#i only realised what day it was from a very abstract post i made on this day 2009

[wild-at-mind]

On this day 2 years ago my gerbils declanned. But it all makes sense now because thanks to facebook memories I realised it is also the birthday of my abusive former best friend. That explains it all, thanks for ruining my gerbils, asshole. #cursed

[website-com]

CW mentions of self-harm specifically cutting (rant about jokes online, discussed in the abstract. not very interesting, not worth feeling uncomfortable reading)

ive never seen a single joke made about the type of s/h that springs to mind when you read the word that didnt feel intensely uncomfortable to read or hear. i dont think its something that is good to make jokes about on say instagram reels because it is something that young people who're prone to being intensely online are Extremely vulnerable to and seeing their favourite creators or even just a fun looking stranger make a casual joke about it could have crazy knock on effects. (cont including examples of jokes under the squiggle)

these days i feel like every alternate fashion person or online personality is like 'me because if i got close enough to a barcode scanner it would go off' or whatever framed in a sort of cute, casual tone that indicates they dont see it as a big deal.

but theres this look in their eye as they tell it, i always see it, that is always so present in people who engage with passive or perhaps the term is 'non-suicidal' (self harm without the intent to end ones life by doing the action) with the intent of having a way to prove their internal pain (there are many reasons a person may do so but this is a common one) asking for you to make it worth it. for you to worry. for it to have worked. to earn the care they lacked. its so fucked up to see. it makes my skin crawl. especially because there are kids who will see it working, will see the nice comments, and think 'oh, thats all i have to do'. its weird. its both a much bigger deal than people realise and not a big deal at all. i wish people would understand the consequences of their actions. theres a reason for its uptick after the rise of social media. you are allowed to do, say, draw whatever you like, but you could hurt someone else. you do have a responsibility when posting to an app like instagram that has a randomised algorithm, or any algorithm at all. if someone can see it without seeking it out then its dangerous to post it

plus like what if someones whos trying to quit sees that? youre going to trigger them in some way or another, right? or youre going to make them feel that the only way to be rewarded is to make a joke of their own. thus continuing it. and no putting a 'CW' at the top is not enough. (i know this post has one. im posting this to my tumblr that is not teenage in its audience or content so i feel safe doing so. i dont have a 'minors DNI' because that has never worked, i just post content i feel is more appealing to people my age. if you guys are vulnerable i hope i have written this in a manner that is detached enough from emotional triggers that if you chose to read it you are able to engage with the subject objectively instead of subjectively)

also cringe is such a powerful weapon. if cool people talk about s/h it will seem cool, but if you literally just make it seem kinda lame people will stop. im not kidding. such a hard thing to navigate because obviously people need love and support but ive literally seen people stop engaging in self harming behaviours because they though it was kinda cringe.

even the way ive described it here, how i see it as a cry for someone to care when someone makes a joke about it, is appealing. it makes it appealing. its cooked man. i dunno

[thomine]

2023 WRAPPED

writing edition for thomine. questions that summarise your writing journey for the whole year. source of these prompts were lost.

thanks for accompanying me on this journey! onward to more words written, more stories shared, and more atrocious alliteration)

Your yearly word count!

a whooping 31,327 words! this does not count stories posted on my older blog. au august really did wonders to my stats, haha. this word count is only for published works, not including drafts. au august was about 24k, which is about 70% of my yearly word count, lol.

Fave fic you wrote this year?

there is so many reasons why something can be a person's favourite... and this year it is probably READY, AIM, FIRE (venti)! i really like metaphors and abstract themes, so it was fun trying to string two concepts that are seemingly not related into a story! i absolutely loved the prompt and the undertone it brought to the story. i also really like venti, and i had tons of fun writing a little bit of the fic everyday.

Fave fic you read this year?

THE FIVE WISHES YOU FULFILLED TO ME BEFORE I DIED, by (@)tartagliaxx! i love the emotional maturity of this fic and how it handles the topic of death so gracefully. the last chapter was something i did not expect (in a sense, i was fooled), but it was a very pleasant surprise and i love the spin of it. there are many beautiful metaphors as the author talks about the experiences of handling a dying loved one which i loved. impressed with this author's stamina because i cannot write a fic this long, lol.

Fave ship you wrote for?

tighnari and reader in REACHING OUT. i wrote this piece when i received news that my friend was travelling overseas and he had no intention of returning. but, even if he did, his absence would impact the friend group dynamic's a lot--and it did--which made me... grief a lot. i wrote this as a conversation between myself and an alternative point of view symbolic of tighnari. however, after the whole year, i realised that reader and tighnari sort of morphed into their own relationship. they're cute (in my head).

Fave character POV to write!

ohhh reader in TUG OF NURTURE (baizhu). in this fic, reader is turning into a zombie, so i had to think about how that would feel like. what even is a zombie anyway? it was fun. an honourable mention would be reader in FOOLISH LOGIC (tighnari), as they are a robot. the issue is that writing in the 3 statement = 1 conclusion can be a bit boring if dragged for too long.

Fave line you wrote!

There are a few who rush through the storeroom shouting for their young master, but they cannot find him.

from SEARCH IN VAIN (xingqiu)! in this fic, xingqiu's role as the second son of feiyun and xingqiu is thinly separated. that is the context that, i feel, makes this line cool. they are trying to find their young master, but they cannot find him. he is not there. instead, it is xingqiu.

WIP you finally finished!

not necessarily finished... but i am glad i tried writing every day for the month of august! it was really fun. being able to write for 12 days straight was inspiring, and that prompted me to make SLO'S MONTHLY REPORT, a newsletter where i hope to share 1 work every month.

WIP you've yet to finish!

i know i don’t talk about it much but i would really like to rewrite AND expand on FOR YOUR SAKE (chongyun). when i wrote it, i was plagued by the idea to the point i had to publish what i’ve already written to give myself breathing space. i had an idea for a 2/3 part story then, but i just didn’t have the energy or time (or effort to fork out both) for this wip. maybe next year!

Your most read fic this year!

probably… READY, AIM, FIRE (venti)? i am not someone who looks back regularly, and often times notes aren’t an accurate indicator for viewership, but i uploaded it to ao3 and it seems pretty loved there as well.

Your longest fic this year!

SERIOUS SCHEMES AND SINCERE SINS (thoma). it was a whooping 2.8k fic even though i limited myself to 1.5k words MAX. but it is thoma, so i had to. funnily enough, my longest fic for 2022 was also a thoma fic! haha.

Your shortest fic this year!

THROUGH THICK AND THIN (mika). it sits at around 600 words. i wanted it to be a drabble (100 words only), but i couldn't do it. maybe another time!

Fave fic title you used!

THE DUET OF ONE HEART (alhaitham)! this is a small symbolism to the fic. although alhaitham and reader are enemies, because they are on equal grounds to compete they understand each other so well, and their hearts "become one". i think it's a nice title because duet = two people, but it's a duet of one heart—a heart of two people combined. do you see it? XD

Biggest surprise while writing this year!

probably the launch of the steambird’s discord! we’re still a pretty small community, but it has been a blast discussing things and sharing posts with them. we have a writing event due and i look forward to that! also, it’s nice to have people to do writing sprints with.

Fave comment you received this year!

being told that there is an air of domesticity in my fics! i think it’s really endearing if a fic has that domesticity, because it alludes to authenticity and also just the general vibe of the author and reader being friends, and the author is telling their story openly. i’m glad my stories come across that way! i write to connect with people, so i like that it is easy to reach (domestic being associated with homely, comfortable, etc).

Fave fic author to read this year!

@andromeda-nova-writing !! my friend uploaded so many fics this year, including a whole world for vampire!ayato. really proud of her, and i adore her skills in dialogue that really adds a beautiful flow to the fics she writes.

Total fics/chapters uploaded this year!

from the tags i use on this blog (assuming i've tagged things properly), i have a total of 22 fics on thomine. most of them are from au august. i hope to write even more this year! final boss is nanowrimo.

What are you looking forward to next year?

writing more long fics! over the years, i realise my ideas are growing in maturity. they’re no longer ideas that can simply be confined to just 1-2k one-shots. they need space to build itself and grow, so i would like to write longer fics this year. may my fics average to about 3-4k words 🙏 i would need to build a stamina for that, so let’s work on it slowly!

[cricketnationrise]

Chowder + Annie's + November 30th ? HUG congrats on 200 cricket that's sososo awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (Okay so I realise that says hug congrats but I both mean I am hugging you and also HUGE congrats and in ANY case I hope you're having the best day ever and I'm so happy for you!!!!) ~dexsbruins

thank you! enjoy your ficlet <3

_X_ _X_ _X_

Annie's, Nov. 30

Chowder very determinedly focuses on doodling in the back of his notebook. He's not going to watch the door.

He's not.

Because if he's drawing (he's not watching the door) he's not stressing about what time Caitlin is going to get here – if she's going to show up – whether she likes him or likes him likes him—

He doodles. Swirls and a chain of those blocky "S" things and leaves and bubbles and several Sharks logos of dubious quality. (He's not watching the door.)

5 days ago, Dex ran them both into the volleyball team and Chowder met the most beautiful girl he's ever seen. She pulled a leaf out of his hair with a laugh.

3 days ago, Nursey passed along a post-it from someone in his Creative Writing class. It had Caitlin's number on it, and a little heart doodle.

Yesterday, Chowder got the nerve to actually reach out. Their five hour conversation about California and being a college athlete and stressing about picking a major and being homesick and everything in between had ended with:

i'd love to get coffee with you! see you after my 9AM at annies!

So.

Here he sits. (He's not watching the door.) His paper is littered with abstract shapes and a volleyball and ribbons and the curve of a smile and more shark fins than he can count.

The bell over the entrance jingles and he immediately looks up – hoping it's Caitlin – only to slump down again, disappointed. Just some football players.

He sighs, lets his head gently thud onto the page before sitting up and trying to pull himself together. (He's not watching the door.)

It's not like they set a specific time, and he knows she's coming from North Quad, so it's not like he expects her to be here immediately or anything—

He picks up his pen and returns to his doodles. (He's not watching the door.) Stars and hockey sticks and a well and a sun wearing sunglasses and a volleyball net and flames and tessellated cubes and—

"Oh, wow, that looks 'swawesome."

Chowder startles, hard, a harsh line ruining the pattern he was making as he looks up into Caitlin's smiling face.

"H-hey, Caitlin. You made it!" He hurriedly shoves his notebook in his bag and stands up moving forward as if to hug her before jerking back, mortified. They've met once, they aren't there yet, he really needs to dial it back, chill—

Caitlin pulls him into a hug, laughing softly. And shit, Chowder could listen to that sound forever. He melts into the hug, his arms coming up to wrap around her waist tentatively.

"It's good to see you again," she says after pulling back. She steps away, and Chowder misses her warmth immediately.

She nods her head in the direction of the line. "Shall we?"

Grinning wildly, heart pounding, he nods, and follows her.

He doesn't need to watch the door – he's watching her instead.

_X_ _X_ _X_

fun facts: charmer met on Nov 25, a fact i did not look up until after I was done writing.

Enjoyed this? Want your own? See this post for details 💜

[undyingsunshine]

Otto as the Sense of Touch

(Spoilers for Psychonauts 2. Just in case :) )

Also before I start I'd like to say sorry if this is just... Super obvious. And kind of a pointless post. But I've been thinking about it for days and I needed to talk about it somewhere HAHA.

Alright so as we all know, in Helmut Fullbear's mind, Otto appears as his sense of Touch.

This originally struck me as a really... interesting choice. After all, Otto is constantly shown to be separated or distant from the rest of the Psychic Seven.

He's always on his own. In the wedding under the stage in Helmut's mind, Otto stands on one side, while the others stand to the other side. In bob's mind, he isn't at the wedding at all. Cassie's mind has him as someone who's full of himself. In Compton's mind, he's one of the judges. All of this adds up to suggest that he doesn't have the best relationship with members of the Psychic Seven, at least during the events of Psychonauts 2, and at the very least, we know that his relationship with Bob in particular might not have been the most peaceful.

In addition, he's the only one who's shown to be happy at the Motherlobe's opening ceremony, and is one of two original members to even remain there. And unlike Compton, he's much more present and active. Heck, this is stretching a little, but they're even on opposite sides of the Motherlobe.

All this distance - especially physical distance - as well as this sort of... "otherness", and yet he's the feeling of touch. A sense that most likely evokes images of closeness. It didn't quite add up.

Then I realised that he's most likely touch because of how he interacts with the mind. He builds machines, physically bringing his thoughts and dreams into reality. He keeps a whole stroage of brains - the physical form of the mind. He seems much more interested in the physical side of Psychonaut research, rather than the more abstract side - which is further enforced by the fact we never see that abstract side of him. We don't enter his mind, and instead we only get to see and interact with him in the physical realm, through tangible objects that he made himself.

He's. Literally got a hands-on approach to researching the mind. It even shows through the way he channels his psychic energy - through a pendant, rather than through his head, like all of the other Psychonauts we see.

Out of all of them, Otto is the one that's most in-touch with himself and the present; in-touch with his emotions, seemingly perfectly able and willing to talk about his emotions and express them, as we see with his gadgets and machines. ("I made that one when I was angry, I made this one when I was sad.")

He's more grounded, and though he does bare the scars from the battle with Maligula, he's not caught up in his own mental world with it, at least, from what we see. He has his regrets - he shows remorse for what happened - but he's also managed to keep moving forward, pushing and pressing on rather than dwell too much in his own mind.

While it's easy to get lost in the other senses - like sights and sounds - touch is often seen as something that tethers us to reality. To hold and to feel offers tangible comfort. This, in my opinion, suits Otto as the more tangible member of the Psychic Seven.

Quite ironic, though, that with all that in mind, it seems Otto had lost touch with the other members some time efore they all completely drifted apart.

[apixrl]

SINCERELY, YOURS.

hanta sero x fem!reader

WARNING(S): none

word count: 3.0k

song: sincerely, yours // nohidea

note(s): i just think that he'd be the perfect hubby tbh (EDIT: I'M SO DUMB I POSTED W/O TAGS PFAHAHHA)

Hanta finally managed to force open the door to the log cabin that had long been awaiting your arrival, the wooden structure welcoming the approaching warmth and laughter of the newly wedded couple. The ravenette smirked joyously and let out a triumphant 'hoorah', your laughter only adding to the display of ego on his face.

"And you said I'd drop you," Hanta mocked your earlier words, looking down at you with that very same smirk. If not for your arms wrapped around his neck and entire weight held in his arms, you most likely would have pushed his face away by the cheek. To avoid that shit-eating, joking smirk that rarely left his dumb and lovable face. The face you fell for so undoubtedly swift and heavy.

"I didn't say you would I said you may drop me," Was your response. "It's not every day we walk through so much snow!"

"Hush now, that was nothing to me," Hanta lifted the arm that supported your back, planting his lips on your forehead in a sweet welcoming kiss. Your lips curled in approval, accepting the gesture as Hanta used his foot to close the door behind you both, driving away the cold breeze from outside as warmth replaced it. "Now would you look at this place!"

Heeding Hanta's words, your eyes averted from his addicting gaze to the bonnie log cabin interior set out before you two. From left to right the cabin maintained an earthy theme, consistent in wooden textures excluding that of the supple beige sofas in the centre of the room. They were accompanied with ripening red cushions, as well as a few other pieces of furniture containing the same colour to maintain an advertising aesthetic no doubt. Lengthy beams stretched from one end of the walls to the other, set out in rows. The deepest wall (opposite to the entrance) was made mostly out of glass and onlooking a gorgeous snowy forest scene, small golden lights lit up outside to only add to the aura already presented. Built-up by red bricks and extending up toward the ceiling was a great open fireplace, already sparked alight and sensing a contrasting warmth to the bitter cold outdoors. In the corner of the room were a set of stairs most likely directing themselves off to the bedroom, though you and Hanta were so taken by the bottom floor's interior neither of you even processed there were more rooms to see.

"Wow... this place is gorgeous!" You said through a whisper, face lighting up at the sight. Never had you thought a place could be so beautifully arranged and so beautiful in general, and the two of you had this place to yourselves for an entire two weeks... it made you feel like the luckiest person alive! That you were really, as you'd just tied the knot the love of your life and were starting an entirely new journey with him. From the very moment you'd both uttered 'I do' in front of all your friends and family - the paths you lead became one that you would waltz down together.

"So you like it then?" Hanta asked, ebony eyes trailing away from the open fire and down to your own E/C irises. His smirk slowly transitioned to an endearing grin upon seeing your face of wonder, heart skipping a beat as your gaze met his and your expression mirrored.

"Of course! It's just how I imagined it - even more stunning than the pictures online," Your hand grazed Hanta's gloved one, though the barricade of wool and cotton did nothing to prevent the love and desire sent through the tips of your fingers. The ravenette admired your beauty in that lingering stare shared between you, exhaling a content sigh. You never failed to astound him with your beauty, the way your eyes glowed whenever you looked at him. How your hair fell perfectly into place no matter the circumstance (even on your worst of hair days you somehow managed to make it work). Not to mention your smile and laugh - those specific factors alone making Hanta fall for you over and over and exceeding limits of love and admiration he didn't even think he possessed.

Just before Hanta was to fall into daydream you shook him out his thoughts, the shifting of weight in his arms struck him to shake out of it, realising that you were attempting to shuffle out his arms in order to stand. So he let you down, grip loosening and reluctantly allowing you to step away.

"I'm glad," He quickly uttered, his hand lifting to his head to remove the woolly hat resting there. Then he proceeded to unbutton his winter coat as did you, the pair of you making light work of it due to the excitement of exploring your temporary home.

"So our suitcases are already here?" You asked Hanta, straightening out your knitted turtleneck jumper which was a soft pink shade. Usually something you wouldn't wear, but it was well-suited for the weather and didn't irritate your skin. So you took advantage of the purchase. From your left Hanta hummed softly, turning towards you once he was done hanging his coat on the rack. He too had a turtleneck on, but his donned a collect of abstract patterns and stuck to more neutral colours than yours.

"Yep, they should be upstairs," Hanta replied, running a hand through his hair as he looked over at you. He shifted over to your side, hugging you from behind with a mischievous chuckle. "But we can unpack tomorrow,"

"I like the idea of that, I just wanna snuggle," You responded with a giggle, leaning back into your husband's hold. After a few seconds Hanta stepped forwards, forcing your feet to follow suit. The ravenette guided you both to the nearest sofa, where he messily fell back against the ruby red cushions and you alongside him.

"That's because you procrastinate more than you've ever been willing to admit," Hanta turned you over so you sat atop his middle, hands settled on your hips like they were structured to hold them. There was a smirk on his face as you rolled your eyes at his last comment.

"I procrastinate because you distract me," You corrected, poking his chest with a prominent finger.

"Ah well, what can I say? I'm just that pretty aren't I?" He replied, laughing joyously. You couldn't help but echo with your own form of a chuckle, shaking your head as the smile on your face sent Hanta all kinds of elated emotions through his veins.

"You're not wrong there, Tiger," You grinned ear to ear, staring lovingly in his direction. Words weren't enough to express how much you loved him, your mind struggling to form sentences most of the time with just how much he took your breath away. In truth, you would have allowed yourself to remain gazing into Hanta's eyes the entire night. But you were due to catch sight of an envelope on the coffee table next to you both, drawing your attention away from him as fast as it came. The item too out of the ordinary to ignore. Peculiarly you leaned over to grab it, tilting your head at the item.

"What's that?"

"I don't know," Was your answer. Your fingers proceeded to slit open the top, discovering a smaller, folded piece of paper inside. Curiously you opened it up, voice filling the room as you discovered golden ink was printed on one side and intended to read it out.

" Dear Mr and Mrs Sero,

We are beyond pleased that you chose to stay with us for your honeymoon. Have a wonderful and splendid time at the start of your journey together and we wish you nothing but happiness and joy during your stay.

Kindest regards,

[resort/name] "

"Mr and Mrs Sero," Hanta repeated with a thoughtful stare to the wooden beams above. "I'm still not used to hearing that and we've already been married a week," A smile formed on his lips, releasing a chuckle from the depths of his chest. Almost like he couldn't believe the words he had just uttered. Tilting your head, you pondered on what he meant.

"How do you mean?" You didn't receive an answer straight away, the man you called your husband gently sighed, almost with the case of the lovesick. Somewhere during the exhale Hanta's eyes fell from the beamed ceiling and onto you, gratitude threaded in his expression as he stared at you.

"I just don't know how I got so lucky to marry someone like you," His hand extended to cup your cheek, cradling the slightly chilled part of your face (thanks to the cold air and wind from outside) as his thumb stroked the surface of your skin. Your eyes widened, all too used to the gesture but rarely ever prepared for it whenever Hanta committed to it. You smiled, nuzzling into his warm hold as your eyes closed.

"Me too," You hummed, sighing out yourself as your heart fluttered higher and higher with each passing second. A short silence ensued, ending as you abruptly let out a little laugh. It caught Hanta's attention, his head cosying into the cushion behind him as his brows raised.

"What?"

"Oh, nothing. I was just thinking about the night you proposed. That's all," Another laugh escaped, humour striking you as you recalled how it had played out. From the manner your lover rolled his eyes, he clearly still hadn't emotionally recovered from it.

"That stupid fire pit," He groaned, eyes closing in annoyance. "I can't believe I let it ruin the moment,"

"I don't think that was the fire's intention, Hants,"

Despite being blatantly confident and bold, when it came to more... intimacy-related things, Hanta Sero's expertise dwindled dangerously. It had taken him months of knowing you to actually ask you out on a date, and when you finally got together? Well, it took him four years before he began to think about popping the question - three months more to actually pop it. Whilst you did say yes once he got down on one knee on the balcony of your holiday home for your fourth anniversary together, the events that proceeded after were what truly traumatised the poor ravenette.

Your holiday was spent somewhere in the Caribbean at a beachside residence that locals rented out for tourists. You and Hanta had always been big on travelling, hence your honeymoon location being such an unconventional place. Or as far as you knew, you didn't have an exact number on how many honeymoons were spent in remote mountain ranges surrounded by blustering winds and snow. It was a nice change of pace to the intense heats nearer the Equator.

During that vacation in particular though, that was the year Hanta finally decided to propose. After a long day on the beach, swimming in the ocean and feeling the sand between your toes as evening approached, you watched the sunset on the balcony of the second floor, neighbouring your bedroom. To set the mood the firepit in the centre had been lit, creating a stunning orange glow in Hanta's eyes as he held you close to his chest.

You noticed he was quite fidgety in his seat, wondering what was wrong with your lover as he gripped his knee tight. Like he was uncomfortable or nervous. Like he needed to get something off of his chest. It was only when you pointed out your concern and his odd behaviour that Hanta managed to shift his stance. Moving from his stiff position to wobbling on one knee, then came the heartfelt speech that gave you a sense of where he was going. A subtle reach into his pocket and before you knew it, you were shouting yes into the night sky and your eyes foggy with tears of complete and utter joy.

Hanta placed the ring on your finger, the realisation hitting him at that moment that you and he were engaged. His excitement got the better of him, the male sweeping you in his arms and swinging you around as he babbled sweet nothings into your ear. The speed wavered his balance, his leg knocking into the table holding a bottle of wine he had ordered specifically for the occasion. Much to both of your bad luck, it all collapsed against the firepit and tipped it over - and one can only imagine what happened next. A rather chaotic ruckus erupted between you as Hanta grabbed you by the waist and flung you both out of the building via the balcony to ensure your safety. Then he 'thwipped' straight back up to the fire and frantically searched for the fire extinguisher to put it out, all whilst you sat on the sandy ground outside, frozen to how drastically the mood had changed.

Luckily the fire didn't spread too far. If not for Hanta's efficiency in dealing with it upfront, it could have spread to the bedroom and the rest of the house. It did not, however, the most damage being the balcony sofas that were scorched no thanks to their wooden frame and white cushioning.

Despite having just been engaged, there wasn't much you and Hanta could do to celebrate. So the night ended with you and he falling to slumber in the early hours of the morning, too exhausted after dealing with the owners' wrath after the slight mishap of nearly setting their building ablaze.

"At least you didn't burn the entire house down," You tried after a few seconds of quiet, earning a scoff on Hanta's part as he ran a hand through his hair.

"It felt like it when I called the owner's to tell them what happened," Hanta answered, softly frowning at the shrieking yells he heard during that call ringing their way through his mind again. Long after he'd shut them out based on the humiliation of being on the receiving end. You giggled, recalling how you were able to hear them despite the phone not being on speaker.

"I'm surprised they let us stay for the rest of the week,"

"That's because I paid the money for the damage caused within six hours of them demanding it," Hanta reminded you, dragging his hands down his face as he groaned out. Probably expelling his inner cringe at his foolishness that night. "Times like that make me relieved I'm a top ten pro, helps out with emergencies a great fucking deal,"

"Are you sure that didn't play any part in their generosity? That you're a top ten pro?"

"No way," He said and sat up to meet your height, hands looping to cradle the small of your back. He held back continuing to briefly peck you on the lips. "The bill they gave me was the complete opposite of generous,"

"How much was it again?" You asked, memory not serving you the answer. The ebony-haired male leaned forwards to kiss you again before he moved his lips up to your ear. His voice became a whisper, telling the sum in Yen which made your eyes widen in astonishment.

"Wow," Was your instinctive reply, Hanta scoffing a laugh in agreement based on your tone of surprise. It was there he nuzzled into your neck, inhaling through his nose to catch a whiff of your scent. The aroma acting as a sedative to wipe the memory from his mind permanently. All he wished to remember of that night was the way your face lit up as he asked you to take his hand in marriage. How your tears formed and how your lips uttered the words he had oh, so desperately wanted to hear after months and months of worry of being rejected.

And look at you both now; husband and wife and on your honeymoon. Holding each other as close as close can be with no doubt or hesitancy in your minds at all. Why he had worried so much was something he would never be able to figure out. As looking back, all of it felt like the easiest thing he had ever had to do.

Due to that, Hanta smiled into your neck. The change could have been missed, but you were far too attentive to not notice. The feeling of his cheeks shaping his smile made you smile as well, your arms wrapping around Hanta's neck in a desperate need to pull him closer. Your fingers ghosted the back of his neck, tickling the hairs that attached with care like no other. You rested your chin on his head, eyes closed gently in comfort. In response, Hanta hummed lowly, hands starting to rub up and down your back like he was giving you a massage.

Silence passed, the two of you simply enjoying the other's company and the intimate moment you had welded together. The proximity created a warmth that could fight any cold, the fireplace behind you both unneeded to fight the swirling snow outside. Your eyes peaked open as the faint crackle of the fire nearby caught your attention. You watched the flames dance for a second or so before you plucked up the confidence to speak.

"Just... let's not set fire to this place. Alright?" You mused, holding your breath as you waited for Hanta's response. Luckily he didn't dismiss it, actually finding the comment quite funny. He voiced a blurt of a laugh, head shaking as much as he could make it whilst it buried into the depths of your neck. Hanta's mouth opened to make his reply, quickly hushing up again to return to the peaceful silence of before, not at all ready to let it go just yet.

"Agreed,"

[mangoofthesea]

I was tagged by @abstract-moth to post 10 songs I’ve been obsessed with lately. In no particular order. Thank you so much I was thinking how I haven't done a tag game in ages so this was very fun to think about (you have excellent choice in songs btw I love loads of the ones you mentioned)

1. EXPIRED by jenny nuo

I honestly love this song since I heard it, it has this angry vibe about being tired of a town you moved to where you don't belong and never have and looking forward to moving away which is me this year while I wait for the autumn and its incredibly cathartic. "i think this town has expired on me" "school is just a building where people come and go"

2. The Red Means I Love You by Madds Buckley

I love songs like this that are kind of different and fun and its based on a villain from bnha, Toga, and it just makes me feel cool and evil lol

3. Funkle Phil by Bear Ghost

I heard the beginning of this song on an animatic by an artist i love (Yamz Animatics on youtube go check them out i love their videos) and the vibes oh my gosh i listened to it on repeat for a couple days the other week and has a very hype vibe and excellent electric guitar and drums which i adore. classically rock/punky. "gonna blast off, oh oh ah, and rocking til the day we die"

4. To The Bone by JT Music

Another one like red means i love you that's about the game undertale sung by the two main skeleton characters Sans and Papyrus. I never played undertale but I heard about it from friends. This is the song with the lyrics "I am the mastermind he's my accomplice, you're only still alive because I made a promise" - I heard it the first time on a hq tiktok and something about it just had me obsessed. It was my spotify top song last year and I still like it. (84 plays in 2021)

5. B.O.M.B by emlyn

The chorus is 'I'm back on my bullshit' and about reclaiming your Energy and getting over a breakup. I'm not getting over a breakup but I like the energy of Getting Back Up Again.

6. Made for This by City Wolf

Such a vibe oh man. Another get back up kind of song that always makes me want to bear my teeth and grin. I heard it the first time on a Zuko music video that was overlaid with his words about fighting to survive. "you're stronger now can't hold you down, you were never born to quit, keep on throwing rocks and fists, you gotta stand up, you were made for this" "stand tall head first into danger".

7. Between My Teeth by Orla Garden

First song I found that properly conveyed my feelings towards relationships and my last relationship where I knew I would hurt them if we stayed together cos I didn't want a relationship. "you need me I don't need you" "please don't lean on me cos I don't want your heart between my teeth" "I can't take the pressure of it I can barely breathe" "You deserve someone else".

8. Bored by Tessa Violet

Slightly self explanatory "its 4am again, you'd think that I could sense a trend. I'm staying up too late just so that I can stay awake". Also its a bop and I love it.

9. Merry Go Round by MAN WITH A MISSION

It's the theme of bnha season 5 part 2. I really really love it. Feels like a song about a fight and hypes me up especially when I listen to it while writing.

10. Soldier, Poet, King by The Oh Hellos

I heard this first on a beautiful bnha animatic for a fantasy/pirate au and I don't know what it is about it but it makes me want to cry and dance at the same time. Very folky and soft and hopeful then finishes in a brilliant faster fiddle section that sounds like you would dance to around a fire in a field with the biggest smile.

this all made me realise I only pay attention to around 30% of the lyrics in most songs I love lol. Honorable mention to Surface Pressure from Encanto too just cos I love it.

Tagging @apparently-a-robot @r0ckyr04d @ihavenomoralsss @ash-and-starlight and @that-was-anticlimactic but no pressure of any kind do it if you want and if not have a lovely day

[n1kolaiz]

ENTJ + INFJ DYNAMIC

BSD MANGA CHAPTER 54-57 SPOILERS

Chapter 54 introduced Mushitaro Oguri, and his background involving Yokomizo was ever so intriguing to me. So unfortunately, here I am.

Mushitaro and Yokomizo's dynamic:

The 'Commander' meets the 'Idealist.'

Alright, I won't go into the details about the case of Yokomizo's death, because there's no way in hell I can explain it fluently at all. So if you need further reference to what these few chapters are about, popopretty's post would elaborate on the details and whatnot.

Before I start, here's a bit of little introduction to both individual characters:

MUSHITARO OGURI

Mushitaro appears to take a lot of pride in his ability, which contributes to his arrogant complex altogether. He had his own desires and goals, and lived out his days just to fulfil them.

His ability is called the 'Perfect Crime,' which allows him to erase any trail of evidence pertaining to whatever crime he had committed. Hence, he is also known as the 'infallible Detective-killer.'

Until Ranpo proved him wrongヾ(❀╹◡╹)ﾉﾞ

His personality type is most likely 'ENTJ,' the 'Commander.'

- ENTJs are known to have exceptional leadership skills. They are confident in themselves and what they do; basically, they don't have the tendency to second-guess what they are capable of. This explains Mushitaro's ambition to achieve his ends, and his ability goes the extra mile of complimenting his success rate greatly. Whether his motives or the end results were morally good or evil, it didn't matter to Mushitaro— as long as his wishes were fulfilled.

"With tyrants and demons, I'll make deal with a demon. That's in my nature."

- They're also quite outspoken with their opinions. It's a fairly minor detail, but this shows why he wasn't afraid to express the distaste he had for mystery novels to Yokomizo— including the extravagant ideas and serpentine stories his close friend based his life upon and discussed with him.

- The subtle insensitivity mixed in with an ENTJ's preference of logic over emotion highlights one of their core weaknesses: which brings us back to Mushitaro's ability to kill his friend. Say you were to put a person with a deeply compassionate heart, who's also very well in-tact when it comes to identifying emotions and being empathetical to other's feelings: would that person be able to kill a friend they'd known for so long? For the sole reason of making his last mystery novel a deathless enigma? This is very subjective perspective, but I believe that if Mushitaro was more of an emotionalist rather than a strategist, things would have turned out different for Yokomizo's eventual fate.

Side note: His insensitivity did, however, find its limit when he realised how devastating it was to have killed his own friend with his hands. Even though there's a wide scale that measures how insensitive a person can be, they are, in fact, still human beings capable of feeling. Killing someone dear to you is no easy task; there is a breaking point for the hardest of hearts.

SEISHI YOKOMIZO

Yokimozo, also known as Kindaichi, was a mystery writer who was very particular about detail and being exclusive, especially when it came to his works. His last wish he pursued to achieve before a terminal illness took his life was done by formulating a 'mystery that transcended reality.'

"I hate regret. So I've done whatever I've wanted to do. Up until now, it's been a satisfying life. But now… I've been given a time limit…Before then, I have to complete the ultimate mystery."

His personality type is identified as 'INFJ,' also known as the 'Idealist.'

- INFJ's are deeply creative and artistic, but they express it in various different ways. For Yokomizo, he portrayed his brilliant artistic skill through his writings revolving around mysteries and their compelling depths. The fictional character's namesake was also a mystery novel writer. Yokomizo was pretty well-versed with how mysteries worked and how their details ravelled themselves into elegantly, well-established riddles, which only added to his natural flair of writing.

- Generally, INFJs are reserved, but incredibly idealistic. Yokomizo was seen to be very abstract in his idea of thinking, and this is due to the fact that INFJs have a thing for pondering about life and the meaning behind everything.

"Mushi-kun, I bet you're laughing at me for destroying myself for the sake of mystery. But if that's the case, maybe there's no such thing as unshakable values. Maybe it's up to us to decide what to put value in and what to live for. After all, we have the right to turn our own decisions into our entire world. It is, foolishly enough, the greatest luxury afforded to mankind."

- As for their weaknesses, some INFJs are very hard to get to know. They are mysterious at times, which prevents them from being flamboyant with their thoughts and opinions. Yokomizo had a very lighthearted, mystifying nature, which made him a very interesting character altogether. Despite having a high regard for their intimate relationships— INFJs can be quite private. Mushitaro vaguely points out his self-contained, introverted mannerisms in this panel:

Now, I'll get to my point.

ENTJs and INFJs don't ideally match up, but when it comes to general friendships, there are a few details that suggest an accomodating dynamic between the two personality types. These qualities emanate from Mushitaro and Yokomizo's friendship with each other.

Opposites attract in most cases, correct?

Well, in this case, ENTJs and INFJs have a lot of similarities:

intelligent

intuitive in thinking

determined

goal-oriented

But the more numerable contrasting qualities is what really brings out the agreeable traits between Mushitaro and Yokozimo. Think of it as a system where two opposites mutually keep each other in check:

1. Mushitaro bases his life on the gaining his own needs and wants, and is very firm in his sense of realism, while Yokomizo is more focused on the deep, complexities of life itself. This may come off as impractical to ENTJs, but also compliments their coordination with INFJs. Realism limits idealism, but idealists can also expand the boundaries realists place themselves in.

2. INFJs accept people and ideas as they are, not willing to put others down just to prove themselves right. Yokozimo's tolerant behaviour stands in contrast with how authoritative Mushitaro is, especially when it boils down to his arrogance— he isn't afraid to spit his pride right into his opponent's face.

Kneel, detectives! I am the king of crime! No one can force me to sin and repent!

Just for laughs reference^

So it's safe to say that because Yokomizo had an acquired sense of serenity and open-mindedness, he was able to tolerate Mushitaro's extravagant, subtle histrionic characteristics, which were laced with his superior complex.

3. In the manga, Yokomizo speaks and converses with Mushitaro in a way that suggests that he is careful with his words. INFJs are gentle and generally sensitive to the needs of others, so they tend to be careful with what comes out of their mouths. Mushitaro, like most ENTJs, are quite blunt. This points back to how insensitive they come off, even if they don't actually mean it. So when it comes to Yokozimo explaining tales of mystery to Mushitaro, Mushitaro doesn't hesitate to mock Yokozimo; but because of how understanding Yokozimo is, he doesn't take Mushitaro's opinions too seriously to the point of discounting the value of their friendship, because he knew Mushitaro didn't use his words with the intention to harm.

If you were to place a more dominant persona in Yokomizo's position, I doubt that that person would be able to tolerate such behaviours. Then again, this is crucially subjective.

I suppose the main thing I wanted to point out was how ENTJs and INFJs balanced each other out by cancelling out each other's extreme traits, and keeping each other in the middle of the equilibrium altogether. But another thing I'd like to point out to sum up Mushitaro and Yokozimo's relationship was this: the fact that Mushitaro had to kill his own friend to grant his dying wish. Dying for someone or by someone's hands is easier than killing someone, especially if that someone is dear to you, no? I guess that's the part I can't fathom— it was the type of relationship that stood out way more than I had expected. Say, the roles were switched, would Yokomizo actually kill Mushitaro? Or would Mushitaro think of such an incomprehensible way to die in the first place? Or what if these two friends had different, more superior traits that coexisted in conflict all the time, would Yokomizo even depend on Mushitaro with such a task?

The speculations are endless, or maybe it's pretty straightforward. Though, I hope this made sense.

Okay, I'm done rambling for now. Thank you for reading!

[chibimyumi]

how would you describe ciel’s and sebastian’s relationship? like yes literally it’s contractor and the one who agrees to the contract. but like their day to day relationship with eachother. i dont ship them but i love how they interact with one another but don’t know how to characterize their relationship.

Dear Anon,

O!Ciel and Sebastian’s relationship is not something I could fit into any inter-human relationship categories. This is because theirs is simply something that seems very unlikely for humans to have in our society. However, that is exactly what makes this master-servant duo interesting.

Most clinically, O!Ciel and Sebastian are indeed master and servant, child and adult. Though surely very rare, child-employers with adult-employees might exist in our world. What makes O!Ciel and Sebastian’s relationship unique is by no means limited to this ‘subversion’ of child-adult dynamic. Let us unpack this master-servant bond category by category, layer by layer.

1. Child vs Adult – Age Dynamic

A unique characteristic of O!Ciel and Sebastian’s relationship is how they do not behave like any child vs adult would. Sebas treats O!Ciel like a child, but he does not see his master as a child. And by ‘child’, I mean more specifically ‘a less-than-adult’ person. To Sebastian who is centuries old, a human who is 13 is as inexperienced and foolish as a 30 or 60 year old human. Instead, it seems like Sebas treats O!Ciel like a child only because it gets on his master’s nerves and it is entertaining.

We must remember that humans are cattle to Sebas, and that O!Ciel is no exception. For analogy’s sake, let us imagine a pig. Humans usually don’t have a higher regard or respect for adult pigs than they have for piglets. We don’t take adult pigs more seriously than we do piglets.

2. Master vs Servant – Power Dynamic

The most unique part in O!Ciel and Sebas’ relationship is not that a child is the employer of an adult, omnipotent demon. The uniqueness is in the detail that this specific employer has absolute command over Sebastian, and can even use the demon’s powers against him at will. We see in the Werewolf Arc for example, how O!Ciel has practically already broken his end of the contract. Sebastian was in full right to claim his payment for his service and return home. But since the contract was technically not over yet, O!Ciel stopped the demon from exerting his right with just one simple phrase: “it’s an order.”

Sebastian may seem all-powerful, but if O!Ciel wishes to make Sebas do something against his will, O!Ciel merely needs to use the binding magical term “it’s an order”. This binding term is so powerful it can infringe all of Sebastian’s personal autonomy, and it would be ““legal””. What if Sebas doesn’t want to be touched? “It’s an order, let person X touch you and get away without harm.” What if Sebas doesn’t want to expose himself to lethal danger? “It’s an order, do it anyway.”

This is the reason why SebaCiel could never work (even if O!Ciel were an adult!), simply because the power balance is inherently tipped way too much to O!Ciel’s side. A romantic and/or sexual relationship cannot work as long as the power balance is off, and true consent cannot be given on all sides. Consent that can be coerced, or cannot be withdrawn freely, is not true consent, after all.

3. Master vs Servant - Bickering

There is a lot of back-and-forth bickering between O!Ciel and Sebastian, which is very uncharacteristic of employer-employee relationships (No way I’m going to bicker against my boss!) Sometimes the bickering is light-hearted and comical, and I surmise this is part of the reason people might have the illusion that their power-dynamic is not completely off (as described above).

This light-hearted bickering is a great appeal, and it makes the master not behave like a full master, and the servant not like a full servant. On surface their contract bears semblance to a friendly relationship wherein both parties also fulfil their respective roles in this employment. This is a powerful ingredient in their usually fantastic cooperation during their missions! O!Ciel allows Sebas some freedom (when he sees fit), while Sebas returns this ‘kind gesture’ with helpful initiatives (when he sees fit). I dare say that many if not most ‘Kuroshitsuji’ fans are here exactly for this reason. Regardless of how fantastic this cooperation might be however, at core their relationship is still ‘employment’.

On the darker side however, this bickering is also one of the fruits born from insidious manipulation. In this post I discussed how Sebastian stretches his arms and legs as WIDELY as possible within his tiny constraints. To a certain extent, O!Ciel turns a blind eye (pun not intended) to it. Why though?

Of course O!Ciel is not a complete tyrant towards Sebastian, but this is the result that Sebastian managed to fight and win for himself. All the way back in chapter 138 Sebas didn’t even know O!Ciel yet, and yet he already made very clear that:

He should not try to exert too much control over him

That if he does try to do so, he should be careful with words

That if he is not careful, Sebas will take any opportunity to punish him for careless word-choice

In this small incident O!Ciel learned that if his demon misbehaves, he’d have himself to blame. THIS is the silent lesson Sebas instilled into the boy; that if Sebas mistreats O!Ciel, it is not Sebas who crossed boundaries, but that O!Ciel didn’t set the boundaries right. “O!Ciel had it coming”. This lesson taught by Sebas leans dangerously close to – if not downright within – the category of victim-blaming. (Sebas you trashy Trash Demon™, I love you.)

3.1. Circus Arc

So far in the manga, the most obvious example of this victim-blaming dynamic is the incident with the snakes in the Circus Arc. Sebas very clearly reminded O!Ciel that he is not above allowing his master to get hurt semi-mortally. O!Ciel was seething when he found out, and justly so. But did Sebas show any remorse? Of course not. Instead he blamed O!Ciel for:

Not being careful enough with his commands

Being too boring to see the ‘fun’ in this game

3.2. Jack the Ripper Arc

Far more dramatically, this same victim-blaming dynamic can found in the Jack the Ripper Arc, and this one arguably even dictated how O!Ciel is going to become as a person.

In the Ripper Arc Sebas also obeyed O!Ciel’s order to the T. But that’s it; only to the T and nothing more. Because the demon deliberately withheld information from his master necessary for the investigation, more victims fell while the case was still in O!Ciel’s hands. Who gets the blame? Jack the Ripper obviously. But who is made to bear the guilt? O!Ciel is; through the victim-blaming Sebastian made him internalise.

O!Ciel is still O!Ciel, so he probably didn’t really lose any sleep over the deaths of 5 people. But had he not been him, then surely this guilt would have been mind-crippling. However, we need to bear in mind that O!Ciel was not unaffected; had Sebas not withheld information, then O!Ciel would have stopped the murders earlier, and presented a scapegoat to the Queen. Let’s be fair, had Madam been arrested then she’d still be awaiting capital punishment. But as the Watchdog, O!Ciel pulls some strings. He would have tried VERY hard not to lose his aunt too.

As it is however, the enormous guilt about the death of his own aunt is what Sebas made O!Ciel suffer through slow and insidious manipulation. Sebas never gave O!Ciel the time to mourn his aunt, and instead pressured the boy into admitting that he ‘callously sacrificed Madam as a pawn’. He made him mentally TAKE the blame for the murder that Grell committed, and Sebas could have helped prevent.

As we can see in chapter 13, O!Ciel was desperately trying to externalise the blame, coming up with excuse after excuse, justification after justification. None however, works. Good seasoning skills, Sebas, amazing food-prep.

I am fairly certain that O!Ciel doesn’t even realise how much he’s being emotionally manipulated by his butler throughout the years. This insight about emotional manipulation and psychological abuse is something that requires a level of abstract comprehension we cannot expect from most people, let alone a 13 year old child (however smart they may be.)

4. Conclusion

In conclusion, both Sebas and O!Ciel exist in this relationship rather amicably on surface level, but they are inherently toxic to each other. Sebas is continuously manipulating and emotionally abusing O!Ciel, while O!Ciel holds the absolute power to infringe all of Sebastian’s autonomy.

This ⇊ illustration by Yana is the perfect symbolisation of their bond.

We can attach adjectives like “f*cking toxic” and “fascinating” to this relationship, but we can’t find a category of inter-human relationship to fit O!Ciel and Sebastian into. In real life there are no children who can wield magical command to strip someone entirely of their autonomy. Likewise, there are very few adults who would not consider a child as ‘less-than-adult’. Should we try to shoe-horn O!Ciel and Sebas into a human category, then we risk over-simplifying this relationship. Over-simplification of this relationship can be very harmful, because the subverted formula of “child-master and adult-servant” SEEMS to compensate for the inherent power imbalance.

Yana however, managed to write this relationship SO brilliantly complex, that Sebas will always remain the servant who is at O!Ciel’s mercy, while O!Ciel suffers continuous mental abuse despite holding the ultimate ace card against a demon. This complex relationship is the ultimate evidence that even the most toxic relationships can look functional on surface level, and I love hating it!

I hope this helps give some insight!

[riversofmars]

World Enough, And Time

Here it is! One year on from posting my first long DW fic, I'm incredibly excited to start another! I'll keep working on all the prompts as well but I need a big thing to sink my teeth into and I'm really excited about this. I've had a lot of requests about doing more River & 13 having children but I also wanted to do a suspenseful adventure... so why not do both? I won't give too much away but I really hope you'll like it! <3

Rating: General, will probably go up to Teen for mild threat etc

Word Count: 4.8k 

River Song is pregnant when she leaves the Doctor on Darillium, intent on investigating an emerging threat to the family they would soon have. Time and space get in the way and soon she finds herself having to entrust her newborn to Vastra and Jenny for safekeeping. While River sets off to the Library looking for clues, the Paternoster Gang reach out to the Doctor. Their message arrives far later than expected.

Chapter 1: After The Long Night

Darillium, 52nd Century

“You’re up early.“ The Doctor’s Scottish drawl was soft and affectionate as it pulled River Song out of her thoughts. She looked up from buttoning her blouse to find her husband entering their suite with breakfast on a tray. She smiled at the little routine that had snuck in over the past twenty-four years. Every morning the Doctor would bring her breakfast in bed; if you could call it morning. On Darillium, a night lasted twenty-four Earth-standard years so of course it wasn’t actually the morning as such, just the end of their sleep cycle. The Doctor always woke first, he slept far less than River, which he insisted was due to his Timelord physiology. River, however, knew there was more to it. Romance wasn’t the Doctor’s strong suit but this he was comfortable with, so she indulged him.

“Up bright and early, yes. Big day ahead.“ River answered cheerfully as she regarded herself in the mirror of her dresser: Just a touch of make up, some mascara and lipstick to apply and she would be combat ready. She could feel his eyes on her but she didn’t turn, she struggled enough without having to look in his puppy dog eyes.

“Going somewhere?“ The Doctor frowned, observing his wife more carefully. Lots of things pointed to something being off, but none more obvious than the gun holster and blaster pistole. She’d had the good grace of draping her jacket over it but he wasn’t fooled that easily. The Doctor glanced out of a window to find that day was about to break. The long night was over and his hearts grew heavy with the knowledge of what was to come. For so long he had pretended that this day wouldn’t come. It had been such an abstract concept, a point in their future that they needn’t worry about. Twenty-four years had flown by. If only they had more time. For the man who had been running all his life, decades of standing still had been the most welcome reprieve. He tried his best to swallow down his emotions as he watch her get up. He knew he couldn’t reveal the foreknowledge he had. He couldn’t change his wife’s future as he world be rewriting his own past, but for a moment, he seriously considered it.

“Nothing for you to worry about. I’ll be back in no time.“ River winked as she strapped her vortex manipulator to her wrist. She had considered borrowing her husband’s TARDIS but had come to the conclusion that she preferred her own means of time travel: less bulky. She didn’t like leaving him upset but there were things she had to do; and it wasn’t like she wasn’t going to come back. She thought it best for both of them if they didn’t make a big deal about it.

“Cup of coffee first?“ The Doctor tried his best to sound cheerful but his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes. He knew this was how it ended, even if River did not. This would be the last time they would see each other.

“Tell you what, I’ll be sure to pop back in five minute’s time, then we can have a proper breakfast.“ River realise the Doctor had seen her gun so she didn't bother trying to hide it and instead made quite work of fastening the holster to herself. She was surprised that he didn’t comment. It had so often been cause for disagreement but now, he looked resigned to it. It almost gave her pause. “I will be back.“ She said, addressing his obvious discomfort with a reassuring smile.

“Of course you will.“ He forced a smile in return. “At least have a bite to eat. No good running around on an empty stomach and knowing you, there will be lost of running.“ He tried to make light of the situation, setting the tray down at last.

“To be honest, I’m not really hungry. Bit of an upset stomach.“ River pulled her coat on, the last item of clothing she required.

“The sunrise then. Let me have that at least. Come on, we’ve waited twenty-four years for it!“ He wouldn’t take no for an answer. He grabbed her wrist and pulled her along to the balcony. Countless nights they’d sat there and looked at the stars together. Now, first light snuck across the marble floor.

“If you insist.“ River couldn’t deny him this. He opened the double doors and lead her outside. The air was brisk but there was a sweetness to it as first sunbeams alleviated the long night, almost like the smell of spring flowers on Earth. The sky was a marvel of pink, orange and purple. A sunrise that would creep across the sky for years as the long day began. River couldn’t wait to come back. It wasn’t an empty promise, she fully intended on it. She didn’t care what the stories said. It was idle gossip that she didn’t care for: so what if this was the last night she spent with the Doctor? She intended to make it a lovely day, too. There were just a few things she had to deal with so she could rest easily. They had found happiness on Darillium and she was not prepared to let anything jeopardise that.

“So? What do you think?“ The Doctor’s voice pulled her out of her thoughts and he wrapped his arms around her as she stood at the railing, looking out across the barren world that had been their home for so long now. It wasn’t quite the same view as from the restaurant balcony but they could still make out the Singing Towers in the distance. A faint hum carried over to them. It was distinctly more sad than their song during the sunset.

“I love you.“ River grabbed on to his arms, holding them tightly across her stomach. It was the simplest truth of her life and there was nothing else to say. This wasn’t goodbye. She would be back as soon as she could and for the Doctor it would be no time at all. She took note of the space time coordinates on her vortex manipulator so she wouldn’t be late when she returned.

“I love you, too, River.“ He pressed a kiss to the back of her head, holding her close. River took a deep breath struggling for composure as the depth of the emotion in his voice took her off guard. He wasn’t exactly the romantic or overly emotional type, so she appreciated his words and their meaning all the more.

“Right then, don’t get all sentimental on me now. I’ll be back before you know it. And I’ll probably have worked up an appetite so don’t eat all the croissant again!“ River joked, trying her best not to let her husband’s emotional statement rattle her. She had every intention of returning and nothing would be able to keep her from finding him again. Till death do us apart - And she really meant it. They had wasted too much time slipping in and out of each other’s lives. They had a life together now and so much more to look forward to. She would be back as soon as she could; as soon as she had seen to their continued safety. She turned in his arms and stood on her tiptoes to press a soft, comforting kiss to his lips.

“Don’t be long.“ The Doctor took her face in his hands and kissed her forehead softly, though not quickly enough to stop River catching a glimpse of the deep sadness in his eyes.

“Wouldn’t dream of it.“ She tried her best to reassure him with another kiss but couldn’t bring herself to say anything else without chocking up. She hoped he already knew all the things she couldn’t say. “Won’t be a minute, Sweetie.“ She took a step back, out of his arms and engaged the vortex manipulator before he could change his mind about trying to stop her.  

——

London, Late 19th Century

“Ma’am?“

“Not now, Jenny, I am so close to seeing this pattern, there has to be something to it…“ Madame Vastra stepped back from the board she was currently pinning notes to. They were dealing with a very complicated case of jewellery theft all across London’s high society and the Silurian was sure she was close to cracking it. If anyone could, it was her, she was the Great Detective after all, and she worked hard to live up to the title.

“Ma’am it’s rather important.“ Jenny Flint interrupted, intent on getting her attention. “We have a visitor.“

“If it’s Inspector Abberline again, I will contact him as soon as I have news. That man is so terribly impatient.“ Vastra sighed with a dismissive wave. She didn’t take kindly to her work being interrupted.

“It’s not the Inspector, Ma’am. It is rather more important and … impossible … as that.“ Jenny insisted more firmly which made the lizard woman look around at last.

“Impossible, you say?“ She echoed, her interest peaked. The expression on her wife’s face made clear this matter required her urgent attention.

“Quite.“ Jenny confirmed and stepped aside.

Vastra had barely made it out of her study when she spotted a woman waiting in the entrance hall. Despite having her back turned to her, the lady of the house recognised her immediately. In her long life, she had ever only known one person who sported a head of hair as impressive as that.

“Professor Song.“ Vastra tried to keep surprise and disbelief from her voice but she couldn’t quite manage it. The last time they had seen River Song was when they had contacted her at the Library in aid of the Doctor. She had been dead a while then, her mind uploaded to the data core but without physical shape. Conscious but trapped. This River Song, however, insisted on looking so very much alive. Particularly when she turned around, revealing a small baby boy in her arms. She cradled him against her chest trying to sooth him. He was crying, the time jump had woken him up.

“Madame Vastra, I am ever so sorry to barge into your home like this, but I need your help and I know I can rely on the three of you.“ She glanced in between the two woman and then up to Strax who had just appeared on the landing, eager to see what the commotion was about.

“No offence, Professor, but you should be…“ Jenny started but Vastra quickly jumped in, shushing her.

“How can we be of service, Professor? Is this about the Doctor?“

“Somewhat. Not quite. He doesn’t know about this and he needn’t know just yet, I need him to be focused for what happens next.“ River answered vaguely. She had been determined to keep the Doctor blissfully unaware for her activities but she had taken far too long already. Now, things were getting to the point where she couldn’t keep him in the dark any longer. She needed his help but he couldn’t know about her visit here, not yet anyway.

When she had left Darillium, she had imagined things differently: What was meant to be a quick investigatory trip had turned into nine months of goose chases and dead ends. Her hopes of returning to Darillium and keeping the Doctor out of it had been dashed when she realised she would need his help. She swallowed the guilt about what else she had kept from him but she knew she couldn’t have take the chance of returning early and putting all of them in danger.  

“How long ago did you leave him?“ Vastra asked slowly, appraising their visitor. She appeared exhausted but insisted on compensating for it by carrying herself with assurance and purpose.

“About nine months of my time. Now please…“ River averted her eyes, avoiding the judgment she feared she’d find in Vastra’s expression. Instead she focused on the child in her arms, who started wailing again.

“And the child…“ Vastra prompted softly, sensing how the other woman was struggling.

“There is somewhere I have to go and I can’t take him.“ River shook her head to herself, feeling herself tear up. “It would be too dangerous but it’s something I have to do.“

“Is he…“ Vastra knew the answer to the question but she had to ask regardless to be sure of what they were dealing with.

“Yes.“ River took a deep breath and looked up to Vastra with a sad smile, touched by the deep sympathy in her eyes.

“And the Doctor doesn’t know?“ Jenny asked, stepping closer as well.

“Not yet.“ River shook her head, focusing on the baby again. It was painful beyond words. The past nine months had been tough. River considered herself a strong and independent woman but pregnancy and child birth was not something she had imagined having to do by herself.

“But why?“ Jenny asked reaching out to touch River’s arm, hoping to give some comfort that she seemed to badly need.

“He can’t know. Not until I’ve figured out who is after us.“ River shook her head to herself. “I’ve been investigating. Someone is looking for the Doctor, for me, and for…“ She took a deep breath trying to compose herself. “It’s hard to explain. There are so many layers to it, so much time… But I won’t let them endanger my family so… I need you to look after our son until I have got to the bottom of what is going on.“ She explained why she was here, as if it wasn’t obvious by now. “I have recorded everything I’ve found out so far in a file. It’s in the bag.“ She nodded towards a duffle bag of baby supplies that she had brought with her. “Please, you have no idea how hard this is…“ Uncharacteristically, River’s voice cracked and Jenny stepped forward quickly extending her hands. River kissed the top of her child’s head and passed him over. He cried and Jenny instinctively started rocking him, holding him close to her chest.

Vastra placed her hand on her wife’s back as she looked at the small child. He appeared human for all intents and purposes. Milky skin and dark curls, a couple of weeks old at the most.

“We will keep him safe.“ Vastra promised as she looked back to River who was welling up with tears.

“I know you will.“ She nodded struggling for composure. There was no-one she trusted more, expect perhaps her own parents, but they were beyond her reach. River pulled a piece of cloth from her coat. It was moss green with golden stitching on. She draped it across the baby’s chest which seemed to calm him a little. Jenny immediately recognised the prayer leaf Amy Pond had been given for her baby - River - at Demon’s Run. A lump formed in Jenny’s throat as she realised how history was repeating itself in a most cruel way. The little boy curled his tiny fingers around the silky fabric, holding on for comfort, and River smiled. “I will be back as soon as I can.“ She said and it wasn’t clear who she was talking to: Her friends, her child or herself.

“Can you at least tell us where you’re going?“ Vastra asked, needing to be sure their assumptions were correct.

“The Library.“ River answered, refocusing on the task ahead. She was confident she would find answers there. The expedition was a means of getting in but what she really needed was the data core.

“And what if you don’t come back?“ Strax pipped up, earning scolding glances from Vastra and Jenny. Even though they all had the same foreknowledge of events, they refrained from posing that painful question.

“I will.“ River said firmly, leaving no room for doubt, the tragic irony lost on her. “But if something happens…“ She couldn’t deny that maybe, they would need to get in contact with her. “I am meeting up with the Doctor. In case of emergency, there is a beacon in the bag. It will find the TARDIS, wherever it is.“ Always the pragmatist, River had prepared for that eventuality, even if she didn’t want to seriously consider it.

“Does he have a name?“ Jenny asked, trying to distract herself from the fact that the little boy in her arms was about to lose a parent.

“Not yet.“ River admitted reluctantly, though grateful for the change of subject. “I didn't want to make that decision without the Doctor… hopefully we will soon.“

“Best of luck, Professor.“ Vastra reached out and gave her hand a squeeze, overcome by deep sorrow at her friends fate that was turning out to be ever more tragic than she had ever realised. Her heart ached for her. “I promise we will look after him well.“ It was a most heartfelt promise. She didn’t know what sort of trouble was chasing the Doctor's family but she was prepared to lay down her life in aid of their dear friends. River nodded gratefully.

“Thank you for this.“ River managed a weak smile at the three of them. She bent down and kissed her son’s head one last time. “I love you, darling, be a good boy for them, they’d take good care of you.“ She whispered and stood, her vision blurred, unable to say anything else so she engaged her vortex manipulator.

“What do we do?“ Jenny was the first to break the heavy silence that followed. She could contain her emotions any longer, tears sprung to her eyes as she rocked the little boy who started to cry again, the moment his mother had departed.  

“We have to tread carefully not to interfere with the time streams. I don’t think the Professor was prepared for this eventuality.“ Vastra mused, trying to focus on the issue at hand so she wouldn’t be overcome herself.

“She didn’t even ask about him the last time we spoke.“ Jenny recalled.

“I have never known anyone as proficient at keeping secrets as Professor Song, particularly when there is a timeline to protect. She will know what she can and can’t say at any given time, we must trust in that.“ Vastra took a deep breath.

“So what now?“ Jenny held the baby close, whispering words of encouragement as he carried on crying, holding on to the prayer leaf for dear life.

“Now I shall see to it that the child is fed, give it here.“ Strax announced in his usual matter-of-factly tone.

“Strax, he’s just lost his mother, do you think you could be a bit more compassionate?“ Jenny snapped, affronted.

“Get this little guy settled in.“ Vastra reached out and stroked the boy’s head. “We shall give the Professor a few days. Never underestimate her or the Doctor. For all we know, she will either find a way of contacting him or manage to somehow, miraculously, escape herself. And then, they will know where to find us. We keep the child safe, as was asked of us.“ She explained receiving affirming nods from the others.

“It will give us a chance to devise a battle plan against whatever is coming for them.“ Strax stated and for once Vastra had to agree. With any luck, the Professor’s file would proof enlightening.

“And what if they don’t come, either of them?“ Jenny asked softly as the baby finally stopped crying and instead look up at them with big blue eyes.

“Then she’s left us the means of finding his father.“ Vastra said as she pulled River’s notes out of the duffle bag, alongside a small emergency transmitter.

——

Sheffield, 2021

The Doctor turned away from the door and made her way to the console. They had remained in their stupor for far too long after Graham and Ryan had left. With a deep breath she decided to refocus her energies on the future: New adventures. Freedom after nineteen years imprisonment. Answers to the questions that had been haunting her since the destruction of Gallifrey.

“So. Where do you want to go?“ The Doctor feigned enthusiasm as Yasmin Kahn joined her at the console.

“You’re the one that’s been locked up for years, you must have some idea of where you want to go.“ Yaz retorted with an encouraging smile. Neither one of them was particularly in the mood for an adventure - not after having said goodbye to their close friends - but if they didn’t set off soon, their sadness would overwhelm them.

“How about you decide?“ The Doctor looked to the central crystal, addressing the TARDIS. “You always have such strong opinions on where I oughtto be, how about now?“

As if on cue, the lights in the TARDIS turned a threatening red, alarms started blaring and the floor started shaking as the engines engaged.

“Okay, this is a bit more than I expected!“ The Doctor grabbed on to the console for dear life as they were thrown about. Wherever they were going, the TARDIS was in a hurry. The Doctor pulled herself along the console to where she could check where they were going.

“Doctor, what’s going on?“ Yaz yelled over the noise and the Doctor shook her head.

“I don’t know!“ She called back.

“Emergency beacon retrieval engaged.“ A robotic voice announced.

“Since when do we have emergency beacons?!“ The Doctor retorted dumbfounded. Only moments later, the TARDIS ground to a halt. The bumpy ride came to an abrupt end and the lighting normalised as if nothing had ever happened.

“Where are we?“ Tentatively, Yaz let go of the console and straightened herself up. If the Doctor couldn't explain how this had happened, perhaps she could at least oblige with the destination. The blonde didn’t answer straight away, she checked the readings, then rechecked them again.

“London, late eighteen-hundreds.“ She said at last, surprised at how pleasant and unthreatening an outcome it was, considering the rough and urgent travel.

“Love the Victorian times!“ Yaz’s expression brightened immediately. That was most certainly a time period she was interested in seeing.

“Let’s not get over excited, let’s find out why we’re here first. That was no ordinary jump.“ The Doctor cautioned her. She had never seen the TARDIS react with quite this level of urgency before and she knew she would be a fool to ignore it.

They made their way to the door and the Doctor stuck her head out for a look around.

“HA!“ She exclaimed sounding both excited and relieved. “12 Paternoster Row!“ She gestured to the familiar London townhouse as she stepped outside and Yaz followed her.

“I take it you know who lives here?“ Yaz concluded and the Doctor clapped her hands together, full of eager anticipation.

“It’s only the finest investigative trio of this time period!“ She announced making her way up to the front door. “Not to mention some of my best friends. They must have sent out a call!“ She knocked on the door and was surprised and unsettled when it gave way. It wasn’t locked, quite the contrary, the lock had been forced out of the frame.

“An emergency call…“ Yaz dropped her voice to a whisper as the Doctor pushed the door open further. Slowly, they advanced into the hallway and the Doctor held her hand out, barring Yaz’s way. The corridor was in ruins but it was no ordinary destruction. “Everything looks so… old…“ Yaz couldn’t think of a better way of putting it. The cabinets looked like they would fall apart at the smallest touch. The coats on the hangers by the door were flayed with moths having been at been at them. The stairs that lead up to the second floor seemed brittle and rotten. The Doctor didn’t answer as she mind was already racing at a hundred miles an hour. She could only think of one weapon that could cause this particular brand of destruction.

“Be very careful now, there might be more…“

“More what?“ Yaz asked anxiously, minding her step on the well worn floor.

“Traps…“ The Doctor used her sonic screwdriver to scan the way ahead.

They found Madame Vastra first, at the far end of the hall. Disregarding her own advice, the Doctor threw caution to the wind and rushed over to her. She quickly checked for vital signs as Yaz just stared at her. She had seen many things on her travels with the Doctor but a lizard woman in Victorian London came as a surprise.

“She’s breathing.“ The Doctor exclaimed, relieved. “She wouldn’t have taken the full blast. Plus, Silurians have a longer life span than humans. Grab me some water.“ She gestured to the kitchen which was in the adjourning room. It looked like Vastra had just stepped out of it as the explosion had taken place. Yaz obeyed and rushed to get water from the sink, the destruction hadn’t reached as far as that, everything looked the way Yaz would have imagined, based on all those period dramas her mum liked to watch.

Without much ado, the Doctor chucked the glass of water into the Silurian’s face and Vastra woke with a start. Instinctively she lashed out for the Doctor with her tongue who saw it coming and just about ducked the attack.

“Vastra, it’s okay!“ She held her hands up where her friend could see them.

“Who are you?“ Vastra looked around panicked, disoriented as she pushed herself up and scrambled away from the Doctor, trying to assess where the danger was coming from.

“Vastra, it’s me, calm down, you called me here.“ The Doctor tried to sooth her as she realised Vastra wouldn’t recognise her. She hadn’t seen this face of hers before. “I’m the Doctor.“

“You’re not the Doctor.“ It was an automatic knee-jerk reaction, as Vastra calmed down a little but couldn’t think through what she was saying.

“Yes, I am, I’ve regenerated.“ The Doctor insisted, moving a little closer and the detective inched back again. “You’re Vastra, the great detective of Paternoster Row, married to Jenny Flint. Friend to Commander Strax of Sontar. You and I, we are old friends. You stood with me in my darkest hour and saved my life more times than I care to admit, now please, let it be my turn, what happened here?“ She pleaded with her to understand and slowly, recognition dawned on Vastra’s face.

“Doctor…“ Her expression softened but her confusion remained: “What happened? I feel like I’ve aged a hundred years… where we attacked?“ She struggled to sit up properly.

“Yes you have and yes you were. Chronon mine, by the looks of it.“ The Doctor revealed as it was the only thing she knew that could cause this sort of damage. “You don’t remember anything else? Where are Jenny and Strax?“

“They would have been upstair with… Oh, Goddess, Doctor, I am so sorry.“ The realisation hit Vastra like a punch in the gut and left her struggling to breath.

“Yaz, stay with her, I’ll go look upstairs.“ Before either of them could protest, the Doctor jumped to her feet and returned to the hallway. She climbed the brittle stairs, hanging on to the railing tightly. The destruction hadn’t reached the upper level. It seemed as if it had just been a means of diversion, but to what end? A unsettling feeling of foreboding crept into her subconscious. There was only one species that was able to pack time into a bomb.

She tiptoed down the corridor. There wasn’t a sound so she couldn’t imagine whoever had attacked them was still around but she couldn’t be too careful. She engaged her sonic screwdriver again to scan the hallway ahead. No traps, no bombs, just two life signs, one human, one Sontaran. She breathed a sigh of relief and carried on to the room at the end of the hall. There, she found Jenny and Strax lying unconscious amongst signs of a struggle. The Doctor lingered in the doorway, her brow knotted into a frown, as she tried to make sense of the scene in front of her. In the centre of the room stood a cot that Jenny and Strax had seemingly tried to protect.  

“Doctor, wait…“ Vastra’s voice hardly registered as the Doctor walked further into the room. Despite Yaz’s help up the stairs, Vastra was not quick enough to stop her from finding what the Silurian feared she would. The Doctor spotted the familiar green cloth that lay abandoned in the empty cot and reached for it. “Doctor, I’m sorry…“ The Doctor turned the prayer leaf in her hand that carried her wife’s name. It was one of River’s most treasured possessions. What was it doing here in a baby’s cot?

[trillgutterbug]

Fic Writer Questions!

tagged by @palamedessextus 😊 thanks friend!

1) How many works do you have on AO3?

64! only five more to the magic number ayyyyy and then i’m legally obligated to never post another one.

2) What’s your total AO3 word count?

289,575 apparently??? which seems way way way higher than i ever would have guessed, wow. who knew!

3) How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

31 on ao3, although that’s lumping, eg, all marvel subfandoms together. but i have a ridiculous amount of wips in all kinds of other fandoms that i haven’t/won’t post, soooo.... more than that! and i don’t want to list them all bc that’d be a long boring read!

4) What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

it serenely disdains to destroy us, a magnus archives fic that, i somewhat vainly note, has been orbiting in the top few top kudosed fics in the tag since i posted it womp womp.

concerning flight, because we all thirsty for thor/loki+gender and i for one support us.

untitled porny snippet (yes that’s actually what it’s called), because same as above. (i see u, kudos-to-comment ratio and i aint mad but.... i see u. all you dirty birds out there shamefully yet silently jerking it. kudos to YOU.)

an experiment in posthumous subsistence, a batman/joker zombie au i wrote fucking TEN YEARS AGO ALMOST. why???? why is this fic so popular?? i’m barely a good writer now and i sure as shit wasn’t one a decade ago! the terrible title alone should disqualify it from being read, but i guess the people want what they want. and what they want is batman and joker handcuffed together, trying to escape the zombie apocalypse  ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

all good things, some stucky hydra trash party-adjacent smut regarding piercings. i stand by this one 100%, it deserves every kudo(s?) tbh.

5) Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

i do, depending on the comment! i don’t think comments like “loved this!” / “thanks for writing!” are written with the intent to receive a response (or at least, when i write them on other people’s fics, i certainly don’t expect one). they’re like an extra kudo(s?), and i appreciate them a lot, but they’re not really an invitation to Discuss. whereas if someone clearly has put a lot of thought into a comment, or asked a question, or made some observations that i jive with, or just seems like they want to engage, then hell yeah i jump in there. love that shit. 

6) What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

i guess arguably thine own self, which is some hydra husbands abo. laugh all you want, it’s one of my fave of all my fics lmao. probably specifically bc of the unpleasant/open ending.

7) What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

probably moderation is a memory! since it, unlike 99% of all my other stuff, isn’t just total smut, and the whole point of writing it was to wallow as deep as possible in the sauce of giddy teenage infatuation, it got the opportunity to have an actual emotional arc (more or less). furthermore i could not possibly bring myself to break johnny lawrence’s tender little heart ever, that would hurt me far more than it would hurt him.

8) Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

i only realised while answering this question that apparently.... no i don’t write crossovers! which is not at all a deliberate choice, i guess a compelling enough one just hasn’t occurred to me yet! 

9) Have you ever received hate on a fic?

shockingly no! by some accidental miracle i’ve managed to fly under the radar so far, despite some of the really buckwild stuff i’ve posted. however, considering some of the stuff i’m probably ABOUT to post.... that clean track record might soon come to an end lmao.

10) Do you write smut? If so what kind?

lmao. uhhhh. almost exclusively, and i guess??? all kinds? this is clearly a question composed by someone who does not write smut.

11) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

not that i know of, and i wouldn’t really care if i did. 

12) Have you ever had a fic translated?

yeah i think a few....? a number of people have asked anyway and i always say yes, so probably there’s at least one floating around out there somewhere.

13) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

i have! just once, and we really made it count. it’s called a reptile dysfunction, which should tell you all you need to know. 

14) What’s your all time favorite ship?

thorki, probably. i always have and always will come back to it, no matter what. it’s got such a ferociously timeless staying power and so much potential variation, i don’t think i could ever get bored of it, regardless of what level of marvel-exhaustion i might feel at a given time, or what tropes, kinks, or stage of literary pretension i’m at. truly the oh tee pee. 

15) What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

ohhhhh all 836575927 of them, but. there’s this one thorki fic i started almost ten years ago as an experiment with a new-to-me style, which turned out over the intervening years to become my main style, and looking back on that fic, which for many years was a touchstone of writing-to-aspire to for me, it’s actually Not Very Good lol. but i still love the core concept, which is a canon divergence berserker thor au, but not only is it a somewhat inaccessible (admittedly less so since the deadpool movies came out, which was a hilarious pipe dream back when i started writing it) x-force comics crossover, but i wrote myself into a bunch of corners and have yet to dig up the energy to write myself back out of them! i go and reread it every year or so and think “hmm... maybe now...” but tbh it’s just not really good enough to bother! perhaps someday i’ll repurpose the best elements of it into something new.

16) What are your writing strengths?

man, it’s so hard to say. in much the same way that you can spend hours every day staring at yourself in a mirror, yet be utterly incapable of picking yourself out of a lineup, i spend a lot of time eyeballing my writing, but stepping back it seems like a chaotic mass of nonsense with few cohesive throughlines. i’m good at writing smut, i know that much! and in that vein, i think i am good at smut bc i am very good at committing to the bit, as it were. getting into the nitty gritty of experience and sensation (physical or emotional) and rendering largely abstract internal concepts in fairly comprehensible ways. i think my prose is quite decent on a sentence level too.

17) What are your writing weaknesses?

utterly incapable of finishing anything! or plotting anything! can’t mange a cohesive emotional arc! write myself into overly structured corners or out onto a vast plain with no structure in sight! all the macro elements of storytelling totally elude me, which is very frustrating when i have all this tasty fleshed out micro-level character stuff, but no narrative skeleton upon which to drape it.

18) What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?   don’t! unless you are very sure you know what you’re doing, and the other language bits are a) very few, b) easily contextually understood, and c) actually adding something other than a weird flex that you know google translate exists.

19) What was the first fandom you wrote for?

11yo me wrote spock/kirk/janice rand and thought she invented the concept of a threesome. brand been stronk since day one 🤘. (the vulcan salute is right next to the devil horns in my emoji list, so....)

20) What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

i love the (ongoing) better with you series very much, not least because i’m still absolutely flabbergasted that i wrote something that long. i think it’s actually pretty good all things considered and it’s very dear to me on many many levels. but the fic that i just viscerally adore, that i love the style of, and that i had such a transcendent, invigorating, organic Experience writing, is temper its strength, adding honey until quite cold, which is a terror fic with the inexplicable pairing of edward little/hartnell, featuring crossdressing and gender stuff. it just burst out of me fully formed one day and i don’t think i’ve managed to top it yet! 

lowkey tagging @lingua-mortua @pitcherplant @kaasknot @froggy-babyy @deputychairman @nomercyonlytears @clockheartedcrocodile

[frumfrumfroo]

I’m new here and couldn’t tell from the tone of some asks (sorry) but did you like what they did with Ben in TRoKR ? I saw the discussions abt him lacking agency in it and I 100% agree but did you personality agree w/ the passive, “things only happen to me” vibe they gave him? And second question: can u give examples of how soule’s writing was telegrsmed in TFA? Thank u for taking the time xx

Like I’ve said before, it’s exactly the kind of backstory I would have written for him/always imagined. I had expected to find out he didn’t kill the other students/fought them in self defence/it was some kind of accident or emotional overload incident in TLJ. That was where everything was pointing.

Someone this insecure and conflicted about what he’s doing, someone who prays for help to resist his loving nature and cries when he sees his dad, who is so uncomfortable with himself he is covered head to toe not even his voice unmasked, who immediately latches on to the protagonist as a kindred spirit in loneliness and needs her to know he’s not a creature and wants to help her rather than hurt her- that’s not a person who had an eyes-open, all-in fall to the dark side full of decisive action and unhindered agency.

Leia saying ‘it was Snoke’ told us from the get go we’re in a situation where he was haunted and manipulated. His subservience and rote, childish repetition of ‘the Supreme Leader is wise’ when Han tells him Snoke doesn’t care about him. The constant, ongoing contradiction of his behaviour and motives tell us he has no conviction in the cause he’s supposedly supporting. His self-harm and naked suffering in the face of his own actions, his recklessness and inability to commit to selfishness and lack of ambition tell us those aren’t qualities which drove him here. He is highly emotionally driven, there’s no tangible goal and he doesn’t have a vision of the future. So why is he on the dark side?

It’s not that things only happen to him or that he’s passive, it’s that Ben has never pursued or been comfortable with what darkness really is and that has always been obvious. He tries very, very hard and fights tooth and claw to cling to something good in the comic until all of it is in ashes- he’s not passive, but he can’t win. No one can hold out forever against that kind of relentless onslaught. That he was absolutely a victim doesn’t mean he has no agency in his later choices. He’s not absolved of responsibility. But his reluctance and victimhood only makes sense, anything else would be incongruous with TFA.

There was never pursuit of power for power’s sake from him- there’s nothing he wants that the dark side can give him, he is there literally because he felt he had nowhere else to go. I said this before TLJ even came out. He felt he could not escape it, both because of the fatalism his family unintentionally instilled in him and because Snoke convinced him none of them loved him, that he is only useful or valued as a tool. Ben is a person who doesn’t believe he has any inherent value just for himself- just Ben, he believes that he can’t be forgiven for the sin of being born a disappointment, and that everything is his fault because he’s wrong and bad no matter what he does. None of his choices feel to him like real choices, all of his options appear to have been taken from him, and he feels compelled to plunge forward on the only remaining path. The comic provided an emotionally and logically cogent explanation for exactly why he would feel that way which is completely consistent with all the implications about his past and his characterisation from the films.

As I’ve pointed out before, there’s a reason he says ‘it’s too late’ to coming home not ‘I don’t want to’. There’s a reason he says ‘what I have to do’ and ‘he (I) was weak and foolish’- there’s a reason he needs Han’s help to go through with killing his father. It’s not about what he wants (he wants to go home with his dad- he thinks he can’t), he has never felt free to make his own choices or that freedom is possible for him.

Even at his darkest he never became cruel, he never enjoyed killing or hurting people, and he totally fails to suppress his instinct to be compassionate. He has a highly developed conscience and an overflowing core of empathy he can’t seal off. That’s why he’s so miserable as he pushes himself to do things he finds abhorrent- but he thinks he has to, there’s no escape, it’s the only way. In the sequence which establishes this character, even before any layers are stripped away or the investment we naturally have in him because of who he is is revealed, one of the first things we see him do is have compassion for F/nn. Those two characters are connected and a comparison is invited- this is visual storytelling showing you that they have something in common (it will be made clear later on that Ben saw himself in F/nn and that’s why he takes his actions so personally- cognitive dissonance).

F/nn was a good person trapped in the mask of the stormtrooper by circumstances beyond his control, but he is able to reject it and reclaim his identity. Ben is a good person hounded into the mask of Kylo Ren by his family’s failure to reconcile with Vader. The crushing weight of their expectations and their total lack of faith in him combined with their lies and Snoke’s manipulation convinces him there is ‘too much Vader in him’ and that Ben Solo isn’t and never will be good enough for anyone. That his love, compassion, and selflessness are all weaknesses which will only cause both him and the galaxy further suffering.

He is the most morally sensitive person in the new gen, he is the most outward-orientated and loving. His impulse is to be selfless and helpful, but that impulse has been relentlessly punished until he mistrusts it and thinks he must repress his wrong instincts and serve a ‘greater order’ guided by someone stronger than him. He has an acute sense of the impact of his actions and he considers it (even when he loses control of his emotions, he overwhelmingly targets things rather than people and his angry threats are empty).

In contrast, Anakin (who was committed on the dark side and successfully cut himself off from his empathy for many years) was all in on the pursuit of power even when he still had good intentions. Anakin also knew that power was the foundation of the dark side and he and Palpatine would always be at odds, that some day he would overthrow him and take his place. Ben only values power out of fear, and solely primal fear not more abstract, possessive fear like Anakin’s, he wants safety. He doesn’t go to Snoke thinking he’s ever going to take his place or gain his power- he wants Snoke to give him belonging and acceptance. He’s then convinced that the ends justify the means and doing things he knows are wrong and which cause him pain are necessary because his whole life and Snoke’s machinations have set him up to believe that. He is still trying to create safety and doing what he’s convinced must be done and will be done one way or another.

Ben is a beautiful compassionate person and always has been and that is why he’s in such constant, excruciating pain trying to shut himself off from love and vulnerability. He is following Snoke’s demands and trying to kill his past to stop the pain, to kill this vulnerability and need and weakness in himself. Connection was always what he wanted most and he is trying to cut off and cauterise all of the broken, abandoned bonds of love his family has left him with. And even here, he still wants Snoke’s acceptance, Snoke’s validation and esteem. He is still pouring himself out for an other, giving everything to please someone else, the last person left who tells him it’s possible he can achieve value.

He latched on to Rey instantly when he realised they were alike and did everything possible to lift her up and spare her what he went through. He only rejected Han and Rey’s offers to come with them because he thinks their love is conditional and that small, dirty, broken Ben Solo will never be able to meet the conditions. He thinks he is a tool or an obligation to them and it’s easy to understand why he thinks that. Han couldn’t wipe away a lifetime of baggage in a few words. Rey pretends it’s about the cause, she doesn’t tell him she loves him.

He thinks he must ‘become who he was meant to be’ and that his destiny is to become a new Vader. Everyone told him that. Whether with their fear or directly with words. When he finds out the truth about his grandfather, it’s a complete confirmation of what Snoke has told him and how his parents have treated him. Luke deciding he can’t be allowed to live because it’s that inevitable is the nail in the coffin in Ben believing there’s any place for him with his family. There is nowhere for him to exist as himself, he has to be someone else, someone less weak. And in running away from himself, his legacy, and his identity he puts himself under Snoke’s thumb and Snoke can finish inculcating his worldview.

Being able to love is freedom to Ben. He is an immensely loving person who feels like he is not worthy or allowed to love people, that his love has done nothing but make things worse for everyone. The tension and repression of trying not to need or care about people is what makes him so emotionally unstable. Kylo Ren is a mask and a shield and a prison built by Ben’s hurt and anxiety but equally built by Snoke out of his boyhood fancies to control him and shape him into an instrument of pain. Ben could never have conviction in it because it is so alien to his nature. He is so fundamentally unselfish that he never coveted like Anakin eventually did, his love never became possessive or jealous, he never sold his soul for a boon, the only way he could be selfish enough to murder is out of animal fear and pain. Wanting the hurting to stop. Rationalising it post-facto with the philosophy that the ends justify the means.

He pours himself out for Snoke because there is no one else left. All he wants is the safety and acceptance that he has literally never had anywhere. Anakin received unconditional love from his mother, Obi-wan, and Padmé and was warped from giving compassion into selfishness by his fear of loss and need for control. Covetousness became his tragic flaw and thus his fall culminates in trying to kill Padmé rather than lose her. Control became so important that others ceased to matter and love became possession. Anakin (despite also being a victim of manipulation and Jedi hubris) got to make real choices, he had real options, and thus he was a villain with conviction. Ben’s attempts to take control of his life are unfocussed and mostly involve abnegation, he pushes people away instead of trying to clutch them close; his response to loss is to isolate himself not seize power to recover the lost thing by force. Ben never received unconditional love until Han’s sacrifice on the bridge and the experience immediately shatters him from his already tenuous position in the dark. The only thing keeping him from coming home after that is sunk cost and the idea that he can never be forgiven. That it was too late.

He just needed someone to show him it wasn’t.

[ihatecoconut]

One of Ours

Cross Posted to AO3   

It was an unfortunate series of events that moved the Jacobs family from Ohio to New York, but it came with a pay rise for Mayer, a new job for Esther, and a new school for their three children. All three had been struggling at their previous school, bullied for being Jewish, and Esther had high hopes that they would get on better in a state with many more Jewish people around. 

Davey and Sarah were fifteen, Les was twelve and unknown to their parents, they were all relieved to be moving to New York- or, back to New York, considering they all had memories of living there before. Sarah called it her past life, Davey just called them memories, without giving it a name that had such huge connotations as Sarah’s did. Les didn’t call it anything, because he was twelve and not yet fully aware of the fact that it set them apart from everyone else.

“It’s called ‘The World’,” Esther was explaining to Sarah as Davey came down the stairs. He still wasn’t used to having a house with two floors, or a room to himself, despite it having been nearly a week since they had moved in. 

“It’s run by a man named Joseph Pulitzer, a descendent of the Pulitzer Prize man- morning David.”

“Good morning, mama,” he replied, sitting next to Sarah.

“I was just telling Sarah about your new high school. It’ll be good to know some things before you get there, won’t it?”

Davey mustered up a smile and nodded, biting into his toast despite the nerves churning in his stomach that threatened to send anything he ate back up. Sarah squeezed his arm under the table, smiling at him hopefully. He knew what she was thinking- in the memories the three of them shared Pulitzer had also been named Joseph, and Sarah had been utterly in love with his daughter. If they weren’t the only ones, maybe Katherine went to their high school as well.

Les borderline tumbled down the stairs and dropped into the chair on Sarah’s other side, “Good morning, mama!” he chirped cheerfully, taking the toast she set in front of him and devouring it.

“You seem excited.” Esther commented, looking relieved- even if the twins were nervous, she knew they would have each other, Les on the other hand was only in middle school, and would be alone surrounded by people he didn’t know.

“I am!” Les replied, around a mouthful of toast that made Davey grimace, “I can’t wait to meet my friends!”

Esther laughed, ruffling his hair, the statement meant nothing to her, just the ramblings of her excited son. Davey and Sarah knew that he was convinced that they would meet the people they had known before- it had been their topic of discussion last night- and neither of them had the heart to point out to their brother that they might be the only three that remembered.

Breakfast was finished, and Esther hurried the three of them out of the house, dropping kisses on cheeks and wishing them a good first day as she walked in the opposite direction to them. Together, they watched her hurry off- she had started working at a local bakery partway through their first week and was used to it by now. As she got out of sight, they turned as one and began walking towards the school.

Their father had made them walk to the gates and back multiple times over the previous few days, so they knew where they were going.

“Davey!” Les gasped, tugging on his sleeve like he did in the memories, the memories where he was much younger, “It’s the lodging house!”

And it was. The building had barely changed, save for some wear and tear and the sign that now read ‘Kloppman’s home for boys’ instead of ‘Duane Street Lodging House.’ As if on cue, a group of boys tumbled out of the door and began walking in the same direction they had been.

Les stood on his tiptoes, glancing between all the boys, trying to see anyone he recognised. Davey and Sarah exchanged a slightly horrified glance- it had been fine thinking about meeting the other people they remembered in abstract, but the sudden idea that it could be very real wasn’t something that either of them had really been prepared for.

“Les,” Sarah said, pulling him back from where he seemed to be about to run into the fray, “you have to be careful. They might not remember.”

His little face took on a much sombre look, “I know. I’m not supposed to know their names unless they say something first.”

She nodded and squeezed his hand, “If you were friends last time, I’m sure you’ll get along this time too.”

He grinned up at her and nodded, with that the three of them began to walk again, no more words exchanged until they had left Les at the gates of the middle school, gaining a promise from him to wait for them and not walk home on his own.

“Do you really think that?” Davey asked quietly, “That if we were friends last time, we’ll be friends this time?”

“Why wouldn’t we be?”

“We only became friends with them last time because we had the same job. They wouldn’t have cared about me if I hadn’t joined the newsboys.”

Sarah hugged him, “You’re so pessimistic. Try and look on the bright side, ok?”

He sighed, “Yeah, ok.”

They went to the school office, following helpful signs, to collect their schedules- and apparently, someone who would show them to first period if nothing else. The secretary introduced herself as ‘Hannah, you don’t need to call me miss anything’ and handed them their schedules with a smile and a basic explanation of the shape of the school.

“It used to be the headquarters for ‘The World’ newspaper, so the main body was set out like offices, but there was some reworking before the school was opened, so there’s more classrooms- and obviously the newer parts were built to be a school.”

Davey didn’t say anything, so Sarah took over the polite smiling and responses until they were told to sit in the waiting room and wait for the people who would be showing them around this morning.

“What’s up with you?” she asked quietly, pretending to be comparing their schedules, “You’re never like this.”

“I know her,” Davey replied, the same volume, “She was one of Pulitzer’s… I don’t know, secretaries?”

“Weird.”

“Do you think…”

“No. No way, she didn’t seem to recognise you.”

“Maybe she’s had practice.”

“If she’s here, who else- “

Sarah was cut off by two people entering the office kind of loudly,

“Hi Hannah!” the boy called, leaning on her desk and grinning brilliantly, “You are looking radiant as always.”

“Romeo.” The twins whispered in unison, thankfully not loud enough for either him, or his friend to here.

“Sarah! David!” Hannah called, “Come here, please.”

They did, smiling at Romeo, and the girl who turned out to be Hotshot, while trying not to let the recognition show through. Neither of them seemed at all surprised to see the two of them, or as if they recognised them and Davey wasn’t quite sure if that was a relief or not.

“Alright.” Hannah clapped her hands, “Sarah, this is Romeo, he’s gonna stick with you for the morning and hand you over to Mike for the afternoon. David, this is Niamh- “

“Hotshot.” Niamh interjected,

“-Hotshot, yes, and she will be with you for first period, then she’ll hand you over to Katherine for the afternoon. Ok?”

They both nodded their understanding and went to stand with their assigned partner, for lack of a better word. Sarah gave her brother an encouraging smile, one that said he could do this, even if he was almost completely convinced, he couldn’t.

They split up almost immediately, with Romeo leading Sarah down one corridor soon after the exited the office, and Hotshot continuing straight on. She didn’t say much, pointing out things Davey would want to remember as they passed, and glancing back every so often to check that he was still there, which was fine by Davey as he had never been particularly good at small talk, and it gave him time to think.

He hadn’t got many memories of Hotshot, just that she had been Spot’s second and he had sometimes had to pass messages through her in order to speak to Spot. She hadn’t been particularly talkative last time either, from what he vaguely remembered, but then none of Brooklyn had- she still had the Brooklyn accent, even at a school in Manhattan. “This is first period,” she said, gesturing at a door that was marked ‘Bi3’ “Biology.” She pushed the door open and walked in, obviously expecting Davey to follow. The teacher who turned and smiled at them wasn’t at all recognisable to Davey, which he found slightly relieving, and she welcomed him to the class, before directing him to sit next to Hotshot at the back- the only spare seat.

*

A few corridors over, Sarah was behind Romeo in math. Before they had gone in, he had warned her that the teacher wasn’t particularly nice and that they called him ‘Snyder the Spider’ behind his back. The words had sent a chill up her spine- her memories of the newsies explaining the Refuge to her and her parents were harsh, sharp, and awful. The memories of even one of the littles lifting up his shirt to reveal an ugly scar were too embedded in her head to ever forget.

“Miss Jacobs, I assume?” Snyder had said as they entered, smiling at her in a way that made her realise that no matter what Romeo or Hotshot or Hannah remembered, Snyder had all his previous memories and he had connected her to Davey immediately.

“Yes sir.” She replied brightly, “Where would you like me to sit.”

He gestured at the empty seat behind Romeo, who was sitting next to another one she recognised, even if she couldn’t call his name to mind- both of them were looking at her worriedly, a warning not to incite his anger. She sat down and pulled out her notebook and pencil case, wondering if anyone was going to sit next to her, or if she was destined to sit alone for the rest of the year.

“Alright,” Snyder said, “Quadratics.”

As if on cue, the door was flung open and someone slid in neatly- a baseball cap sat backwards on top of red hair, bright enough that she knew immediately it was Albert.

“DaSilva.” Snyder snapped. “That’s the second time this week. Detention.”

“Yes, sir.” Albert replied, grinning cheekily, and making his way across the room to flop into the seat next to Sarah, “Morning Romeo, Elmer, new girl.”

Elmer- that was his name.

“Hi,” she said, “I’m Sarah Jacobs.”

“Albert DaSilva.” He replied and shook her hand politely. At the front of the classroom, Snyder was writing questions on the board. “You met Romeo and Elmer?”

“Romeo’s showing me around this morning.”

“Damn, be prepared to get lost.”

“Shut up.” Romeo replied, but he was laughing, “I’m not that bad.”

“I’m Elmer,” Elmer said turning around. “Ignore these two idiots, honestly, and don’t worry about math too much, we have another teacher more often than we have the Spider, so she actually teaches us.”

That was actually something of a relief, and she thanked him for the information, at which he nodded, and turned back around before Snyder did- she was remembering Jack saying that you didn’t give Snyder a chance to yell at you, you did everything right before he could tell you.

The class went silent as Snyder turned around, instructed them to do the twenty questions he had written up and left. The silence remained for a good five minutes and then the classroom almost erupted into noise.

Sarah sat back, copied down the questions, and wondered if the Katherine that would be showing Davey around would be her Katherine.

*

As it turned out, it was in fact Sarah’s Katherine that Hotshot passed Davey off to after Biology- he barely held in the urge to shout her name, hug her, or do something else that would scare her off. Her fiery hair stood out from where she was leaning against the white walls, a pink folder hugged to her chest with one arm, while she checked her phone. She smiled up at the two of them when Hotshot called out her name, and moved towards them. She was taller than Davey remembered, almost as tall as him, but aside from that she seemed exactly the same. He had known her the best out of the few people had seen so far, and he found that it actually ached not to be able to reach out, brush her hair off her shoulder, hug her, lean into her and just resume the comfortable affection that they had had last time.

“English?”

“Huh?”

“I said, are you ready for English?” she repeated, smiling gently, and he almost thought she was going to reach out and put a hand on his shoulder. She didn’t, and he nodded, trying not to show his disappointment, and wondering if he could warn Sarah about how it felt.

Like Hotshot, Kath pointed out a few things he should remember- the lockers, the nurse’s office- and unlike Hotshot, she kept up a steady stream of conversation that Davey wasn’t really expected to contribute to, only interrupted by people greeting her, where she would pause and introduce them to Davey. By the time they reached English, Davey had been told more names than he thought he could ever really remember, and maybe he was right because they all flew out of his head immediately when he was faced with the English teacher. Denton.

The English teacher was Bryan Denton, and he could have laughed at that if it wouldn’t have got him several questioning glances.

“David Jacobs?” Denton asked brightly, moving towards him to shake his hand firmly, “It’s a pleasure to have you in this class, please- take a seat.”

Slightly tongue tied and reminded of the unfortunate crush he remembered having on Denton, Davey followed Katherine and sat down next to her, remembering to ask if the seat was empty before he collapsed into it.

“Alright,” Denton said, “I just need to go grab some photocopies, so talk amongst yourselves for a bit.” Katherine smiled at him and turned around to talk to someone behind them, who turned out to be Spot, much to Davey’s surprise- they were introduced, and then Spot pulled Katherine into a conversation that seemed to need a lot of background knowledge to follow, so Davey pulled out his phone instead. To Sarah: I’ve found Katherine and Spot, as well as Hotshot. From Sarah: I’ve found Romeo, Elmer, Albert, Specs and Jack. He stared down at his phone, willing the words to make sense. She had found Jack- his Jack.

From Sarah: I think Romeo and Specs are dating and I know Albert and Elmer are dating because they started making out as soon as they saw each other. They were both avoiding the obvious topic, but it was nice to know that they were surrounded by people they had known. To Sarah: I’m pretty sure they were dating last time as well, subtlety had never been Albert’s strong point. He got a laughing emoji in response, and didn’t have time to send anything else as Denton re-entered the room, waving a load of paper triumphantly, “I have the photocopies.” The lesson began there, they were looking at The Great Gatsby, which Davey had covered at his old school only a few years prior, so he felt comfortable enough to relax slightly. Or relax as much as he could with Spot’s eyes boring holes into the back of his head. The one time he glanced around, Spot made direct eye contact and held it until he turned back. Spot wasn’t any less terrifying in the twenty first century it seemed. * Katherine seemed to be expecting Davey to eat lunch with her and her group and based on the interactions she had had with people that Davey recognised, he was pretty certain that Sarah would be eating with her group as well. He went with her, stopped by the small greetings from people that he had gotten used to by walking around with her, and some of them even remembered him, remembered his name and were actually interested in how his day had gone so far. They went through the lunch room, Katherine pausing at one table to talk to some people- two of whom Davey recognised as Bill and Darcy- but kept going after she had gotten the information she wanted, past all the other tables and outside and towards a tree. A tree that already had a large gathering of people under it- including Sarah who jumped to her feet as soon as she saw him and pulled him towards where she was sitting. Where she was sitting, next to Jack. “Hey,” Jack greeted as Sarah pulled him down onto the grass, “You must be Davey, Sarah said you were somewhere around here.” The utter lack of recognition in Jack’s friendly tone went like an arrow straight to Davey’s heart, and he somehow found it in himself to smile politely and ask who Jack was. “I’m Jack.” Jack told him, “Jack Kelly, and I live at Kloppman’s with most of these idiots.” “We walked past that on our way this morning,” Davey said, desperately trying to keep the conversation as long as possible. “Yeah, Sarah said, she said you’ve got a younger brother too?” “Uh, yeah- Les, he’s twelve and at the middle school.” “Yeah, my brother Crutchie’s there too, he’s thirteen, though.” Davey smiled, both at the fact that Jack still considered Crutchie his brother, and at the fact that Les would be able to make at least one friend, even if nobody outside of the three of them remembered the previous century. “Speaking of Les,” he said, and pulled out his phone to discover that Les was ahead of him and had already texted. From Les: im fine, ive made friends, im being shown around From Les: ALSO ULL NEVER GUESS WHO I MET To Les: Was it Crutchie? From Les: YESS!!! From Les: and he remembers Davey paused staring at Les’ final text, a text that in three short words had brought something that might have been hope to sit in Davey’s chest. “Sarah?” “Yeah?” “Has Les texted you?” “Yeah, he said he made friends with Jack’s brother.” They both looked up at each other, and he could see that Les had in fact imparted the important piece of information to Sarah as well. She raised her eyebrows. Davey went back to his conversation with Jack. Looking around, he could see most of the previous newsies that had been their age in the little group under the tree. Race and Spot were next to each other, arguing over something that he couldn’t quite hear, Sarah was sat with Katherine, Smalls, Sniper, and the twins- Mike and Ike- on the other side of Jack was Buttons, Tommy Boy, Henry, Blink and Mush, Hotshot was next to Spot, but not involved in the argument, instead talking to Albert, Elmer, Romeo, Specs, and Finch. It was just as chaotic as he remembered the lodging house being and it was oddly perfect for him, someone who hated loud noises and crowds. * They picked Les up at the gates of the middle school, along with Jack and Race who had accompanied them to grab Crutchie- the rest of the group, Jack explained, just left when they were let out and they all reconvened at Kloppman’s, otherwise they’d be waiting on the school grounds for ages and it was sometimes hard to know when they had everyone. Crutchie beamed at the four of them as they approached and was quick to introduce everyone who didn’t already know each other. “You guys wanna come back to Kloppman’s with us?” Jack offered, one arm slung over Crutchie’s shoulders, “We generally do homework and stuff together.” Les wanted to say yes, it was obvious in his face, but… “Mama asked us to have dinner going when she got home.” Sarah pointed out gently, “Maybe another time.” Les and Crutchie looked sorely disappointed by that, and maybe Davey was flattering himself, but he thought Jack looked a little disappointed too. They said their goodbyes, Les hugged everyone because he was just like that, the three Jacobs headed back to their little house, and the other three headed to their home. Jack would never have admitted it to anyone, but he did glance back multiple times until they were out of sight, hoping that they might change their minds. The Jacobs weren’t aware of Jack’s glances, instead too focused on getting back to their house where they would be free to discuss the weirdness that had gone down on their first day. Sarah locked the door and dropped her bag, rounding on Les, “You’re certain? You’re certain that Crutchie remembers?” Les nodded frantically, “he brought up an inside joke from before and I finished it and we both just knew!” The twins exchanged a glance, both hoping that the other would know what to do about the situation, and- when no solution came- the three of them just fell about laughing. There wasn’t really anything else to do in such a situation, it wasn’t like there was a handbook entitled ‘What to do when your friends don’t remember their past lives’ or anything, no matter how much Davey thought it would help. “Holy shit.” Sarah finally breathed out, “This is insane.” “Yep.” “Yep.” They looked at each other and started laughing again. * Back at the lodging house- which was still how most of them thought of it, despite the fact that it hadn’t been called that in over a century- Crutchie was sitting in the middle of a circle as he explained how Les also remembered, but he didn’t think that the twins remembered because Les hadn’t said anything, and he hadn’t seen any recognition in their eyes. Other people mumbled their agreements at that, they hadn’t seen any recognition from the Jacobs either. “I don’t know,” Katherine argued, “I’m pretty sure Davey at least recognised me from the way he kind of stared when Hotshot introduced me.” “Maybe he was just doing that ‘cos he thinks your hot.” Spot offered from Race’s bunk, where he was currently curled up with Race. “Funny.” “Just saying.” “Well don’t.” Jack muttered, ignoring the amused looks that gained from most of the older members. Spot shrugged in response, “Kloppman’s gonna come and tell us off for not working soon.” There were a series of groans and objections from around the room, but people stood up and moved to their desks or onto their beds, depending on how they preferred to work, and by the time Kloppman walked in everyone was doing something appropriate- even if they were occasionally mentioning the three Jacobs’s siblings. “What’s this about then?” Kloppman asked gently, sitting down next to Jack on his bunk, “There’s some new kids,” he glanced up, “you remember Davey? Davey Jacobs?” Kloppman resisted the urge to ask how he could have forgotten with Jack drawing him every few days, and instead just nodded. “Him, and Sarah, his twin, and Les- you remember Les- they joined our schools today.” Kloppman raised an eyebrow, unphased. He had met too many people that he had known before to be surprised when another one showed up, in all honesty he was almost convinced that they were all gravitating towards New York in some way- call it fate, destiny, a horse- they would all be there eventually. “Bring them ‘round.” He said to Jack, patted his knee and eased himself up to check in on the littles, who were primarily looked after by Miss Medda these days, but it was good to keep up with them for when they moved up. “Yeah,” Jack sighed, watching him go. “It would probably help if they remembered.” * “Yeah,” Les sighed from where he was cutting carrots at the table, “I’m pretty sure they don’t remember, that was what Crutchie implied before you guys arrived.” Davey sighed, resigned, “I mean, I’d already worked that out, but…” “It kinda sucks?” Les finished, “Yeah, it kinda sucks.” Esther and Mayer arrived home at that point, thanked their children for starting dinner and the conversation about past lives, memories and people they knew that didn’t know them, had to be dropped in favour of more parent-friendly conversations like how was your first day at school? And did you make any friends? Which classes did you enjoy? Were the teachers nice? Did you find your way around alright? That became a sort of pattern for the rest of their week, they would walk to school, drop Les at the gates, continue walking to school where they might be joined by one of Kloppman’s boys or their extended group, split up for classes which they both all had with at least one of said extended group, regroup for lunch, under the tree, finish classes, walk to the middle school with at least Jack and sometimes a few others, collect Les and Crutchie, say goodbye to Jack and Crutchie, reject Jack’s invitation, walk home and start on whatever their mother had planned for dinner while complaining about how much they wished the others remembered. And it followed into the next week, and the week after, until Sarah finally remembered to ask their parents if they could go over to Jack’s after school with their friends. That broke the pattern more than they could have anticipated when Esther gave them the go-ahead that morning. They walked to school, dropped Les and weren’t joined by anyone but that was fine because they were going to hang out with them after school, they split for classes, regrouped at lunch, by mutual agreement didn’t tell anyone they had been allowed to go over to their house- Sarah’s idea, she thought it would be funny to just say yes to Jack’s invitation with indication that was going to happen- spilt up again for afternoon classes and walked to the middle school with Jack and Katherine. “Do you wanna come over?” Jack asked, “Get something done on your homework with friends?” It was pretty obvious he was now just asking to be polite, because he didn’t think that they were going to say yes, but he had made a habit of asking everyday. “Yeah.” Sarah said. “That’s fine, I- wait what?” “Yeah,” Sarah repeated, trying not to laugh, “we’d love to.” Jack blinked at the three of them stunned for a couple of seconds, before a smile broke out across his face. Davey thought it looked like the sun was coming out, and he was taken breathless by the happiness that Jack displayed and the memory of when he had truly been in love with him- he thought that he might be able to fall in love with Jack again if he was given the chance. “Let’s go!” Jack said, looking happier than a child in a candy store- as happy as a child in a candy store who had been told everything was free. The five of them turned towards the home and crossed the road, Jack thundering ahead to yell the good news into the bunk room. Davey, Sarah and Les entered to loud obnoxious cheers- the loudest of which came from Race, because he was just like that. There was some laughter when Race just kept going after everyone had stopped, and more when Spot pushed him off the bunk, but they made space for the three of them, offered them blankets and fluffy socks because the floor was always cold no matter how high they turned the heat up. Kloppman came in at the usual time glanced around the room and stopped his gaze on Davey, “Davey Jacobs?” Davey jumped up automatically, “Yes, sir.” Kloppman stared at him for a second and then broke out into one of his rare complete smiles, “Isn’t it good to see you again?” and wrapped Davey up in a hug, shook hands with Sarah and swung Les around like he had done before. Davey stood in a minor amount of shock, “What do you mean again?” “Don’t you remember? 1899? The strike?” “I mean, yeah but I didn’t realise you did.” “Wait,” Jack cut in, “You and Sarah? You remember too?” “Yeah, we thought only Crutchie remembered.” Jack laughed, “We thought only Les remembered.” The volume suddenly picked up with everyone asking questions over each other, but Davey found he could only look at Jack- and Sarah for a brief second when he saw her leaning in to kiss Katherine. “Hey Mouth!” Spot called, and the angry eyes Davey had been faced with in English for the past few weeks were gone, replaced with an odd gentleness. “Welcome back.” “It’s good to be back.” Jack lunged at him suddenly, and he found himself with an armful of Cowboy, “I missed you,” Jack whispered, loud enough for only Davey to hear, “I missed you so much.” I missed you didn’t seem to cover Davey’s feelings, but he said it back anyway, because how else could he express feeling like a part of him that was missing had been returned now that he was holding Jack in his arms? There was no other way. He glanced around the room, Les and Crutchie were on one bunk with some of the other pre-teens, Sarah and Katherine were curled up next to Smalls and Sniper and everyone else was in their own little groups. Spot was the only one still watching them. “It’s good to be back.”

[andmaybegayer]

you said 'highly engineered things' like 100 gecs appeal to you; wondering what other prominent examples of that category are

There’s a single category which I realise has an interesting subcategory, let’s start at the top.

The top is anything with a great deal of planning in it. This is not just about music, but about anything. When it’s very clear that something has been designed to achieve a goal I think that’s neat because it’s displaying the fact that it’s a product of human ingenuity and not trying to hide that. One art example is Gunnerkrigg Court, The Webcomic, because it’s got layers upon layers of plans and almost every part of it connects to at least one other part. You could also look at this Boltr video about a Mitsubishi toaster, which is just, extremely well put together and designed and it does its job quietly and accurately. What a good toaster.

If you want my perspective on WHY these kinds of things are interesting you could probably read my old post about Injection Moulding, which is me yelling about precision mass manufacturing techniques for an hour.

Far more interesting to me though is a subset of this, which is something created with a great deal of planning Targeting Some Audience. I have held for a while now that the best way to Create Things (anything: posts, music, stories, whatever) is to pick the audience you’re making it for and then work from there.

The audience might be you, or it might be your friends, or it might be a group of students you’re teaching, or it might be people who read harry potter fanfiction, or it might be people who browse the history non-fiction shelf at the bookstore. Work made with an audience in mind has a high chance of success at pleasing that audience.

Musically, you could look at someone like Lady Gaga, who writes very particular music and has a very carefully constructed stage presence and musical style. I’m not that big into her work these days but I used to be and there’s something to be said for basically creating a cult around yourself and marketing your music directly to that cult.

It’s also why I appreciate the work of Tumblr User @pukicho. They’re not of particular interest to me but they’re almost laser focussed on being Perfectly Tumblr Weird and they’re very good at it. As far as I can tell they came out of the woodwork in the past two and some change years with the sole focus of being Big Online and it worked, extremely quickly, because they know their audience very well. I enjoy seeing how they do it whenever it comes past my dash.

In honesty these things are really interesting from the outside looking in, I have kind of a knee-jerk reaction to being marketed AT that makes me avoid being the target market for these whenver I notice it happening to me, but the abstract concept of marketing is like a fun game you can play with people’s brains.

100 Gecs music attempts to combine several niche-ish genres that people have fond memories of into Hell Music. I’d guess there’s a reason there’s Ska in their songs, it’s because a lot of people have memories of Ska that can be leveraged to make the song sound nostalgic, even if they don’t exactly like Ska on its own.

To bring this full circle, that Injection Moulding post from earlier? That was actually a targeted post I made on One Person, twitter user SwiftOnSecurity, because I thought it would be fun. The core post is here, and I basically replicated their style when they talk about Corn Byproducts and then drew their attention to see if they’d retweet it, and they did. That’s fun, I enjoy building models of what other people like and then making things to meet those models. Usually that means making an extremely focused joke intended for One Person Only, but sometimes it means writing an effortpost like this with the goal of being interesting to Twitter Nerds.

All of this constitutes part of my Grand Unified Posting Theory which I should really write down sometime.

[dirtyfilthy]

Women is the Yoko Ono of the World

I was reading a post on reddit a little earlier today: 

https://www.reddit.com/r/relationships/comments/obre06/girl_22f_im_24m_dating_thought_i_was_recording/

We’ve been dating for a month and this was the third time having sex. We were making out when she saw my camera pointing at us from a shelf and immediately exclaimed “are you recording this?!” then sort of slapped my arms off her.

She then grabbed it to see if it was on, but it wasn’t. She absolutely freaked out on me for about a minute or two, asking if was recording this or our past encounters and saying things like “is this happening?” or “I can’t believe this is happening”, before realizing that, no, it actually wasn’t on and even if it was, it had the lid on anyway. I tried to reassure her and she kinda slowly melted down in my arms, crying for several minutes.

And of course I knew in an abstract way that people made non-consensual fuck recordings and that revenge porn existed and so forth, but I hadn’t really considered what living in a world where that happening to you was a very real and a very genuine possibility must actually be like. Goddamn terrifying. 

Every now and again I’ve been given these glimpses into what life is like for women, mainly through the stories of my women friends. All this stuff I don’t even think of, that doesn’t even cross the horizon of my mind. Being fearful of my physical safety, careful of who’s drinks I swallow, constantly aware of the potential of getting followed, having to surreptitiously order plain soda at the bar instead of vodka and soda when some dude is trying to get you drunk.

Been thinking that in my lifetime (I’m 41), as well as the general overall improvement in seeing women as actual human beings, #metoo is the biggest positive change I’ve seen happen, not only in taking the worst predators outta the pool, but in sending the signal that this shit isn’t acceptable and we won’t accept this undercurrent of sewerage in our drinking water any more.

That isn’t to say it hasn’t been a slow process for me as well. I totally fell into the whole nice guy trap when I was a young dude. It’s what the movies tell you right? Be persistent! Keep being nice and eventually she’ll notice you.  Now-a-days I realise there is either chemistry or there ain’t, and if not, the qualities that initially attract me to someone, like intelligence, being genuine, having a free spirit etc will also make them a great friend. They will be my kind of people.

Anyhow things have certainly improved, but that doesn’t mean we need to stop at “egalitarianism” just cos women got the vote in eighteen hundred and fuck or whatever. 

[thefloatingstone]

We’ve gone from Self-Isolation to Quarantine and in some places to gradual relaxation phases, but that doesn’t stop the need for more nonsense you can watch on youtube while you wait for things to get back to normal. And recommending things and making lists are some of my favourite things to do but I have not yet figured out how to start or structure a video myself, you guys get another rambling tumblr post of things you can watch on youtube.

This time I’m once again just gonna recommend individual videos rather than full channels like I did in part 2.

Part 1

Part 2

In no particular order; 

LOCAL58: The Broadcast Station that Manipulates You

I recently started watching the Nexpo channel when I went on a binge of creepy youtube videos. Most of his videos are really good although the ones where he himself goes into theory crafting can be a little asinine. However, this video is REALLY good. And before you get nervous, LOCAL58 is not a real TV station. LOCAL58 is a youtube channel created by the same guy behind the Candle Cove creepypasta. This video by Nexpo covers the various episodes of LOCAL58 and discusses them. Just be aware going in that this is abstract horror, and will probably get under your skin regardless if you’re unaffected by certain topics or not. although cw for suicide mention.

I also recommend most of the rest of this channel, although be careful where you tread. I don’t recommend his series “Disturbing things from around the internet” as it can sometimes include real life crime, abuse and such caught on security cameras. Everything else is really good tho. (although I was really annoyed by his 2 videos on KrainaGrzybowTV)

The Search for D.B. Cooper

LEMMiNO has a new video out covering one of the most unexplained crimes in the past century of the US. LEMMiNO is the guy I’ve recommended before who did videos on the Universal S. He is very down to earth and not someone prone to conspiracy or even really that fanciful of thinking. (He’s like the one person I feel covered the Dyaltov Pass incident and was confused by why this was even a mystery because if you read the Russian Autopsy reports and documents associated with the case it’s all pretty logical and easily explained)

D.B. Cooper is the name given to a man who, in 1971, hijacked an airplane with a bomb, asked for a large sum of money, and after receiving it, parachuted from the plane and was never seen or heard from again.

The Austrian Wine Poisoning | Down the Rabbit Hole

Down the Rabbit Hole also has a new video out, this time covering the Austrian Wine Poisoning event from 1985. A scandal that involved literally the entire country of Austria, affected multiple countries, and forever changed the way wine was made world wide. As someone who is generally pretty allergic to most artificial substances this one made me personally very angry. But luckily, it has a happy ending and a better world for us all... if I could drink wine which I can’t do anyway.

The Turbulent Tale of Yandere Dev - A Six Year Struggle

The Right Opinion is another channel I only recently subbed to after watching his cover on Onion Boy. I put off subbing to him simply because of his channel name and I thought it meant he would come across as smug and elitist. Luckily this seems to merely be one of those “I chose a bad channel name and now I’m stuck with it” type of situations. (IHE has a similar problem).

Anyway, I have a weird interest in bizarre internet personalities, so I’ve been enjoying his channel as he simply discusses and presents a timeline of events of certain individuals. In this video, he covers the developer behind the much maligned Yandere Simulator. It’s a tale of hubris, arrogance, immaturity, and an unwillingness to accept your own shortcomings due to ego.

Oh and there’s a meme game about Japanese school girls with anime tiddies in there as well.

The Most Relaxing Anime Ever Made | Yokohama Kaidashi Kikō

Kenny Lauderdale is a youtube channel which is slowly becoming bigger which I’m very happy to see. He exclusively covers anime and live action Japanese television no younger than the mid 90s (as is the case with YYK) and which usually never saw a release outside of Japanese Laserdisc. I do wish his videos were a little longer, but if nothing else his videos serve as an excellent starting to point to find some older and underappreciated shows... or hot garbage fires. In this episode he talks about the 2 OVA episodes made based on one of my favourite manga, Yokohama Shopping Log. A Post apocalyptic anime about an android who runs a coffee shop outside of her house, and the quiet solitude of living in a world of declining human population, brief encounters with travelers and other people, and just... existing. The anime was never released outside of Japan and is only available on Japanese VHS and laserdisc.... but hey guess what!! Somebody uploaded both episodes, subbed, to Youtube.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2HCVOH6DtA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqSTwfkobME

YMS’ slow descent into madness as he uncovers just how bullshit the Kimba Conspiracy is

I’m linking a full playlist for this one.

YMS is busy planning his review on the “live action” Lion King remake as the original 1994 movie is probably his favourite movie all time (and also self declared what made him a furry). As part of the 2 hour review, he decided to what all 2000 hours of Kimba the White Lion just to mention how The Lion King potentially stole the idea. ....until he actually watched all 2000 hours of Kimba and realised that if you actually WATCH Kimba, it has VERY little to do with the Lion King at all apart from having the same animals in them because AFRICA. Watch as one man slowly loses his mind as he realises just how stupid this conspiracy theory is, just HOW DECEITFUL and straight up LYING people can be. People who write BOOKS. People who teach LAW AT UNIVERSITIES. Because NOBODY bothered to actually watch the entire show and just parroted the “Disney stole this” lie which got started by like 2 salty fans on the internet.

The man set out to just mention how Disney stole an idea, and uncovered one of the most infuriating rabbit holes on the internet. Screaming for SOMEONE to provide him with sources or evidence.

YMS will be publishing his full Kimba documentary this month which he has said is around 2 hours long before he continues to work on the Lion King one.

Science Stories: Loch Ness eDNA results, Poop Knives, and Skeleton Lovers

TREY the Explainer has a video giving us some updates in Archeology from 2019. In this video he discusses the findings of the eDNA results conducted on the Loch Ness to see what animal DNA the lake contains which will tell us what living animals currently inhabit the lake, ancient knives made of poop and if this is a real thing that could have existed, and a skeleton couple found buried together which were at first thought to be lovers, then revealed to be both male, and then how in this instance we cannot let our modern sensibilities dictate what we WANT this burial find to be, but to look at the evidence as presented to us and place in context finds of this nature. The worst thing an archaeologist can do is look for proof to a theory they already have.

The Bizarre Modern Reality of Sonic the Hedgehog

Super Eyepatch Wolf is back and he’s here to talk to us about the very very strange existence of Sonic. a 90s rebellious “too cool for School” answer to Mario, a lost idea as the world of video games changes and culture shifted, a meme and punching bag amplified by a unique fanbase and poor quality games, a transcendence into a horrific warped  idea of what he once was, and modern day and where Sonic and his fans are now. As usual Super Eyepatch Wolf knocks it out of the park.

Kokoro Wish and the Birth of a Multiverse: A Lecture on the Work of Jennifer Diane Reitz

I don’t even sub to this channel as I’m not entirely sure what Ben’s usual content is about. But every now and then he has a “101″ class, where he explains to a room full of his friends in a classroom setting (complete with Whiteboard) an internet artist and oddity, the timeline, and what it is they have created. (wait... didn’t I say this already?). Unlike TRO however, the 101 classrooms are not a dark look into disturbed individuals (although the CWC 101 is debatable) nor is it a “lol look at this weirdo” dragging. Instead, of the 3 he’s done so far, it’s usually a rather sympathetic look at some of the strange artists on the internet who through some way or another, left a very big cultural impact on the internet space through their art. Sometimes they may not be the best people, but their work is so outside of what we’re used to seeing that just listening to him run you through these people’s internet history is fascinating.

In this episode he talks about Jennifer Diane Reitz. And although it is titled Kokoro Wish, the lecture is more about Jennifer’s larger work back in the early internet when being a weeb was unheard of, how being trans influenced her stories and characters, and her world building that is so rich and in-depth with it’s own ASTRO PHYSICS it puts any modern fictional world found in games or movies to shame.

Jennifer is not exactly a nice person... and in many ways can be seen as dangerously irresponsible, but she created something truly unique in a way that you kinda struggle figuring out if it’s terrible or a work of genius.

Anyway I think that’s enough for now