#i played the campaign and felt obligated to draw this??

[doisnuois]

the original is not too freaky but it doesn’t match my tumblr vibe so i cropped it, but anyways GRAVES🫶

[myloveforhergoeson]

ch 31 preview bc i feel bad for not posting in so long yayy

“Mr. Rocque, Kelly, please,” Roxanne pleaded, shaking fingers threaded, palms pressed together. She would’ve gotten down on her knees to beg if she, the band, and their two bosses weren’t already in the back of the limousine headed to Brand New Day’s album release party. “The Big Time Rush booking fee is for interviews and photoshoots, and- and millionaire’s birthday parties. Not for an advertising campaign for a band no one has ever heard of!” 

Though she winced at her desperate tone of voice, she hoped one final appeal would make the two adults change their minds. Despite spending the last 24 hours making similar statements since Gustavo’s call at the movie theater, neither of them had budged in their decision for the band to attend the party. She’d even taken the fight all the way to Griffin’s office, sitting atop the Rocque Records building and adorned in the strangest taxidermy the assistant had ever seen, hoping that even he would think it an odd request. 

Turns out that had been a mistake; Roxy had severely underestimated how much Griffin seemed to like her. America’s fourth most powerful CEO was no better than his money-hungry adversaries and deep down she knew that… She just wanted someone other than her friends to take her feelings into account just this once. 

With Griffin’s word as law, and whatever Gustavo was afraid of in Obdul’s briefcase when the tall man tapped on it, the band was set to attend the gathering and adhere to Brand New Day’s request. 

When Kelly sighed, shifting her gaze from the soft glow of her BlackBerry in the back of the dark limo to the writer, she just slowly shook her head. “You heard Griffin earlier, Roxy. They’re paying customers and Rocque Records has a contract to fulfil. As much as you dislike these boys-”

“These two,” The assistant automatically corrected, feeling James’ hand slide onto her shoulder as the limo turned a corner. “These two,” Kelly continued after a brief pause, “There’s a lot of money at stake here.”

That was the same answer the talent scout had given her all day - the same corporate talk about contract fulfillment, legal obligation, and reputation. Bullshit. 

 “Griffin said we have to,” Gustavo added in a flat tone, red glasses matching the tint of a neon sign zooming by outside the window behind him, suggesting that he wasn’t all too thrilled with the night before them either. “So we have to. Set aside whatever crap has you all up in a twist about this party! It’s only a few hours, okay?” 

With a huff, Roxy crossed her arms and pushed back into her seat, watching the endless stream of cars out the window beside the man’s head. Most of the time she and Gustavo were on the same page, especially when it came to breaking down emotional barriers in the writer’s room. If he was able to help her draw out the words to place on the page when she was struggling in the past, why was he so incapable of seeing her irritation now? 

“We’ll be okay, Rox!” From across the way, Carlos reached out to pat her knee, welcome warm contact on skin that felt as cold as ice. The charm from the bracelet she’d made him for Christmas jingled around his wrist. “The night will be over before you know it!”

Carlos’ optimism never ceased to amaze Roxy; She wished she could feel even a small portion of it at the present, but her confusing amalgamation of fear and anger had been too busy building up in her system all day. Too much time had already been wasted worrying about Mag and Dani since they’d moved to Hollywood. Past memories playing in her head like a bad movie plagued her dreams, causing her to reach out for James in the darkness of her room, only to feel the emptiness creep in when she remembered a few walls separated them in 2-H and 2-J. Horrible flashes of whatever may transpire tonight took hold of her imagination when she was awake, only fueling the fire of emotions rooted in her belly. 

And even that felt ridiculous to her because Mag and Dani were just people she used to be friends with, not the supervillains of epic proportions her mind was making them out to be. The hurt and confusion then mingled with shame for expecting the worst from them, dragging up situations in which they’d looked out for her at local gigs or sat up and listened to her complain on the phone all hours of the night while she tried to work out a new tune or melody. All the fun they’d had playing together, advertising for their band wherever they could, and drawing up big plans to hit the big time together.

Then, the cycle of emotions started anew, because if they were such great people, how could they so easily take her work and pass it off as their own? How could they be Brand New Day without her?

Pinching the bridge of her nose, Roxy tilted her head back into the hard headrest, focusing on the silence in the car since she’d been too fatigued to pick a radio station, and took a deep breath in an attempt to stave off the emotional overload.

Beside Carlos, messing with the material of his lap belt, Kendall nodded at his friend’s words. “Just a few photos for the news outlets and some social media posts saying how much we love the new album, then we’re so far out of here and everyone will forget about Brand New Day in a week.”

Though the both of them knew that last part probably wouldn't be true, Roxy wanted to believe it anyway. Internally, she cursed her past self for all the time and effort she’d put into promoting their band to friends, strangers, and whoever would listen, and all the wishes on shooting stars in clear Minnesota skies that one day they’d blow up and get to move out of their nothing town. 

Too little, too late, the girl thought, feeling the unpleasant sting of her nails cutting into her palm as they balled into tight fists in her lap. At least we all got what we wanted in the end.

James must have noticed her discomfort; The hand on her shoulder trailed down her arm to unwind the mess she might have made of her palm with her fresh manicure. 

“You also… Don’t have to come…” Logan tried to add but quickly winced when Roxy countered his comment with a nasty glare. 

“Are you kidding me? I’m the only one who knows what those two are like! This is all part of their big scheme to-” 

“Roxanne.” Gustavo cut her off with a grating exhale of her name. For a few seconds, the humming of the engine was the only sound heard between the seven. “Being in the entertainment industry means sometimes you have to do things you don’t like to do. Do you think I enjoy playing babysitter for the five of you? No! But if I want to stay Hollywood’s number one producer, that’s what I have to do!”

“Oh, stop it Gustavo, you flatter us too much!” Kendall said with a sarcastic smile in a clear attempt to ease some of the tension radiating off of his boss and assistant, which calmed Roxy only slightly. At least one of them was able to keep a level head at the present. “We all know you love us too much but simply can’t admit it - out loud or otherwise.”

Grumbling something under his breath, Gustavo turned to look at Kelly’s BlackBerry, signifying Kendall had won that part of the conversation for now. 

The frontman looked over to her too, for approval or something else she wasn’t sure, but she did catch the upward quirk of his lips. Momentarily, some of the tension left her body and she finally let her head rest on her boyfriend’s shoulder. If there was one thing she could count on tonight, it was her four friends. 

Like it or not, this was happening, so she might as well suck it up and be the bigger person. In public at least; The big tub of chocolate chip ice cream in her freezer and the floor of her kitchen were already calling her name no matter how hard she tried to ignore it. 

Even if it wasn’t his intention, Roxy found comfort in Kendall’s subtle smirk. As good as friends Mag and Dani had been to her in the past, their bond didn’t even come close to the one she shared with the Big Time Rush boys and her new friends at the Palm Woods. So, she took it as a sign. One that screamed “We’ve got your back, Roxy! Always!” in bright, flashy colors, big enough to rival the magnitude of the Hollywood sign looking out over the city they so loved. 

Maybe James had noticed it too, his hand tightening in hers before pressing a light kiss into her hair. The two savored the last bit of physical contact they’d have before the prying eyes of everyone at the party, because neither of them needed to add a potential relationship exposé to the list of things that might happen that evening. “Everything will be alright, baby. I promise.”

[fmp2ofeuanbaxter]

Grand company arcs 3 - University part 1:

The party arrive at the University of Bayeux, going to the desk of the local roamer's guild to meet an incredibly nasally and weird man at the helm managing applications to the university. Turns out they haven't mad too many applications and are doing things on a first come first serve basis, the party join the university right away. When they get there, after a little wait, they and a bunch of other aspiring students stand at the gates, greeted by a tired, grumpy and annoyed teacher called Adelheid Koch.

(This is actually Adelheid's new sprite, not the original one. I refuse to show the original one, it is terrible.) Adelheid shows the party around the 3 different buildings in the university, that being the dorms, service halls and the lecture halls. The party are then given their dorm rooms and instructed that lessons begin in roughly an hour. I rushed the application process through unrealistically since waiting months for your application to be processed and then accepted is not exactly riveting gameplay.

In the halls leading to their class, the party run into a little girl called Rebecca who is most certainly NOT old enough to be at the university. She demanded snacks, in which the party reluctantly obliged. When the party arrived in the classroom, they found out that the little girl was actually their teacher.

The lesson she teaches is arcane fundamentals. Mana in this world actually works more like electricity with positive and negative charges. In order to cast a spell, you need to draw in mana and expell it using your imagination to shape the mana into a spell. It takes the party a long time but over the 3 month course they all practice enough to develop their own spells.

Exploring the library after being told that a student went missing there they run into a robot girl named Grace who is a long term student at the university. Grace doesn't know too much except that it happened in the underground halls that the name of the student who went missing was Elizabeth Magistrate.

Before the party went down into the underground I gave them their university rewards for month 1, which are special permanent passives that change how they play in unique ways. This will be a thing in every university arc as they provide stat buffs, unique passives and the opportunity to develop custom abilities.

The party wander through the halls before 2 of them go missing. Running to where they went missing, the party finds themselves in a gigantic chamber of flesh, their first taste of a dominion spell, Mikiiwa. The name is based off of the myth of the 3 wise monkeys, see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil. Of course though, Elizabeth does plenty of evil.

After battling several puppet zombies, Elizabeth decides to take matters in her own hands, summoning her avatar, a power unique to the new world.

This fight also ended up being too easy and quite confusing which led into a discussion about the campaign and what my party liked and didn't like. They wanted characters who were permanent, a way to have more access to magic shops as they travelled (zora is only in Leyvenholm) and felt confused by the fight which involved fixed turn counts. One of the biggest issues was hard croud control which I addressed in the following PSA.

I made changes to how fights worked inspired by MMOs such as World of Warcraft & Final Fantasy 14. I didn't want crowd control to be rendered redundant so I made some abilities interruptible and this helped clear a lot of confusion while opening more complex mechanics down the line. I took on as much criticism as possible and going into the future it really helped make the second half of the campaign so much better than the first half.

[keefiswhoiam]

May 02 - 2024 Thursday

10:35pm

2.5/10

I woke up tired and in a bad mood. I decided to go back to bed for however long, I only slept another hour. I got up and figured I should try to go through my usual schedule, I have an obligation to the people that pay me so that was my motivation. I had also decided to quiet Discord for a little to focus on my work and myself. My tummy hurt so I only ate a pack of soup for breakfast. I was able to stream on time.

On stream I warmed up with chinchilla sketches. Then I was trying to find the sketch I was commissioned to upgrade but I couldn't. I was also in a hurry because I had asked mom to take me to the store later so I couldn't waste too much time. I moved on to a different drawing for the time being. Then my stomach was upset again and I had to end the stream. I redid my schedule to give myself a little break and go to the store early. At the store I did my best to complete my therapy homework. I asked the girl if she had any super cool plans this evening and she said no, probably just gonna curl up under a blanket. That was about the extent of that interaction but it was better than usual. It also made me realize I can probably come in and ask any ol random question until I can probe deeper. Next I might ask what her current favorite show is or something. When I got home, I did an hour of commission work. I was in a poor mood and was trying to hang out with TK and friends in their server. They were playing a free hockey game I planned to join them in which I did. I hated it though so we only played a few rounds. Then TK and her boyfriend left to watch a movie in theater and I left to make lunch. I wasn't hungry but I ended up making tuna spaghetti. It was a little bit hard to eat it all but I did. I tuned into Tomato streaming hardcore Skyrim and that was my cozy content for the afternoon.

I had an afternoon schedule planned but it sort of fell apart. I knew all I really had to get done was commissions so I did that at least. I had planned to also work on idea requests and some of my next VR world but I skipped all of that. Given how I felt both physically and mentally, I gave myself the rest of the day off. A lot of it was spent curled up watching Skyrim. I felt very lonely but like I couldn't reach out to anyone. I thought about how hard it is to have fun anymore and how I'm not looking forward to anything. My day looked like being alone and unfulfilled, waiting to do it all again tomorrow. I asked DS for some company later. In the meantime I joined TK again and just chilled with them while I started installing mods for a KSP1 run.

When DS was ready, I kept preparing Kerbal and she put on a 90s EPCOT Barbie birthday video. Then we went down the rabbit hole of ASMR with Maya's channel. I felt very sick when we started watching and I almost wanted to ask for something else but I ended up really liking the Jimmy Neutron one we watched. It was hilarious and a great distraction from my body. Then we watched one as Buzz Lightyear.

In bed we did our puzzles, the crossword was stupid. We read a good chapter of Monster High and I progressed Twilight Town in KH2. After she fell asleep I booted up KSP to just barely start my campaign and the old UI is kinda grody but I found a mod to hopefully help that. Also not a fan of the loading times but it is a much more stable game.

[mr-styles]

Pleasing’s New Campaign Star Mick Fleetwood on the Magic of Harry Styles and Joy of Wearing Nail Polish

“He’s a magical man,” says Harry Styles of Mick Fleetwood, who he counts as a musical hero, close confidante, and now, the new face of his brand, Pleasing. “Mick is someone who brings me–and countless others–great joy,” he continues. “I felt there couldn’t be a better embodiment of Pleasing, or a person who could so naturally capture the wizardry that we love.” Any Fleetwood Mac fan knows the pivotal role that the Fleetwood drummer played not just in forming the band, but holding it together during the making of their landmark 1977 album Rumours amid heartbreak and emotional turmoil. Accordingly, they will know that he’s the perfect free-spirited sorcerer–and force of style–for the job.

The connection of Styles and Fleetwood began as any cross-generational friendship between two music legends does. “My 12-year-old daughters said, ‘Dad we want to go and see Harry Styles!” says Fleetwood with a laugh, recalling the catalyst for him first meeting the British pop singer back in 2014. Obliging the pleas of his twins Ruby and Tessa, he took them to a One Direction concert and subsequent meet and greet at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. Try as Fleetwood did to play “cool dad,” and fly under the radar (at 6′ 5″, no less), Styles, a lifelong Fleetwood Mac fan, immediately came up to him. The group’s iconic song “Dreams” was, after all, one of the first tunes Styles learned as a kid. It's also recently rocketed back into the collective consciousness via TikTok thanks to creator Dogg Face (real name Nathan Apocada), whose viral “Cranberry Dreams” video Fleetwood recreated to further Internet-breaking effect. “Two factions from completely different worlds came together,” continues Fleetwood of the fateful encounter. “Without my girls wanting to see One Direction, we–Stevie [Nicks] and I–never would have met Harry.”

Nor would the 74-year-old rocker have ended up starring in the campaign for Pleasing’s second drop, Shroom Bloom (out March 15th), which figuratively riffs on the theme of magic mushrooms with its groovy product offerings. It features face and nail products, like the Acid Drops Lucid Overnight face serum, hand and nail balm, and four new polish shades, plus psychedelic limited-edition apparel meant to supply, as Styles puts it, “an intoxicating escape-evoking curiosity.” With his distinctive sharp bohemian style, Fleetwood, a self-proclaimed hat enthusiast (“Hats are poetic, romantic; they provide generous amounts of theatrics for an old drama queen like myself,” he once wrote) with a predilection for tailor-made suits and jeans, brings much swagger to the campaign shot at his home in Maui, Hawaii—complete with a cameo from his pet pig, Tilly.

“Pleasing is this experience of, ‘Why not?’ or ‘I’ve never thought of that’—and that’s why I’m part of it,” explains Fleetwood, who views the brand as an empowering tool for self-discovery and self-expression. “It says, here’s something, either literally or figuratively, to hold your hand while we’re all on this journey. That’s what it means to me.” Along with a set of theatrical ensembles, Fleetwood sports an array of colorful manicures in the campaign. Think: a purple top hat paired with matching tiny shades, zebra print loungewear, and stacks of chunky metallic rings with teal digits; or a salmon silk vest layered over a mushroom Pleasing T-shirt and indigo trousers, topped off with glossy cherry red nails.

Ahead of his Pleasing debut, Vogue caught up with Fleetwood, speaking over the phone from his other Hawaiian home on the island of Moloka‘i. From the way he waxes eloquent about Styles and his impactful Pleasing mission, and the likeness he draws between the counterculture of the ’60s and today’s Gen Z-fueled Youthquake, it’s no wonder that he and Styles are kindred spirits.

Read the full article on Vogue

[kingstylesdaily]

Pleasing’s New Campaign Star Mick Fleetwood on the Magic of Harry Styles and Joy of Wearing Nail Polish

“He’s a magical man,” says Harry Styles of Mick Fleetwood, who he counts as a musical hero, close confidante, and now, the new face of his brand, Pleasing. “Mick is someone who brings me–and countless others–great joy,” he continues. “I felt there couldn’t be a better embodiment of Pleasing, or a person who could so naturally capture the wizardry that we love.” Any Fleetwood Mac fan knows the pivotal role that the Fleetwood drummer played not just in forming the band, but holding it together during the making of their landmark 1977 album Rumours amid heartbreak and emotional turmoil. Accordingly, they will know that he’s the perfect free-spirited sorcerer–and force of style–for the job.

The connection of Styles and Fleetwood began as any cross-generational friendship between two music legends does. “My 12-year-old daughters said, ‘Dad we want to go and see Harry Styles!” says Fleetwood with a laugh, recalling the catalyst for him first meeting the British pop singer back in 2014. Obliging the pleas of his twins Ruby and Tessa, he took them to a One Direction concert and subsequent meet and greet at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. Try as Fleetwood did to play “cool dad,” and fly under the radar (at 6′ 5″, no less), Styles, a lifelong Fleetwood Mac fan, immediately came up to him. The group’s iconic song “Dreams” was, after all, one of the first tunes Styles learned as a kid. It's also recently rocketed back into the collective consciousness via TikTok thanks to creator Dogg Face (real name Nathan Apocada), whose viral “Cranberry Dreams” video Fleetwood recreated to further Internet-breaking effect. “Two factions from completely different worlds came together,” continues Fleetwood of the fateful encounter. “Without my girls wanting to see One Direction, we–Stevie [Nicks] and I–never would have met Harry.”

[full article under the cut]

Nor would the 74-year-old rocker have ended up starring in the campaign for Pleasing’s second drop, Shroom Bloom (out March 15th), which figuratively riffs on the theme of magic mushrooms with its groovy product offerings. It features face and nail products, like the Acid Drops Lucid Overnight face serum, hand and nail balm, and four new polish shades, plus psychedelic limited-edition apparel meant to supply, as Styles puts it, “an intoxicating escape-evoking curiosity.” With his distinctive sharp bohemian style, Fleetwood, a self-proclaimed hat enthusiast (“Hats are poetic, romantic; they provide generous amounts of theatrics for an old drama queen like myself,” he once wrote) with a predilection for tailor-made suits and jeans, brings much swagger to the campaign shot at his home in Maui, Hawaii—complete with a cameo from his pet pig, Tilly.

“Pleasing is this experience of, ‘Why not?’ or ‘I’ve never thought of that’—and that’s why I’m part of it,” explains Fleetwood, who views the brand as an empowering tool for self-discovery and self-expression. “It says, here’s something, either literally or figuratively, to hold your hand while we’re all on this journey. That’s what it means to me.” Along with a set of theatrical ensembles, Fleetwood sports an array of colorful manicures in the campaign. Think: a purple top hat paired with matching tiny shades, a custom zebra print suit by S.S. Daley, and stacks of chunky metallic rings with teal digits; or a salmon silk vest layered over a mushroom Pleasing T-shirt and indigo trousers, topped off with glossy cherry red nails.

Ahead of his Pleasing debut, Vogue caught up with Fleetwood, speaking over the phone from his other Hawaiian home on the island of Moloka‘i. From the way he waxes eloquent about Styles and his impactful Pleasing mission, and the likeness he draws between the counterculture of the ’60s and today’s Gen Z-fueled Youthquake, it’s no wonder that he and Styles are kindred spirits.

I’d love to hear about how you first connected with Harry?

The magical mystery tour started probably eight years ago. I took my daughters, Ruby and Tessa, who were 12, to see one of the last One Direction shows at the Rose Bowl. Very generously, their organization made it possible for us to go backstage for one of those meet and greets. If you’re a kid around your parents, you want mom and dad to disappear. But what happened was immediately Harry and the band started hovering around me while I’m trying to hide and get out of the way and be the dad that wasn’t there. [Laughs] Eventually, the girls realized Dad was actually causing a bit of a commotion. Anyways, that’s when Harry and I first met. We really connected because it turned out Harry had been brought up around Fleetwood Mac’s music when he was a child. And so on and off for years we’ve had this passing in the night relationship, which has included him doing Fleetwood Mac songs and doing countless little and big things with Stevie.

Stevie Nicks once said Harry was like the “love child” between you two? Why do you think she puts it that way?

Stevie has a great sense of humor! The fact is Stevie and I have been in a band for, well, 50 years really and she’s an incredibly close friend of mine. She’s an adventurer! She is also the godmother of Ruby and Tessa. I think Harry and Stevie first met at a show or something. He knew it was around her birthday and he walks into her dressing room with her favorite cake. I thought, “How cool is that?!” It wasn’t arranged by someone else, he had it in a little box with him. That’s who he is.

What do you love about him as a person and musician, particularly within today’s landscape?

When I came back from meeting him that day, we had a connection that was driven by music. That became the magical part of it, which continues today. As a person, he was incredibly kind and thoughtful right from the beginning. Having come from such a tidal wave of attention, and to still remain that normal…I really gravitated towards his lack of ego. Coming from the band he was in was probably a real challenge for him, for anybody, and I could identify–not with the same thing, no one could imagine what they went through. It was literally like being in the Beatles.

Surely, though, you can relate with Fleetwood Mac, especially when things exploded with Rumours?

One of the earliest conversations that Harry and I had, and one that continues today, is he looks at a band, entity, or a person, and think “What allowed that to keep going? What allowed it not to lose the plot, even with challenges?” That, as you know, is Fleetwood Mac’s story. He identified with that and thought, “If that’s possible, then I can hold on to what I feel is true and what my next step will be not only as a musician, but very, very much as a person.” And that’s what I think is magical and meaningful about Harry Styles.

What was it like shooting the Pleasing campaign, and what do you love about Maui as its location?

I loved every moment of it. It was a hoot! I was originally gonna do it in L.A., but because of COVID, the original photo session never happened. With that being the case, the next thing that I said is, “Well, I’m gonna be going home!” And they loved the idea of doing it here. It went incredibly well. Everyone was really on mark about what to do and how to do it. And I just remained open, pitching in and finding hats to put on. And I told Molly [Hawkins, Styles’s creative director], I said, “I'm so into doing this!” And the fact that it was somewhere that I really love...Everyone has their home and their own versions of where they like to be and why they like being there. Mine are selfishly explicit. Hawaii’s a very beautiful place and I'm happy to be here. So having that be connected to what we were doing selfishly was great.

Your colorful painted nails were a particular highlight. Have you worn nail polish before?

Oh, I loved that. I kept the varnish on for two weeks! Back in the day in London, I used to wear near polish and all sorts of stuff, and the attitude was, “so what?” It didn’t have anything to do with sexuality. It’s not about that. It's about having fun. If you look at half the tribes of ancient history, men and women all dress up in beautiful, colorful things. No one thinks anything one way or the other, which is the point. During the shoot I noticed some of the nail colors were really muted, like the light blue and the pinks and the greens. I said, “You might wanna pick one of the red colors!” About three or four days after the shoot was over. I still had the nail varnish on and thought, I can actually see where my hands are going. I’m not kidding you! It’s really useful, and I thought, “I’m not taking this stuff off!” When you pick a glass up, you actually connect with what you’re doing, which is what style is all about.

Speaking of style, you’ve always had it in spades. You seem to really have fun with fashion and never limit yourself. What’s your personal style philosophy?

Style, to me, is taking the trouble to present yourself. Sometimes presenting myself means I just walk out in a T-shirt and a pair of pumps. Conversely, it can also mean I've spent an hour thinking about what I'm gonna wear. That to me is very human. It gets back to what we've been talking about: Why not think about that you're presenting yourself? It's all about suggestions of style. It’s like with music, you go, “If I hadn't heard that music when I was 10, I might not have written that song when I was 20.” And that is all part of the story. What you see in the presentation of Pleasing is they're very, very simple, but demonstrative options. The way I think of it is: Why not? What makes someone think that something's weird?

Pleasing is part of a bigger movement towards genderless style and beauty—one that I’d argue, you and your peers helped pioneer in the late ’60s and ’70s. Have you noticed the evolution? What excites you about seeing a new generation feel free to experiment and express themselves more freely?

That’s a really astute observation. When I think about what happened in my generation, we had a sense of freedom, a sense of feeling that what had happened before didn't need to be repeated. Millions and millions of people in my world, our generation, saw that, felt that…But imagine the ‘60s right now with social media. One might be so bold as to say that slightly naive pipe dream of everyone not being judgmental might spread like wildfire. Being reminded of that premise, I think there's a huge amount of similarity now asking, “Why not? What gives you the right to close me down?” It’s not confrontational. It's just, why would you want to do that to anybody or anything? In our time, if someone went to a concert with blue paint all over their face, you go, “How cool is that?” You wouldn't say one thing or the other. That's how I've always felt. Don't be judgemental and have fun with it. That’s what Pleasing represents.

With Pleasing’s missions of bringing joy to beauty and going beyond the gender binary, what do you envision for its future?

I have a sneaking suspicion that this is just the beginning of a real lovely journey. It’s the first page of the book that Harry’s seeing can be written and he doesn’t need to know how it ends up. I think it’s really important to have these stages that are set that allow the creative process to go where it needs to go.

So let’s talk beauty as a form of self-care. Do you consider your personal regimen ritualistic?

It's fairly that way. When I’m out working, working, working, which, in truth I haven't been doing too much of in the last two or three years, like most other people, it's more focused. With COVID lockdown, the backdrop of it is that you need to have a form of discipline. A year into COVID, I realized that I should pull my socks up. Eventually, I went, “You need not give up on taking care of yourself. You need not give up with finding new avenues, new ways to have fun to present yourself.” That type of theater I think is really important. And so there is a routine and I'm much more aware of it. I don't think I’m the best one in the world at doing it, but it's become a regimen. I'm actually more disciplined about self-worth, self-presentation, and the theater of, “Why you do take care of yourself?” or “Why you do put a mirror up, not literally, but a mirror where you go, ‘I need that?’” The past two years have been a reminder of why I need to take time out.

At this moment, what excites you most about the future?

I'm looking forward to more music! One of the things we started off right at the beginning of the interview is the fact that this conversation was happening because of the connection through music and something that both myself and certainly Harry’s world are completely connected to that allow all these lovely things to happen. And I think that's really the overview, the backdrop to this is music and being creative. It’s part of a really fun journey we’re on, and I can’t wait to see where it might go.

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

courtesy of vogue.com

[hldailyupdate]

“He’s a magical man,” says Harry Styles of Mick Fleetwood, who he counts as a musical hero, close confidante, and now, the new face of his brand, Pleasing. “Mick is someone who brings me–and countless others–great joy,” he continues. “I felt there couldn’t be a better embodiment of Pleasing, or a person who could so naturally capture the wizardry that we love.” Any Fleetwood Mac fan knows the pivotal role that the Fleetwood drummer played not just in forming the band, but holding it together during the making of their landmark 1977 album Rumours amid heartbreak and emotional turmoil. Accordingly, they will know that he’s the perfect free-spirited sorcerer–and force of style–for the job.

The connection of Styles and Fleetwood began as any cross-generational friendship between two music legends does. “My 12-year-old daughters said, ‘Dad we want to go and see Harry Styles!” says Fleetwood with a laugh, recalling the catalyst for him first meeting the British pop singer back in 2014. Obliging the pleas of his twins Ruby and Tessa, he took them to a One Direction concert and subsequent meet and greet at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena. Try as Fleetwood did to play “cool dad,” and fly under the radar (at 6′ 5″, no less), Styles, a lifelong Fleetwood Mac fan, immediately came up to him. The group’s iconic song “Dreams” was, after all, one of the first tunes Styles learned as a kid. It's also recently rocketed back into the collective consciousness via TikTok thanks to creator Dogg Face (real name Nathan Apocada), whose viral “Cranberry Dreams” video Fleetwood recreated to further Internet-breaking effect. “Two factions from completely different worlds came together,” continues Fleetwood of the fateful encounter. “Without my girls wanting to see One Direction, we–Stevie [Nicks] and I–never would have met Harry.”

Nor would the 74-year-old rocker have ended up starring in the campaign for Pleasing’s second drop, Shroom Bloom (out March 15th), which figuratively riffs on the theme of magic mushrooms with its groovy product offerings. It features face and nail products, like the Acid Drops Lucid Overnight face serum, hand and nail balm, and four new polish shades, plus psychedelic limited-edition apparel meant to supply, as Styles puts it, “an intoxicating escape-evoking curiosity.” With his distinctive sharp bohemian style, Fleetwood, a self-proclaimed hat enthusiast (“Hats are poetic, romantic; they provide generous amounts of theatrics for an old drama queen like myself,” he once wrote) with a predilection for tailor-made suits and jeans, brings much swagger to the campaign shot at his home in Maui, Hawaii—complete with a cameo from his pet pig, Tilly.

“Pleasing is this experience of, ‘Why not?’ or ‘I’ve never thought of that’—and that’s why I’m part of it,” explains Fleetwood, who views the brand as an empowering tool for self-discovery and self-expression. “It says, here’s something, either literally or figuratively, to hold your hand while we’re all on this journey. That’s what it means to me.” Along with a set of theatrical ensembles, Fleetwood sports an array of colorful manicures in the campaign. Think: a purple top hat paired with matching tiny shades, zebra print loungewear, and stacks of chunky metallic rings with teal digits; or a salmon silk vest layered over a mushroom Pleasing T-shirt and indigo trousers, topped off with glossy cherry red nails.

Ahead of his Pleasing debut, Vogue caught up with Fleetwood, speaking over the phone from his other Hawaiian home on the island of Moloka‘i. From the way he waxes eloquent about Styles and his impactful Pleasing mission, and the likeness he draws between the counterculture of the ’60s and today’s Gen Z-fueled Youthquake, it’s no wonder that he and Styles are kindred spirits.

I’d love to hear about how you first connected with Harry?

The magical mystery tour started probably eight years ago. I took my daughters, Ruby and Tessa, who were 12, to see one of the last One Direction shows at the Rose Bowl. Very generously, their organization made it possible for us to go backstage for one of those meet and greets. If you’re a kid around your parents, you want mom and dad to disappear. But what happened was immediately Harry and the band started hovering around me while I’m trying to hide and get out of the way and be the dad that wasn’t there. [Laughs] Eventually, the girls realized Dad was actually causing a bit of a commotion. Anyways, that’s when Harry and I first met. We really connected because it turned out Harry had been brought up around Fleetwood Mac’s music when he was a child. And so on and off for years we’ve had this passing in the night relationship, which has included him doing Fleetwood Mac songs and doing countless little and big things with Stevie.

Stevie Nicks once said Harry was like the “love child” between you two? Why do you think she puts it that way?

Stevie has a great sense of humor! The fact is Stevie and I have been in a band for, well, 50 years really and she’s an incredibly close friend of mine. She’s an adventurer! She is also the godmother of Ruby and Tessa. I think Harry and Stevie first met at a show or something. He knew it was around her birthday and he walks into her dressing room with her favorite cake. I thought, “How cool is that?!” It wasn’t arranged by someone else, he had it in a little box with him. That’s who he is.

What do you love about him as a person and musician, particularly within today’s landscape?

When I came back from meeting him that day, we had a connection that was driven by music. That became the magical part of it, which continues today. As a person, he was incredibly kind and thoughtful right from the beginning. Having come from such a tidal wave of attention, and to still remain that normal…I really gravitated towards his lack of ego. Coming from the band he was in was probably a real challenge for him, for anybody, and I could identify–not with the same thing, no one could imagine what they went through. It was literally like being in the Beatles.

Surely, though, you can relate with Fleetwood Mac, especially when things exploded with Rumours?

One of the earliest conversations that Harry and I had, and one that continues today, is he looks at a band, entity, or a person, and think “What allowed that to keep going? What allowed it not to lose the plot, even with challenges?” That, as you know, is Fleetwood Mac’s story. He identified with that and thought, “If that’s possible, then I can hold on to what I feel is true and what my next step will be not only as a musician, but very, very much as a person.” And that’s what I think is magical and meaningful about Harry Styles.

What was it like shooting the Pleasing campaign, and what do you love about Maui as its location?

I loved every moment of it. It was a hoot! I was originally gonna do it in L.A., but because of COVID, the original photo session never happened. With that being the case, the next thing that I said is, “Well, I’m gonna be going home!” And they loved the idea of doing it here. It went incredibly well. Everyone was really on mark about what to do and how to do it. And I just remained open, pitching in and finding hats to put on. And I told Molly [Hawkins, Styles’s creative director], I said, “I'm so into doing this!” And the fact that it was somewhere that I really love...Everyone has their home and their own versions of where they like to be and why they like being there. Mine are selfishly explicit. Hawaii’s a very beautiful place and I'm happy to be here. So having that be connected to what we were doing selfishly was great.

Your colorful painted nails were a particular highlight. Have you worn nail polish before?

Oh, I loved that. I kept the varnish on for two weeks! Back in the day in London, I used to wear near polish and all sorts of stuff, and the attitude was, “so what?” It didn’t have anything to do with sexuality. It’s not about that. It's about having fun. If you look at half the tribes of ancient history, men and women all dress up in beautiful, colorful things. No one thinks anything one way or the other, which is the point. During the shoot I noticed some of the nail colors were really muted, like the light blue and the pinks and the greens. I said, “You might wanna pick one of the red colors!” About three or four days after the shoot was over. I still had the nail varnish on and thought, I can actually see where my hands are going. I’m not kidding you! It’s really useful, and I thought, “I’m not taking this stuff off!” When you pick a glass up, you actually connect with what you’re doing, which is what style is all about.

Speaking of style, you’ve always had it in spades. You seem to really have fun with fashion and never limit yourself. What’s your personal style philosophy?

Style, to me, is taking the trouble to present yourself. Sometimes presenting myself means I just walk out in a T-shirt and a pair of pumps. Conversely, it can also mean I've spent an hour thinking about what I'm gonna wear. That to me is very human. It gets back to what we've been talking about: Why not think about that you're presenting yourself? It's all about suggestions of style. It’s like with music, you go, “If I hadn't heard that music when I was 10, I might not have written that song when I was 20.” And that is all part of the story. What you see in the presentation of Pleasing is they're very, very simple, but demonstrative options. The way I think of it is: Why not? What makes someone think that something's weird?

Pleasing is part of a bigger movement towards genderless style and beauty—one that I’d argue, you and your peers helped pioneer in the late ’60s and ’70s. Have you noticed the evolution? What excites you about seeing a new generation feel free to experiment and express themselves more freely?

That’s a really astute observation. When I think about what happened in my generation, we had a sense of freedom, a sense of feeling that what had happened before didn't need to be repeated. Millions and millions of people in my world, our generation, saw that, felt that…But imagine the ‘60s right now with social media. One might be so bold as to say that slightly naive pipe dream of everyone not being judgmental might spread like wildfire. Being reminded of that premise, I think there's a huge amount of similarity now asking, “Why not? What gives you the right to close me down?” It’s not confrontational. It's just, why would you want to do that to anybody or anything? In our time, if someone went to a concert with blue paint all over their face, you go, “How cool is that?” You wouldn't say one thing or the other. That's how I've always felt. Don't be judgemental and have fun with it. That’s what Pleasing represents.

With Pleasing’s missions of bringing joy to beauty and going beyond the gender binary, what do you envision for its future?

I have a sneaking suspicion that this is just the beginning of a real lovely journey. It’s the first page of the book that Harry’s seeing can be written and he doesn’t need to know how it ends up. I think it’s really important to have these stages that are set that allow the creative process to go where it needs to go.

So let’s talk beauty as a form of self-care. Do you consider your personal regimen ritualistic?

It's fairly that way. When I’m out working, working, working, which, in truth I haven't been doing too much of in the last two or three years, like most other people, it's more focused. With COVID lockdown, the backdrop of it is that you need to have a form of discipline. A year into COVID, I realized that I should pull my socks up. Eventually, I went, “You need not give up on taking care of yourself. You need not give up with finding new avenues, new ways to have fun to present yourself.” That type of theater I think is really important. And so there is a routine and I'm much more aware of it. I don't think I’m the best one in the world at doing it, but it's become a regimen. I'm actually more disciplined about self-worth, self-presentation, and the theater of, “Why you do take care of yourself?” or “Why you do put a mirror up, not literally, but a mirror where you go, ‘I need that?’” The past two years have been a reminder of why I need to take time out.

At this moment, what excites you most about the future?

I'm looking forward to more music! One of the things we started off right at the beginning of the interview is the fact that this conversation was happening because of the connection through music and something that both myself and certainly Harry’s world are completely connected to that allow all these lovely things to happen. And I think that's really the overview, the backdrop to this is music and being creative. It’s part of a really fun journey we’re on, and I can’t wait to see where it might go.

[myhockeyworld87]

What Happens In Vegas...Doesn’t Always Stay There - Jacob Markstrom - Part 3

Word Count: 4,050

POV: Reader

Warning: Language

Notes: Well I’m finally at home for a night and I definitely owe you guys a story. So since I had the next part of this one ready, I dediced to post it. When last we saw these two, they had decided to divorce, and our reader had signed the papers and sent them back to Jacob. Who had forgotten to sign them. Let’s see what happens now, though I think some of you have an idea. As always feedback is welcome. Happy Reading!

What Happens In Vegas…Doesn’t Always Stay There Masterlist

It had been almost seven weeks since Jacob met you. For six of those, he’d talked to you every day, sometimes two and three times. It was just these last few days that you wouldn’t answer his calls or texts. Jacob was confused, to put it mildly. He wracked his brain trying to recall the last couple of conversations that you’d had, wondering if he’d said or did something to anger you, but nothing came to mind. In Jacob’s mind, he thought the two of you were actually starting something. Sure, it had been one of the most peculiar beginnings to a relationship ever, but the last several weeks' things had been nice, better than nice actually. He thought the two of you might have a chance at a real relationship. Of course, the distance between you played a part, but he thought the two of you could work that out; apparently, he was wrong.

 Jacob knew the moment he stepped poolside, that you were something special. The longer he talked to you the more he knew he’d been right. If he was being honest, it was probably one of the reasons he suggested marrying you, even though that marriage would be over soon. Just like lightning striking in the middle of a storm, it hit Jacob then why you were pissed. He’d forgotten to sign the divorce papers. He’d had them for well over two weeks now. Rushing into the office, he started rifling through all the crap on his desk looking for the manila envelope that you’d mailed it to him in. He was just in the process of opening it when the front doorbell rang, so back on the desk it went, as he headed to the door to answer it.

 Jacob was shocked to see you standing there. “(Y/N), what are you doing here?” He didn’t mean for that to come out the way it did. It took him a moment to recover before taking you in. There were dark circles under your eyes that made it look like you hadn’t slept in days, not to mention how puffy they looked as if you’d been crying. Jacob wanted nothing more than to take you in his arms and make whatever seemed to be causing you this much pain go away.

 “Hey,” you mumbled out weakly. “Can I come in?”

 “Of course.” He stepped aside, letting you into his home. It was your typical bachelor pad. Walls stark and devoid of any real character that you knew Jacob possessed. He led you over to the couch in the living room, an enormous piece of furniture designed for his large frame. It almost seemed to swallow you whole. “(Y/N) is everything ok?” There was concern in his eyes and you knew he was probably questioning your presence there after you’d been radio silent the last few days.

 “No.” The one-word answer was hard to push out without tears falling down your eyes. You could see how Jacob’s fingers itched to touch you and honestly that’s all you wanted right now, for him to just take you in his arms and somehow have all the answers, but he had to know the problem first. You took a deep breath trying to steel yourself for what you needed to tell him. “Jacob, I don’t know how to tell you this.” At that moment Jacob grabbed your hands and engulfed them in his giving you his support in just that simple touch. It gave you enough courage to blurt out the last part. “I’m pregnant.”

 You felt his hands slip a bit on yours at the shock of the news; his mouth working trying to form a sentence yet nothing coming out. It took a minute but he finally found his words. “Wow, um…ok…I hate to ask this…”

 This was the part you knew was coming, expected it really and you didn’t blame him at all. So, to spare him, you found yourself answering the unspoken question. “It’s yours.” He nodded but you felt the need to explain more. “I haven’t been with anyone since Vegas, and even before that, well, work was really busy, and…well let’s just say it had been over a month or longer.”

 “You don’t have to say anymore, (Y/N). I believe you.” His hands tightened on yours, the shock of everything starting to wear off. “Plus, we didn’t use protection.” It was something you didn’t give much thought to when you were with Jacob, which was odd because you’d always been extra cautious with hookups, but then everything with Jacob was different than anyone else. “Do you…do you know what you want to do?”

 This time you couldn’t stop the tears from flowing. “I tried, Jacob. I really did.” He looked confused, unsure of what you meant by that. “I went to get an abortion yesterday.” He blinked hard but other than that showed no expression. “I was sitting there on the damn table in a gown just waiting for the doctor to come in and then I looked around. There was this damn chart that showed what the size of your baby is every week compared to fruit of all things. It’s a blueberry by the way. A damn cute little blueberry, like the kind they put in muffins and stuff.” Why it had to be an adorable little fruit like that you didn’t know. Why couldn’t it be honeydew? You hated that fruit. Well maybe not hate, but it wasn’t your favorite that’s for sure. “Anyhow, I was just staring at that poster and looking at each week and I don’t know. I couldn’t breathe.” Kind of like now, even telling him brought back all those feelings. “I started thinking about the doctor telling me that I could hear the heartbeat next week when she did the ultrasound, and I’m not sure what happened, but I couldn’t go through with it; so, I left. I’m so sorry.”

 You weren’t quite sure if you were apologizing to him or yourself. This was something you didn’t want, at least not right now, or at least that’s what you always thought. Now, you didn’t know what you wanted anymore. You took a deep breath, composing yourself. “I booked a flight once I got home. I couldn’t tell you this over the phone or text. You deserved to hear it in person.”

 “Thank you for that.”

 You slipped your hands out of his, distancing yourself from him for this next part, but also pulling out the envelope you brought. “I’m going to keep the baby.” As if that part wasn’t obvious, but you somehow felt it needed to be said. “I had Aaron draw up some papers. They absolve you from any obligations to the child both financially and emotionally. All you have to do is sign them. You won’t even have to be listed on the birth certificate.” He took the envelope from your hands, glancing briefly at the contents inside. “I’m sure you’ll want to have your lawyer look it over.”

 Jacob didn’t know what to think. Ten minutes ago, he was wondering if you were ever going to speak to him again and now you were telling him you were having his child. A child you apparently didn’t want him to be a part of. But did he even want a baby? He certainly hadn’t wanted a wife, yet here he was still married to you. He should come clean right now and tell you that he hadn’t signed the papers yet. That some indescribable feeling had taken over him, and he wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to sign them anymore. And now, well, now he felt like he shouldn’t sign them. Maybe this was all some force in the universe steering his life in a different direction; a route he hadn’t planned on taking until later, yet here he was on it. “And what if I don’t want to sign them?”

 Well, that certainly wasn’t what you thought he’d say. You didn’t think this was something either of you wanted, but you couldn’t be certain. It wasn’t like the two of you had had this long talk about where you saw your life in five years. Hell, this wasn’t where you saw your life in five months, but here you were, on the verge of being divorced with a baby on the way. “Well, I guess we’ll need to figure things out then.”

 Jacob got up and started to wander around the living room. You weren’t sure if he was trying to decide whether or not he wanted to sign the papers or how he was going to be part of his child’s life. “Do you want a drink or something? I need a drink. Oh shit, you can’t drink, can you?”

 “It’s not advised, but please don’t let that stop you. Though if you have a water that would be great.” He headed towards the kitchen, which gave you a chance to just breathe. The hardest part was telling him, all the rest you’d figure out. He was back quicker than you expected, a bottle of water in each hand. He handed one over to you and sat back down beside you. “You know, you can think about this if you want. You don’t have to sign or not sign them right now.”

 He nodded and pursued his lips before answering, though not how you expected. “How long are you here for?”

 “A few days. There’s a movie being filmed not far from here. I offered to drop off some of the specs for the campaign, as long as I was here, but it also gives you some time to make a decision.”

 “I already have. I want to be in our baby’s life.” You don’t know why but it felt like a thousand pounds had been lifted off your chest. It was nice to know that you weren’t in this alone. “But there’s a lot to figure out.”

 “Yes, there is.”

 “(Y/N), this is going to sound crazy, but I want you to move here.”

 Pregnancy did weird things to the body and maybe your hearing things was one of them because you were pretty sure Jacob had just said he wanted you to move to Vancouver. “I’m sorry, you want me to move here, as in Vancouver?”

 “Well, yeah but I want you to move in here, like in my house.”

 He seemed dead serious and you weren’t sure how to take his suggestion or him at the moment. “But my life and my home are in LA. That’s where my job is.” Couldn’t he see that?

 “I know, but moving here just makes sense. I’ll be able to help you then, not just after the baby is born but before as well. I have plenty of room in this house. There are three spare bedrooms; we can turn one into a nursery for the baby.”

 How could go from finding out you were pregnant to a full out plan of attack in less than a half-hour? God, it took you a day to wrap your head around it when you found out and then another to make the decision about the abortion, and even then you still didn’t figure out you wanted to keep the baby until you were sitting in the doctor’s office. Jacob seemed to be processing everything much better than you were.

 “I don’t know Jacob, just because we’re having this baby together doesn’t mean we have to live together.” Everything with Jacob was still in this weird transition phase like you went from being wildly attracted to each other, to being married, to getting a divorce, to now having a baby, and now he wanted you to live together under the same roof. You didn’t even know if the two of you would get along that great. Sure, the sex was amazing, well really better than amazing if that was even a thing, and you seemed to get along if your conversations over the last several weeks were any indication, but to live together; that could just be a whole other problem altogether.

 “Look I know it’s a lot to ask and believe me if I could, I’d be willing to move to LA. It’s not like I can just ask to be traded there though. But I don’t want you to have to do this on your own.” It was awfully sweet of him to want to be there for you, and not just the baby. You’d just assumed that he’d want to see the baby on some weekends and maybe an extended time during the summer when he was off. “You don’t realize this yet, but there’s going to be a whole hockey family here for you. That’s just the way it is in this sport.” He grasped your hands then, the gesture one pleading in and of itself for you to see his side of things. “We can do this (Y/N), together.”

 Together, it sounded so nice. You knew that if he had decided to sign the papers that being a single mom was going to be tough, but now knowing that he wanted to be there every step of the way eased some of the burden you felt. It was just hard to think about giving up the life you’d built for yourself in LA. You were already giving up so much as it was. “I get what you’re asking, I really do. I just…it’s a lot.” His thumb started to run back and forth across your knuckles, softly urging you to his side without him even knowing it. “Can I think about it?”

 “Of course.”

 “I mean we don’t have to decide everything tonight.”

 “No, we don’t.” He smiled at you. The same one he gave you when you’d been in Vegas. It gave you butterflies in your stomach back then as it did now. “How are you feeling?”

 “Pretty good, I get a little queasy now and then; mostly when I’m hungry. I’ve learned to carry crackers with me everywhere.”

 “Well, I could make you something or we could order.” The fact that he even offered scored points in your book and was definitely a check on his side of the box for moving to Vancouver, and you were kind of hungry.

 “I mean, I haven’t really eaten.” He gave you a disapproving stare and you felt the need to justify why you hadn’t. “I was too nervous before.”

 “Well, then let’s get you something to eat.” Jacob led you out to the kitchen, where he took out some chicken along with some vegetables to stick in the oven. The two of you worked side by side getting dinner ready. You were midway chopping up some zucchini when Jacob brought the baby back up again. “You mentioned something about the heartbeat. Were you able to hear it?”

 “I have to schedule an ultrasound when I get back but they said that I should be able to.”

 “Mmm.” You weren’t exactly sure what that little hum meant. Was that a good hum, or a bad one? You stayed silent waiting for him to say more. “Do you think you could record it for me?”

 Why did your heart just flutter when he asked that? Was it because he wanted to hear the baby or was it because you were realizing how much he would be missing when you went back to LA? “I will,” you finally told him, but then had an even better idea. “Though you know, I’m here for four more days. Maybe we could find a doctor that would be able to do it while I’m here.”

 His face lit up, like a little boy on Christmas morning. “You would do that?”

 “Yeah. If we can find a doctor to squeeze us in.”

 “I’ll take care of it.” He pulled out his phone, you weren’t sure if he was searching for gynecologists or texting someone, either way, it was adorable how he just jumped in at the first mention of being a part of this whole pregnancy. Again, he was showing you just how nice it would be to share this with him. Ten minutes later he had an appointment all set for you in two days.

 During dinner you talked about how you had found out you were pregnant, telling him the story of how Kennedy was the one to point out your nausea wasn’t normal and that you should take a pregnancy test. She was the only one that knew you were pregnant. You swore her to secrecy, hoping that she wouldn’t spill the beans this time like she had about a certain movie star. Surprisingly, he wanted to know everything, though there wasn’t too much to tell. By the time you got the mess cleaned up from dinner, you were starting to feel the weariness of the day.

 “I think I’m going to head over to the hotel. I still need to check in. Hopefully, I’ll be able to sleep better tonight, now that you finally know.”

 “Stay.” The word fell out of Jacob’s mouth in almost an authoritative manner, which belied the puppy dog look on his face. He cleared his throat and tried again. “I mean you could stay here if you wanted. Sort of like a tryout or something.”

 “You mean trial run?” Leave it to his athletic side to call it a tryout. It made you laugh.

 “Yeah. We could just take the next few days and see how we do together.” It wasn’t a bad idea. “You call and cancel the hotel and I’ll go grab your bag from the car.” He was halfway to the door before you actually agreed.

 As Jacob went outside, he contemplated with himself as to where he should put your things. Did he just bring your luggage to his room or should he give you one of the spare rooms? Despite the fact you were carrying his child, his body still wanted you as much, if not more, than when you were in Vegas. He just wasn’t sure where you saw things going.

 You were just hanging up the phone when he walked back into the house and unbeknownst to him, you were wondering the same thing. However, your head kept telling you that if the two of you were going to make this work, you needed to keep things out of the bedroom, at least for now. Jacob must have had the same thought as you, for when he came in, he said, “Here, I’ll show you where the spare bedroom is.” The room was spacious but again, it wasn’t that homey, and occurred to you that if you decided to live here, you’d definitely need to make some changes. “Did you maybe wanna watch a movie or something, or are you tired?”

 You could see he was struggling in this unchartered territory as much as you were, and while you were exhausted; you still wanted to spend time with him, to see if moving to Vancouver was even an option. “I’d love to watch a movie. Do you mind if I change first?”

 “No, not at all.” He fidgeted with the back of his neck a bit, before turning to leave. “I’ll meet you back downstairs.”

 You really wanted to take a hot shower and crawl into bed, but instead, you opted for just washing up quickly and slipping on a pair of pajamas you’d brought. It was still warm in LA, though the nights were a bit cooler. All you brought to sleep in were a couple pairs of shorts and some comfy t-shirts, thinking that you’d be in a hotel room by yourself. Now, you were wishing that you’d thought about it a little more and packed something a little warmer, if not more modest. Why you cared, you weren’t sure, considering this man had seen you completely naked several times.

 Jacob had changed into some sweats by the time you got downstairs. He had bottles of water for you both along with a pack of crackers laying on the coffee table, and you had to admit your heart melted a little bit when you saw that. “So, what kind of movies do you like? I remember you saying no horror.”

 “We don’t have to watch a movie. I know the Bruins are playing tonight and that you play them tomorrow. Why don’t you just turn the game on?” He looked surprised that you knew his schedule, but you did a deep dive finding out as much information as you could once you found out you were pregnant. He was going to be the baby's father, even if he would've decided not to be in your child's life, though now that he decided he wanted to be, the information was even more useful.

 “Are you sure?” You nodded giving him the go-ahead to watch his opponents’ play. “Speaking of that, would you be interested in going to the game? I mean I know someone who could get you a ticket on short notice?” He looked so adorable when he asked you couldn’t tell him no.

 “I’d love to.” You’d watched very few hockey games live, though ever since Las Vegas, you’d been following the Canucks, well, more like Jacob. It would be fun to see him in action.

 “Great, I can leave you a ticket or have Erik’s fiancé come and take you. You’ll love her.”

 Jacob really wanted you to jump in with both feet, didn’t he? You weren’t quite sure if you were ready to meet all his friends and teammates, but you supposed that if you moved here this would be a part of your life. “If she wouldn’t mind that would be great.”

 “I’ll text him now.”

 “Jacob,” you stopped him, just by saying his name. “Can we keep the baby our secret for now? I know Kennedy knows and I don’t expect you to keep it to yourself, but I don’t want to broadcast it either. At least until we know what we’re doing.”

 He took your hand in his, the gesture reassuring. “Yeah (Y/N), we can do that.”

 It wasn’t long before your attire got the best of you and you found yourself tucking your feet underneath you on the couch trying to keep them warm. You thought that Jacob was fully absorbed in the game, but he caught the subtle movement. “Are you cold?”

 “A little.”

 He scooted your closer to him, his large frame wrapping around yours. You weren’t sure if it was his body heat or him just holding you, but it was definitely warmer in seconds, though Jacob still covered you with a throw blanket that was on the couch. “Better?”

 “Much.” It wasn’t long before you found yourself dozing off. The stress of the day and travel wearing on you. Your head fell softly against his shoulder and you sighed in contentment.

 Jacob felt your body relax against him and he savored the feel of it. He’d honestly missed this closeness to another person in a completely non-sexual way and having you in his arms just felt right. He should’ve been paying attention to the game, scouting out his opponents but instead all he could do was watch you, even before you fell asleep. His fingers were idly stroking your bare arm under the blanket, slowly inching their way down to your wrist. He didn’t realize they’d made their way to your midsection until they were there; just lightly caressing you, scared he would wake you, but he had to touch you there. He’d been dying to all night but been afraid to ask as if it was almost an invasion of your privacy even though you were carrying his child. His child. The thought both terrified him and thrilled him. Jacob always wanted kids; knew that someday he would have them. He just didn’t think it would be this soon. He always assumed that he’d start his family after hockey was over, but here he was with a wife and child on the way. It was something he hadn’t bargained for and never saw coming. Apparently, what happened in Vegas was a lot more than he gambled on.

 taglist: @iculyrea​  @fiveholegoal​  @raysofcrosby @leafs-lover​ @sexysidney87​ @lovethepreds​  @miranda0102​  @stbluesbrat21  @perrieeloise  @mandypants95​  @hockeyunits​  @liz96893  @golfergirl1982​  @princessphilly​  @ajstylesworld​  @zinka8  @dontworrybeekappy​  @hiimana  @meishaabae​ @heatherawoowoo @beauvibaby @hockeybabe87 @leafs-forever

.

[gusu-emilu]

and you can use my skin to bury secrets in

Ship: Jiang Cheng / Wen Qing

Summary: Jiang Cheng ties himself with Zidian. Wen Qing has some prideful (if conflicted) thoughts about the core transfer.

Rated M, Sunshot Campaign, Bondage, Referenced Canon-Typical Violence, WQ has needles but nothing really happens with them

read on AO3 or on Tumblr below

As Wen Qing slowly unties the layers of fabric, she wonders if Jiang Wanyin's robes are from before the burning of Lotus Pier, or if they are a new acquisition. A new asset for the rising Jiang Clan.

'Rising.' She almost laughs at that thought.

This man, trembling and frightened, is Wen Qing’s greatest act of treason.

The night is quiet. Dense. Wen Qing could disappear into the forest if she wanted to. Should disappear, should flee this supervisory office that is now littered with corpses and corrupted talismans.

She doesn’t know why she is back in front of the gate of the Yiling settlement, where anyone could easily spot her as the only body that isn’t mutilated on the ground. She tells herself it’s to inspect the carnage, to determine if her clansmen really were each killed in a different way, but she doesn’t look at the bodies as she walks down the path to empty buildings. Doesn’t look at anything, really. Her sight is all dizzy moonlight and visions of A-Ning.

He could be anywhere by now. Officers from Qishan seized him from the dungeon a day after Wen Qing was thrown in next to him. He had still been bloody, bruised, delirious when they took him away.

Wen Ruohan plays his hand well. He allowed her enough time with A-Ning to see the price for saving the Jiang siblings from Lotus Pier, and no more. Now their empire is falling, A-Ning will be caught in the crossfire, and she doesn’t even know where he is.

The door of the main office creaks as she pushes it open. The floorboards creak, too, under her feet, unless that’s just the sound of her joints fighting with each other as she wanders toward a place she should not be returning to.

Her hand slips inside her robes and closes around a small hard object in a velvety cloth. It is made of wood. Rich hornbeam wood. It should feel heavier than the paper-light weight of an empty promise.

I can hide you in our shelter outside Yiling, he had said, outside the dungeon where Wen Qing is now standing. Just for the night. I can keep you safe. In the morning, the spies will have news of where your brother is, and then you can go.

So simple it all was for him. Come with him to Lotus Pier, come with him to the shelter, keep this gift in her robes, leave her clan. Words of a man who knew their uselessness, yet still said them.

The words give her no comfort. And yet, they settle inside her with a faint warmth.

Unfortunately, warmth is worth very little in war.

She is inside the dungeon now. Somehow she remembered it being darker than this. There is enough moonlight creeping through the slits of the slightly-opened shudders to reveal the room’s sharp angles and cold corners, a drab wooden table and stool, a flat hard bed. A room of brittleness not even softened by the layer of dried grasses littered across the floor.

She must stand there for a while, because she doesn’t know what happens in the moments between when she lays eyes on the spot where she had found A-Ning curled up and bloodied, and when she hears, “Wen-guniang,” in a low, resonant voice behind her.

Immediately everything becomes crisper. She can see the individual strands of hay on the stone floor, smell the dull musk of the dungeon, hear footsteps come one bit closer.

She turns around.

Jiang Wanyin is standing just inside the dungeon. His arms are at his sides, slightly bent and tenser than should be comfortable, and his fists are not much better—one tightly clutching a sword and one hanging hesitantly under a thin silver snake around his wrist. His shoulders are broad, his chest raised like he’d deflate if his upper body didn’t displace enough air.

Indeed, now he wears the robes of a clan leader, and fills them. But his face still has that same naïve mixture of distress and wonder as when Wen Qing healed a gash in his leg on a boat in Caiyi Town.

“Wen-guniang.” His lips are soft and slightly parted, offensive in how they call after her with concern. “Why did you come back here?”

She has no obligation to answer him, so she doesn’t. She turns back to the dungeon to stare at the spot on the floor where she once held A-Ning.

Quiet footsteps. Jiang Wanyin is right behind her now. She can’t feel his breath, but she can hear its pattern clearly enough that it might as well be touching her. “Come back to the shelter with me,” he says.

“A-Ning would be safer in this dungeon than wherever he is now.” Her voice sounds far away.

Jiang Wanyin is quiet for a while. Then his feet shift, and she catches the sound of another of his too-swollen breaths. “Wen-guniang. Come back with me. You’ll be safer in the camp.”

A scoff rises up her throat. She walks over to the vacant spot on the floor and sits down on the sparse blanket of hay, hugging her knees into her chest with her back against the cold wall. She’s not sure why she is letting Jiang Wanyin watch her do this, but it doesn’t especially matter. She has seen Jiang Wanyin more vulnerable than he will ever see her.

Without needing to look, she can tell that Jiang Wanyin’s brow is furrowed, and his eyes are glistening with worry so abrasively genuine it would grate on her like scales if she let it.

She has felt the gaze of men before. A filthy, unwanted thing it is, like scooping up clear water in her hands only to find mud stuck under her fingernails.

Yet Jiang Wanyin’s gaze is something completely other. When she cups it, it settles in the lines of her palms. It wets her fingertips, waiting for her to seal another wound in his skin. Or perhaps cut a new one.

But she knows what Jiang Wanyin’s limit is. His care for her does not extend to A-Ning or the rest of her family—and with the war, what can she expect?

She does not want his concern. What she really wants is to sit here alone and cry.

It could be easily arranged. One flick of her wrist, a needle in the side of Jiang Wanyin’s neck, and she could cry in peace as he crumples to the floor and sleeps. There are kinder ways to make him leave her alone, but this one is the fastest, so she’s on her feet with a needle between two of her fingers.

She doesn’t throw it.

Instead she strides toward Jiang Wanyin with the needle held up for him to see. Once she is close enough, he catches her wrist.

His eyes are wide. “W-Wen-guniang—”

She pulls away and slips the needle back into her sleeve, leaving his hand hanging. The silver chain of Zidian waves back and forth beneath his wrist.

Neither of them moves.

She supposes she’s testing him as she raises the needle once again. It turns, slowly, like a compass pointing toward his cheek. Every part of his body freezes except for his eyes warily following the sharp tip as it draws closer to his face, until it rests on his cheekbone.

His breath is louder now. Unstable.

A bang hangs just over his cheek, so she presses the length of the metal against his hair and trails the tip along the side of his face, barely grazing his skin, until she has carefully tucked the bang behind his ear.

He swallows. His Adam’s apple looks like it wants to escape his throat.

There is no bang on the other side of his face, so she just touches the needle to the top of his ear and traces along its rim, slow and light enough to torment. When the tip is halfway down his ear, his teeth chatter.

He sucks in a breath and finally meets her eyes. From the eager terror swallowing his expression and the way he’s working to keep his mouth closed, his state of mind is obvious.

Jiang Wanyin would do anything she asked.

How nice it would be, to have control over something. Wen Qing has long known the authority that comes with her position—the orders and paperwork, the entire Qishan medical inventory, the health of Wen Ruohan, the safety of her family—and she has control over exactly none of it.

Her position is all false security when A-Ning is dangled over her head.

But Jiang Wanyin…

He would do anything she asked.

Anything except leave her to cry alone in this dungeon, or save her family.

But that might be enough for now. Too much has been asked of both of them since the Sunshot Campaign began.

One hand still at his ear, she hides the needle in her robes with a flick of two fingers. She strokes the side of her thumb along his cheek. It sends a rush through her.

“Why did you follow me here, Jiang Wanyin?”

“I—you could have been—”

She traces a finger along his jawline, his bone much sturdier than he is before her. “Has it not occurred to you that I can take care of myself?”

His only answer is a pink flush spreading across his cheeks. Wen Qing has seen him in many states of turmoil—his shy glances in the Cloud Recesses, his outburst in Yiling at the sight of her Wen robes, his utter emptiness as he lay in mountain grass waiting for “Baoshan Sanren”—but this is a type of turmoil she has never quite seen.

“Kneel.”

A staggered gasp escapes Jiang Wanyin’s lips.

He blinks at her a few times, then drops to his knees.

* * *

Every one of his muscles is shaking. His breath is caught in his throat—or maybe he has forgotten how to breathe—and he wonders if he might suffocate like this, quivering on his knees and waiting for Wen Qing to move.

He ducks his head, trying to hide the burning in his face, but he knows she can see every inch of him. That makes him burn hotter. He wonders if she can hear his heartbeat, how it fights against his inability to just get some damn oxygen inside himself.

He is a clan leader. She is an enemy. He should be on his feet, not kneeling at hers.

As if Wen Qing can sense this, she takes a step closer and says, “Jiang-zongzhu.”

He thinks he makes a noise. Maybe a grunt. Maybe a squeak. He’d rather not know what it is.

He has responsibilities, Wei Wuxian is still missing, his people are injured—

But it all fades away, lost in the dimness of the room.

He does not feel like a clan leader now.

He realizes that Wen Qing is making some kind of gesture, and with effort he lifts his gaze enough to see her holding the comb in front of herself, casually displaying the gift he gave her as though it is just a doctor’s tool she happens to have.

Surely she must know what that comb means. She must know how much courage it had taken to buy it, how much more it had taken to give it to her, and it stings for her to wave it so easily before him.

She lowers the comb and disappears behind him. Her footsteps are soft and chilling on the stone floor, and they stop closer to him than he expected. The silence that follows is agonizing. He curls his fingers into his robes at his sides, the shuffle of fabric just audible enough to fill the stifling emptiness.

Light pressure at the top of his head. Feathery. Phantomlike.

This should not be enough to break him already—it isn’t, he isn’t—but he shivers and grips his robes tighter.

Thin fingers gently tug at his hair, removing his hairpiece with such precision that even as Jiang Cheng’s mind falls apart into alternating screams of make it stop make it stop and touch me more touch me more, he can sense how methodically her fingers work through his hair.

Once the metal hairpiece is out, he is left plain, unornamented.

He is certainly not a clan leader now.

* * *

The silver hairpiece gleams in her hands. The moonlight seems to be drawn to it, as if it knows that this is the only valuable object in this dungeon. The only thing that isn’t worn and beaten. The blue glow from the window does not even shine on Wen Qing or Jiang Wanyin as much as it illuminates this piece of embellished silver.

She drops it to the floor.

Jiang Wanyin’s shoulders draw up at the harsh clang of metal on stone.

For a brief moment, she considers removing her own hairpiece as well. But instead she runs the comb through Jiang Wanyin’s hair, draws his locks into a bun like raising a curtain. Then she decides she likes his hair better down and takes the bun out. Jiang Wanyin winces at the light tug.

She repeats that several more times, running the comb and her fingers through his soft hair, tying it up and taking it down, sometimes pausing to study the creation she has made, sometimes pulling it apart right away.

It’s comforting, to do and undo him as she pleases. She has felt many bodies under her hands, zipping and unzipping them with finality, leaving a permanent imprint whether the result was successful or not. It’s nice to be able to alter the work of her hands however many times she wants. To have someone so obliging, who lets her be impatient and indecisive with no consequences, who melts a little more with every stroke of her fingers in his hair.

Jiang Wanyin, too, she has remade. It is only right for her to tweak him a bit more until she is satisfied.

Especially since, if the rumors are true, her remaking of Jiang Wanyin has left Wei Wuxian coreless in the Burial Mounds, another corpse thrown onto the heap of resentment.

She tugs the bun out more sharply this time. Jiang Wanyin makes a feeble, pained noise.

In the end, she finishes with the bun tied. When she circles back in front of him, it is clear that it was a good decision, as the sharp lines of his face are both more boyish and more mature with his hair drawn back.

He glances up at her.

A bright streak of violet binds his wrists and wraps around a beam on the ceiling. His arms shoot over his head, his hands tied.

Judging by the look of horror on Jiang Wanyin’s face, he is just as surprised as she is.

* * *

“Is this something it does often?”

Jiang Cheng can’t bear to look at Wen Qing, but he can clearly see the smirk on her face just from the amusement in her voice.

This is, in fact, not something that happens.

Zidian has never acted without him telling her to.

He struggles against the whip cords enough to realize that they are so tight around his wrists that he can barely rock his shoulders.

His face is on fire.

Did he…did he tell Zidian to do this?

“No need to hurry,” Wen Qing says, her voice slick, teasing. “Release yourself for now.”

“I—I—” He stops himself, because he doesn’t know which would be more embarrassing, to admit that he had no control over his own weapon, or to say that he tied himself up with it on purpose. He retracts Zidian with a crack, and his hands fall limp at his sides.

“First,” Wen Qing says slowly, “ask me to remove your robes.”

Jiang Cheng jerks his head up, and immediately he knows it was a mistake to look. He almost shatters under the hawklike sharpness of Wen Qing’s gaze, the steady attentiveness of eyes trained to notice every detail of the body.

He forces his limbs to function enough for him to begin to stand. He immediately regrets that, too, because the best he can manage is to stagger weakly to his feet.

Once he straightens himself up, he is much taller than Wen Qing. Much broader. Funny that even as he towers over her, he feels tiny.

He stands there for a while, trying to will the heat out of his face and slow his breathing.

Ask me to remove your robes, his mind repeats.

Some traitorous part of him claws up his throat, ready to beg for Wen Qing to take off his robes, to take off everything, take off his clan and his name and his body until he is nothing more than a heartbeat in her hands.

Instead, he straightens his spine and sets his jaw.

The corners of Wen Qing’s mouth twitch. She reaches up and strokes Jiang Cheng’s upper lip with the tip of her finger. “Can’t speak?”

His lips quiver. They part slightly, and her finger enters his mouth just the smallest amount.

He pulls away and scowls. “I can speak just fine,” he says, ignoring how much his voice cracks.

“Prove it.”

He does not prove it.

But he does hold his arms out at his sides for Wen Qing to remove his robes, closing his eyes as he waits, as if sealing his vision would stop his dignity from rushing out of him like a river.

* * *

As Wen Qing slowly unties and slides away the layers of fabric, she wonders if these robes are from before the burning of Lotus Pier, or if they are a new acquisition. A new asset for the rising Jiang Clan.

Rising. She almost laughs at that thought.

This man, trembling and frightened, hot skin exposed more each second, is Wen Qing’s greatest act of treason.

By opening and sealing Jiang Wanyin’s meridians on that mountain and hiding that pulse of gold inside him, she has enabled revenge to fall upon Qishan much faster than it would have come on its own.

The Wen Clan struck down the Jiang, only for Wen Qing to recreate its power.

It’s too bad Wen Ruohan will ever know. At last, something she would not object to being thrown in a dungeon and beaten for, a crime she has full ownership of, and it is a secret that will soon die with her and A-Ning and has probably died already with Wei Wuxian.

She blocks out the pain of that thought.

Jiang Wanyin’s robes fall to the floor.

He gasps, and his gaze darts around for a few moments. Then he slowly looks up, as if expecting something he is too afraid to ask for.

“You may tie yourself now,” Wen Qing says.

Jiang Wanyin averts his gaze, hesitating. Then he kneels, and bright violet cords appear around his wrists and lock over the beam on the ceiling once more. He hangs forward with his arms over his head.

This is much better. Jiang Wanyin had been fully clothed during the core transfer, as the operation was purely one of spiritual energy. Now Wen Qing can see the taut muscles under which her treachery lives.

She smiles.

* * *

Coolness rushes through Jiang Cheng’s body. He feels a strange sense of release, as if something heavy inside him has slithered out through his fingertips into the binds of Zidian and left him weightless.

But Wen Qing’s scrutinizing gaze is even more unbearable than before, now that it is upon his bare skin. He fights the urge to squirm, to hide, to rip away Zidian’s restraints and run out the door. At least Wen Qing had the mercy to leave his trousers on.

A growing urge swells in him, and he wants to hear her voice. To feel her hands on him.

Touch me.

Want me.

He musters the courage to meet Wen Qing’s eyes again, and she is smirking. He thinks his entire body shrinks to half its size.

“Are you waiting for me to say something?” she asks.

He bites his lip.

“I have seen many men, Jiang Wanyin.” She paces in a circle around him, each of her footsteps calculated, reverberating through the floorboards and into his nerves, giving him goosebumps. “Are you waiting for me to call you remarkable? To marvel at you?”

She kneels in front of him. She smells like smoke and ash.

Jiang Cheng wants to lean forward, tangle his face in her hair and bury his lips in her neck and rest with his head on her shoulder, but the biting restraint of Zidian holds him back. Perhaps it is better that way. He can do nothing wrong, can make no mistakes, when he is powerless like this.

Security courses through him, sweet and hot.

Wen Qing places her hands on his shoulders. He can’t stop the moan from escaping.

She rubs his arms, which have stopped straining against Zidian and now relax even more as she squeezes and massages his muscles, runs her hands down to his collarbone and digs her thumbs into the sides of his neck. He shudders as one hand slides down his chest and presses into his lower abdomen. With the other hand, she grabs his chin and gently draws it forward.

Jiang Cheng lost control of his breath long ago. Tension he did not even know he held onto is disappearing from his body, pried away by Wen Qing’s hands.

He wants to curl up and crawl away.

He wants more.

“Jiang-zongzhu,” Wen Qing says, her expression intense, unreadable. “I will tell you one thing.”

She presses firmer on his abdomen, above his navel, as if digging inside him.

“You will be a powerful clan leader.”

Heat blazes over Jiang Cheng’s face, to the tips of his ears, down his neck. He closes his eyes, fights the primal urge to flee and hide.

“Don’t make any mistakes."

He shakes his head. “I—I w-won’t…”

“Good.” Her hand lifts from his abdomen and finds its way to his jaw. She cups both sides of his face, her hands steady and slightly calloused.

“I won’t harm your people,” Jiang Cheng murmurs. “I’ll—I’ll protect you.”

Wen Qing sighs. Rubs a thumb over his cheek. Then again, closer to his lips.

Somehow, he dares to open his eyes. “Would—would you—please—”

She tilts her head.

He swallows. Zidian sparks around his wrists, as if she is just as eager. Selfish little thing.

Wen Qing seems to consider it for a few moments. “Close your eyes.”

He does not want to. He wants to see her lean in, see her eyelashes lower—

Wen Qing raises two fingers to each of his eyes and closes them.

“If we are lucky,” she says quietly, “we will never meet again.”

She silences him with her lips before he can reply.

* * *

Thanks for reading! If you liked this fic, you can be a supportive sibling like Jiang Yanli by visiting me on AO3!

[shmegmilton]

Can you explain how Aaron and Alexander stopped being friends and started fighting?

They were never really ‘friends.’ I assume you got that idea from the play, but I have no idea why the play tried to push that narrative. Civil? Sure, but that was necessary. New York was less than 50,000 people at the time, and they were both accomplished lawyers & statesmen who had to work and interact with each other on a daily basis. Politics is politics, look at how people are acting right now during our election. 

As for your question, it’s a long line of policy & personal disagreements, mostly. They were on opposite sides of the aisle on pretty much everything. Lots of small things, but a lot of big, BIG things.

     Burr was (ironically) kind of a pacifist; he kept mostly to himself, didn’t really speak much publicly & didn’t necessarily go out of his way to confront people unless he’s been pushed long enough (everyone ‘snaps’ at some point, y’know?)

But that’s why the ‘Burr is an evil mastermind’ myth is so pervasive today. Burr just… didn’t bother defending himself, or correcting anything, because he (mistakingly) had faith in the inherent goodness of people that someday people would see him for his true character. So for that reason, we don’t really have a good timeline from Burr’s perspective as to how he felt about Hamilton—but BOY howdy did Hamilton never shut up about Burr.

----

Trespass & Confiscation Acts  (1782ish)

     During the Revolution, the British confiscated the property of patriots that fled the city. New York did the same thing, & for a while it was this game of: ‘Oh, you’re gonna take my stuff? **draws a line in the dirt** Well, everything behind this line is mine now.” It was all very bad, and after the way Tories & Loyalists faced a lot of honestly very fucked up discrimination & forfeiture of their rights. Hamilton (like most Federalists) was pro-British, so he represented a lot of these people in court. I’m sure it wasn’t purely out of the goodness of his heart--most of his clients were loaded--but the sentiment is there. On the other hand, there are multiple records of Burr buying up property around this time, most likely confiscated Tory property, which he would usually flip or give away to people that he knew, so he was taking full advantage of this. Burr also, most likely, went head-to-head with Hamilton on a few of these cases, because Burr tended to work with the ‘common folk.’

French Revolution (1789ish to 1799ish) & Proclamation of Neutrality (1793)

     Burr (like most Democratic-Republicans) was pro-French, so much so that he took in French refugees fleeing the Revolution into his home. He was very sympathetic to the cause.Hamilton was not. He basically saw it the same way that right-wing Conservatives see the Black Lives Matter movement is the best way I can explain it. He also hated it for the amount of immigrants that were now fleeing to the U.S.

Burr Gets Chosen For NY Senate (1791)

     Key word: chosen. As in, he didn’t actually run. That wasn’t how politics worked back then. The Hamilton musical just fucking lied outright about that, let’s be clear. He also never switched parties. Ever. Back then you were nominated by the people who were already in government--usually by one of the powerful families like the Clintons or the Livingstons, or yada yada. So Burr didn’t actually do anything. He didn’t even really want the position either, if I recall. But back then if you were ‘called to serve,’ you were obligated to do it. Hamilton was furious either way because it meant that Burr was replacing his father-in-law, Phillip Schuyler, meaning that he wouldn’t have that extra ear in government that he wanted. Burr also had a lot of views that were considered ‘extreme’ at the time, like getting extra rights for women, immigrants & black people, but I have no idea what Hamilton thought of those individual policies other than he just didn’t like women, immigrants or black people.

1792 & 1796 Presidential Election

Burr wasn’t really that serious about either of these elections, I don’t think (in ’92 he wasn’t that well-known & barely got any support, but it’s worth noting the fact he was nominated to run at all was really impressive. He’s tied with William Jennings Bryan as being one of the youngest people to ever receive an electoral vote, at 36 years old.) In ’96 he faired a little better—he got 30 votes, which is nearly half of what you need to get the ticket nomination, also very impressive.Hamilton was super staunchly opposed to both of these runs, though, and did his typical Hamilton thing of openly campaigning about how the people shouldn’t vote for Burr, yada yada.

Jay Treaty (1794)

     I highly suggest looking up supplemental information on this because it’s a bit complicated, but it was basically a treaty between us and Great Britain to reaffirm that we were going to continue to not mess with France, as well as a couple of other weird hang-ups. It was not popular, at all, especially with the Demo-Republicans. There is a specific instance (that is actually kind of insane) where Hamilton gave a public speech in defense of it, and the Democratic-Republicans in the crowd started pelting him & the other Federalists with rocks. Hamilton got SO mad that immediately challenged a man to a duel, and threatened to fight each of the Democratic-Republicans one-by-one.  

Reynolds Affair (1797)

     Burr had a personal relationship with Maria Reynolds; he was her divorce attorney in 1793/1794, helped her out financially, & successfully petitioned (+paid for) her daughter Susan to attend a boarding school. I believe they also stayed in his him with him during the divorce proceedings, but don’t quote me on that. He never said anything publicly that I could find, but Burr probably had a personal investment in the Reynolds Pamphlet, since it painted Maria in a really damaging light.

Alien & Sedition Acts (1798)

     These were some of the most worst laws ever passed in the history of the country. Like, these were AWFUL. It not only limited immigration, but it limited the freedom of the press and freedom of speech (ESPECIALLY immigrants, my god.)

Burr was right on the front lines helping defend people in court, he actively opposed it & is probably the thing that propelled him into Jefferson’s orbit as a potential Vice President.

John Barker Church Duel (1797)

John Barker Church had accused Burr of taking bribes (which was unfounded & untrue) and they ended up dueling. JBC was the husband of Angelica Schuyler, Hamilton’s sister-in-law.

Neither was injured (though, JBC apparently put a hole in Burr’s coat), but it supposed infuriated Hamilton & his associates so much that they would send out fake letters “from Burr” challenging people to duels.

The Manhattan Company (1799)

    Burr was getting sick of the difficulty he was having getting loans from the Federalist-run banks and decided to do something about it. There had been several seasonal epidemics of yellow fever—caused by mosquitos but, at the time, it was thought to be caused by improperly treated water, miasma (‘bad air’) or (if you asked Hamilton) stinky evil immigrant refuges who were fleeing France and Haiti. Burr saw this and spearheaded a campaign to get a proper water treatment plant, even getting Hamilton to help him. Through some really weird loophole that I don’t quite understand, Burr was somehow allowed to use the ‘surplus capital’ for banking, which essentially turned it into a bank. The actual water treatment portion of the company was plagued with problems due to improper management and things like that.     We’ll never know his exact thought process on this (people normally assume it was malicious trickery because people are biased to hate Burr anyway) & I highly doubt that Burr knew the extent of the issues (he was on the Board of Directors, but so were a dozen others--INCLUDING John Barker Church) so I don’t entirely think it’s his fault, but the fact of the matter is that it most likely exacerbated the existing problems & indirectly led to more people getting sick/dying until they finally fixed the problems.I would say that it’s completely justifiable for Hamilton to be mad at Burr, but, as we established, Hamilton hated both poor people & immigrants (two groups most likely affected by this) so he wasn’t actually mad at him for the reason a… y’know, a normal person would be mad at him. He was mad at him because Burr destroyed the monopoly that Federalists had on banks, making it easier for Democratic-Republicans & others to get loans. He was literally mad at him for making the economy fair.

1800 Election & 1804 NY Governor Election

  These two are self-explanatory, I think, and I’ve already been writing way too long, lol. My hand hurts.

[crisisdparity]

Game Master Akuma AU

(Note: Originally submitted to @justanotherpersonsuniverse, on their advice I will be using my own tumblr for anything in the future related to this AU.)

Xavier Duchamp was rather proud of himself. What he had before him was an absolute masterpiece of a campaign if he did say so himself. The product of over six months of study, research, and rebalancing efforts followed by two weeks of discussion with his five players to hash out schedules, meeting times, characters, backstories, potential character arcs, and getting them set up with a messaging app that was really good for sending discrete messages between the GM and the players.

Valentine and her boyfriend Justin were onboard in an instant. Within days, he'd greenlighted their Half-Elf Bard of the College of Glamour whose spell list was 100% Illusion spells and Half-Orc Fighter (Eldritch Knight) who was focusing entirely on Abjuration as Rena Rouge and Carapace respectively.

Olivia had spent a few days coming up with a Halfling Rogue and debating subclasses with him until settling on Scout. Along with some discussion over how her special magic item's stunning and paralysis effect would work with Sneak Attack, the campaign had its Vesperia.

Jeanette had gone back and forth with him for a week looking at various homebrew subclasses for her Gnome Artificer before they both agreed on one particular Master Tinkerer entry that would be balanced and do the character justice. And with that they had their Ladybug.

Even Matt was on board with a stealthy human Chat the Barbarian using the Path of the Beast. The class choice was something Matt had insisted on (and that Xavier would have suggested anyway just for the high hit point totals given Matt's history with characters dying) and he'd even come up with a backstory that Xavier felt was quite compelling compared to Matt's usual efforts. Morally ambiguous, likely to be tempted by promises of power, but with a great deal of story potential to work with.

Which was a relief. Getting a new player into their group to replace Matt was not something Xavier really felt comfortable with. There were too many unknowns with introducing a new person, far too many for him to risk his masterpiece on an unknown factor. He knew Matt. He could work with Matt. Despite the history.

He'd put everything he had into this. Every known Akuma ever fought by the heroes had been made into a boss-tier foe. He'd carefully documented each and every power the heroes had shown to craft special legendary magic items based on the Miraculous. Hawkmoth and Mayura themselves were going to be the final bosses of his campaign.

In response to criticism about the difficulty of his campaigns (he tried to make them fair, but still challenging enough to be memorable), he'd made several guest NPCs based on every other hero that had ever been called upon, statted out like player characters that might show up in a pinch to help. He even had a genuine Deus ex Machina that he was ready to use to get the players out of a truly impossible jam if they found themselves in one.

Not always, but a few times at least. Enough to get them to the point where they wouldn't need it anymore.

-----

It was thirty minutes in, right in the middle of exposition from the Guardian NPC, when Xavier got his first message on the app.

Matt/Chat - Chat's going to wait until everyone breaks up and follow Ladybug stealthily.

Xavier/GM - Starting party conflict on the first session? Not what I'd advise, but it's your character. Go ahead and make your Stealth roll now.

Matt/Chat - <photo> 17

Xavier/GM - Yeah, that beats everyone's passive Perception easily. You'll sneak off handily without anyone noticing.

-----

"Jeanette, Ladybug is grabbed from behind by an unknown assailant. Roll to resist the grapple."

"Geez, already? Okay, what did my assailant get for their grapple? How screwed am I?"

Xavier pretended to roll a die while consulting the message from Matt.

"19."

"Okay, difficult, but not undoable... Crap."

"What'd you get?"

"Nat 1..."

"Hah! I rip off her earrings and claim them for myself! The Wish is mine!"

"Seriously Matt?! What the hell?!"

"Because it's payback time! Payback for every character of mine killed in these hellish campaigns!"

"Oh, come on! You're not the only person whose had a character die at this table! Xavier runs some pretty challenging campaigns, but they're always fair!"

"What about the time he killed Allric the Allmighty in a single round of combat?"

"Dude, you tried to Leroy Jenkins straight into melee with a 4th-level Wizard that had a CON penalty. Even at full health you had like 10 hp."

"14!"

"Not much better, dude."

"Guys, it's fine. I can handle this. Okay, Matt. Chat the Barbarian managed to get the earrings-"

"Yeah, Ladybug screams bloody murder when he rips them out. Good luck getting out of this in one piece."

"The moment Rena hears Ladybug scream, she bolts for the sound."

"So does Carapace."

"Vesperia too."

"-and with their current locations and movement speeds, I assume you're all using the Dash action?, you've got maybe one round to decide on your Wish before they're all over you, so choose carefully. And be aware that I plan to grant whatever you wish for in the worst possible way, just as I would if any of the others pulled this."

"Rena screams 'What the HELL, Chat?! We're supposed to protect the Miraculous, not use them for our own selfish purposes! Didn't you listen to the Guardian? Such actions always bring misfortune upon those who misuse the Miraculous!'"

"Because I am Chat, avatar of Destruction and I WISH THIS WORLD NEVER EXISTED!"

There was dead silence at the table.

"Matt... What... just... WHAT?!"

"Hah! You like that?! How does it feel now that the shoe's on the other foot, huh?!"

"What the hell is your problem, Matt?!"

"My problem? MY problem?! Do you know how much time I've spent making characters for these shitty campaigns only to have them turned into paste in one session?!"

"Because you made primary spellcasters and played every last one of them like a barbarian, charging in headfirst without thinking! All of us breathed a sigh of relief when you revealed that your character finally matched your playstyle!"

"I HATE BARBARIANS! THEY'RE BORING! I SHOULD GET TO PLAY CHARACTERS THAT CAN AT LEAST CHUCK FIREBALLS!"

"THEN MAYBE YOU SHOULD STOP RUNNING THEM FACE FIRST INTO ENEMY SWORDS!"

"NONE OF YOU COULD EVER HANDLE THE FACT THE I MAKE MORE AWESOME CHARACTERS THAN ANY OF YOU, SO YOU JUST LET THIS DOUCHEBAG KILL THEM OFF SO YOU WOULDN'T GET OVERSHADOWED BY HOW AMAZING I AM! WELL NOW I KILLED SOMETHING YOU ALL WORKED HARD ON, SO SUCK IT! I'M DONE WITH ALL OF YOU FOREVER!"

"MATT! HEY! GET BACK HERE YOU JERK! MATT!"

"Crap, I think Olivia might actually kill him this time..."

"It's going to take all of us to stop her from getting arrested at least."

Xavier just watched numbly as the rest of the group ran out of his apartment. Over six months of work. Gone in less than an hour.

He'd given so much to making sure this would work. He'd apologized to Matt at least twice for every character of his that had died to get him to come back. He'd agreed to demand after demand just to keep a familiar face on board, never dreaming he'd pull something like this.

He'd nearly gotten fired from his job trying to rearrange his schedule to fit with everyone else's. They'd somehow, miraculously, gotten the whole day with no other obligations among any of them and decided to make the first session a true marathon. They'd meet in the morning after breakfast and eat both lunch and dinner at the game table before calling it a night late in the evening.

It was barely 10:00 in the morning and the whole campaign he'd slaved over for months was kaput.

He never noticed the butterfly landing on his custom Miraculous-themed Game Master screen and being absorbed into it.

"Game Master, I am Hawkmoth. Few people appreciate the kind of effort that goes into making something truly grand and memorable. I shall give you the power to bring your entire world to life and in return, I ask only for a few simple things."

This was wrong. Hawkmoth was the worst of the worst. The kind of person who would be at home among all the final bosses he'd ever made for his campaigns. Heartless, manipulative, cruel.

"Not enough? Ah, but what is a game without players? How would you like to have the Miraculous heroes themselves run your great campaign? Surely they would be far more appreciative than those ungrateful peons that left you alone with nothing but the broken remains of your efforts."

He knew all these things, but the allure of bringing the world he'd spent so much time on to life... What creator could ever turn down an offer like that?

"I, the Game Master, accept... Hawkmoth."

"Excellent. And in exchange, you shall bring me one of two things: The Miraculous, or the identities of their wielders."

"No."

Hawkmoth was silent for a moment.

"I beg your pardon?"

"I said no. I am the Game Master. I make the world. I craft the challenges. I decide the rewards. But I do not do anything for anyone. If you want these things, get them yourself."

"If you refuse me, it shall be very unpleasant for you."

"No. As Game Master, I decide the limits of all powers within my realm. And I decide that you have none over me."

And with that, he unleashed his creation over all of Paris, drawing everyone and everything within into his sphere of influence.

-----

Ladybug blinked the spots (ha) out of her eyes as the flash of light died down and looked at herself. She didn't remember transforming, but she was clearly in her spots. Except her red and black superhero uniform didn't usually look like it was headed to a steampunk convention. Looking around, she tried to figure out what had happened and her eyes landed on a familiar belt and pants combo.

Problem. Whoever this was, their groin was at eye level for her.

She looked up.

And up.

To find a grinning Chat Noir, sans anything resembling a shirt and having put on at least a foot of height and apparently a hundred pounds of pure muscle, grinning down at her.

"How's the weather down there?" Chat Noir chuckled as he flexed his unfairly attractive muscleman physique.

"I WILL END YOU!" the heroine snarled, already 100% done with whatever new insanity Hawkmoth had cooked up.

Characters:

Ladybug - Gnome Artificer (Master Tinkerer - Homebrew)

Chat Noir - Human Barbarian (Path of the Beast)

-----

Vesperia had to admit, as Akuma attacks went, this was pretty dope.

She was currently a halfling. A halfling! If it wasn't for her fantasy ensemble being yellow and black, she'd have thought she stepped straight out of Lord of the Rings.

Of course, fantasy setting or not, there were still things she'd have rather left back in the real world. Like racism. And stigma against mixed couples. Not directed at her, but rather at the two walking down the street next to her.

"You know, people are staring..." she said as she craned her head to look at her companions.

"Let them," the Half-Elf Rena Rouge (who looked like a cross between a musician and a belly dancer) said from her perch atop the shoulders of the heavily armored (and surprisingly buff) Half-Orc Carapace. "They're just jealous because their boyfriends can't carry them everywhere."

Characters:

Vesperia - Halfling Rogue (Scout)

Rena Rouge - Half-Elf Bard (College of Glamour)

Carapace - Half-Orc Fighter (Eldritch Knight)

-----

Ryuko blinked as she studied the apparent snake-man-thing before her who claimed to be Viperion. She lifted a hand to study it and found what appeared to be bronze scales covering every inch of her skin.

She sniffed herself, smelling the sharp tang of ozone. What was she?

And why did she appear to be wearing wooden armor?

Characters:

Ryuko - Dragonborn (bronze) Druid (Circle of Storms - Third Party)

Viperion - Naga Sorcerer (Divination Magic - Homebrew)

-----

Polymouse giggled as her friends ran over her. Okay, she'd freaked out a little to find a swarm of mice (with hair like hers no less) crawling all over her surprisingly mouse-like body when she'd come to in the middle of some forest somewhere. But she'd gotten over it pretty quickly. It helped that her new friends were adorable.

It might help more if she could figure out where she was.

Or find another person.

Characters:

Polymouse - Kobold (rodentlike) Ranger (Swarmkeeper - Reskinned)

-----

Purple Tigress sighed as she felt the hair (fur?) on the top of her head being shifted around and twitched her new catlike ears in mild annoyance.

"Are you quite done?"

"Almost!" Pigella's cheerful voice answered. "Your fur is so comfy!"

Tigress sighed. Of course Pigella would end up being a fairy, and having her normal cheerful enthusiasm cranked up to previously unimagined levels.

"I love you dearly, but if you start shouting 'hey listen' I will stick you in a bottle."

"Aw, I love you too! Hey, what's that?"

"I think it's my character sheet?"

Characters:

Purple Tigress - Tabaxi Paladin (Oath of Glory)

Pigella - Fairy Cleric (Order Domain - Reskinned)

-----

"According to my analysis, we have been placed into what appears to be a Dungeons and Dragons campaign under 5th edition rules," Pegasus stated in a mechanical monotone. "I am apparently a Warforged Wizard using the School of Conjuration whose spells create portals to bridge dimensions and summon or banish my intended targets. You are what is known as a Simic Hybrid, with the class of Monk, following the Way of the Drunken Master."

"Aweshum," King Monkey slurred, his generally human appearance clad in monk's robes marred by his monkey-like hands and feet as well as the monkey tail swishing behind him.

"Why do you keep slurring like that? According to my sensors, your gourd is filled with only water."

"Gotta keep up appearanshes!" King Monkey grinned as he continued faking drunkenness.

Characters:

Pegasus - Warforged Wizard (School of Conjuration - Reskinned)

King Monkey - Simic Hybrid Monk (Way of the Drunken Master)

-----

Hawkmoth studied the dark red horns growing out of his head in the mirror. The change in appearance was disconcerting, but he felt a rush of power in this new form that he'd never felt before.

"Hmm... perhaps I can work with this..."

"Speak for yourself..." Mayura muttered off to the side, ruffling her peacock-like feathers in annoyance as she tried to glare at the beak on her own face.

Characters:

Hawkmoth - Tiefling Dark Lord, Warlock Patron, Contracted by Lila Rossi, Volpina, Queen Wasp, and many others.

Mayura - Kenku Assistant to the Dark Lord, Creator of Monsters

-----

"Oh, come on!" A figure in a cyan and white hooded robe complained as they waved a similarly colored umbrella around angrily. "Everyone else gets to be part of this adventure, why can't I join them?"

"Because you're too OP. You'd completely break everything and remove all challenge from the adventure."

"But sitting around is no fun at all!"

"If you like, I can put you in the position of the main quest giver. Your job would be to direct them towards their enemies and means of becoming stronger."

"That's it?! I'm on 'mysterious hooded figure' duty? Boo! Why can't I fight with them?!"

"Because you're too OP. But if you insist, I'll allow some Deus ex Machina interventions."

"YES!"

"Five."

"I'm sorry?"

"I'll allow five interventions at your discretion to aid them when they are in peril. Once you have come to their aid five times, I will allow no more meetings save to impart quest information."

"That's it?"

"Yes. Choose your interventions wisely."

"So... if I manage to save one for when they fight Hawmoth and Mayura in the final battle...?"

"Then I would allow you to join them of course."

"Score!"

Characters:

Bunnyx: Mysterious Hooded Figure, Deus-ex-Machina (5)

Game Master: Akuma Lord of the Miraculous Campaign

-----

Addendum

When the Game Master is finally purified and the damage reversed, it turns out that he took the effort to trap all of Paris in a temporal stasis bubble so that no matter how long passed inside no more than a few moments passed outside. Meaning that after what seemed like months in the bubble, it's basically less than a minute after he was akumatized when everything is put back.

All his friends, minus Matt, come back in bringing a new person named Zack that they vetted themselves to take Matt's place in case he pulled something like what he did. And while he has a similar playstyle to Matt, he's savvy enough to know what kind of characters that is suited for and he loves playing barbarians.

They all sit back down and restart the game they were all looking forward to.

[theirishhalfling]

It’s been two years since we started Watcher’s campaign, so that’s two years of good ol’ Watcher (though never mind we’ve only played twice this year so far, and with all that’s going on I can’t imagine we’ll be doing so anytime soon either... :’D)

To commemorate this milestone, I felt obliged to doodle Watcher as he is most of the time, since for all the ‘dramatic’ and noble scribbles of Watcher I do (I definitely give him far more credit for the chance to draw him looking so dashing), he probably spends 90% of his time being awkward, out of his depth and looking for help ;) 

[loquaciousquark]

Talks Machina Highlights - Critical Role C2E45 (Dec. 18, 2018)

Evening, all! @eponymous-rose​ is off tonight with such silly things like family and events and real life obligations, so I’m here to make bad jokes and have opinions instead.

For those who hadn’t heard, Brian & Ashley are engaged as of this week! Brian is taking both her last and first name to be ultra-progressive. Tonight’s guests: Sam Riegel & Matt Mercer. Matt is here willingly. Sam is not. We’re discussing Episode 45: The Stowaway, sponsored by LootCrate. Brian asks Sam for an impromptu song ad; he rhymes moot and loot and jigs and everyone is a little closer to death than they were a few moments prior.

Tonight’s announcements: Pub Draw & Name Drop are two new shows on the Critical Role channel--check out critrole.com for more details.

This Thursday’s episode is the last of 2018; Critical Role then returns on January 10.

Liam’s oneshot, The Night Before Critmas, airs at 7pm Pacific this Friday night. He’s been planning it for two years, and the VOD will be available December 23.

Talks Machina is also breaking for the holidays and will return on January 8, where they’ll have a cast-wide discussion on the state of the campaign so far. The questions open on Reddit, Twitter, and email on January 4th.

CR Stats: Nott has the most kills of the group with 37. The 45th HDYWTDT occurred in episode 45 as well. Twiggy’s dragon kill was the fifth guest kill of the campaign, and the 2nd guest HDYWTDT. In campaign one, guests got 22 kills and four HDYWTDTs. This was the longest episode of campaign two and the fourth longest of the series.

Matt and Deborah had met extensively to discuss backstory and mechanics, but hadn’t discussed much personality. The only person who wanted to check voice/accent was Khary (with Shakaste).

Deborah was one of the first guests they reached out to when they started streaming all that time ago, but she initially said no because D&D was such a personal thing for her and she didn’t want to share it with the internet. Everyone agrees she was worth the wait.

Everyone’s furious about Daredevil’s cancellation. :(

Sam thought it was fun to play alongside another Arcane Trickster because... “she was very good at it, all that great stuff that I forget to do.” Nott was jealous that many of the things that made her unique were present in Twiggy. However, the jealousy was later reversed because of how excellent Twiggy was in the fight.

The Happy Fun Ball was a narrative device Matt had been planning for a long time--he liked the idea of a pocket dungeon with lore attached. When they realized Deborah’s schedule would put her on a boat in the middle of nowhere, he found a perfect opportunity to bring it in.

Sam asks if Matt intended the device to be a one-use single episode thing, or something recurring, something for the party to further explore at their will. Matt explains very circuitously (and hilariously) that certain DMs may have in the planning of the introduction of the Happy Fun Ball originally intended for such Happy Fun Balls to leave with the guest, and were very surprised when said Happy Fun Ball (and all its hundreds of extraplanar rooms to explore) was left behind with the party instead. He then basically dares Sam to press a button and see what happens.

Nott doesn’t resent Fjord for touching the window or setting a time limit on the library exploration. While it was cool in the library, there were too many things attacking them.

Matt doesn’t necessarily intend his traps for Travis, but he likes having good buttons and bad buttons. “I just want shit to happen. Surprise me!” He admires the player that occasionally gets bold, rather than the one who always sends their minions out to touch all the tiles and trigger all the traps before they ever set foot in the dungeon. He also enjoys the meticulousness of Liam being at the same table as Travis’s impulsiveness.

Sam does not want the fans to send him larger flasks. His current flask holds 128 oz, which is exactly a gallon.

GIF of the Week: @criticalschluck with a hilarious movie-trailer-style GIF of Travis explaining he’s got an intelligence of 6 (Grog), then an intelligence of 14 (Fjord), then pushing buttons and experiencing... consequences.

Nott approves of Caleb’s choice to abandon the books to go back to the party. While she wants as much knowledge in his head as possible, it’s because “a smarter Caleb is a more powerful Caleb, and hopefully a Caleb that can stay alive a little longer.” Matt likes watching characters be put in situations where they have to choose between long-reaching character goals and the people they have chosen as their family. He was fascinated to see the struggle as he was ticking down the time on his sheet. He’s very excited to see what’s going to happen this Thursday.

Brian and Matt both fanboy over Sam’s 1hp decision.

Sam reflects on Jester’s being left behind--”not in a malicious way, you know, but sometimes in a big family someone gets left behind at a mall!”

Matt circuitously explains that the stained-glass window could be used to access other places. This man’s being slipperier than soap suds on wet tile tonight.

Nott was aware that the hit she took for Jester could have been a killing blow, but she was ready--”it was what goes through her head around Caleb a lot: ‘I’ve got to protect my friends.’” She’s very protective and very maternal, and Sam would have been okay if that had been the last of Nott.

Both Sam and Liam (and others) have begun to experience the in- and out-of-game changes that come with finally beginning to really know these characters. They certainly wouldn’t have died for each other at the beginning of the game, even knowing how hard their friends worked on these characters. It was originally a “system shock” (as Matt puts it) which required check-ins after certain blow-ups at the beginning of the campaign to make sure they (the players) were all okay. Now, though, they’re closer and closer to being willing to die for each other for both in-game and meta reasons.

Sam reflects on how both Caleb and Nott hate themselves, but manifest that very differently in how they treat other people. Caleb withdraws and puts up thick walls; Nott is quick to trust and care about everyone.

Nott is least close to Yasha at the moment. She’s still a li’l scared of her.

Matt had a few battle options planned out regarding which parts of which chamber were futzed with. The black tapestry was the one curtain they didn’t mess with that would have led to a “very rough encounter.” Matt had six maps built off-stage, just in case.

Sam’s backup character is a handsome actor named Sam Seagull.

Brian is annoyed that every encounter starts with the chat screaming “TPK.” Matt: “I hope not. That’d be my fault if that happened.”

While the dragon was very powerful, Matt had expectations that the party would understand very quickly that the fight didn’t necessarily have to end with the dragon’s death--he wanted them to understand the challenge was the exit, not the dragon. However, they came in in a different order than he’d anticipated, including party staggering, and that was when he started to get nervous.

Whatever magic had first triggered the first crystal would have been the same magic required to open the second door. It was proximity-based.

Fanart of the Week: @tehsasquatch, with this super-cool portrait of Nott.

On whether Nott feels as if she’s earned her comma: sometimes, especially in encounters like these, Nott feels just for a moment that she can be brave, she can be useful, she can be heroic--and then the moment it’s over the world comes crashing back down. When she’s out of those moments, she feels that she’s still just a goblin.

Is Sam ready for Nott to get the spotlight Fjord’s currently in?

Sam: No. Matt: [very intense face]. There’s a lot of backstory elements that he and Matt know that no one else is aware of, and he’s nervous about those coming to light.

The Traveler’s appearance was complete improv. Matt was reading the situation and the emotions and looking for ways to facilitate a heroic story, and when the dice worked in her favor, he felt it would be a wonderful, dramatic story beat to suddenly include--especially since the Traveler hadn’t responded much recently. Matt: “Yeah, that was really cool.”

The Traveler/Jester relationship has evolved in ways Matt both did and did not expect. He wasn’t sure how seriously Jester was going to take it. It’s the difference between believing in something and allowing that thing to define you as a person. He loves it. Sam: “The Traveler...is Taryon, right?”

Nott doesn’t see Caleb as abandoning her at all. “He’s a weak, puny man who needs to get himself out of danger.” It would have actually been harder if Caleb had been there, because if Nott had had to make a choice as to who to protect, Jester would be dead.

After Beau’s emergence from the orb, she probably for a few minutes would have thought that they were all dead behind her. It wasn’t that hours or days had passed--just a few minutes. Matt found Beau’s and Caduceus’s conversation at the end very fascinating and compelling, especially as a way to end the episode.

Nott agrees that Jester is not as happy and fine as she appears to be, especially after their talk about boys, but doesn’t feel it’s as severe as Caleb’s issues. “Jester’s a functional person.” However, Sam’s excited they’re getting past the “flitty person from the first half of the campaign” to the “core of sadness” as the story progresses.

Matt’s sure Yasha was not happy at all that her friends all disappeared without warning. “She spent six days thinking her friends were never going to come back. She doesn’t cry in a corner; she’s familiar with grief and loss. She hardens herself and moves on.” He’s hoping they’ll get to see some of that this week.

Critmas Spotlight: The Blind Weaver, a really, really cool 3D painting by a lady named Elaine Ryan, which has layers upon layers of polyurethane stained to make an amazing effect. See @elaineryanart on twitter and tumblr for more!

Talks Machina: After Dog

They decide where guests sit at the time of the episode. Matt likes to avoid the edges so they don’t feel like the outlier. Sam requests no attractive guests be placed immediately adjacent to him so that it does not detract from his glory. “That’s why I sit next to doggo Laura Bailey.” Brave man. Brave, foolish man.

Sam likes oatmeal raisin cookies. I am DELIGHTED, WHAT AN OLD MAN WHO SHARES MY TASTE. He also likes Werther’s, which is bringing back so many memories of my grandmother’s house. Matt likes ginger snaps, which are my favorite Christmas cookies also. I would kill for ginger snaps right now. Matt and Sam both are excited about pumpkin pie.

Essential D&D gifts, per Matt: dice, PHB, HeroForge custom minis if you really want to get them excited. He finds that getting in there and making a character can really help hook someone on the visual aspect & get invested in their character. Everything else is fluff. Sam suggests a music playlist for the first game; when he ran his first game with his kids, he liked having gridded paper to draw the maps on.

Matt does not feel that the crew of the ship has been mistreated, but they have been “neglected and dragged through places they didn’t expect.” He does think they’ll talk about everything they’ve done to all their friends and family when they get home in a very “you won’t believe this!” kind of way.

Sam always wears the same tie when he’s voice directing and on the first day of a new show. He’s wearing it tonight and can’t discuss the new show.

Favorite holiday movies! Brian: “Love, Actually” and “Die Hard,” as well as “Miracle on 34th Street.” Matt loves “A Christmas Story” (my favorite also, bless this man). Sam likes “Prancer” and “Scrooged,” but realizes mid-sentence that this is Brian’s first Talks as an engaged man.

Brian on proposing: ”It’s...the best.” They’d been together for over six years & met during the first Last of Us game. Brian describes himself as a former “piece of shit” and a very different person back then. Ashley had no expectations that he was going to propose & was totally surprised. Gah, this is too romantic.

Brian: “I always imagined for years what that moment would be like, and this topped all of my expectations... What more can you really hope for in this life than to feel that feeling with another person? It’s to me the pinnacle of our human experiences to be able to say ‘I’ve been through hell and yet found someone that I can definitely say I want to spend all the days of my life on this earth with,’ and the fact that it happened is fucking cool. It’s like heroin with none of the bad side effects.”

It was extremely stressful--but only the logistics. Apparently Matt’s proposal was extremely logistically intensive; Brian sympathizes.

And on that lovely, quiet note, we’re done for the night. Happy holidays, everyone. <3

[spacejew]

oops accidental personal post I guess

It's weird that I almost feel the need to go here to personal blog again because of a handful of irl friends following what was supposed to be a private personal Twitter in theory, just for like, idk, internet strangers and friends I made online not those imported from meatspace. Also those character limits... Suffocating.

Anyways yeah things are kinda stable but dissapointing lifewise? I'm definitely in a rut and stuck somewhere I'm desperately trying to get out of. Also like. idk. Gender shit. I think I really fucked myself over hard when I made the decision a few years back to conviously bottle up all my dysphoria and trans feelings and bury them and repress them hard and just live as a very gay and feminine bi boy and like. hm. I think I've been happy since? But im thinking now that maybe. Because that's still a part of my psyche that haunts me every day. I might actually have been mildly depressed this whole time and like, still struggling to make important life decisions because of the anxiety of that. Idk. Maybe if I got a therapist and realistic attention to that all those years ago and it turned out to be very real n legit and i got to make tough choices and live my truth, I would be equipped now to actually be joyful and able to fully focus on hard work and taking risks and putting myself out there and being successful and shit. Idk idk idk. I just have to wonder if all this time I've actually been quite unhappy and filling the void with dumb shit and a good deal of dissociation and complacency. Idk. what I'm saying is maybe I made a big mistake there lmao and could've started transitioning, if that's right for me, 4-7 years ago maybe, who knows. Haha so fun. Fuck me. Big Regrets, lads. But also I still don't know if that's right. Which probs means it is who am I kidding. Oof. But it's ok life is a journey I'm full of wise shit and I know it's not the end of the world. It just kinda. Makes me so sad on behalf of the old me who would cry so much because of dysphoria and living in this body in this life. She knew. I don't know why I buried her alive like that. Anyways.

I spent all year struggling to make an animated short (which ended up being kinda long tbh like 10 minutes?) by myself mostly, just me and my mental blocks and executive dysfunction and shit, but I was v passionate about it and worked hard and got to actually bring a whole vision to life, with basically nobody to tell me what to do, just give me feedback that I wasn't obligated to follow. It came out pretty nice and I'm very happy that I got to tell exactly the story I wanted and try a cool new look and I just wish I gave myself more time to work on the actual animation part but I put my heart and endless weeks and months of refinement into the storyboarding and script and every little detail and I really feel accomplished and like it paid off -- and I even got to do a private screening at my summer camp job that I was called in to do one more time at the last minute right when I finished my film, it was a miracle and so perfect, everyone cried and truly loved it and felt touched by it. And then I went to animation festivals! And all this cool shit! But... I haven't been able to figure out a public screening thing yet. And I feel like all my excitement is gone now. And I really wanted to polish the look and some backgrounds a little, just some very quick rerendering and comp, but. I feel like too much time has passed, i just feel dissapointed. I haven't put it online yet cause I haven't done my public screening, cause of my stupid anxiety about little details and overall idk imposter syndrome I guwss I feel more ashamed of it than proud of it even tho it's probably good, and like I feel that everyone was excited to support me but probably nobody cares anymore.

Basically I had all the wind taken out of my sails. Oh and right when I was trying to get it off the ground I guess and push through, my grandma died. I'm so heartbroken I loved her so fucking much and. She never got to see the film cause of my stupid bullshit. I feel so bad about that. So so bad. Ugh. And it's a film very very hilariously blatantly directly based on me and my feelings and my real family history, ultimately besides other main themes it's about talking to your grandparents and family about the past and your current feelings. And in it the main character, a girl, cough cough even though it's basically me, cough cough go figure, gender shit, anyways the climax is her going back in time to talk to her great grandma, and it's very emotional and my best friend of like almost 10 years now composed and recording a music for that scene for me. And now when I eventually screen this, my entire family and also myself is gonna get torn to shreds by this scene more than intended because my own fucking grandma, who I was excited to show this film to more than anyone on earth, passed so unexpectedly without seeing it. Fuck. Why didn't I send it to her when she was in the hospital? Obviously cause if I did that that would make it real and she wouldn't get better and all I do is live in denial. Ugh. Anyways yeah. The point is I'm stagnant and in a rut right now and just want to move forward and focus on making new work and just get a real career relevant job already. Tough year hit a well needed high and now petering off back into misery. Not to be dramatic. I'm ok tbh I have a part time I'm slowly getting sick of and a loving supportive partner and some very good friends, tho not as many as I used to see regularly and that's kinda sad too. That's your 20s babey.

I just need to move on and make big changes. My pattern rn is like. Work fri-sun, if I'm lucky I get to hang out with friends or lovers, usually at least with my partner. on monday I recover from working. on tuesday I have dnd and usually get some stuff done but honestly just catch up on warframe with my clan friends. wednesday my partner and I got to the park and library for half the day and eat and draw and talk. on thursday I mentally prepare for work again and usually we go out to play another roleplaying game with her roommates friends. a lot of that free time that's been left unmentioned is spent being over at bae's sometimes so I don't have the ability to get much work done. Lately I've spent most of my time planning a dnd campaign which is fun but also too stressful on account of obviously I'm not playing it yet so like what's the point, sorry friends who have patiently waited for months for me to be ready to start the game for them. And also like. Yeah idk. just sad and confused and resting my weary heart and body after a very rough month after my grandma passed. But! I did accomplish a very crazy deep cleaning of my room. I threw out 14 bags of shit at the least. I wish I weighed it all, it was a lot. I feel so much more organized and cleansed from that. For the record I didn't have any trash in my room, nor was it every a mess. Just every single cabinet and drawer was crammed full of stuff and I guess I hoarded a lot of shit. I was able to throw away a lot of things I held on to be cause of sentimentality and I'm proud of myself for growing that way. So like. Idk. It's not all bad, baby steps. I still feel like I'm constantly improving as a person! I'm positive, optimistic. Just tired, anxious, and feel bad.

Also I finally got a new phone and because of my hubris I dropped it without a case and it shattered only two weeks in. The day I was gonna buy a case. But it's ok. Story of my life I guess. I can't keep everything pristine and polished forever, one day shit falls and breaks but it's still usable. It has character.

I wasn't expecting to dump everything like this, sorry yall. Thanks for reading I guess. Also I forgot how to do a read more on mobile lol sorry

[zippdementia]

Part 61 Alignment May Vary: A Harshness of Harpies

This is the ongoing journey log of my longest running Dungeons and Dragons campaign, started in October of 2016. The campaign will be broken into five parts, the fourth of which you are currently reading. For the first part, which focuses on adventures in the Moonsea, click here. For the second, which focuses on the search for the Tomb of Haggemoth, click here. For the third, which focuses on the confrontation with the Red Hand of Doom, click here.

Having been told that they need to travel to the legendary Hidden Fane and see if they can find and kill Azor Khul, the three companions prepare for a long journey. But before they head that direction, Aldric receives word from Lady Kaal of where he can find Varanthian, the Behir who killed his troop, the Green Company, and his former commander, Vincent. The beast lairs in the Giant Shield mountain range, near the Red Rock mountain.

Our three companions are.....

Aldric Alwright: A former mercenary turned hero of Brindol, who wants to avenge the slaughter of his former companions, the Green Company, at the claws of the Behir now calling itself the Mother of the Horde, Varanthian. He has faced her once, now, at the Battle of Brindol, where he grievously wounded her with Black Razor.

Carrick the Risen: A half elf paladin who has joined the party as part of a longer trial of self-redemption. His background is mysterious and sinister. Unknown to the others, he did terrible things. The black rod at his side, a weapon whose name is not spoken, is a reminder of such times. Once in a while, he runs his hand along its surface, but he never uses it.

Nysyries Soul Seeker: Dragonborn Druid, once the thrall of Lord Nazragul of the Maakengorge and also the servant of the Mistress of the Wytchwood, she is now free of their influence, free to seek her own destiny once more. The land cries out to her, begging her to remove the cancer that has dug itself deep inside of it. Nysyries hears the cry and seeks answers. She carries the Rod of Storms, an artifact of grave and dangerous power, which gives her some control over the weather but also draws disaster to itself.

A Harshness of Harpies

It is a dangerous criss-cross of paths and half-hidden trails to climb to Red Rock and the trek is made harder by the Rod of Storms. The artifact attracts bad weather to its wielder, drowning the players in rain and fog for their entire journey, leaving them feeling despondent and weary.

The fog pressed against Aldric’s face like a wet rag, leaving frost in his blonde beard and leaving him blind as he tried to carefully lead his horse, Anope, across the rickety bridge. He looked down only once, but saw only the thick white cloud stretching out beneath him.

When he heard the screech, Black Razor was in his hand instantly, swinging through the fog, slicing the mist apart and briefly giving him a glimpse of the creature that had emerged from a hole in the rocks ahead.

It was a harpy, though one unlike any he had ever seen. Instead of the beautiful body of a woman sitting atop the distorted vulture legs the upper body of this one was thick with feathers, obscuring her breasts and other shapely features. Curling from around her head were two fur-tufted horns, like the horns of a great owl. Her voice was a powerful purr that he felt in his groin:

“Leave your horses,” she demanded. “We will take them as toll for your passage through our land.”

Aldric shook his head, trying to clear the voice from his mind. “No,” he said, though it took him a moment longer to remember why he was disagreeing. “They are... our horses.” His thoughts felt sluggish, his body tight and tired, like he had run miles over the mountain.

The harpy smiled, seeing him shake his head again. She scratched one talen idly against the hard stone of her perch. “Come to me, man child,” she said. “If you will not pay the toll, then you will give me your life.”

And Aldric listened, and  obeyed.

The layout of this battle is on three narrow and rickety bridges that cross between islands of stone and eventually to a more secure stretch of mountain pass. The companions are separated: Aldric is almost to the pass, Carrick is on a bridge, and Nysyries hasn’t crossed the bridges yet.

There are six or seven harpies who hover above the bridge, hidden by the Rod of Storm’s fog, and use their wings to create a magical gust that almost knocks Carrick off of the ledge. Meanwhile, Aldric becomes charmed by the Harpy Queen, failing his saving throw miserably. It’s actually pretty in character: Aldric has been played as a horn-dog who can’t resist a pretty woman (or man) under the best of circumstances. And these are not the best of circumstances. The harpy’s charm forces Aldric to try to move towards her at all costs and with no thought given to his own safety. He totally ignores combat while doing this.

To Aldric’s credit, he tries to turn this failure into some kind of success. He mounts Anope and launches himself towards the Harpy Queen, leaping from his horse to try and grab her. He fails miserably, literally rolling a critical fail and faceplanting into the stone wall while the Queen, laughing, takes flight and heads into the fog. Aldric’s crash breaks the spell over him and, bloody faced, he stumbles towards the bridge to join in combat.

Carrick has been trying to fight off the harpies. He takes a defensive stance, forcing the harpies to fly close to him, at which point he slashes out with precise and deadly strikes, cutting two from the sky. Aldric rushes towards him then, prepared to aid him. But one of the Harpies casts charm on the hapless mercenary and once again Aldric is unable to resist, even with a Paladin near him with his powerful aura (darn those critical failure saving throws). Aldric this time throws himself off the bridge in an attempt to grab one of the harpies and literally ride her, trying once again to turn a failure into an attack.

And he rolls another critical failure.

Aldric plummets into the fog, completely missing his mark. Carrick rushes forward, unsure of what to do but feeling like he must do something. But then suddenly he is set upon by a huge flying beast: a Quetzalcoatl. It is Nysyries, also fallen prey to the Harpy Queen’s charm as she transformed into a beast. She slashes at Carrick with her spear-sharp beak and the half elf is nearly driven from the bridge by the assault before Nysyries regains her composure and, screeching, lunges back towards the Harpy Queen who used her magic on her.

The Harpy Queen is taken by surprise, unbelieving that Nysyries could break free from her spell. The Quetzalcoatl’s talons rip feathers from the Queen’s flanks and the Harpy screeches in indignation. She stretches her wings out and puffs up her feathers, releasing a cloud of dust and dander that Nysyries breathes deeply into her lungs. The effects are instantaneous: Nysyries falls into a deep sleep and drops from the sky like a stone and a moment later the fog, created by the Rod of Storms, dives after her.

Carrick, blinded by the sudden reveal of the sun and unaware of what has happened, continues to fight bravely, but the harpies overwhelm him and when their Queen joins the fray, there is nothing he can do. Talons claw ribbons of flesh from his face and the weight of three Harpies bears him to the ground, unconscious, as the bird-women prepare to feed.

But then suddenly they all look up, their screeching halting. The Harpy Queen hisses. “It’s her,” she snarls. But though there is hatred in her voice, there is no fight in it. Fear and frustration mingle together to push out anger and the Queen takes flight, her coven soon following, snatching Nysyries’ horse as they depart (Carrick’s mount was actually a summoned magical being which disappeared when he fell unconscious, and Anope is strong enough to rear up and kick the harpies away, clocking one in the face with its hooves).

And something approaches Carrick...

Decisions

Aldric opened his eyes. How was he still alive? He looked around and saw he was on a thin path that practically hugged the cliff side. The fog was still present here, but not as thick as it had been above. Still, it showed him only that there was a drop bare inches to his left, a drop that most likely he would not be fortunate enough to survive as he had this one.

He strained his ears, trying to hear the sounds of battle, but nothing came to him from above. Or almost nothing. There was a rasping sound drifting through the air, like the quiet pained breathing of some great beast.

“The next time you are going to jump off of a mountain, do me a courtesy and give me to Nysyries,” growled Blackrazor, startling Aldric.

“I don’t know,” Aldric told the sword cheerily. “That seemed to go pretty okay for me. Maybe I have a new career in mountain jumping.”

Aldric fell about one hundred and fifty feet, but the damage rolled is surprisingly low, less than sixty (and he has over a hundred hit points). So while the fall hurts, it doesn’t phase him, and so he gathers himself up and heads up the skinny path towards the sounds, his boots trailing mist as he walks. The sounds get worse the closer he comes and eventually he realizes they aren’t quiet rasping sounds at all, but roars of pain muffled by layers of stone.

He follows the roars into a cave and eventually comes to a place where Varanthian lies on a treasure hoard, writhing in pain. She notices him almost at once and hisses at him that their last encounter left her painfully wounded and the wounds of Blackrazor are refusing to heal. Now she can’t move enough to throw herself from the cliffside and her strength is gone so that she cannot beat her brains out on the cave ceiling. All that is left to her is slow starvation, and Behir can survive for months without food and water. She begs Aldric to finish her off, and the mercenary obliges, cutting her head off with a single blow.

As Blackrazor pulls in the soul of this powerful creature, her body turns to ash and blows away, much like what happened with the other powerful foes he defeated at Brindol. And then Aldric is left alone, his revenge completed, feeling elated... and completely lost as to what to do next.

He wanders for a while, then, traveling aimlessly through the caves, until he finds himself looking down a path that spirals past waterfalls, glistening in the light of the moon coming in from somewhere high above. A pool rests at the bottom of the path and in the middle of the pool is a stone island. And on the island stands a man, waiting for Aldric.

Aldric’s old leader, the commander of the company, beckons him to join him on the island of stone. He tells Aldric that the company has been avenged and can finally rest, and that Aldric is now the new commander. He must go out and rebuild the company, “for better or for worse, the choice is his.” He leaves Aldric with a silver horn that he can use to call the souls of the company to join him in battle and, surrounded by the ghosts of his old companions, Aldric is made the new commander in a short ritual.

Carrick, meanwhile, is in a deep sleep. The half elf wanders a grand temple of his god in this sleep, following the sounds of hammering to a humongous side room where a small man (made smaller yet by the ridiculous god-sized room) stands at a huge anvil, hammering away at something. The man is not just small, he is a dwarf, though it is hard to tell at first because he has no beard. Carrick first mistakes him for a halfling, but when the dwarf speaks, his rough accent betrays his species.

“You’ve finally come.”

Carrick speaks slowly in response: “You... know me?”

“Aye! Your god put me here to give you a message.”

“Who are you?”

“One who sought balance, and failed to find it. The world had a chance, old man. It had a chance to be saved. Balance could have been had. But the moment was lost when a decision was made, a decision that tore my soul apart. Only a piece of it was able to escape the destruction of my device, and it made its way here, to you.

“Now balance can never be had. Good and Evil will fight and one WILL win. The world will fall either forever into darkness, or be cleansed by the light. There is no longer one way or the other. And when that moment comes, which way it falls will depend on the actions you take, Carrick.

“You will be traveling with two companions and they will become forces of either good or evil, turning the tide of the battle to come. You must make sure they fight for the forces of good, Carrick, or all will be lost.”

The dwarf looked up briefly from his hammering. “Will you take on this mission, Carrick?”

Carrick nods. “I will try.”

The dwarf nods. “When the time comes, we will meet again. For now, awaken!”

Imoaza

Carrick startled awake to find himself in a cave, a small fire burning next to him, keeping him warm. Aldric crouched over him, smiling. “I wondered when you would get up.”

Carrick ran his tongue around his mouth before speaking, feeling how thick it felt. “Water,” he croaked and Aldric obliged, opening his waterskin and pouring some over his parched lips. Carrick swallowed and this time when he spoke it was less like speaking through cotton. “You survived... how?”

“Manly bravado,” Aldric said.

“I survived... how?”

“That would be her.” Aldric nodded to a corner of the cave where, when Carrick turned his head, he could see a figure crouched in the darkness. The figure moved then and Carrick unconsciously pushed himself away from her, his entire mind reeling from the way the figure seemed to uncurl from the darkness and move towards him.

She was not human. Despite having two legs, two arms, and a head, he could see that at once. Her skin had a sickly greenish hue, small scales flecked in random patterns and configurations at seemingly random places over her body, and her facial structure was far too narrow and thin to be considered normal. Her eyes were the largest feature on that narrow face and they stared at him unblinking, their pupils not circles but slits.

“Your friend says you are looking for the Vale,” the snake woman hissed at him. “I know the way.”

This is Imoaza, a Yuan Ti Pureblood and Nysyries’ new character. Intrigued by the Warlock Hexblade, she built Imoaza as a back up character only a session or two before Nysyries unexpectedly fell to her end. Actually she was originally intended for another game entirely, but I’m glad she ended up here. Her story will help shape the next chapter of the game.

Imoaza comes from a tribe of Yuan Ti obsessed with the Hexblades. She attempted to ascend into a higher form of Yuan Ti, an Aberration, and challenge the leaders of the tribe in a bid to take over with her own brood. However, her son betrayed her, taking the power of transformation for himself and becoming an Anathema, an extremely powerful form of Yuan Ti. Imoaza remained a Pure Blood and was ordered killed by her son. As the rest of her children hastened to cut her down, Imoaza stole one of the greatest Hexblades of the tribe, the  Dosselgreymer (Dah-sol-grey-mur), a huge scythe that can fire Eldritch blasts as well as separate into two smaller curved blades for use as a rapid, close up, weapon.

Cutting her way free of the tribe (literally), Imoaza fled into the mountains and became a hermit, but she dreams of one day returning for revenge on her family. She has become obsessed with finding the source of the Hexblade power and to this end has been searching for the place where her tribe came from, the Vale Where the Stars Fell, also known as the Fane where the horde of the Red Hand is thought to have their base of operations.

With this goal in mind, she decides to lead Aldric and Carrick to the Fane, in hopes of finally achieving her revenge. She dared not go alone, for her people still hunt for her, but with these two companions at her side, she believes she is safe enough.

Before they leave, Aldric insists on searching for Nysyries and Imoaza reluctantly takes them through her network of caves down to the base of the area where Nysyries fell. For a day and a half they search before Imoaza refuses to waste any more time on sentiment.

They do not find Nysyries. They do find the Rod of Storms and a piece of the jade statue...

... the statue that long ago Karina, Shando, and Targaryen found in an undersea temple; that Karina, Abenthy, and Twyin took from the resurrected Targaryen; that Karina, Trakki, and Tyrion used to fight and defeat a dread pirate raised from the depths of hell; a piece of which Karina gave to Tyrion for safekeeping and from whose bag Nysyries took to remember her fallen companion.

That jade statue. A statue which will soon come into play once again, forever changing the lives of three new companions: Aldric, Imoaza, and Carrick.

[omni-8bit]

Character Creation Meme

@sredmund   tagged me for this – that’s so much! I haven’t thought about this character in a long time. I’ll tag @adventurewithtea , @polyhedralprincess , and @natsora . No obligations, as always. 

OC: Alendri (previously named Glorendel when I thought her up) was one of the first original characters I created for a fantasy story that I began working on in middle school. Fuck I feel old now.

1.What was the first element of your OC that you remember considering (name, appearance, backstory, etc.) I remember creating her family lineage and country that she hailed from. Making her father an instrument crafter and her mother a fierce politician who encouraged her lessons in military swordsmanship.

2.Did you design them with any other characters/OCs from their universe in mind? Her family, but also the other original protagonist of the story who I’ve since dropped completely from the plot because I really didn’t need him after fully developing Alendri years later.

3. How did you choose their name? Originally she was Glorendel. As I got older and the story notes sat untouched for several years, I got into D&D and started a campaign where I played a female noblewoman who was quite adept with a rapier. After about halfway through the campaign it hit me that I was playing the OC I’d come up with years earlier and decided that I needed to simply use my D&D character’s name, Alendri, instead, because it sounded much less Tolkien.

4. In developing their backstory, what elements of the world they live in played the most influential parts? Politics. She’s the first born of her house and in the matriarchal society of her country, she’s supposed to be in line to take over the family name eventually. She actually wants to so that she can make drastic changes to the rigid caste system of her country to try and spread the wealth outside the capital. Oh, and the fact that she’s gay AF. ;)

5. Is there any significance behind their hair colour? Nope.

6. Is there any significance behind their eye colour? Again, no.

7. Is there any significance behind their height? Nope. The only physical significance is that she has a relatively slender build because she’s a finesse fighter. Other than that, I didn’t spend really too much time in why she looks a certain way.

8. What (if anything) do you relate to within their character/story? I relate to how passionately she cares about people, regardless of how well she knows them.

9. Are they based off of you, in some way? There are some parallels. She is heavily influenced by my “go against the grain that society demands you to perform in” and she was further influenced by the way I played the character in my D&D sessions with her.

10. Did you know what the OC’s sexuality would be at the time of their creation? Hahaha! I thought she was going to be straight and fall madly in love with the male protagonist that I had created around the same time. But, I started conceptualizing this story in middle school, before it clicked that I was gay. For a while, I wanted to keep her heterosexual, because I didn’t want to be that writer who was gay and only wrote on gay topics. But then I wrote an entire thesis on queer literature and stopped caring about what type of writer I’d be perceived as because after allowing myself to write queer characters and stories with queer themes, I felt so much more passionate about my writing than I had ever felt before. So, I went through all my original works and asked “does their orientation change the plot? If so, in a good way or bad way?” In pretty much every instance, it was for the better. It got my stories away from a lot of tropey plot hooks and made me really rethink what the core plotlines of my stories were. So, she grew with me as I grew as a writer and now she’s a fabulous sword-wielding lover of ladies.

11. What have you found to be most difficult about creating art for your OC (any form of art: Writing, drawing, edits etc.)? Not giving her my sense of humor has been the hardest part about writing her. She’s more serious than I am and a lot of the characters I write. So keeping her tone true to her has been the most difficult.

12. How far past the canon events that take place in their world have you extended their story, if at all? I’ve mapped out her whole life leading up to the major story events. The story takes place when she’s in her mid-twenties. I have done a little contemplation on what her life is like after the events of the story, but nothing concrete.

13. If you had to narrow it down to 2 things that you MUST keep in mind while working with your OC, what would those things be? She will always question why she must do something in accordance with societal expectation and she will always fight for the people who are being oppressed.

14. What is something about your OC that can make you laugh? She hates dresses almost as much as I do?

15. What is something about your OC that can make you cry? How she thinks that her own personal happiness doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things.

16. Is there some element you regret adding to your OC or their story? Having a dysfunctional relationship with her father. I dislike the trope, but I keep it in because it helps showcase Alendri’s moral compass and how it differs from other nobles.

17. What is the most recent thing you’ve discovered about your OC? Despite her father being a master instrument crafter, she has zero talent for anything musically related.

18. What is your favourite fact about your OC? That she is unapologetically herself.