#i think I have a whole sheet of ideas for this crossover somewhere but i dont remember rn

[the-random-phan]

Have some old art I stumbled upon that's of an AU so niche it's not even funny /j

The Magnus Archives x Witch Hat Atelier

Brimcap/hat Elias and his apprentice Jon (who is def way too old to still be an apprentice) who doesn't know Elias is a brimcap and that the magic he's being taught is forbidden >:)

[a-swiss-and-a-spaniard]

Twenty Questions for Fic Writers

Thanks for thinking of me @yoellglia ! I had fun reading your answers and even more so trying to answer myself :)

1. How many works do you have on A03?

Jeez, should I consider both of my accounts? Let's do it, why not.

I have 12 fics in total. 7 for Tennis RPF and 5 for the DC Universe.

2. What's your total A03 word count?

37,211 words combined. Ngl, I thought it would be less than that as there are only two multi-chaptered fics and the rest are one-shots. Hopefully, I'll add some more words in the upcoming months :)

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Currently, I only write Tennis RPF. I've been toying with a few ideas for the Good Omens fandom, but I haven't opened a new doc yet. And I used to write for the DC Universe, but I haven't done that in ages.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

(I’m gonna keep this Tennis RPF only bc this blog is tennis themed)

Waking in the Night Light: Fedal share their first kiss in a parking lot.

A New Target: Fedal have sex in the locker room.

Moonlight in Paris: Rafa goes to Roger's hotel room.

Strawberry & Dulce de Leche: Roger and Rafa get ice cream.

Somewhere or Other: Fedal phone call.

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

Yes yes yes! At least I try to. Although more often than not I get the notification, reply in my head, then forget to actually write back, and I'm too embarrassed to answer if more than a week has gone by… so apologies for that. That doesn't mean I don’t appreciate every single comment I have ever gotten, they always make my day in fact.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Mmh… perhaps Moonlight in Paris. It's not angst per se but it does have an overall sense of uncertainty.

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Strawberry & Dulce de Leche, definitely. Rafa's joy at the possibility of Roger going to his birthday party is everything.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

No, thankfully. I’m glad I haven't unlocked that side of fandom yet.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I do, but I consider myself a newbie at it (smut writers, pls teach me your ways).

Generally speaking, I prefer it when smut has a little plot. It doesn't have to be anything complicated or serious, I just need a bit of a story behind what's happening for it to feel more organic. I also like it when the focus is on the emotional aspect of it, though descriptive can be nice as well. And I don't mind wordy smut as longs as it doesn't mess with the flow.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

Nope, and I'm not a big fan of those tbh

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Story time! Yes 💀 Although it wasn't the whole thing, just a fragment. The fic in question was None but the Lonely Heart for the DCEU. And I only found out bc a lovely person left a comment on my fic, letting me know what had happened and the link to the other fic. I checked and the writer had indeed literally copied and pasted one of my scenes, they'd just changed the names of the characters. So I reached out to the AO3 team and they took care of everything.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

No

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

No. Stef and I had an idea for a Fedal fic, but who knows if we'll ever get to actually write it lol

14. What's your all time favourite ship?

I don't think I have one, really. I would say my main ones/the ones I keep coming back to are Fedal (Roger Federer/Rafael Nadal) and Superbat (Superman/Batman). Though right now I've been reading almost exclusively Ineffable Husbands (Aziraphale/Crowley), so it mostly depends on my hyperfixation at the time

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Oof, that might be a Superbat (long) fic set post BvS, where resurrected Clark has lost his powers (and the sun seems to actually make him sick now), so Bruce helps him to get back on his feet and of course they fall in love in the process. I have the whole thing outlined, sheets of dialogues and a couple of scenes already fleshed out, but I took a break from the fandom bc it was draining me out. Idk, maybe one day I'll get back to it. I mean, never say never and all that, but it's looking highly improbable right now

16. What are your writing strengths?

I think I'm good at setting the tone of scenes, be it fluffy, angsty, whatever.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

I tend to write in long, long sentences. Seriously, you should see my drafts, sometimes a whole paragraph can be a single sentence. I don't know if it's due to my Spanish hard-wired brain or what, but I’m working on breaking things up a bit more.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I love it! But you need to make sure readers will still get the message through context, so I think it's best to stick to single words and/or common phrases. Unless, of course, you want to leave your character (and thus your readers) feeling confused.

I do it often when I’m writing Rafa and it's part of the reason I love writing him so much.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

DC Universe

20. Favourite fic you've written?

Tough question… can I say an unpublished one? I have this sort of introspection/character study of Domi, his struggles coming back on tour after the wrist injury and dealing with all the ups and downs. There's not a story to it per se, like I'm not trying to get him from A to B. It's just a dive into his mind, where it gets kinda dark real quick, and it's unlike what I usually go for in tennis fics (fluff), so I've been enjoying the challenge of getting out of my comfort zone there

[whump-tr0pes]

The Collection Box/Honor Bound crossover AU - part 5

Omg folks, @whump-it is letting me use her darling boy Callum for this AU. We had this idea to make a short collab featuring Isaac, Sam, and Callum as an adult. If you haven’t read her Collection Box series, it��s a box boy AU where people can donate themselves to an Appointed Person where they can then be Selected by anyone who wants them. Anyone. You have no more rights, no protection, no documentation.

Callum donated himself when he was around 20. He was selected by some dick who made Callum call him Master Hayden, and then proceeded to torture him for 3 years before Rory (Callum’s Appointed Person and soulmate) was finally able to get him back. Years later Callum is a doctor, and uses his training and authority to help other Donations.

In this universe, Sam themself is a Donation. Isaac (and Vera, mentioned) are a duo that goes around saving Donations from abusive Selectors. It just so happens that Sam may not have been of age when they Donated themself… or were Donated by someone else. Now they’re injured, confused, and just want to be back with their Selector… or they might pay the price.

Part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4

Cw: human trafficking, past whump of a minor

~

Isaac stood just outside the curtains around the kid’s bed. All around him he heard the sounds of the hospital. Nurses chatting, machines beeping, children crying… It felt strange for the kid to be in the locked pediatric ward. They may be eighteen. But it was the best way to keep them safe, for now.

He’d been guarding the kid for days. Hardly sleeping. Vera had come in to relieve him a few times, but he had insisted on staying by the kid’s side as much as he could. He felt so protective of them, anchored to the spot, connected with them in a way they’d never felt connected to the other Donations he’d rescued. He couldn’t explain it.

Behind him, the kid – Sam, their name was Sam, it was better if he called them that – stirred in their bed. The sheets rustled against the mattress, the mattress crackled as it moved under their weight. The kid was waking up.

Isaac put his face in his hands. All night he’d stood, or sat, or paced by Sam’s room, waiting for the moment that seemed inevitable. He waited for the moment when the kid’s AP, that prick Leo Tierney, showed up to take them away. Or worse, Colleen Stormbeck herself. Technically it was her legal right. She owned Sam, owned their body like they were a thing. Like they were something to be bought and used and hurt because she felt like it. Sam had been tortured because someone felt like it.

Isaac’s chest burned with a rage he’d tried so hard to douse his entire life.

The kid groaned and tossed against the bed. I wonder if I could get the kid some breakfast. Then, a darker thought: I wonder how often they’ve gotten to eat in the past few months… or years.

Then the kid let out a whimper. The sound cut right to Isaac’s heart. He turned, his hand brushing against the curtain around their bed. He clenched his jaw and stopped himself. What if they don’t want to see me? What if it makes them worse? I took them away from their home. They’ve done nothing but beg me to take them back, for days.

The kid let out a scream. Isaac tore the curtains back and darted to Sam’s side.

Sam thrashed against the sheets, their eyes closed, their face twisted in a desperate sob. Isaac immediately stepped forward, his hands outstretched to them, before he stopped. His hands shook. Uncertainty muddied the waters of his mind.

“No, please!” the kid sobbed. All of Isaac’s hesitancy was knocked out of him in a moment.

“Sam, wake up,” he said urgently, shaking their shoulder. “It’s okay. You’re not back there. You’re safe.”

“No!” Sam sobbed, twisting away from Isaac’s hands. “No no no no please, I’ll be good, ma’am, please, please don’t hurt me, please…” They clawed at their neck, trying to tear away a collar that was no longer there. The torn skin and scars remained.

“Sam,” Isaac hissed, before they could get the attention of the whole ward. “Sam, stop. You’re safe. You’re alright.”

“NO!” Sam shrieked. Isaac grabbed their shoulders and shook them until their teeth rattled. Sam jerked awake and cringed back from Isaac’s hands.

“Sam?” Isaac croaked. “Sam, I…”

Sam squeezed their eyes shut and turned their face away. They tilted their head back, exposing their neck, holding out their hands to Isaac, their palms together. As if offering him… to tie their wrists. Isaac scrambled back off the bed with a gasp.

“I’m sorry,” Sam whispered. “I’m yours. I’m yours to do with as you please, ma’am.”

“No,” Isaac whimpered. “Sam, open your eyes. Look at me.”

Sam’s lips trembled. Their hands squeezed into fists as they held them out to Isaac. “P-please…” Their voice faltered. “I’m sorry. I can be good. D-do you want to… to tie me? Or should… um…” Their throat bobbed as they swallowed. “Should I kneel?”

Isaac took a heavy step forward. “Sam… please… stop…”

Sam whimpered and tilted their head back further. “I can wear the collar today. Do you want to, um… to cut me? Or… or the whip? Or…” They whined softly, their voice beseeching, as if… trying to guess what Isaac wanted. What their… owner… wanted.

“Sam,” Isaac rasped. “Sam, just…” he reached out and gently took their wrists in one hand. They shuddered and bit down on their lip. Isaac guided their hands down to rest in their lap. “Sam… open your eyes. Look at me. Please.”

Sam stifled a whimper. Their eyes fluttered open and slowly – slowly – brought their gaze to Isaac. Their lips trembled. “I-Isaac?”

Isaac let out a gusty breath of relief. “Yeah, Sam,” he said softly. “It’s me. You’re not, um, not there.”

Sam’s gaze bounced around the tiny room, moving past the curtains, the tiny table at their bedside, the machine behind them that normally monitored vital signs but had been turned off yesterday. “They’re medically stable. No need making them uncomfortable with all the wires and such,” Dr. Callum had said.

Sam swallowed hard. “M-Ms. Colleen, she—”

“She’s not going to find you,” Isaac said gently.

Sam whimpered. “But sh-she has, um the legal right to—”

“Not if you were underage when she took you,” Isaac said, hoping, praying this wasn’t what would shatter the delicate trust Sam had placed in him already.

Sam’s eyes went wide. Their chest began to heave with panicked breaths. Their hands fisted in the sheets. “N-no,” Sam whispered. “No, I’m… I’m not underage. I’m not underage. Ms. Colleen bought me with, with, with… within the constraints of the law…” Sam’s voice took on the dull, flat tone of someone reciting something they’d been forced to repeat over and over and over. “And I’m not… no… d-don’t say that…”

“Sam…” Isaac sat slowly on the side of the bed, careful not to touch them. “If we can prove you were underage when she took you, you’ll be free. She can never hurt you again. S-so…” He wet his lips. “…um… Sam, we need to know. We need to know how old you are. We need to know when she took you.”

Sam’s hands tightened around the sheets. “She’ll always get me,” they whispered. “She can, can always find me. I can n-never go f-far enough away from her to—”

“I’ll protect you,” Isaac said fiercely, the bite in his voice making Sam quiver and sit back against the pillow. Isaac squeezed his hand into a fist and forced himself to take a calm, slow breath. “We all will. Me… Dr. Callum… Rory…”

Sam’s eyes flicked to the blanket covering them. They opened their mouth to speak, then closed it again. Then, so quietly Isaac could barely hear, Sam said, “Dr. Callum’s like me.”

Isaac’s throat tightened. “Yeah, Sam,” he said heavily. “He is.”

“And… and he… he l-left. Escaped. He’s… he’s a doctor. He… um… he became something.”

“Yeah,” Isaac said softly, his eyes burning with tears. “He did. You can, too. We’ll get you away from Colleen. Get her arrested. Or, or something. Or…” Isaac clenched his jaw. “…or I’ll send you away from here. Somewhere far away, where she can’t get you. And I—”

“I’m eighteen,” Sam whispered. “I’m eighteen. I was, um, sixteen when she took me. Sixteen and a half.” They ducked their head. “I’m… I’m eighteen.”

Isaac bowed his head, the tears in his eyes running down his cheeks. “Oh,” he murmured.

“I… I told you… I… no,” Sam whimpered. “She’s… she’s going to be so angry…”

Without thinking, Isaac pulled Sam into his arms. Rather than pull away, Sam buried their face in Isaac’s shoulder and sobbed.

“We’ll keep you safe,” Isaac murmured against their hair. “I’ll keep you safe. I’ll protect you, so she can never lay a hand on you again.”

Sam trembled, their hands tightening in Isaac’s shirt. He held them until they pulled away.

“You want some breakfast?” Isaac said softly.

Sam licked their lips and nodded.

@pepperonyscience , @whumpygecko , @newandfiguringitout , @orchidscript , @gottalovethemwriters

[muffintonic]

MY CATU LIVEBLOG

I did it for the crossover, so I thought i’d do it for the new movie (Phineas and Ferb the Movie: Candace Against the Universe, for those unaware of the acronym)! 

TLDR: 8/10 not canon, but surprisingly good nevertheless.

Good: character interactions, dialogue (hilarious), everyone was involved, nice use of Chekhov's guns, absolutely EPIC background music

Bad: off-model issues, animation kind of flash-esque at times, the color palette was more like MML than PnF (more saturated and oddly shaded with clashing colors), overly long gags/pacing problems, immersion-breaking/stereotypical sound effects sometimes, some OOC

Ahh, i've missed Candace's singing.

WAIT A SECOND, WHY DOES HER CHARACTER MODEL LOOK SO MEATY (her head shape is blobby, too)

Oh my god, the entire Hirano family a minute in....i'm living.

Hmmm, the pyramid sports thing was from "Thanks But No Thanks," which is a Season 4 episode. In that episode, Vanessa is dating Monty, which only happened after "Minor Monogram" in Season 3. We know that Phineas and Ferb the Movie: Across the 2nd Dimension takes place in July after "Candace Loses Her Head" (since Doof's Drill-inator from that episode is scene in ATSD), but also before or around "Great Balls of Water" (since it's July in that episode) and definitely before "This is Your Backstory" (2D!Doof's advice to Doof is referenced)/"Road to Danville" (Phineas' trust gesture is referenced)/"Fly on the Wall" (the summer song gets referenced). LONG STORY SHORT: if ATSD took place in July, when the fridge does CATU take place if we're considering it canon?

Seriously, her off-modelness is super distracting to me. It was fine that she essentially had a triangle silhouette because she also had stick limbs, but giving her realistically meaty limbs makes me question why the rest of her is shaped like that. Bad.

That is some EPIC opening music!

Okay, the weird shading on that clown is also super distracting. PnF's design aesthetic is light and bright....I wonder if the MML people worked on this movie or something (which would also explain Candace's odd meatiness).

Why are all the lines so thick????? It looks like one of those low-budget toonboom or whatever animations Disney posts to YouTube.

Hmmmmm, Doof did the "evenly matched" thing in "Doofapus," too.

OH MY GOD, THE SATURATED COLORS + DARKNESS + THICK LINES ARE SOOOOOOOOO UGLYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY.

Bwahahahahaha, that pause when Candace is like "Actually, yes, WTF is it now?" is hilarious.

I like the detail of how all the kids' bikes are lying there in the driveway.

I would've just grabbed Linda's head and turned it at that point, honestly.

Linda is telling Candace calmly that she's exhausted...WHEN DOES THIS MOVIE TAKE PLACE?!!!!

Candace learns by "Sci-Fi Pie Fly" that she can take a break from busting to the betterment of her mental health sometimes....and that's a Season 3 episode. WHEN. DOES. THIS. MOVIE. TAKE. PLACE.

Ahh, i've missed Baljeet and Buford's banter. #oldmarriedcouple

Phineas is like "Candace wasn't having fun this summer? D:" but, like, if this movie takes place in the middle....they sure as heck didn't acknowledge it for the entire rest of the summer. HRGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH, THIS IS WHY YOU CAN'T JUST RETROACTIVELY INSERT EVENTS IN THE MIDDLE OF A SERIES: WE KNOW HOW THE REST OF THE SUMMER/THEIR LIVES TURNED OUT.

Why is Perry's wrist communicator a square. It's a circle throughout the entire series.

Does Vanessa have a scooter license? Do you need a license to ride a scooter? She was complaining in "Vanessassary Roughness" that she was always riding on the back of Doof's scooter, so I assumed she didn't. We did learn in "Finding Mary McGuffin" that she knows how to drive/has her license in "This is Your Backstory," does that count?

WAIT, WHY IS VANESSA SO PINK???? SHE AND DOOF ARE SUPPOSED TO BE A DIFFERENT SHADE OF WHITE (more coffee-toned) FROM THE FLYNN-FLETCHERS. Goddang, I had always appreciated how even the white characters were all different shades from each other in PnF....what a letdown.

Mmmm, characters either willingly engage in diegetic music in this show ("Where's Pinky?"), or it's just an imagine spot/non-diegetic. "Why do I have a guitar?" is not something that should be said.

Hmmmmmmmm, Candace is faulting the universe.......in ATSD she's talking about the Mysterious Force.....HMMMMMMMMM.....

Sounds like that was what Vanessa used to stop her Evil Busting phase...nice. Also, i'm only ~7 minutes into this movie, but i've spent the last 30 minutes watching it.

Hey, astute observation! That's what I always say: Candace wants to bust her brothers both because their projects can get dangerous ("Happy Birthday Isabella"/"Picture This"/"The Great Indoors"/ATSD/etc), and because she feels overshadowed by them/that they can get away with more than her ("Gi-Ants"/"For Your Ice Only"/"Love at First Byte")!

OH MY GOD, SHE ACTUALLY SAID "...completely overshadowed by Phineas and Ferb?" HOLY VALIDATION BATMAN

Man, i've said it before about Vanessa's deconstruction of Doof's motivations in "Last Day of Summer," but she would make a great therapist or something. I hope she goes into Psychology in the future.

HMmmm, I do kind of wish it was with Stacy that she had this breakthrough with, considering how Stacy's been her best friend since they were 5 years old ("Phineas and Ferb Save Summer")/she's only known Vanessa since "Phineas and Ferb: Summer Belongs to You!" somewhere in June. Like, I get that Vanessa is more in-tune with psychological stuff like this and it makes sense, but i’m just a Stacy fan at heart

Oooh, she's even saying "breakthrough" and "healing!"

UGLY SHADING/SATURATION YET AGAIN (did I mention that the D.E.I. scooter is also the wrong color from how we've seen it before? because it is)

Bwuh, "What Do it Do?" all over again.

Okay, seriously, it looks like the giant thing is floating...where's the shadow under it?? THERE IS NONE.

BRO, THERE HAD BETTER BE MORE STACY IN THIS MOVIE. DON'T TELL ME SHE JUST GETS A CAMEO AT THE BEGINNING.

What did they make her? I want to know!

Ooooh, Candace's hands are way too small in that window shot. The off-modelness is so distracting.

AUGH, PHINEAS HAS A BABY HAND, TOO.

Haha, I love it when debris falls in with Perry when he goes to his lair.

Bwahaha, he's so done with Monogram

They use landlines ("Sipping with the Enemy") and physical files...don't try to tell me that PnF takes place later than 2012 I won't hear it.

NICE FILE PHOTO, CANDY

Wait, they have a whole alert-protocol thing about a host family member getting kidnapped by aliens, but it says to send the assigned agent on the mission??? In "Undercover Carl" and "Bullseye!" Monogram specifically didn't want Perry to get involved (in ATSD Perry was acting on his own), so ????????? Is it because he's their best agent or what?????

Some stuff is missing from Phineas and Ferb's room (on the walls).

GALACTIC WEB???? My first thought was the Galactic Kids Next Door

Haha, oh, these kids. Love little moments like these.

Why do characters always play with a ball when in jail/trapped? 2D!Candace did it in ATSD, too.

Why is that CGI so conspicuous. PnF used CGI sometimes, and it didn't look like butt. We're in 2020, people.

BWAHAHA, Vanessa!!

Ooh, they're bringing back Space Adventure! Now, we know that after "Not Phineas and Ferb" in Season 2 they say they're over it, but also that 9 episodes later in "Nerds of a Feather," Phineas and Ferb go to a convention/dress up from it. WHEN DOES THIS MOVIE TAKE PLACE.

Hmmm, cutaway gags like I remember MML doing...still too Family Guy for my tastes, especially with it being overly long. (I'm also not pleased with how Baljeet's half-lidded eyes goes straight across instead of bending over the curvature of his eye like what PnF usually does....the straight thing is also Family Guy/South Park's style. This does not bode well.)

WHOA, OFF-MODEL BALJEET ALERT!!!!! WHY IS HE SHORTER THAN PHINEAS AND WHY IS HIS ARM BENDING LIKE THAT!!!!

Bruh, Phineas thinking it's dangerous and not asking his friends to go seems OOC. Where was this attitude in "Meapless to Seattle?" In "Night of the Living Pharmacists?" In ANY OTHER dangerous scenario?

I do like how the kids are getting to go with them this time after missing out on ATSD.

NORM?!!!!!!!!!!!

PBBBFFFT, WHY DO YOU THINK GIVING THEM BUFORD WOULD APPEASE THEM

Hey, yeah, they've never made mistakes like this! What's going on?

Okay, seriously, in ATSD and NOTLP the kids don't know who Doof is. WHEN. MOVIE. Also, Doof's lab interior does have the correct items in it, but they're colored + shaded weirdly.

DOOF IS A VIRGO?!! Okay, that tracks with him being incompatible with Sagittarius people from "Love at First Byte."

Mmmm, the animation is definitely more on the "low budget YouTube shorts" level. The way Doof moves....

Yeah, gotta stick to your brand, bwaha!

OKAY, SERIOUSLY, THAT IS NOT THE SAME CHICKEN-REPLACE INATOR FROM "What a Croc!" GET THE GODDANG COLORS RIGHT JEEZ DID THESE PEOPLE NOT LOOK AT A SINGLE MODEL SHEET BEFORE MAKING THIS MOVIE

Bwahahahahahahaha, I missed Buford and Isabella's banter (and Buford is right: they might need a canoe...or maybe that's just my over-preparedness talking)!

Again: "Undercover Carl"/"Bullseye!"

Ah, Buford.

Wait a second, they didn't even have an introduction scene between Doof and the kids like they did in ATSD. *insert thinking emoji here*

Meh, D.E.I.'s been blown up worse before (the "Ask a Foolish Question" time comes to mind)

DOOF YOU ARE THE ADULT SUPERVISION!!!! GAH!!

Wait, what are you talking about Candace? I don't remember a voice automated translator being a thing in the Flynn-Fletcher household. If this is a crack at Alexa/Google Home or whatever, THEY HAVE NEVER BEEN SHOWN TO HAVE ONE OF THOSE IN ALL OF THE EPISODES OF PNF

They could have done a fireman slide, I guess...though maybe the friction would've made that a bad idea.

Okay, is everyone going to get mind-wiped at the end of this or what? Candace didn't even know Vanessa's last name or where she lived in "It's No Picnic," and they definitely didn't seem friendly enough in NOTLP considering all of these interactions. I'm going to count up all the "WHEN MOVIE" comments i've made by the end of this liveblog, and if it's 10+ i'm just going to say the movie is non-canon/just an OVA. I am enjoying it more than the MML crossover so far, so that's good, though.

Haha, oh, Candace. See, this is why she and Stacy are BFFs: same braincell (AKA Stacy's "Elementary My Dear Stacy"/"Put That Putter Away" moments).

OH, CANDACE. XD

OH, SNAP!!!

Ugh, okay, the "WHEN MOVIE" doesn't even matter anymore. Officially non-canon due to irreconcilable timeline a la MML post-2016 reference.

Yay, Isabella showing off her skills again! People tend to forget that she's also smart.

Go, Perry!!

Oh my god, the "unsung hero" being technically sung....good stuff

Oh my god, Perry, nooooo!! Someone save him!

Wait, did Doof purposefully put that platypus-sized spacesuit on the ship for Perry?!! Awwwwwwwww!!

HAHA, BUFORD

Oh my god, Vanessa, noooo!!! D: I bet the pods were sent back to where they came from/Vanessa should've been in the Earth pod.

Goddang, good thing that planet's got breathable air (not that that ever really gets addressed in PnF, haha).

Ah, okay, it took her to the planet the aliens are from. Weird.

Wait, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO, these aliens are weirdly humanoid!! What!! PnF was so good about that ("Out to Lauch"/"The Chronicles of Meap"/"Escape from Phineas Tower"/"Sci-Fi Pie Fly")!!

So they were sending out pods looking for a leader? Weird. Also, they already had Candace be the leader in "Gi-Ants"/"Unfair Science Fair Redux (Another Story)."

Wait, they're doing show-tunes, and pretty much only people who are Evil in PnF do that ("Phineas and Ferb Save Summer"/"The Klimpaloon Ultimatum"/most of Doof's songs). I bet they're going to sacrifice her because of a prophecy or something.

Okay, -1000 points for the Floss. I hate it so much. You know what you'd be flossing if you did that with real rope? POOP. GROSS. Bring back Baljeet dabbing if you're going to make a reference like that, dabbing is fun.

Okay, this song is officially going on for too long. I know the overly long gag thing is a Family Guy staple, too. U G H, leave that horribleness out of my wholesome cartoons, please. Goddang, the influence was even in WBB's movie, too (Panda's dead pose). The Horribleness Lovers are infiltrating the animation industry. (How do I know about the Horribleness if I don't watch Family Guy/South Park? From people making infoposts about how horrible they are + reading up on their wikias/watching YouTube analyses of them, of course. Knowledge is power, and you must know your enemy.)

Seriously, open the freaking door. All of these overly long gags are not only unfunny, they eat up the runtime. PnF has great pacing where it's not too fast (Wander Over Yonder was sometimes too fast), but spends enough time on the things that need it. Opening a door is not something that needs time, especially when it's following up an overly long song.

I bet they're going to extract the element from her or something.

I'M PARANOID, TOO

Wait, this lady (I didn't catch her name) seems to be their leader?? Is she abdicating?

So the aliens have a gender binary, too? Is that necessary? Would that be necessary?

Hmm, I know that Doof didn't realize how futile rotating the moon was in "The Doof Side of the Moon" and what a boat was in "Are You My Mummy?" but he tends to be smart about intricate science stuff. Like, the problem with his inators (he even says it himself in "Phineas and Ferb Save Summer") is that he executes them poorly, not that he's failing in other aspects. Like, is this is the same scientist that built a Re-Good inator solely from plane parts in "Where's Perry?"

That cutaway was not necessary.

BALJEET, NO. Also, is it in character for him to be so gung-ho about trying out this unprecedented maneuver? I know he does have a wild side, but it's not usually about science things/throwing things that require this much caution to the wind.

Wouldn't they pass out from the G-forces or whatever?

Wait, what was the point of that alien mammoth getting flung? I mean, I figured that was going to happen to their ship by the way it landed on the mushroom.

Haha, oh, Doof.

XDDDD Buford had better save the day, since he's the only one that doesn't register the ominous tone. If he doesn't that'd be such a waste of the gag.

Haha, Buford. Still my favorite kid. :')

Okay, I seriously can't hear anything this alien leader lady says. It's like she's whispering all her lines with a hoarse throat or half-mumbling parts of her sentences or something. I have my volume turned up, and it's not helping.

Gross. WAIT, ISN'T THAT LIKE WHAT THE CITIZENS OF THE CANDY KINGDOM DO FROM ADVENTURE TIME?

Wait, do they have a farming culture? They were doing something in a field right now.

Hmm, yeah, lots of non-humanoid alien species on this planet alone....did they NEED to make the kidnapper ones so humanoid?

Doof, you even said that there was no adult supervision earlier. XD Isabella's definitely more qualified to lead, considering she's a Fireside Girl Troop leader/her vast array of badges compared to Doof absolutely ruining the Tri-State Area in "Phineas and Ferb's Quantum Boogaloo" and not knowing what leadership entails in "The Beak"/"Last Day of Summer."

Haha, yeah, see! Whip out those badges.

HAHAHAHA, Oh, Doof. I can see him facing front in the card's photo, ahhh, frontal Doof.

DOOF!!! XDD

Oh my god, he took her hat. She looks like she's starting to get pissed....you never want to get on Isabella's bad side. XDD (She knows hapkido/jujitsu from NOTLP)

Oh my god, this song is amazing.

See, songs are okay to be long if they're dynamic: lots of movement between locations, varying camera angles, engaging lyrics, moves the plot forward, etc. Now this is PnF!

Baljeet, please. XD

Oh my god, poor Doof. Yowch! I hope his leg's not broken. D: He's certainly dragging it around like it is.

HAHA, I love how he just calmly zaps it!!! Nice (and a good example of the experience thing he was talking about earlier).

That chicken looks uncomfortably realistic for PnF's style (we've seen Agent C in "Traffic Cam Caper" before and a rooster in "Cheer Up Candace").

They got the farmer's hair color wrong. Interesting that they brought him and his wife back, though!

What's with the sudden cartoony sound effects for Doof falling??????? Bad.

Hmm, the audience seems like they're being mind-controlled.

It can't be the first time ever, since she was a star in "Flop Starz"/"Run Away Runway"/"Lights, Candace, Action!"/"Unfair Science Fair Redxux (Another Story)"/"Gi-Ants."

For a hot second I thought she was going to ask Candace to marry her or join her family or something.

I bet Vanessa is going to tame that alien dragon! Also, I hope they realize she's not on earth soon.

I bet the gift they made Candace at the beginning is going to change her mind about living it up on the alien planet.

Oh my GOD, Candace has shown repeatedly that she loves and cares about her little brothers. WELP, GOOD THING THIS MOVIE AIN'T CANON.

Like, seriously, if this movie was canon, there's no way the boys would ever drop the "Candace is unhappy" thing for the rest of the summer.

HAHA, LIKE I SAID: ISABELLA IS TO BE FEARED. XD Also, wasn't it Candace's fault since she sent them away?

"While I love ominous patch-related threats more than anyone--" *AHEM* "Right, apart from Ferb" BOYS, PLEASE. BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

I'm getting flashbacks to Horde Prime inviting Glimmer to dinner. Also, I almost typed "Glitter" instead of Glimmer right now.

I bet she killed her brothers or had them mind-controlled or something.

Ooooooof, that's ominous.

Aw, Baljeet's so interested in joining Buford's gang.

Bwahaha, Doof looks so interested! I bet he's going to remember the stuff they're listing for later or something.

DID MONOGRAM JUST SAY DO NOT ENGAGE THE ALIENS BECAUSE OF AN INTER-GALACTIC TREATY?? IS THAT A LILO AND STITCH REFERENCE???? (probably not, but i've been getting into L&S again lately)

Meh, Buford and Baljeet survived being eaten by the worm from "One Good Turn." Those aliens will be fiiiiiiiiiiiiine. :P

Were those alien prisoners rebels or something? They have a hidden city, but they also seemed too scared to be rebels.

Oh my god, cubism.

Okay, so they're not rebels, per se, but they resist by....hiding and cowering. Sort of?

MMmmmyep, the show tunes tipped me off. So these guys got invaded by another alien species, huh? OOF, cordyceps vibes

So she needs Candace to be food for the spores or something?

Yep, she's using Candace as plant food.

Overly long gag again. :\\\\\\\\

Okay, so she didn't kill/mind-control them, but she did lock them up. I was right!

I don't know how their alien biology works, but humans can't eternally walk. Candace's legs would eventually get tired/become not able to move until the lactic acid she builds up wears off. She could also develop varicose veins or blood clots from all that standing. Bad move, aliens.

Yeah, Candace would never do something like that! Also, see: it was her fault they ended up on the prison shuttle, not Doof or Isabella's.

Bruh, the rest of the earth gang breathes CO2...did your scanners not pick up on that?

Oh my god, Candace, don't reveal information that could get earth invaded.

Wait, how was she keeping the mushroom alive before? Where did it come from?

Also, WHAT ABOUT VANESSA!!! SOMEONE SAVE VANESSA!!!

Wait, why was the alien lady holding onto the smaller alien's long moustache? Is he her pet?? CONFUSION

Ugh, they don't have to make every single thing a gag. PnF knew when to make moments real/dramatic. Grow a spine and live with the weight of emotional tension, movie.

ANOTHER OVERLY LONG GAG? No wonder this movie is so long.

Wait, is Shego the VA for the alien lady? The way she yelled sounded like Marlene, who has Shego's VA. I'm going to look this up later.

BWAHA, Vanessa hears the ominous tone, too!

I don't doubt that Doof will be able to cobble something together to get them back, but that honestly has nothing to do with "adulting" since Phineas and Ferb could probably do the same, and they're kids.

I absolutely love how Buford's still carrying that canoe everywhere.

YES!!! Haha, yes, Doof, Perry is your guardian angel (and emotional support animal). :')

I KNEW Vanessa was going to tame that dragon!!

Yeah, see, she never has that dragon again, so this movie is totally just an OVA.

OH MY GOD, PULLING A Chowder HERE, I SEE! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

Yeah, you can see how off-model/pink Vanessa is right here where she's standing next to Doof. She's supposed to have his brown-tinged coloring (just look at any other time she’s next to him--”Finding Mary McGuffin”/”Minor Monogram”/NOTLP/”Hail Doofania!”/”A Real Boy”/etc).

Bwahahahaha, chicken selfie

Oh, yeah, that makes sense. What would happen if they killed the chicken? Does it only switch with alive chickens?

BWEHEHEHEHEHE

Though I don't like the particular scare chord they used when Doof holds up the Axe inator--very stereotypical/they could've composed a new version, like how Candace's leitmotif is technically Ring Around the Rosie, but different.

Aww, why not, Vanessa? It's your best bet home! Although, I guess it would be awkward considering Perry's right there....

I need to see a photo of the Lieutenant Baljeet's talking about here, for....reasons.

See, Baljeet's recklessness in this movie seems more like something Buford-i'm going to randomly mess with this ("Fly on the Wall")-Van Stomm would do

In "Nerds of a Feather" Baljeet cosplays as a Space Adventure character, so....

"You made another boat?! What've I been lugging this one around for?!" NICE, BUFORD, BWAHA

Wait, how on earth did that work? Can hunks of metal just allow something to fly like that? I admit to not knowing how planes work, but at least those have, like, engines and whatever.

WAIT A SECOND, I SPY MISHTI IN THAT MCFREAKING STADIUM CROWD!!! WHAT IS SHE DOING THERE!!! SHE'S NOT A NORMAL FILLER BACKGROUND CHARACTER!!

Stacy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I wonder if they meant to put her mom on the bleacher seat behind her, or if it's another Mishti case.

They spelled his name wrong: we saw in "Doof 101" that it's John P. Trystate (the elementary school is named after him)

Beh, nothing bad is ever supposed to happen to Roger, that's the whole point of his character. Bad.

Ah, Bujeet banter.

WHY IS ISABELLA'S ROBOT A CAT THING

They should've made something to kill the mushroom instead.

OH, JEREMY XD Wait, that didn't sound like Mitchel Musso. 

Was he just making those weapons because it's his hobby? Stacy did suggest a compound bow as a gift for him in "Vanessassary Roughness," and there's a bow on the counter

Buford and Isabella banter!

I like the detail of Candace's hair being disheveled and her socks drooping after walking all this time

Aww, does she feel guilty? :(

She does. Again, this movie can't be canon, because they don't acknowledge what she's saying for the rest of the summer and this kind of breakdown would definitely leave a mark on her.

AHA, I knew that gift would come into play!

Aww, that's a cute mug! Also, good on Candace for not drinking coffee!

HMMM, OKAY, SO THE SIBLING HUG FROM "Phineas and Ferb Get Busted," WHICH WAS PERRY'S DREAM, IS ON THAT PROJECTION OF THEIR NICE MOMENTS. TOLD YA: NOT CANON.

Haha, nice @ the new gelatin memory. It aligns nicely with the various things Candace has done offscreen that Phineas and Ferb get a kick out of (getting her face caught in the dishwasher, getting tangled in the clothesline, etc)

The exploding thing is technically a step forward, but, again, the real issue is killing that mushroom. Also, are Doof and Co. still stuck??

"Why does that sound like her name?" "I dunno." BOYS

STACY...JEREMY...LARPING.....Aww, don't be ashamed, Jeremy! Candace does Ducky Momo cosplay, and she accepted your dance deficiency in "Nerdy Dancin'!" I have to say, I love it when Stacy and Jeremy are on the same side, since Candace was sidelining Stacy in favor of spending time with Jeremy for a while (to the point where "Canderemy" happened).

Mmm, I notice a trend in cartoons lately about applying psychology to things. Amphibia, SPOP, Steven Universe...it's nice to get kids used to the idea that introspection is healthy.

DID SHE JUST DIE

Okay, did they just...fly from another planet? The gang went beyond light speed to get back home....there's atmosphere issues....they didn't even bother to try and have them salvage the space suits from the inator even though characters in PnF can't survive in space/always have to wear a space suit (Doof even puffed up in "Out to Launch" when he stuck his head outside without a helmet on, and Perry made sure to put a helmet on him when he was going spaceward in "The Doof Side of the Moon")?

Oooh, okay, furthest chicken. Nice.

Aww, the dragon's shielding them! Reminds me of How to Train Your Dragon when Toothless was protecting Hiccup from the flames

WOW, that is an EPIC remix of Perry's theme music!!! Holy crud, there's not as much background music as usual in this movie, but the music that is there goes HARD.

Bwahaha, to quote Maui: "The chicken lives!"

Oh my god, Baljeet really likes petting zoos? Also, I guess the farmer's last name is McDonald??

Beverly Hills + Beverly Hills adjacent...why XD

The chicken still lives!!

Okay, so she's alive.

Ah, so that’s why the mammoth got flung.

Aw, I wish Jeremy and Stacy had had more of an action scene after gearing up.

Okay, see, this lesson she's learned? How if this movie was canon, none of the rest of the summer would have been possible? MMmmmmmmmyeah.

Wait, so the American police are just taking the aliens?? No special forces or anything?? They're ALIENS.

LAWRENCE, DON'T TOUCH THAT!!

OH MY GOSH!!!!!!!!!! I WAS NOT EXPECTING THAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Welp, it took me 5 hours to watch this 1 hr 24 min movie...wowza. I forgot to write it when they occurred, but I didn’t like that the alien lady’s blinking had a sound effect in that one scene or that they used the Wilhelm scream during the final battle. I do wish there’d been more Perry and Doof interactions + some more Stacy, but what we did get was good. There were some pacing problems (too much alien screentime), but the excellent interactions between the PnF gang made up for them. Also, I genuinely laughed at at least two handfuls of moments! Anyway: a good movie!! I'm shocked--i'm so picky, and I haven't liked anything since "Last Day of Summer!" I mean, it's definitely an OVA/not canon, but still!! Solid 8/10.

[theink-theiron]

Fairys Lost in Liones - Chapter One

Gajevy and Banlaine are my OTP's and I wanted to see a crossover between them and between Fairy Tail and Nanatsu no taizai, hope you enjoy!

Read on AO3 Here

Levy could feel aching and pain all over her body as she woke up from a deep sleep, she opened her eyes and shuffled sitting up on the bed, wincing as she did. Rubbing her eyes, she looked around the room expecting to see the guilds infirmary, but that didn’t seem to be the case in this situation. Instead of white sheets they were pink and instead of Mira or Wendy stood beside her tending to her wounds there was no one.

“Where am I?” She muttered out groggily, speaking to no one in particular but hoping that one of her guild mates would answer her. The nerves were beginning to creep in as the predicament she found herself in began to dawn on her, alone, injured, and unaware of where she was or how she got there; With each passing second more questions arose but no answers were there to comfort her.

She slowly got out of bed, being mindful of her injuries that seemed to encompass the majority of her body, she stretched out her body a little hoping to ease some of the tension she was feeling both inside and out, she took another quick scan around the brightly coloured rustic bedroom that for the life of her she could not recognise, she was hoping it would be a guildmates bedroom or something like that but she didn’t think so, the whole place just felt a little… off.

It was at that moment that she realised two things A) She was covered in neatly wrapped bandages, so she assumed that whoever brought her here was friendly and B) That she was wearing an outfit that was more befitting of Lucy! a tight pink t-shirt that ended at her waist, the smallest blue mini skirt and belt, and one long blue sock. Not her typical state of dress however she was more concerned about who dressed her.  

Then it hit her, Gajeel, Pantherlily, Jet and Droy were all with her, the last thing she could remember was all of them heading out on a mission together, which she had just about managed to drag Gajeel onto. Are they here? Are they ok? A loud commotion from downstairs disrupted her train of thought, it sounded like a lot of people, maybe that was them. Even if not she would still have to leave the room at some point, so that’s what she did. Creeping down the stairway the ruckus got louder, people yelling and cheering maybe, but none of them sounded like any of her boys.

Reaching the bottom of the stairway and rounding the corner, she shyly walked into what seemed like quite a nice little restaurant and bar. How odd. But what caught her eye the most was that she could see the group people she is assuming found her.

“Look who’s finally awake” Straining her neck looking up she came face to face, well face to chest, with a pair of red eyes with a devilish glint in them, the man was grinning down at her but it wasn’t malicious it seemed more playful which actually threw her off a little bit. She had to take two steps back just to look at him properly, how tall is this man!? she thought, he easily towered over her, even more than Gajeel did. And why on earth is he wearing an apron instead of a t-shirt?

Six pair of eyes scattered around the room were all on her waiting for her to say something, but her nervousness temporarily got the better of her, she didn’t recognise any of these people or the place and Gajeel was nowhere to be seen the whole situation was very unsettling for her, she wished she didn't have to do it alone.

“Ban don’t scare her! Don’t mind him my. name's Hawk captain of scraps disposal!” A large pig pushed past the man she now knew as Ban to speak with her. He seemed rather outgoing. She heard Ban mutter out a quick ‘Sorry Master’ This pig wasn’t in charge was he?

“Uh hi, my name's Levy Mcgarden, it…it’s nice to meet you Hawk” She was taken back by the fact there was a talking pig for only a moment before she composed herself again, deciding to ignore the part about scraps, she had bigger questions at the moment.

“You’re not surprised by the talking pig?” Ban asked incredulously whilst leaning against the bar and wrapping an arm around a small blonde girl with big golden eyes, seriously who are these people?

“I know a talking cat so no” He nodded at her, as if it were the most normal thing in the world.

“I’m sorry but I’m so confused, who are you people?” She tried to remain polite but the whole situation was so strange.

“You don’t know? we’re the Seven Deadly Sins” A small blonde boy who seemed rather chipper then joined the conversation, but he also started groping a tall, beautiful white haired woman who kind of reminded her of Mira. The girl blushed but didn’t do anything. Levy immediately averted her eyes and decided to talk into the void instead as to avoid the embarrassing scene.

“Who?” Ok so the name ‘Seven Deadly Sins’ did not put here at ease. And she had never heard of them before, is that some sort of guild name perhaps?

“You’re not from around here are you” Another small brunette boy joined in with a deadpan tone, it wasn’t exactly a question more of an accusation. The blonde boy then introduced himself as Meliodas the leader of the Seven Deadly Sins, the Dragon Sin of Wrath and gave a very brief description of what they were, although it was confusing, an order of Holy Knights for the kingdom of Liones and… criminals. As interesting as it was to hear it raised a lot more questions than it did answers.

“What? There is no place called Liones or Britannia and there are no Holy Knights”  She knew of every country on Earthland and she was sure that she was right about this, but she also didn’t think that they were lying, what is going on?

“Yes, there is and that’s where you are right now” Meliodas said keeping his voice light, she could not seem to tell what he was thinking and everyone else was just looking at her like she was crazy, which to be fair she could understand.

“OH! Gajeel, Jet, Droy and Pantherlily where are they!?” She suddenly burst out looking frantically around the room, they must know where they are, they would have been with her right; she couldn’t be out here all on her own.

“There was only one other person with you, tall, dark hair, angry looking guy. He’s going to be ok, but he’s hurt bad, he’s upstairs resting now” Meliodas told her pointing at the staircase then heading behind the bar.

“Oh thank Mavis Gajeels ok” She sighed letting out a breath of air she didn’t know she was holding in, but that didn’t make her feel completely better as the other three still weren’t accounted for “But are you sure there wasn’t any else with us? A ginger guy, a big guy with dark hair, and a small black cat with a sword maybe?” It was a desperate attempt; she knew it but she had to ask maybe they had seen them somewhere else on their travels.

“No but that last guy sounds cool!” Exclaimed Ban jumping up a little, the blonde girl patted him on the shoulder and giggled signalling for him to cool down a little bit, which he did.

Worry took over her then, where on Earthland could they be? she hoped they were ok, with any luck they were still in Magnolia.

“You must be starving” The White-haired girl approached her and ushered her to sit down at the bar, they sat beside each other, and the blonde girl sat on the other side of her. “Ban why don’t you get started on some supper for everyone, the others should be back soon” Meliodas told Ban whilst he started fixing up some drinks for everyone.

The White haired girl accepted the drinks and divided them amongst the three girls “My name is Princess Elizabeth but don’t worry you don’t have to be formal with me” She smiled brightly at her and it actually did make Levy feel a bit better.

“Wow a Princess are you sure I feel like I should bow” Elizabeth giggled at that and shook her head.

“And my name is Elaine, I’m from the Fairy kings Forest '' There was something about Elaine that she couldn’t quite figure out, she looked young like Wendy, but her eyes gave her away she looked wise beyond her years.

“Ha that’s funny I’m from the Fairy Tail guild”

“You’re a fairy too!?” She beamed with excitement practically bouncing out of her seat.

“Are you a fairy!?” Shocked beyond belief this girl seemed genuine when she said too so that must mean…no. This doesn’t make any sense, she can’t be a fairy, this day just keeps getting weirder and weirder.

“Yes…why are you surprised?”

The guild wasn’t going to believe this, if this was real then she had just discovered actual Fairy’s, just imagining everyone’s faces when she told made her laugh internally.

“I’m sorry I know this might sound ridiculous, but you don’t have a tail do you?”

“No we don’t have tails! are you crazy?” The brunette boy shouted from the cushion he was currently laying on in the air, ok so that was a little weird. But now she could tell everyone the answer to the age-old question on whether Fairies have Tails or not, this was an amazing day, well if you don’t include everything else that has happened.

With everyone in the room looking at her like she was out of her mind she started to explain why she had asked, she told them about the guild and Fiory, hopefully they might be able to fill in some of the gaps that she was missing. They told her that they had no idea what she was going on about which by now wasn’t that surprising, but they said a mage called Merlin may be able to help, they would just have to wait for her to return. Apparently there were still a few people missing called Merlin, Escanor, Diane and Gowther.

Dinner was almost ready for everyone so she decided she should head up and check on Gajeel just to make sure he was alright.

“LEVY!” Everyone stopped at the sound of a fierce roar coming from upstairs, he rushed downstairs clearly ignoring any pain and each thud of his descent was getting closer and closer. Rounding the corner they locked eyes and he marched up to her gently grabbing her shoulders and checking her over noticing the many bandages, his eyes looked panicked and she could tell that unlike her the moment he awoke he leaped out of bed and instead of waiting to try and piece together what was going on he immediately went on a hunt.

“Are you alright?” He asked, staring at her. After a moment he realised how close they were and stepped back and let go of her shoulders opting to scratch the back of his head and look away from her to alleviate some of the awkwardness, she noticed a very light blush on his cheeks but passed it of as a reaction to all the adrenaline coursing through his system. She nodded and hoped that he didn’t see her light blush either though, but of course it was only because of the adrenaline

“Where’s Pantherlily and the two morons?” And who are all these people?” He motioned to everyone else in the room who were still looking at them intently, seeming a bit put off by the silence of the unknown presences.

She ignored his moron comment and then smiled thinking of introducing him to the new friends she had made, Elaine and Elizabeth were delightful and she didn’t know what to think of the guys yet, but they seemed alright too.  

“These are the Seven Deadly Sins” levy gestured around the room and the girls and Meliodas waved, Ban nodded his head, and the brunette boy rolled his eyes.

“What the hell is that, a boy Band?” Gajeel asked mockingly, still seeming a bit Sceptical though.  

“No but that would be cool” Meliodas shouted out from beside Liz and jumped up to look excitedly at Ban who also had a massive grin plastered over his face.

Gajeel however looked much like Levy did not too long ago as hearing that name didn’t really clear anything up. Oh well she had plenty of time to explain things to him in more detail later, she couldn’t wait to tell him about the Fairy’s.

But as ok as things seemed at the moment they were still in a dire situation; was this the result of the Dark Guild they were going to face?

[first-and-last-neocount]

Death, the Shadow, Spreads Its Wings Around Me - Chapter 1

Yooooo, I finally finished the first chapter of my first fic! And it’s a multi-chapter Resident Evil/Supernatural crossover, so it’s not like I’m diving straight into the deep end at all! *sweats*

All thanks to the wonderful @fonulyn, who nudged me into actually finishing and posting this damn thing by luring me into squealing about my ideas over Tumblr and then drowning me in supportive comments until I gave in. You’re an absolute darling, Fon, and I hope you enjoy my contribution to our cozy little Nivannedy rowboat. 

Most of it’s under a cut, since it got awfully long for a first chapter, lol. Or you can read it on AO3 here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26437897/chapters/64411741

Chapter 1:

The ocean looked as black as ink.

Wreckage from the underwater base was strewn through the rolling waves, pieces as small as sheets of paper up to entire sections of insulated wall nearly ten feet across; all the truly heavy material had plunged to the bottom of the bay, but the rest now bobbed and swirled on the surface. Stormclouds had rolled in, the winds whipping the bay to a frenzy and darkening the water until it was impenetrably dark. A sea of shadows, from which nothing good could emerge.

Leon should have been resting in a medical tent, but instead he was on a boat cutting its slow but steady way across the churning waves, helping the rescue teams as they searched against all the odds for survivors. The winds had grown too unpredictable for a helicopter, so they were doing it the old fashioned way – a half-dozen coastal patrol boats, spread out into as even a grid as they could manage on the open water, combing through the debris field. Leon didn't hold out much hope for survivors, but he needed to be here anyway.

Even if he only managed to find the body, it was the least he could do.

When Leon had made it to the emergency command centre that the BSAA had set up just outside of Lanshiang's city limits, it had been in too much chaos for him to get a meaningful report from anyone. The explosion of Neo-Umbrella's underwater base had thrown everything into a frenzy, as rescue and salvage teams scrambled to deal with the fallout and contain any potential escaping bioweapons. When Leon had found the hasty medical centre and walked into the first tent, he'd been relieved to see Chris Redfield sitting on one of the folding cots, one arm in a sling and cut and bruised to hell but otherwise seemingly unharmed. Ignoring the chaos of medical personnel rushing around them, Leon made his way over to the BSAA Captain, and even managed to dredge up a wry smile from somewhere under his exhaustion.

“Well, we did it again, I guess. You'd think someone else would take a turn at saving the world one of these days...”

Chris had looked up at him, and Leon stopped in his tracks. There was something far worse than the usual exhaustion in Chris's dark brown eyes. His face was mostly expressionless, too tired to convey what was clearly churning inside him, but his eyes – his eyes were almost black with despair, filled with the kind of pain that Leon knew all too well. He offered only a single sentence.

“Piers didn't make it out.”

The ground didn't crack open beneath Leon's feet. The sky didn't fall. There were no explosions or dramatics or apocalyptic signs; instead, the world just... stopped. The noise of the chaos around them cut off as if the audio track had simply been muted, leaving ringing silence in Leon's ears. In that moment, a grenade could have gone off three feet away and he wouldn't have heard it. His vision seemed to dim around the edges, narrowing in until he couldn't see anything beyond Chris Redfield's hunched, defeated shoulders and despairing eyes. He couldn't feel the weight of his tac vest or the aching of his own muscles, couldn't smell the lingering smoke in the air – everything was gone, leaving him unmoored and adrift, his brain no longer processing the wealth of information that his body was trying to convey.

Low and echoing, as if from down a long tunnel, Leon heard himself rasp out, “What... happened?”

“He saved my life.” Chris's expression twisted as he said it, some of the raw agony in his voice finally breaking through onto his face. “We... that thing down there... if it got out, so many people would have died. We had to stop it.” His head bowed forward, his gaze falling to the ground – yet his haunted stare was clearly seeing something else, flashes of the horror he had just lived through.

“Piers got caught under debris. Crushed his arm. We were going to lose, we didn't have a chance... then he. Injected himself, with something.” A shudder ran through the Captain's frame. “He started to mutate. Whole arm swelled, muscles, spines, the whole nine yards. Fought the creature off with some kind of electrical blast. Got me into an escape pod, even though I was barely conscious.” Another shudder, stronger than the last. “Then he... when the base blew...” He looked back up at Leon, and the mask of exhaustion was gone, fiercely held-back tears shimmering in his eyes and his handsome features warped with helpless rage. “He stayed behind.”

This time it was Leon who couldn't hold the gaze. He turned away, his gaze drifting over the walls of the tent before fixing, still not really seeing, on the view from the open flaps of the tent – on the grim orange light reflecting against the gathering clouds, the rising plumes of black smoke reaching up like grasping hands. Lanshiang was burning, whole tracts of the city turned to rubble by the wanton destruction of the J'avo mutants, and it felt like the perfect mirror to the devastation unfolding inside Leon's heart.

Piers Nivans. Leon had only crossed paths with the young sniper a few times, and always in the context of a mission, where the BSAA and DSO's interests had overlapped; they had probably only spoken directly to each other on a handful of occasions, yet that had been enough for the younger man to make a powerful impression on Leon.

Admittedly, it had been his looks that had caught Leon's eye the first time. Leon had never tried to make much of a secret of his preference for tough, muscular men who looked like they could probably bench press him if they tried; Piers hadn't only had that going for him, but also stunning hazel-green eyes, a jawline to die for, and a fierce self-confidence that he wore like the proverbial shining armor of a noble knight. After only a few brief exchanges, though, Leon had realized there was so much more beneath the surface; Piers might have acted like just another military muscle-head sometimes, but he was also kind, quick-witted, and compassionate. While other agents often shied away from Leon, intimidated by his reputation, Piers had looked at Leon with something embarrassingly close to awe in his eyes sometimes... but he'd still had the nerve to ask if Leon was okay after an intense fight, offer him a hand into an escape chopper, even once argue with him when he thought the plan to breach a building full of infected was too risky. Chris had once commented to Leon that Piers usually stayed in the background and left the detail-wrangling to others, but that when Leon was present, he seemed compelled to step into the conversation; Leon had been unexpectedly warmed by that little revelation. He'd even wondered, sometimes, if the spark of attraction he felt for the sniper might be mutual. Their line of work didn't allow much time for their private lives, and Leon had mostly given up on the idea of romance after how spectacularly his relationships with Ada and Jack had crashed and burned, but something about Piers had made him want to reconsider. Maybe someday, he'd thought. A beer after work, just the two of them, without the rest of Chris's boisterous team around – get to know each other better, see if their compatibility only existed on the battlefield or if that chemistry extended to personal interactions as well. Always, though, those ideas had come with those inherent caveats; possibly, maybe, someday.

Now, someday would never come.

The numbness was starting to wear off a little, the duller throbs and sharper aches of his body making themselves known again, but Leon couldn't fathom the thought of resting. More pressing than all the physical pains was the sudden, burning knowledge that he'd forgotten the other crucial truth of their work. That all of them spent their lives standing on the very threshold of annihilation; that all too often, someday never arrived. Planning for tomorrow was a fool's dream, because none of them ever knew if they'd even have a tomorrow – if Leon wanted something with Piers, he should have grabbed for it with both hands, when he had the chance. And the slow, collapsing hole of despair in his chest told him that whether or not he'd admitted it before, he really, really had wanted it. He'd let his own fear hold him back, though, and now the chance was gone.

“They're putting together a recovery team, to see if they can find any survivors – or remains.” The sound of his own voice was startlingly normal, but Leon didn't turn to face Chris; he didn't want to find out if his face was holding up the facade as well. “I'm going with them. I'll bring his body back if I can.”

“What?” He heard Chris shift behind him, the sudden concern in his voice. “Leon, you're exhausted, you -”

“Get some rest. I'll let you know when I get back.” Forcing himself into motion, Leon strode out of the tent, ignoring Chris calling after him. The edges of the gaping void in his chest were growing, the chasm spreading wider and wider as the reality of the situation sank in, threading tingling lines of pain through his whole body. It felt as though, if he stopped moving now, he might just fold in on himself like a dying star and crumble into nothingness.

That could come later. First, he had to do what he could for Piers – even if it was far, far too late for it to matter. Even if all he could manage was to bring his body home.

The icy spray coming off the waves as the boat cut through them barely even registered on Leon's skin; he felt just as cold inside, that black hole of pain swallowing his organs and filling his veins like tar. He wasn't alone in his focused silence – no one in the boat was talking, all of them standing rigidly at the rails and staring intently out at the waters around them, searching for signs of life... or, failing that, of human remains. So far, they had only recovered two bodies, both of Neo-Umbrella scientists who must have been working inside the facility when it was destroyed. Those bodies had been placed at the very back of the boat, tucked against the rear rail under a tarp, and were being studiously ignored; Leon wouldn't have even bothered to fish them from the water, if it were up to him. They had known what they were choosing when they signed on with Neo-Umbrella. The people who kept this interminable war going, who made it necessary for good men like Piers Nivans to give up their lives to keep their world safe... they didn't deserve burying, if you asked Leon.

Suddenly, his gaze caught something other than the smooth surfaces of the laboratory wreckage. He called it out before he even fully knew what he'd seen. “I see something! Twenty degrees left!”

The boat slowed and turned, heading toward the object he'd seen. As a wave crested and sank, Leon got a better glimpse, and his heart leapt into his throat. It was a body, alright; floating face up, half-draped across a piece of wreckage, and wearing not the white of a lab coat but camouflage military gear. They were still some distance away, and the body's face was turned away  - but Leon could just make out the drape of a piece of grey-green fabric around the body's neck, sodden wet and plastered down against the tac vest but still distinguishable as a scarf, and he knew. He knew with a certainty that turned his blood to ice.

Piers.

As the boat pulled closer, murmurs swept through the boat crew; they might not have known Piers by name, but they all recognized that the man whose body they were approaching had been a BSAA Lieutenant by the insignia on his left shoulder. Leon didn't make a sound, his gaze trained on Piers, his pain-numbed brain finally starting to recognize that there was something strange about the corpse. They had almost reached their target when Leon's sluggish mind finally connected the pieces, and he inhaled sharply.

Chris had said that Piers injected himself with one of Neo-Umbrella's viral cocktails, that he'd mutated heavily enough to have spines and some kind of electrical discharge. Hell, prior to that, his arm had apparently been crushed by falling debris. And yet...

The right side of Piers's shirt was torn away, exposing not only his arm but the side of his chest as well. Even his tactical gear there had taken a beating, the vest ripped and sagging as though the swelling of the mutation had burst it. Yet – there was no mutation. All Leon could see was smooth, tanned skin. Piers's arm looked whole and undamaged, as human as it had ever been where it lay limply at his side, not even cut or bloodied as Chris had been; other than the deathly pallor under his tan, and the horrible stillness of his chest, he looked entirely uninjured.

As the boat pulled alongside the wreckage, the two men closest reached out with hooked poles and snagged the back of Piers's tac vest. With a few muted grunts, they dragged the BSAA agent's limp form closer, until they could reach down enough to grab him and haul him up onto the boat. As they lowered him gently onto the slick wood of the deck, Leon couldn't help but kneel down and reach out to touch him, mind spinning and chest aching fit to burst. He was distantly aware of a few of his companions watching him with pitying eyes, but no one tried to stop him; it was obvious that Piers was gone, but it must have been equally obvious that Leon was breaking down, and that he wouldn't fully accept it until he'd felt the sniper's cold skin and absent pulse for himself.

His shaking fingers landed first on Piers's shoulder, touching that undamaged flesh and wondering with a sick shudder what fresh hell Neo-Umbrella had cooked up, that the horrific mutation Chris had described had simply vanished as though it had never been – but the moment he made contact the muscles under his hand tensed, Piers's brilliant hazel eyes flew open, and his chest heaved as he gasped for breath and started to cough.

“Piers!” Heart suddenly pounding double-time, Leon grabbed for the sniper's wrist; even as he sought for a pulse, his other hand was smoothing the sniper's soaked hair back from his face, assessing the look of wild panic in Piers's eyes. “Get me blankets and a first aid kit, now! Piers, can you hear me? You're safe, I promise, you're going to be fine -”

“Agent Kennedy?” Piers's voice was a weak rasp, barely audible over the sudden flurry of movement around them, but his eyes had refocused and were fixed steadily on Leon. The recognition and awareness there made Leon's heart flutter, and he managed a shaky smile, smoothing Piers's hair back again needlessly. He could feel the BSAA agent's pulse with his other hand, stunningly strong and steady, and it made him smile wider despite the absolute deluge of adrenaline running wild through his veins.

“Yeah, it's me. Just stay with me, Piers, you're gonna be okay.”

Leon knew that the odds of that were not actually in their favour – hell, it was bordering on an impossibility that Piers was even alive at all, and a downright miracle that he wasn't mutated beyond recognition – but he said with all the conviction he could muster, and it was almost enough to convince himself. Piers smiled weakly back at him, then the medic was there, wrapping warm blankets around Piers and asking rapid-fire questions about where he was hurt and how much he could feel as the man began to cut away his waterlogged tactical gear. Leon moved back a little to give the medic room to work, but when he would have let go of Piers's wrist, the sniper grabbed his hand and held on; heart swelling with too many emotions to even begin to process them now, Leon mirrored that fierce grasp and stayed close, unwilling to move an inch further away than he had to as long as Piers clearly wanted him there.

As the medic did a thorough inventory of Piers's injuries, checking vital signs and testing responses while looking for any major wounds, a strange look of consternation came across the man's face. Before Leon could ask, the medic said slowly, “Lieutenant, are you in any pain right now?”

Piers blinked, then frowned. “Um, not really?” he said, looking rather surprised by that fact himself. “I figure I'm in shock, though, because I don't even feel cold and I'm pretty sure you guys just fished me out of the ocean.”

“We did, yes.” The medic was frowning too. “Yet your core body temperature is already returning to something near normal. Your heart rate is steady, your blood pressure is only slightly elevated, you have no major visible wounds, and you don't seem to be suffering any loss of sensation.”

Piers froze, and his grip on Leon's hand tightened. “Wait.” he breathed out, eyes wide, and looked down at his own arm in bewilderment. “My arm... I was...”

“Chris said you got hurt pretty badly down there.” Leon murmured, cutting Piers off – he didn't know how the medic would react if Piers admitting to having been infected, but he knew it wouldn't be in any way good and he wasn't anxious to find out specifics. There were absolutely no signs of mutation or mental alteration in evidence, and unless and until Piers started showing worrying symptoms, Leon wasn't going to let them lock him up in quarantine when he'd somehow managed to survive what should certainly have killed him. “You look fine though. Maybe... Chris just got it wrong, yeah? Heat of the moment and all that.”

Piers looked up, met Leon's gaze – and whatever he saw there, it made his eyes go wide, and Leon could have sworn he saw the sniper's cheeks flush, ever so slightly. “Right.” Piers said, voice still slightly hoarse. “Yeah. I... it was pretty chaotic there, for a while. I got thrown against the wall, and I just assumed my arm was broken and I was powering through on adrenaline. Can't stop to assess injuries mid-fight, you know? But maybe I – maybe it was just a little bruised after all.”

“It appears so.” The medic still looked perplexed, but he shrugged. “You're damn lucky, then, Lieutenant – we thought we were out here on a recovery mission only, and I'm damn glad we were wrong.” He stood up then, and cast a pointed glance at Leon. “He needs to stay wrapped up in those blankets until we get back to shore, and one of us needs to get back to helping with the search. You wanna stay and keep an eye on him, make sure he stays awake and responsive?”

Leon usually put a lot of work into maintaining his aloof persona, but right now he'd just been handed a miracle of a second chance and his facade of cool indifference was the last thing on his mind. He nodded gratefully, and the medic nodded back before striding off to rejoin the rest of the crew at the rails.

“Agent Kennedy...”

The soft words brought his gaze back to Piers, and Leon smiled down at him, squeezing his hand gently. “Call me Leon, please.” He said quietly, and got to watch a little smile tug at the corners of Piers's mouth. “Are you really okay?”

“I think so.” Piers held his gaze steadily, hazel eyes open and honest. “The Captain told you what I did, didn't he? You know that I was...”

“He did, and I do.” Leon replied, still keeping his voice low – the recovery crew didn't need to hear this exchange. “Don't particularly feel the need to spread it around, though. You look completely fine, and I don't know how that's possible but I'm not inclined to look a gift horse in the mouth. I'm just incredibly glad you're alive.”

Piers was definitely blushing now, but he was also looking at Leon with dawning confusion. “Wait a second, weren't you in the city when everything went sideways? What are you doing out here with the recovery crew? And where's the Captain?”

“Chris is at the medical tent back at command. He's a bit battered, but he's going to be fine.” Leon said soothingly. “As for why I'm here, I was looking for you.”

Piers just stared at him as if he didn't understand what he was hearing. Leon bit the inside of his cheek  a bit, trying to force back the nerves; it had been a long time since he'd opened up to anyone, to any degree, who wasn't Claire or Chris. Even with them, he usually just put a bit less effort into making himself appear 'fine' and let them draw their own conclusions about how he felt. He'd just been given a very sharp and painful confirmation, though, that what he felt for Piers was more than a passing fancy – and even he wasn't stubborn or emotionally constipated enough to ignore that kind of a warning, so he took a deep breath and made himself continue.

“Look, I know we haven't really spent all that much time together, but – I like you, Piers. A lot. And when Chris told me you were dead, I realized what an idiot I was for not saying anything. I let my own fears and hang-ups get in the way, and if you weren't somehow here and alive and safe, I'd have regretted that for the rest of my life.” Piers's eyes had gotten rounder and rounder as Leon spoke, and he was looking at the DSO agent like he had hung the damn moon, and they were still holding hands, so Leon smiled weakly and said, “I guess, what I'm saying is – once the trauma team back at command clears you for real... do you wanna go grab a drink together?”

For a second, Piers looked like he'd frozen in place – then he started nodding vigorously, and a broad smile broke across his face like the sun coming out from behind the clouds. “Yes.” he said fervently. “Hell yes, I – honestly, it's kind of a running joke with the guys on the team at this point, but I really, really like you too, Agent Kennedy.” If anything, his grin only got wider then. “Leon.”

Leon grinned back at him, a light, giddy feeling bubbling up in his chest; it had been far too long at this point, so long that Leon had almost forgotten, and it took him a moment to identify that feeling as joy. For once not tempered by loss, or anger, or bitterness. The city was still burning and the war against bioterrorism might feel like an unwinnable uphill fight, but Piers was alive and safe and they were going to get a drink after debriefing and maybe this once, just this once, Leon could actually get to keep something good in his life.  

Their boat finished its section of the grid and turned back toward shore a few minutes later, one survivor and two dead bodies retrieved from the wreckage. It took about a half hour to get from the debris field back to port, and then another ten minutes to make the trek back to the emergency command centre.

Piers didn't let go of Leon's hand until the medical team came to whisk him away for a proper examination, and neither one of them had stopped smiling.

[chriscdcase95]

Life is Strange: Pricefield parenting headcanon

Updated.

This has partially to do with Unlife is Strange, but is a general headcanon AU. This isn't an immediate update of the AU, and it's still taking time for me to work on. 

For those who are following the hashtag or still care at this point I have been planning and writing an AU storyline on her that serves as a crossover between Life is Strange and Vampyr. It's gonna take some time to work on and I lost the initial file for the character sheet. So I have to do all that work on a different file. My grandmother recently passed away and it took a damper on my writing motivation. I'm still taking it kind of hard, but I am working through it. 

On the upside my older sister recently announced that she is pregnant which got me thinking of an old headcanon I had. It involves Max and Chloe as parents. This one I am considering to implement into the Undeath AU. 

The headcanons to as such. 

1. The kids name is Bill, after William Price. 

2. Max and Chloe have a "Fun Parent/Responsible Parent" dynamic. That being said Max is considered the responsible parent, Chloe is surprisingly the more competent parent and better with kids than Max. Like Max could spend an hour or so trying to rock a baby to sleep and get the kid to stop crying; Chloe would manage to do so in under a minute. 

3. If the kid is one of theirs biologically, I am considering Chloe to be the biological mother. At the very least it's her eggs that are used, and Max might be a surrogate to carry the child to term. 

4. In my headcanon, there's quite a few survivors of the Storm (let's say somewhere in the double digits, again this is following my "Undeath" story). Among them are students and friends of theirs (Kate, Warren, Steph, etc) who take the role of surrogate aunts/uncles. Also to go with the surrogacy and artificial insemination idea, I was thinking that a possible sperm donner would be from a trusted friend of theirs. I have Warren in mind for this.

 5. Every time Aunt Victoria is alone or thinks she's alone with the baby, she gets all cutesy and cuddly with him; baby talk, raspberries, tickles, the whole nine yards. Whenever caught she vehemently denies everything. 

6. I was considering the possibility of giving the kid powers. I don't think he would inherit Max's time travel powers...especially considering I aim for him to be Chloe's biologically. After thinking about it for some time I decided make him see spirits and detect supernatural phenomena. 

He doesn't just see or sense spirit animals, but spirits in general; angels, demons, spirits so long as they are attached to people around him. He can also immediately tell if someone is a witch/vampire/spirit, etc. Point is, he is usually the first if not the only one to pick these things up, but the thing is, he can’t talk

The wicked ones especially tend to seek him out. They get closer and closer everytime Max and Chloe go on an outing with him. Seemingly he’s the only one who notices them

7. Chloe would be a total Mama Bear. That goes without saying. She does what she can to be the best mother she can be, to the point of quitting pot cold turkey. She also took cues from David's book when it comes to being an overprotective parent. Putting that much thought into it, it seems like the most natural route I can take Chloe being a parent. 

8. Ironically on the flip side, David turns out to be a natural at playing grandpa, he'd be playful, a little goofy. We have seen the "Good Guy" side of David before. Now we are seeing go absolute doting.

9. Sometimes, the kid will wake up in the middle of the night to see an inhuman figure looking down at him. Again, could range from a vampire, demon or the like.

10. Just as their is supernatural beings that pose a threat to him, whether his mothers knew it or not, there’s supernatural beings living among them that will try to protect him, It’s only a matter of time before Max and Chloe discover the truth.

[carolyncaves]

Hey op, I was wondering if you could give me some advice? High school senior here and I have no idea what to do with my life. Is accounting really as painfully boring as it's reputed to be? I'm a perfectionist and a good student and I feel like that might be helpful, but I've also nearly fallen asleep many times in math class. (I'm more a science and humanities person.) Is accounting actually as tedious and unfulfilling as people say? Do you like your job? Do you have any career advice??

Oh, no, advice ...

I've been sitting on this because I wanted to do your ask justice, and then it ended up extremely long - I'm apparently constitutionally incapable of giving advice without giving all the advice, just to be thorough. I started with my impressions of the accounting field and why I went into it (in case any of that resonates with you either way) and made it all the way to a probably-too-abstract meditation/ramble on careers, work, and purpose. Since I'm just a dumb 27 year old who is not entirely successful (yet) in any area of my life, you should maybe (definitely) take everything below with a grain of salt. But here are some things I think I've learned:

I didn't know what I wanted to do with my life either. I went to an engineering high school, but decided it wasn't for me because I didn't really care about it and wasn't spending my spare time tinkering with robots like some of my classmates. I almost majored in physics, but switched to accounting at the last second because I decided I probably didn't want to spend my whole life in a basement fine-tuning lasers.

I went into accounting because I thought math was boring but I was good at it, and I figured accounting might straddle the math-type-brain with the people-stories-humanities things that were more interesting to me. This is somewhat true - financial accounting is not math (thank goodness), but someone who is good at one will probably be good at the other and it is quite satisfying the way balance sheets always balance. (You can get into more math-and-statistics-intensive applications, but base accounting is just adding and Microsoft Excel, which is unironically one of the greatest tools humankind has ever created. How you feel about that opinion might tell you a lot about whether it's the right field for you lol.)

'Accounting' is really (at least) three entirely different types of job:

‘Industry accounting’ is the accountants who work for a business and keep track of its numbers. They record everything, analyze the data, and organize it into reports called financial statements, which are then given to the CEO, the board of directors, the shareholders, etc. to tell them how the company is doing.

‘Public accounting’ (as in Certified Public Accountant) has two main subclasses:

Audit, where you get hired by businesses to independently examine their financial statements and provide some verification that the managers who prepared them aren't lying or mistaken.

Tax, where you do taxes for people and businesses.

(+1: If you're a tech-savvy person, there's a huge amount of potential for crossover into technology work - data science, financial software, etc, etc. Though IT work has its own delights and frustrations.)

All three flavors of accounting require not only technical accounting knowledge but also at least some degree of business acumen to be truly good at (you'll develop this over time; I barely have any, the partners at my firm are very astute), and any of them can can put you literally anywhere, because everyone in every industry and lots of individuals need an accountant. (There are cross-state licensing issues that can affect how literal 'anywhere' is, so if you want to work somewhere specific that's a good thing to research in advance when planning out your degree, but even these are for the most part eminently surmountable). So particularly on the public side of things, it's a field that can expose you to a lot of different people and situations, and that's interesting. I like getting a glimpse of someone's life when I prepare their tax return. (I think I prefer individual returns to business returns for this reason, among others.) And if you're someone who likes business, it is a fantastic field from which to study it and could position you well for a more generally-businessy position down the road. (I have frankly found that I ... do not, so much. So keep that in mind when considering the rest of this opinion piece.)

All three types of accounting are, by their very nature, repetitive, in the sense that they're cyclical - you do the journal entries and close the books on one month, or you do a hundred tax returns and get through tax season, and then you do it all over again. Accounting isn't a field that really makes or does things - it measures what other people are doing, over and over and over again. It's a keeping-the-lights-on-and-wheels-running kind of field. It matters, because all three of those functions above are important in the context of our current economic arrangement. But some people are going to be happy doing that and some people are not.

Public accounting also has pretty punishing work schedules during crunch times. I can attest to that for tax (my current field), and have heard it's at least partially true for audit. This can be a good thing in some ways (I happen to like it), because it means there are some relaxed times as well - but again, some people are going to like the up-and-down rhythm and some people are going to want something more steady. (If you find this one isn't for you, you can always leave public accounting after a year or two and go into industry - that's what many people's planned trajectories are from the get go.)

In all three corners it's a field about developing expertise. You're doing something complicated for people which they don't know how to do for themselves, and you do sometimes get to come up with crucial information and/or creative solutions to help them. And in the broad societal scopes of public policy and the health of the economy, people having that expertise - in tax and its ramifications, in business, in financial accounting, in principled and accurate auditing - is important.

In a world where most of us regrettably have to do something for money, accounting is a pretty okay thing to do, and it pays money.

Being in the workforce for a few years has made me come to imagine a lot of things are tedious in some ways and important and interesting in others. Our incredibly complex global civilization goes because different people become experts in the minute, tedious details of their own different things, and then they all work in their own corners of the huge, infinitely complex machine. Tinkering with robots and living in laser-filled-basements are not that dissimilar to reading discourse over the minutia of the United States tax code. (These are all examples from relatively technical/'professional' career areas, because I don't really have first-hand experience with anything else (yet) - but maybe someone will chime in on that front in the notes.)

The extremely good news, which I can't emphasize enough, is that you're going to have a lot of opportunities to pivot, or change direction, or try different things, to eventually find the thing that at worst you don't mind becoming something of an expert in, and at best you absolutely love. I've already had three extremely different jobs, all of which have been very informative in terms of what I Do and Do Not like. It's surprising how often that doesn't line up with what I expected when I was younger. You might of course have a different experience - the point is you have plenty of time to experiment and find out.

But if I don't LOVE my career, isn't that terrible? Time for a confession, or something: I've always been an achiever-type, and in my youthier youth I would've answered the above question 'yes' - but in my first few of years out of school, whenever anyone would ask me what my future plans were, my answer was always '... I don't know? Try to get promoted, I guess?' I was really leaning on the external validation of what a 'good career' was without running that past whether it was what I wanted to achieve with my life. And over time that had a noticeable effect on my wellbeing. You're right that perfectionism will help, no matter what you go into - but you should be careful to keep an eye on whether it's really mostly helping your boss, and whether it's doing it at your expense. Don't get me wrong, this will make you a fantastic and therefore valued (read: employed) employee. Just be wary of it getting out of hand. (You might find you need to practice figuring out how and when to prioritize yourself even if it's inconvenient for others. I'm still practicing that now.)

Anyway, after a lot of reflection, I began to refine my idea of my capital-P Purpose, and it has little to do with working in a shiny fancy office or having a successful-sounding job title next to a well-known employer's name or really anything to do with accounting. Those things were only superficially rewarding. I'm working on rearranging my life to abandon some of the more costly ones to make room for my Purpose as I've come to understand it, and my license keeps me in overpriced coffees and, like, a house. It means even an occasionally disastrous person like me is doing reasonably okay (so far).

Some people love careers like that, though. Some people love living in basements full of lasers. It's really so individual. For me, it became clearer when I connected the dots between the things I kept coming back to time and time again, even in my most difficult moments, even years or decades apart. For other people, it might be very different.

But at the moment, you may not have all the information you need yet to make determinations about Purpose. Why would you, you're a baby; heck, so am I. It might evolve over the whole course your life. My main advice for you would be to just try something, or several things - whatever seems most interesting, or most practical, or ideally both! - and see how it goes. Like I said above, that will give you experiences instead of guesses, which will help you know. And you really do have so much time to work with. The most important thing, the thing I would tell my younger self, is to make sure that every so often you pause and honestly look. How do I feel about what I'm doing? Does it feel good because I like it, or because other people like it? Am I actually interested in building on and using the things I'm learning? Do I have a plan for the future? Is there anything about it I want to change, or add, or that doesn't actually matter to me? (And perhaps "What would I be doing right now/want to be doing in five years if I didn't have to make money?", because that might give you hints to what you want your money-career - if it isn't the same thing as your Purpose - to give you room for.)

Did I mention I think it's very individual? I think it's very individual. I invite anyone to add their own numerous-cents to this post - alternate takes on the accounting field (do you love it passionately? please tell this person why), additional career or life advice, etc. I'm just one person who's walking my one narrow path through the world with its particular terrain. Everyone's is going to look different.

P.S. Ask a Manager is imo an indispensable resource for getting a job - resumes, cover letters, interviews. Literally it has gotten me all my jobs.

It also gives a lot of great advice about what to consider in an employer and potential red flags - and I can attest that the culture of the company you work for and the management skills and style of your supervisor(s) matter more than almost anything when it comes to your day-to-day happiness in a job. This is part personal fit, part objective competence. It's not the end of the world if you take a misstep here either - it's something you figure out, just like everything else. You can do almost anything for a year - and you are NOT COMPELLED to even stay that long if it's really not working out.

P.P.P.S - and this is way out there ... I was exceptionally good at both reading/English and math as a young person - and it’s interesting that when that’s true, the careers people throw at you are all STEM-related. It’s almost as if people are predisposed to thinking STEM fields are more important, and that smart people belong in them. I have come to feel strongly that isn’t the case.

A lot of people (at least in my western/US culture) feel the humanities are an afterthought, but when I think about it, I think there are and have always been two main sources of human suffering in the world: nature and its limitations (hunger, health and disease, weather and environment, etc.) and other humans (war, murder, racism/sexism/all oppression and hatred, conquering and imperialism, poverty/socioeconomic inequality, and also elements of the way societies are organized that affect hunger, and health and disease, and weather and the environment, and so on).

STEM work is hugely important to making improvements in the first category, and helps with the second (it gives us the internet and weapons to defend ourselves from evil people who want to destroy us, for example). But a lot of the fundamental root issues in that second category are in the sphere of culture and the humanities - law and politics, sure, but those are derived from history, sociology and psychology, literature, cultural studies, philosophy, ethics, education, journalism, literature and the arts and pop culture (which informs and is informed by all of the above). The world needs smart people in those fields as well as STEM and business.

STEM fields often offer more money, or more certain money. Business fields offer sometimes significantly more. That’s a practical element to consider. And if you like a STEM thing, or a business thing, and want to go into it, please do and do fabulous things with it. All I mean is that if you find yourself considering a career in a humanities field, don’t be dissuaded only because people seem to think you’re too smart for it and would be better off doing something else.

[the-cookie-of-doom]

What's this about mitch and parrish? Can I hear some more???

I am so glad you asked! Please join me in the wonderfulness that is Marrish, I had this whole fic (kind of) planned out. (This is a bit of a jumbled mess, mostly bc I just took all my ideas from my chat with @missleeismyname who is wonderful and helped me flesh this out a bit)

So this starts when Parrish is still in the military. He’s in the Middle East (I can’t remember if he was in Afghanistan or Iraq?) and Mitch is there on business as well. They run into each other entirely by accident, probably while Mitch is doing recon, and he is Not Interested. He is working, and the tunnel vision is real with this one. But Parrish is a sweet pea and manages to charm him, of course. You can’t not love him. Mitch agrees to Parrish a call after the job is finished in a few days, and then after he is given leave for a few weeks, free to go wherever he wants, so long as he tells Kennedy (since she is his handler) and he decides to stay in the Middle East for a while and pursue a relationship with Parrish.

Full disclosure, that ending was inspired directly by the end of American Assassin (book ver) when Mitch decides to stay in Switzerland for 6 weeks and starts sleeping with possibly the worst person he could have chosen. It comes back to save him and bite him in the ass after the next book.

I also had an idea for a different ending, where the crazy shit happens to Parrish before they really have a chance to do anything/get to know each other, and Mitch thinks he’s dead. Then he finds out that no he’s alive, but he was medically discharged and sent home to the States. Sucks but oh well, it happens. Mitch goes on with his life, occasionally still thinks about Parrish but mostly tries not to think about the “what-ifs”.

Then Mitch goes home to California, because he hasn’t seen the fam in a while: John and Stiles, his dad and little brother. A while later he’s at the Sheriff’s station for some reason or another, and imagine his surprise when John introduces him to Parrish the guy he’s kinda sorta been crushing on, who is !!! when he sees him, like a happy puppy getting a treat. Which is a little odd, until Mitch says they’ve already met.

At that point John is just done. Because the reason I loved this ending was because of how he would react to his oldest kid apparently having a Thing with his newest deputy already, after Stiles was already dating Derek and then he became a deputy, and can his kids please stop sleeping their way through the station? It’s hereditary, since Claudia totally had a thing for John in his deputy uniform.

Of course then it becomes a station-wide joke that the easiest way to become a deputy is to date one of the Stilinski’s…

Then Mitch finds out Parrish is a hell hound, and he’s just like “I knew you were hot before, but damn…”

And when Stiles finds out about them lol, he’s just like what is this Sweet Innocent Puppy doing with his broody asshole of a brother??

Mitch: he is none of those things, just so you know 

Stiles: LALALA I DONT WANT TO KNOW NVM

Stiles and Derek are going over to Mitch’s place for whatever reason and right after Stiles opens the door Derek is just like Stiles No Bc ffs Derek can hear them but Stiles doesn’t listen and then totally walks in on them and handcuffs are involved somewhere. Parrish is absolutely a gentleman on the streets and a freak in the sheets. 

I have like so many crossovers bc I love Mitch so much, you guys have no idea. Steteritch is the Top Fav, but I have ideas of Mitch with just about everyone, platonic and otherwise. My Mitch/Allison (platonic) dynamic absolutely wonderful and will make you weep. I can’t wait to show them in SIF if I ever get that damn fic finished, bc he is just so sweet with her.

[flowerfan2]

Bound To Be Together - Ch. 9

McDanno, M, A03 A continuous story of Season 9 codas exploring the bond between Steve and Danny as they grow even closer.

(Author’s note... I had no idea that this story would turn out to be so smutty, but what can I do... for this chapter I added the tag “a touch of superhero kink?” on A03...)

Chapter 9: 9.09

Danny is a little disappointed that he had to bring Charlie back to Rachel’s after the release party at Other Realms, but the view as he walks through Steve’s house and out onto the lanai does a lot to cheer him up.  Steve is kicking back in a chair, eyes closed, late afternoon sun turning his skin bronze.

There’s a flutter in Danny’s chest at the sight.  He and Steve haven’t had any time alone together to speak of since Danny got back from Jersey, since he’s had the kids with him all week.   Danny is hoping that tonight he might finally get a chance to see up close and personal what he experienced over the phone.

Steve barely twitches as Danny approaches, however.  Whether he’s tired, blissed out in the sun, or just teasing, Danny figures he’ll play it cool for now.  Unless they catch a very poorly timed case, there’s no rush.

A copy of “The Mysterious Night Sentinel” is lying on the ground by Steve’s feet, open to the “Book ‘em, Danno” page.  Danny grins. Leave it to Jerry to immortalize their catch phrase.  Danny looks from the comic book to Steve, still pretending to sleep, and wonders if there’s any connection.

“Hey, babe,” Danny leans over and presses a quick kiss to Steve’s forehead.  Steve blinks his eyes open, and Danny shifts so that he blocks the sun shining in Steve’s eyes.

“Hey,” Steve says, hands coming up to rub his face.

“You okay?”

“What?  Yeah, I’m fine.”

This isn’t exactly the reception Danny was hoping to get tonight, but he knows Steve well enough not to be offended.  When something is bothering him, Steve doesn’t cover it up in front of Danny, and that’s worth more than a roll in the hay.

 Danny sits down in the chair next to Steve and stretches his feet out in front of him.  “Any chance you wanna talk about this Batman thing?”

 Steve grunts. “Nothing to talk about.”  He turns to Danny and raises an eyebrow.  “Where’s the beer?”

 Steve’s playing the Neanderthal card, but Danny can play along if that’s what he needs.  “You said you had plenty.”

 “Well, maybe I wanted you to get some more.  Or at least, you know, bring me one.”

 Danny pushes out of the chair and heads back into the house.  He could really use a beer. “You’re deflecting,” he calls over his shoulder. “Think about what you’ve done, and I’ll be right back.”

 In the kitchen Danny loads up a bucket with ice and a six-pack’s worth of cold Longboards, and snags a bag of pretzels and a pack of oreos for good measure.  They’ll probably order a pizza soon, but it isn’t healthy to drink on an empty stomach.

 “You’re actually a lot like Batman, you know,” Danny comments when he returns, handing Steve a beer.  The idea has been haunting Danny ever since their conversation in the car about superheroes.  Danny isn’t sure how Steve thought he could avoid the obvious comparison between himself and Bruce Wayne, or between himself and the Night Sentinel, for that matter – parents dead, father investigating dastardly deeds, son out to avenge his father’s death.

 “Nah, I’m just a regular guy,” Steve says flatly.

 “One who trains for years to bring himself to the height of physical perfection, in order to seek out justice.”

 Steve smirks.  “You think I’m the height of physical perfection? Thank you, Danno.”

 “Okay, you’ve got me there,” Danny admits, enjoying the brief look of surprise on Steve’s face when Danny doesn’t brush it off as a joke.  Steve may not be as young as he once was, but he’s perfect in Danny’s book. “But seriously, now that this fascinating chapter in Oahu history has come to a close, are you sure you don’t want to talk about it?”

 “What’s with this sudden need to deconstruct superheroes, Danny?  Can’t we just let poor Gene Wahale  be?”

 “You’re saying it didn’t feel weird to you, maybe bring up some… difficult thoughts, looking into Gene’s investigation into his father’s murder?”

 Steve pauses, finishing off his beer and taking another one from the bucket.  “If I got all worked up about every case involving a father and son, I wouldn’t get much work done.”

 “This isn’t exactly your ordinary case.”

 Steve scowls.  “Fine, I’m a messed up little kid just trying to be a superhero so I can catch the bad guys who killed my parents.  Now can we just relax and enjoy the evening?”

 “That’s not what I meant-”

 “No?  Then what did you mean?”  There’s an edge of anger in Steve’s voice, and Danny isn’t sure how it happened.

 “Hey, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” Danny holds up his hands.  “I didn’t mean to piss you off, or insult you, or whatever’s going on here.”  Maybe his superpower really is irritating people.  “I just wanted to let you know that…” He trails off.  It’s hard to speak all of a sudden, especially with Steve glaring at him.

 “Let me know what?”

 “I think you are kind of like Batman. Your parents’ deaths’ did mess you up, and look what you did in response – you trained to be one of the most elite soldiers on the planet, and now you fight crime.  You save the world – or at least the island – on a regular basis.  You’re one up on Batman, too, because you don’t have a fortune to use to build your crazy tech, you’ve got to go through all the red tape and requisition it from the government.  You are a superhero, Steve, a real one.  Making a difference and saving people’s lives.”

 Steve looks away, biting at his lip.  “There are plenty of people I haven’t saved.”

 Danny knows this all too well, it’s part of the job.  “We try to save as many people as we can. Sometimes that doesn't mean everybody, but we have to find a way to live with that, or next time maybe nobody gets saved.”

 Steve starts to grumble something in response, and then turns sharply towards Danny.  “Did you just quote Captain America at me?”

 Danny grins.  “If you’re Batman, I get to be Cap.”  

 “That makes no sense,” Steve protests.  “They’re not even in the same universe.”

 “So, we’ll do a crossover.”

 Steve shakes his head at Danny and pulls his phone of out his pocket.  “It’s clearly time to order dinner.  I think the beer is going to your head.”

 *****

It’s hours later, after dinner and beer and getting progressively closer together on the couch as they watch a movie (of course Danny had argued for something with Captain America, while Steve voted for one of Christopher Nolan’s Batman movies, just to keep the debate going; they finally settled on Deadpool 2, because it’s hilarious).  Steve grabs the remote and turns off the television, the strains of Pat Benetar’s “We Belong” still echoing in Danny’s head.

 Steve doesn’t move to get up, keeping his arm over Danny’s shoulders where it’s been for most of the past hour.  It’s dark in the room, a trickle of light coming in through the windows, and it’s pretty clear what might happen next.  Suddenly Danny feels almost shy.

 “Do you, um,” he starts, but then Steve shifts and presses him back against the couch with a fierce kiss, big hands pushing hard against his shoulders.  It goes on until Danny’s breathless, and then Steve lets up. Danny can feel Steve’s smile against his cheek, and his breath hot on his skin.

 “Oh,” he says gracelessly, and Steve chuckles.  

 “Want to go upstairs?”

 There’s only one answer to that.  “Sure.”

 For all Danny’s anticipation, it turns out that sex with Steve is a lot like other things he does with Steve – mostly they move together easily, they laugh when things get awkward, and they can’t seem to decide who’s in charge.  They clunk heads as they each attempt to get into position to blow the other, and then Danny’s foot gets caught in the sheets and he swears until Steve yanks the sheet off the bed, almost taking Danny with it.  

 Finally they’re both naked and lying facing each other, Steve’s hands running up and down Danny’s sides and Danny exploring every inch of tanned and inked skin on Steve’s body.  Steve grabs Danny’s ass and pulls them close, and damn, it’s good.

 “Just like this for now?” Steve stutters out, questioning. He’s gotten a handful of lube from somewhere and is stroking Danny’s dick with it, his own, too, and thrusting them together.

 Danny’s on board, sucking kisses into Steve’s neck.  No need to make this complicated.  Steve’s leg comes over Danny and pulls them closer, coarse hair rubbing against Danny’s skin.  Danny tries to get his hand in the mix, wanting to feel  Steve’s heavy weight, and Steve kind of elbows him out of the way, finally flipping them so that Danny’s on his back and Steve is looming over him.

 “Stop it, just let me-” Steve pants.

 “I just wanted to-” Danny doesn’t have the breath to explain, and he doesn’t really care, because now Steve has got one hand on his dick and another pulling at a sensitive nipple, and his whole body is on fire.

 “You can’t even stop arguing during sex, can you?” Steve says, and lets Danny take a hold of his dick, moaning low as Danny gets a rhythm going.  Soon there’s no more arguing, just heat and fantastic friction.  

 Danny is teetering on the brink, and he hears himself letting out a stream of pleas, “oh yes oh god Steve yes…”  Steve’s doing much the same, his “that’s it, there, Danny, right there” the hottest thing Danny has ever heard.  

 Not letting up for a minute, Steve drags a hand over Danny’s body, up and down and back again, then landing at the jut of his hip and holding tight as they grind into each other until there’s nowhere left to go.  Danny feels Steve come first with a shout, shuddering above him, and it pushes Danny right over the precipice, white-hot pleasure shooting through his body.

 As they come down, Steve flops over the edge of the bed and comes back with the discarded sheet, using it to wipe up the mess on Danny’s stomach.  Then he gathers Danny under his arm, and Danny lets him, cuddling up close on his chest and not even caring about how ridiculously sappy he feels.

 Steve trails a finger along Danny’s side, then spans his palm across Danny’s waist, possessively.

 “You’re right, you are like Captain America,” Steve says, his voice soft.

 Danny hums, pleased, brain still too fuzzy to parse this.  “Okay. Thanks for the compliment.”

 “I mean, you know, maybe pre-serum Steve Rogers.  Tiny, can’t walk away from an argument-”

 “Tiny?”  Danny jerks the pillow out from under Steve’s head and swats him with it.  “I’m gonna kill you.”

 “Well, not everywhere…” Steve drawls, giving Danny’s cock a pointed look.  “But I like it.”  Steve drags Danny back down into his embrace, arms going all the way around his shoulders. “I like that I can wrap myself around you, hold you like this.”  Steve’s voice trails off.  When he speaks again, there’s a trace of uncertainty in his tone.  “That’s okay, right?”

 Danny pulls away enough to look at Steve.  “Is there anything about what just happened that makes you think it wouldn’t be okay? Anything that makes you think I’m not one hundred percent, head over heels into you, mister superhero Seal?”

 “I dunno,” Steve says. “We’ve never exactly done this before. It’s different, in bed…”

 “It’s not.  It’s not different.  It’s just right, just like always.”

 Steve’s face lights up. “Yeah?”

 “Yeah.  I’ll even play Robin for you sometime, if that’s what turns you on.”

 Steve freezes, and Danny laughs, Steve quickly joining in.  “You’ve got a dirty mind, Williams.”

 “Holy kink, Batman,” Danny teases, loving the blush on Steve’s face.  

 “Stop it,” Steve protests. “I’m too old to go another round, it’ll have to wait ‘til morning.”

 “Fine.  But settle down, you make a lousy pillow when you’re squirming.”

 “Sir, yes sir,” Steve says, his voice light and happy as he gathers Danny against him once again. Danny feels him press kisses into his hair, and he lets himself drift off, secure in the knowledge that tonight all is well in Gotham.

[queenofthegalaxxy]

Blackfire’s RP PLOTTING CHEAT-SHEET

Want new-and-exciting plots for your character? Long to reach out to more of your followers, but don’t know where to start? Fear not! Fill out this form and give your RP partners both present and future all the of juicy jumping off points they need to help you get your characters acquainted.

Be sure to tag the players whose characters YOU want more cues to interact with, and repost, don’t reblog! Feel free to add or remove sections as you see fit. Template here.

Mun name: I go by Star or Starfire online. If we’re close, I might give you my real name upon asking - but if I do, please don’t ‘openly’ call me by it for others to see on this site. I’m very hesistant about RL things like that. OOC Contact: IMs and Asks are always open. I also have Discord, and technically still some Skype account somewhere though I never use that anymore. I do have the right to decline giving you those things even if we’re mutuals though. Anything listed here aside from asks is only OOC.

Who the heck is my muse anyway:

Disowned princess of Tamaran, was shunned from her birthright of being ruler because her younger sister was preferred. Ever since, Blackfire has taken on a rule of ‘take what you want when you want it’, which naturally ended up leading her into a criminal career. Every now and then she also comes up with plans to get her sister to suffer for what she did to her.

Points of interest:

Orange-ish skin, purple eyes in both sclera and pupil, though the sclera is only very slightly colored. Always wears armor that covers pretty much the whole body. She can fly, has superhuman strength, can assimilate languages through lip-contact, and use a form of energy commonly called starbolts; her energy is purple. She loves to make use of her body, her beauty, to play with and/or manipulate others. She enjoys to be seen as sexy and attractive, and she doesn’t really hold back on her thoughts unless it might give her an advantage to do so.

What they’ve been up to recently:

Nothing much. Planning her next attack on her sister, travelling to other planets and sometimes to earth, ever so often causing destruction somewhere to have fun, occasionally going to clubs or other places of proper parties.

Where to find them:

Stealing something; dancing in clubs; informing herself about potential competition in regards to stealing and such. She could be all around the universe, she’s often travelling. Not only because she enjoys it, but sometimes also to escape some sort of law-enforcement that’s looking for her. Every now and then, she could also be found in prisons, if she didn’t manage to escape those chasing her.

Current plans:

I don’t really do big storylines much, so nothing really. I had an AU thing once that I had running basically as a sort-of ‘event’ (Blackfire’s Final Trial was how I called it, searching for it will probably show you more info - or you need to ask me), and while similar might happen again if I ever get that spark of an idea again, nothing is really planned at the moment. As for Blackfire’s plans: There may or may not be another plan in the works to get at Starfire (and Wildfire), but nothing actually going on yet.

Desired interactions:

More that try to befriend her, but also more that are enemies. I’d enjoy some sort of deep bonding too, though it’s very hard to get Blackfire as far - come to talk to me and maybe we can find some way to make it happen! Maybe even interactions with ones she stole from before, too! I think I never really had situations where she was... like, put into her place, yet, by someone better than her or maybe a bigger villain or something. That’d be a thing I’d really want. I like my powerless-verse a lot and would love to actually have the chance to explore it with someone. Maybe even the setting up of it - we can alter who helped her if you’d prefer your muse to be the one. I’m open to crossovers or the likes too.

And to name specific character/s I’d really like to interact (more) with: Red X! Like honestly, I want to have them interact so much. All the Red X’s I encounter on here though seem to vanish shortly after we got something going, and I never get the satisfaction of being able to build a proper relationship with them. I think Blackfire and Red X could be a great team (and/or more if it clicks and both muns are interested) and it would just be wonderful to be able to explore their dynamic. I mentioned Mar’i on Star already, so let me just shortly say here that of course I’d love to have Blackfire interact with her too. I can’t really think of more here right now.

Offered interactions:

She’s stealing and destroying things on a frequent basis. Also dancing, drinking (though it doesn’t affect her unless she drinks in masses), flirting and... what flirting leads to.

Current open post/s:

Open Starters and Memes! Both are always open, regardless of if they have already been replied to or if they are old. Please just respond to what you find interesting, I always appreciate new interactions!

Anything else?:

This is a Sideblog to Starfirechan. I’m in Germany, so timezone differences are a thing. And I’m also very shy about making the first step for an interaction. I do have Wire-accounts for my muses, and you can either search for them on my blog or ask me about them, but I don’t know if I could/will ever do any good on those.

Tagging: You! Yes, I mean you! Too late to decide to not do it, you’re already tagged!

[rawbiredbest]

The Lifeline of Tsukuyomi

Hello, and welcome to the first installment of Amrita Memories, a collection of crossover vignettes between the Yakuza (Ryu ga Gotoku) series and the game Nioh, re-imagining your favorite professional criminals as 17th Century samurai, ninjas, and mages, with a dash of demonic invasion and protective spirits.

IN THIS EPISODE: Saejima's found something precious, and could use some assistance.

WARNING: contains graphic, canon-typical depictions of violence, body horror, the supernatural, and war flashbacks. 

Shoutouts to @taiga-saejima for putting up with me brainstorming this universe.

Read here or on AO3!

- - -

“You a magic man?”

Akiyama looks up from the pot of boiling broth. The new arrival almost fills the cave mouth entirely. Only the barest light, already filtered by the gloom of the storm raging outside, squeezes past his bulk. The ring of fur around his neck has long since drowned; rain drips from every channel of his armor plates.

“I prefer the term yamabushi,” Akiyama says, shifting to face the stranger, “But yes, I’ve been known to write the odd spell or two. That what you here for?” He suddenly chuckles, flashing a grin. “Sorry, sorry. I forget myself, it’s become so routine. Please, come in.”

The arrival stoops to fit inside the cave, tracking mud and wet behind him. Something nudges Akiyama’s hand. He looks down. It’s the white twin of his tonfa set. Hana, sitting nearby, pushes it closer. Shun gives her a comforting smile. He’s dealt with oni before.

The newcomer drops to the ground and Akiyama flinches, half-expecting the whole mountain to quake under his weight. By the campfire’s light, he can tell he’s a samurai. Was, at least. His garb is battered and broken in places, stained with the toils of a journey. What could be dirt is more likely blood. The enormous hammer on his back looks like it’s heavier than he is. Shun is glad it either hasn’t been used recently, or has been washed clean from the deluge. He doesn’t like the sight of brains.

“I have soup coming up in a second,” Akiyama says, “Why don’t you tell me about yourself?”

The stranger hesitates, grappling with his own thoughts. He climbed a mountain for this. Might as well trust the so-called yamabushi. “My name is Saejima Taiga,” he finally says, “I need your help.”

Akiyama glances at Hana. See? his look says, You were scared for nothing.

She shoots him a frown right back. The moment yokai know we’re up here, we're ruined, it replies.

“What kind of help? I have charms for money, luck, clarity of mind. I’ll tell you now, they’re not guaranteed to work. You can’t slap them on your head for an instant fix. You have to want them to work.”

Saejima shakes his head, spilling droplets across the cave. “Nothing like that. You can get crap like that from anybody.”

Akiyama’s eyebrow twitches. “I like to think they’re not cra--”

The samurai lifts his breastplate. Sitting inside, sheltered from the storm, is a spirit. The smallest one Akiyama’s ever seen, it could fit in his palm. Just a fuzzy ball of nigitama -- positive energy.

“How do I care for him?” Saejima asks.

Shun swallows his heart. “Put it back,” he says, nodding when Taiga tucks his armor back into place, “How long have you had it?”

“A day. Bad things were picking on him. That wasn’t right, so I stopped them.”

The yamabushi glances at the hammer.

“Couldn’t leave him behind,” Saejima continues, “He’s so little, you know? So I picked him up. Put him somewhere safe. Heard rumors you could help, so I came here. Can you?”

Akiyama touches his chest. “Did you know to put it there?”

“No. Seemed like a good idea.”

Shun thinks for a moment. Extracting three cups, he ladles soup into each. “Tell you what. Let’s sleep on this. I’ll have a better idea what to do in the morning.” He gives a cup to Hana and offers one to Saejima.

The samurai takes it, looks at the contents. Pieces of rabbit, plant roots, a few vegetables. He can’t be picky. Few people are willing to lend even wilted greens to a wandering disgrace.

“Cheers,” Akiyama exclaims. Everyone drinks. He spoons seconds and thirds for Taiga before he subjects himself to the shame of asking for more.

- - -

Hours later, when the storm has calmed and Saejima is twitching on a bed of straw, Akiyama goes to work. He feels a tad wretched for drugging his pilgrims, but how else can he judge them at their most sincere?

Tasogare bumps his fingers. Shun interprets it as comfort instead of the common sleepy wobble the baku calls a gait. He strokes down the pillars of stardust along its spine and feels the simultaneous sensation in the back of his mind. Touching his spirit is like putting his hand to a mirror and sinking into it like the surface of a pond. Touching himself and, at the same time, not.

Tasogare knows the drill. Despite the glow from its fur that paints the cave walls in shades of galactic violet, Saejima doesn’t stir as it approaches. It sniffs his skin, ox tail sashaying, and places the end of its trunk over his ear, mindful of its tusks.

Akiyama watches a bulge travel up its length. When Tasogare has collected enough, it slips its trunk into its mouth and swallows deeply. When it reaches for more, Shun kneels, extracting three talismans from inside his joi.

The first is for divination, for the wisdom and empathy. The second is for healing, for apologizing for what he has to do. The third is for protection, for a suit of armor around his mind. Just in case. They are far more potent than anything he gives his visitors, and he feels their effects the instant he casts them on himself. He is within and above his consciousness, watching it expand and drop roots, the cave and the mountain beyond coming into hyper-focus. 

“Ready when you are,” he murmurs.

Tasogare turns to its host. Not a hint of a sway in its step this time. This is their duty, solemn and sacred. Akiyama gives the spirit’s paws a gentle squeeze. I’ll be fine.

The eye on the baku’s forehead opens and the cave is obliterated with consuming light.

- - -

It’s a battlefield. Akiyama has seen them before. A musket round sails past his face slow enough for him to spot the gases it trails from exploding gunpowder. He lets it pass, and wanders on.

Dreams are always slippery. A combination of his self-protective onmyo magic and the simple fact that the dream isn’t his makes them liquid and loose. This one is made worse from the smoke in the air, belched from cannons and untamed fires. Deep gouges made from stomping hoof and sprinting boot rake the earth into ash-topped waves. Men hide behind barricades, peeking out to raise their rifles. The bodies -- piles of corpses everywhere, thrown together to make way for soldiers soon to join the ranks of the dead.

Movement ahead. It’s Saejima.

He is fury incarnate. Swarmed by infantry, he pays no heed to the swords and spears clanging off his armor. Men fly with each swing of his hammer -- ribs crushed, limbs smashed, blood spilled. A soldier rushes in with his blade. Taiga knocks it up and brings the hammer down on his head. Red mud conceals the worst of the pulped skull.

Eighteen. Eighteen men destroyed for the sake of Lord Sakon, who doesn’t know he exists.

Saejima is on number nineteen when it happens, almost too fast for Akiyama to see. It comes from behind the yamabushi, the sound of flesh splitting open giving it away. He turns to face it. There’s no mistaking what it is. A snake the color of gore, tearing through the smog, whipping from one haggard soldier to another, bashing through their chests with jaws wide open, no hesitation, no remorse.

A spirit.

Akiyama raises his arms, braces himself, staring as the serpent barrels down on him with rows of fangs and a ravenous maw--

It blasts past him.

Shame flares hot in Shun’s chest. A novice mistake. This isn’t his dream. He isn’t here.

But Saejima--

The snake makes a lightning-fast revolution around Taiga, plowing through the men surrounding him, and it is out of sight, slashing over the battlefield for more prey. Ankle deep in the dead, Saejima tries to take hold of his thundering heart. He looks toward Sakon’s camp, toward some sign of order.

The ground jolts beneath their feet as huge crystalline spikes erupt from the earth. Akiyama stumbles to a knee and dirt grits against his palm. His breath catches in his throat --  if he can feel the dream, the protection talisman has worn off.

The sky turns crimson. From a crevasse in the earth the demon rises, bones from countless dead creeping together to form its six arms, its whip-like tail. Amrita lies caged in its chest and embedded in its skull. Two-thousand feet tall, born from hatred and magic blacker than midnight, the gasha-dokuro roars its rage.

Saejima flees.

Akiyama, shocked to his core, almost doesn’t notice. He turns and Saejima is gone. The pile of bodies shifts. It’s victim nineteen. Miasma pours from the ground, seeping into the gaping wound the snake spirit left in his chest. He looks at his fallen comrades even as aratama consumes him, swallowing his humanity in a thick case of orange hide, bristling horns, and jagged fangs. The newborn yokai bellows and lifts its blade.

Akiyama runs.

All around him, monsters are arriving. Soldiers rise to their feet, flesh sloughing off in thick, gray sheets until they are no more than skeletal wraiths. A one-eyed giant wrenches itself through a swirl of darkness. From the corner of his eye, Shun spots a heap of deceased mold themselves into an oni larger than a house. He tries to ignore the fire in his lungs. This isn’t really happening. He isn’t here.

Saejima--

He almost passes him. Taiga hasn’t found shelter -- the charred wood of a fallen tree is no barrier against devils. Still, he hides behind it as well as he can, curled into a ball. Akiyama kneels, reaching for him while around them the twilight of humankind looms.

Cannons blast from the Tokugawa camp. Saejima clasps his ears as four shots fly overhead. Three miss their target. The gasha-dokuro bats the fourth one out of the air. The round explodes uselessly against its hand. Shrieking, the demon counterattacks, spitting a volley of ghostly energy. Saejima bolts, scrambling as the air itself seems to harden around his feet.

Akiyama’s talismans splinter like twigs. He has no idea what will happen -- if the nightmare is so potent it will chew him up, if the underworld will rot him from the inside out. He bares his teeth, hands balling into fists. So be it, he thinks, If I die, I die helping my fellow man.

Golden eyes open as the the gasha-dokuro’s attack rains around him -- Tasogare’s eyes--

He’s in a forest. A dirt road. A decaying sign, nearly impossible to read in the mist that clings to his clothes and drips from the trees, points the way to the nearest towns.The only sound is wind through the leaves. It smells pungent with new, fresh growth.

Ten years have passed.

Shun breathes deep, reaching out with his mind for Tasogare’s presence. Cut it a bit closer next time, won’t you? he thinks. The baku stays hidden, but he feels it turn. He follows its gaze.

Saejima, walking through the undergrowth. Armor beaten and bashed, black hair slipping out from beneath his kabuto, the old soldier moves without destination, hammer leaving a furrow in the dirt as he drags it behind him. Anything to stay away from the aratama hounding him. Wriggling legs and a core of yellow energy propel them through the air. There are eighteen in total. One scurries ahead of Taiga, brushes against his cheek. Flinching with disgust, he slaps it away, and it joins the rest of the pack.

Lord Mitsunari is dead. Lord Sakon has vanished. Saejima is a ronin.

Akiyama follows him.

Emboldened, the aratama stage another offense. Weaving under and around each other, they nip at Taiga’s ankles, his fingers -- digging into gaps in iron plate and sinking needle teeth into his skin. “Enough,” he grunts, “Leave me be.”

We will never have enough, one of them whispers.

We had wives, another murmurs, We had children.

We became monsters, they say, So monsters we become.

Jaws find a tendon. Saejima chokes on a cry, crashing to the ground.

He imagines he will lie here forever. Perish and sink into the earth. He knows he is bound for the depths of the Sanzu River, for the cold waters to trap him for eternity. He deserves his fate, and so he stills, face in the mud, and waits.

Something growls.

Saejima knows he’s going to die, but he isn’t interested in being eaten alive. He lifts his head and sees a small shrine carved into a tree.

Within shines the prettiest light he’s ever seen.

A group of foxes circle the tree. The once holy creatures are shot through with amrita. The stones jut from their bodies like tumors. Their muzzles are coated in dry blood. Two of them are small, but the third is huge, easily the size of a bear. They snap their fangs and pant and whine, purple tongues swollen and hungry.

He reaches for his hammer. An aratama breaks a tooth through his fingernail.

Cringing, Saejima staggers to his feet. He’s already cursed. Nothing can worsen his situation. “Hey!”

The foxes turn toward him, hackles raised.

The ronin holds his hammer. “Pick on someone your own size!”

It’s over shockingly fast. Something activates in Saejima, a conduit wide open between his weapon and his soul, so blinding in its brutality that the foxes are defenseless. One catches a hammer to the back, spine broken backwards. Another is smashed upside the jaw, sending it crashing into a log. The third, the largest, spits an orb of foxfire.

Saejima reaches through it, oblivious to the heat splashing against his chest, grabs the fox’s throat, and slams the steel-hard horns of his kabuto onto its head, caving in its skull.

The corpses dissolve into shards of amrita and noxious gas.

Taiga slings the hammer onto his back. The little light in the shrine is unharmed. It’s truly beautiful, a pearlescent egg of a substance he can’t identify. Otherworldly and terrified.

“Sorry you had to see that,” he mutters, “That’s how it is.”

Realization hits him like a rock slide. He hasn’t felt this good in a decade. Even the blood dripping from his ruined nail isn’t painful. He looks over his shoulder. The eighteen aratama are staying away. Milling around each other in restless channels, and keeping their distance.

The light. They hate the light.

Saejima makes a decision before it even occurs to him to do so.

“Um,” he starts, unsure how exactly to speak to, quite frankly, the supernatural, “Listen. It ain’t safe here. You got lucky this time, but I have to keep moving. You want to come with me? If not, uh, smite me. Or something.”

He scoops the light into his palms. No bolts of lightning, no chasms opening beneath his feet. It weighs nothing and everything simultaneously. He slips it under his breastplate beside his heart.

If there’s a shrine out here, he thinks, there must be a village nearby. Somewhere to beg for a meal and pray no one recognizes an old enemy. He finds the dirt road, aratama trailing behind him.

“You have a name?”

No response.

“That’s fine. I don’t talk much either.”

Akiyama watches the reincarnated soldier until he fades into the murk of the dream. The forest comes undone. Trees and grass and ground meld into a hazy slime. Tasogare wraps its trunk around his hand, and as its third eye shuts, Shun knows what he has to do.

- - -

By morning, the rain has stopped. Saejima awakens to sunlight and clean air. He sits up and yawns, stretches his legs. Hana sits nearby, boiling water for tea.

“Mornin’,” he says. A hint of a smile twitches his lip. “Maybe there’s something to being a weird recluse. I haven’t slept that well in years.”

He turns deeper into the cave. Akiyama leans against a wall. The yamabushi’s face is pale, his eyes hang with shadows, and his clothes are covered in dust. His fingers are red and sore.

Taiga scowls. “What’s wrong with him? Get into some bad mushrooms?”

Hana purses her lips. “No, not this time. Must’ve been something he ate.”

The ronin stares at her, a hand touching his chest. Reacting to his heartbeat, the spirit pulses against his plate. “So now what? I came up here for noth--”

Akiyama startles awake with a cry. Hana nearly topples over. Saejima grabs for his hammer. They left it within my reach last night, it occurs to him.

Shun rubs his eyes, groaning. “Sorry, sorry. I...didn’t get much rest last night. Wanted to catch you before you left though.” He shifts to his knees, reaches into his joi.

The magatama is sunset orange. Though in the proper teardrop shape, its edges are rough and sharp. Freshly chiseled. There is a leather string through its hole.

“You don’t need my help,” Akiyama says, offering the charm with both hands, “You’re doing just fine. This is my gift to you. It’s a ward against evil, an enduring shield, and fuel for growth.” He bows his head. “And it will work, whether you believe me or not. Always. You have my word.”

Saejima hesitates. A purple thing sits behind Akiyama. Although it’s almost too sleepy to stand, tilting on its striped paws, the gleam in its eyes, open just a crack, is knowing. Taiga knows it’s a baku. And it’s been in his head.

He could kill them. They know who he is. If they squeal to Tokugawa’s forces, he’s as good as dead. He could kill them and throw the bodies to the crows and keep the cave as his lair.

Tiny mouths gnaw at his flesh.

He takes the magatama and slips it around his neck. It might be his imagination, but did the spirit kick against his chest? “Thanks.”

Shun looks up and smiles. “Don’t mention it. If you need anything else, you can always ask.”

“Yeah. How do I get out of here?”

The yamabushi explains. Turn right at that rock, make due west at that bush, mind the sheer cliffs and loose gravel. When he’s confident Saejima can make it off the mountain, he bows until the ronin leaves.

Then collapses face first to the ground.

A tug on his shoulder helps him sit up. “Nightmare?” Hana asks.

Akiyama sighs, pinching his brow. “The worst I’ve ever seen.” He stares at the ceiling. “I saw Sekigahara, Hana. The rumors are true. For a brief time, the yokai realm conquered ours. What does this mean about our shogunate? They’ve covered it up for years.”

“Is that a bad thing? Most people think yokai are just superstition.”

Until they turn up at their front door, he thinks. After a moment, he says, “Hana, would you hate me if I became a member of polite society again? Just for a while?”

Hana smiles, petting Tasogare’s trunk. The spirit leans into her touch. Akiyama feels it too, both as a comforting hand on his cheek, and a kind push to follow his dreams. “Only if you forget to bring me back a souvenir.”

[thunderoad]

HMMM 6. 12. 48 for to the end of the night. 24. 50 - would you just talk to me a little about why you like found family as a theme.

BLESS U KATE ILY

6. how did writing change you?

oh shit, this is like a deep question right out of the gate?? i’m not sure, exactly. it’s definitely given me some of the best friends i’ve ever had. i think maybe that’s the best thing about writing, really - realizing how you can connect to people you’ve never met, both in the fic itself and in those friendships outside of it. aw. man. i’m gonna cry lol

12. favorite place to write

my bed! anytime i can wake up abt 7am, get my coffee, and open a word doc without any distractions i know it’s going to be a really productive day. i also wrote, like, the entirety of everything between my second fic and hold on at my friend’s place, often while watching tv. (quiet is only for the very end of a fic where i gotta tie up all those loose strings or let it all unravel)

48. three spoilers for (insert story title) to the end of the night

i’m not sure about spoilers, but i found my old notes doc for this one, so here’s some stuff i had planned for the fic that didn’t make the final cut. 

niall was originally gonna be taking some time off music work to enroll in uni. i was DEADSET - i have no idea why - on him doing this in toronto, or somewhere else northern and cold, but i couldn’t make that location work, which was a pretty good indication i couldn’t make that plot work, either. (at least, not from louis’s pov.)

the dedication at the beginning is to the mother’s we’ve lost. i’ve gotten some real nice comments on it, but it’s really nothing fancy - it’s exactly what it says it is, louis’s mom and mine. i didn’t even know she was ill till halfway thru the fic, but i didn’t have to make any edits to it at all, really, which probably says more about me than it should! it was really nice, though, at least on my end; that dedication at the beginning, and the run-on sentence at the end sort of act like this framing device where the whole fic is louis catching his mum up on everything she’s missed since she passed away. unlike louis, i like middles; i don’t think they ever really end. 

this is just a couple of deleted scenes that kind of capture a mood, but don’t really move the plot in any way: louis accuses niall of lying to him, and “Like you never lied to me,” Niall says, all the more hurtful because he’s not wrong. But that’s not the kind of relationship Louis wants to have with Niall. It hits him out of nowhere, how fucking lonely he’ll be if Niall gets up and walks out right now, how dependent he’s become on Niall’s warm, assuring presence. So of course Louis does his best to get rid of him right away. and, “Fuck,” Louis says, the feeling trapped inside his chest like a lead weight, like a jar of fireflies, like a helium balloon. He closes his eyes, and the image of Niall, sleepy and lax in his bed, the soft sheets slipping over his bare skin, springs forth. “I miss you.” “It’s okay,” Niall says, his voice gravelly with sleep. He means, it’s okay for you to feel like this about me. i never want to articulate feelings explicitly if i can help it for some reason, but i remember thinking of these scenes and going ohh, it’s going to be one of those fics. i really wanted to write a canon compliant fic that delved into louis’s character and looked at the way he coped with losing eleanor and zayn and having freddie all in one fell swoop, but time had just progressed too much. i remember reading that portraying louis as the commitment-phobic one in a relationship just doesn’t make sense, cuz he’s constantly in these big, beautiful romances, but i wanted to write a louis who was older and bitter and really deeply hurt, and i think that’s what these scenes were trying to get at. it’s like darkest timeline!louis. that’s where this monologue comes from that was later fiddled with a bit and mostly put in the final version of the fic: “The truth is,” says Louis, “the truth is, I don’t know that maybe he is better off without me. He can have a normal dad and a normal life and – and that might be better for him, wouldn’t it? And you, I don’t – for God’s sakes, Niall, you told me you’d booked more tour dates the other day and all I could think was can you cancel them so I can keep you a little longer?” Louis shakes his head. “It’s fucked up, and I’m fucked up, and I love you so fucking much. You deserve better.” He puts his hand over his heart like he’s been hurt. Sort of feels like it, to be honest. Now that he’s started talking it’s like he’s an oil station way out in the ocean and all this blackness is just pouring up and out into open water. “My dad, Eleanor, Danielle – even Harry,” says Louis. He draws up short. “Zayn,” he says, barely above a whisper. “Liam. I mean, there’s a fucking pattern there, isn’t there? It’s me, there’s something wrong with me that everyone stops loving me eventually.” “Louis,” Niall says, his voice hushed. “Don’t deny it,” Louis says. “You were there – you saw it happen. I just…can’t love them enough. And I just,” Louis runs out of steam. “I don’t want you to stop loving me.” 

24. favorite scene you’ve ever written

i answered this before, but i really like this scene, too, from to the end of the night: 

They get as far as the back garden – straight through the living room and kitchen – before they lose the plot. Louis kicks one of Freddie’s little play footie balls into the pool and watches it bob along the surface like a fishing lure. He’s aware of Niall watching him from the corner of his eye, same as he’s looking at Niall every time he pretends to look away.

Looking out over Louis’s infinity pool, Niall says, “California,” in his best Terminator accent.

“I hardly ever come out here anymore,” Louis says. He’d had all these plans when he bought the house of playing footie with the lad and floating around on pool loungers and maybe even the occasional water balloon fight, and then he’d just kept saying “tomorrow” till tomorrow’s today, and it’s just him and Niall, silhouetted by the light spilling out of the kitchen windows.

it’s not really a crucial moment or anything, but i felt like it really captured that feeling of life passing you by; that bitterness of knowing you used to have something great, and having lost it, and the way you can want something or someone so bad you don’t even know how to ask for it. (at least, that’s what i hope it says.) 

50. found family - my FAVORITE theme

i have a healthy respect for fate - ‘there is a tide in the affairs of men,’ and all - but a lOT more regard for the bit that contradicts, ‘i have taken these tides of men into my hands and wrote my will across the sky in stars.’ there’s definitely a kind of crossover for me between family and genetics and even learned behaviors and fate, and on the other hand, found family and the parts of ourselves that we choose. 

my dad’s watchwords are ‘but they’re blood,’ as if that settles everything. which it SO doesn’t, at least not to me! a lot of reason for the way i am is because i want to be as unlike my family as possible, and that’s all about choice, really. caving to blood and genetics and stuff i can’t do anything about is like accepting defeat. (there’s a lot of this stuff in oaft, looking back.) but lotr is such a good example of the way you can sort of tie these conflicting values of fate vs. choice together, though, like all those times sam and frodo reflect on how they’d never have accepted the ring quest if they knew what it entailed, and will people tell their stories someday? you don’t often get to know the full extent of what you’ve signed up for, but you do get to choose. so that’s what found family is to me, really - a way of choosing your own fate, accepting the quest you think you can abide. 

i rely a lot on connections between people in my fics, whether it be one acting as another’s human credentials and making them seem lovable at their worst moments, or of tethering them to other people, memories, even parts of the world. i love the way those connections that are made, and not born, can be the most important thing. two of my favorite books, mrs. dalloway and howards end, are built around this idea of “Only connect . . .” where connecting  to people and then connecting them to each other is, like, what life is all about. i like to imagine it looks a bit like portolan charts from back in the day, where maps were made based on the connections between places. some were near and some far, but all tied into the same network, and all tied to each other, albeit with some degree of separation. whenever my directions start getting mixed up, it’s soothing to think of these forged connections making sense of everything. 

[chromacomaphoto]

Places to Shoot in Bangkok Part 11: 'Airlab'

Welcome all Chromacoma brethren, I am looking to try something new this month and going for a 'two for one' kind of deal involving a useful place to know for film photographers (digital too for sure) with good facilities, people and equipment that also happens to be a place you can shoot at (even if the area is small) as there is a studio for rent there too!

Airlab has already been mentioned in this blog and within the main guide article (click the banner at the top of this page) but I thought it might be nice for bit more detail and a dedicated round up this month in the style of 'Chromacoma meets Airlab!', so let's get it started. First up, I think that there might well be a parallel to be drawn between this entry to the guide and the 'Chang Chui' post last year. This place also being the brainchild of a fairly well known chap within photographic/artistic circles (and Thai society circles also) who decided to create and open up his own place as a sort of hangout and cool zone for his artistic vision. Just to be clear, this isn't the same person or in anyway connected to Chang Chui, it's just another, similar example of a Thai artistic type with the vision and resources to make a place like this happen in Bangkok. If you check out their website HERE, I'm pretty sure you will be able to see more details about this individual himself but for the sake of his modesty and protocol, I'm choosing not to name him specifically in this article. Suffice to say, if you choose to visit Airlab, you'll probably meet him yourself and find that he is very cool, laid back and relaxed with a nice, welcoming down to earth sort of vibe.

The location itself isn't exactly one you are likely to accidentally stumble over, even if you live in Bangkok, but the good news is that it really is easy for anyone to get to. So easy in fact that I am not including a map as there is one on their website and I have a very simple way of explaining it to you: Take the BTS skytrain out of Bangkok heading down the main (old) Sukhumvit line towards the East (Bearing etc) and get off at On Nut station. Go down one floor and keep walking in the same direction that the train was heading in before you disembarked. Walk all the way in this direction as far as you can go to the station's end before you go down to street  level. Before you exit down, you should clearly be able to see Sukhumvit Soi 81 and its road sign ahead of you, on the left. Go down the stairs to street level, walk along to this street and turn down it (all on your left hand side), keep walking a little way and turn down the very first soi off of Sukhumvit 81 on the left hand side, follow that around a blind right hand corner and walk for a couple of hundred metres at the most, Airlab will come into view after a couple of minutes walk on the right hand side, it's a compound with a house inside and very clear signage. Trust me, it's very easy indeed and hard to go wrong, just wear a hat for the sun.

So, what did I find there? Well, lots of good stuff really. First up, there's a nice air con cafe with decent Thai food at local prices and proper fresh coffee on offer. So, even if you were to visit with people who might not be as keen on photography as you are such as with a partner or kids in tow, there's a haven for them to occupy for a while in relative comfort. There's also a huge all glass and air con shooting studio for rent plus a nice little leafy lawn area with some cool tiny artsy shops. Cool t shirts and the like were for sale here and there but it didn't come off as tacky, definitely a faint whiff of hipster (maybe that was coming from me)  but overall this is only too much at busy times. Apparently however, such really busy weekends as I had seen before at this venue are not as common now. That said, they do hold events from time to time and these are not only 'Airlab' events per se but also sometimes things done in conjunction with outside companies and brands as crossover into advertising and brand hyping circles so I guess it all depends on what's on. There's a small shop selling very high end and good condition camera gear including lots of Leica and classic Rollei gear, bodies, lenses etc. but it opens towards the later part of the day and not in the morning time. I can't comment on that much more as I have never purchased here and so I'm simply putting it out there.

Meanwhile at the other end of the lawn area there's somewhere to sit in the shade and have your coffee or tea (even a smoking area) and this backs up to a really impressive and fully equipped darkroom facility inside an old (air conditioned) familiar looking metal cube shape. I guess one man's shipping container is another man's darkroom, this is also for rent to those who would like access to it. You'll have to contact them for details re. pricing

I would just like to say that I didn't inform Airlab that I was going to be dropping by and taking photos for inclusion into the guide or recommendations to others, rather preferring instead to just turn up on spec as a random foreigner to see what sort of reaction or welcome I received. I'm not saying that I was trying to be deliberately sneaky or judgemental (I really wasn't) but rather I merely wished to try and see what would happen if you, dear reader, were to do the same and how it would be. I'm delighted to say that people either left me alone (as was the case when I first strolled in around 11am) or they then eventually came up to me and politely spoke in English. This wasn't done to hassle me either, a couple of people were genuinely making sure I was okay and letting me know they would help me if I had any questions, was I looking to buy or develop film? etc. Expanding on that last point, there's film for sale of many different types and they do a whole load of processing here, colour and black and white and even some really long lost ancient wet plate processes which is really cool. Again I won't comment too much on pricing but its reasonably competitive at the time of publishing this post and suffice to say that they accept most kinds of film for processing including even slides (E6) and will do very accurate push and pull processing too. It's not a Mickey Mouse all hipster and no skills outfit, it's a proper lab. There's also an 'express' option for those maybe leaving Thailand soon, scans of a very high quality also available. The guy behind the whole endeavour is certainly deeply into film photography and so you are not just going to be handing your film  over to a random outfit without any interest or skill. They have a lot of processing equipment, chems and machines actually onsite in addition to the fully set up darkroom. It's pretty full on. I deliberately didn't attempt to talk to the owner until the very end and he was very polite and friendly indeed. I am certain that  if you turn up on spec and behave respectfully as you would at anybody's 'open house' kind of business, the people here will be very accommodating indeed. It's open daily from around 10am and goes on till about 7pm ish. You might even bump into a Thai celebrity here and there....

As an aside, there were some lovely quirks that had been really well thought out here and there. One personal favourite example was perhaps in the public toilets extending off from the garden lawn area where I noted that the toilet roll holder was actually an old style Polaroid camera body adapted to this new role (maybe that should be 'roll'? ha!).  If you've ever felt like your photographic skills are slipping and your last roll was about as good as toilet paper, well hey...maybe you're not alone in such an assertion. Another nice touch was that the food menu of simple, classic Thai dishes was a full colour, medium format positive contact sheet showing the dish to be ordered, a simple but very effective idea that really caught my eye.

There's limited parking inside the compound but looks like you would be good to go on a weekday, although the street outside is legal to park on. Motorbikes would have no issues. Honestly though, it's probably easier to just take the BTS there. So, I hope this month's little entry proves useful both in terms of picking up film there, dropping it back off to have it devved or even booking their soft light, glasshouse (thankfully there's air con in there too!) kind of beauty/photo studio as a stunning location that is just crying out for great portraiture to be done there (as the owner has done many times and examples of which can be seen around). You could even then go on to rent their darkroom in which to develop the films that you've just shot in the studio at the same location. That's seriously cool and a fully contained (albeit 'shipping contained') 'one stop shop' option for serious dedicated film photographers in Bangkok. For that alone, and with no affiliation whatsoever, I have deemed it well worth inclusion in the places to shoot series for this month, enjoy.

CCP