tries to goad shen on by playing up but being that close to each other just makes it worse. zed devolves into pretty much just clinging onto shen and begging him to please give in

shen doesn't want any of it, not when they're being made to feel that way, but zed insists that it isn't making him feel anything, not anything different from usual anyway. so shen brings him off with sympathetic intentions at first, and gently pushes zed's hands away whenever he tries to reciprocate, but watching zed come undone affects him more than he expected it to. zed said it isn't any different from usual but it is, zed isn't normally this pliant and desperate, and he doesn't usually call shen's name so sweetly and sometimes zed will outright make shen fight to get zed beneath him, but now, zed yields to him so easily and that should be evidence of how wrong this is but shen is so utterly captivated with this eager zed that he gives in and gives him the good dickin. he's super disappointed with himself later while zed is just smiling dopily, completely satisfied

fuck or die after the fallout would be rough hate-filled sex, zed pushing shen's face into the dirt and forcing him because it's easier that way. shen bitterly spits out that he'd rather die than touch zed, and zed only laughs because they both know that's a lie. if it were anyone else shen would 100% approach this with his usual pragmatism but it's zed and he hates being made to lose control like this, and of course zed won't just get it over with. he takes his pleasure and then leaves shen tied down and makes sure to work shen slowly and coax him with disgusting gentleness into climax, making it good for him and shen hates every second. he doesn't do anything like try to make shen beg because that shit would go nowhere fast, and afterwards zed is just completely smug with himself and shen hates him more than ever

Secret kinks: zed loves body odor which is really fucking unfortunate because shen reeks of it after the hours he spends training, and he probably knows it bc why else would he have his dirty clothes so conveniently left out like that for zed to furiously wank into while grumbling stupid sexy stinky shen

he has a bored and ignored kink too, but he's too fucking needy for it to ever take place out of his control so he has to specifically negotiate with shen to not pay attention to him during a scene, like zed showing off his bod or blowing shen while shen's just trying to read as long as they're 100% clear that shen has to make up for it later

he probably tries to convince shen to pee himself at least once but gets kinkshamed to death and never tries again. he also loves shen's hands/wrists and being praised. like ok, shen likes being praised too right? he'll glow and be intensely pleased and would fit that indulgent kind of "good boy!! you like pleasing me don't you" praise kink but zed's is like a fucking id-tagged collar in which only shen can hold the leash. shen gives him a passing glance and a murmured, "well done" while zed's just like sweeping and zed will somehow always be sweeping somewhere shen can see for the next five days, with a boner. you know what i mean??

anyway shen is the most repressed fucker out there so he THINKS he's vanilla but shen's definition of vanilla is very. i mean. he regularly undergoes resistance training and mindfuckery so you could tie him up and CBT him and he'd still just be like ah good ol vanilla sex. a lot of the kinks he has he isn't really even aware of having. shen doesn't know what he likes a lot of the time, in and out of bed. he spent his entire life being dictated, and it isn't until after zed gets rid of all the people who did that to him that he's forced to consider more deeply about himself

and of course he immediately finds that he likes being dominated and having someone else take control, even if they completely fuck him up in the process. he likes being collared and humiliated but he doesn't like his position as the eye of twilight being brought into it so shit like "look how far the eye has fallen" isn't gonna fly.

even so he's a bit of an exhibitionist. it's probably a carry-over from his student days when being caught was a definite possibility in a household full of ninja, so he likes the rush of doing it outside, especially since it also has the benefits of being rougher and quicker and there being no time for nonsense or softness

the concept of aftercare is a foreign one. the first time zed tries to administer it shen is repulsed and probably tries to escape but he can't get away from zeds sweet sweet embrace. he doesn't ever get used to it, not from zed the two-faced snake, and for good reason honestly. zed's brand of tenderness is kind of saccharine and condescending, and all too often he whispers secrets as if shen cares at all that zed used to love him, or that zed is glad he's here now, or that zed doesn't want to hurt him. really, he doesn't care. at all. not a bit.

also he tries to keep it secret that he loves getting dicked by zed's clones but it's pretty obvious. zed hates it because he gets jealous of himself but he absolutely loves all of shen's other kinks since he thinks shen would never trust someone other than zed to do those things to him

Their first kiss: shen was definitely the one who had to initiate it!! zed would have been fine with just pining after shen his entire life (not really), because he sure as hell wasn't going to give shen another point in his favor by letting him know that zed had F-FEELINGS FOR HIM... regardless it's still obvious as fuck to everybody, including shen, who kind of takes it in stride because let's be real shen was probably the target of numerous an unrequited crush in his life.

shen thinks he's doing a good job handling zeds emotions, letting him down gently without making it obvious he knows zed likes him, and it comes so naturally to him because hes so used to doing it that he doesn't even stop to think that maybe he actually kind of looks forward to zed's not-so-subtle attempts to spend more time together?? maybe he actually kind of wants to hold his hand?? maybe he's actually a raging homosexual?????

so the kiss would happen after a really tough mission that they just barely scraped through together, and shen's just so happy that they're both alive and safe that he gives zed a big ol smooch. obviously zed's not-so-subtle attempts become outright overt now that he knows it's mutual (even if shen keeps embarrassedly trying to convince him it's not)

likewise, their first kiss after they start working together to hunt jhin would also be shen calling it. zed's older now and not as angry and petulant. their history and ties are so intensely and irrevocably woven together that he just kind of dully accepts that a little part of him will always love shen, right next to the part that will always resent him. because of that he doesn't want to ruin this tentative (and probably temporary) truce they've got going on, even though he's unexpectedly thrilled to have shen by his side again and he's dying to ask whether stick-up-his-ass prudish shen has bedded anyone else in the past five years

shen's kind of not really in the same boat bc the power dynamic is mostly in his favor and it's zed who has to watch his footing, but shen has never had an equal like zed before or since. he can see that zed's changed, but he's also remained the same in the ways that matter and not all of them matter in a good way. for one, he still doesn't see reason in balance, and shen argues that zed himself is contributing to the power balance by foiling shen and zed absolutely hates that because he doesn't want to sustain a war between their clans just for the sake of shen's notion of equilibrium.

shen feels duty-bound and obligated to his clan to you know, not consort with the enemy, but he's also aware of the intrinsic connection he has with zed and how they're naturally drawn together. and it could be something as tiny as a bad dream or getting caught in the rain or meeting eyes when they've both just awoken, and shen acknowledges the inevitability of it and just kisses him

anyways when!! will riot give me my jhin lore follow-up!!

A crossover of my choice: the events of ninja gaiden could fit seamlessly right into ionia but there's pretty much no way im picking it over a mortal kombat crossover.... yall know how much my ass loves mkx

anyway quan chi has manipulated pretty much every one and thing in existence so it's not at all surprising that he was the one who brought into existence the scroll of shadows that corrupts zed and instills in him a thirst for power so great it drives him to destroy the kinkou. zed's death animation where he opens a portal? actually just to get back to netherrealm. quan chi sees him and just sighs again, really? and restores him and sends him back up

also ok. i know thematically shen has a lot in common with subzero but think of raiden and shen..... raiden was probably bosom buddies with master kusho, they regularly convened to discuss the state of earthrealm and shen got to inherit that friendship and trust!! raiden guides him and tells him how to purify zed, which leads him into scorpion and subzeros path since at this point they're revenants too. afterwards shen holds the recovery club for "I Was Under Quan Chi's Control" but only hanzo and kuai liang are invited

after all zed still has his entire fucking order of shadows which were forged under quan chi's ideals, and just like how hanzo still resents the massacre of his clan zed still resents the kinkou--that wasn't something that was instilled into him through quan chi's control. so basically everyone hates zed still. bye zed

i had fatalities for shen and zed written out too but....... i dont want to talk abt it here since it's obviously gorey and honestly embarrassing to talk about lmao!!! NEXT

An AU of my choice: i love my bloodborne AU so much but it's too detailed and involves more than just sz so i'll settle for another one about time shenanigans

shen tries to bypass zed's whole crawling into a shadow portal and escaping death thing by sealing him away in a time loop, but when the dust settles something's obviously gone wrong. there's a body laying there and shen picks him up and carries him inside and no one can really believe it, but the old kinkou veterans were raised next to that face and they know what zed looked like in his youth.

he's ten years younger, before the order of shadows and before the golden demon, and he hasn't just been aged down but swapped places entirely because he knows fuck all about what's going on. akali wants to kill him before he can fuck everything up but agrees that'd mess with too much other shit, kennen is so so sad and tries the hardest to make zed feel at home even though he and zed were never particularly close, and shen keeps his distance as best he can manage. he doesn't want to look at this zed when all it makes him think about is how things should have been

young zed feels confused and alone as fuck in this future timeline. so many members of the kinkou are foreign to him and the familiar ones are made of bitter implications and no one tells him outright why he's being ostracized, shen is never at the temple and when he is he's holed away. zed has to practically ambush him just to find out shen's already gone to pay zilean a visit to work out what's gone wrong, and all zilean told him was that he needed to find where the feedback came from that switched the zeds

eventually someone tries to assassinate zed as a preventative measure and shen realizes it's not safe for him at the kinkou monastery, so he takes zed with him on his journey to find the zero point and angst happens as they measure each other up to the versions of themselves they're familiar with--present shen is discomfited by how naive past zed is, past zed can't believe how much bigger the stick up shen's ass got, but after he learns what his future self did he can't imagine ever hating shen enough to do that to him. queue lots of bonding, slow burn, shen waffling and acting under a LOT of pretenses because he doesnt want to take advantage of this younger zed, who sees him as a mentor

meanwhile present zed wakes up in his old room and thinks he's trapped in a memory, and confirms it the only way he knows how. he sneaks into shen's room and is completely delighted upon finding a young shen who's much too interactive to be just a memory, and quickly works out what's​ happened. the thought of killing shen doesn't even cross his mind, not when shen barely presents a challenge like this. rather, he finds himself appreciating the change in their dynamics now that the power balance is tipped in zed's favor.

he goes on his own trip to find zilean and tells shen to stay here and give master kusho an excuse as to why zed is gone. instead, zed vanishes off away from the monastery and, twenty minutes later, has to make himself detectable just so shen can find him properly from where he's followed zed to.

zed secretly wanted this to happen and gladly takes the young shen under his wing. obviously he doesn't tell him why zed's eyes are red or his hair is white or why sometimes he'll completely disappear in the shadows. eventually he coaxes shen into bed and fucks him, which is something shen never allowed him in his time, and the sensations of it are transmitted to future shen through his dreams and he wakes up feeling phantom sensations of zed holding him and eventually the present sz discover they have a very rudimentary means of communicating through their past selves via sex dreams/strong emotions lol

the juxtaposition between present shen and zed would have been explored, because even though at a glance, shen sticks to his lawfulness and zed immorally takes advantage of the power imbalance, when they each discover that they receive the feelings of their past selves, zed treats past shen tenderly and tries to make him softer.... whispers the things he needs to remember, in the hopes that present shen will hear them and meet him halfway so that they can fix the timeline (and also meet him halfway feelings-wise 83c) whereas shen fights the young past zed and humiliates him, trains him even though logic tells him he shouldn't, treats zed the way the kinkou treated him, and all the feelings conveyed to present zed are ones of bitterness until it reaches a head and past zed snaps at him and almost dies. after that shen realizes that in lieu of master kusho distancing zed from the clan, shen is now the one doing that, when he should be taking this as an opportunity to fix the future and set things right between them.

just like present shen is forced to confront things about himself though, so is present zed. his feelings of "haha past shen was such a puppy" turn into slow realizations of why he loved shen in the first place. he thought, all this time, it was just because he was attracted to power and back then, shen had had it in abundance. but now, he can destroy shen any time he wishes and yet... it just makes him regret even more how things ended up the way they did, and he tries to give vague hints to past shen about things to avoid, and to remember to take care of himself and master kusho.

anyways it turns out the whole thing was engineered by zilean because he sees all timelines and he wants one where there isn't a fucking war between the shadows and the kinkou

ok i put this one at the bottom just bc it's yandere zed and it's pretty fucked and does get pretty graphic

tw mind control, brief ableism, amputation, lobotomy

Dark!fic: all of zed's students knows of his fixation on shen. by now everyone's used to those brief intense moments where he'll waft smog from his body just thinking about shen nd cursing his existence but none of them really know the full extent of it. it's not just zed, but the shadows as well, and they've wanted shen for such a long time, especially after kusho sealed them away. to take control of shen would be the first step to controlling two worlds after all, but instead, after all their pining, it's zed who comes along and they don't care about him but its their first opportunity in years, and they can sense the frustration and mutability in him so with no other option they decide he'll do

but when they take him over, zed's present fixation on shen, a very different sort, warps the shadows' and it becomes this twisted love where zed wants shen solely for himself, shen's mind and body and ambition must all belong to him, and he needs to kill everyone who gets in the way of that. of course, shen's father is first. then, the rest of the kinkou. when he finally has shen, he really doesn't want his hard work to go to waste! shen fights back of course but that's what makes him so cute--no, no, it's why he's a worthy host body, take him now--but all of zed's hard work!--and shen, where do you think you're going?

oh geez. zed REALLY doesn't want to do this but shen's always been so strong and zed can't guarantee he'll always be able to overpower shen or outrun him. well, he will be able to guarantee it if shen has no legs! you complete utter fool you've rendered him useless! he loves shen's hands though so he gets to keep those.

zed was really hoping that would be all it took, he was even being extra nice to shen by not force-feeding him those chi suppressants. but no. a week later shen tries to escape again, by warping out this time, and zed desperately and frantically tears the place apart looking for him. he sends his order out but shen could be anywhere at all, though shen's mind apparently couldn't take him very far because they find him rather quickly. he's lying unconscious in a pool of his own blood. it looks like he was dragging himself towards the edge of that cliff, but the ones who found him don't tell zed that.

zed is heartbroken. he's not even angry, maybe a little, but he's just so sad that shen still wants to leave him after all they've been through. he holds shen and apologizes over and over for taking his legs, he knows shen was--attached to them. zed will definitely make it up to him. he loves shen so much. the shadows agree with that much at least. as gently as he can he straps shen to a chair and takes out an ice pick, positioning it very carefully over shen's prefrontal cortex. shen, please stop squirming and shouting, please, he doesn't want to hurt you. he's going to make it better. he's going to make it so that you never want to leave.

on a lighter note thnks for checkin in!! i dont realistically expect anyone to read the entire thing because the way i type is actually horrendous but thanks for reading even a lil bit. i wrote this like 5 months ago which is thankfully enough time to not care as much about how embarrassing this is :)

i lied im still embarrassed