#i just have......... Many thoughts and feelings about romana

[the-worms-in-your-bones]

Yes, I’m having a completely normal night, why do you ask (<- thought about romana too much and almost started crying earlier)

[melodygatesauthor]

Goodnight, Princess

Yandere Dad's Best Friend - Santiago Garcia X f!Reader

Not Beta Read - For @romana-after-dark's Dead Dove December event!

PLEASE READ TAGS/DISCLAIMERS/WARNINGS BEFORE READING THIS FIC. THERE ARE DARK THEMES!

Summary

Your dad's best friend accidentally discovers that you're a sex worker. He tries to let it go, but it eats away at him until things go way too far.

This fic was written in first person from Santiago's perspective. I know that's not normally something I do, but if you give it a chance I think you'll like it hehe <3

Tags/Warnings

NSFW, non-con, dubious consent, rape, sex, unprotected sex, praise kink, masturbation, obsessive behavior, possessiveness, porn with some plot, smut, creampie, breeding kink if you squint, non-consensual somnophilia, intoxication, implied murder, dad's best friend, age gap, voyeurism, hidden cameras. DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT (that means that what you see in the tags WILL be in the fic, don't act surprised when you get exactly what you were warned about.)

Word Count: 5.7k

I should’ve put a stop to it the second I realized it was you on the other side of that wall.

Don’t ask me how I knew. A good guess? A hunch? Maybe I’d known you so long that I could tell, based on some deep ingrained instinct, exactly what your lips would feel like wrapped around my cock. You sucked on it like you knew what you were doing, like it wasn’t a challenge for you to take something so big in that pretty little mouth.

I recognized the sound of your moans almost right away. The hum of your voice when you started sucking my dick was the same sound you made at dinner the other night when you popped a spoonful of mashed potatoes in your mouth. Does your dad know you’re doing this? Do you care? Do you ever worry about what he might say if he finds out?

Don’t worry princess, I'll keep your secret. 

Our secret.

I bet you never thought I would find out about your slutty little side job. To be entirely honest, I didn’t think I’d find you working at a place like this. If you know me at all, and I know for a fact that you do, then you’d know I’m a lonely man. Years of serving in the military and the endless night terrors have made it difficult to find any sort of real relationship, so I’ve given up. That doesn’t mean I don’t still have needs, sweetheart.

Everybody jerks off, and I’m no exception. I don’t even know how many nights I’ve been in my room, cock in hand while I watch some crappy porno to get myself off. Every once in a while though, I like to treat myself to a little something more. Most people treat themselves to some kind of dessert, or a nice bottle of wine, but I like to treat myself to a night at Club BJ where all the dirty men go to get their rocks off.

I never thought I’d find you there.

Not a chance in hell did I think for even a second that you would be sucking random cocks on the other side of a gloryhole to earn a few extra bucks. You’re so good at it though, princess. How did you learn to swirl your tongue like that? Hm? Was it all the boys at college who taught you how to do that? Did they tell you what a pretty little girl you are while your lips were stretched around them?

They better have. They better have said thank you when they finished all over that beautiful face too.

I couldn’t speak to you. I couldn’t let you know it was me on the other side of that wall, so I hope the $200 tip I left you gets the point across. 

When I got home tonight, you were running through my mind like a fucking hamster on a wheel. I’m not sure what to do now, but I can’t shake how bad I want to go back to the club for another round. I’d pay thousands, probably even tens of thousands, just to have more…

But I can’t do that. Not to you, and not to your dad.

That was the first and only time I’m going to know what it’s like to feel you sucking my cock.

—

There’s no possible way for you to know what you do to me, well, for you to know that it was me on the other side of the hole that you were making feel so fucking good. I’m coming back again, despite promising I wouldn’t. I’ve been trying so hard to let it go, but I fucking can’t. You’re like a goddamn siren luring me back to that shithole, and I can’t resist your call.

I’ll be back on Friday, because that’s the night they set the girls up with their asses sticking out through the wall. I would assume the club has you bent over some kind of table on the other side of that wall? I’m not sure, but Friday can’t come soon enough. I feel like I need you.

Maybe if you hadn’t looked at me the way you did when I saw you today at your dad’s for dinner. Were you looking at me like that on purpose, sweetheart? I mean, you must be…right? Or have I completely lost my shit?

I probably lost my shit, let’s be honest.

I’ve known your dad since high school. I even helped him beat up a guy that was hitting on your mom back when she and your dad had just started dating. I’m really not a bad guy, and I’ve never looked at you like this. I mean it. But how can I look at you any differently now? How can I look at you any differently after what you did to me? What you did for me.

“Santi, can you pass the butter?” You asked, looking at me, probably no different than usual but I couldn’t think of anything other than those pouty lips wrapped around my dick again.

Did you notice the way my hand shook when I handed you the butter dish? Maybe not, but they were trembling and to be honest it was fucking annoying. I’m a man in his late thirties and I can’t get a grip on the feelings I’m developing for my best friend's goddamn kid. It’s wrong, disgusting, hell I’d kill someone if you were my kid.

But you’re not, and I can’t fucking help it, even though I tried.

Maybe someday, if you ever find out about any of this, I’ll tell you about how much I hated myself (hell, I still hate myself sometimes), when I came home with that post nut clarity. That might’ve been the best blowjob of my life, but I stood in front of my mirror for a good ten minutes trying to tell myself that I’d never go back to that hellhole, Club BJs. I meant it with all my heart when I said it over and over like a mantra.

Now I’m stuck though. I’m stuck thinking about you bent over with a wall separating the top half of your body from the bottom with countless men fucking you until you’re so full of cum you looked like a damn overstuffed pastry. You deserve to feel good. You deserve to have at least one of those men be someone that cares about you.

I guess I’ll have to be the one to do it. I guess this is how I’ll justify doing something I know I shouldn’t.

I’ll see you on Friday, princess.

—

It makes me feel a little bit better to know that every man in there is at least checked for STDs before he gets to fuck you. Surely you wouldn’t have signed up to work at a place like this if they weren’t. You’re smart, you’ve always been so smart. It’s one of the things I admire most about you.

Still not clever enough to know that I was one of those men who stood behind you that night. In fact, I was your last customer of the night. Your pussy was so puffy and swollen, those guys really stretched you out and fucked you good didn’t they? Don’t worry, princess, I took good care of you and gave your little hole a break. I won’t lie, it took everything in me not to use you the way they did, but I’ll do that another time.

Tonight I was on my knees for you, grabbing onto both of your asscheeks and spreading you out so I could clean up the mess those filthy men made of my little princess. You sounded so surprised, I heard you gasp, when I started eating you out. Did you like that? It sounded like you did. I could feel your thighs shaking and at some point you even started rocking back and forth like you wanted more.

Maybe you wanted me to fuck you. Were you hoping that the mystery man on the other side of the wall would clean you up and then fuck his own cum into you too? Or maybe you were happy to have the break. Either way, I licked your swollen clit until I could hear your pretty moans on the other side and feel your cunt throbbing against my tongue. Your slick tastes so good sweetheart, can’t believe you made something so delicious all by yourself.

“You’re not going to fuck me?” You asked me. I could almost hear the desperation in your voice, like you were begging me to come back and take you.

“No.” I said firmly, faking a deeper voice than my own.

Next time I will though, don’t worry sweetheart, I’ll fuck you so good you won’t want anyone else.

—

The same night I ate you out I rushed home to jerk off. It sounds crude to say, but fuck I couldn’t help it. The taste of your pussy was still on my lips. I could still smell you soaked into the stubble on my chin and upper lip. I’m making a mental note to snag a pair of your panties when I come over for the barbecue at your dad’s tomorrow night. Maybe that will help get me through this mess I’m in. Maybe it will help me stop this shit.

I know I can’t keep doing this, but the feeling I get when I’m scrolling through your instagram photos from last summer in your bikini with my cock squeezed in my hand is incredible. I’m looking at those perfect tits hidden beneath such a thin layer of fabric, and your pretty rear is barely covered at all.

When I came it’s like I was possessed, blowing up a picture of your face just so I could imagine myself coating it in all of me. I don’t even really want to talk about how hard it was to clean that mess off my phone.

I feel like I’m losing myself in the depraved thoughts and fantasies I’m having of you. I woke up with soaked sheets and I thought I fucking pissed myself, but I didn’t, it was…something else. I’d dreamt of you. I can’t remember exactly what was happening in that dream, but it must’ve been good, and I’m annoyed that I still can’t remember what it was about.

—

A small part of me, the part of me that still had some morals left, was hoping you’d be working your day job. (honestly I can’t even remember what your day job is, aren’t you a housekeeper? Or a waitress or something?) At least if you were working I wouldn’t have to see you. I wouldn’t have to think about you more than I already was. Not to mention, I wouldn’t have had to sit there and watch you laugh with your ‘friend’ that you’d invited over.

You told your dad when you introduced him, “we’re just friends dad.”

You said it with such an attitude that both your dad and I knew better. You might’ve thought you were just friends, but that guy wanted more, and I knew you were going to give it to him. I could tell by the way you looked at him when you thought no one was paying attention.

I bet you didn’t think I’d hear you both making out in your room that night, but your moans call me now like a moth to a flame. The other barbecue guests had gone home, and your dad was drunk and passed out in his recliner, and I heard you faintly over the hum of the crappy reality show on tv. I didn’t pause the show, I didn’t want to wake up your dad, so I went upstairs silently, masked by the sound on the tv.

Initially, I wanted to walk in there and rip this kid off of you, giving him a few vicious but empty threats before sending him on his way with his tail between his legs. Your voice stopped me in my tracks though.

“Shh, I don’t want my dad to hear us,” you whispered, followed by a sweet giggle.

He won’t, princess. I thought, as though it were me you were talking to and not this loser.

You’d left your bedroom door open, per your dad’s request, such a good little girl. Despite being a grown woman, you still did what your daddy told you, and that’s the only reason I was able to hide in the bathroom and hear you get fucked while I jerked off and imagined I was with you instead of…whatever the fuck his name is.

“Oh god!” You whined, making my body shudder.

That guy doesn’t talk much, and that made it all the easier for me to imagine myself in his place.

When you said, “mm, harder, please…”

I was right there to say, “anything you want, sweetheart.”

I tried to move my hand in time with the light thump of your bed against the wall. It helped. What didn’t help was the fact that I could tell how little you were enjoying yourself. You were making the same sounds you made when you were ass out at the gloryhole. I knew I could do better, I knew I could make your body shake with pleasure like when I was kneeling down behind you with my tongue working overtime on your sensitive clit.

You were pretty good at faking it though, good enough that I was a leaking mess, precum dripping all down my shaft while I worked myself behind the wall your bedroom shared with the bathroom. I really wanted to go in there, tell that guy to get lost and give you the night of your life, but I didn’t. Instead I stood there, spilling a few globs of cum into some toilet paper and calling it good enough.

I was quick to head back downstairs before you even knew I was up there in the first place. That guy had the audacity to say goodnight to me in the kitchen on his way out the door. I let that go pretty quickly because then it was just you and me alone in the kitchen while your dad slept soundly in the living room.

You have no idea how badly I wanted to ask you for the pleasure of taking care of you, of making sure that you got off too, but I bit my tongue. Instead we made small talk about how your college was going and you asked me about Benny, Frankie and Will. 

For a moment I had forgotten about all the things that transpired between us, or that I’d done while thinking about you, and you were just my best friend’s kid again. We were just two people who had known each other for a long time, catching up and making small talk. Then you had to bend over in your shorts, and my cock ignored its usual refractory period to spring alive and nag for attention again.

“You okay, Santi?” You’d asked so innocently, as if I didn’t know what that mouth was capable of, or what that body could take.

“I’m fine, sweetheart.”

I’m not fucking fine, but that doesn’t matter.

—

You slept like a rock that night, not even stirring in the slightest when I grabbed your panties out of your hamper by the closet. They didn’t look particularly fancy, so I assume you won’t miss them, will you? Doesn’t matter anyway, you’d never expect that I’m the one who took them.

I can’t even begin to tell you how disgusting I felt when I got home the next morning and I had placed your panties on my bed in front of me like a prize I’d won. I think I stared at them for at least a full ten minutes before I picked them up again and put them in my nightstand. I’ve never been a “panty sniffer” and I tried to convince myself that just knowing I had them in my possession was enough.

Have you ever read The Tell-Tale Heart? I remember when I was in high school I had to, and it stuck with me for some reason. Your underwear in my nightstand reminded me of that story in some ways. It’s like all I could hear were your moans in my ears and no matter where I went in the house the temptation to smell the remnants of your cunt on that fabric was following me.

So finally, here I am, two weeks after you first sucked my cock, and I can shamefully admit that I did it. I smelled them, and sweetheart, you smell so much better without all that cum inside of you. Of course the panties can’t compare to the real thing, which I don’t know if I’ll ever smell without six loads of spend inside, but god I hope I get the privilege one day.

Or maybe I hope I don’t.

I’m still so torn between the fact that you’re my best friend’s kid, and the way I want to bury my dick so far in that pretty little cunt that you’re seeing stars.

—

I was first in line tonight. It’s Friday night so your ass was out again and untouched this time. You weren’t wet yet which excited me for some reason. It meant I got to have the honors of making you nice and slick.

My hand looks so big against your ass, princess. I wish I could show you. That was me who rubbed your clit, making you shake and whine for more on the other side of the wall. I’m the one who slipped my thick middle finger in that greedy little hole, and then my index finger, and then the ring finger.

I’m guessing you liked it based on how slippery you got, and how much you moaned on the other side. Do you know how dedicated your customers are? One of them got pissed at me for taking too long with you. I can’t say I blame them, your pussy is perfect sweetheart.

God the feeling of sliding my dick between those pretty pussy lips is like nothing I’ve ever felt. As I bottomed out, I felt your walls were squeezing around me like you wanted me deeper, so of course I pushed in more, all the way until I couldn’t go further. You gasped like you hadn’t felt a hundred dicks inside you before mine. 

I slid back again and slammed into you. I heard you begging me to keeping going, and saying, “fuck you’re good, holy shit!”

It was so hard not to say all the filthy things I wanted to when I fucked you, princess. I wanted to tell you how good you looked like that, pussy lips split around my cock like it wanted to swallow me whole. I wanted to ask you if you would like me to stick my thumb in your ass but decided to just try it anyway and see how you reacted.

You liked it.

At least it seemed like you did, your cunt clamped down around my dick like a damn vice grip the moment my thumb popped through your tight little hole. Did you like having something in your ass sweetheart? It’s shocking how tight you are, given how often I know you’re getting fucked. Some of the guys coming in behind me were big, some even bigger than me, but you don’t like them as much as you do when I fuck you, right? Of course not, because you don’t sound like that when you’re with them.

I caught a small glimpse of your eye through the hole. There was a small gap between the wall and your hips and you were looking at the same time I was. Did you see me? Did you have time to realize who I was? Did you come right then and there because you liked the idea of your dad’s best friend fucking you until you were too spent for anyone else?

Your orgasm forced me to come at the same time you did. I can’t even begin to tell you what it felt like to spill my load inside of you like I’d wanted to for so long. I remember so clearly being pushed up against your ass, pulling my thumb out of your hole so I could squeeze your hips and pull you over my dick further. It’s like I was willing every ounce of it to fill you up so full that no one else could. It’s like I was trying to make sure that when you look in the mirror a few months from now, you’ll remember the feeling of the man who fucked a baby into you.

I’m not an idiot. Well, I am, but I know that you’re on birth control. I know that no matter how many times I fuck you, the chances of you actually getting pregant are slim, not that I’d want to get you pregnant anyway. That would be too much, and I don’t want to go too far.

I’m not going to go too far.

—

I went to your house today.

I already had an excuse planned if I somehow got caught while you and your dad were out. If you or your father saw me, I’d say I came back for my hat. It’s not a total lie, I did leave my hat behind, but neither of you needed to know it was on purpose.

Do you realize how much dust has collected on the little stuffed bear you have on the shelf facing directly across from your bed, sweetheart? I doubt it, but it does make for the perfect place to put the small camera I bought.

I feel so fucking gross I can hardly stand to look at myself. But I can’t stand not to watch you touch yourself either. The glory hole is great, but I want to see that pretty face when you’re coming so hard you can’t breathe right, and I can’t do that when I’m on the other side of a fucking wall can I?

Seeing you later that night while I was at my own house, fist closed around my cock and watching you play with yourself is worth all the self loathing in the world. I had the camera feed pulled up on my laptop, and I could see you walking over to your dresser. God, what an array of toys you have. Do you have all those toys because you like them? Or is it because you haven’t found someone who knows their way around your body yet?

If it’s the latter, I promise you won’t need those things once I’m done with you.

Fuck, princess. The one you picked out is so damn big. I’ve seen you fit some pretty big cocks in that little hole, but I was shocked to see you squeezing lube around the head of that thing and gliding it over your pussy lips. You took a deep breath. Does it hurt to take such a fat silicone dick like that? 

Fuck, I’m glad I put the camera where I did. Who had you so wet like that? Hm? Were you thinking about anyone in particular? Can you even get that entire dildo in there? I hated to admit how much I liked watching you struggle. My cock leaked so fucking much I thought I was going to come too fast, but I kept it together.

You finally pushed it in, and I’m so damn proud of you princess. You had a really hard time going all the way though, didn’t you? That tight little pussy of yours was stretched to its limit and you were only halfway in there. Why do you even have a dildo that size if you can’t get it all the way in your cunt? Are you trying to stretch yourself out for someone? You don’t have to stretch yourself for me, I’d be happy to take care of that for you myself.

I watched you push it in even more, I was so focused on the furrow of your turned up brow and the way you bit your lip while I stared. We both exhaled the moment you managed to fit the entire thing in. Your eyes rolled back like it was the best thing you’d ever felt. You really do enjoy being stuffed full, don’t you, sweetheart?

You started fucking yourself with it, the sounds of your wet cunt hit my ears like the sweetest music I’d ever heard. I stroked myself in time with your movements, my eyes focused right on your face, and my cock throbbed every time you moaned. Wasn’t your dad home tonight? Shouldn’t you be a bit quieter when you’re doing stuff like that? Maybe you just don’t care if he hears you.

You started fucking yourself faster so of course I was jerking myself harder, trying to keep up with you without losing it too quickly. It didn’t take long for you to come though. Did you like the feeling of that toy that much? You gushed around it, you choked back some moans but several other soft whimpers escaped, filling your room and hitting my ears through the camera feed. I came too, coating my knuckles and my stomach with so much cum I didn’t know I was even capable of producing that much.

Why’d you have to ruin it? Huh?

It was such a good fucking orgasm for both of us, and then I heard you say a name. It wasn’t my name though, was it, princess? I don’t know why that bothers me so fucking much. Maybe it’s because in some twisted way I’ve managed to convince myself that you were putting on that private show just for me. So if you did do it for me, then I don’t want to hear you saying some other guy’s name while you’re fucking your self like that sweetheart. 

I just don’t.

—

I lost it today.

I really fucking lost it today, princess.

I found that guy. You know the one who fucked you the other night while I jerked off in the bathroom? That ‘friend’ of yours? The one whose name you called out instead of mine?

I found him.

I…

—

Did you miss me, sweetheart? I’m sorry, but I had to leave for a while, at least until things quieted down, and until you weren’t sad anymore. I know I should feel bad, but I don’t. I would probably do it again a thousand times if I had to.

You seemed fine during dinner at your dad’s tonight. I don’t really think you were that upset over the guy anyway, but it doesn’t matter. I don’t want to hear his name come out of that pretty mouth again. Ever.

After too much wine during (and after) dinner, I carried you upstairs. You never could handle your liquor. Remember when you were only eighteen and I would let you sneak a few shots under your old man’s nose when he wasn’t looking? Your dad was sleeping when I put you down gently in your bed. Your skin is so fucking soft it killed me to step away from you.

Your eyes opened for a moment meeting with mine. I felt my gut stir at the sight of you biting your lip. Why were you doing that to me? Didn’t you know how that would affect me? I couldn’t resist the way you looked at me that night. No one would’ve been able to. It’s not fair for you to put me in that position and expect that I’m just going to walk away. When I think back to it, this was all your fault, princess.

“Santi,” you said sweetly.

I almost climbed on top of you right then when you grabbed my shirt and pulled me closer. I almost grabbed your throat and fucked you through your shorts, but I held back.

“What, princess?” I asked you, putting a caring hand on your shoulder, trying to fight back my more primal urges screaming in my head.

You shivered, “I-mm-need something towearto mm-bed,” you slurred out.

I could see the curve of your hip disappear into your too-short shorts. I really don’t want you going out in public wearing things like that. I gave you my shirt to keep you warm. I hope it’s comfortable, sweetheart, I can’t let you go cold, can I? When I leaned down to put it over your head, I felt such a fucking ache in my chest when your face appeared again through the hole. Such a pretty babygirl.

“Thank you,” you smiled contentedly and snuggled into your pillows.

I gulped, “princess,” I whispered, slowly creeping my fingers toward the hem of your shorts where they rested on your waist.

“Hm?” You hummed, but you weren’t really awake anymore, from what I could tell.

When I touched your soft, exposed hip you didn’t stir at all, and when I slipped my fingers underneath your panties, then your shorts, you didn’t make a sound. When I pushed both down to your ankles and dropped them on the floor, you didn’t open your eyes. You didn’t have any fucking clue what I was going to do to you, did you?

Did you feel my fingers when I slipped them between your thighs and felt your little wet cunt? I bet you did, even if you didn’t realize you were feeling it. I thought I would wake you up for sure when I pushed you onto your back and climbed over you. And when that didn’t wake you up, I thought, without a doubt, that when I pulled my cock out and touched it against your slick pussy lips your eyes would shoot open and you’d catch me in the act.

You didn’t though, you stayed deep in your drunken sleep, and I could get away with doing anything I wanted to you.

I’m still wondering what I would’ve done if you’d caught me. What would I say? How would I justify this feeling I craved that only you could satisfy? Would I even need to say anything? Surely you would recognize the feeling of the cock that made you come so good in that glory hole. Surely you’d be desperate for me to keep going.

Being able to look at your face, even if you were asleep, while I slid my dick into your wet heat made my brain stop fucking working. I couldn’t even think. It was like my body just took over, hips rocking into you over and over without a care in the world for how loud the bed was creaking.

You still didn’t feel anything when I dipped down and kissed you, my hips still thrusting slowly against you. This isn’t a Disney movie, and I’m no prince charming, but you’re still my little princess, aren’t you? You’re like my personal sleeping beauty, except my soft kisses didn’t wake you from your drunken slumber.

Thank god.

I kissed all the way down your jawbone until I got to your neck. You’re so soft, and you smell so nice. I kinda wish you’d been awake so I could’ve heard you whimper and whine in my ear. I want to hear you tell me how good it feels to have my cock slamming into your pussy, sweetheart. I want to feel your lips on my neck, my chest, all over my body.

“You take me so well, princess.” I whispered in your ear, hoping that somewhere deep in your dreams you’d hear my words and know I was inside you. “You feel so good, I can’t stop. Never felt anything-so-fucking-g-good-I-f-fuck…”

I came so much that when I pulled back my cum poured out of you as if my cock was a dam holding back a river. I still wonder if I should’ve cleaned you up, but I didn’t. Maybe you’d remember that I was the one who brought you upstairs and you’d put the pieces together.

I can imagine it now, you waking up in the morning with a dried up substance between your thighs. You might not know what it is right away, but I’m sure when you go to the bathroom and notice the hickeys peppered all over your neck, you’ll know that something must’ve happened to you the night before.

I’m not sure what to do now.

I need to have you for myself, that much is clear. The thought of someone else touching you ever again is killing me, so I have to take you. I’ll take you away from all this shit, and I’ll take good care of you. You won’t have to work at that nasty place anymore, I’ll be sure of that. And please don’t worry, princess. When your dad is looking for you, and he needs a friend to help him through the tough times, and the times he’s missing you, I’ll be that friend. He will only be sad for a little while. 

If things go wrong, and someone finds this…well I guess it’s a journal isn’t it? I won’t be able to deny the things I’ve done. I should burn it, but I can’t bring myself to do that. When I read it back, it’s almost like I can relive our time together. Someday I might show you this so you can understand why I did what I had to do, why I have to keep you.

Until then, I hope you sleep well tonight, your final night in your childhood home. I hope you enjoy your last breakfast with your loving dad, and that the two of you don’t argue before he leaves for work. Make sure you give him a kiss on the cheek and tell him you love him, because I’ll be over before he gets home from work.

Goodnight, princess.

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[anotherwatchedninja]

I feel like people forget Time Lords are the same person across every incarnation.

like, ‘14’ even says that it’s not dying. Same memories, same thoughts about people, sometimes expressing something they can’t, not being able to say something they used to.

Think back to you 10 years ago.

You're probably a very different person now compared to then, but you're also not at the same time.

You probably talk differently now, you see the world differently, you might believe different things.

When The Doctor regenerates, that's the level of change that is done but in a few seconds instead of a decade.

Fundamentally you’re still the same person, and you’ve probably retained most of your core beliefs and interests, but you’ve also grown and learnt more about the world; altering many of your less integral values, and even possibly some of you more integral ones.

you could attribute it to a line from one of the novelisations, where the doctor attributes his lack of control over regeneration (and as we can imply, how bad of a post-regen situation he has) is because he didn’t pay enough attention in regeneration lessons.

I think for the Doctor it's like if you woke up and were suddenly 8 again, with all your 8-year-old impulses and personality and likes/dislikes, but your current memories.

The Doctor is always the Doctor. There's no "2nd Doctor" or "10th Doctor" or "14th Doctor." they're all the same person. Just because someone gets clobbered on the head and wakes up from the resulting brain damage knowing fluent German doesn't mean they disappeared and a new person took their place. His brain gets a shake-up, and his appearance changes, but it's still the same person all together.

I think all the media hype about the actors playing the role, and this weird regeneration for the 60th, kind of make it hard to remember that. For the Doctor, it's one continuous line of consciousness. 10 didn't die and wake up again with 13's memories, because there is no 10, there is no 13, there is only The Doctor. We number their faces but they're one person.

And it's confirmed by what he said immediately after the regeneration. He didn't say, "I'm alive!" or "How did I get here?" or something along those lines. He said, "I know these teeth." He realises that he's reverted to an earlier form, but he hasn't forgotten the intervening forms.

It seems to change not just from writer to writer, but Doctor to Doctor. 9 didn't seem to think of his 'death' as the end by any stretch. 10 considered them different people that shared memories, while 11 seemed to see more continuity and connection from incarnation to incarnation. 12 similarly was refusing to regenerate because he wanted to end it, a pointless position unless he saw 'the next Doctor' as still being him. 13 seemed to lean more towards the individual incarnation view, as she felt in necessary to say goodbye to Yaz.

And this is just the Doctor, a single Time Lord. We've seen extremes from literal dissociation from incarnation to incarnation with the One through Union (aka the collective, but that’s due to their condition), to Romana trying on new faces line a human would a new outfit, or how the monk tries to act like their past selves are different people to shift the blame and get away free from the consequences, or how six was post-regen

I just really don't like the idea of them being separate people, which unfortunately does seem to be RTD's interpretation from 10's line of regeneration feeling like dying, and a new man sauntering away. To me that devalues the idea of the Doctor being the same person from 1963 until today. They're the same person, who have been through the events of every single episode, and remember them and all the companions there travelled with.

If they were different people, them meeting former companions just doesn't have the same weight either. 10 for example becomes someone who just knows of Sarah Jane instead of being the same person who travelled with her.

But that doesn't mean it can't still be confusing when an old face returns. It's something that's never happened to the Doctor before, and perhaps it's something that he's never heard of happening to other Timelords either. So when it does happen he's very confused because he immediately knows who this new version of himself is, instead of having to go through the usual self discovery at the start of each incarnation.

I remember from an audio story (I think Sirens of Time), one of the Doctors (i say DOCTORS because time travel) said something along the lines of this: Take every trait of their personality is like a bar graph. Kindness, courage, alienness, anger threshold, etc. each have their own bar on the graph. Each regeneration is essentially the same personality but the bars could be altered with some traits more emphasized in a new face than the previous one.

Some examples of what I mean.

10 and 11 are examples of the alienness trait being skewed in opposite directions, where I feel Smith is more alien-like in his physical behavior than Tennant is. 12 and 13 still have this trait but it’s viewed more subtly through social interactions.

6 and 12 were less on the kindness scale but increased over time. 10, 11, and 13 seemed to have that kindness trait more emphasized.

Anger threshold /emotional control can get thrown multiple ways if a respective Doctor is impulsive and expressive vs bottling it up and letting it simmer. I feel like there are many examples to pull from off this alone.

There could be more obvious ones I’m missing but these spring to mind. I do like this interpretation since it lets you know it’s the same person but just aspects can be more emphasized than others across their different incarnations.

I like to think it’s just the same person at different points in their life - hell, we aren’t the same person at 18 that we are in our 30’s, or even the same person we are in our 40’s that we were at 30.

Life changes you, sometimes you’re goofy, sometimes you’re callow, and sometimes you’re stern. In DW terminology: you’re a quirky thief, then a person who has to kill everything they know, and then you become a person capable of finding some solace in life… then to a whole new person.

From the doctor’s point of view I believe they think they are the same person, they don’t differentiate between selves. Think of 12 near his start when 11 phoned Clara, he says he didn’t need to eavesdrop because it was him talking and that she looks at him but can’t see him.

Now this doesn’t mean the doctor doesn’t remember the traits each regeneration has, and this can manifest in their subconscious as talking to their different regenerations; but that’s no different than you talking to yourself in your head.

like, it’s even implied 14 will eventually become 15

[presidentdisastraofgallifrey]

500-Year Diary Headcanons: Updated

I’m reposting this rather than just reblogging the other one because I changed the timeline

One: writes pretty regularly. Doesn’t record his adventures so much as grumble about people and the universe, interspersed with the occasional joke or amusing anecdote, but does include enough detail to read between the lines and guess at what he did and that he had fun doing it.

Two: writes almost not at all, instead doing watercolor landscape and urban sketches, labeled with the place and date but no other information.

Three: usually starts off intending to rant about humans or time lords or the universe at large but gets distracted and ends up either indodumping (about cars or other tech) or happily relating an anecdote about one of his companions.

Four: very, very bad about remembering to write ever. Does directly relate adventures, and a fairly good writer, but heavily editorializes them into being the way he wants to remember. Just as often as writing about what happened, he instead discusses his feelings or the sudden realization of what someone was trying to tell him several days ago.

Four addendum: Romana. Keeps her own diary for 80 years or so, but after regenerating discovers his and begins annotating and correcting the entries, and eventually just writing down their adventures for him. She is more consistent and accurate than he is, but not perfectly either, and includes quite a lot of side commentary.

Five: much less emotional about it all. Also (a little tiny bit) more consistent. Tends to write short, summary-like entries about adventures without much detail.

Six: oh Rassilon, the purple prose. Almost entirely poetry and legend-style tales starring him and based only vaguely on what actually happened. Any companions are barely an afterthought.

Seven: tbd, still not quite there yet.

Eight: the most normal diary of all of them. Records and processes thoughts and feelings, as well as fairly emotional and fairly accurate recounting of his adventures (though still not fairly consistent) in case he loses his memory again. Does stop writing the moment he gets involved in the Time War, though. Initially meant only to take a break because it felt too big to think about, but begins to dread having to record it until he just stops writing entirely.

War: nope. Actually tries to destroy his diaries but the tardis saves them and spits them back out into the library.

Nine: doesn’t start writing again until after the whole empty child thing, and when he does it’s only listed itinerary-style recordings of what happened with no detail or feeling at all.

Ten: wildly emotional without actually processing any of those feelings. Writes in glitter pen. Goes on for pages and pages about his feelings and forgets to include the actual events that happened. Can only really read between the lines to get the gist of it because he does gush about his companions and others he meets.

Eleven: the most adhd anyone has ever been. Will start recounting a story only to get distracted by any number of things: rants about pasta shapes, listing favorite planets, telling a completely unrelated story. The margins are filled with doodles of people and objects. The books themselves are heavily dented from all the times he throws them across the room after failing to understand what his past self meant when he wanted to look something up. Writes less often towards the end of his life but has too many thoughts in his head to ever stop entirely.

Eleven addendum: River. At some point she discovered his diary and read it. Maybe she thought at first it was like hers and meant to compare where they were. At any rate, it’s how she learned so much about his life and past and old companions. She starts using it to leave him notes, though he frequently doesn’t find them for years.

Twelve: approximately half infodumps about his newest hobby while trying to sound too cool to be that into it. The other half is ranting and raving at the universe right after a traumatic adventure or speaking fondly of a happy adventure years after the fact. Is written in plain pen and incredibly messy, full of crossed out and corrected rememberings.

Twelve addendum: Missy. Steals it at some point while she’s locked up and role plays as him for years, but eventually tells him when he completely fails to notice. He leaves angry annotations in the margins but doesn’t tear out her entries.

Thirteen: the second most adhd anyone has ever been. Writes in brightly colored marker, always very excited, with a ton of exclamation points. Almost no emotional depth. Often recounts adventures with a coherent beginning and end but no middle at all because she got distracted by her thoughts on a detail, a different story, or gushing about someone (75% of the time it’s Yaz). There is the occasional rage-filled sentence in a spiky bubble with 50 explanation points, but never any context.

Fourteen: actually uses it to process his feelings as well as get excited about all the little everyday things he is discovering, and within a few decades gets in the habit of writing most evenings before bed. Also does those complex scrapbook-style journal pages and sometimes detailed drawings.

Fifteen: keeps up the nearly-everyday routine of it for a bit, but as more things happen he gets out of the habit and goes back to just whenever he remembers. Writes excitedly, coherently, and in plenty of detail about his adventures, but does have a habit of focusing on little things that made him happy and glossing over or entirely skipping big things like nearly dying. Still, does occasionally process negative feelings with it. Often illustrates his stories with lovely pencil sketches.

[wannab-urs]

The Spreadsheet Digest - Vol 23

Howdy y'all!

If you're new here this is every new (to me) fic I read this week and some of my silly lil thoughts about them.

I did some catching up on series this week and also did some writing so I've only got 12 fics for you this week! I read a lot of dark shit this week, but that's October for ya. There's still some sweetness in here somewhere if you aren't into dark stuff and I've made sure to mark everything appropriately (I think).

As always you can find all my previous fic recs here.

Recs below the Pedros!

Apple - a Frankie/Santi/Will one shot by @romana-after-dark

You are married to Santi and you have a CNC kink he very happily obliges. You set up a thing where Santi, Will, and Frankie pretend to be home invaders and they gangbang you. Stuff goes a lil sideways and it ends up being NC/DC. This was wonderfully unsettling. I love how there's this strand of believability that they don't intentionally overstep her boundaries. It's dark and scary and feels very real.

sam and diane, eat your heart out a Marcus Pike one shot by @chronically-ghosted

You've been working with Marcus for a while and finally wrapped up the case you were on. You've almost given up ever getting what you want with him when finally!! You both admit your feelings for each other. Cue steamy office make out sesh with thigh riding. I loved the will they won't they shit in the beginning. The frustration makes the pay off so good.

i am touchin', i am grabbin', everything I can't be havin' - a Dieter one shot by @chronically-ghosted

You show up at the doorstep of your long time but estranged family friend Dieter Bravo, soaking wet and with nowhere else to go. You've known him so long you call him Uncle Dee, no I'm not kidding. I almost didn't click on this bc like UNCLE?? But he's not really your uncle and I cannot express enough how fucking hot this was. Like Dieter is just so fucking good this OH MY GOD. If you love Dieter, read this. You'll love it.

Recovery Road - a Dieter series by @chronically-ghosted

Dieter finally gets his shit together, he's clean and married and working on a new project. His costar (you) is a cunt fr. You're on drugs, you're a brat, and you're a mess. And Dieter can't stay away from you. When his wife gets fed up with him and humiliates him in public, you're there to catch him... and ruin his sobriety, his marriage, and maybe everything else. I have a couple chapters left of this but OH MY GOD. I was so MAD at Dieter, but also so sad for him. Don't take that as me saying I didn't love this because I did. I do. It's so beautifully written. The pain and angst and desperation and everything is so powerful, this hurts to read. And the smut? Mind altering actually.

a revolting development - a Joel series by @chloeangelic

Your new step dad is really hot... and that's gonna be a problem. I've been reading so many step dad fics lately (not just Joel!) and I'm so into it and what is wrong with me?

The Rogue Who Coaxed You - a Joel series by @atticrissfinch

You're Joel's secretary and you suck him off while he fields a phone call from his wife! We love an infidelity fic round these parts, we really do. Reader is filthy, Joel is mean, there's a lot of degradation, the works. I'm so obsessed with this dynamic I can't wait to read more.

When the Gallow-Grass Gives - a Silva one shot by @gasolinerainbowpuddles

Silva rescues you (m!reader) from the gallows, walks you home by the rope you were supposed to hang by, and then tells you that you remind him of someone he used to know. I love a good gay cowboy fic and this is a GREAT one. The historically accurate lube made me cackle. This was so well written and so HOT and managed to maintain that wistful sadness Silva seems to have hanging like a cloud around him.

Desires and Complications - a Marcus Pike/Dave York series by @ezrasbirdie

Sweet little Marcus Pike wants to please you better in bed so he calls up your ex, Dave York, to show him how to be a dom. It goes a little differently than any of you imagined when Marcus turns submissive for Dave. This fic is so hot. I read up through "plead" and it looks like maybe there's some throuple dynamics forming!!! I'm so excited to finish this AHHHGHGHG

Ripping Sunrise - a frankie one shot by @idolatrybarbie

You accidentally take an edible and Frankie takes care of your high ass. And then once the high wears off he really takes care of you... This is so sweet and hot, I love it so much.

I Might Kill My Ex - a Joel one shot by @beskarandblasters

Joel leaves you for Tess and that... well that's just unacceptable. We got dark!reader, asshole!Joel, murder, dub con for Joel, the works. This fic is so good. It's dark and gives you a fascinating look into reader's crumbling psyche. I love the ending so much also

------------------

I wrote Ouroboros and Eat You Whole. Dave York x f!reader fics set in the same universe, canon divergent but some canon stuff still happens in the background. Love as consumption/Love as violence type thing. Basically you and Dave are two touch starved, miserable people with nothing left in this world and you have crazy sex about it. There’s some softness in there too.

-----------------

Here's some series I've been reading (not a comprehensive list): Hot and Heavy (Joel), Muddy Waters (Joel/Ez), Stepdad!Joel, Exile (Javi P), New York or Nowhere (Joel), Feral Woman (Joel), Yearling (Joel), a lover's pinch (joel), the world tipped on it's side (Frankie), and Pretend Alleyways (Marcus/Dieter)

(In order: @tieronecrush @bonezone44 @toxicanonymity @jksprincess10 @beskarandblasters @gasolinerainbowpuddles @justagalwhowrites @hier--soir @idolatrybarbie @radiowallet)

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Happy Reading!

[not-a-unique-snowflake-blog]

2023 was fun! It’s my first year reading fan fiction so it’s been one of the horniest and the thirstiest years of my life!😁 I found a lot of amazing people here and this hellsite truly became my home in 2023!💖

I want to say ‘thank you’ to people who made this year very special for me and wish them all wonderful 2024!😘 I came up with some categories so here they are!💖

✨The “OMG” fic of the year

This one goes to Promise /a dragon!Ezra x f!reader/ by @criticallyacclaimedstranger I’m a proud monster fucker but holy hell I surprised myself when I loved this fic so much!🥵 it’s hot and also very sweet and beautifully written!😍❤️ After reading it I had long and thorough discussions about the logistics of dragon fucking with a few people and had the best time!😄

✨The series I love with all my heart

Stay In Bed /pre outbreak!joel miller x f!reader, one sided tommy miller x f!reader/ by @psychedelic-ink is amazing, touching and beautiful! I felt a ton of emotions reading about Joel and reader’s journey to each other. Thank you for writing it, Sil!🫶

✨The “I’m too old for this, my heart nearly stopped” fic of 2023

Every Inch pt 3 /m!ghostface x f!reader/ by @toxicanonymity was so hot that it nearly killed me😅I had to open the window to get some fresh air cos reading it made me dizzy with hyperventilation. I survived thus I strongly recommend to TRY THIS AT HOME‼️

✨The loveliest co-writer of 2023

@milla-frenchy my friend, my twin, my co-writer💖 your support gave me confidence to come out with my own writing which wasn’t easy😅 thank you!🫂 It’s always a pleasure to write with you and I hope to continue our creative journey in 2024. I love you, baby! Check out her masterlist! It’s gold!🥵🥵🥵

✨The most unhinged reader

@gracieispunk created a reader so unhinged, badass and hot that she sometimes overshadows Maintenance Man!Joel himself!😍 Tenant Girl takes what she wants and I love her for it‼️💖

✨My man, my love, my everything

Do you have an emotional support character who can make you feel happier, safer, calmer when you simply think about them? I do thanks to @toxicanonymity ! Nightwalks Joel is my most favourite fictional man! The first, the best, the hottest! HELL YEAH!🍆🧎🏼‍♀️🐆

✨“If horrible, why so hot” character

Joel from the Wrong Way series by @romana-after-dark wins this one! This Joel is one of the darkest I’ve ever read and he makes me feral and I love him!😵‍💫🥵

✨The most read fic of 2023

Liquid Gold /Joel Miller x fem!pregnant!reader x Tommy Miller/ by @gasolinerainbowpuddles is my breastfeeding kink Bible and simply an extremely hot fic! no joke I thought of pinning it on my blog cos I searched for it that often. Just thinking about it now makes me feel like a reread is due!😵‍💫🫠

Also thank you, Puddles, for your hilarious memes!😆👏 you’re a treasure!💖

✨The most unique series

Muddy Waters /Ezra x F!Reader x Joel Miller/ by @bonezone44 blew me away this year! Its characters are complex, the plot is fascinating and unique, it’s like a diamond that shines differently when you look at it from a new angle❤️

✨DDDNE fic of the year

Whatever You Want /Comandante Veracruz x Reader/ by @iamasaddie is a non-con masterpiece! It’s not easy to keep the realism of the situation and still make it hot, but this story has a perfect balance of both!🥵🖤

Also Aly, thank for being such a great friend!💖 You’re hilarious, kind, gorgeous and a super talented writer and artist!😍👏 I love you!😘

✨My favourite writer of 2023

I dearly love many writers on this site. But this title goes to @toxicanonymity without a doubt❤️

You made this year for me, Toxy! I’ll never be normal about your writing, your talent, your characters, your kindness, your heart😍 Every series, every story of yours is perfect! Thank you for everything you gave me and all of us this year! I love you, friend!💖🫂😘

✨My favorite people in 2023

My moots, my lovelies, my friends! Y’all made me laugh, cry happy tears, thirst, FEEL things like I’ve never felt before! I LOVE YOU ALL💖 @missannwinchester @milla-frenchy @toxicanonymity @iamasaddie @neverwheremoonchild @lumoverheaven @multiversed-daydreamer @beefrobeefcal @lunitawrites @rubyfruitjungle @xdaddysprincessxx @ellasinnombre @princessanglophile @romanarose @gasolinerainbowpuddles @noxturnalpascal @gracieispunk @ghoulettesinspace @janaispunk @funnygirlthatgab @jupiter-soups @seratuyo

Special smooches to my wifey @missannwinchester who has to deal with my nonsense every single day😅😘😘😘 LOVE YOU, SWEETIE🫂❤️

If you feel you should be on the list and I missed you, you’re absolutely right and I deserve a good spanking for not including you!😏

HAVE AWESOME 2024 Y’ALL!!! WOOOOOO!🥳🎊✨💖💖💖

[romana-after-dark]

Blessed be the Fruit: Bonus Chapter

Commander!Joel Miller x fem!OC! Angela Dempsey x Commander!Tommy Miller

Series masterlist : Join dark!Romana's tag list : Dark!Romana's Masterlist

Summery: In the weeks before Joel's new handmaid arrives, Tommy and Angela have some fun at the Jezabels and Joel watches... an it's a good thing he does

Content and warnings: Joel watching Tommy and Angela fuck, jerking off, subby!tommy, top Angela, degrading, objectification, choking, almost murder lololololol protective Joel, creampie.

AN: Just a lil thing to hold y'all over. Chapter 5 is in the works but its taking me forever bc i keep getting distracted with other shit and I need to get the next chapter of this Javier x reader x santi fic out lololol

Support writers, reblog and leave comments!

****************

“You gonna do more than watch this time, Joel?”

Angela spoke as she teased Tommy’s body, both of them fully dressed for the time being, but Angela’s dark green dress and skimpy panties running over Tommy’s pants could hardly be counted as ‘dressed’.

“You know the drill, now get to work. Tommy looks like he’s about to have you on the wall.”

Angela shot him a look, but she knew he was joking. “Just for that, I’m gonna tease him a little longer.”

“Joel, shut the hell up!” Tommy grunted blow her, gripping at the bedsheets.

This scene had been displayed time and time again. Joel Miller liked to watch. Tommy liked to be on bottom. Angela liked to pretend she had some semblance of control over her life. The last two years, Tommy took her out here and honestly? She liked it. She got to pretend she was normal. She got to be sexy, fun, she got to play with Tommy’s body the way men liked to play with hers. The clock was ticking and there was no baby to show for it, and it wouldn’t be long before she was shipped off to her next commander, and she doubted he would be as kind as Tommy; and Tommy was kind. She liked him. Many handmaids fell for their commanders, naive and innocent and stupid girls years younger who thought oh, he’s different, his wifes a bitch, but he loves me, he just can’t leave her. Tale as old as time. 

It wasn’t like that with Tommy, Angela just liked him, she enjoyed his company. He didn’t try to tell her they’d run away together, they just had sex, played games, hung out. Deb really was a bitch, and Tommy wasn’t fucking her much. She believed him on that, considering that she slept in a separate bed. Joel was still fucking Gina though, and Angela couldn’t fault him for that. Gina was a cunt, but beautiful, with flawless dark skin and perfectly braided curly coils every single day. She’d been a knock out before, when the hair was allowed down and Angela was sure that’s the Gina Joel got to see in bed. Still, Joel still came out here with Tommy, riding separately. He’d find a girl later on, but for round one, Joel liked to jerk off while watching you fuck his brother.

He liked watching you bounce on Tommy’s cock while you looked directly at him.

“Fuck, Ang… oh my god, please let me cum, please” Tommy whined, youthful body writhing and he really did look so, so good like this. Sprawled out and desperate. 

“Not yet, Tommy, I’m not done using you yet. Lay there like a good toy and shut up.” Angela liked degrading him, reducing Tommy to what Gilead made her feel like. It wasn’t personal; Tommy treated her like a person, but there was no pure blood in Gilead. Angela looked away from Tommy’s tanned chest and back to Joel, whose face was calm and collected but the rapid rise and fall of his chest matched more closely to how furiously he was jerking his cock. “Hear you’re getting a new handmaid, Joel? Your cunt of a wife not, ooo, not tight enough?”

“Nothing tighter than my right hand, but yeah, she hmph, won’t shut up about wanting another.”

Joel was handsome, she gave him that, and his cock was massive. Longer than Tommy, but not as thick. “Gonna bring her here?”

“No.” He chuckled. “You don’t need another plaything.”

She pouts and is about to retort when Tommy speaks again. “Angela, please-”

“Shut up!” Angela covers her mouth as she rides him slower, making him groan at the torture. “Grown ups are talking.”

This makes Joel smirk. “Wanna keep my privet life private… but don’t worry, I’ll still come by for a show.”

“And what a show it is.” She releases Tommy’s mouth, slowly riding up and down Tommy’s cock, the man beneath you barely holding on as she touches herself, her full body. Angela knew she was hot, ample tits and the curve of her, soft skin and dark, curly hair, she liked being wanted, and she liked being in control of that want. She did not like when Tommy grabbed her hips, hard, and attempted to control the pace.

Angela and Tommy had done breath play plenty, so he didn’t blink when her hands wrapped around to choke him. What he didn’t realize that in playing the brat, he had accidentally triggered something in her. This is where she had control, and she refused to let him take it. So Angela chocked him. And it was hard. Faster and faster she road him, continuously spearing herself on his dick and choking him harder and harder. She thought she might break a windpipe… and the thought made her orgasm around her. Her fluttering walls, the deep, intense pleasure, the power and control over Tommy right now as he gagged and coughed and wheezed… What if she just did it? What if she ended it right now? She’d end up on the wall, but that's where she was going anyway. This way, there’d be one less commander… What if she did it? Tommy’s eyes were unfocusing… she could watch the life leave his face….

The sound of the chair creaking caused Angela to look up, seeing Joel had taken note of the prolonged and aggressive choking of his brother, and had slowed down his own hand while waiting for the scene to play… Angela let go, allowing Tommy to breath and Tommy came inside her right then.

“Oh god, oh god Angela, you’re fuck’n perfect.” He continued to praise her as she road his overstimulated cock, leaving him twitching and whining about cumming a second time, but Angela’s eyes were on Joel.

He had gone back to his position, fighting himself with ferver but glaring a deathly look at her. Joel knew what Angela had almost done, and the look he gave her said if she ever touched his baby brother's throat again, what he’d do to her was far worse than the wall.

Maybe it was the fear in her eyes that made him cum.

***************

Angela Angela Angela..... if ur gonna kill someone, dont kill tommy. But, heat of the moment... more will be reveled about angela and tommy soon but this is just a hint.

@my-secret-shame-but-fanfiction @dins-riduur-anthe @morallyinept @fan-fiction-floozy@med494 @taliarose12 @flvrdoll @k-ra @sam-2me @ramblers-lets-get-ramblin @moriartyyouwhore @hereforthepedrofanfic @alwaysmicado @noisynightmarepoetry @kyloispunk @jenna-ortega @lunitareads @labyrinthofheartagrams @swimmjacket @magpiepillsjunior @stevngrant @theywhowriteandknowthings @everyth1ngfan @movievillainess721 @syrupstuff @christinamadsen

[gotyouanyway]

Coming here always gave Narvin a bit of a pang in his hearts. One of the many things Romana had overlooked when she replaced him as Coordinator was that, per regulations, she would be taking his living quarters as well. And take them she had - the place was so cluttered now he could hardly recognize it as the same sterile installation it had been when he’d lived here. That part didn’t bother Narvin, though. He’d never made himself at home here; these rooms were a place to sleep and wash, nothing more. But the view, he always thought when he knocked on Romana’s door. That heart-stopping view of the city sprawled out below him, every district and sector, the old and the new. It was angled just so that the tallest towers aligned like stars in Orion’s belt. His new quarters were on the other side of the Capitol, with a view of the mountains. Romana kept the blinds here closed.

we've seen narvin have feelings about the beauty of gallifrey before. i have this very specific thought i keep trying to include in a fic: when he's no longer coordinator, he changes rooms, and has nothing to miss but the view

[thethirdromana]

Romana II's costumes, rated

Most screengrabs from the BBC image gallery, all opinions from me.

As seen in Destiny of the Daleks.

What a costume to open on. I love this. I love that it reminds us that Romana - even this younger-looking, more playful Romana - remains the Doctor's equal, being his costume, but pink. I love the details - the necklace, the white shirt with the pink pinstripes, the weird high-waisted pink trousers that we barely see, and the first of many outstanding pairs of boots. Above all I straightforwardly love how good this looks. Pink is undeniably Lalla Ward's colour. 10/10, setting the bar high.

As seen in City of Death.

So this costume has a very sweet backstory behind it. Lalla Ward hated wearing school uniform, and thought that the little girls watching Doctor Who might feel better about school if they saw a favourite character wearing the same kind of thing as they had to wear. Which is adorable. And then she got heaps of letters from pervy man. Which is... less so. 3/10, for the thought?

As seen in the Creature from the Pit.

I could either get a decent photo or one that showed the whole costume, so I chose the former. You're not missing much in the bottom half, it's a sort of floaty Grecian affair with a wide belt. They seem to have dressed Lalla Ward as Mary Tamm for this one. Her hair looks pretty, though. 5/10.

As seen in Nightmare of Eden.

This is it, this is the worst Romana costume. There's a sort of institutional vibe, like it might have been sewn from prison curtains. Every decorative detail - the massive bow, whatever's going on with the skirt - makes it worse. How did they manage to make Lalla Ward look so drab? And it looks at least a size too big for her, too. 0/10.

As seen in The Horns of Nimon.

This is more like it. It's clearly a fox-hunting outfit, which in the UK has connotations that are... let's just go with problematic. But Romana doesn't hunt any foxes in this episode, as far as I can remember, so I think it's OK for me to like the costume. Which I do. 9/10.

As (not*) seen in Shada.

Yes! Some people have faces that belong in a particular era, and doesn't Lalla Ward have such an Edwardian face? No wonder, then, that this is such a wonderful costume. I want to wear it myself, and then spend a day lounging in a punt with a good book. The only danger is that I would try to eat the trim on the hat. 100/10.

*because it never aired.

As seen in the Leisure Hive.

Apparently the Edwardian look was so good in Shada, they decided to do it again? This time Romana appears to be in an Edwardian boy's sailor suit. As an aside, I love how her costumes switch back and forth between historical men's styling and traditional feminine dresses. This costume is more fun than flattering, but I like it. 7/10.

As seen in Meglos.

This costume is... a lot. I mean, even next to what Lexa's got on, it's a lot. There's actually so much texture on this, I can't fully make out what's going on, and that's before we get to the world's largest sleeves. I think this is one of the few times that it feels like the costume dominates Romana, which is a pity, because I would otherwise be on board with the Henry VIII vibe. 4/10.

As seen in Full Circle.

I wish I had a decent-quality full-length photo of this costume, because it includes a long red skirt that's quite fetching. I enjoy the contrast between the military jacket and the dainty lace shirt. Red is a good colour on Romana II. 8/10.

As seen in State of Decay.

Another one where Romana is essentially in historical male drag, in the kind of outfit you would expect a gentleman to wear in the country. Only she has her hair down and it's all carefully fitted to Lalla Ward's figure, so it barely registers as GNC. I think that's a really fun costuming decision, and also I want this outfit. 10/10.

As seen in Warriors' Gate.

A disappointing costume to end on. I mean, it's perfectly nice. But if I decided that I wanted to dress for the job I want (Time Lady in E-Space) rather than the job I have (middle management) and rocked up to the office in this, I doubt anyone would register it as unusual. Which makes it rather less exciting than most of the other options on this list. 5/10.

Now I just need to see if I can track down an Edwardian lace dress.

[ierofrnkk]

Forget to Remember

DEAD DOVE: DO NOT EAT!!!

William Tell & Reader

Summary: You wake up in William’s hotel room. You don’t make it out of there alive.

Warnings: 18+, gore (cutting, blood, removal of organs, death), restraints, knives, language. Reader’s gender and physical appearance aren’t specified

a/n: this is gross and bloody and weird. participating in @romana-after-dark DD December event !! title is from ‘forget to remember’ by mudvayne

You went out last night; celebrating something that seems so unimportant now. It all feels so far away.

You met someone you shouldn’t have.

He was mysterious, charming. He bought you a drink. That was your first mistake.

You wake up in a bed that isn’t your own. A motel room. Every piece of furniture is wrapped in a white sheet. It feels sterile, clinical—at the same time, it feels filthy, grimy. You feel a weight like stones in the pit of your stomach.

The weight sinks deeper when you realize that you’re restrained—arms and legs—strapped down to the bed.

You try to scream—you can’t. You’re gagged, a piece of fabric tied around your head and settled snugly in between your jaws.

He’s there, sitting in a chair across from the bed, watching you. You can’t take your eyes off of his face, trying to memorize every feature of him in case you make it out of here alive.

Tall—no, average height. Brown eyes. Grey hair, slicked back. He’s wearing the same clothes you saw him in last night—dress shirt, slacks. This time, though, he’s got latex gloves. Medical ones.

You feel sick to your stomach.

He watches as you wake up, struggle. There’s no emotion on his face. As sick as it is, you would’ve at least wanted to see him smile. Then, you could have the justification in your mind that he found this enjoyable.

But…nothing.

He stands from his chair, walking over to you. You’re afraid, panicking. He’s so calm. Why is he so calm?

The thought that he does this enough to be desensitized scares you even more.

Maybe this is just a weird sex thing, you think to yourself. Maybe I’m misunderstanding.

You’re still dressed, which offers you the tiniest bit of comfort. For now.

He’s at your side now, and you’re terrified. He reaches out, putting a hand on your sternum, right at the base of your throat.

“Quiet.” Is all he tells you.

You swallow roughly, nodding hurriedly in an effort to obey his every word. Maybe if you do everything he says, he’ll let you go; that’s all that you can think about, that this is some kind of power thing.

On the bedside table, there’s a pair of scissors, clearly brand new, and a knife. The sight alone makes your head fuzzy with anxiety, panic settling into that space behind your teeth and in the back of your throat.

He picks up the scissors. You struggle against the restraints, trying to break free, to get a hold of something to defend yourself, anything.

But you can’t.

“I used to do this for a living, did you know that?” He starts, his tone calm and low, like he’s talking to you about the weather.

The scissors cut through the hem of your shirt like a hot knife through butter. He continues to cut as he talks, acting as if this is the most normal thing in the world.

“Every fucking day, I saw so many guys who would come in, and just…never come out.” He shakes his head as he talks, clearly reminiscing about this all.

You have no fucking idea what he’s talking about, but you listen anyway, like his word is gospel.

It doesn’t take him very long to get your shirt cut open, the fabric pooling lamely on either side of your chest—you’re starting to understand that this probably isn’t some weird sex thing, and now have to come to terms with the fact that he is very likely going to kill you.

Your heart feels like it’s going to beat straight out of your chest; if you didn’t know any better, you’d think that he can hear it.

“So many young guys—soldiers—they didn’t know any better. Just following orders.”

He pauses, clears his throat. Sets down the scissors.

“They’re all dead now, so it doesn’t really matter what they were doing.”

For the briefest of moments, you swear you can see a flicker of vulnerability in his eyes as he talks, like the memory itself is fighting to keep some sense of morality in him.

It’s gone before you can even realize that it was there in the first place.

He picks up the knife, and that anxiety settles in your chest once again, flooding through your veins.

In any other circumstance, you’d say that it's a beautiful knife—polished wooden handle, slightly curved, razor-sharp steel blade. He likes this one, clearly a favorite of his.

You don’t know whether to feel honored or terrified.

He moves so sure, like every motion is practiced and certain.

There’s no hesitation when he presses the cold steel to your chest, right against your sternum; it slices through your skin with no resistance.

You scream, but your voice is so muffled by the gag, that it ultimately doesn’t matter. You struggle against the restraints, but it feels like they only get tighter.

The blade trails from the point between your collarbones, down your chest, and stops just past your navel. Your adrenaline is pumping, and you can feel the way your blood pools on your skin.

“It was going on for so long, I got numb to it,” he continues, seeming to just talk mindlessly as he takes you apart, piece by piece.

“Stopped caring about what I was doing; I got sloppy.”

Two more cuts, parallel to your collarbones and meeting with the cut he’s already made.

He’s opening you up, like a cadaver to be autopsied.

Your adrenaline is pumping so hard that you can barely even feel it anymore; your eyes are wide, tears spilling out and down your face as you watch this man—if you can even call him that—cut you open in such a way.

You’ve resigned yourself to the fact that you’re going to die, right here, in a shitty motel room.

The blade cuts through your body so easily, the metal clearly so razor sharp that it meets no resistance when it meets your muscle tissue.

Gloved fingers tuck beneath the layer of skin and muscle that protects your organs, pulling them away like he’s unwrapping a gift. Your head is spinning—dizzy and trembling from the adrenaline and the fear. The pain.

“Spent a long time trying to forget a lot of the things I did when I was there.”

You can barely even hear him anymore; it all sounds so distant, your brain going into overdrive trying to protect you from this.

His hand skims across your internals—your stomach, your intestines, your liver. His touch is almost reverent. In some sick, grotesque way you feel flattered.

Like you were good enough for him.

You can’t see where he brings the knife, but you know it’s somewhere inside; you’ve gone numb from the adrenaline, so you’re just a helpless bystander now in your own murder.

You feel the pressure of the cut; he pulls away with your large intestine in hand, and sets it down on the sheet beside you, staining the white fabric red.

It feels clinical, like a biologist taking apart an animal for research.

“I spent so long trying to push all that away, that—“ he pauses, chuckling to himself.

“—that I almost forgot how good I am at this.”

You watch him as he continues to work, eyes glassy with tears, the adrenaline flooding your veins and making this feel more and more like a terrible nightmare than your horrifying reality.

Your small intestine is next, cut away from all the connective tissues and set out on the sheet as well. A small part of you feels bad for the poor housekeeper that will probably come across your eviscerated corpse.

Your liver. Your stomach. All cut away and set down beside you.

Somehow, he hasn’t managed to get any blood on himself besides the blue latex gloves, which have been stained thoroughly with your own blood.

This is transactional to him, he’s treating it like any other day.

You watch him dumbly as he works, filled with too much shock and adrenaline to do much else anymore. You know you’re going to die.

He seems to appreciate that.

“Thank you,” he tells you, and it’s bittersweet.

He brings a hand up, resting it on your cheek; a bloodied thumb wipes away some of your tears.

The moment of tenderness lingers, and a small part of you is grateful for that.

He moves, knife in hand, and presses the blade to the untouched skin of your arm, slitting your wrist. He does the same to your other wrist. Blood pours from the cuts, seeping into the fabric of the once-pristine white sheets.

He’s mercy-killing you, if you can even call it that.

You can feel the blade press against your throat, and your heart flutters weakly in your opened chest. You’re already faint from the adrenaline and the removal of your organs, but this helps.

Putting you out of your misery.

He presses down, and the blade cuts through easily, severing the artery in your throat. Thick, dark blood pours from your neck and soaks the sheets, the mattress.

You swear that you see him smile, just barely, before your vision blacks out.

—

Not going to do my usual taglist.

[sleeptowns]

a year (or so) of fics, in retrospect

once every handful of years i remember to look back at the collection of projects i’ve finished recently and to simulate a critique as if i’m an art school student — and also as if i’m the haunted teacher’s assistant who wants to be gentle on the prof’s behalf but actually hates your work and also i am the other students who have been sitting there for seven hours straight and can’t offer much more except say, “it’s fine.” a one-man critique day, all parts played by me. 

sometimes i do this and the last period of writing has been drier than a pizza slice left in the winter sun, but this time i’m lucky that these last couple of years have been the closest i’ve had to a writing pax romana.

with that said, i’m not entirely sure how valid i am whenever i think these days that my writing has gone through some drastic changes in the last year; i’m not even sure if it’s accurate to call any of it growth, though i’m aware it’s the sort of thing i won’t have a clear perspective on until a few years after the fact. but i do know that i’m lucky to have so many works to act as markers for different periods of my writing, and while it’s far from a sure method of evaluation, there are parts there that i’m able to at least assess, if not outright measure. in the last year or so, my fics have started mutating towards — not really a separate sort of output than my previous ones, but definitely older somehow. older and quite different because of it: stylistic choices i would have steered clear of before, failed and/or lacklustre genre explorations, even relationship dynamics that were previously unfamiliar territory. my most recent fic feels like a culmination of all my attempts at wrestling with my writing in the ring, and now that it’s a few weeks behind me and i get to look at it with fresh(er) eyes and accept that it’s my favourite child (i’m sorry flls... you’re not too far behind), it’s also reminded me that i have a now overdue fic roundup to write. 

tangentially speaking, it’s interesting that you never really hear about self-taught writers. self-taught artists, yes, and self-taught musicians, but never quite self-taught writers. i don’t exactly purport to have taught myself everything i know about writing, and i know you can’t really be self-anything as a writer; what i lack in technique and finesse learned from proper writing classes, teachers, and/or workshops, i owe to the media i’ve consumed, good and bad, as well as to the creators i love and to all the thoughtful readers i’ve had over the years. if i’m self-taught in any way, then the self as a teacher was reared by countless others who have honed in me a limitless capacity to be an observer to stories, mine and all else. 

this post is just a roundup of all my fics from december 2020 to january 2023, including only the ones with enough substantial content to write about, which disqualifies a lot of the fics i left at one or five scenes max but qualifies the ones i abandoned at one chapter. just a little something for me to reference as i figure out where to take my writing next and hopefully move towards some kind of ✨ growth ✨ lol 

・・・・・・

FIRST LOVE, LATE SPRING december 2020 to march 2021, jujutsu kaisen trial element | dual pov romance, multimedia (?)

i covered a bit of the early chapters and conceptualization for flls in a separate post, but as i was reflecting on how to write a continuation, it occurred to me that if there’s a clear before and after to the current state of my writing, then the first portion of flls chapter five is where i’ll find it. 

when i was drafting my 58393th version of that chapter — nothing was working, none of it was the right vibe i needed, most of them too detached or too on-the-nose but never the perfect middle — i happened upon trying second person pov by accident. i’m not the biggest fan of second person (though to be fair, i don’t think anyone is) but by that point i was so sick of writing and rewriting this one section and not getting anywhere that i wondered if i should just lean all the way into that disgust. why not do something i hated entirely? and act of desperation as that was, the moment i started writing in curt, nauseating second person, i knew it was the right choice. 

the thing about writing flls!yuuji is that he felt both alive and unfamiliar. flls!megumi was easier to understand, even if he was trickier to write — but yuuji, i had to really work to get to know. one thing about him that i knew to be careful about from the very beginning of jjk is that it would be too surface level to think this boy is an extrovert. yuuji is usually painted as an energetic, sunny person, and i don’t think he’s not that, but there’s something about yuuji that’s also very internal and almost innately… isolated? i don’t know if that’s necessarily the right word, but there’s a lot about him as a character that’s out of view or grasp, which ironically i find people taking at face value. in flls, he required a lot more balance than megumi, who was a dam waiting to be relieved of its duties. flls!yuuji knows who or what he is — how could he not, when he’s never had a choice but to be this person, this kid who lost his grandpa, this kid who needs love but doesn’t know how to ask for it because he doesn’t even know there are forms of it he can ask for? 

how to write a character like that? how to nudge someone who doesn’t reveal even at his most revealing towards the christmas eve fight i had set up in the beginning of flls chapter one? back before chapter six of flls came out, i saw a lot of people argue that megumi and yuuji just needed to communicate, and yes, of course they do, but i was also very adamant as i started chapter five that the real tragedy about them is that communication will do nothing in the end. even if they magically became master communicators about their needs and wants and insecurities, none of it will change the fact that neither of them are ready to love and be loved by the other person. at least not in any way that constitutes a relationship that feels like love. 

i think that’s the key to writing the relationship in flls. it was never a question that they loved each other, and how much. never. this is probably the first piece of ~growth i appreciated about flls. it would be easy to write a romance where the main conflict is them not knowing the other loved them back, but flls got rid of that quite early. i left no room for doubt — or at least this is the hope — that flls!itfs loved each other in a way no one else would be able to compare to. they’re it for each other. but if it had been as simple as portraying that, then i never would have finished flls at all, and it definitely wouldn’t have been my longest fic at the time. 

instead — what if it was a given that they loved each other, and it still wasn’t enough? what kind of story can we spin about that? what kind of questions and answers can we find?

that’s actually such a pretentious way to frame that, but the fact of the matter is that i needed to not waste space now that we’re five chapters in. this is the beginning of the end. how do we shift gears and take the tone of the entire story along with it? i don’t know if there’s something about second person pov that’s just inherently full of dread, but it did quite a bit of work in chapter five. it felt disembodying for me as a writer, and i could only hope the same for readers. i was really, really worried some people will give up reading altogether thinking all of chapter five will be in second person, but i didn’t want to compromise. it was going to be second person for most of their real relationship or nothing: vaguely dissociative, intensely drained, with no room to actually enjoy being each other’s boyfriend. the main challenge was to not go from zero to a hundred in a snap. i had the room to do so in only one chapter, but i had to find a way to keep a tight rein on the pace or else the whole fic will fail. 

there also had to be love. and longing. and a desperation to make it work. i think that was yuuji in a nutshell — someone desperate to make it work, whatever this thing is. that’s what constitutes his strengths and his weaknesses, in canon and in flls. i wanted to find a way to make that palpable to a reader the way it was palpable to me while writing yuuji in second person. somewhere along making sure to tether myself to him by knowing what pieces of media he’d reference (high school musical and fullmetal alchemist) and his life outside of megumi (work, basketball, tea with nanami, skateboarding), i had to also drown with yuuji in the hope that the reader would follow. chapter three afforded me the luxury of only examining yuuji from the omniscience of a writer writing in third person — i could dismantle him through the therapy scene, could show myself and the reader a way to understand him, but i could not take us there to where he is. 

i don’t know how successful the second person pov was, ultimately, though i’d be lying if i said it wasn’t what i thought was truly best at the time. it probably wasn’t that creative to anyone but me, but it gave me a nudge towards different ways to explore… vibes. atmosphere, maybe, is the more formal word for it. if not for the second person pov choice in flls, i wouldn’t have been nudged towards kamo’s newsletter to act as the midway point of the story, the last palate cleanser i’ll allow myself and the reader, and i never would have written please let me love you forever and days of brutalism and hairpin turns the way i did. i owe a lot to that tiny but crucial choice, as does flls as a whole. everything that followed that section — the fight, the aftermath of the fight, the breakup — relied on it to make themselves work, and it’s funny (and valuable to note) how it’s something as seemingly inconsequential as a pov choice that set the tone. 

especially because there’s nothing special, really, about those following scenes. the christmas eve fight, megumi’s conversation in the car with geto, the break-up itself — all of it followed my standard flow of dialogue. sure, there’s more tension when you’re writing an argument, let alone when writing scenes that will inevitably lead to a break-up, but all scenes, particularly dialogue, have to feel fraught with some kind of energy and inevitable anyway. for the remainder of chapter five and six, i just coasted on the tone set up by the beginning of chapter five, and that’s knowledge that has served me quite well since. atmosphere goes a long, long way, and with my writing style, a healthy balance between dialogue and introspection will take me the rest of the way to the finish line. the part of flls that i’ve heard people find the most heartbreaking were also its simplest. all of chapter six is dedicated to one wedding, and chapter seven to one evening. i wish i could say there was a trick there, that i agonized over how to write such important scenes, but my personal takeaway is that there is no trick. the point is that you get the story to a point where those scenes write themselves; there’s nowhere else for the flow to go, and geto’s gentle unpacking of megumi, the last few scenes before megumi and yuuji break up, and the bittersweet reunion after two necessary years — i can only hope they carried a sense of “this is the only way it could have gone” the way they did for me. geto doesn’t tell megumi anything we don’t already know from earlier chapters, if only just now put into words. megumi and yuuji also don’t tell each other anything, in the breakup scene and the getting back together sections, that we haven’t already gleaned from them. from the moment kamo’s newsletter ended and we headed into act two — everything was just wrapping up what i left for myself.  

it’s worth noting that i did try to complicate the final chapter a bit. i tried a split pov between yuuji and megumi at first, as a way to finally reconcile their two perspectives, but that felt too cheesy. i tried an outing to nagoya for nobara’s birthday, tried to divide the pov amongst the people in their lives (junpei, nanami, nobara, etc), and even to do my usual cyclical structure of starting with the same image we did in chapter two, this time in yuuji’s funabashi apartment — but those all felt too on the nose. i trusted my flls readers. maybe that’s what all it came down to. i trusted them to know these people, and this story, and i didn’t want to do too much and compromise that trust. and in the end, i would argue, returning to simplicity made the story what it was. 

something i love to think about is how to explain my fics to others. i know it’s been said a lot that the ao3 tagging system has convinced a mini generation of writers that tags and names of tropes are all you need to pitch/be pitched a story, and i wholeheartedly agree. or i might just be terrible at advertising my work, with an obnoxious aversion to learning how to do it better to boot, but to be fair, i think my premises are all just as boring as they are ridiculous. flls is a college au with two friends with benefits turned fake boyfriends turned real boyfriends turned exes. that’s it. there’s nothing else in the plot but that. yet it’s a lot more to me than that, and sometimes that’s all you have when you send a story out into the world. the knowledge that it was briefly yours, and now it isn’t, but that doesn’t at all devalue what you’ve taken away from spending time with it. 

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US april 2021, jujutsu kaisen trial element | short form, childhood friends

this is one of a handful of attempts at writing a trope i don’t love all that much, inspired largely by the atmosphere in “horatio” by t.j klune. i was very conflicted about this fic when i first published it, primarily because it was so short and written in a sparse style i didn’t know how to evaluate, and partly because it didn’t feel substantial. in a post i’ve put on private since, i’d written: 

what if i repeat the same themes in another context? that doesn’t make the theme carry any less weight as long as i put heart and sincerity and compassion into how i’m writing about it. there’s something that is equally as much self-deprecation as it is borderline vanity in me placing these rules upon myself. i’ve always known i wrote first and foremost out of love, out of what makes me excited to write — and that still applies here. i was thrilled to be able to experiment with a short, snappy fic. and that’s far more important, isn’t it, than whether i’m writing a different dissertation angle on love or friendship or family or career? it doesn’t feel like it, no, but it should, because i know it is. i know that what matters to me is that writing is fun and compassionate, and i know that as long as one person finds comfort in a world i’ve built, it’s enough.

i don’t sound very convinced there, and i wasn’t. i still don’t know what to make about us. i like that it’s short, and i endeavour to write more short fics with nothing specific or significant about them — but it’s hard to stomach its existence, let alone see it as something to love. it just feels so… not empty, but definitely less than what i’m used to asking from myself. it’s short, it’s sweet, it’s snappy. it’s also formulaic in its own sparse way, and i think it works because of the sweetness, but the truth is that if i hadn’t written it for itafushi week, i would never have greenlit it for publishing. i still wrestle nowadays with wanting to delete it, but it matters so little to me that i can’t even justify that much. it’s a weird limbo of a story, though i still hope to explore this kind of writing more in the future. 

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SOME KIND OF WE june 2021, jujutsu kaisen trial element | sequel to existing complete story

broke my own rules here by revisiting a story past its run, but to be very fair, it was less out of sentiment (though there was also that) so much as me startling at my first proper reread of the latter half of flls and realizing there are still unresolved arcs for megumi because the final chapter set two years later only had yuuji’s pov. not many of them, and none especially urgent, but i thought it would be a good opportunity to reorient the story to something quieter and more mature than what the central conflicts in flls left room for. i’m not convinced the back-and-forth between pieces of their recent few months being together and the present evening worked as seamlessly as i wanted it to, but it was still a nice opportunity to use a non-linear narrative to explore the growth and development of a relationship that i left at quite the bittersweet open-endedness. what was only delicately certain by the end of flls was made concretely certain through some kind of we, even if it did run a bit too sentimental and saccharine. but i think it can be forgiven, considering what yuuji and megumi went through in flls proper. 

the main challenge of this fic was figuring out which portions of their life post-flls were worth including, and the first draft had five potential sections:

tokyo, for megumi’s first visit back after moving to chiba, mostly dedicated to him realizing that home — after being rooted for so long to this city, this one apartment with his dad, the same neighborhood and transit lines, to the gojo-geto household — now finally belongs somewhere else, with someone else. 

funabashi, most of which was preserved in the version that was published. 

sendai, to visit grandpa itadori’s grave, which i decided to streamline into a single scene at the end of the final some kind of we draft to cut away the excess and break it down to the core of why i wanted them to make this visit — which is to hammer home for yuuji that he isn’t alone anymore, that he has someone taking care of him and loving him without fail and with care, and to give megumi the agency to solidify, for his own sake, that he’s someone who means the whole universe to yuuji. enough that what place is his will always and solely be his, and enough that megumi will be allowed to love and take care of another person in a way that’s both eternal and an ever-evolving work in progress. 

okinawa, for a trip that was only referenced as a backdrop in the final version but that i still like to think a lot about even now. a cc anon said once that the gojo-geto household must be so lonely with all the kids grown up, but as i talked about in another reply once (it’s too far back for me to have time to dig out at this point), i do love to imagine yuuji and megumi being uncles to the next generation, even if not outright parents themselves. sometimes you don’t know what you’re capable of giving as someone who was denied so much as a kid until you see someone so young, a stranger to the world, and know what to give them precisely because you didn’t have it once. and between yuuji not having much family and megumi’s life being complicated by the fact that he has too much family, i think they’re well-equipped to be uncles to tsumiki’s kids and beyond. and i was tempted for a bit to show this in the annual okinawa trips i mentioned in the final version of skow, but there just isn’t enough space without becoming superfluous. 

kuantan, to visit nanami, mostly to reconsolidate the rather serious interaction megumi and nanami had in flls into something gentler, considering he’s still family to yuuji and while nanami might say yuuji doesn’t need his blessing, yuuji will want it anyway. i never did end up writing this part, so it’s not exactly canon to the au and i’m hesitant to make it so, but the idea was to end with megumi asking for both nanami’s blessing and help to propose to yuuji on that malaysia trip.

the end result for this fic was a little lesson for me in cutting and cutting and keeping my hand light on the source, until i’m left with what i consider necessary. the final version of some kind of we is more a collection of vignettes than a straightforward account of megumi and yuuji’s life together post-flls, which i found much more strangely fitting. i feel like i spent so much of flls trying to get them to a point where they’re ready to be with each other, and i just wanted to dedicate skow to them not just making it work but building love on top of the foundations they secure. it’s one thing to portray that through a whole fic dedicated to each milestone; it’s another to write ordinary moments that are made extraordinary because they have chosen that for and with each other. neither of them say i love you out loud in the entire fic, but i wanted there to be no doubt that they do say it. that they do love each other, and that this part isn’t the obstacle it used to be. they’re just some kind of them, together, and this time it doesn’t feel bittersweet for me to send them off to the world for good knowing there’s love falling out of the spaces between each vignette i wrote. 

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HAND IN UNLOVABLE HAND october 2021, jujutsu kaisen trial element | fantasy au

yikes. one of two fics in this round-up that i abandoned at chapter one. started this because an idea occurred to me while reading the atlas six, wrote until i had to stop, then didn’t look back once even when it would have served me to. 

i flew too eagerly close to the sun with this one, truly, but as far as intentions go, i think both my mind and heart were in the right place. it’s quite clear where this one went wrong: i had neither time nor the energy to dedicate to it; i started it on the same whim i start most other things but this time didn’t have the passion for it — and i confess i just didn’t have the patience required to work on writing the story i wanted to write.

it was also one of those lessons in how often big ideas — or an attempt at them — cannot sustain a story. i had what i thought were clear ideas and intentions about the themes i wanted to cover in this one (the downfall of religious devotion, reconstruction, academic institutions versus personal/individual responsibility, all of which just look like buzzwords now that i’m typing them out, omg), but it just didn’t leave room for the kind of story i like to write. i guess my main takeaway here is that the pitfall of high(er) concept genre stories is that you have to make space for the world at the cost of room for character writing; it’s just the nature of how much space in the narrative you can allot for each individual aspect of the story, and with stuff like fantasy and sci-fi, the worldbuilding takes up a significant amount more than your run-of-the-mill slice of life story where the only world i have to worry about sketching is where someone lives and works. 

i do like some parts? it’s kind of crude, how i tried to reconcile my writing style with genre-specific bits, but it’s not all terrible. this sequence is alright:

Megumi was seven the first time he restored something. 

Every part of it had been an accident, and he remembers it now only in fragments. The wet rag in his hand as he wiped down the dining hall tables, having to climb the chairs to get to each corner. The horrible echo of something shattering in the kitchen, where Tsumiki had been tasked to do all the dishwashing for the evening. The panic on her face when Megumi got to her, both of them crowding around the shards of ceramic left by what was once a plate. The spill of harsh candlelight from above the sink, the harsher shadows it sent dancing around the broken glass. 

But he does remember the remembering. The knowing of what the plate had looked like once, the image behind his eyes anchoring him in place as he latched onto the curl of the shadows on the floor. It would be more intuitive, more rudimentary, than anything he’d learn to do later in life, propelled by the worry on Tsumiki’s face and the footsteps he swore he could hear coming towards them from the other end of the servants’ quarters they called home back then—but it had taken only a single blink for the shadows to cover the plate, tighten around it into darkness, and then retreat to where they were, leaving a clean, untouched plate in the middle of the kitchen floor. 

it could be better, but it still could be worse. and i do like the overall architectural imagery and how i managed to scrounge up some standard fare coziness somewhere in the cold, almost-medieval setting. 

as far as disastrously failed ventures go, this one could be a lot more embarrassing than it is. i’m not mad at it. it’s far from good enough, and if i didn’t write it in such a frenzy, i probably never would have allowed it to be published. but. it’s a useful failure. 

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PLEASE LET ME LOVE YOU FOREVER march to june 2022, blue period trial element | five-character gen dynamic, multimedia

what a... headache of a project. bit off more than i could chew without choking and decided to take even more bites each new chapter because why the hell not, apparently. i do appreciate how un-edited this fic is, despite it all. it feels the most bleeding-heart of all my fics from this past year or so, and it’s nice to look back at this and know exactly when i shifted my approach to it altogether because, again, why not. it’s such a valuable “why not?” to have. it’s nice when i don’t feel quite as… under surveillance? when writing a story. and i get to just go off the rails a bit. a lot, actually, with this one. it’s nothing crazy because i don’t think i can write anything crazy (though i think hairpin turns had blinks of it), but there’s definitely plenty of choices that i’m surprised i decided on with a sober mind. 

to be fair, they weren’t exactly mindblowingly successful. if i were to rate this fic out of five, despite all my fondness for it, i’d maybe give it a 2.75. it’s a well-earned mark, and i have a special soft spot for people who have read it, but i’m not mentally proud of it. emotionally so, maybe, in whatever way i can be, but if this fic didn’t feel so intimate with a much cozier readership and comment section, i’d be a lot crueler to it than i am, i think. as it is, it makes for wonderful conversation and reflection for me, and it’s always fun to consider how a story about a disbanded idol group became a metaphor for childhoods lost to growing up too fast and also involved alternate universes. 

but cycling through five povs really is too much, i think, and if it was exhausting for me to write then i imagine it was just as exhausting to read. a nicer alternative would have been to stick to one pov for each chapter, but even that was a lot to juggle considering there were also smaller dynamics going on in the background with each character. within the core group of five alone, there were thirty-one variations of scenes to write, including individual introspection and pairs — and that’s not to take into consideration trios, or groups of four or the whole five plus a secondary character, for example. i don’t know how i pulled off my usual character study here. i don’t know if i did. 

another thing about this fic is that i’m still not sure why a time loop didn’t work. i wanted it so badly to work. i thought it would be fun, but i guess time loops aren’t necessarily compatible with prose. there’s something about repetition and looping that’s best visually, but even if i had been able to stick to imagery and vibes, it would have gotten tedious at some point for me and a reader considering the quantity/length i tend to need. just something to keep in mind if i get the urge to keep trying time loops in future works and wonder why it’s not sticking seamlessly. as with a lot of things in life, if you have to force it then maybe it’s not meant to be there. or maybe you have to go shortform, narrow down the playing field?

one thing i’d commend this fic for is how it managed to unpack so much between dynamics that barely exist in canon. that, and how it managed to pack so many formats into one story — song lyrics, album reviews, tweets, a play, nonfiction, a profile, wikipedia pages, messages, i don’t even know how many more — while maintaining a semi-cohesive tone throughout. there was a lot of fun there, in figuring out how to adapt your typical characterizing to a format you haven’t tried before: how would kuwana write a preface to hashida’s book? would this particular character include rhymes in their song lyrics, or are they more of a diaristic stream of consciousness kind of lyricist? what medium best translates this character’s personality? what medium best conveys this dynamic’s under-the-skin knowing of each other? who sees more than the others, and how can i show that without using the same structure of two or three characters talking in a setting that doesn’t change? 

my favourite part is probably the fake album review at the top of chapter four? there’s something giddying about the research-like quality of figuring out how to perfect the tone that music reviewers tend to default to, but also sobering about how easily adapted this fake idol group’s history is from real life. the easiest part of the entire fic was making this group feel real to me, situated in the real life history of j-idols and beyond, even if i admit to shying away from being explicit about the worst things that would still have been grounded in reality. some references to real life idol incidents worked a little too well, but there was also how clean it felt to spin fictional lore for this group in that fake album review. from their individual songwriting styles to tobi’s own background in-story to the kind of themes and concepts a faux pretentious pitchfork reviewer might like to talk about — it was just incredibly fun. i don’t know when else i’d get the chance to write something like that. everything else paled in comparison to it soon after, though i do also tolerate whatever my writing was doing at the end of chapter five, even if some parts of that chapter also feel lacklustre through a hypercritical lens. it doesn’t hold up under extremely rigorous scrutiny, even if i consider the fact that i’d just wanted the fic wrapped up as soon as i could at the time. it could be better, more so than all the other fics in this post could be better. but i don’t mind too much that it isn’t better. i mind it a little. just a little. but its flawedness is also what forced the multimedia format to happen in the first place, and that, i like a lot.

there’s a fair amount that this fic did quite more than alright, i think. if nothing else, it was useful as a playground that i didn’t have to be too finicky about. it will be one of those projects i’ll look back at someday and laugh deliriously over because how did i think that was the only way to make it work, but with the facilities i had at the time, it’s definitely not a shitshow. it has a lot of heart — which doesn’t necessarily redeem awful works, but in passable ones, those parts of the writing meet each other halfway. please let me love you forever holds its own weight, which is plenty more than i can say for most of my other experiments. plus it contains a background relationship that is not at all the focus of the story yet will probably haunt me forever. it’s always the ones you least expect to matter that will ripple further down the line, etc.

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LOSER TAKES ALL july 2022, tomodachi game trial element | soulmates, mystery au

another unpublished little guy left to rot at one complete chapter. i don’t really have any huge problems with this one, just that i tired of its demands very quickly and didn’t have enough attachment to the dynamics in it to muster up any motivation for. but tomodachi game, and especially yuuichi and kei, are so uniquely positioned for a fic like this, and i don’t resent past me for approaching it this way at all. is a soulmate bond that fosters a telepathic link between people who come back from a brush with death kind of an unhinged premise for a mystery au? yes. but so is remodeling a breakfast restaurant with my mom and the guy i didn’t know confessed to me in high school and who is now literally displaced in more ways than one by said remodeling, and even also acting is all i know so here i am trying to find the love of my life by dating anyone for an entire month on a first come first serve basis only to be shocked when that doesn’t work. 

again. boring yet equally ridiculous elevator pitches. if i cemented anything for a fact from this abandoned wip, it’s that my premises have always been questionable, and that time and time again, the only path forward is to lean all the way into it — which i did with hairpin turns, thankfully. hand in unlovable hand and loser takes all are apart by about a year, and there’s palpable change here in my approach to worldbuilding even if i abandoned each for unrelated reasons. granted, i might just be better suited to one side of speculative fiction than the other, but that’s such a copout. when it comes to trying new things in writing, the “if he wanted to, he would” logic applies, even if the he in question ultimately finds that it doesn’t work the way he wants it to (like in hand in unlovable hand). 

loser takes all worked fine for me, and i loved the inherent intimacy in having two incredibly smart and perceptive characters in each other’s minds while trapped in this soulmate bond that isn’t necessarily romantic. not to mention yuuichi is a deeply unwell person, and his ways of showing attachment to kei range from drastically protective, such as offering to fire the receptionist that was rude to kei, to:

Sometimes, watching Kei asleep right against him, Yuuichi wants to press his lips against Kei’s pulse. To feel it warm and alive under his mouth, to hear that little sigh of ticklish laughter Kei does if someone so much as runs a soft cloth against his neck. 

And sometimes—sometimes Yuuichi is also seized by a strong thought, a strong urge, to sink something sharp into that pulse. His teeth, a fork, a shard of broken glass. Sink it in hard, deep enough to leave a bloody bruise, a scar, a puncture. Hard enough to maybe even sever that heartbeat, to tear it, slit it into silence somehow. Hard enough that it feels almost the kinder choice to imagine himself wrapping his hands around Kei’s neck—tightening them without hesitation, itself a mercy of a kind as the blood quickly drains out of Kei’s cheeks. Yuuichi imagines then how Kei will struggle, whether he’ll kick or bite Yuuichi, if he’ll reverse their positions with one twist of a martial arts trained body, or if he’ll just accept it, resign himself to it knowing that not even this, if it’s Yuuichi, could possibly be meaningless.

But it would be. It would be meaningless to kill Kei. Meaningless because Kei is singular in his position within Yuuichi’s life, loyal and intelligent and a force to be reckoned with like no one else is, not even Yuuichi’s sister, not even the only friend he trusts most. Meaningless because every time Yuuichi pictures it, every time he wonders if he’ll have it in him to press two killer’s hands around Kei’s neck, it doesn’t take long for the accompanying sting to come like a splash of boiling water on exposed skin. A kind of scolding, a kind of reminder, that just as much as it would be difficult for anyone to kill Kei—so impervious to physical harm, whose broken bones and bleeding wounds will always heal even if he jumps off a twenty-story building—it would be just as difficult for Yuuichi to do him harm and survive it without any damage done to his own heart at his own hands. 

the temptation to keep writing this is not entirely absent, to be honest. but a mystery takes care and attention, and i just don’t have that in me the way this story deserves. but this fic was delicious to write, and i think it gave me a hunger to write more dynamics that feel just as juicy. dynamics that aren’t necessarily geared towards healthy love, but ones that ooze if poked anyway. 

i definitely want to revisit the telepathy plot device i explored here someday, but for now, this fic, abandoned wip as it is, is kind of the goldilocks midpoint between failed venture (hand in unlovable hand), almost-passable venture (please let me love you forever), and basically there if being there counts taking your literal first baby step into a new frontier (days of brutalism and hairpin turns).

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HONORARY MENTIONS

i don’t mean to ignore the canonverse fics (here and where you are, i’ll give you something so real, detour, and the two manhwa fics, that is) out of favouritism, but i’m afraid there’s nothing much to say…? not that these weren’t lessons in themselves, but canonverse takes a quarter of the energy and brainpower to write, and i’ll be lying if i don’t go about them essentially all no thoughts, head empty. i talked a bit about here and where you are here, while the logic for detour, which i was happy to write for and based on exchanges with a friend, is pretty self-explanatory. i did love getting to write a character like loid (and i’m relieved that the chapters that follow the ones i took into consideration for that fic hold up the characterization i imagined for him) + it was interesting to give sexual content and the philosophy of desire or whatever a shot in i’ll give you something so real. they were effective at what i needed them to do — which is, really, just to check the temperature of the water. i always feel so rusty when any amount of time passes without me writing, and these small, low-maintenance fics work as a burst of ice cold water before jumping in. i don’t value these fics any less for their place in The Process, and i might even be extra happy when someone likes them, but as far as Advancing The Craft 🤢 goes, all of these are simply necessary bridges to get to the next checkpoint. sometimes you gotta scratch the tip of the pen before the ink starts bleeding like it’s supposed to. words are the same. it takes a while each time to get my writing to a place i recognize, and sometimes a while is an entire fic before i can write the next chapter for an ongoing multi-chaptered story.

(that said: shoutout to the particular flavour of introspection in detour, within which my favourite line was written the literal minute before i sent it off, and a big heart emoji for the fact that i’ll give you something so real unfolds in a span of barely half a day. both are very interesting to think about moving forward.)

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DAYS OF BRUTALISM AND HAIRPIN TURNS january 2023, blue lock trial element | a romantic triad, sci-fi, memory loss (finally!) 

my angel. my darling. my love. who is far from being perfect but is the closest i’ve had to at least being sure i won’t just wake up one day loathing the soul out of it. i’ll laugh at it, probably. i’ll think it’s hilarious and cringy someday soon. but it’s a work i can’t not appreciate wholeheartedly. 

my cc tells me that the first time i put it on record that i won’t mind doing a blue lock fic is may 16, 2022, and the fact that i didn’t even make it a year and did so in the most Hard To Pitch If This Was An Actual Novel And Not Just A Fic For Fun way possible is worth at least a salute of disbelief, i think. my journal from my writing hiatus also tells me i’ve been trying to make memory loss work since 2020 and managed to scratch the itch minutely with here and where you are (which is… a pretty janky piece of work, looking back now) — but i’m just really, really content, even proud, of how i managed to weave it into a fic adapted from a story about football battle royale. 

it’s almost kind of unnerving how satisfied i am with the premise of hairpin turns, even if the execution leaves quite a bit to be desired — as it always will, really, and therein is the joy of finding the next writing project. i laughed a lot at myself while writing hairpin turns, and of all the inside jokes that my works started as, this one is by far the fic to feel most like it — a fun little joke that got funnier and funnier the more of it i wrote, and so i wrote more, chasing that laughter until it was time to catch my breath. and i think with how much i require writing to feel urgent and single-minded to be fun, there’s a part of me that’s easily... bored, for lack of a better word, when something doesn’t give me that. without this fast-paced almost-violence, i get bored and restless, the way i was around all the projects i had lined up after please let me love you forever. i’m making a face as i type that but maybe i just mean to say that there were a good few months there where nothing scratched the itch in need of stimulation. i’d write scenes and they wouldn’t be awful, wouldn’t even be bad, but they weren’t exciting to me. they weren’t thrilling. they didn’t feel like i was dissecting anything, just poking at skin with a scalpel and rolling my eyes when i didn’t draw blood from a dead body — you know? 

but projects have an uncanny way of arriving in your life when you most need it, and just when i have peeled and replaced my wallpaper and assembled and reassembled my keyboards and poked at this manuscript i refuse to rewrite until i did a warm-up that felt substantial enough, the blue lock anime started airing. i knew vaguely what dynamics i wanted to write even back when i had only the manga, but i know i could not have tortured this fic out of me then. not before please let me love you forever, not before loser takes all, not even before all my failed attempts at pitching speculative fiction stories to myself at 3 AM and gritting my teeth at my own disgust. the best aus fall into your lap fully formed and fully realized before you even know what you’ll be shaping it into; they’re a little predestined that way, and aus might be why i owe fanfiction my certainty that the author is just as possessed by the narrative if the narrative has its own pace and direction. i think that’s logic that should be applicable to original projects as well. 

i did hesitate in the very beginning of hairpin turns because sci-fi was such a huge deviation from my comfort zone and i have the misfortune of being both a taurus sun and an enneagram type five. i’ve never tried writing proper sci-fi, not even a little, let alone enough to be comfortable with knowing where to start something that wasn’t merely regular slice of life with a slight sprinkling of specfic. i was sure my writing style wouldn’t be a good match for it. i still don’t think it’s a match, necessarily. my prose is a bit too sentimental for some of the demands sci-fi asked of me — and that’s fine. i wouldn’t know the precise nature of that incompatibility if i hadn’t jumped into the pool of sharks and came out of the tank somehow, disbelievingly, friends with them. i began wary of relying too much on technobabble since i’m not exactly the most stem-oriented person around, but even the background of this au wrote itself, half because blue lock was a shockingly perfect match for the world i had in my mind and half because i found that the technology i imagined for the plot was both possible and easy to break down into the narrative. even now i’m still shocked at how scientifically sound the core pitch of the story is, and the fact that it married itself well to both the overarching plot and the character dynamics i wanted to highlight was just icing on a cake i would have tried to politely finish anyway. 

it could very well be that hairpin turns is just a fluke, its parts too seamlessly glued to each other that i’m not sure it could have been anything else except luck doing the work there, but i think there’s also credit to be found in how nothing is sacred in blue lock. these are characters who have done ridiculous things and said ridiculous things, and it was a matter of matching their energy. therein is the same lesson from loser takes all: if i’ve always known that characters decide the pace, tone and atmosphere of the story and everything else in it, then doesn’t it also go to say that in order to write a story far out of my comfort zone, i need only start with characters far outside of my comfort zone?

i think with au fics in particular, a lot of the work begins with justifying why certain things are in character for them in this universe based on what we know from canon. but because those boundaries are expanded by what blue lock innately is, it doesn’t feel as weird to posit something like, what if you and your android bf get tasked with rescuing his older brother’s android bf and find out along the way that you might also both be in love with your childhood best friend? as with most other of my initial ideas, this quickly spiraled into something significantly different — which luckily for me included the memory loss idea that i’ve been wanting to explore for forever now. proper sci-fi was the perfect backdrop for it, and bachira the perfect person to willingly do it, and isagi and rin the perfect people to be left in the aftermath of that loss. stars aligned, truly. i’m incredibly grateful for it. 

whatever challenges i encountered writing this fic had nothing to do with writing it. it was as smooth to write as it was an absolute pain to edit, because the three povs are so vastly different from each other, and with no outline to mentally check each time i add a new scene, i was reliant on going back and forth again and again to make sure the worldbuilding is cohesive and the plot is coherent. at some point i couldn’t look at it anymore, and it might even be a testament to how much i appreciate the fic that i still can’t look at it now yet cannot deny how fond i am of the final result. 

with sci-fi in particular, it really is a case of faking it till you make it, and whatever lies don’t feed into each other, you can always revisit and adjust later. that’s the common sense magic of fiction, i suppose. there’s a degree of patience i held onto writing hairpin turns that i wouldn’t have had with any other previous work, and i think it benefited me more to have all three chapters written in varying increments, out of my usual linear order, than publishing it chapter by chapter. i had all the room to experiment — what does the world look like in 2070? is 2070 even the right year to set this in? is there anything big happening around that time period? how does the lingo change in the time between present and this potential future? when i run into things that feel too out of my depth to write, like isagi’s pov for instance, do i actually have a justification for saying no other than how it will be easier than trying? are there benefits to giving bachira the final chapter that i’m being biased against because i think it would be a challenge? and between all of these choices, how do i adapt existing blue lock canon, from their playstyles to the favourites listed in the egoist bible, to worldbuilding in other forms of media that i’ve always wanted to try a different approach to? 

i used to think it was unnecessary and superfluous to go into writing something while getting bogged down by stray facts about characters, in both fic and original projects, but at the same time, it’s truly the tiny details that will humanize more than knowing a character’s birthday or what traumatic events lie in their backstory. tiny details that breed more tiny details, until it’s about the fact that bachira and isagi are childhood friends in this au yet when we meet bachira again he’s calling isagi by last name, or how rin understandably questions the validity of his own humanness because we can only assume sae had recreated him in grief or defiance against mortality or whatever other emotion that we’ll never know for sure because we only ever see sae in this fic through rin, and that matters a lot more than if i gave sae a pov — and yet rin manages to love through the small things, in how the warehouse is in an eternal sunset waiting for bachira to return to him and isagi. it’s about how first love, late spring was about learning how to love someone else the way they need you to when you weren’t loved the way you needed to be, but hairpin turns is about how spending your whole life never questioning if you were loved can rob you of the facilities to put a name and shape to what you feel for someone who’s always been in your life. the things you don’t take for granted, necessarily, but you do love for granted by not calling it love.

hairpin turns is about the pieces obscured from view and all the more present because of it. it’s about lost memories, the phantom outline of a person like a haunting. it’s about how sae never once appears in a direct scene yet he looms over rin’s existence. it’s about how rin’s chapter represents the past, isagi’s the present and bachira’s the future, but time matters little in the end — how could it weigh any more, in a story about memory? it’s about the uneasy momentary peace that’s the only scene we can count on as a happy ending. it’s about the lengths you’ll go to get the chance to be ordinary about your love, even if all else about it is unconventional. 

and yet above all, what i like best about this fic is that it works towards questions that feel like being given answers. some of my other fics try to provide answers to its characters and the readers they resonate with, to give them a way to be well-equipped to move forward, while a few other fics settle on non-answers because uncertainty is the only ending there is. but hairpin turns moves outward only to ask more questions, questions that are the answers and the thesis, yet in a way that isn’t strictly open-ended. and i have no fucking clue how i managed it, but this feels like the target i’ve been itching to catch sight of this entire time. this is the kind of story and process i would like to aspire to this year, and even though it had taken me 80k to glean what i needed from it, i’m glad i stayed with this fic as a warm-up. 

anyway. this got a bit away from me, and who knows, maybe this level of pretentiousness is only because i’m still riding the high of affection for my most recent brainchild to make it to college — but i’m not totally blind to the flaws in hairpin turns. the execution of the ending itself is clunky, not because it doesn’t resolve anything but because it does, and by then, the post-rescue section has gone on for long enough that even an ending feels like an epilogue. the story overall lacks complete confidence in what it is, with some parts shadowed by a slight hovering hesitation and others weighed down by a heavy hand showing too much kindness to my non-confidence. it’s never too heavy-handed, and definitely not so much that i’ll send it to the bin, but enough that if i want something to pick apart, there are stray choices hiding in places that i’d circle as an editor for feeling too sentimental, or the tone too dissonant with the pacing, or, ironically, not explored enough. in the genre i’m used to writing, the adrenaline rush is in finding the right balance within a new choreography for a dance style i know well, but in my first real foray into speculative fiction, i think i was just trying to find my footing the whole time. i’m still surprised i made it to the other end of the tightrope, honestly. i didn’t expect to applaud myself for the bare minimum, and i still don’t. 

but all of this is a lesson for me, too. what i do know is that it’s interesting to tell a story about what’s missing, about the unsaid and the unseen, and if that’s what it will take for me to rediscover excitement in what i write so that i don’t have to sink back into the ennui of these last couple of months, then that’s a pretty darn fun goal to spend the rest of the year unpacking. 

[lurking-latinist]

reviving a meme I previously got from @swinging-stars-from-satellites

1. How many works do you have on Ao3?

158 (one currently unrevealed).

2. What’s your total Ao3 word count?

103,185. I cracked 100k recently!

3. How many fandoms have you written for?

All the Doctors Who + Gallifrey + Iris Wildthyme + The Time Travellers + GoR etc.; Ancient Greek Religion & Lore; WtOVPIC; Blake’s 7; Dracula; Discworld; Windrose Chronicles & Sun-Cross series also by Barbara Hambly (one crossover); All Creatures Great and Small; Lost at Christmas, heaven help me. That makes nine as I count it. Most only for one small thing or crossover.

4. Top 5 fics by kudos?

Skipping kudos bot victims:

Ms Smith (13 and Sarah, fun with fake names)

don’t worry, he’s with me (Ten and Donna five-times-fic)

Vicarious (Six & Martha drabble)

Time Flies Like an Arrow (witches fly on a broomstick) (Discworld, Lancre Witches, having a philosophical conversation about time) (I have come to detest this title but I’m glad people enjoyed the fic)

to all our nights and days to come (Seven/Romana Time War AU)

It’s helpful to include extremely popular, well-known characters in your fics. Or, apparently, to write a slightly darker twist on your rarepair OTP and happen to plug it one day on a relevant popular post.

5. Do you respond to comments? Why/why not?

I do, because I love getting comments and I am always genuinely grateful to hear that someone has enjoyed my work!

6. A fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

Wow, last time I did this meme I said it was That Which We Call. That’s changed. It might actually be to all our nights and days to come, or else one of the Six-post-Trial ones.

7. Do you write crossovers?

Apparently! But not much, and not well.

8. Ever received hate on a fic?

Nope, touch wood.

9, Do you write smut?

Not my thing.

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of.

11. Ever had a fic translated?

Yes!! @sci-firenegade translated Making History into Portuguese! It is so cool.

12. Have you ever co-written a fic?

Sort of, with Moki! We more tend to write sequels to each other’s stuff, but we also have listed ourselves as co-authors on a couple of things.

13. All time fav ship?

Seven/Romana.

14. WIP you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

Never say die! Probably the Eight/Charley babyfic AU, though. If I go back to it it’ll be as a very different writer and I’ll probably want to rework what exists and it’ll be technically a different fic.

15. Writing strengths?

Character voices & dialogue. Also, focalization. I always know what A thinks of B and what B notices about A, which is hilarious as I absolutely do not know any of this in real life.

16. Writing weaknesses?

Used to be length; I’m still very brief but I feel like I have more control over the length of a fic now. Like it comes out more or less the length I expect it to; I can tell what size something’s gonna be. Probably now I would just say plot. I’m not great at Things Occurring. And like everybody else I get hung up on how to describe basic actions like walking across a room.

17. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in a fic?

Don’t do it if you can’t get the other language right (as well as how code-switching actually tends to work). Also, translation convention exists for a reason. Probably don’t pull an ‘opening lines of War and Peace’ unless you are in fact Tolstoy, in which case you don’t need my writing advice. Nothing inherently wrong with it though.

18. First fandom you wrote for?

Officially, DW. Unofficially, probably something as a kid before I knew fandom existed. Redwall or something.

19. What’s your fav fic you’ve written so far?

to all our nights and days to come, probably.

Not tagging anyone, but memes are for stealing!

[magicofthepen]

🐜 🪳🐝

bug me for fic recs!

let’s see if I can do a different fandom for each one….

🐜 Recommend a fic that makes you laugh! A crack fic, or something that's just really funny!

I rarely ever read crack fic or fic that’s goal is to be silly, but the first one I thought of was this one:

Fandom: Doctor Who (1963)

The Strands of Fate by @lurking-latinist: The Doctor and Romana find that the details of Time Lord biology can have... unexpected implications. Rated G.

(a silly twist on the sex pollen trope, no sex involved)

🪳 Recommend a great AU!

Fandom: Wolf 359

something enchanting, something deadly by @lottiesnotebook, @privethawk: In the palace; a coup succeeds, a princess is imprisoned, and a prince is forced to make a terrible choice. In the caves of the mountain, a dragon stirs. On the island, a queen awakens. It’s going to be an interesting year in the Kingdom of Hephaestus. Rated M.

(the way it reinterprets season 3 is so good and heartbreaking, I haven’t reread it in a while but it has stuck in my brain. excellent characterization, haunting story, stayed with me so much that it’s semi-responsible for my brain inventing a fantasy au for my current sci-fi fandom.)

🐝 Recommend a fic with great symbolism, or themes, something really clever, or like. just something you could write a whole literary essay about!

Fandom: Gallifrey Audios

it’s difficult to think of a Gallifrey fic by @whifferdills that I don’t feel this way about (I have a note in my notes app that’s just quotes from their fics bc oh my god, so many sentences that drive into the heart of these characters’ stories, that show how complicated they are). but to pick one:

The Far Tundra by @whifferdills: Transformation, destruction, movement, growth. s5/6ish, vaguely canon-compliant. Rated E.

(a brilliant character study of the main three characters, their complex relationships with each other and with Gallifrey — but it’s especially a Narvin character study. I don’t know how to accurately describe what is so !! about it, but it is so good, highly recommend)

[natequarter]

We were both laughing about this, when the Doctor and Romana rejoined us. And that’s when we stopped laughing.

I could see on their faces, even before they spoke, that this was serious. They told us that only way they could possibly shut it down was to step inside and communicate with it directly.

I’d seen them do so many brilliant things before that at first I didn’t really understand. I started to understand, though, when they asked Tivorg to look after me. I started to protest as they returned to the machine. Romana gave the Doctor a kiss on the cheek, and took his hand as they stepped inside.

I watched them through the glass. They smiled at me, but I could see the fear in their eyes. I heard Romana say that if anything went wrong, at least she’d never have to go back to Gallifrey.

And that’s when I really understood. That’s when I realised what was going to happen.

They thought they were going to die.

They knew they were going to die.

I started to scream and hammer on the glass with my fists, but the Doctor suddenly just called out my name, just my name. But it was so commanding that I just stopped. I stopped and stared in silence.

His voice sounded, muffled through the glass. “Adric, we need to do this. If the dead don’t stay dead, then the universe will end.”

Romana smiled at me. “Oh, Adric, you’re going to be so brilliant. Do you know who you remind me of?” I shook my head. “A young man who broke the rules. A young man who fled his privileged existence so he could see the universe, and change things for the better.”

“So you see,” continued the Doctor, “I won’t really be gone. You’re here.”

I stared at them. I’d never felt so young, so hopeless, so stupid. I couldn’t understand how this was happening. We had just landed there. We’d just been looking for a way back to their universe, and now, this?

“One more thing,” said the Doctor. “Stop saying, ‘Pass the sodium chloride.’ It wasn’t funny when I said it at your age, either.” His voice fell to a whisper. “Nobody likes a showoff.”

Then he raised his arms dramatically into the air.

“Who’s showing off now, Doctor?” asked Romana. He grinned at her and she grinned back. “Let’s save the universe!”

Then their heads fell back, and they went silent, silently mouthing equations into the machine. Their bodies began to shake. The machine began to shake. I stared in total horror, Tivorg coming over and putting an arm on my shoulder, trying to turn me away, trying to stop me watching as my friends, my heroes, my best friends—

They became the machine. And the machine broke.

[tape recording clicks, shuffling]

They didn’t scream. I remember that. They didn’t scream. They were in so much pain, but they knew, they knew they were saving all of us.

I stared down at their broken bodies. Their minds had been burnt out entirely. Their hearts had stopped.

They were gone.

I was numb. I wanted to punch Tivorg, kill him, but I couldn’t move. I didn’t move, for hours. I just sat there, staring at their bodies. The first two people to die on Veridis in months. It wasn’t fair. It was wrong.

That night, Tivorg returned with some friends, including his son and daughter-in-law. They brought me some water, and some food, and I drank it and I ate it and I didn’t feel anything. My parents, Varsh, and now my two best friends. I was so young, and yet all I knew was death.

I slept there at their feet, that night. The following morning they said that we should bury the Doctor and Romana. I still didn’t cry. I’m not sure I really believed it. Instead, I just left them. I walked out.

a full life and other big finish audios that break into your house and kill you dead.

[forgottencerberus]

No Hound Can Outrun Ananke - A Soap x F!OC fanfic - Prologue

Decided to port my fanfic from AO3 to here as well, in case someone prefered to use this platform to read it ;0;

[AO3 LINK FOR THE STORY HERE]

Pairing: John "Soap" MacTavish x F!OC

Tags: Friends to Lovers, Slow Burn, Teasing, Flirting, Eventual Romance, Maybe eventual smut?, Getting Together, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Pining, Denial of Feelings, Generally NSFW due to a lot of reasons.

Warnings: Detailed depiction of gore, fights, torture, and struggles with mental health (majorly PTSD and anxiety). If any of these topics upset you, or hit too close to home, I ask that you please do not read this fanfiction for your own health.

READER DISCRETION IS HIGHLY ADVISED, MINORS DNI! THIS STORY WAS INTENDED FOR MATURE AUDIENCE ONLY!!!

Please forgib any grammatical wobbliness, English is not my native tongue.

Summary: Romana "Cerberus" Hanlon was never meant to join the Mexican Special Forces, but faith deemed that she must. Tortured by her past, she is alive yet barely living as she tries to find her place again in life, both as a soldier and a person.Then one day, all is changed when she is put on a mission by Alejandro. She soon finds herself surrounded by new faces and dangers, and lost pieces of her that she thought were gone are slowly falling back into pieces. The question is, can she fully heal herself with the help of others, or is she destined to fall apart once again?

___________________________________________________________

“Thank you for your help, Alejandro. The sooner we can get our hands on Hassan and the missiles, the sooner we can celebrate.” Laswell’s voice was oozing confidence, but Alejandro knew well enough already that her spirit hid the feeling of concern deep inside. He also knew that even if she felt anxious about any situation, she would never show it. She knew better. A woman in her position had to be untouchable and emotionless so that no one could take hold of them in any shape or form. She has already mastered the art of that. “Sergent MacTavish and Lieutenant Riley will arrive tomorrow. The latter goes by Ghost and will wear a mask. Don’t ask why. I trust that you will be ready to leap into action upon their arrival. I have sent you our intel, but I suggest that your team also do some digging. You know Las Almas better than we do.” “No problem. I’ll put my best person on the job.” Alejandro was comfortably sitting in his chair, his arm crossed over his chest as he listened to Laswel’s words. His eyes quickly scanned through the documents and pictures that were delivered to him. He recognised the place, but it had been a while since he had been there. Ever since it became a part of El Sin Nombre’s territory, he was not a frequent visitor. Many things could have changed. He sighed at the thought. He would play with the others so many times there, and later, he and his team would practice there as well. Losing that area was a tactical failure, but the emotional value of it made its loss feel even heavier. As much as he wanted to do the intel gathering himself, he knew he could not. He had to prepare for tomorrow and ensure that by the time the two Task Force 141 members arrived, they would have everything they needed to find Hassan. “Good. Wishing you the best, Alejandro. If you need anything, you know where to find me.” “Of course. Stay safe, Laswell.” “You too, Alejandro.”

As soon as she disconnected, Alejandro cracked his knuckles and briefly stared at the wall on the other side of the room. It has been a while since something of this urgency and risk happened around Las Almas; usually, their hand was full with El Sin Nombre’s antics. Whoever they were, they had been getting progressively more and more aggressive with their methods, and the fact that they were now involved in the missiles made him feel just a smidge agitated. The streets were flooded with violence, and he hated seeing it that way. For a split second, he remembered his childhood. He would play pranks on all kinds of people or pretend to be a cowboy who would lasso every 'bad' guy he saw. The older kids often chased him for taking their toy guns. He would always outsmart them, and on the rare occasion when they managed to catch up to him, he would hold his ground and fight them off. He had a few scars left from those days, and whenever he saw them in the mirror, the feeling of nostalgia would entrap him in a heartbeat. He missed those times; they shaped him into the man he was today. Those days were behind him, and he hoped that his work would at least make sure that there would be kids like him growing up in Las Almas, ready to fight the good fight.

A small cough from the door’s direction took him out of his train of thought. “Ah, Rudy” He could not help but give the biggest, brightest smile when he saw it was him standing at the door. “Come in; we are already done.” “Good news, I hope.” Rudy smiled back at his colonel as he quietly closed the door behind him. “Could be worse. We have two S.A.S members coming in to help us with Hassan. The intel she sent me showed that he could be holed up in the old houses, the one at the mountains.” “The ones where we would practice?” “Exactly.” “I miss that place.” Rudy smiled faintly.

Alejandro slowly rose up from his chair, disconnecting the laptop that he was eyeballing until now from the charger, and held it out towards Rudy. His brother-in-arms took it without hesitation, carefully putting it below his armpit. “Give it to Cerbero. I want her to scout the place out for us, they might have set up extra security to protect Hassan, and I want to know if that’s the case.” “Oh, we are letting the dog out for this one, hmm?” Alejandro could not help but laugh at Rudy’s response. “She has been holed up for way too long in her room. It will do her good.” Alejandro remarked with a grin. “That is for sure.” Rudy nodded. The two soldiers left the room with heavy steps and went on their way without saying any more words. They have known each other long enough to be able to communicate without them at this point. They both knew what would happen in the upcoming minutes. Rudy would drop the laptop off at the “doghouse”, as they would call Cerbero’s room on the regular, and then they would meet again in the armoury. They would talk more there.

The path to Cerbero’s room was a tedious one, despite her office being in the same building. Rudy had to take several flights of stairs and then walk into one of the darkest places of the base, something that he was not particularly a fan of. Cerbero, however, loved the dark and isolation, something that the soldiers would constantly tease her about, all in good spirit, of course. When she first joined their team, Alejandro did not want to let her office be situated just above the basement. He did not want to make her feel like she was a prisoner with all the darkness and pipes, but she would assure them that this was what she needed to be able to work well. She’s got a proper room just for herself in the dormitory from Alejandro as a means to compensate for that cave of an office.

When Rudy reached the door, he could not help but notice the faint light leaking from under the bottom of the door. The room had no windows, and as a result, she always had the lights on whenever she was working, making sure that the Special Force’s electricity bill got some well-deserved attention. He gently knocked on the door three times, and when he heard a quiet “Come in”, he entered.

He was not at all surprised by the mess that was in there. Not like this room ever felt cosy, but its current state was certainly a lot more unorganised than it usually would be, which meant one thing. She was highly focused on her current task. Besides the rocking chair in the corner, and the several bookshelves that were hugging the walls so close that they might as well be the wall itself, the room only had two other pieces of furniture; one desk, and an enormous board that was hanging on the wall, filled with maps, notes and pictures, some of them being connected with one another via thick strings of yarn, in all kinds of colours. If someone random were to enter this place, they would probably think that this is a set for some sort of noire movie. The desk was similarly filled with papers of all kinds, and behind it sat a figure who felt minuscule in comparison to the desk. Rudy’s eyes scanned the board before he would open his mouth; he was quite simply fascinated by her dedication and her attention to detail. Everything had its own place; there was a method to the chaos that even he could see through after his observation.

After the board, he let his gaze drop to the woman in front of the desk. As usual, her head was hanging low, her shoulder-length brown hair dropping in front of her face in a few strands as she focused on a paper that she was holding. Dark circles were deeply embedded under her eyes, and an almost melancholic expression was sitting on her face. If he did not know her, he would have assumed that something was deeply troubling her, but by now, he knew that this was just her default expression. He understood why, however. She was sleepless, restless, and troubled by previous events, things that, even after the years, would still come back to haunt her and give her pain. He and Alejandro would always hope that one day they could see her be happy for longer than just a second, but that time has yet to come.

“Good morning, Rudy.” Her voice sounded a bit more tired than usual as she finally spoke up, but the faint smile curving just barely on the edge of her lips made it known that she was feeling just fine. “It’s two in the afternoon, Romana”, Rudy chuckled as he put the laptop down in front of her and then got comfortable in her rocking chair. “No wonder she wanted this here; it’s oddly relaxing”, he thought to himself as he gently started rocking back and forth. It made him feel like a grandpa, but if this is what it felt like to be an elderly person, he was looking forward to retiring. “Morning for me”, She mumbled under her breath, her accent just as thick as the day they found her. She has been living in Las Almas for many years now, and yet, her eastern European accent barely got softer. Rudy and Alejandro would always joke about it, saying that her mood was easy to read from it, as it would become stronger or weaker depending on how she was feeling. They were not wrong. “What’s this?” She asked with curiosity, her eyes reflecting the light of the monitor as she opened the laptop and quickly scrolled through everything that was on it. “Alejandro told me to give it to you. Intel on Hassan’s possible location, but we need you to scout the place out for us. In person.” Rudy replied, letting his eyes close just for a moment as he was trying to catch a few minutes of rest. He was up way too early and had been running around getting things done; his body yearned for this momentary rest. He knew that she would not mind it either; that chair was mainly used by the people who were visiting her office anyway. He always wondered why she wanted it there so badly, but after taking many trips, he realised that it was her way of giving people comfort in a place that undoubtedly felt creepy for most people. Whenever someone came here, they would immediately gravitate towards the chair just to try it out and then end up staying in for long periods of time. Romana only hummed as a response, her eyes drinking in all the information that was displayed right on the screen. Many minutes had passed before she would speak up again. “How is your head, by the way?” She asked, a hint of worry in her voice as she took her eye off the screen to look at Rudy. She could still see the bump on his forehead, but the stitches were hidden well by his hair. The medic of the special forces was one talented bastard who would always try his best to stew the soldiers together in a way that would leave as less scarring as possible. He should have been a plastic surgeon, not a combat medic. He would have made a lot more money, too, in that carrier path.

“It’s fine.” He smiled, letting one of his eyes open ajar. “You are still worried about me?” “Well, you are going out there to try and get him, no?” Rudy could not help but notice how she dodged answering his question but decided not to pry at it. He knew that he would not get an actual answer from her regarding her feelings. “No. I plan on just driving them.” He muttered. “Unless Alejandro asks me, I doubt this will change.” “It’s too personal, isn’t it?” She raised an eyebrow. “He almost killed you.” “He tried.” Rudy chuckled. “If not for Alejandro, I’d be a pile of ash.” “That would be unfortunate. Who’s amazing cookies would I steal then?” She let out a faint laugh, thinking about all the fantastic bakery items that Rudy made on the regular. She was addicted to them and simply could not get enough. Rudy has gotten into the habit of making one extra batch just for her, just so that she would stop asking for more. A fatal mistake cause now she had an entire batch for herself, and she would still be able to yoink one or two pieces out of the collective cookie bin, as they called it. “My recipe book is at the bottom of my bookshelf if you are wondering” Rudy stretched, slowly forcing himself to get out of the chair’s comfort, despite his brain yearning for its softness. “Thank you for the valuable intel,” Romana replied, her eyes resting on her friend’s face, scanning for any signs of pain as he moved. “I should get going myself. Based on what Laswell wrote, her soldiers should arrive at eight a.m., which means you would arrive at the house by ten. I have a lot of ground to cover until then and mountains to climb.”

She rose up from her chair slowly, stretching her arms above her head and leaning backwards, letting her bones crack in the process, and let out a satisfied sigh. She opened one of her drawers to take out one of the several throwaway phones she had. “Will you be staying there until we arrive?” Rudy asked, despite knowing the answer already. She would always linger around after collecting intel; she was a marksman for a reason. That was her method. She would scout, even sabotage if needed, and once that was done, she would take overwatch and would help the soldiers from a distance. “Naturally. Someone has to make sure our boys don’t get their heads popped off by enemy snipers.” She chuckled, putting the phone in her pocket. “I have to dress up for the occasion, though. Gotta look pretty for the outsiders if you know what I mean.” In all honestly, Rudy had no idea what she meant, so he just nodded with a smile on his face. He would find out what she meant later, anyway.

Rudy opened the door, letting her walk out first, like a true gentleman, before following her. Romana fiddled around with the keys a bit, cursing under her breath as it took her an embarrassingly long time to find the correct key to lock her door. When she was done, Rudy let her lead the way. It had been a while since he had seen her out on the field; a part of him worried for her, but he knew that he was a ferocious woman once she was on a mission and that she would manage this with no issues. They walked towards the Armory in silence, just enjoying each other’s company without any words necessary, just like with Alejandro previously. Eventually, when they needed to split up, they hugged each other and walked towards their destination. They both had a long night ahead of them.

[stopmyhearts]

So I listened to gallifrey 2.1 Lies for the first time today/yesterday and thought some of you might appreciate my live notes

Brax is so funny

Romana I !!!

Wait baby Romana I? Or academy romana anyway

everybody hates the academy 😂

Brax has amazing banter

Failing her exams on purpose awww she’s just like me (ignore what that says about my mental state)

Theme tune !!! So fun

Not xenophobic my ass

[…]Plotting and scheming. Aren’t you? Of course amazing quote

She is my president he’s so loyal but also hateful

Loving the banter between Narvin and Darkel

Wow this got intense

Do I not hold the rod of Rassilon? etc. 😆

I love Romana, she’s so passionate and abusing her power constantly

These timeline things are so weirdly fascinating

They call me president know-it-all and not just in the academy Romana I love you

No friends for Romana?? 🥺

Also I don’t like Andred, he’s so mean, Leela is better off without him

I love how ruthless Romana is, she’s such a bad person

I control your future that’s hot

Oh he still loves Leela

K9 using Leela’s terms is so cute

Are you happy K9? 🥺

Oh Leela

She’s so sad

The disdain in her voice when she says Narvin

I adore her instincts, she’s got such a specific type of intelligence

Andred and Darkel are both being so manipulative

Romana called him Brax!

our scheme 😂

Also she’s just using her power as she sees fit he’s totally right, but he’s also kind of power-hungry

Stop being so wretched and obsequitous about it I adore how she says that

Also I love her

Apparently I don’t have a sense of humor just like me for real

What’s up with that icemaiden phrase? Brax’s reaction is very weird

You are appreciated! that’s cute

I’m not allowed friends no Romana bad don’t say that

I have learned that Romana will think this a good plan she’s so cute

Romana’s rant on the use of literally is also so cute

K9 is wonderful

Her relief at Leela showing up

Romana is not very nice to Leela

the storage methods 😂

What the fuck do these spirits want

Interesting lore

And parallels so many parallels

This unit does not have feelings, Mistress. That is untrue, K9 aww

If we could move on from the emotional support group session 😆

I really don’t like Andred

Brax and Narvin are so fun

Leela is really so loyal, I love that

K9 is her friend awww

Leela and Romana I have such banter

Romana murdering Romana? I mean the regeneration out of nowhere was certainly something, I’ve been wondering about that

Ooohhh what’s happening now in the political intrigue

She’s far sharper than you think and even sharper than Romana II thinks in my opinion

Oh they’re working together that’s cool

yes, why did you kill yourself Romana

the more I learn about Brax the more grateful I’ve become he’s on my side. our side so am I he’s such an interesting character but keeps it so close so you don’t know much about him

Oh Narvin not sleeping is important? I thought it just contributed to his characterisation as stressed and overworked

Brax reluctantly saving Narvin 😂

Okay I like the way Narvin’s loyalty works

Ooohhh no one ever tells me anything exciting! I love Leela 🥺

No wonder Romana keeps trying to kill herself

K9 remind me to listen to you when you interrupt me the dialogue is just excellent

Interesting plot

Leela soft! I just adore when her voice goes soft with grief 🥹

I could feel the deceit in the air

You are learning Romana appreciate Leela more please and thank you

Why did you shoot Narvin? Not that I’m complaining😆

Romana and Brax friendship only beat by Romana and Leela friendship