#i like being canon compliant very much so that's why i had to rework so much of the fic before i could share it on my page back in january

[active-mind-15]

Just spent several minutes agonizing over the timeline of Accidental Siblings and tweaked parts of my fic yet again to match the canonical timeline better

[oivsyo]

hello oivsyo-san. I know who you ship Hinata with, Neji, ko. but I'm wondering, who do you ship the other hyugas with? such as Hanabi, Hiashi, Natsu, and other beautiful members of the Hyuga clan?.

Good luck, oivsyo-san! I love you and your creativity! ❤️

Hi! 

Thank you very much for your question and I'm glad to know that you like my arts!

Well,  I haven't shared any thoughts on this topic yet, so I will briefly share my headcanons regarding other Hyugas. 

But before we start there is a remark: In all fandoms I almost always have an OTP and these characters are like a default ‘married’ couple for me. Even if I assume they could have crushes or even sexual relationships before getting together (exes), I’ll never draw them in any other ships. NejiHina is my OTP in Narutoverse. This means that they are my all-time-endgame in any AU I come up with.

I have a “main Hyūga AU” - this is a canon compliant + canon divergent AU where some aspects are reworked or some more details are added. In this AU I have one endgame couple for each character. 

For some characters I have other ships outside this AU, bc I have a simpler attitude towards other ships and evaluate them from the point of view of "what suits the story better, which ship will develop the characters better, what will be more profitable and more interesting for the story".

For example, I'm ok with KōNatsu in some AUs (yeah, I use a screenshot here to draw a line between Kou from the canon and Kou from my AU, bc technically my Kou is a semi-OC)

Although in my main AU Kō is gay and has a Hyūga boyfriend (and I can’t express how much I love this ship, I love them as much as I love NejiHina probably ТзТ). 

I also like KōHina for AUs where Neji dies (tho I don't like AUs where Neji is dead T.T). I like this ship, this is my #2 top ships for Hinata and even flirt with it in my main AU, bc I know for sure that Kō will never offend or hurt Hinata, he will be a true friend and a devoted consort, together with whom Hinata will become the head of the clan or the right hand of the head of the clan, if Hanabi remains the heiress.

In my main AU Neji was in a teammates-with-benefits relationship with TenTen before they both grew out of it and found another better partners for each other, who they fell in love with.

Same for Hinata - her crush on Naruto was an important phase of her development and I see no sense in ignoring her feelings, but it remained only as a crush and I want to see her growing out of it and letting Naruto go in my main AU.

Generally speaking, in my main AU, a Hyūga only makes couple with a Hyūga. I don't want to go into why this is and how it works. 

The only exception is Tokuma. I have a headcanon that he is married to a woman from the main branch and they even have children, but he has not lived with his family since the day of the wedding, because he is in a relationship with Anko. They have a complicated toxic-manipulative relationship, mostly due to Anko not being mentally stable after being with Orochimaru. She and Tokuma attended the Academy together before Anko became Orochimaru's test subject. When she returned, Tokuma began to show signs of affection to her and they got together. Despite the fact that their relationship is by no means healthy, Tokuma cannot let her go, therefore he will try to help her cope with the madness and protect her to the last.

Hiashi was married to a woman from the clan - the mother of Hinata and Hanabi is also a Hyūga with a Byakugan. Hiashi took the death of his wife very hard, bc he sincerely loved her.

I also have a headcanon according to which in the Hyūga clan it is forbidden to marry and have children with a new partner if the first spouse died and the couple had children.It is not forbidden to enter into sexual relations tho. Hiashi was never interested in sex, he was always rather unliberated, but after the death of his brother and wife, he died inside and began to lead a very secluded life and completely devoted himself to the work and the clan's business. I hc that he occasionally meets with some widow from the clan. Probably the woman herself was the initiator of this, so they could share lonely nights. It's not about falling in love. I am convinced that Hiashi is a man who is too devoted to the one he loved to fall in love again.

Hanabi. In my AU, in the future, she will also marry someone from the clan. But for any other AU, I like KonoHana, ShinoHana or even ShinoHanaKono and I blame Boruto for this XD

This girl can get them both, I tell you! xD

In my AU, Natsu is married to OC Hyūga, they probably either already have children or will have them after the war. Initially, I wanted Natsu to have a crush on Kō, but later decided against it, since in my main AU Natsu is much older than Kō and it is unlikely that they interact a lot and it would have affected Natsu's character the way I didn't like.

Hizashi was also married to a woman from the side branch - Neji's mother. Before marrying Neji's mother, Hizashi had a lover from the main branch, but she was assassinated bc of her eyes.

There maybe other ships that I didn't mention, but it means they are less significant or are less based.

[deadhumourist]

I posted 1,186 times in 2022

That's 892 more posts than 2021!

82 posts created (7%)

1,104 posts reblogged (93%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@oonajaeadira

@sirowsky

@just-here-for-the-moment

@katareyoudrilling

@quica-quica-quica

I tagged 1,055 of my posts in 2022

Only 11% of my posts had no tags

#comment reblog - 109 posts

#pedro pascal fanfiction - 96 posts

#pedro pascal - 78 posts

#dieter bravo - 65 posts

#frankie morales x reader - 49 posts

#din djarin x reader - 46 posts

#din djarin - 46 posts

#frankie morales x f!reader - 42 posts

#pedro pascal fics - 40 posts

#dieter bravo x reader - 35 posts

Longest Tag: 110 characters

#also for some reason her looking down and seeing the closeness of their shoes waa weirdly intimate and how idk

My Top Posts in 2022:

#5

Mistletoe and Beskar

Pairing: Modern!Din Djarin x F!Reader. Mechanic AU.

Rating: M for the series, minors shoo. 

Warnings: Female reader, use of “she” pronoun. Reader has no physical description, but general mention of “curves.” We're here for a good time, not a canon-compliant time - watch me take massive liberties with Mandalorian lore. Well-worn and loved tropes ahoy.  Helmet off.

A/N: This was a Christmas drabble I reworked into a proper story. A big thank you to my darling @just-here-for-the-moment for reading it over and shouting at me. 

Author Masterlist --

Din sat in the waiting room of the specialist auto repair shop, mindlessly scrolling his phone. Every article was Christmas this, Christmas that. If it hadn’t been for the kid, he would have just stayed at home and never paid attention to any of it. A little smile crept up his face at the thought of his son, who was visiting Aunt Peli for a few days before Christmas.

A few minutes into his scrolling, Greef Karga's face popped up on his screen, a FaceTime call ringing loudly in the quiet room. His heart sank as he realised that he knew what this was about.

He swiped and instantly the screen animated. “Mando! You’re a difficult man to track down.”

Din winced. He had not-so-subtly been avoiding this phone call, but he had to get it out of the way one way or another.

“I keep busy with the kid and catching up with other things.”

Greef chuckled. His booming voice seemed much louder than it needed to be in the quiet of the workshop.

“You haven’t RSVP’d to my invitation, my friend. You skipped last year’s function, I hope it’s not what you’re planning to do again.”

“You know why I skipped last year, Karga.”

There was a long beat before he spoke again.

“Is she going to be there?”

“Of course she is, she’s an old friend. If I had to uninvite every person who bats their eyelashes at a Mandalorian, my guest list would be empty."

Laughter thundered through the phone, Greef very amused with himself.

Din sighed.

“Alright. Let's get it over with. But I’m not staying late at the Christmas ball. Not my scene.”

“None of this is your scene, which is the point, my friend. I await your arrival with optimism.” And with that the call ended.

Din stared morosely into the middle distance. He needed to get out of this somehow. 

He trundled into the workshop to see how far you were with the Razor Crest. He only trusted one person with his gunmetal grey Jaguar E-type and she was currently on her back underneath its chassis. 

Your denim-clad legs stuck out underneath the car and as he stared at the shoelaces on your trainers, a thought subtly drifted into his mind like the snow outside. If he had someone there she would leave him alone. Even if it only discouraged her from sticking around too long, it would be worth it. 

You were…nice. You talked to him sometimes. Despite only seeing you when the Crest was in need of some attention, he liked being around you. 

There was a quiet, unassuming comfort about you that didn't require effort on his part. You didn’t fawn over him or expect anything of him, you were just you. Unbothered with his title, reputation or what you thought you knew about him.  

He leaned against the front fender, crossing his arms across his broad frame. 

You heard the warm baritone, revealing little emotion as usual, bouncing off the cold concrete. 

“How long?”

The mechanics creeper shot out from under the car and your face came into view, a firm scowl in place. Clever hands with grime stuck in the cuticles came up to cup the air, and an uneven oil dab was streaked across your cheek, making you look grubbier than usual. 

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119 notes - Posted August 2, 2022

#4

Rescue

Summary: Oberyn brings back what belongs to him. Little comfort ficlet.

Pairing: Oberyn Martell X GN!Reader

Warnings: Mention of violence and discomfort, use of "little one" as nickname, no pronouns used, no physical description of reader.

A/N: This is a little dip into writing a new character so it won't be perfect. Oberyn is almost always associated with seggsy times so I thought it could be interesting to put him in a protector role. Microficlet - around 650 words . Thank you @just-here-for-the-moment for the read.

Masterlist

-----

You wake up. The ground is hard and compacted and it takes time to get upright, your elbows digging without much give into the soil below. A chill has sunk deep into your flesh, many hours of exposure making you icy to the touch. 

Grey light floods straight down like a dull halo on a dirty, fallen deity. It burns your newly opened eyes anyway. Vision suddenly swimming again, you lie back down and get folded into the darkness.

Until a warm hand grips your wrist and you feel your body lift.

When you wake up again, the first sensation that drags through the thick cloud of your mind is softness. Warm, brushed fleece against your skin and the comforting weight of arms wrapped firmly around you. You’re securely nestled against a broad chest when your eyes flicker open, the muted yellow silk almost covering your field of vision. Worry makes the brown eyes looking down at you inky.

He sees you draw breath to speak and he reaches down and gently cups your cheek.

“Quiet, little one. You are safe.”

And then, looking up, the words seething from his lips like smoke as he focuses on the middle distance.

“They can never hurt you again.”

You’re too tired to ask, but your eyebrows lift to him.

He looks down at you like he’s considering staying silent.

“A poison-laced dagger has pierced each hand that was laid upon you. Nailed to the trees they will wait for death - I am not merciful to those who take from me.”

You shudder in his arms. His eyes soften as they meet yours again.

“I wish you were not a witness to the cruelty of this world, my love.”

He presses you closer to him, feeling a sense of peace for the first time in the week since you disappeared.

"We are a day away from Dorne, and I will make sure that pleasure and comfort wipes away every trace of fear once we are back. That is a promise."

You drift away to the feeling of the slow rise and fall of Oberyn's chest under your cheek. You're safe.

163 notes - Posted December 4, 2022

#3

Real Sugar

A/N: So this one has been stewing for a while. It's completely self-indulgent and built around things I love irl. A huge thank you to @just-here-for-the-moment who kindly read a first draft of this - without her encouragement I probably wouldn't have worked on it again. Not beta'd mistakes are mine.

Rating: M - brief mention of smut in this but will get much spicier in subsequent parts.

Characters: Frankie Morales x f!reader - Chef AU

Warnings (let me know if I missed any): In-depth descriptions of food, cooking and feeding. Cursing, some flirting, R-rated things. Mention of receiving a noogie and reader not wanting their hair messed up.

You smoothed your Henley down and peered out of your kitchen window. It really was a perfect day to make something different. Not a cloud in sight, and sunlight was streaming in the large bay windows, bathing the counter in a soft glow.

Even though you were excited to get started, you carefully placed all your utensils out one by one, a ritual you learnt in culinary school that just became habit. Only once you had your own kitchen, your items became a little less..utilitarian. Your pastel green mixing bowl and measuring spoons stood to the side, and you ticked off the necessary items in a neat little mise en place.

You reveled in the quiet moments before you started a new dish. Taking a deep breath. It was a quiet moment with a blank canvas before it exploded in colour, and this anticipation before letting go was cathartic in a way.

You were not an expert baker, preferring to spend your time on the savoury side of the spectrum. Now that you had everything set up, you were missing one more thing.

Ah, yes.

You reached over and turned up your stereo. When you were used to the chaos and cacophony of a professional kitchen the quiet was disquieting in its own way. With this in the background, you could avoid thinking and just focus on what was in front of you.

I know you wanted me to stay

But I can't ignore the crazy visions of me in LA

And I heard that there's a special place

Where boys and girls can all be queens every single day

I'm having wicked dreams

Of leaving Tennessee

Oh, Santa Monica

I swear it's calling me

As you got into the song and your stand mixer whirred to life, you spun in the kitchen, holding the wooden spoon up like a mic, singing along loudly and tunelessly.

I'm gonna keep on dancing at the

Pink Pony Club

I'm gonna keep on dancing down in

West Hollywood

For a brief second you considered whether to take your pants off and attempt a slide into the kitchen like Tom Cruise in Risky Business. You decided against it as you heard the oven ding.

It pulled you back into your kitchen and the deliciously sweet mixture waiting to be baked.

You were excited as the cake came together bit by bit. Your best friend Hannah was celebrating her birthday so you were heading over to her house later. She was hosting what sounded like the party of the century and you volunteered to bring something sweet. You slipped the cake into the oven and turned back to the counter. Eyeing the box in the corner, you couldn’t help but feel a little smug.

A Captain Crunch cake for your friend’s 30th was going to be a hit.

At 5pm you knocked.

“Baby Cakes! You missed the unicorn tequila shot round! ” Hannah squealed as she opened the door further and grabbed your arm to reel you in.

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169 notes - Posted February 27, 2022

#2

Bravo Juliett

A/N: Since the trailer for The Bubble dropped, we've been reduced to thirsty (gender-neutral) bitches, and there are some good fics out. Dfinitely check out Please by @ezrasbirdie , Extra Whipped Cream by @pettyprocrastination and Stay by @honestly-shite. And like clowns we're all using the same fucking gifs because this character ain't even on screen yet. All three fics are brilliant, please go read and shout at them about how good it is.

This fic definitely borders on a crack fic, he’s not a fully rounded character and the action is smutty and with tongue very firmly in cheek. And other places. It’s satire if you squint. I am both amused and deeply ashamed. If I’m going to horny jail, I’m taking you with me. Not beta’d, mistakes mine.

Rating: 18+, no minors

Pairing: Dieter Bravo x F!Reader (fuck, I know ok. I KNOW)

If you want more ficlets in this universe please come shout at me. This was so much fun to write.

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You're one person in a long line of interviewers. They're ushering you into the hotel like cattle, but honestly, you would gladly queue for days to meet him. You spent way too many hours engrossed in Dieter's work, rewatching scenes. You can quote most of his iconic lines. You didn't even have to do research prior to this interview. Dieter. Mentally you’re on a first name basis with him. You have lost yourself in his work, and you want him to know that.

The hotel lounge is a large, airy space, the Rococo decor offering glints of gold as it catches the morning sunlight. Most interviewers are sprawled across couches and chairs, with one pacing nervously and reviewing his notes, repeating it back to himself.

You know your shit, so you opt to spend your time doom-scrolling through Tumblr looking for Dieter fics. Commented on two; reblogged one that was particularly hot. What you wouldn’t give for him to go down on you like that, worship your body for hours and call you his sweet girl.

It feels like the day is dragging interminably, when a PR assistant beckons you. You have 10 minutes.

By this time the sun is dipping low on the horizon and it’s many many hours into his media schedule.

You make your way to the veranda and as you sit down, you can see the day wearing on him. Even though he’s incredibly handsome, he looks every inch the middle aged, harried acting veteran tolerating yet another interview by some clueless twit asking irrelevant questions.

He looks bored. Irritated. His eyes screaming “A moment of respite please.” as you smile at him in greeting.

"So Dieter, tell me a bit about your character in Cliff Beasts 6"

He rubs his neck and sighs deeply, mustering the energy from somewhere to give a terribly rote description of the character.

You listen intently, waiting for the right time to drop your bombshell.

"You have an unrivaled command of physicality, seen in so few actors. You manage to convey the entire character's personality without a single line of dialogue, like in Death Games. Will we see more of that in this movie?"

Dieter sits up, attention suddenly focused on you. You can see that you’ve surprised him, and you're silently reveling in that he might start to enjoy this interview. He rolls his tongue in his cheek, like he's contemplating something.

“You did your research.”

His full eyebrows quirk upwards, almost as if impressed.

“ With Death Games, the director, Joel, trusted me to go beyond the page and really create Jackson from the ground up and make him real. This….”

He breaks your gaze to look over the horizon, a hint of a smirk playing on his lips.

…is not that kind of movie."

The PR assistant on the side motions for you to wrap it up, your slot is almost done. As you thank him for his time, he leans over and whispers in his assistant's ear, winking at you. You can't make out what he's saying but you feel a blush creeping up your neck at the brazen gesture. He’s doing this in front of everyone.

You shake his hand. A warm, large palm that almost completely envelops yours. He has a firm grip and for a split second you imagine it wrapped around your throat, as he caresses you with just enough pressure to make your pussy clench and your breath hitch.

As you walk out of the room, his assistant pulls you to the side by your arm."Mr Bravo wants you to wait in the lounge area."

You swallow nervously at the strange request."Uhm, okay…how long?"

"Until he's done with interviews"

You nod slowly, not sure if you understand, but make your way to the plush lounge at the centre of the hotel.

See the full post

188 notes - Posted March 5, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Emptiness

Summary: Soft Dom Dave spends a little time with you.

Pairing: Dave York X f!reader

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Dom/sub dynamics, established relationship, Soft!Dom, Sub reader, Smacking, PiV sex, anal toys, no physical description of reader.

A/N: This was a 250-word ficlet that ran away with me. Beta by the lovely @just-here-for-the-moment

Author Masterlist

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Dave’s voice lowers to barely a whisper, and he slowly strolls towards the desk, shoulders squared like a predator whose prey has given up the chase. 

He trails a cold hand along the inside of your thigh, raising goosebumps in its wake. Long, clever fingers tap the heel of the anal plug and you jump from the sudden touch. The blindfold digs into the corner of your eyes as you wince. 

“This stays in, hmm. You’re going to be my good girl.”

A sharp thrill chases down your spine, straight and tense on the desk. Waiting. You feel those same fingers close to your pulsing heat. 

Then his flat palm thwacks down on your pussy, a sharp twinge of pleasure pulls a whimper from you. The obscene, wet slap sounds loud in the quiet of the room and you hear the smile in Dave’s gravelly voice.

“Can’t wait, can you? So needy.” 

The last syllable is punctuated with another sharp slap, followed by a soft, luxurious rub of his open palm on your heated sex. You feel your folds glide against his large hand, and you squirm at the temperature difference and obscenity of it as his hand leaves again.

Minutes tick by.

Loudly.

Slowly. 

His large, blunt cock head slides from your clit down to your entrance and up again, the slow drag of the hot flesh against yours delicious but not enough. He does it again. You feel him twitch against you.

“Does my good girl need me to empty her head?” 

You nod into the darkness. Agreement and submission bob your head of their own accord. 

The next moment, Dave sinks into you in one smooth thrust, his large hands curled around your hips to make sure he fills you completely. Without warning, your pussy convulses around him, the sudden thrust and the plug lighting your nerve endings like fire. He wraps your legs around him, enveloping himself into you.

You cry out helplessly. Dave reaches forward and gently cradles the back of your neck in his hand as he thrusts, working you through your first orgasm. As it subsides, he starts thrusting in earnest, the hand that was on your hip migrating to your clit. 

He always knows how to work you just right. 

In the dark behind your eyelids you thrash as the sensation starts becoming overwhelming. 

“Let me have it. I want it.” he commands. 

The hand that gently held your neck slides to the front and his fingers close around your throat. Gentle pressure makes your head swim pleasantly. 

Your breath stutters. Your mind is empty and the only thing you know in the darkness is Dave’s cock driving into over and over and over. 

When he knows you’re close, he leans down and presses a soft kiss to your sternum.

“Give it to me, my good girl.” 

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228 notes - Posted November 30, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

[bao3bei4]

fan language: the victorian imaginary and cnovel fandom

there’s this pinterest image i’ve seen circulating a lot in the past year i’ve been on fandom social media. it’s a drawn infographic of a, i guess, asian-looking woman holding a fan in different places relative to her face to show what the graphic helpfully calls “the language of the fan.”

people like sharing it. they like thinking about what nefarious ancient chinese hanky code shenanigans their favorite fan-toting character might get up to⁠—accidentally or on purpose. and what’s the problem with that?

the problem is that fan language isn’t chinese. it’s victorian. and even then, it’s not really quite victorian at all. 

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fans served a primarily utilitarian purpose throughout chinese history. of course, most of the surviving fans we see⁠—and the types of fans we tend to care about⁠—are closer to art pieces. but realistically speaking, the majority of fans were made of cheaper material for more mundane purposes. in china, just like all around the world, people fanned themselves. it got hot!

so here’s a big tipoff. it would be very difficult to use a fan if you had an elaborate language centered around fanning yourself.

you might argue that fine, everyday working people didn’t have a fan language. but wealthy people might have had one. the problem we encounter here is that fans weren’t really gendered. (caveat here that certain types of fans were more popular with women. however, those tended to be the round silk fans, ones that bear no resemblance to the folding fans in the graphic). no disrespect to the gnc old man fuckers in the crowd, but this language isn’t quite masc enough for a tool that someone’s dad might regularly use.

folding fans, we know, reached europe in the 17th century and gained immense popularity in the 18th. it was there that fans began to take on a gendered quality. ariel beaujot describes in their 2012 victorian fashion accessories how middle class women, in the midst of a top shortage, found themselves clutching fans in hopes of securing a husband.

she quotes an article from the illustrated london news, suggesting “women ‘not only’ used fans to ‘move the air and cool themselves but also to express their sentiments.’” general wisdom was that the movement of the fan was sufficiently expressive that it augmented a woman’s displays of emotion. and of course, the more english audiences became aware that it might do so, the more they might use their fans purposefully in that way.

notice, however, that this is no more codified than body language in general is. it turns out that “the language of the fan” was actually created by fan manufacturers at the turn of the 20th century⁠—hundreds of years after their arrival⁠ in europe—to sell more fans. i’m not even kidding right now. the story goes that it was louis duvelleroy of the maison duvelleroy who decided to include pamphlets on the language with each fan sold.

interestingly enough, beaujot suggests that it didn’t really matter what each particular fan sign meant. gentlemen could tell when they were being flirted with. as it happens, meaningful eye contact and a light flutter near the face may be a lingua franca.

so it seems then, the language of the fan is merely part of this victorian imaginary we collectively have today, which in turn itself was itself captivated by china.

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victorian references come up perhaps unexpectedly often in cnovel fandom, most often with regards to modesty.

it’s a bit of an awkward reference considering that chinese traditional fashion⁠—and the ambiguous time periods in which these novels are set⁠—far predate victorian england. it is even more awkward considering that victoria and her covered ankles did um. imperialize china.

but nonetheless, it is common. and to make a point about how ubiquitous it is, here is a link to the twitter search for “sqq victorian.” sqq is the fandom abbreviation for shen qingqiu, the main character of the scum villain’s self-saving system, by the way.

this is an awful lot of results for a search involving a chinese man who spends the entire novel in either real modern-day china or fantasy ancient china. that’s all i’m going to say on the matter, without referencing any specific tweet.

i think people are aware of the anachronism. and i think they don’t mind. even the most cursory research reveals that fan language is european and a revisionist fantasy. wikipedia can tell us this⁠—i checked!

but it doesn’t matter to me whether people are trying to make an internally consistent canon compliant claim, or whether they’re just free associating between fan facts they know. it is, instead, more interesting to me that people consistently refer to this particular bit of history. and that’s what i want to talk about today⁠—the relationship of fandom today to this two hundred odd year span of time in england (roughly stuart to victorian times) and england in that time period to its contemporaneous china.

things will slip a little here. victorian has expanded in timeframe, if only because random guys posting online do not care overly much for respect for the intricacies of british history. china has expanded in geographic location, if only because the english of the time themselves conflated china with all of asia.

in addition, note that i am critiquing a certain perspective on the topic. this is why i write about fan as white here⁠—not because all fans are white⁠—but because the tendencies i’m examining have a clear historical antecedent in whiteness that shapes how white fans encounter these novels.

i’m sure some fans of color participate in these practices. however i don’t really care about that. they are not its main perpetrators nor its main beneficiaries. so personally i am minding my own business on that front.

it’s instead important to me to illuminate the linkage between white as subject and chinese as object in history and in the present that i do argue that fannish products today are built upon.

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it’s not radical, or even new at all, for white audiences to consume⁠—or create their own versions of⁠—chinese art en masse. in many ways the white creators who appear to owe their whole style and aesthetic to their asian peers in turn are just the new chinoiserie.

this is not to say that white people can’t create asian-inspired art. but rather, i am asking you to sit with the discomfort that you may not like the artistic company you keep in the broader view of history, and to consider together what is to be done about that.

now, when i say the new chinoiserie, i first want to establish what the original one is. chinoiserie was a european artistic movement that appeared coincident with the rise in popularity of folding fans that i described above. this is not by coincidence; the european demand for asian imports and the eventual production of lookalikes is the movement itself. so: when we talk about fans, when we talk about china (porcelain), when we talk about tea in england⁠—we are talking about the legacy of chinoiserie.

there are a couple things i want to note here. while english people as a whole had a very tenuous knowledge of what china might be, their appetites for chinoiserie were roughly coincident with national relations with china. as the relationship between england and china moved from trade to out-and-out wars, chinoiserie declined in popularity until china had been safely subjugated once more by the end of the 19th century.

the second thing i want to note on the subject that contrary to what one might think at first, the appeal of chinoiserie was not that it was foreign. eugenia zuroski’s 2013 taste for china examines 18th century english literature and its descriptions of the according material culture with the lens that chinese imports might be formative to english identity, rather than antithetical to it.

beyond that bare thesis, i think it’s also worthwhile to extend her insight that material objects become animated by the literary viewpoints on them. this is true, both in a limited general sense as well as in the sense that english thinkers of the time self-consciously articulated this viewpoint. consider the quote from the illustrated london news above⁠—your fan, that object, says something about you. and not only that, but the objects you surround yourself with ought to.

it’s a bit circular, the idea that written material says that you should allow written material to shape your understanding of physical objects. but it’s both 1) what happened, and 2) integral, i think, to integrating a fannish perspective into the topic.

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japanning is the name for the popular imitative lacquering that english craftspeople developed in domestic response to the demand for lacquerware imports. in the eighteenth century, japanning became an artform especially suited for young women. manuals were published on the subject, urging young women to learn how to paint furniture and other surfaces, encouraging them to rework the designs provided in the text.

it was considered a beneficial activity for them; zuroski describes how it was “associated with commerce and connoisseurship, practical skill and aesthetic judgment.” a skillful japanner, rather than simply obscuring what lay underneath the lacquer, displayed their superior judgment in how they chose to arrange these new canonical figures and effects in a tasteful way to bring out the best qualities of them.

zuroski quotes the first english-language manual on the subject, written in 1688, which explains how japanning allows one to:

alter and correct, take out a piece from one, add a fragment to the next, and make an entire garment compleat in all its parts, though tis wrought out of never so many disagreeing patterns.

this language evokes a very different, very modern practice. it is this english reworking of an asian artform that i think the parallels are most obvious.

white people, through their artistic investment in chinese material objects and aesthetics, integrated them into their own subjectivity. these practices came to say something about the people who participated in them, in a way that had little to do with the country itself. their relationship changed from being a “consumer” of chinese objects to becoming the proprietor of these new aesthetic signifiers.

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

i want to talk about this through a few pairs of tensions on the subject that i think characterize common attitudes then and now.

first, consider the relationship between the self and the other: the chinese object as something that is very familiar to you, speaking to something about your own self vs. the chinese object as something that is fundamentally different from you and unknowable to you. 

consider: [insert character name] is just like me. he would no doubt like the same things i like, consume the same cultural products. we are the same in some meaningful way vs. the fast standard fic disclaimer that “i tried my best when writing this fic, but i’m a english-speaking westerner, and i’m just writing this for fun so...... [excuses and alterations the person has chosen to make in this light],” going hand-in-hand with a preoccupation with authenticity or even overreliance on the unpaid labor of chinese friends and acquaintances. 

consider: hugh honour when he quotes a man from the 1640s claiming “chinoiserie of this even more hybrid kind had become so far removed from genuine Chinese tradition that it was exported from India to China as a novelty to the Chinese themselves” 

these tensions coexist, and look how they have been resolved.

second, consider what we vest in objects themselves: beaujot explains how the fan became a sexualized, coquettish object in the hands of a british woman, but was used to great effect in gilbert and sullivan’s 1885 mikado to demonstrate the docility of asian women. 

consider: these characters became expressions of your sexual desires and fetishes, even as their 5’10 actors themselves are emasculated.

what is liberating for one necessitates the subjugation and fetishization of the other. 

third, consider reactions to the practice: enjoyment of chinese objects as a sign of your cosmopolitan palate vs “so what’s the hype about those ancient chinese gays” pop culture explainers that addressed the unconvinced mainstream.

consider: zuroski describes how both english consumers purchased china in droves, and contemporary publications reported on them. how: 

It was in the pages of these papers that the growing popularity of Chinese things in the early eighteenth century acquired the reputation of a “craze”; they portrayed china fanatics as flawed, fragile, and unreliable characters, and frequently cast chinoiserie itself in the same light.

referenda on fannish behavior serve as referenda on the objects of their devotion, and vice versa. as the difference between identity and fetish collapses, they come to be treated as one and the same by not just participants but their observers. 

at what point does mxtx fic cease to be chinese? 

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

finally, it seems readily apparent that attitudes towards chinese objects may in fact have something to do with attitudes about china as a country. i do not want to suggest that these literary concerns are primarily motivated and begot by forces entirely divorced from the real mechanics of power. 

here, i want to bring in edward said, and his 1993 culture and imperialism. there, he explains how power and legitimacy go hand in hand. one is direct, and one is purely cultural. he originally wrote this in response to the outsize impact that british novelists have had in the maintenance of empire and throughout decolonization. literature, he argues, gives rise to powerful narratives that constrain our ability to think outside of them.

there’s a little bit of an inversion at play here. these are chinese novels, actually. but they’re being transformed by white narratives and artists. and just as i think the form of the novel is important to said’s critique, i think there’s something to be said about the form that fic takes and how it legitimates itself.

bound up in fandom is the idea that you have a right to create and transform as you please. it is a nice idea, but it is one that is directed towards a certain kind of asymmetry. that is, one where the author has all the power. this is the narrative we hear a lot in the history of fandom⁠—litigious authors and plucky fans, fanspaces always under attack from corporate sanitization.

meanwhile, said builds upon raymond schwab’s narrative of cultural exchange between european writers and cultural products outside the imperial core. said explains that fundamental to these two great borrowings (from greek classics and, in the so-called “oriental renaissance” of the late 18th, early 19th centuries from “india, china, japan, persia, and islam”) is asymmetry. 

he had argued prior, in orientalism, that any “cultural exchange” between “partners conscious of inequality” always results in the suffering of the people. and here, he describes how “texts by dead people were read, appreciated, and appropriated” without the presence of any actual living people in that tradition. 

i will not understate that there is a certain economic dynamic complicating this particular fannish asymmetry. mxtx has profited materially from the success of her works, most fans will not. also secondly, mxtx is um. not dead. LMAO.

but first, the international dynamic of extraction that said described is still present. i do not want to get overly into white attitudes towards china in this post, because i am already thoroughly derailed, but i do believe that they structure how white cnovel fandom encounters this texts.

at any rate, any profit she receives is overwhelmingly due to her domestic popularity, not her international popularity. (i say this because many of her international fans have never given her a cent. in fact, most of them have no real way to.) and moreover, as we talk about the structure of english-language fandom, what does it mean to create chinese cultural products without chinese people? 

as white people take ownership over their versions of stories, do we lose something? what narratives about engagement with cnovels might exist outside of the form of classic fandom?

i think a lot of people get the relationship between ideas (the superstructure) and production (the base) confused. oftentimes they will lob in response to criticism, that look! this fic, this fandom, these people are so niche, and so underrepresented in mainstream culture, that their effects are marginal. i am not arguing that anyone’s cql fic causes imperialism. (unless you’re really annoying. then it’s anyone’s game) 

i’m instead arguing something a little bit different. i think, given similar inputs, you tend to get similar outputs. i think we live in the world that imperialism built, and we have clear historical predecessors in terms of white appetites for creating, consuming, and transforming chinese objects. 

we have already seen, in the case of the fan language meme that began this post, that sometimes we even prefer this white chinoiserie. after all, isn’t it beautiful, too? 

i want to bring discomfort to this topic. i want to reject the paradigm of white subject and chinese object; in fact, here in this essay, i have tried to reverse it.

if you are taken aback by the comparisons i make here, how can you make meaningful changes to your fannish practice to address it? 

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

some concluding thoughts on the matter, because i don’t like being misunderstood! 

i am not claiming white fans cannot create fanworks of cnovels or be inspired by asian art or artists. this essay is meant to elaborate on the historical connection between victorian england and cnovel characters and fandom that others have already popularized.

i don’t think people who make victorian jokes are inherently bad or racist. i am encouraging people to think about why we might make them and/or share them

the connections here are meant to be more provocative than strictly literal. (e.g. i don’t literally think writing fanfic is a 1-1 descendant of japanning). these connections are instead meant to 1) make visible the baggage that fans of color often approach fandom with and 2) recontextualize and defamiliarize fannish practice for the purposes of honest critique

please don’t turn this post into being about other different kinds of discourse, or into something that only one “kind” of fan does. please take my words at face value and consider them in good faith. i would really appreciate that.

please feel free to ask me to clarify any statements or supply more in-depth sources :) 

[makiruz]

Fixing RWBY, a series I hate, proposed the idea that Ozpin, the headmaster, was Hazel’s brother as a “fix”. That fix is stupid, but against my better judgement I started entertaining the idea of Ozpin and Hazel being brothers and Hazel going to work with Salem and realized it has a lot of drama potential, I ended up getting really into the idea and making a whole AU (here and here, should make a tag for it)

But I love my AU so much that I have rework into a canon-compliant headcanon:

So basically one Oz in the past had a sibling, and they were very close, the sibling was the person Oz loved the most and trusted them implicitly. He trusted them so much that Oz told sibling literally everything about Ozma and Salem, he couldn’t stand keeping secrets from them; but this eventually became a problem.

So here’s the thing, sibling didn’t like the way Oz was changing because of the Merge; and when it was finished, sibling came to the conclusion that their brother had died and the Oz standing before them had killed him and was wearing his skin (yes, I like this trope, shut up).

Now, as mentioned in the other one, Oz still loves and trusts his sibling and continues to tell them everything; sibling is the only person in the know for everything (more than Ozpin’s inner circle in the show) and the only person Oz feels comfortable being himself around, Oz only allows himself to be vulnerable in front of his sibling. But because again, sibling genuinely believe their brother is dead and this is someone else who stole his face, they don’t see Oz’s honesty as genuine, they believe he is manipulating them (like he manipulates everyone else) and makes them hate him even more (”why do you pretend to be my brother? You’re fucking not”)

This eventually comes to a head in a dramatic confrontation between the siblings, which Oz didn’t see coming even though he absolutely should’ve. And sibling almost killed him! They didn’t because they couldn’t kill their brother, but rationalize it as not wanting to damn anyone else to brother’s fate, but that’s just an excuse.

Oz hadn’t trusted anyone like he trusted sibling in centuries or outright millennia, so he’s understandably miserable, he hasn’t felt this betrayed since Salem, that’s how dramatic this is! And to make matters worse is that part of what precipitated this whole thing was Oz’s own trust for his sibling; like I mentioned sibling hates that Oz appears to open up to them because they don’t believe it, but they also hate Oz because of what they know about Salem and Ozma: they literally throw Ozma’s name to Oz’s face, and call out that he gets people to fight even though he knows Salem can’t be killed.

It’s a total shit show you guys. And kinda convinces Oz never to trust anyone again. I mean come on! “Last time I told anyone about Salem the person I loved the most tried to kill me, so let’s not do that”

[antchurch]

Hey can you please rec me your fave avatar fanfics?

i would be Honoured to

this is going to be a heavily zukka themed list as they recently became my top tagged ship on ao3 (im there @ jiminie if u want to see any more of my bookmarks) but i will endeavour to be more inclusive don't u worry !! these are all mostly pg - if there is sex it isn't the focus, mainly cause id feel weird rec’ing smut to a potential minor and also cause i don't need the judgement of my taste in porn but if u do want an 18+ rec lmk  the art of burning - zukka (eventually), canon divergence, ongoing - this might be one of my favourite fics ever, its a hadoka+ the watertribe come across zuko fic and i cannot recommend it enough have done some quality crying 2 this one xo what is living is burning - zukka, canon divergence, complete - BRO the canon divergence on this bad boy? so good - it had such a Mood, the tone is exquisite - - i cant say much without spoilers but trust me it goes Hard blue - zukka, canon divergence, complete - i may as well be recommending the bible here but i mean it when i say this has some of the best zuko character exploration that i’ve ever experienced it deserves all the love it gets!! the spirit stone - zukka, canon divergence, ongoing - zuko imprisoned by the fire nation? very cool ideas going on here, can’t wait to see where it goes!!! what you’re meant for - zukka, post-canon, complete - ambassador sokka saved the world! jk but like this is a really interestingly written fic, i love the epistolary style and its really satisfying to see a political system become unfucked. i wish i could be more articulate cause this fic rlly deserves that but im clow n

more below the cut cause it got long ;)

boy problems - zukka, post-canon, complete - this boy can fit so much angst in him!! this also has some excellent mailee content s/o to my lesbians xoxo swords of fate, pride of heart - zukka, alternate universe complete - zukka zoom uni au! did this fic hit entirely too hard for me as a uni student on zoom? why yes. do i also want to fall in love with a boy over zoom because of swords? also yes say you like your shirt soggy - zukka, alternate universe, complete - this is just good vibes aman falling in love n doing dishes its all we want - excellent hakoda content here !! very good if u desire better parental figures!! Flow Like Fire - canon divergence, ongoing - zuko is an airbender au that slaPs - also our first none zukka one look at me having range! but very very good its so clever in how zuko figures shit out i really enjoy the world building on this one blue's clues - zukka, alternate universe, complete - modern au where the blue spirit is a vigilante - its so fun to read and has sexy spiderman vibes big love 2 this one tell me a story - zukka, post-canon, complete - this will rip ur heart out!! izumi likes being read stories! tw major character death xox goodbye to fathers - canon compliant, complete - hakoda and zuko have a talk and ozai just sucks - good hakoda dad vibes and adults being responsible love it lighthouse beam - zukka, alternate universe, complete - uni au again!! very cute and disabled zuko rep!! love 2 see it  - so much pining my dude when the sun sets, and the moon follows - zukka, post canon, complete - this is an elderly gaang fic, so if ur constantly thinking abt grief like i am this is Right up ur street - tw major character death but so worth it.  Baby Hotline, please hold (me close to you) - zukka, alternate universe, complete - this shit is hilarious boys, fbi agent zuko and engineer sokka its a great time  Mass Times Acceleration - zukka, alternate universe, complete - this is a masterpiece, zukka roast trip au just very good painful feelings big fucking fan here man i would die 4 this fic survival will not be the hardest part - azula-centric, canon compliant, complete - beautiful azula character piece really rich and painful also lowkey sapphic Look How Far We've Come - zukka, alternate universe, complete - this whole series is insane!! daemons au!!! such good worldbuilding amazing character work fucking phenomenal man rain dance - aang-centric, canon compliant, complete - beautiful, beautiful aang piece about airbender culture and loss if u read any of these pls make it this one Intimate Counselors - zukka, post canon, complete - fucking hilarious zuko buys shit for sokka plot very good very fun honestly a joy 2 read might read it right now when im done with this list studying the blade - zukka, alternate universe, complete - social media au!! great gang dynamics n super fun!!!! kintsugi - toph+zuko bros 4 eva, canon divergence, complete? but only sorta cause the whole series isn't complete but its So good such a good reworking of the plot aaa it just goes hard man its the toph n zuko content u deserve spring comes to caldera - zukka, post canon, complete - ambassador sokka is back baybe and its so fucking good - great azula stuff here, really well developed pining, the full works figures 1-5: killing gods - zukka, canon divergence but only a lil, complete - a really lyrical and althetic exploration of zuko. feels like catharsis (do you take this jerk to be) your one and only - zukka, canon divergence, complete - hehehe proposal related hijinks love 2 see it yue is here n its great the art of charting the stars - zukka, post canon, complete - beautiful star gazing theme and gorgeous pining this is iconic i love it  speak ill - zukka, alternate universe, complete - sometimes u just need to call ozai a bastard. immaculate wow long list - sorry abt that!! but it really could have been easily twice as long aha

i hope i’ve managed to rec u something new and that u enjoy any of these and thank u so much for the ask~~~

[todaydreambelieversfic]

Author Spotlight: Teddyshoney Day 3

Author: @teddyshoney

How many times do you usually revise your fic/chapter before posting?

Three. When I finish writing the chapter, I go back over it quickly to catch any glaring errors. Then, JayhawkWrites, who betas almost everything I write now, goes over it for me. (Thank God for her! She's amazing!) Then, I go over it again once she's done, and I do a quick once over it again before I post.

If you were to revise one of your older fics from start to finish, which would it be and why?

Never Saying Goodbye. I feel like the plot is lacking, and I was very nervous about writing smut back then. I'd love to go back and give more emotional details as well as completely rework the (sorta) smut scene at the end to be a little more...confident.

What do you look for in a beta?

I've never actually had to look for a beta...JayhawkWrites volunteered not long after we became friends, and she's been doing it for me ever since. If I needed to find someone, though, I'd want someone who would be willing to let me bounce ideas off of them. I do a lot of talking/thinking out loud about fics with JayhawkWrites before I ever sit down to write. I would also need someone who is willing to point out when something sucks or needs more development.

If you could write the sequel (or prequel) to any fic out there not written by yourself, which would you choose?

Ohhh...This is a really hard question. I've read so many fics that I absolutely love, and narrowing it down is so hard... Recently, I read HKvoyage's story, The Seduction, and I didn't want it to end! So, it would be pretty fun to write a sequel to that story. I also love Lilinas's series Expectation Fails. It's been a source of inspiration for the D/s story I'm going to be working on soon, and it would be really fun to write a story in her universe as well.

Do you take liberties with canon or are you very strict about your fic being canon compliant?

Well, most of what I write is AU, so I'd say that I take liberties with canon when/if I need to. I'm honestly not sure that I've ever written a fic that closely adhered to canon...

Talk about a review that made your day.

I've had so many lovely reviews, but I think my favorites are probably the ones that mention their favorite line in the chapter and explain why they love it. I've also had a few where the commenter told me that the story I was updating was their favorite story in the In Every Lifetime verse. I love all my comments, though!

Do you ever get rude reviews and how do you deal with them?

Thankfully, I haven't really had any rude reviews. I've been quite blessed in that so much of what I've written has been well-received. If I did get a rude comment, though, I'd like to think that I'd try to do my best to ignore it.

What advice do you have for people just starting to write?

Don't get caught up in whether your fic is as good as someone else's or if anyone will want to read your story. Write first and foremost for you because you have a story to tell. Everything else is secondary.

Which fic do you most like to discuss with other people? Why?

I always have the most fun discussing whatever fic I'm currently working on because it's freshest in my mind, but I think my favorite fic to talk about was When Worlds Collide. There were so many pieces from JayhawkWrites story, The Silver-Scaled Mark, that I wove into this story that it's fun to discuss all the ways the two stories tie into one another and the In Every Lifetime series as a whole.

What's one aspect of writing fic that gets you really excited?

Going on a new adventure. Each fic that I write is chalk full of new things for me to research and learn about, and that's one of my favorite parts of writing fic. Along with that, too, is the personal journey I go on when I write a fic. Each story that I've written contains some little part of me, and I always find writing to be very cathartic.

***

Check out Teddyshoney’s Fic

Never Saying Goodbye -  Kurt is looking for a way to prove to Blaine that they will be together forever, even after Kurt's graduation and move to New York. Kurt doesn't think words are good enough to suffice, so he comes up with a better, much bigger way to prove his commitment to Blaine.

Five Times Kurt and Blaine Didn't Plan on Getting Sexy and One Time They Did -  Blaine is the sexiest thing Kurt has ever seen. Kurt is the sexiest thing Blaine's ever seen. They have a hard time controlling their urges and keeping their hands off of one another. In this story, they always fail.

Just When I Was Falling -  When the counselor catches Kurt looking at a pamphlet about depression, she gives him a website to visit where he can chat anonymously with other students who have been bullied. A reluctant Kurt signs up and makes his first post which launches him into an online friendship with someone he'd really like to know in person. And, maybe someday, he will.

[t100ficrecsblog]

an interview with @mobi-on-a-mission (she/her)

what are you working on right now? I'm in between fics right now after posting The Cockroach recently for Chopped! I'll likely start something new soon (I'm thinking of a canonverse forbidden lovers fic?), but we'll see where the muse takes me! When I'm not busy writing fic or being a human disaster I like to beta read. I beta read several fics for the Bellarke Big Bang, and I'm really excited to read them in their final form once that comes out! Beta reading may not be the first thing people think of with writing, but it's really elevated my experience with fanfic. It's a great way to let out my inner critic, participate in the writing process from a different angle, and read new fics before anyone else (hehe!) while helping out other writers. Going beyond 'this doesn't work' to 'this particular aspect isn't coming through right and here are some ideas on how to fix it' is the crucial step and has really made me a better writer!

I'm also excited to be accepting prompts for Bellarke Writers for Black Lives Matter. Send me a prompt and a donation to an organization of your choice which supports the BLM movement, and I'll write you a fanfic!

what’s something you’d like to write one day? I usually write whatever I want to write! One thing I've never tried though is an ot3. I enjoy them but at this point I don't think I could do that sort of relationship justice.

what is the fanwork you’re most proud of? Honestly I'm proud of all my fics. Each one carries its own challenges and rewards, so I never get in a rut! The work I'm most proud of, though, has got to be Revive. It's a canon compliant through s6 Memori pregnancy multichap that I wrote during hiatus. It's by far the longest fic I've ever written, and I wrote it at a time when I was still very uncomfortable writing fic. I must have had my eyes closed half the time I was drafting it, I was so nervous! But I finished it and posted it and from there on writing was just that much easier. I haven't looked back since.

why did you first start writing fic? I wrote my first "fic" in 2014, when I was 14 years old. Then I came back a year later with a really short oneshot. Both of those were for Supernatural, and they're still on my ao3. I was extremely nervous about writing, especially with the fear that my family would find out what I was doing. That fear kept me from writing for years and years, pining to write something. That is, until last July. I'd had enough. So I sat myself down and made myself write, every dad for three days until The Best Back Rubs (my first fic for The 100) was written. Again after that fic I had trouble writing. Four months later though I started writing Revive and like I said earlier, I just kept writing after that!

what frustrates you most about fic writing? The most frustrating thing about fic writing is lukewarm reception. As much as I hate to admit it, validation is important to me and I like to feel like people are enjoying what I write. When I spend a lot of time on a fic and get excited about posting it, a part of me is expecting a whole bunch of comments and kudos and hits. Sometimes that doesn't happen though! Usually that doesn't happen. I have to remind myself that those responses are not reflective of my value as a writer. My friends are a huge help with this!

what are your top five songs right now?

Sweet - Cigarrettes After Sex Foreigner's God - Hozier One More Hour - Anthony Ramos Combustible - Cœur de Pirate Undrunk - FLETCHER

what are your inspirations? My inspiration is a little bit different for every fic I write. I tend toward canonverse, so I pull from interesting aspects of canon and then let my imagination run wild with *what if*s. My own life inspires my writing as well. This helps me to add in little details to make the story feel more real. I've been inspired by writing prompts and movies and songs and other fics and snow falling outside my window!

The one thing that's constant is other writers. I learn so much from reading, beta reading, and of course talking to my friends! They help to give me ideas as well as motivation to keep going. Writing can be a lonely pursuit, but it doesn't have to be. There's only so much going on in my brain—connecting with others is what brings things to the next level.

what first attracted you to Memori? what attracts you now? From the first time they locked eyes, I shipped it a little! But in the beginning, I wasn't that invested in Memori. I kind of took them for granted until s5. But more on that later. What first attracted me to Memori was how non-traditional they are in that they're not standard cut good guys yet they were allowed to meet and fall in love. Add on top of that how they make each other better in a nuanced and imperfect way, and I'm hooked! I also really liked how they didn't beat around the bush with getting together. In a world where slowburn is seen as peak romance, it was refreshing to see a couple that was just like 'you? I like you' and then they got together and eventually became what is (in my possibly biased eyes) the strongest couple on the show at this point. Getting into s5, that's when I really became invested in the ship. It hurt to see their relationship problems like that, but it allowed them to grow from it in a beautiful way. Through it all, they have so much love for each other. They're imperfect people and they make mistakes, but at the end of the day they learn from it and become better as a couple than they are alone. Their devotion to each other really is something else!

Besides Memori, what character or pairing do you like best on t100? Funny story: I actually decided to start watching The 100 after reading Bellarke smut on ao3! It was a non-traditional introduction to the story, but something must have clicked with me and I was a Bellarke shipper from the start (even though I frankly detested Bellamy in the beginning). I still ship them, even though Memori has taken my heart! Oh yeah and I got to give a shoutout to Niytavia as well because apparently canon isn't going to feed us with content for them.

why did you decide to start writing for bellarkefic-for-blm? It's pretty simple, really: Black lives matter should not be a controversial statement, and this is one of the ways I can help make our world a little less sucky for Black people.

what’s your writing process like (esp for prompts, chopped!, etc)? Every fic I write begins with a hodge podge of ideas. Sometimes I scribble them in a notebook and sometimes I use the computer, but it's always a creative mess! Recently I've been using Notion, a free editor which has a great desktop app. A writer friend turned me on to it and now I use it for writing as well as other life stuff too! It's easy to drag and reorganize ideas, so it really helps take a brainstorm mess to a working outline. Once an idea starts taking form I organize my ideas into related pieces and some end up getting thrown out. I craft "scenes" out of this and soon it becomes clear what pieces I'm missing. I fill in those pieces, throw out or rework stuff that doesn't work together, and pretty soon I have an outline.

I absolutely love getting prompts! I haven't gotten one through Bellarke Writers for Black Lives Matter (yet!), but I've written in a few rounds of Chopped. Most recently wrote for Chopped 3.0 Round 2 and won 1st place for best overall with my Memori fic The Cockroach. The biggest difference that comes when writing from a prompt like that is I need to make sure the fic not only fits the prompt but breathes life into it!

what are some things you’d like to recommend? Remember how I mentioned I beta read? Yeah. Right now my friend Kara, aka @queenemori, is writing a slowburn Memori actors au called We Don't Need To Say It. It's out of this world amazing and I am so hype to be a part of the process. The first chapters are up on ao3 and I cannot recommend it enough. ed’s note: this fic just updated!

For writers who are looking for a push, I highly recommend participating in Chopped. Fandom events are fun, the prompts make you get creative, and writing deadlines inspire you to actually get them finished and out there!

I know some of you need to hear this: drink some water! It's good for you and it's yummy yummy in your tummy!

The best place to find @mobi-on-a-mission is right here on Tumblr. Her AO3 is here. Request a fic written by her via @bellarkefic-for-blm.

[digitaldreams0801]

Potential Adventure Rewrite Idea Dump

I am hereby asserting myself as the CEO of Bad Ideas. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately about how interesting it would be to do a potential Digimon Adventure series rewrite (Adventure, 02, Tri, and their related animated media; haven’t seen Kizuna so I’m not sure if I’ll include that or not).

Of course, this would be a pretty long ways off given that I’m already doing a rewrite of Frontier, but I think that’s alright, in all honesty. This project would take a really long time to plan and a lot of research. This post is just for me to get my preliminary thoughts out of the way before I dive any deeper. Also, keep in mind that I’m a stupid American with no way to watch the Japanese version of the first two season legally (I would if I could), so this is all dub-centric stuff. One of these days, I’ll figure something out to watch the Japanese version since I feel like research there will be important for something like this. 

Against my better judgement, I’ve also got a small discord server for this. I want to talk to like-minded individuals and all that about this sort of project and hopefully make some friends along the way, so here’s that if you find yourself interested in something like that: https://discord.gg/zFvTx5h

It’s pretty barebones right now, but hopefully it will develop more in the future. 

Adventure

Adventure is mostly fine as it is when it comes to plot in my opinion. The character development is amazing and doesn’t require much in the way of reworking. Only a few small things would be changed for the original Adventure for the sake of foreshadowing future events, and they wouldn’t really have an express impact on the story itself. 

Adventure Movie

Again, this doesn’t really merit much in the way of changing. It’s a simple story, but I feel like it works pretty well. No need to change it. 

Our War Game

For a third time in a row, this is perfectly fine and doesn’t really need to be reworked. Go War Game. 

Adventure 02

Alright, this is where I actually have some ideas to dump. Strap yourselves in, kiddos, because there’s quite a bit I’ve been throwing at the wall. None of this is set in stone yet; it’s just me saying what random shit has been coming to my mind. 

- New arc about the Dark Ocean. I’m not quite sure where this would go, but I want to work out the Dark Ocean fully and explore everything that has to do with it. 

- Shortening first arc. The Emperor/Kaiser arc at the start of 02 would need to be cut down in order to make space for the Dark Ocean plot I already mentioned. The major plot beats would remain the same while filler is removed or reworked to have a key purpose. 

- New character arcs. This is mostly applicable to the 02 kids, but I want to give them more defined arcs a la Adventure. They’re fine as they are, but Yolei/Miyako in particular really gets the short end of the stick here, and I would love to flesh her and the others out further. 

- Destiny Stones. I don’t know if I want to keep these or cut them, but if I do, I’m going to change things so it’s less of a fail arc on top of adding detail to their history. 

- Give new kids Crests. All three of the characters who don’t have Crests/only inherited Crests are getting their own ones, which brings me to the next point... 

- Give 02 cast their own Ultimate/Mega partners. DNA evolution is going to be reworked for this, and the 02 kids are going to get their own partners to go up to Ultimate/Mega prior to this. 

- DNA evolution deserves its own point since it’s probably going to function more like Omnimon does: Digimon reach Mega first and then use DNA evolution. As for if all of this will happen during 02 or not, we’ll have to see, but it will happen. 

Hurricane Landing

This one only has one notable change, but it’s a pretty big one. 

- Make it canon. This will require a bit of work, but it is possible to make this movie fit in with the canon timeline. That’s the primary problem I have with it. Also, I have seen the Japanese version of this movie, and this rewrite would be following the plot of the Japanese version. Why? Because this is quite possibly the worst adaptation between languages when it comes to the English version, and this movie deserves better. 

Revenge of Diaboromon

We’re back to the stories that seem fine as they are for the most part, but there is one thing that could be done in this movie. 

- I mentioned how DNA evolution was going to function differently, right? Well, I don’t know how it’s going to fit into the timeline since having Armor, Champion, Ultimate, Mega, and DNA forms would be a bit cramped as far as pacing goes for just 02, so this could be a good chance to introduce one of the DNA evolutions after 02. 

Tri.

Oh boy. This one is by far the one that will require the most changes, but I have the fewest ideas for it, as much as I hate to say it. I think the plot of the original Tri. is fine, but if I was the one writing the story, it would be pretty different. In fact, most aspects would probably wind up completely upended in favor of something new. This season in particular would require help developing. 

- I’m still going to have the kids who don’t yet have Mega forms by this point reach that level here. On the subject of DNA evolution, that will most certainly happen here near the end of Tri. with Sora/Mimi and Izzy/Joe pairing up for it. 

- This is a more general change, but making things a bit more compliant with canon character arcs from Adventure/02 is a big thing. 

- Yes, the 02 kids will be included this time around. I think they had a lot of potential that simply wasn’t followed up on during Tri., and I’m going to do it, god damn it. 

- Meicoomon isn’t going to be the villain. Yeah. I told you that this was going to require a lot of changes. I’m not quite sure on the details yet, but Meicoomon is not going to be responsible for the events of Tri. in this rewrite. Instead, she and Meiko are going to be regular members of the team, but they will act as a thirteenth team member outside of the DNA pairs. 

- Instead of Meicoomon, I’m thinking of having Yggdrasil/King Drasil be the villain behind Tri., something that I feel would fit thematically given that he’s going to be defined as the creator of Apocalymon and the Dark Masters as well as responsible for other important events during 02 (I still need to iron out these details). 

- Meiko is going to bear the Crest of Darkness. I know this is an odd trait for a Crest to be, but I want you to hear me out on this one. Meiko doesn’t have a DNA partner and seems different from the rest because she wasn’t chosen by Homeostasis. Instead, she was chosen by Yggdrasil without knowing it, and she and Meicoomon were going to be pawns in Yggdrasil’s plot at first without realizing such. Of course, this is still just me bouncing ideas around, so there’s no way to say for sure that this will be the case. 

- I’m not sure if the reboot is going to be happening, but if it does, then I’ll probably dedicate some time to the aftermath of such with the resurrection of the previous villains from the first two seasons. This is very up in the air along with the Destiny Stones, but I’m putting it here for the sake of reference. 

- Tri. is going to be the regular length of a Digimon season, so it’ll be twice as long as it is in canon. Something with 26 episodes shouldn’t have filler with the grand story it’s trying to tell, and that’s one thing that bothered me about the original. One thing about Adventure (and to a slightly lesser extent, 02) is that the filler pushed character arcs forward, but that’s not exactly the case with, say, the hot springs episode of Tri., and that bothers me personally. Doubling the story’s length will give everything more time to develop, including the characters, and that’s pretty mcfrickin important. 

So those are all my thoughts for the time being. There’s quite a few of them, and nothing is finalized yet, but I wanted to at least get that stuff out there. If you read this far, thank you and congratulations. Have a nice day, y’all. 

[kaleidodreams]

40 Questions - Meme for Fic Writers

Well, I only got one ask for this game, but I really wanted to answer more questions, so I’ve just decided to answer all of them!

1. Describe your comfort zone—a typical you-fic. - I don't know if I really have a "comfort zone"... Maybe family drama and dealing with characters' backstories?

2. Is there a trope you’ve yet to try your hand at, but really want to? - Hmm, fake dating seems like it would be pretty fun to try to write. I just wouldn't know which characters to use.

3. Is there a trope you wouldn’t touch with a ten foot pole? - The whole A/B/O thing... Yeah, no.

4. How many fic ideas are you nurturing right now? Care to share one of them? - Maybe five or six? And you can check out the answer to Question 37 if you want to know what most of them are.

5. Share one of your strengths. - People seem to like my original characters.

6. Share one of your weaknesses. - I'm not very good at description.

7. Share a snippet from one of your favorite pieces of prose you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it. - This is from Ashes to Ashes:

However, the more time that passed, the more otou-sama lost himself in his work and the more distant we became. Our house, which had always been full of laughter and smiles when okaa-sama was alive and healthy, might as well have been a cemetery itself, the ghost of her memory haunting us who remained. Even as young as I was, I realized that otou-sama would never be able to truly recover from his grief as long as we stayed there, where the scent of okaa-sama's favorite perfume still seemed to linger in the air and every room remained a museum to the woman who once lived there because otou-sama couldn't bear the thought of putting her things away.

I just really like the "house is a cemetery" metaphor. (By the way, that story is written from Rei Hino’s point of view, if that wasn’t clear from the title.)

8. Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it. - This is from To Build a Home:

"Take if off and put it back the way it was," he ordered, crossing his arms over his chest.

"But why? You always said my bed looked so cute."

"Yeah, your bed. But this is my bed, and I don't want it to look cute."

"Your bed?" She set down an ugly-cute hippo plush and arched an eyebrow. "Isn't it our bed now?"

He rubbed at his temple. "Yes, of course, but… You know what I mean." Mamoru pointed an accusing finger at a very familiar blanket – one that was too small to properly fit the queen-sized bed. "I am not having sex on a bed covered in bunnies and crescent moons!"

"That's never stopped you before. We did it all the time –"

"You're missing the point, Usako! We're adults now. Isn't it about time you outgrew all this cutesy crap?"

He regretted it as soon as the words left his mouth.

"Oh, I see. I can move into your oh-so-sophisticated apartment, just not my 'cutesy crap'." She grabbed an empty cardboard box from off the floor and started throwing her plush toys in it with a force that made Mamoru very glad she wasn't pummeling them at him. "If that's how you really feel, then maybe we shouldn't move in together at all!"

I like it because I tend to have trouble writing arguments, but this one turned out exactly how I wanted it to, and I can just picture the scene so vividly.

9. Which fic has been the hardest to write? - Hmm, probably Melting Ice? It took me about eight years -- I started writing it a couple of years before I actually started posting it -- to finally finish the whole thing. Sure, it’s a long fic (over 150,000 words), but in comparison, I managed to write Spirit of Fire, which is almost twice as long, in only two or three years (ignoring the side stories added later).

10. Which fic has been the easiest to write? - Probably my first fics because back then I wasn’t as self-conscious about my writing. But later in my career, I seem to recall Blood On His Hands being really easy and fast to write until I got to the last chapter. Honestly, I think the ending took me longer to figure out than the rest of the story!

11. Is writing your passion or just a fun hobby? - Both!

12. Is there an episode above all others that inspires you just a little bit more? - This is easiest to choose with Sailor Moon, so can I just say the entire SuperS season/Dream Arc? Obviously because of the Chibiusa/Helios OTP factor, but also because we learn about the Inners’ families and Elysion/the Golden Kingdom, both subjects that I love exploring.

13. What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever come across? - I learned about this from a post on Tumblr, but it’s REALLY helpful to run your story through a screen reader (I just use Google Translate). I think I’m pretty good at catching spelling and grammar errors, but one thing I have trouble with is missing words. Hearing the story read aloud instead of just reading it to myself and mentally filling in the blanks makes the skips so much easier to find. I also worry a lot about the flow of my writing, so I figure if it doesn’t sound too terrible being read by a computer, it’s probably not as awful as I think it is!

14. What’s the worst writing advice you’ve ever come across? - Probably the "avoid adverbs" rule. Sometimes using an adverb is the best choice!

15. If you could choose one of your fics to be filmed, which would you choose? - Oh, man, this is totally impossible to choose... Um, To Be By Your Side? I really don't know.

16. If you only could write one pairing for the rest of your life, which pairing would it be? - If I had to, I would no doubt pick Chibiusa/Helios, but I’m really glad I don’t! I enjoy being able to write a variety of couples and imagine I would get bored fairly quick if I was limited to just writing one OTP forever, as much as I may love them.

17. Do you write your story from start to finish, or do you write the scenes out of order? - It depends on the story, but most of the time it’s out of order, which is frankly annoying, but it seems to work for me.

18. Do you use any tools, like worksheets or outlines? - Not really, unless you count screenwriting and research tools.

19. Stephen King once said that his muse is a man who lives in the basement. Do you have a muse? - Haha, I remember when I first started writing fanfiction as a teenager, there were four characters I considered my muses: Helios (obs!), Shigure from Fruits Basket (who is a writer himself), Touya from Card Captor Sakura, and Tooya from Ceres: Celestial Legend (not sure why, though, since I never wrote for Ceres). I guess I would still consider Helios my muse?

20. Describe your perfect writing conditions. - At my desk in my bedroom, with the room at a comfortable temperature and absolute quiet.

21. How many times do you usually revise your fic/chapter before posting? - I tend to edit while I write, which I know isn’t generally considered the best way to do things, but it works for me. So I can’t really answer this question definitively.

22. Choose a passage from one of your earlier fics and edit it into your current writing style. (Person sending the ask is free to make suggestions). (Skipping this one unless someone wants to make a suggestion for a passage.)

23. If you were to revise one of your older fics from start to finish, which would it be and why? - Spirit of Fire, because while I love the story and the characters, I think it could be better written, especially the earlier chapters.

24. Have you ever deleted one of your published fics? - I did take down a first chapter of a planned multi-part and reworked it into a one-shot when I decided I didn’t want to write the rest of it, if that counts. (The Legend, if you’re interested.) Otherwise, no.

25. What do you look for in a beta? - Basically someone who wants to beta for me. *laughs* Like I said before, I consider myself pretty good at catching spelling and grammar goofs, so I don't feel like I really need a beta, but if someone offers, it doesn't hurt to have a second pair of eyes!

26. Do you beta yourself? If so, what kind of beta are you? - I've done so in the past, and if somebody asks me, I would probably be willing to do it again. I would say I focus mainly on spelling/grammar, occasionally making suggestions or asking questions if something seems off (like a character feels OOC or something).

27. How do you feel about collaborations? - I've never really been a part of one, so I don't have much of an opinion. If you're good friends, it seems like it would be a lot of fun, but maybe a bit difficult if you have different styles.

28. Share three of your favorite fic writers and why you like them so much. - his lordship Chaos, Allekha, and commas_and_ampersands 

29. If you could write the sequel (or prequel) to any fic out there not written by yourself, which would you choose? - I honestly can’t think of any. I have enough sequels and prequels of my own stuff to write! *laughs*

30. Do you accept prompts? - Not unless I’m doing a drabble game, which I haven’t done in years, or I’m taking part of some writing challenge. Just random prompts, though? No. I like to write what I want to write.

31. Do you take liberties with canon or are you very strict about your fic being canon compliant? - I’d say I’m middle-of-the-road between the two, closer to being strict about being canon compliant.

32. How do you feel about smut? - Despite being asexual, I’m a fan!

33. How do you feel about crack? - A lot of it is really stupid, but with the right writer and idea, crack can be brilliantly funny. I usually only read it on recommendation, though.

34. What are your thoughts on non-con and dub-con? - It’s not something I go looking for as a reader, but I don’t mind if I come across it and it’s handled well. I’ve written some dub-con myself, mostly in the form of drunk sex, but also some incidents involving magic. Overall, though, I’m really a HUGE fan of consent when it comes to sex scenes. Consent is sexy!

35. Would you ever kill off a canon character? - Yes, of course. Done it before and I’ll probably do it again!

36. Which is your favorite site to post fic? - I like AO3 and FF.net equally well.

37.Talk about your current wips.

Friends With Benefits (Kaleido Star) - This is the only WIP I’m actively posting. It’s a sequel to Blood On His Hands, and it’s about Layla and Yuri engaging in a, well, “friends with benefits” arrangement, leading to complications when they fall in love. 

The Bonds We Choose (Yuri!! On Ice) - A sequel to It’s Complicated, taking place about four years later. Yuri, Otabek, and Mila have settled into their unusual relationship -- Yuri and Otabek are queerplatonic partners while Otabek is also dating/living with Mila -- when a drunken mistake at the Olympics changes their lives forever.

Metamophosis (Sailor Moon) - This is kinda a prequel to To Be By Your Side, telling the story of how Helios became priest of Elysion.

Stolen Dreams (Sailor Moon) - Ha, this is the only non-sequel/prequel story on the list! But it’s about an incubus who plans to get revenge on Helios by seducing a grown-up Chibi-Usa, who’s under a lot of stress due to her upcoming college entrance exams.

38. Talk about a review that made your day. - I was really happy when @floraone favorited and wrote a review for my Sailor Moon Smutember entry, Head of the Class. Knowing that someone like her, who IMO writes the BEST sex scenes I’ve ever read, enjoyed it... Well, like the question said, it really made my day! I also was pleasantly surprised to get any reviews at all for my last two YOI fics, Lonely Hearts and No Risk, No Reward, since Minako/Celestino and Sara/Emil are both extremely rare pairs. I seriously didn’t think anybody would read them, so I was thrilled with the reviews I got.

39. Do you ever get rude reviews and how do you deal with them? - Occasionally, and I just ignore them.

40. Write an alternative ending to [insert fic title] (or just the summary of one). (Again, skipping, unless someone wants to suggest a story.)

[deadhumourist]

Mistletoe and Beskar

Pairing: Modern!Din Djarin x F!Reader. Mechanic AU.

Rating: M for the series, minors shoo. 

Warnings: Female reader, use of “she” pronoun. Reader has no physical description, but general mention of “curves.” We're here for a good time, not a canon-compliant time - watch me take massive liberties with Mandalorian lore. Well-worn and loved tropes ahoy.  Helmet off.

A/N: This was a Christmas drabble I reworked into a proper story. A big thank you to my darling @just-here-for-the-moment for reading it over and shouting at me. 

Author Masterlist --

Din sat in the waiting room of the specialist auto repair shop, mindlessly scrolling his phone. Every article was Christmas this, Christmas that. If it hadn’t been for the kid, he would have just stayed at home and never paid attention to any of it. A little smile crept up his face at the thought of his son, who was visiting Aunt Peli for a few days before Christmas.

A few minutes into his scrolling, Greef Karga's face popped up on his screen, a FaceTime call ringing loudly in the quiet room. His heart sank as he realised that he knew what this was about.

He swiped and instantly the screen animated. “Mando! You’re a difficult man to track down.”

Din winced. He had not-so-subtly been avoiding this phone call, but he had to get it out of the way one way or another.

“I keep busy with the kid and catching up with other things.”

Greef chuckled. His booming voice seemed much louder than it needed to be in the quiet of the workshop.

“You haven’t RSVP’d to my invitation, my friend. You skipped last year’s function, I hope it’s not what you’re planning to do again.”

“You know why I skipped last year, Karga.”

There was a long beat before he spoke again.

“Is she going to be there?”

“Of course she is, she’s an old friend. If I had to uninvite every person who bats their eyelashes at a Mandalorian, my guest list would be empty."

Laughter thundered through the phone, Greef very amused with himself.

Din sighed.

“Alright. Let's get it over with. But I’m not staying late at the Christmas ball. Not my scene.”

“None of this is your scene, which is the point, my friend. I await your arrival with optimism.” And with that the call ended.

Din stared morosely into the middle distance. He needed to get out of this somehow. 

He trundled into the workshop to see how far you were with the Razor Crest. He only trusted one person with his gunmetal grey Jaguar E-type and she was currently on her back underneath its chassis. 

Your denim-clad legs stuck out underneath the car and as he stared at the shoelaces on your trainers, a thought subtly drifted into his mind like the snow outside. If he had someone there she would leave him alone. Even if it only discouraged her from sticking around too long, it would be worth it. 

You were…nice. You talked to him sometimes. Despite only seeing you when the Crest was in need of some attention, he liked being around you. 

There was a quiet, unassuming comfort about you that didn't require effort on his part. You didn’t fawn over him or expect anything of him, you were just you. Unbothered with his title, reputation or what you thought you knew about him.  

He leaned against the front fender, crossing his arms across his broad frame. 

You heard the warm baritone, revealing little emotion as usual, bouncing off the cold concrete. 

“How long?”

The mechanics creeper shot out from under the car and your face came into view, a firm scowl in place. Clever hands with grime stuck in the cuticles came up to cup the air, and an uneven oil dab was streaked across your cheek, making you look grubbier than usual. 

“Listen. You can have it done quickly or you can have it done properly. Not both. It’s a delicate piece of machinery, so I suggest you sit your butt back down or find someone else to work on her.”

When he didn’t respond, you continued to stare at him. Not exactly challenging him but creating a vacuum that you expected he would fill with his usual scoff.

Instead you could see the cogs turning in his head. He was carefully looking down at your face, searching. Looking like he was weighing up different parts of a decision before settling on something.

“I have this…thing I have to go to. It’s a weekend…thing. Lots of people.”

He swallowed, looking uncomfortable. You had never seen someone trying to hide in plain sight, but by gods it was entertaining. 

“I need a partner.”

You swallowed harshly. 

For the longest time, he had been coming into the shop. Quiet, didn’t speak unless he absolutely needed to. He had driven away several highly skilled mechanics from working on the Crest because he was so difficult to talk to, exacting and intense.

The owner of the specialist auto repair shop was happy to rotate as many mechanics as needed for this client. It wasn’t often that one had the opportunity to count someone of his stature among your regulars. 

You disregarded all of that, refusing to tip-toe around him or shrink under his cold, glowering gaze.

He was so difficult to read, sometimes it felt like you were talking to a visor. But you were undeterred and concentrated on the car and her needs, making sure to be meticulous in your work. 

As the months passed, he would eventually come in asking for you by name and listen intently while you gave him the run-down after each job.

He had a way of slightly cocking his head to listen to you as you spoke. You didn't often deal with clients who gave you their undivided attention. Most were typing on their phone, or looking around, clearly disinterested in what you had to say. Din's attention was like a spotlight - bright and isolating, sometimes making you feel like you were the only one in the room. 

He had that presence. 

Now he was towering over you, arms folded over his broad chest, and regarding you with an unreadable expression on his face. Heat was slowly creeping up your neck. You felt especially vulnerable lying on your back like this while he was…asking you on a date?

“There’s a girl who won’t leave me alone.”

Oh. So he needed a deterrent, not a date. Of course. A twinge of misplaced hurt settled in your chest. You brushed it aside and replied in your best attempt at deadpan humour to wipe it away.

“Fine” you sighed exaggeratedly. “I’ll be your bodyguard.“

His eyes widened almost comically.

“You’re not my bodyguard, it’s…”

While keeping eye contact, a devilish smile playing on your lips, you rolled slowly back underneath the chassis, softly singing.

“-And AIIIIII IIIAIIII will always love youuuuuu.”

You could hear Din huffing on the other side, shuffling around before the familiar sound of his combat boots retreating back to the waiting room echoed in the cold space. 

An hour later you were done with the car and slipped the keys into his large, gloved hand. He always wore the same, dark yellow tipped, buttery soft gloves in winter.

After discussing the necessary details about the car’s repairs, he reluctantly told you more about the weekend you had signed up for. 

Like the man himself he was sparse on the details but you liked the idea of hobnobbing with the rich and famous. If you were completely honest with yourself, you were also dying of curiosity about who this mystery woman was. His type was probably some impeccably gorgeous model stuffed with lip filler and trust fund cash, who never remembered his birthday. 

Greef Karga’s mountain mansion also sounded fantastic, and you could trade shifts to make it work. You couldn’t remember the last time you had time off, and some days it felt like no matter how hard you scrubbed, the oily grime wouldn't dissolve from your hands. Neither would your debt. 

Looking down at your hands, you regarded them critically.

You had 6-shifts-a-week hands and Din had those goddamned soft gloves. 

Fuck it, you wanted to go. 

——-

That night you flipped open your laptop after a hot shower. You realised you were going away with a man you knew almost nothing about and you definitely weren't saintly enough to just trust him. 

You Googled while sipping some tea - you only had nuggets of information to work off, picking up little bits and pieces during others’ conversation in the auto shop. You never chatted to him socially, which now seemed odd, considering.

He wasn’t from around here, that much you could make out. Searching social media threw up dead ends. Apparently he wasn’t big on socials and there were no photos of him online, which didn’t surprise you at all. You suddenly remembered Pete mentioning a country once, and you typed it into the blinking search box. The innocuous little search box spilled a handful of results onto your screen, and, taking another sip, you dove in. 

If your sleuthing was correct, Din was from Mandalore, a small principality in Europe. An enclave which boasted a rich history in combat and was known for training the fiercest warriors. They were feared across the globe during the Roman Empire, and stories of their prowess spread to such an extent that no conquering nations dared approach their borders. According to Wikipedia, they enjoyed a peaceful existence among exotic fauna and flora which flourished in the verdant mountainsides. 

You yawned. There was a lot about the actual country, but nothing much about him online. The closest you’d gotten to a background was that he was a far-off, many times removed descendant of an old ruler of Mandalore, but what the connection was, you couldn’t make out. You were sure it was super important but you couldn’t bring yourself to care enough to dig further into the rabbit hole. 

Trading Google for some series, you settled into bed. It was a show you were several seasons into but for some reason you couldn’t really focus. Your mind kept pulling back to the mysterious entries for the country. Most countries on the planet would be well-mapped out and would have a wealth of information available, if only to draw tourists. Eventually you lost the battle to stay awake and settled in for a good night’s rest. 

The next morning, Din was at your door at 10 am sharp. 

More specifically, the gorgeous Jaguar had roared down the tarmac until it smoothly slid into your driveway. You always appreciated her purr and felt proud that you were the one keeping her in good nick. 

Din got out of the car, his black aviators perched on his curved nose, and his leather jacket slightly pushed up from his wrists. A brushed silver watch glinted in the early morning sun as he made his way over to you. He made an imposing figure in denim and leather and you found yourself a little lost for words. 

He grunted hello and picked up your bag as if it weighed nothing. You tried to smile at him but he ducked back to the car and you were left wondering how much more awkward this could get. It was already really weird seeing him outside of the shop.

Sliding into the passenger seat you marveled at the simple luxury of the car’s interior. The black leather sets hugged your curves as you eased back. It was a comfortable fit that felt like a lover’s caress. 

The old-school steering wheel and bulbous gear stick sent a little shiver of excitement through you - you loved vintage cars but couldn’t hope to ever own one. They were steep, and collectors items to boot. You would live vicariously for the weekend, Din and his stupid plans be damned. 

The car swallowed mile after mile of pitch black tarmac, winding into snow-capped mountains. With the AC on heat, mercifully you didn’t feel cold at all and could marvel in the winter wonderland unfolding on both sides of you. 

He hadn’t said much during the drive, which you expected, but the little that was exchanged had your mind wandering anew. 

“So….are we meant to be like partners or like…partners? You want this girl to think you’re spoken for, right?

“Yeah.”

“So do we have to kiss?”

His body went rigid almost imperceptibly. You got the impression that he hadn’t thought of this particular detail before proposing his plan.

“No, we don’t have to. Your presence will be enough.”

"Oh." 

Feeling a little deflated at what you perceived to be a second rebuff, you continued looking at the mountainous landscape speeding by.

You wondered how bad this girl could be if his blinding charm couldn’t scare her off.

In front of you an enormous set of cabins and structures unfolded from the landscape. Festive lights hung at each corner, and warm yellow light spilled from the large windows. 

The car finally came to a stop, and you pulled your winter coat from the back seat. 

As the porter took your luggage to reception, you padded through the snow to the impressive entrance to the resort, Din on your heels.

As soon as the doors opened, a comforting warmth drifted through, a hint of cinnamon and nutmeg lightly scenting the air. A huge foyer housed an impressive, roaring fireplace in the centre, with the soft tinkle of Christmas music rounding out the cosy atmosphere.

At the far end, an impressive white marble bar was decked with tinsel and lights.

Greef smiled as soon as he saw you, and turned to grab two glasses from the bar counter. He was a well-practiced host and managed to put anyone at ease very quickly with his smooth manner and easy conversation. He was also looking forward to seeing his friend again.  

You realised Greef would make his way over shortly, and it was time to start acting like you were together.

You gave Din a sidelong glance as you knocked the back of your fingers against his, wordlessly prompting him to take your hand without attracting too much attention. 

He looked at you, the notion taking a moment to register. Then he turned his palm and his fingers threaded carefully through yours. He squeezed. 

Your heart gave a large, uncomfortable throb at the touch. Well this is new. 

Greef walked over with tumblers, a beaming smile on his face. After handing them to you both, he embraced Din, clapping him on the back.

“Welcome my friend, it’s good to see you again and I'm keen to meet your lovely companion”

You were introduced and the two spent some time making small talk, catching up the way old friends do.

Then you heard a high-pitched yelping sound from across the large room.

“Din, baby is that you?”

An excited clippity clop of heels echoed on the marble as the owner of the penetrating shriek made her way over.

As she came closer, you started to appear from behind Greef, who had inadvertently been blocking you from her field of vision.

The clippity clop slowed down and turned into a sullen clip clop.

The woman had a sour expression on her face, her eyes shifting between Din and you multiple times before she schooled her face and pushed on.

Walking closer, she leant forward and smacked a languid kiss on Din’s jaw, the fuschia lipstick mark shining like a scar in the world’s most one-sided battle.

In a move you were sure she thought was sexy, she winked at him.

Feigning disinterest, she turned to you.

“I’m Kraelia, we haven't met.”

You stuck your right hand out, determined to keep a straight face at the absolute farce playing out in front of you, and introduced yourself.

"That's right, we haven't. It's uhm..nice to meet you."

She offered you a limp handshake, retracting her hand too quickly. 

"Din and I go way back, don't we baby?" She answered the question you never asked. 

She stayed for a few minutes longer then made an excuse to leave. After watching her round a corner and disappear, you turned your attention back to the men. 

You couldn’t help the shit-eating grin on your face, looking at Din. The new nickname was dancing on the tip of your tongue. 

"It's so nice to meet some of your friends, baby.”

When Din achingly slowly turned his head to you, Greef wisely took the out. He could see a storm brewing and he knew Din long enough to know that he wasn’t keen to get caught in it. “I’m sure you two need to relax and freshen up after the drive, I’ll leave you to it - your key is at reception.”

With that, he said his goodbyes and wandered off to greet more guests. Din had started walking towards the check-in desk, and you realised he was still holding your hand. He didn't let go until he reached over the desk to take the room key.

Part 2